The first few weeks after Justin’s death were the worst. I was in a strange place, surrounded by strange things and I had absolutely no idea what to do with myself. During the day everything was mostly bearable but in the darkness I had no protection against the pain and terror. On most nights I was only lulled to sleep by John’s voice repeating over and over: “Breathe, Harry. You’re safe. Everything’s okay now.”
My dreams were never peaceful. Most of them were full of blazing flames, rage and helplessness. Some of them were shrouded in darkness with the smell of stale blood and despair. And only very rarely I dreamt of hands shielding me and fingers gently stroking my hair.
I never told Ebenezar McCoy about Johnny. I knew he would not for a second think it was something as innocent as an imaginary friend and was afraid that he’d try to persuade me to get rid of this connection. Or worse yet, that he’d do something about it without even asking me first. And the prospect of losing the last remaining constant of my life terrified me much more than even the White Council’s wrath.
Still, I didn’t make the decision to keep this secret blindly. After realizing that John was as real as myself I’ve thought long and hard about the possibilities. At first I imagined that he was some sort of Fae – I guess it appealed to some deep-hidden fairytale-loving part of me. But realistically there was no reason for any magical creature to maintain the link between our minds for so long. If they wanted to make a pact with me (and this was another notion fraught with disturbing memories) it would have been far easier to make a little kid promise them whatever they desired. There is, after all, no concept of legal age in the Nevernever.
That same argument equally applied to warlocks so I was left with the only other option – that Johnny was a plain mortal connected to me by a strange twist of fate. There could be no harm in communicating with him especially while he didn’t know anything about me except my given name. (I ignored the fact that he knew about me almost as much as I did myself because there was no way he could get close enough to me to use that knowledge).
~!~
Johnny didn’t like Eb. There was a couple of months before he first started showing his displeasure with my new mentor but it just snowballed from there.
“Why isn’t he teaching you magic?” he asked once during our late night conversations.
“You know, it’s a strange question coming from you,” I muttered. “You don’t even believe in magic.”
“Of course I believe in magic! It is preferable to thinking that the voice I’ve been hearing in my head for the last decade is only a figment of my imagination and I desperately need a mental specialist.” I snickered quietly. “So why isn’t he teaching you?”
“He said I’ve been taught more than enough over the last years,” I answered after a brief pause. “I need to slow down, find my center and ground myself.”
“Bullshit!” he barked. “He’s punishing you.”
“What?”
“He’s locked you in some hellhole, Missouri, away from anything and anyone remotely familiar and took away the only thing that can still bring you joy.” I wanted to ask him to drop the drama but his words hit too close to home. “What is it if not a punishment?”
“Don’t I deserve it though?” I whispered. “I killed Justin.”
“You killed a man who tried to enslave you.”
“I still killed him.”
“Would it have been better if you let him bind you to his will?” John asked angrily. “What do you think he intended to use you for? I you’ve become his mindless tool there would have been more blood on your hands, blood of the innocents whose only crime was standing in Justin’s way.”
“I could have…” I hesitated for a moment.
“Don’t you dare complete that sentence!” I couldn’t see why he was so enraged. Sometimes I truly felt that dying that day would have been much easier than living with the consequences. “This is exactly what your White Council wants you to believe. You must not defend yourself against our control, you should just roll over and bare your neck. Justin needed to be stopped. Maybe your primary reason for killing him was selfish in your eyes, but in the long run you’ve saved a lot of lives besides your own. Maybe you’ve even saved me that day.”
I tried to smile though there was no way Johnny could see me.
“I feel awful,” I confessed loosing the battle with my emotions and burying my head in the pillow to muffle my sobs.
“Doing the right thing is not always the same as doing the good thing. But I don’t want you to feel that your life was not worth saving, Harry. I never want you to feel guilty for protecting yourself.” My tears burned gathering under the eyelids and escaping into the pillow. “I’m sorry I can’t help you, Harry,” he whispered regretfully and went silent. I wanted to say that his lingering presence beside was already helping but I just couldn’t gather the strength.
~!~
“What the hell is he teaching you?!” Apparently, lifting the ban on all things magical didn’t improve John’s attitude towards Eb in the slightest. “Who the fuck invented these Laws of Magic and what were they smoking?”
The last time I’ve heard Johnny cursing was during my trial so I was I bit taken aback by this extreme reaction.
“Why?” I asked tentatively. “They sound perfectly right to me.”
“Oh, and I thought our legal system was fucked up,” he plowed right over my question. “You shall not kill with magic! Is that why they’ve almost executed you?”
“It’s true!” I said forcefully. “I should not have killed him with magic. It’s a power meant for creation, to take a life with it is just… wrong!”
“I thought they tried you for murder,” again, he made no sign that he heard me. “But it was actually only for the weapon you used.”
“What’s your problem, John?” I exploded. “The man is dead by my hand!”
“Yes. But what is better, killing him with magical fire or going into his bedroom and strangling him with a pillow?”
“What kind of question is that?” I sputtered.
“It’s a legitimate question in the eyes of your Council,” Johnny countered. “In fact, they think that while the former is punishable by death the latter is perfectly fine.”
“You’re absurd.”
“Me? I just repeat what you’ve told me, but in simpler words. The Law of Magic states that you should not feel guilty for killing Justin, only for the method you’ve used in doing it.”
I had nothing to answer. Somehow this little truth was lost among all the explanations Ebenezar gave me on the subject.
“If magic was only meant to do good it would have been physically impossible to use it for murder,” John said into the silence, his voice now quiet and contemplative.
“You can’t know that!” More than anything I felt confused by the fact that the arguments that sounded so solid only couple of hours ago were now crumbling to dust. “You don’t know what magic is.”
“But I know logic. And I know a great deal about politics. Do you know what I hear when you recount the Laws of Magic? You shall not gain enough power to overthrow the White Council.”
I… I simply didn’t want to contemplate this. I didn’t want to think that everything I learned was a lie.
“Harry,” John’s voice was gentle and soothing, and I relaxed into it despite the fact that it was he who caused all the previous tension. “You need to understand. I’m not saying you’re wrong to grieve or feel guilty. But you must rely on your own moral compass and not on these dogmas the White Council created to safeguard themselves. You are not a criminal, and I know you are not capable of doing anything truly wrong.”
“How can you know that?” I muttered weakly.
“Because you are the voice in my head.” And that simple yet loaded answer inexplicably made me feel better.
~!~
Over the next year we had a lot of arguments along the same lines. Usually I objected but it was half-hearted at best because in my heart of hearts I agreed with Johnny.
Though Ebenezar McCoy was my official mentor, the voice in my head taught me a lot of more important lessons.
You must not believe in anything blindly.
You must measure everything against you own set of values.
Sometimes you must put yourself first.
Although these rules were useful and I intended to follow them there was one more underlying message I cherished most of all.
No matter what you do you’ll still have me to turn to.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
timeasmymeasure
My (not so) Imaginary Friend (2/?)
Date: 2011-03-23 01:32 am (UTC)My dreams were never peaceful. Most of them were full of blazing flames, rage and helplessness. Some of them were shrouded in darkness with the smell of stale blood and despair. And only very rarely I dreamt of hands shielding me and fingers gently stroking my hair.
I never told Ebenezar McCoy about Johnny. I knew he would not for a second think it was something as innocent as an imaginary friend and was afraid that he’d try to persuade me to get rid of this connection. Or worse yet, that he’d do something about it without even asking me first. And the prospect of losing the last remaining constant of my life terrified me much more than even the White Council’s wrath.
Still, I didn’t make the decision to keep this secret blindly. After realizing that John was as real as myself I’ve thought long and hard about the possibilities. At first I imagined that he was some sort of Fae – I guess it appealed to some deep-hidden fairytale-loving part of me. But realistically there was no reason for any magical creature to maintain the link between our minds for so long. If they wanted to make a pact with me (and this was another notion fraught with disturbing memories) it would have been far easier to make a little kid promise them whatever they desired. There is, after all, no concept of legal age in the Nevernever.
That same argument equally applied to warlocks so I was left with the only other option – that Johnny was a plain mortal connected to me by a strange twist of fate. There could be no harm in communicating with him especially while he didn’t know anything about me except my given name. (I ignored the fact that he knew about me almost as much as I did myself because there was no way he could get close enough to me to use that knowledge).
Johnny didn’t like Eb. There was a couple of months before he first started showing his displeasure with my new mentor but it just snowballed from there.
“Why isn’t he teaching you magic?” he asked once during our late night conversations.
“You know, it’s a strange question coming from you,” I muttered. “You don’t even believe in magic.”
“Of course I believe in magic! It is preferable to thinking that the voice I’ve been hearing in my head for the last decade is only a figment of my imagination and I desperately need a mental specialist.” I snickered quietly. “So why isn’t he teaching you?”
“He said I’ve been taught more than enough over the last years,” I answered after a brief pause. “I need to slow down, find my center and ground myself.”
“Bullshit!” he barked. “He’s punishing you.”
“What?”
“He’s locked you in some hellhole, Missouri, away from anything and anyone remotely familiar and took away the only thing that can still bring you joy.” I wanted to ask him to drop the drama but his words hit too close to home. “What is it if not a punishment?”
“Don’t I deserve it though?” I whispered. “I killed Justin.”
“You killed a man who tried to enslave you.”
“I still killed him.”
“Would it have been better if you let him bind you to his will?” John asked angrily. “What do you think he intended to use you for? I you’ve become his mindless tool there would have been more blood on your hands, blood of the innocents whose only crime was standing in Justin’s way.”
“I could have…” I hesitated for a moment.
“Don’t you dare complete that sentence!” I couldn’t see why he was so enraged. Sometimes I truly felt that dying that day would have been much easier than living with the consequences. “This is exactly what your White Council wants you to believe. You must not defend yourself against our control, you should just roll over and bare your neck. Justin needed to be stopped. Maybe your primary reason for killing him was selfish in your eyes, but in the long run you’ve saved a lot of lives besides your own. Maybe you’ve even saved me that day.”
I tried to smile though there was no way Johnny could see me.
“I feel awful,” I confessed loosing the battle with my emotions and burying my head in the pillow to muffle my sobs.
“Doing the right thing is not always the same as doing the good thing. But I don’t want you to feel that your life was not worth saving, Harry. I never want you to feel guilty for protecting yourself.” My tears burned gathering under the eyelids and escaping into the pillow. “I’m sorry I can’t help you, Harry,” he whispered regretfully and went silent. I wanted to say that his lingering presence beside was already helping but I just couldn’t gather the strength.
“What the hell is he teaching you?!” Apparently, lifting the ban on all things magical didn’t improve John’s attitude towards Eb in the slightest. “Who the fuck invented these Laws of Magic and what were they smoking?”
The last time I’ve heard Johnny cursing was during my trial so I was I bit taken aback by this extreme reaction.
“Why?” I asked tentatively. “They sound perfectly right to me.”
“Oh, and I thought our legal system was fucked up,” he plowed right over my question. “You shall not kill with magic! Is that why they’ve almost executed you?”
“It’s true!” I said forcefully. “I should not have killed him with magic. It’s a power meant for creation, to take a life with it is just… wrong!”
“I thought they tried you for murder,” again, he made no sign that he heard me. “But it was actually only for the weapon you used.”
“What’s your problem, John?” I exploded. “The man is dead by my hand!”
“Yes. But what is better, killing him with magical fire or going into his bedroom and strangling him with a pillow?”
“What kind of question is that?” I sputtered.
“It’s a legitimate question in the eyes of your Council,” Johnny countered. “In fact, they think that while the former is punishable by death the latter is perfectly fine.”
“You’re absurd.”
“Me? I just repeat what you’ve told me, but in simpler words. The Law of Magic states that you should not feel guilty for killing Justin, only for the method you’ve used in doing it.”
I had nothing to answer. Somehow this little truth was lost among all the explanations Ebenezar gave me on the subject.
“If magic was only meant to do good it would have been physically impossible to use it for murder,” John said into the silence, his voice now quiet and contemplative.
“You can’t know that!” More than anything I felt confused by the fact that the arguments that sounded so solid only couple of hours ago were now crumbling to dust. “You don’t know what magic is.”
“But I know logic. And I know a great deal about politics. Do you know what I hear when you recount the Laws of Magic? You shall not gain enough power to overthrow the White Council.”
I… I simply didn’t want to contemplate this. I didn’t want to think that everything I learned was a lie.
“Harry,” John’s voice was gentle and soothing, and I relaxed into it despite the fact that it was he who caused all the previous tension. “You need to understand. I’m not saying you’re wrong to grieve or feel guilty. But you must rely on your own moral compass and not on these dogmas the White Council created to safeguard themselves. You are not a criminal, and I know you are not capable of doing anything truly wrong.”
“How can you know that?” I muttered weakly.
“Because you are the voice in my head.” And that simple yet loaded answer inexplicably made me feel better.
Over the next year we had a lot of arguments along the same lines. Usually I objected but it was half-hearted at best because in my heart of hearts I agreed with Johnny.
Though Ebenezar McCoy was my official mentor, the voice in my head taught me a lot of more important lessons.
You must not believe in anything blindly.
You must measure everything against you own set of values.
Sometimes you must put yourself first.
Although these rules were useful and I intended to follow them there was one more underlying message I cherished most of all.
No matter what you do you’ll still have me to turn to.