Alright, alright. I promise to make Wastelands the next fic I start. This may take a while.

 

TBH, I just don't have the time to begin a 300,000 word story + sequel. I've have real books that I actually have to read, college apps, and too many people bugging me about too many things.

When I've got some time, I'll give it a go. 'Kay?

 

I'm sorry that it's taking longer than usual for the next update, but I'm dealing with some very serious RL stuff at the moment (I need to get a restraining order set up among other things).

Good news is the next update is nearly done. With some luck, it'll will be out sometime this coming week.

 

That's great to hear - and good luck with all the RL Stuff. Just out of curiosity, did you simply forget to update the story on ffnet? Because I've read chapter 10 as well as the interludes (which were amazing, by the way) but neither of them are on ffnet.

 

You apologized for a lack of update and have a good reason for it? You are making me feel bad for even bringing it on.

On more serious note - good luck with dealing with RL stuff.

 

Finally updated in WbA

 

Okay, so this Calypso business actually was about a marriage contract, like many of us suspected. Awesome. I also like the undertone that there might be something more to this that we don't know about.

The Dumbledore vs. Grindelwald duel gift was pretty cool; Harry is clearly going to focus even more and gradually increase his badassery quotient.

Overall, though, I really like what you're doing with the development of Harry as a character. I feel like he's starting to grow into his role a bit and I'm eager to see how he handles whatever challenges come in his way.

Edit: should be "precedes", not "proceeds" (Viktor's dialogue in the library scene right after Harry scares off the first year)

 

I love you!

(Rosier's gift was ace, nice one!)

 

Sexy update is sexy. That said, you definitely went a different route than I had envisioned, and looking back on the story I can see how you mapped it out in retrospect. I do find it interesting though how Calypso's reasoning for him learning occulmency is not the same as her father's reasoning; nitipicking, but the best lies are always the truth told from a certain point of view.

The Library section seemed to be a little more abrupt than your old writing style for some reason; I can't put my finger on it, but it just feels like you took two scenes and worked them together into that one for some reason. It was well done, don't get me wrong, but the pacing just seemed a bit off - the division before you start talking about the Professor's gifts and after is really noticeable, and though it doesn't disrupt the flow of the story, it still seems a bit jarring. The actual content was very well thought out, but it just seemed like you went 'Hey, these two (or three, depending on if you intended to have the last bit as its own or not) scenes could go together, let's see how I could fuse them together!' It works, but just feels... off somewhat.

Regardless, keep up the good work!

 

Now you made my day.

And Rosier gave Harry the coolest gift ever. That's how you do it and not just spend more money than the rest.

I also love how Harry is slowly gaining reputation and respect, even from his teachers. Long gone are days when Karkaroff was only helping him because of his fear of Dumbledore.

 

I figure there are a lot of reasons for Calypso and her father wanted him to learn the art...some perhaps a tad bit more important than others. Marriage contract, being able to keep secrets to yourself, gaining the ability to scan the minds of others, and control of emotions are all some very viable reasons to want someone to learn the art. Control of emotions is, if I do say so myself, the most important benefit.

If what we know about certain spells is to be believed then someone who has such a high level of control over their emotions as to be able to fool someone looking in their mind should be able to also apply such a technique to spell work. This is especially important when using dark arts spells as we have already seen how important emotions are in that branch of magic. Being able to bring up murderous intent without a second thought or actually feeling that emotion about someone is extremely handy.

The Patronus Charm is another such example of powerful emotion based magic that could indeed benefit from someone able to pull forth the proper emotions quickly and remove any emotions that may conflict with casting such a charm. While Harry is capable of stopping people from entering his mind the more he practices controlling his thoughts the easier emotion based magic will come to him. We have seen that the hardest part of casting some spells comes from the emotions needed.

A lot of people want to turn masters of occlumency into people with amazing memories...They hardly ever touch on how control of a person's emotions could be another effective way to use that type of magic as an advantage. At any rate it was an awesome update. I won't deny that I've been waiting for an update for quite some time now. This is easily the best genius Harry I've ever read.

 

As good as usual, the only real complain is how plain the cover story that Calypso gave Harry, it needs an additional layer, like how she needs to hide the fact that she is contemplating a marriage contract with a light family from her father's enemies as well as her father himself... at least until she is ready. After all Harry is smart and he would see a simple answer, but one a little more complex like that one would hold better for a while.

Also the love story needs some more flesh, like how she used it to study the genealogy of The Boy Who Lived, intending to use Harry as a control subject to see if his genealogy would have something to do with his brother success agains the Dark Lord, purely as genuine curiosity, but then she falled in love and the study evolved into a marriage contract before she realized.

 

I was a little disappointed as to the explanation of why she wanted Harry to learn occulmency. I was also surprised that Harry's family was not invited to the ceremony that was to take place before the welcome feast. I hope that their is a flashback scene to what happened at his house once his parents discovered he left.

 

Loving the story and great to see an update. Just a quick question. At the very beginning:

Did you mean leaving home?

 

It means exactly that, as written. Is there something ambiguous about it?

 

The occlemency thing is bothering me. Having him learn a extremely rare, difficult and painful art that accomplished the same thing as a calming draught and a little time to get over embarrassment is stupid. If there was another reason that she made him learn it, make that clear if not please make one up.

Also the battle between Dumbledore and Grindenwald would be much better with more detail. It is not necessary, but would make it more awesome.

Good chapter though. Quicker update please this was a very depressing wait .

 

The phrasing is clumsy, but quite clear.

I've got to say, when I read about marriage contracts I was pretty nervous, but as usual it's pulled of very well. I do think it's a slightly awkward age for this to appear though. I geddit that the years before the Triwizard need to have the character building and interactions and stuff, but objectively it would have been more interesting if the fact that they're now adolescents had been better established.

As for the Occlumency/Marriage Contract story needing more layers, I can see plenty, but maybe I'm giving The Santi too much credit (doubt it). Apart from Calypso's lame excuse that it would help Harry absorb the news, it's also clear that she wasn't expecting Harry to master it so quickly. So it was probably a way for her to just give herself time, by giving him a very difficult task. Then there's the obvious fact that if she wants to be friends or more with him, they need to be able to hide stuff from their parents.

I'm slightly confused though. The line "Years later, he would look back upon that as his first use of Legilimency." clearly indicates that Calypso isn't explicitly lying. But don't we know that her father had her gather information about Nathan? Doesn't that qualify as an explicit lie?

Good stuff overall. I'm excited about the Grindelwald duel - great way to bring him further into the story.

 

Really good update, and it reminded me why this is my favorite story in all of fanfiction. Also, called the marriage contract thing a long time ago. Can't wait for the next update, just don't let it be for another month!