The Phoenix's Fire

Alexandria de Winter

Chapter 3

Sitting in their booth while attempting to eat the disgusting food, none of them spoke. The room was crowded yet still more people came. Alexandria had appeared several more times to take others orders and to wipe off tables.

"How did a de Winter end up working in a place like this?" Sirius asked, glancing around sadly at the place where the girl had chosen to work.

"We'll find out soon enough," Harry stated, standing up. "Here she comes."

Before she could reach them though, a drunken brawl formed. Taking a hit to the head, Alexandria crashed into a table and sprawled onto the floor. Snarling, she leapt to her feet and tackled one of the two men, subduing him instantly. Seeing the man unconscious on the floor, the other one turned on his heel and raced for the door.

Hurrying over to the wreckage, they helped her to her feet before she wrenched away and headed for the door. When they got outside, they immediately headed to where Alexandria was crouched against a wall at the dark end of the parking lot.

"Are you alright?" Sirius asked concerned, kneeling down next to her.

Cradling her arm to her chest protectively, she hissed dangerously, "Get away from me!"

"You're hurt," Harry replied, trying to be reasonable, reaching out to look at her arm. Seeing her shaking her head, he grabbed her arm only to be smacked across the face. Sighing, he rubbed his fingers together over the wetness that had appeared from touching her. "You're bleeding."

"Look," she snarled, rising to her feet, "fights break out here all the time. It's nothing new. I can take care of myself."

"But-"

"Leave her alone," Remus snapped, pushing them away from her before stepping up to help.

Staring her in the eye, he waited. At last, she held out her arm to him. Remus immediately started to pull broken glass and splinters out of her arm. He worked quickly, but not quickly enough to hide the cuts and blood from the other two men.

"My God," Sirius whispered eyes wide. "Your blood is silver!"

Glaring indignantly, she replied nastily, "So? At least mines a pretty color and doesn't stain white clothes!"

"Let's all just calm down," Harry snapped. "Let us bandage you up so we can get going."

"I'm through for the night. I'm going home."

Disappearing with a pop, the three men were left standing alone in the dark parking lot.

*****

Harry awoke at dusk the next afternoon after sleeping through the day. Remus and Sirius had left sometime before saying they were going to explore the city and promised to meet him and the Seer at a homey little café down the street from their hotel. Harry decided to make the most of his time alone and get to know the strange person they were desperately seeking help from. After dressing, he quickly made his way back to the dilapidated apartment buildings.

Knocking softly on the door, he called out, "Miss de Winter?"

When there was no answer, he pressed his ear to the door to listen for any sounds of movement from within. The sound of a bolt sliding out of the way was like a gunshot, causing the Mage to jump in surprise.

"I'm sorry," Alexandria laughed. "Did I startle you?"

"No, not at all," Harry said quickly, trying not to look as alarmed as he'd felt.

"What do you want?" she asked curiously.

"Just to see what you were doing." Harry smiled charmingly. "Would you like to go see a Muggle movie or something?" Seeing that she was hesitating, he added quickly, "My treat... I'll even buy you popcorn."

"Fine," she mumbled, walking back into her apartment and immediately coming back with her car keys. "Whatever, I'm driving."

Outside, when Harry turned towards the parking lot, Alexandria kept right on walking.

"Where are you going?"

"To my car," she stated as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

"Where did you park?"

"Somewhere where I won't have to worry."

After walking for several more minutes, they came to an old barn that was partially caved in and sported no trespassing: condemned signs all over the yard.

"Here?" Harry asked incredulously.

"Is the great Harry Potter afraid?" she mocked. Seeing he wasn't going to budge, she sighed. "There's spells to hold the place up and most of the damage is actually just a glamour. It's safe. There's repelling charms and everything to keep vandals away."

"What kind of car do you have that's worth all that effort?"

"A Corvette."

"Nice," he responded with a nod.

"More than nice; you can't even buy my car yet!"

Cocking his head to the side, he asked incredulously, "Then how did you get it?"

Hesitating for a moment, she finally said, "A guy owed me a favor. He paid off his life debt to me in a material aspect." Smiling happily, she chirped, "Works for me!"

Pushing open the large wooden doors, they walked in. Upon seeing the sight before him, he froze. The inside looked nothing like the out with its clean surfaces and large interiors. This though was not what shocked him. For a girl that lived in a horrible apartment, she sure had a great number of expensive vehicles. There were old cars, new cars, motorcycles- every type of vehicle you could want.

"How did you get all of these?" Harry asked, awed.

"I sell them when I finish restoring them and buy something new with the money. It's a very expensive hobby but it gives me something to do."

"Never seen many girls interested in auto repair," he said, amused.

"Oh no," she replied quickly, "not just cars. I fix up houses, gardens, cars- anything that the world considers worthless, I make beautiful again. I even fix people."

"People?"

"Yes, and I've decided to make it my mission to fix you."

"ME?"

"Yes, you." She smiled serenely. "What better a person to fix than the one that is to save the world? I mean, look at you: hardened War Mage, angry at the world, feeling guilty... You're a mess and the world the world needs their hero back."

"What if you can't fix me?" he asked quietly, no judgment in his voice.

"Well, then I guess you're stuck with me forever because I NEVER give up!"

Smiling, she walked over and slid into the red corvette convertible. Shaking his head and smiling at her know-it-all smirk, he followed her, knowing there was more to the white haired beauty than met the eye.

*****

At three in the morning, Harry Potter could be seen laughing and having a great time in a small restaurant on the outskirts of the grand city with non other than Alexandria de Winter.

Though he had planned to meet Sirius and Remus at 10:00 pm, he had long since called to tell them not to wait up.

Smiling cheerfully, Harry said, "You know what Alexandria? I've had a great time tonight. It's been so long since I've laughed."

"Glad I could be of service," she replied in her laid-back, calm voice. "Enough formalness though. You can call me Alexia... or Alex, or Lexi, or even Lexia-"

"Alright!" he exclaimed in mock annoyance. "I get it!"

Setting off down the road to where they'd left the car, Alexia began to tell one dirty joke after another as Harry laughed helplessly. Halfway through a particularly disgusting one, she froze.

"Uh oh..." she whispered.

"What- Oh."

Before them stood six men wearing ski masks and holding an assortment of knives and clubs.

'This isn't good,' Harry thought as he reached slowly for his wand.

"Don't!" she hissed. "They're Muggles! You can't let them know what we are!"

Giving her an angry glare, he instead shifted into a fighting stance.

Seeing that their victims weren't going to give up without a fight, the gang began to circle around the two, knives flashing dangerously. Moving so that his back was to Alexia, he waited until the scrawny one nearest to him was within reach. Bringing his foot up, Harry snap kicked scrawny boy in the face, taking him out of the fight immediately. Seeming to be shocked out of their momentary paralysis, the five men that were still standing attacked. Leaping forwards, Harry grabbed a second man by the shirt before giving him a good hard head-butt in the face. While starting for the next one, he glanced over to see how the vampire girl was doing.

What he saw shocked him to no end.

For all her talk about fixing things, she was obviously no stranger to destroying them. He had been trained to fight using only the minimum amount of force necessary to solve the problem. Alexia had no such qualms.

She reached out, grabbing a rounded man around the wrist before pulling it towards the ground. As if wrist went towards the ground, she twisted her body so that her side faced the man's front, brought her leg up, putting her almost into a vertical type of splits, and kicked him in the jaw, nearly breaking his neck- leaving him in heap on the floor. The three remaining men turned and ran when they saw what had just happened to their friends.

Looking after them in disgust, Harry turned back to Alexia to make a comment and froze. Leaning on her knees, she breathed heavily, little gasping noises escaping her throat. Before he could move to help her, Alexia collapsed onto the sun-warmed concrete.

Hurrying over to her, he dropped to his knees. Lifting her head so he could look into her eyes, he asked what had happened.

"Nothing," she gasped weakly. "I'll be fine in a moment. You go find a phone and call the cops."

"I'm not leaving you here alone," he snapped. "You can't even stand, let alone fight! And where are all the people? Surely somebody saw what just happened!"

"People learn not to interfere here. It's the way of the world: Only help others if they can help you."

"That's pathetic," Harry replied with a scowl. "You sound like-" Cutting himself off, he stared at his feet, blinking back the sudden rush of tears that came to his eyes.

"Who?" she asked curiously, as she began to sit up. "Who do I sound like?"

"Nobody."

"I sound like her don't I? I sound like Destiny Black."

"Do you know her?" he asked urgently.

Sighing, she rose unsteadily to her feet. "I used to-"

"Where is she?"

"Your Destiny?"

"Yes!"

"She's gone."

"Yes, I get that," Harry replied with exaggerated patience. "Now, where did she go?"

"Harry... You do understand that people change right? Well, what I'm trying to tell you... The girl you knew and loved doesn't exist anymore. Besides, I don't know anymore where she PHYSICALLY is."

Silence descended as they made their way to the car, leaving the unconscious men lying on the ground.

'She's lying,' Harry thought.

*****

After parking the car and walking back to Alexia's apartment, they both headed upstairs to talk.

Walking into her apartment, Harry was stunned. From the outside you could never begin to imagine that the inside would look as it did. The walls were a light sky blue and the furniture was artfully decorated. There were glass objects everywhere, from every country and culture. Artifacts dating all the way back to ancient Egypt lined the walls and the famous paintings by various artists were exquisite.

"Your home is beautiful," Harry murmured in awe. "If you can afford objects such as these, why do you live in such a place?"

"Because," she replied, kicking her feet up onto a coffee table, "rich people are noticeable. Nobody ever looks at the poor ones, and in the poorer section, nobody asks questions that can't be answered."

Sitting down slowly into a squishy arm chair, he asked about her obsession with being invisible.

"When you're different, you have to be careful of the attention you draw to yourself. The English Ministry may be gone but the American one is still thriving. I do not wish to live to see another hunt, yet I have no desire to meet my demise just yet."

After lightening the conversation for a while, Harry asked the question he'd been dying to have answered.

"How old are you?"

Lowering her tea cup to her lap, she responded with an amused smirk. "Isn't that supposed to be a rude question to ask a lady?"

"It's supposed to be but I don't know why that is, so that officially makes me free to ask it."

Laughing, Alexia said, "I'm twenty-one."

Harry smiled. "A true girl. Lying about your age."

"What do you mean?"

"I know you're a vampire," Harry stated. "I've seen pictures of you from the 1600's."

"Oh," she mumbled.

"So how old are you?"

Smiling, she restated herself. "Twenty-one, I was twenty-one in the picture too."

"Ah... I get it. You're saying you'll always be twenty-one, right?"

"If you wish... Tell me about yourself; things that haven't been published in books."

"Well," he said, reclining in his chair, "I work in the spying division. Of course that's public knowledge to, just not published yet. My job's kind of like active service in the Muggle world. I like chocolate."

"You like chocolate? Wow, I feel so close to you now!"

"Are you alright?" he asked. "You're starting to look kind of... white."

"I'm okay," was the reply from the suddenly quickly fading voice. "You need to leave. Now."

"I'm not just going to leave if you're feeling bad-"

"Just GO! I don't want your help!" she shouted. Seeing that she was serious, he rose to his feet and gave her a worried look. "GO!"

Going to the door, he spotted something on a table he hadn't noticed before. There was a picture in a little silver frame and in the photo there were two people. A girl with black curly hair and an older man with short black hair.

In her living room, Alexia had a picture of Sirius and Destiny Black.