Amongst the Hunted Moons

Harry Potter.

The meeting with Hagrid didn't yield anything, for the man was as shocked as Harry was when Artemis had dropped that little bomb. Apparently, after Harry had told her about the Centaurs that had attacked them, she had gone to take a look and what she had found was weird, even for an immortal Goddess. The bodies had rapidly decayed and the kills looked weeks old instead of only hours. Most of their organs were either missing or didn't exist in the first place, and the most damning fact, they held no touch of death. As if they had died long ago and only now started to rot, Hagrid held no direct answers for it but had told Artemis what he did know.

The Centaur herd had been in the forest for as long as he could remember, longer than anyone could remember, they were hostile to any who trespassed into the deep woods, be it animal or human, and were one of the reasons the students were not allowed inside without supervision. The Ministry had tried to remove them on a few occasions, but all who had entered were never seen again, and the herd has always been led by a hunt master named Bane, whether it was a title or name Hagrid had no clue, he normally avoided them out of respect and they didn't bother him unless he had gone too deep into the woods. By the end of the talk and tea, Harry had thanked Hagrid before he and Artemis had left, it wasn't till they got past the tree line that Artemis had shifted back to her normal form with a scowl.

"If they're not Centaurs, what the hell are they?" Harry asks.

"I don't know, I've never come across these creatures, they may look like Centaurs but do not act like them, nearly all Centaurs are from the Olympian myths with a few notable exceptions in Asia, and even then they act nothing like them either," Artemis tells him as they walk back to the camp, "it is simultaneously exciting and frustrating, to hunt something new but knowing nothing about them," the Goddess says and Harry could hear the excitement in her voice, her eyes glow with power and want, eager for something new to hunt and kill. Harry could feel her excitement through the hunt and had to suppress the shiver of excitement that threatened to roll down his spine.

They made it back to camp quietly after that, both of them mulling over their thoughts about the hunt to come, Artemis had walked off without a word heading back to her tent. Harry himself wandered about the camp, looking for something to do or help with before he started on his summer school work. He asks around with any of the hunters that seemed busy with something but always got politely rebuffed from helping with them saying they had enough hands working on the task, he had checked in with the cook tent but everything was already done, though Chelsea, the hunter in charge of the kitchen, had told him he did a good job the other night and told him he could come back before dinner and help with the cooking, Harry had just nodded awkwardly and agreed before he took his leave.

Harry resigned himself to finishing his summer school work as he was walking back to his tent, thinking about starting on his Potions essay and potion before it was too late, but stopped, as he hears his name called.

"Harry!" The calm voice of Daphnis calls out, Harry stops and turns to the friendly hunter who was walking up to him with Cecilia guiding him, "How are you settling in with the hunt, I heard that you were found in a bed of oiled-up and deflowered hunters this morning, if the rumors are true," Daphnis says with a grin as both Harry and Cecilia blush at his words.

"W-what?!" Harry says, shocked by his words, "No, no absolutely not!" He defends and Daphnis raises a brow, as if he was skeptical, the grin never leaving his lips, "Atalanta, Sophie, and Brittany just bunked with me, Nothing like that happened! We-we just, ah, c-cuddled and stuff," Harry says, face burning with embarrassment as Daphnis begins to crack up.

"I'm sorry, Harry," Daphnis says after having a laugh, "I know it wasn't anything like that, I was just teasing," he says with a smile that reaches up to his scars.

Harry scowls at the other boy and shuffles about but says nothing otherwise, so Daphnis continues, "Teasing aside, I was wondering if you were free at the moment," the blind boy asks.

Harry shrugs, "Yeah, I volunteered for Kitchen Duty later on, but otherwise I'm free, why? What's up?" Harry asks, hoping for a job to do, he hates not doing anything, which makes him feel lazy like Uncle Ver-, Harry cuts off that train of thought as quickly as it had come.

"I was hoping you were free for a spare in fact," Daphnis says, "I find myself curious about how strong a…relative, of our lady, is," The blind commander says, picking his word carefully.

Harry shuffles side to side once more, looking around, "Um, … Sure? I guess, against who?" The Heir asks.

"Well, myself, of course," Daphnis says with a grin.

"But your, well, ah, you can't, um," Harry doesn't know how to respond to the request honestly.

"Roguishly handsome?" Daphnis asks, "Yes, I know, I see it in the mirror every morning," he says, and both Harry and Cecilia snort in amusement.

"I think he means your blind, Commander," Cecilia says, her voice laced with amusement at the high priest's antics.

"Ah," Daphnis exclaims with a nod, "Yes, I can see how that can be off-putting to some, but I assure you, Harry, no one in the Hunt is without the ability to defend themselves," he says.

"Ar-are you sure?" Harry asks, and Daphnis was right, he was a little put-off about fighting a guy who couldn't see.

"Very sure," Daphnis says with a grin that oozes self-confidence.

Harry, hesitantly, agrees to a quick spare and follows as Cecilia leads Daphnis to the ring of stones that he and Atalanta had set up a few short months ago to act as a ring for them, it lay unbothered in the compound that the hunters had made. Cecilia leads Daphnis to the middle before taking the walking stick from him and walking over to the side to stand outside the ring.

"You've spared against Atalanta, Correct?" Daphnis asks as he stands in the middle of the ring, head tilted so an ear faces Harry with his hands folded behind his back.

"Ah, yeah," Harry says from the edge of the ring, "Haven't beaten her yet," Harry says with a shrug before he starts to take off his jacket.

Daphnis chuckles, "I'd be surprised if you did, out of all of the hunters, Atalanta would be one of the two people I would never want to fight," he says, tilting his head a bit, "and you may want to keep that on Harry," Daphnis speaks, talking about the jacket Harry was halfway through removing.

"Um, why?" Harry says confused, they were about to spare, right?

"Because you'll be needing the armor," Daphnis says as he draws two wicked-looking silver hunting knives from behind him.

"We're sparing with weapons?" Harry asks, a bit shocked as Daphnis laughs.

"Yes, how else would demigods spare?" Daphnis says, sounding amused before pausing, "Ah, I have forgotten, you've never been to Camp Halfblood before," he says with a shake of his head, "This is how demigods spare, Harry, weapon training, full contact but we try not to maim or kill,"

"Are you sure?" Harry asks as he slips his jacket back on, unsure himself, he and Atalanta had only spared with their hands, never with weapons. But as Daphnis nods with a smile, Harry shrugs on his jacket and pulls out Serpent-Hunter from his pocket, and opens it up to his spear, if Daphnis was certain well, he wasn't one to stop anyone.

"The rules are simple, as previously said, full contact but no maiming or killing, we go until one of us is knocked out, gives up, or their back is on the ground," Daphnis says and Harry agrees, "we may use the hunt, but be careful with how much you draw on, try to keep it to a minimum for a friendly spare, okay?" The blind hunter says.

"Ah, sure, I can do that," Harry says, nodding.

"Good," Daphnis says, "You may have the first move, Harry," the Commander tells him with a gesture.

By the time Harry began to circle Daphnis, there was already a small collection of hunters starting to encircle them outside of the ring, most were placing bets on the outcome of the fight while others just watched on in silence waiting for it to start, and Harry didn't disappoint. Harry called on a small portion of the Hunt to flood his body as he charged the blind hunter, swinging the flat of his blade at his head aiming to end quickly but not to hurt the blind hunter too much. Harry was caught by surprise as Daphnis swiftly brings up one of his hunting knives knocking Harry's spear up and over his head before flinging the other one at his head with unnerving accuracy, Harry jerks his head to the side to avoid the blade thrown, before turning his head and yelling, "Watch out!" To the other hunters behind him, only to see the dagger disappear in a flash of silver light.

"Where are you looking, Harry?" Daphnis says, and as Harry looks back, he sees Daphnis charging him with BOTH of his hunting knives, Harry pulls back his spear blocking the first two strikes Daphnis hits him with, and as Harry tries for a wild swing, Daphnis drops one of his knives and grabs the shaft of Harry spear, stopping the swing dead in its tracks before Daphnis reals back his other hand and slams the butt of his knife into Harry's chin making the Heir of the hunt's world spin, and before Harry knows, Daphnis is standing above him with a foot on Harry spear.

"It seems that this round is mine," Daphnis says with a smile before offering Harry a hand to get him back to his feet, "What have we learned?" The blind hunter asks Harry as the latter rubs his jaw.

"Avoid knife butts to the jaw?" Harry says and Daphnis chuckles.

"Yes, that is generally a good idea," the Commander says with a smile, "but I was hoping you learned not to be so quick to judge an opponent based on only what you see," he says as he walks back to the middle If the ring before the knife he had dropped reappears in his hand without sound or light.

Harry looks at him with narrowed eyes, "Are you sure you're blind?" He asks.

"As a bat, Harry," Daphnis says with a smile.

"So, what? Do you have echolocation or something?" Harry asks, wondering if the Hunt could do something like that, but Daphnis chuckles tell him he was wrong.

"No, no, nothing as complicated as that," Daphnis informs him, "I just have rather good hearing, even from here I can hear your heartbeat, the contraction of your muscles, your footsteps, and the air displacement from your spear, none of this I could do without the Hunt," he says with a smile and a nod, "So, would you like to try again?"

Harry pops his neck as he gets back to his starting position before settling into the position that he had learned from Scátchach, legs apart and bent, one leg a step forward the other a step back, one hand above the middle of his spear, and the other near the bottom with the point aimed forward at his body twisted for a lunge.

"Come on Harry, kick his ass!" Harry hears Atalanta yell from behind him and he smiles, now he has to, and so with that, he draws on the Hunt once more and lunges forward for the blind hunter's heart. Daphnis slides to the side knocking away his spear before throwing one of his knives, Harry not falling for the same trick twice, tilts his head to the side so the blade misses him by inches before Harry draws his spear back and begins to dance around Daphnis in a flowing wave of blades as he stabs and slashes at the other boy's arms and feet. It was a crude imitation and peeled in comparison to what Scátchach had shown him with her twist and flourishes mixed in, but Daphnis seem to be able to keep up with the dance of shadows and silver as he deflected and parried Harry's incoming slashes and stabs. Daphnis tries to close the distance to get in closer to Harry, to get inside the range of his spear and avoid the point of it, Harry remembers trying this same tactic as well, so taking another leaf out of Scátchach's book, he pulls his spear back to a shorthand grip where his hands are above the middle of the shaft and blocks the two swipes from the hunting knives before smashing the shaft into Daphnis' nose making him real back as Harry takes a step back and swings the butt of his spear at the blind hunters head. Daphnis ducks the swing before rolling off to the side quickly before popping up and throwing both of his hunting Knives in the direction he hears Harry, but the Heir of the Hunt was already on the move. Slashing out with his spear he knocks both blades away, and before Daphnis could call them back, Harry had the blade of his spear to the blind hunter's throat.

"Well then," Daphnis says before swallowing, "It seems I've lost this round," he says, giving up with a smile.

"Your knives are easy to figure out," Harry says as he pulls his spear away before helping Daphnis back to his feet, "They disappear in a flash after you throw them but come back to you with no show, it's to distract so you can stab them as they're wondering what's going on," Harry says with a smile as Daphnis Laughs.

"Yes, it's a rather cheap trick but you'd be shocked at how many things fall for it," the blind hunter says with a smile and a pat on Harry's shoulders, "How about we go for round-" but Daphnis is soon cut off by another voice, a voice Harry really didn't want to hear.

"No, if you were to fight the boy again you would just go soft on him again, Commander," Zoë says as she steps out from the now much larger crowd, Daphnis sighs.

"I could find that very insulting for you to say that, Lieutenant," Daphnis says as he turns to her, "If you would think I would go easy on any members of the hu-" the blind hunter begins to say but Zoë cuts him off again.

"He is not a member of the hunt, he is unworthy," Zoë says with a hiss, and Harry grinds his teeth at the words as they echo in his head in another voice, "Our Lady's son or not, I've seen nothing of worth in him," she says with a glare at the boy in question.

"He saved Brittany," Daphnis says, "He hunted and killed a Basilisk by himself and that one, not even you can claim," he fires back at the Lieutenant.

"He saved her from things that were not even Centaurs after she was ambushed," Zoë dismisses what Harry had done for a sister of the hunt, "I'm sure she would have been fine," the lieutenant of the hunt says, ignoring the Basilisk comment completely.

"No," Brittany speaks up from the crowd, "The Centaur had me, I would be dead if Harry wasn't there," the hatchet-wielding hunter admits with a shrug.

Zoë scoffs before turning her attention back to the boy, eyes narrowed in a glare and arms crossed over her chest, Harry could practically taste the hate rolling off her, reminding him far too much of Uncle Vernon and the looks he would get from him whenever Harry would walk into a room with Uncle Vernon in it, and Harry was tired of it.

"What the fuck is your problem with me?" Harry asks again to the lieutenant of the hunt.

"None of your busin-" Zoë tries to say but is cut off by Harry.

"The hell it isn't!" Harry yells at her, Daphnis puts his hand on Harry's shoulder to try and drag him away, but Harry shrugs it off before he stomps up to the lieutenant, stopping only inches from her, "Ever since you met me you've hated me, you didn't even give me a chance or anything, you hated me straight away!" The heir screams in her face, "why?! Is it because I'm related to Artemis? Because of the prank she played on you? Or is it just because I'm a boy?"

Zoë's face goes from a glare to a completely blank face, "Get out of my face, boy," she says very calmly but with a hint of danger at the end of it.

"Make me," Harry says back, as the crowd goes quiet, no one talked to the lieutenant like that, not the Commander, not Phoebe, not even Atalanta.

Zoë uncrosses her arms and towers over Harry, her dull golden eyes burning with rage, "You are to obey the orders of your seniors while you are allowed to be with the hunt, as unworthy as you are of it, so now I'm ordering to stand down and get out of my sight, now boy, " she tells Harry with a growl.

"And I told you, to make me, cunt," Harry says with a growl of his own, his pupils splitting with the power of the Hunt, Zoë flinches, it's small and if Harry wasn't in her face he wouldn't have seen it, but to his own surprised Zoë's golden eyes darken to a color closer to amber as her face twists in rage and veins begin to bulge in her forehead and neck giving her a much more fearsome look. As Daphnis and Atalanta move to break up the Lieutenant and the Heir from undoubtedly ripping each other apart, the sound of a horn is heard coming from the west of camp. Harry and Zoë break off their staring contest, but their heads snap to the west as does the rest of the gathered crowd, and there's a pause before the crowd moves as one rushes off to the west with weapons drawn.

Zoë gives Harry one last glare before rushing off with the crowd as Atalanta finally reaches Harry.

"Come on Kiddo, we need to go, get your bow out," Atalanta says, her bow already out.

"What is it? What's with the horn?" Harry asks as he closes his spear to open it to his bow.

"It was a warning horn from the patrols," Atalanta says, a grim look on her face, "My bet, the Centaurs are here,"

Hunters encampment

Atalanta was right, by the time they got to the gathering of hunters to the west Harry could see the Centaurs, most half hidden in the trees with bows drawn and aimed at the rows of hunters lined up behind the makeshift cover of a small earthen wall that had been erected overnight, the hunters had their own bows out and knocked with silver and bronze arrows. Artemis stood a few yards in front of the barricade looking up at three Centaurs, two Harry knew, the one in front was Bane glaring down at Artemis growling and baring his teeth as he talked to her. Artemis calmly looked back at him and seemed almost bored but even from where Harry was, he could tell her body was ready to spring into action at a moment's notice.

"-not welcomed here, Greek, your pathetic kind left the islands centuries ago when your flame moved, I suggest you move with it now!" Bane yells, his hand gripping the massive spear as he talks.

"Oh, you know who I am and yet you dare to speak to me like that? Very foolish spirit," Artemis says in her normal monotone voice

"Oh, we know of your kind leech," Bane says back, "You attach yourself to the most powerful civilization to drain it dry before leading an assault against the next to inherit your flame so you can set yourselves up as gods of them," Bane spits on the ground next to Artemis after his little speech.

"That's a very nice little theory you have spirit, but in the end, it doesn't change the fact that I'm not leaving, and neither is my hunt," Artemis tells him, "We were asked to come to do a job, and that's what we are here to do,"

"Do you hear that brothers!? She even admits that she is here to kill us," Bane yells, and the other Centaurs stomp their feet, "They have come to finish the job that they started almost two Millennia ago!"

"We are not here for you, I would not waste the arrows," Artemis says.

"Lies!" Bane roars, "six of my brothers are dead in the woods, killed by your hunters! I will have justice for this, the justice of the hunt!" He growls out as he leans down into Artemis' face, but still, her face doesn't change.

"Well, that's a shame, because from me you will get nothing but a swift death," the Goddess of the Hunt tells the Centaur, and Bane growls as he raises his spear and Harry has heard enough.

Harry hops the wall, ignoring the yells of Atalanta as he races forward, "Stop, Firenze! It's me! It's Harry!" Harry calls out, and the blonde hair blue eyed Centaur reaches up and grabs the spear before it could fall.

"Harry Potter, the stars foretold we would meet again, but I had not imagined it like this," Firenze says in his ever-soft and calm voice, as Artemis' head snaps to him, eyes wide and angry enough to almost makes Harry stop.

"Hey, Firenze, listen I tried to give them a chance, I asked them to stop, but they wouldn't! They attack first, we're not here for your herd, we're here for the spiders!" Harry quickly says, as Firenze narrows his eyes at Harry's words, his eyes looking back and forth between Harry and Artemis.

"Are you saying you killed our brothers, boy?" Bane asks and Artemis steps in between Harry and the Centaur as Bane moves to face Harry.

"He has nothin-'' Artemis begins to say, but Harry cuts her off.

"Yes," Harry tells Bane with conviction, and Artemis turns to face him with a scowl.

"Then we take the boy's life," Bane exclaims.

"You will not touch him!" Artemis says at the same time, her bow appearing in her hand as her head snaps back to Bane, and once again Bane tries to drop his spear but is once more stopped by Firenze's grip on it.

"You dare challenge the Hunt Master, Firenze!" Bane roars as he turns back to his herd mate.

Firenze looks at him calmly before saying, "tá fuil an tseilg aige ann, sé an té a rabhamar ag fanacht air.," and Bane stops dead before looking back at Harry, narrowing his eyes, Firenze speaks once more in English, "We would not win this fight, Mars is not in our favor this day," Firenze says in his sage-like way.

Bane looks back at Firenze, a scowl on his face, "Perhaps you are right, the stars are not right, we leave the leech and her pathetic collection of girls she calls a hunt for another day," Bane says before turning, his tail whipping out, and Firenze lets go of the spear before riding off to the deeper parts of the forest, calling his herd with him.

Firenze turns to Harry and Artemis, bowing his head low, "An honor, Goddess of the Hunt, and a pleasure to see you once more Harry Potter, but the stars have not changed, we will meet again," he says before turning and riding off himself. The hunters behind Harry and Artemis don't move as the Centaurs leave, the Goddess of the Hunt's eyes scan the treeline watching the spirits in Centaur form ride off into the wild and deep forest they call home.

Suddenly, Artemis spins in place and grabs Harry by the collar dragging him down to her eye level, "What in the name of the Hunt is wrong with you!?" The normally calm Goddess yells in Harry's face, her own face twisted in rage.

Harry freezes, his eyes go wide as he looks into the amber eyes of Artemis so full of rage, he opens his mouth to say something but no words come out.

"I had this handled, boy!" Artemis continues, not waiting for the boy to answer, "you were ordered to stay put by Atalanta and you ignored it! I can not protect you if you do such foolish pea-brain things!" The Goddess continues to berate the boy who was her son as the boy begins to pale and shake, not from the rage of a Goddess, but from the demons that rose at the moment that he didn't want to deal with.

"I-i w-wanted," Harry tries to say, but all he can feel is Uncle Vernon's steel grip, all he hears is the shrill sheaks of Aunt Petunia, he closes his eyes trying to will the memories away, "I j-j-just w-wanted to h-help," Harry managers to get out.

"I do not need your help, boy!" Artemis yells, "I am a Goddess, not a fragile mortal whose life could end with a lucky arrow!" The Goddess screams, before tossing Harry back to the wall, his bow falling in the process, he lands and rolls onto his back and begins to push himself away from the glaring Goddess till his back hits the wall.

"To your tent!" Artemis yells, "now! And you will stay there until I come for you, do you understand me, boy!?" The Goddess is fuming as Harry quickly nods before jumping to his feet and over the wall, he couldn't help but to notice Zoë's cruel smile as he runs through the encampment at full speed to get back to his tent.

"Harry!" Atalanta calls after him, intent on following him, but stops at her Goddess' voice.

"No, Atalanta!" Artemis yells, "The boy disobeyed your direct order to stop, he will get no comfort from you," the Goddess orders, "he will stay in his tent and think about what he has done!" The hunters all freeze, avoiding looking directly at the Goddess hoping to avoid her attention, "The rest of you, back to your duties, now!" Artemis orders her hunt and the girls scatter, Daphnis sighs rubbing the scars that cover his eyes before calling Cecilia to him before leaving.

Zoë approaches the fuming Goddess without fear, stopping just short of her, "I had expressed my concern about the bo-" Zoë begins to say but is cut off by Artemis.

"Enough!" Artemis hisses out through clenched teeth, "I had told you to stop needling the boy, to avoid him if you had to, do you think me blind of what you did earlier?" The Goddess says as she turns on her lieutenant, "for nearly four millennia I had let you carry your grudge against male demigods for what Herakles had cursed you with, it has only once been a problem which you had paid for," Artemis tells Zoë, her amber eyes still burning with anger.

"But now you take it out on a boy who knew nothing about our world or myths a year ago, I will say this one more time, The boy. Is not. Herakles," Artemis says through clenched teeth, "He looks nothing like him, acts nothing like him, he does not wield the Anaklusmos, and he was not responsible for your loss in status," Zoê flinches at the name Anaklusmos, and looks to her Goddess' feet, lips pressed in a thin line as Artemis turns from her.

"Double the patrol, intersecting reverse formation, I do not like how they looked at Harry," Artemis says after taking a deep breath to try and calm herself down.

"Yes, My Lady," Zoë says softly.

"Good, now leave me, I need time to myself to calm down," the Goddess tells her lieutenants she walks over and picks up the bow Harry had dropped, Zoë bows her head before turning and walking away, hands clenched tightly into fists, thinking that this was somehow the boy's fault.

Centaurs campsite.

"Are you sure it is the boy?" Bane asks as he looks down at Firenze who was laying down looking into the silver bowl filled with water that reflected the heavens at night.

"I am," Firenze says simply.

"And how are you sure, Brother?" Bane asks.

"You saw how the Goddess protected him," Firenze tells the Huntmaster, "One does not protect that fiercely unless they are kin, he fits all of what the stars have told us to watch for,"

"A child with the hunt in their blood," Bane says with a nod, "born under the full moon and ill stars, wrapped in the belt of the great hunter as Mars begins to glare with red anger,"

And Firenze finishes it softly, "duine a fheicfidh bás trí huaire, agus a mbeidh grá aige,"

Notes:

Well, that's not spooky! Wonder what the Centaurs are up to? Does not seem to bode well for our best boi. And Artemis is just going off like that! Dammmmmmmn, she was mad at everyone one there for a moment. Even Zoë got it, but we'll see the after-effects of that next chapter.

Harry's reaction is because he had come to trust Artemis in some small way, and Artemis just acted like the Dursleys which triggered him badly, has this destroyed the relationship that was building? no. has this set it back a little bit? yes.

Should be fun!