Darkness Burning

Harry stares into the fire and watches it burn. He’s been sitting on the same spot on the floor in the sitting room for so long that his legs are beginning to ache, but even just the thought of moving nearly paralyzes him further. So he sits, and he stares.

He senses more than sees the weight that settles next to him, bare knees bumping his joggers-clad own. Then a gentle head is placed against his shoulder, curly hair tickling his cheek.

“I miss you,” Hermione says.

“I’m right here,” Harry responds. But he’s floating somewhere far, far away, somewhere where the sun is warm and the water is kind and the sand heats beneath him. Where he is safe and loved without suffocating. Where a boy with bronze hair and hazel eyes prances around with a yellow tie hanging round his neck. Where that boy is alive and whole and real and so is Harry, right by his side.

Hermione lifts her head from his shoulder and he forces himself to turn and look at her. She’s dressed in what looks like one of Ginny’s band t-shirts and muggle athletic shorts, fuzzy socks reaching halfway up her shins. He stares at her and it feels like they’re children again, 11 years old and staying up late doing homework in the common room. She hasn’t changed at all and at the same time he doesn’t recognize her one bit. “Where did you go?” she asks, and spins a hair tie around her wrist, “You keep disappearing on me.”

He doesn’t have an answer for her. He turns back to the fire and pretends like he can’t feel the way her breath catches.

There’s a soft murmur behind him that he vaguely recognizes as Ron’s voice, and Hermione lifts herself up and toward him, and a minute later he hears the tell-tale sound of the stairs creaking as she walks up them.

“You can disappear on me all you want,” Ron says, “But don’t be angry when I keep finding you.” And then he leans down and brushes his lips on Harry’s forehead, and Harry shivers from the affection. He’s seen Ron do that before, to Ginny, to the twins, even Percy after he had come home from work last summer frazzled and bleary eyed, but the gesture being made to him in the firelight makes his heart burn from it.

Burning, burning, burning. He burns from love and from pain. He burns when good things happen and he burns when bad things do too. All he knows how to do is watch the flames grow.

His eyes are bleary when he feels a calloused hand on his shoulder, before it moves down to cup his back and a second palm bends further down to cup the underside of his knees. Sirius’ tattoo’s shine as they always do, and Harry watches as the ink that proclaims 1980 in large lettering stretches across his neck as he moves his head.

“I’m not a child,” Harry tries to say, but it comes out quiet and sleepy, somewhat slurred from exhaustion, and he finds his head lulling against Sirius’ chest as they head up the stairs.

“I know, darling,” Sirius responds, so sure and so sad, and he lightly kicks the door to Harry’s room open, “You always will be to me, though.”

-

Grimmauld is a dreary place. Despite this, Harry feels almost disappointed by his verdict at court, sentenced to go back to Hogwarts, a castle that he once considered his home. How foolish he had been; how naive. He doesn’t want to leave, not anymore - wants to stay with the foul elf, the cursed bathrooms, the empty fridge and screaming paintings. He wants to stay with Sirius so desperately it threatens to swallow him whole.

And Sirius needs him, Harry can see it, even though Sirius is trying to pretend that he’s okay so hard that it hurts to look at. But he’s still too thin, still drains whiskey at dinner too quickly to keep count. And he still stays whenever Harry asks him too. If Sirius were okay, he would look at Harry in the eyes and tell him so. But he can’t. And that speaks all the words they can’t say.

“I want to stay here,” Harry says, sleepily. He blinks slowly, trying to focus on Sirius’ face above him. “With you.”

Sirius hushes him, runs a calloused hand across his forehead. “I know, Harry.”

Harry says, “I don’t want to go,” and then he begins to cry, great, big, terrible sobs that echo in the late night silence. He doesn’t want to go back to school; he doesn’t want to sleep and face the nightmares; he doesn’t want to see his friends; he doesn’t want to leave Sirius, and most of all - he doesn’t want to be here anymore, stuck in an everlasting cycle of suffering that he can’t seem to get out of.

Sirius makes a noise of distress but holds him tighter all the same, and Harry pretends like he can’t feel his godfather’s tears soaking into his hair. There is nothing Sirius can do to help him, Harry knows. He’s a wanted felon. But a part of him so desperately wants to believe that someone will finally save him. That someone will finally hold his face, card fingers through his hair, and tell him “You’ve done enough”.

“You can visit,” Sirius tries, his voice cracking. “We can arrange something with Minnie. Every other weekend, perhaps?”

Harry doesn’t want every other weekend. He wants every day, every hour, all the time. He wants to live in this dreary house, wants to curl up in his favorite moldy chair in the library. He wants to keep learning about the stupid wizard etiquette that Sirius is teaching him about, wants to keep arguing with Walburga Black’s portrait, wants to stare at the newspapers that cover Sirius’ little brother’s bedroom, as evil and terrible as they are. He wants and he wants and he wants and it may just kill him, because he’s wanted for a million things his whole life - a home, a family, a place to feel safe - and now that he finally has it, it’s seconds away from being ripped from his grasp.

“I want you,” Harry says, because it’s the only thing he can say. He wants Sirius. Sirius, who started as a half-crazed godfather; Sirius, who Harry has recently begun to refer to as ‘Dad’ in the depths of his mind.

Sirius closes his eyes, like Harry’s words have physically pained him.

-

Harry has begun to take refuge in Myrtle’s bathroom.

It’s quite wet, but with some maneuvering he manages to find a semi-dry spot against one of the sinks that’s usually out of the splash zone. It’s not altogether pleasant, but it is much better than the stares he receives when he so much as exists anywhere else, so he can’t complain.

“This is my bathroom,” Harry does complain, when a handsome boy with a Slytherin tie sits down on the floor next to him.

“I believe it’s Myrtle’s, actually,” corrects Blaise Zabini, eyebrows raised.

“Harry and I share it,” Myrtle sniffs from her corner, “Although he’s much more quiet about it than I am.” Then she dives down one of the toilets, splashing the spot where Zabini sits.

Harry fails to hold in a cackle. Zabini merely sighs, and waves his wand over his robes, becoming dry again.

They sit in silence for a long time. Harry thinks about asking the boy why he’s sitting on the disgusting girl's floor, and then promptly decides it’s really not any of his business, and since he’s being quiet, he doesn’t mind too much. It’s kind of nice, the quiet companionship.

“This is Murtlap’s Essence,” Zabini says finally, and places a little bottle by Harry’s side. He glances down at it, brows furrowed. “It’s for your hand.”

Harry sighs. He wondered if anyone else had noticed - thought it may have been impossible not too. His left hand had been wrapped in heavy gauze for weeks now; some nights, the blood soaked through, and Harry would have to call the house elves up personally to change his now red sheets.

“Thank you,” he decides, and unwraps his hand right then and there, careful to go slow so as not to pull the wound open again.

Zabini helps him scoop the cream out of the bottle with a small spoon attached to the top. It reminds him of Petunia's fancy face lotions he had never been allowed to touch; it tingles against his hand and then the pain begins to dull, like its leaching out altogether.

“There you go,” Zabini says, very softly. Like he’s afraid that if he speaks too loud, Harry will run away. Harry thinks he maybe isn’t all that wrong about it. “Is that better?”

Harry nods. “Yes. Thank you.”

A quirk to Zabini’s lips. “Thank you for letting me sit here. I’ve been going a bit mad with Draco in the common room recently.”

Harry lets out a surprised laugh. He should probably be more suspicious- but Zabini had been kind to him, and hadn’t Peter Pettigrew been a Gryffindor anyways? Hadn’t Harry almost been a Slytherin - hadn’t Sirius? What did houses even matter?

A Gryffindor couldn’t save a Hufflepuff. Some lion he was.

“Anyways,” Zabini was saying, twisting the cap back on the potion bottle with deft fingers, “My friend Daphne is studying in the library, if you’d like to join us? It’s defense, obviously - I haven't learned anything at all from Umbridge this year. My mother will have my head if I fail any of my OWL’s.”

Harry couldn’t care less about his OWL’s, and he thought that Sirius would be quite happy with him even if he dropped out of Hogwarts and fucked right off to Greece, so he couldn’t relate to that - but he could understand Zabini’s hatred of Umbridge.

“She’s mental,” Harry agreed, running a hand through his hair. It was getting long again, but he didn’t want to cut it just yet; he felt like Sirius when he could tie it back. “But I’m alright with studying. Hermione has me at the library most of the time - any more and I might go mad myself.”

Zabini shrugs, and lifts himself elegantly off the floor. “The offer is always open, Black. We’re usually in the back right, the window that overlooks the lake.”

Harry says, “Cor, thanks,” and then watches as Zabini steps gracefully over the puddles, his robes fluttering behind him. It takes another five minutes before Harry gets up himself, and another ten before he realizes that Zabini had called him Black, instead of Potter.

It takes him several days before he can admit to himself that he liked being called a Black more than he had ever liked being called a Potter.

-

With a quiet greeting to Madame Pince, Harry walks into the library in the late hours of the night. It’s nearing midnight, but he couldn’t sleep, had spent the past three hours staring blankly into the fire, before he’d had enough of his own thoughts and decided to drown them in knowledge instead.

It’s something that Sirius had taught him; how re-learning old material is all that kept him sane when the nightmares of Azkaban wouldn’t let him rest. Harry is sick of old knowledge, though, decides to flip into himself and learn all the things he’s been putting off instead.

Almost unconsciously, he grabs a book about wixen politics and makes his way toward the back window that overlooks the lake. It’s dark, but the moon glitters brightly, shining over the water.

“Interesting book choice,” Zabini’s voice says from the corner of the table, and Harry starts, glances over at him. “Apologies, I didn’t mean to frighten you.”

“My own fault,” Harry says lightly, plopping down across from the boy. “I was stuck in my head. I need to be more aware.”

“Constant vigilance,” Zabini jokes, and Harry remembers how Zabini had looked last year in Defense, when the fake Moody had talked about putting them all under the imperious curse, the way his eyes had shuttered in disgust.

“Indeed,” an amused voice agrees from behind him, and Harry turns to the smirking face of Daphne Greengrass. “Good evening, Black.”

“Greengrass,” Harry acknowledges, deciding not to say anything about the name he keeps being referred to, “I’m not in your chair, am I?”

Greengrass snorts. “Unless you’re lying on the floor, no.”

“Daphne says she does her best thinking when she’s comfortable,” Zabini explains with a grin as the girl sat cross-legged on the ground against one of the book shelves. “Just don’t tell her father.”

“He’d never stop moaning about how improper it is,” Daphne complains, twisting a blonde curl around her finger. Her nails are painted a light blue, and they twinkle against the low lights. “But it’s just Blaise, I always say. And you, I suppose, Black, but you don’t mind?”

Harry lets out a surprised laugh. “No, I don’t.”

Greengrass grins, teeth flashing. She’s got an air about her that reminds him of the Weasley twins; constantly on the edge of mischief. “While you’re here, you wouldn’t happen to know about the eye blinding curse in chapter seven for defense, would you? Because I’m awfully confused…”

In a turn of events that Harry from last year would have never expected, he stays up until the early hours of the morning teaching two Slytherins about defense charms and some questionably dark curses. They’re funny, and they make him laugh - but they take him seriously at the same time, listening intently as he does his best to explain magic the way that he had taught himself.

“I understand that magic is about intent,” Zabini is telling him from where he has moved to lying down on his stomach on the floor, “That’s why it’s so strange, the spells that are banned. You could use a vanishing spell to get rid of someone’s head, right?”

Harry thinks about how he had used the floating spell to nearly kill a troll in his first year. He doesn’t know why he’s never looked at it from Zabini’s view before - had just eaten up what his professors had been telling him half his life, he supposed.
“I don’t know about that,” Harry admits, not bothering to lift his head up from where it's resting against the table. “There is no intent in my magic; it just is. It comes from your soul, I think. You have to let it be free - you can’t control it, it’s part of you.”

“So then why do we need wands at all?” Asks Greengrass, who has taken over Zabini’s chair.

Harry shrugs. “You tell me. Maybe it’s like - a muggle crutch. When you sprain your ankle, you can still walk on it, but a brace makes it easier to be steady. I suppose if you’ve been taught you need that brace your whole life, you start to believe you can’t move without it.”

Zabini hums. His eyes close, and Harry watches his long lashes flutter. He tears his gaze away, embarrassed.

“But how do you channel your magic without a wand?” Greengrass wonders. “You say you can’t control magic - but then how do we control it enough to push it through our wands, and not our own beings?”

The discussion is getting entirely too theoretical for Harry’s liking. He’s never really thought about it in depth - he had simply acted as he saw fit. Often, the best of his magic was performed in moments where there wasn’t time for thinking at all; like burning Quirrel’s face, or sailing twenty feet in the air to escape from Dudley, or even breaking free of Voldemort’s Imperio in the graveyard.

“You’re confusing him,” Zabini mutters. He lifts his head up, places a folded arm under his neck and looks up at Harry. “She’s not trying to get answers from you, I swear it, or make you feel stupid. She’s just trying to understand your view of it.”

Harry nods. “I appreciate that. I’m just not sure how to explain it. Siri-“ he cuts himself off; continues, “A friend of mine says that when you find yourself in a life or death situation, you do what you must. And what you must do is usually giving up control; it’s giving yourself to the mercy of the magic that fuels you. Letting go of any inhibitions you may have, whether you mean to have them or not. I won’t pretend it doesn’t tire you, but if it saves you, then it’s worth all the exhaustion in the world.”

There’s a heavy silence. Then, so quietly that Harry could almost convince himself he was imagining it, Greengrass whispers, “He’s really back, isn’t he? The Dark Lord?”

Unbidden, Harry shivers. Her eyes are closed still, but he can see the way her hands are shaking in her lap.

Zabini doesn’t glance away from Harry, his gaze steady and sure. Harry appreciates it, in a backwards sort of way. That the girl was brave enough to ask; that Zabini was brave enough to see Harry’s grief written across the very lines of his face and not turn away.

“Yes,” he says, and even though he’s been telling people for months now, something about this feels different. Heavier; more real. “I wish I was lying. I really, truly do.”

“We know you aren’t,” Zabini assures, sitting up. Harry is still shivering - Zabini takes off his cloak, a thick green thing, and lays it gently around Harry’s shoulders. “You don’t need to say anything else, if you don’t wish to.”

Harry sinks his face into the fabric for a long moment, debating. Then, stuttering all the while, he tries to explain himself in the simplest way he can. “His magic was oppressive. It was like… fighting a tidal wave with a sword. And I felt it, and for a moment, it felt terribly familiar.”

“Who did it remind you of?” Greengrass asks. She opens her eyes, and that is what gives Harry the courage to continue.

“Myself,” he admits, possibly for the first time out loud. “Or perhaps every wizard I’ve ever met, too. It felt as if he had let go of everything that common wizards hold onto- like he had stopped trying to control his magic, and instead let it control him. But it wasn’t - the way it felt, it wasn’t right. He wasn’t letting it be completely free. He was holding onto the biggest pieces of his magic, because I think… I think that his own magic would have turned against him. It felt just - wrong.”

Greengrass twists her necklace around her fingers. “Can your own magic really turn against you? Wouldn’t that be like betraying yourself?”

Zabini says, “Think of an Obscurus, Daph. It’s been shown before - although I’m not sure that’s what Black means.”

“Not like an obscurus,” Harry shakes his head. “Just - look. Magic doesn’t really have morals, right? If it did, then branches like necromancy wouldn’t exist. But it’s still sentient, almost. There are still certain things that it can fight against. It won’t stop it - but it will make it extremely unpleasant.”

Harry thinks of how the Death Eaters that tortured the Longbottom’s and tried to kill a baby Neville had gone truly mad only hours after the act; how after Walburga Black had nearly killed a teenage Sirius all those years ago, forcing him to run to the Potter’s, her husband died only days later, the cause still unknown; how when Voldemort killed the Potters and then tried to kill Harry himself, he became less than a wraith, sentenced to a decade of miserable pain.

Sirius liked to say that blood knows blood. Harry says magic knows magic; it will always find out. There’s no hiding who you are from magic, not when it’s intertwined with your very soul.

“I think I understand,” Greengrass scribbles on her parchment, as if writing down his words, “Or at least - I’m beginning too.”

Zabini pulls out the chair beside Harry, sits on it sideways so that their knees are touching. “If what I am about to say makes you uncomfortable, please tell me to be quiet,” he says, voice soft over the scratching of Greengrass’s quill. His eyes, only a shade lighter brown than his skin, are wide and open, and Harry struggles to hold eye contact.
“Okay,” Harry agrees.

Zabini rubs his palms on his thighs. Then he says, slowly, as if to make sure Harry understands, “I’m so, very sorry for what you must have gone through. I can’t imagine how you must have felt. And I am also incredibly sorry for how you must feel now, with the way everyone is treating you,” he places one of his hands on the back of Harry’s chair. “You don’t deserve this, Black. None of it.”

Harry’s throat tightens to an almost painful degree. His eyes burn, and he can hear the way Greengrass’ quill pauses its frantic note taking.

No one has ever truly apologized to him before. He didn't mind - no one needed to. If anything, Harry feels as though he himself should apologize more often, to all the people who get hurt in his crossfire. But still - it took his breath away, Zabini’s words. For all that Harry had been content in his actions, hearing someone acknowledge his feelings - other than Sirius - without getting massively uncomfortable felt like a weight had been lifted off his shoulders.

“You’ve been very brave,” Greengrass adds on, when it’s clear Harry didn’t have the current capacity to respond, “Although you shouldn’t have had to have been. Blaise and I - well. You’ve got really incredible natural talent, Black. But you’re also just fifteen.”

But you’re also just fifteen.

Harry breathes. The scent of Zabini surrounds him, a whiff of Greengrass’ perfume radiating throughout the room. Like vanilla, like muggle Christmas candles, like something soft and gentle.

“Thank you,” he finally gets out. Glances down, away from the two Slytherin’s kind stares. “That’s very kind of you to say.”

Then, frankly overwhelmed, he packs up his things and hurries out, careful to tuck his new book into his bag before checking the map to avoid wandering professors.

“I hope we didn’t scare him away,” Greengrass’ voice says quietly from behind the bookshelf he had just left.

“No,” says Zabini, sounding awfully sure. “He’ll be back.”

-

Sunday night finds Harry creeping through the dark halls and into the library, waving a quiet hand at Madame Pince as he slides past and beelines for the table by the window.

“I’ve got a question that may offend you if I ask it,” Harry announces, throwing his bag on the table, and then blinking as he makes eye contact with a new boy.

“I’m sure that won’t stop you,” Zabini says dryly, then inclines his head at the boy next to him. “This is Theodore Nott.”

“I know him,” Harry says, then flushes, pulls out his chair and sits down. “Sorry. We’ve partnered in potions before.”

Nott nods. He looks different in this lighting than he does in the dungeon; still severe features, all cheekbones and jawlines - almost aristocratic, but; softer. He’s in a v-neck light blue sweater, and his hair is all curly instead of gelled back.

Harry doesn’t want to say he’s handsome, but - he is. Handsome in the sort of way that Harry has appreciated before; put together but with some sort of messy energy underneath all of it, something that he cannot hide. Harry’s sure there’s a flush on his cheeks now; or there would be if he hadn’t inherited his father’s brown skin.

The thought of his father sobers him. Harry twirls his wand around his fingers, and says, “I want to know why your families joined Voldemort in the last war.”

Greengrass flinches so hard that her whole body tilts against the floor, and Zabini’s usual serene expression twitches for a moment. But Nott doesn’t even move, just stares at Harry unblinkingly, still as stone.

“I did say that you wouldn’t like it,” Harry mutters.

Zabini closes his eyes for a long moment. Then he rolls up his parchment, steeples his fingers together, and sighs. “My mother did not directly follow the Dark Lord in the last war, you must know. She never took the mark - she never even met him. After my father died, right after she found out she was expecting, she lived primarily in our estate in Italy.” He hesitates for a moment. Picks up his wand and, with a muttered charm, sets it back down again. “I do not wish to be overheard in what I am about to reveal, Black, I hope you can understand. What I - and presumably Daphne, in the future - am about to say must stay within your own mind.”

Harry nods, twisting the ends of his scarf together anxiously. “I understand.”

“You and I have spoken about magic. Dark, light, grey - my mother believes it doesn’t matter. Magic is simply magic. So when our folk first started accusing her of being a dark witch, it didn’t bother her. It did bother her, however, when the ministry got involved and tried to take me away from her.” Zabini scrubs at his face. “They didn’t succeed, of course. They were stupid to even try. But it was enough to plant seeds of suspicion in her, and when she began to receive letters that spoke of a world where she could practice whatever magic she wished too without losing her son, she was… intrigued.”

Harry could understand that. Honestly, he could. He could even agree with it. What he couldn’t understand was how she put that wish over innocents who were being hurt by the same man who was promising to protect her.

Greengrass seems to read the look in his eyes easily. “It was more complicated than you think. There had been a build up in the last fifty or so years regarding the use of prohibited magic. The ministry had begun to search manors at random, send Aurors to shut down completely legal businesses down Knockturn Alley, even started to pass laws about magical creatures like werewolves, vampires, and Veela not being allowed as functional members of society. That’s what the Dark Lord originally said he wanted to change. He preyed on families and people who were victims to what was happening,” She took a deep breath and then sat down beside him, as if steeling herself for what she was about to admit, “And when he started taking action against muggles, well… at that point, some people were in too deep.”

“And the others?” Harry asks lowly.

Greengrass shrugs helplessly, blonde curls bouncing. “The others thought he was right. Black, Grindelwald had nearly destroyed the wizarding world with the help of muggle bombs only fifty years prior. We were dropping like doxies, our numbers decreasing; many of our parents had become infertile from the exposure from the radiation of the war. They were angry. I’m not saying it was right, but -“

“He chose the exact right time to do what he did,” Nott finishes. He didn’t look away once from Harry as he spoke, his gaze piercing. “He had the perfect opportunity, and he took it. We can debate the morals of it all day, if you wish. That’s what it all comes down to in the end. Each side chose what they believed most important, and fought for that importance above all else.”

Harry knew that already, although he had never truly allowed himself to delve into it. Feeling truly out of his depth, he says, “Everyone is so afraid of him, though. Even his own followers. How can you trust someone so deeply to fix your problems, if you can’t trust them not to hurt you?”

“That’s why my mother stayed on the outskirts,” Zabini says, “She had hope for a new future, yes. But she wasn’t willing to bet our lives on it by getting any closer.”

Greengrass explains, “My house has been grey for as long as we have been a house at all. We pick no sides in wars, and we never have. We are supposed to be part of the world’s balance; had the Dark Lord ever asked us to publicly join him, it would have been a grave insult to our family.”

“I’m sure he asked for something else, though,” Harry says quietly, because he’s not an idiot, he can tell that the girl is being careful with her words.

“My grandfather gave him money,” she admits quietly, something like shame sweeping across her face. “There was never any proof of it, of course. By the time the aurors came knocking, my grandfather had been dead nearly two years already. My father was the new Lord, and he’s well respected in the ministry - works with international law. He would never do what my grandfather did- but people think he did, so the aurors still come by sometimes, the papers try to smear us…”

She trailed off miserably, and despite his reservations, Harry couldn’t help but feel sorry for her. He didn’t know her that well, but she seemed honest; she could make him laugh, and she was wicked smart. She had been a baby when Voldemort was in power, just like he had, and the thought of people blaming her for anything at all seemed completely ridiculous.

“Good thing there’s another war on the horizon, then,” Harry says, and reaches forward, grabs both her hands and squeezes them gently. “You’ve got plenty of time to prove yourself.”

“Why are you asking all this, anyways?” She inquires, and pulls her hands back, but not before she taps her thumb against Harry’s own, a little thank-you in the rhythm.

“I want to win this time. Permanently,” Harry tells her, and turns to the two boys in front of him so they hear it clearly too. “I have a feeling I might need to go into more politics than just plain brutality.”

Nott makes an amused sound, watching him with hooded eyes. “Running a little late, aren’t you?”

“Better late than never,” Zabini bats back, then turns a stare to Harry. “We need to get you an entirely new wardrobe.”

While the three Slytherins begin to argue about which colour would suit his complexion the most, Harry leans back in his seat and watches them. He’s not quite sure what he’s doing anymore. Just that when he’s around Ron and Hermione, he feels this little glimmer in the back of his mind, how they’re so good and he’s poisoning them with just his very presence. And he loves them, he does - more than his own life, more than probably anyone in the world, apart from Sirius - but they’re just so light. So disconnected from the touch of a bad experience, of a troubling childhood, that no matter how much they try and understand, they never will.

Harry had been raised on poison. Had begged for it, even, because being given the attention of hatred was better than being given nothing at all. He remembers the shouting, the harsh grip of Vernon’s hand tightening around Harry’s little arm, the ringing in his ears when Petunia swung the frying pan and he wasn’t fast enough to move away. The spiders in the cupboard under the stairs and how when he first got to Hogwarts he couldn’t sleep because his bed was far too soft compared to the hard wood floor he was used to.

It stays with him, that. Just like the shame still lingers on Greengrass’ face, and the way that Zabini tries to keep a mask over his emotions, and how Harry knows that Nott’s father was one of the death eaters at the graveyard last summer, but that Nott is sitting across from Harry anyways, arguing about whether to get him dress robes with periwinkle lining or emerald.

Harry opens up the book in front of him - A Guide to Wizarding Politics; history of houses, etiquette, and supreme law - and sinks into the words, determined now to make a difference in a way that will change everyone’s - even Zabini’s dark witch of a mother - lives for the better.

-

“I didn’t know that we have seats in the government,” Harry is telling Sirius through the mirror, eyes wide. “Or that your house is one of the most noble and most ancient.”

Sirius laughs. “I’m glad you’re keeping up the studying, Haz. We do have seats in the Wizenmagot, of course, although they’ve been dormant for the past fifteen years now. Not that it makes much of a difference - the Blacks almost exclusively voted for dark and ancient laws. The Potters were often a balancing force, though.”

Harry thinks back to what Greengrass had said in the library the week before. “My family was grey?”

Sirius’ eyes lit up. “Been talking to some of the old families, have you? No matter. Yes, the Potters were notoriously grey. They’d immigrated here from India some hundred years before, but had been an established house there for another hundred. India had some interesting magic - parseltongue originated there, I’m sure you know - so occasionally your family leaned toward darker laws, though occasionally they believed some to be too old fashioned, in which case they leaned light…”

Sirius continued to ramble on about how the magical government worked, completely unaware that he had turned Harry’s entire world view on its head. All this time, he had thought that his parseltongue was an evil, stained magic that he had somehow shared with Voldemort - but really, it was a gift within his family? And he was Indian - Harry remembered the years he had spent wondering as a child why his skin was so much darker than the Dursleys, and how when he had finally gotten the courage to ask Vernon, his uncle had muttered something about deserts in Pakistan and a stain on England, and that was that.

“Sorry, Sirius, I missed that last part,” Harry interrupts, setting the mirror down against his bedpost as he pulled out some parchment. He wanted to write down everything, though he didn’t think it would even be possible for him to forget information that he had wanted his whole life.

“I said it’s a shame that you didn’t learn Punjabi growing up. I only knew French and Latin, but James taught me as we grew together, and then it was a fun little secret between us, you know?” Sirius’ gaze seems a bit far off, his eyes unfocused. “No one else could speak it, really. Just us two and his parents - maybe a couple of the older kids, but - it used to drive Remus and Lily and our other friends mad. They’d be so angry, they could never understand us. Would try translation spells and everything.”

His father spoke Punjabi, Harry thought, and scribbled that down too. And Sirius spoke French and Latin as well - though that wasn’t too surprising, he supposed. He had heard Malfoy talking in rapid French to some of the Slytherins before, and most of his classmates were passable in Latin in order to gain a better understanding of the spells they used.

“My mum never learned it?” Harry asks.

Sirius shook his hair out of his face, mouth split open in a grin. “No, and bless her, honestly. I think she knew that it was mine and Jamie’s thing. I don’t think he wanted her to learn it at all. She spoke Gaelic, anyhow, with Remus and Mary.”

Gaelic, Harry wrote, and then, Mary? He had learned more in the past ten minutes about his parents than the past fifteen years, and his head was beginning to pound. His quill struggled to keep up as Sirius slowly dropped small facts about his parents; Lily had grown up in the English Midlands, but her mother had been from Scotland, and that’s where she had learned the language. Petunia had been her only sister, but Lily was closer to her dad than her mum. Lily called James ‘Jim’ because only Sirius was allowed to call him Jamie, which drove Lily half mental, and subsequently she had let only Remus call her ‘Evans’ for an entire year and only allowed James to start again when he proposed. James was an extremely early riser; Lily would often sleep until noon.

Over and over and over it went, until slowly his parents began to form actual shape within his mind. Harry had always seen them; had always loved them; but there had been pieces missing for as long as he could remember.

“I remember this one time I had been fighting with Remus,” Sirius tells him, looking more animated than Harry’s ever seen, “So I went round to your parents, and I woke Jamie up, and he made me climb right between him and Lils. When I woke up in the morning, he’d just left me in the bed with her while he made us breakfast, and I remember your mum looking at me and going, ‘He’s our husband, isn’t he,’” Sirius snorts with laughter, grinning larger when he notices Harry’s own chortles, “But that was the Potter’s, always too kind for their own good. Soothed me when the nightmares were bad, and Lily must’ve rubbed my back raw with all the nights I spent puking firewhiskey over the toilet.”

Without meaning to, Harry feels his eyes well up, and he blinks, turns his head to the side to hide it from his godfather. He’s not jealous, exactly; sure, he wished his mother was around to rub his back when he was sick, and that his father was there to make him breakfast in bed, but mostly Harry was overcome with a pure wave of sympathy for Sirius. How brutal, it must’ve been, to lose his two best friends in the world in a split second. To be the only one to know the truth of their demise.

Harry thinks about how he would feel if Hermione and Ron were dead; he adds Luna, Neville, and the Weasley twins to the equation, then even Nott and Zabini and Greengrass, and still the pain of it feels horrifically distant to Sirius’ own.

“Haz?” Sirius calls softly, and the warmth of a nickname makes Harry shudder, wishing that he was curled into Sirius’ side instead of hearing his voice through a mirror, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you.”

“You didn’t,” Harry reassures, and then reassesses the situation, because he is crying a bit, “Well, maybe, but not in the way you think.”

“Sometimes I just forget that they’re gone,” Sirius whispers, “You know?”

“No,” Harry admits, perhaps too honestly, “I don’t. They’ve been gone my whole life. All I know how to be is an orphan.” And it’s not a lie. He’s never woken up to noises downstairs and thought it was his dad clattering about; never heard a woman’s laugh and equated it to his mother’s. His parents being dead is as sure of a fact in his life as the sky is blue. He’s not sure if that’s better or worse than Sirius.

“I need to check something,” Sirius says, fiercely. “But if I’m right, if my brain hasn’t been too addled by Azkaban - well. You aren’t an orphan, Harry. Not when I’m still here.”

His reflection fades from Harry’s view. Calmly, Harry sets the mirror under his pillow, rolls up his parchment, checks that the curtains are pulled tight around his bed, gets under the covers, and lets himself cry it all out.

-

Nott is the only one in their library nook the next night, curled up against the window and staring drearily at the moon. Harry thinks about leaving him be, wary of disturbing the quiet - but Nott’s expression is far from peaceful.

“I won’t bite,” Nott says quietly, not taking his gaze away from the glass. “You can sit.”

Harry sits. He doesn’t take out any of his books, or his notes. He is still a bit melancholy from his talk with Sirius, heart a little heavier than he usually allows it to be. He would’ve shoved the sadness into a little corner of his mind - or spun it into anger, spitting and mad - but he was a bit too tired, a bit too bitter. He’d avoided Hermione and Ron the whole day, skiving off his Transfiguration class and spending a solid couple hours beneath the warm water in the showers. His hair is still damp from it. Water slides down the back of his neck, but Harry can’t find it in himself to shiver.

“Do you believe in a God, Potter?” Nott breaks the silence.

Harry scrunches his nose. It takes him a moment to respond; he’s not used to being ‘Potter’ in their corner of the library. “No.”

It’s a short answer, and it’ll stay that way. The truth is a complicated thing that Harry himself still struggles with. But Nott waits patiently, quietly, until Harry sighs, and adds, “I never prayed, you know. But sometimes my Aunt would take me and my cousin with her to mass on Sundays, and we would be kneeling in the pews, and all I could think was that if God was real, then why had he taken away my parents? And why did my knees have to hurt in order to talk to him - why couldn’t I just sit on the bench and pray instead?”

He still remembers the stained glass windows, mostly because he thought that if he lived somewhere with them, he would stare at the way the sun shone through for hours. He remembers the touch of the priests’ thumb against his forehead, the cold water he dipped his fingers in when they walked out, and the way the singing echoed in the emptiness.

“I believe that pain is a central factor in life,” Nott says smartly, as if it’s something he could talk about for ages. “It grounds us, keeps us humble. Keeps us sane and thankful that we’re not always surrounded by it.”

Harry can’t help but sigh. “I said that once, you know, to Hermione. She told me that it makes sense that I thought that, because all I’ve ever truly known is pain. But most people don’t, and they turn out just fine. Just as humble and sane and thankful as the hurt people around them.”

Nott looks stricken, his face paler than usual. Then it clears, and he turns to face Harry, pulling a chain that hang around his neck out from under his jumper. “I never believed in that singular muggle God, of course,” he says smoothly, as if their previous sentences hadn’t been uttered at all, “Not many magical families do. Most of them are traditional wiccans - my family is descended from Vikings, Potter, did you know that?”

Harry shakes his head. That hadn’t been in any of the house politics books he had read over the past few months. Harry struggled to wrap his mind around the fact that magic had been around long enough for it to transfer through Vikings.

“We believe in Norse gods,” Nott whispers, making Harry lean closer, “My family always has. They say that’s where we got our magic from. You’ve never seen my father fight, though, I’m sure.”

“I’ve seen him get tortured,” Harry says, quietly and quickly, the words rushing through him, “I’ve seen him kiss the feet of a halfblood.”

Theo’s eyes glint a streak of silver, and then he leans back and chuckles, slow and long. “We have many gods, us Norsemen. Yet my father only truly worships one. I cannot speak his name, but I will tell you that one of His core principles is resilience.”

Harry snorts. He’ll listen to Nott’s culture, truly, he will. But listening to Nott’s father’s beliefs, after he had chanted Harry’s name in the graveyard five months ago - that would be harder to respect.
Nott doesn’t seem angry, though, which is a surprise. He just says, “I know what you’re thinking. Logically, though - my house is still standing. My father isn’t in Azkaban, not now and not after the first war, either. He has a high role in politics, endless money, more land than he could ever see, and a son to continue his legacy. That sure sounds like resilience to me.”

Harry is already shaking his head. “No, Nott. Your house is still standing because your father chose to join Voldemort instead of getting destroyed for saying no; your father isn’t in Azkaban because he bribed officials and witnesses; he has a role in politics because your grandfather did before him and money and land for the same reason; and his son will never continue his legacy, because they will both die before the new war ends if he keeps making the choices he does.” Harry pauses, and meets Nott’s gaze. The silver is there again, but that’s fine; Harry can flash red right back. “That’s not resilience. That’s all the fault of our piss-poor excuse of a ministry and delusions that you let yourself believe because you are terrified that there is no explanation for our magic - it simply is.”

There is a very long, very drawn out silence. Harry doesn’t regret what he said, although it was harsh for a boy he had only spoken to maybe ten times prior. But it was true, and sometimes the only way to make people listen is by being honest.

And maybe he’s still feeling a little bit raw, a little bit cut open from his grief. Cedric’s face glimmers in his mind; the dimple on his left cheek, and the way his hair fell over his eyes, and the warmth of his soulless body as Harry pulled him from the graveyard.

There was certainly no God there.

Finally, Nott hums. “You may have some potential in you yet, Potter.”

“It’s not potential,” Harry says, his exhaustion bone deep. “It’s just fight. My parents gave up their lives to let me live. I won’t welcome Death with open arms.”

“You cannot turn him away,” Nott states. His sleeve falls down a bit on his arm; there’s a long, thick scar that travels from the end of his thumb to the side of his wrist and into the depths of his jumper. It’s purple, like it was too deep to heal properly. Harry watches it ripple as he moves.

“I can deny him for as long as I’m able,” Harry says, and thinks about his parents unfolding from his wand, of the scar that goes down his shoulder from the blade of Wormtail’s knife, of the lightning bolt that splits his face in two.

Nott makes a humming sound. “You don’t believe in muggle God, or my gods, or Death. What do you believe in?”

Himself. But he won’t say that. Not just yet.

“My friends,” he says instead, because it’s still true. “And the ability to survive.”

There’s an appraising look in Nott’s eyes. He turns away from the window and sets his chin in his hands, his full attention focused on Harry. “We do need to get you new robes. And I’d like to see you duel.”
-
Black,

Draco will not stop speaking about the secret group he believes you are in the process of forming. While seeing his hair stick up is quite entertaining, I would err you to be cautious and continue on as silent as possible.

And why aren’t you wearing your new robes? Do you know how long it took me to figure out your colour palette?

I’ll be in the library tonight if you wish to discuss either of these matters further.

B.Z.

-

Hermione’s head rested gently on his shoulder, and Harry did his best to keep very still, in hopes of letting her stay asleep. The bags under her eyes had been extremely fierce recently; she’d been doing an absurd amount of studying on her own. Harry knew he had been worrying her with how often he was disappearing, but she never brought it up.

“D’you mind if I say that the moon is predicting you’ll beat my arse next term?” Ron whispers from his place on Harry’s other side.

Harry can’t help but snort. “No, mate, go on. I’m sure Trelawney will like the drama of it.”

Ron hummed. “How would you know, Haz? You’ve skived off at least half her classes since we got here.”

It wasn’t accusing; just curious. Harry knew Ron was worried about him too - he was just better at hiding it than Hermione was. And as much as Harry adored Hermione, Ron knew him in ways that she never would.

Ron had helped pull the bars off his bedroom window in Surrey. He’d been the one to lay in bed with Harry in third year, when the memories of his mother screaming were too much for him to bear. He was the only person Harry had ever trusted to rub the bruise cream into the imprints of his uncle’s fingerprints that bloomed across his upper arms.
Harry loved Hermione. No matter what, her and Ron were a part of him. But for all her smarts, all her wit and ambition, she was thoughtlessly naive. It wasn’t all her fault - Harry and Ron had, perhaps unconsciously, done their best to shield her from the worst of it.

She had grown up so privileged, and she didn’t even realize it. Her parents were married, and both respected dentists with their own practice. She was given love and whatever material item she could ever want. And Harry was glad for it - she deserved that happiness. But Ron, for all the love he was surrounded by, was toeing the line of poverty; Harry had never known love nor money at all before his two best friends. There was understanding that they shared without her, and Harry hoped it stayed that way forever. He would never wish for her to go through what he or Ron had.

So he’ll stay still and let her rest on his shoulder for as long as she needs, even with his arm falling asleep. Harry leans his head back against the sofa, meeting Ron’s gaze with a sigh. “I think Hermione has the brightest future out of anyone in this school,” Harry says, not really answering Ron’s question. “No offense.”

Ron doesn’t smile. “I think yours is plenty bright.”

Harry closes his eyes. He says, “Ron.”

They sit in silence for a long moment, but there’s no scratching of a quill that would signify that Ron had gone back to his homework. Instead, a calloused hand cards through Harry’s hair, achingly gentle.

“You think you don’t have a future,” Ron states more than asks.

“I should’ve died at least five times,” Harry agrees, “I’m living off of stolen time.” What he doesn’t say is this; Harry cheated fate the first time, so it came back and bit Cedric. He’s cheated it twice now, more than that - so which one of his loved ones is going to die next? Which one of his friends will pay for his life?

He doesn’t open his eyes to look at his best friend, but the hand through his hair doesn’t stop its soothing movement. He hears Ron hum, listens to the sound of him breathing. “He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named tried to kill you. That’s not your fault, Harry. He stole your time- you aren’t stealing anyone’s. You’re just fighting for it all back.”

It’s such a simple point of view, such simple words, and such a Ron perspective that it makes Harry let out of a low laugh. Because Ron isn’t really wrong, either. But he’s too optimistic; or, rather, he wants Harry to stay alive, and he’s willing to look at things positively to have it stay that way.

Regardless, “I’m tired of fighting, and I think at the same time, it’s all I know how to do. I want to be able to go through a school year where the biggest concern is passing my classes, not nearly being murdered.”

Ron cracks a grin. “You’ve got some shit luck, don’t you?”

“Just a little,” Harry replies, and he tries to make it sound like a joke, but his voice comes out much more weary than he means it too.

Ron’s smile fades. “Me and Hermione love you, Harry. I know I don’t say it enough, but it’s true. And I know you’re doing some secret thing now, with some new secret people, but - we’re always going to be here for you. You can always come home to us.”

It’s a nice sentiment, and Harry believes that Ron does mean it. Yet it’s hard to explain that as much as he loves them, Harry’s home is Sirius.

He tries. “I miss my mum and dad.”

Ron stares at him.

“You know, sometimes, back in third year, I would be so angry with you when you woke me up from my nightmares. Because there, at least I got to hear their voices again,” Harry admits softly. “I envy the dirt that holds them now. Most days, I wish I was lying in a coffin between them. I get angry at the fact that other people are buried next to them; it should be me by their sides.”

Ron says, “Harry.” His brown eyes are dark, even in the firelight, and yet Harry can still see the aching sadness in them. It’s not sympathy - Ron knows Harry doesn’t want that - and it’s certainly not understanding - because Ron couldn’t begin to understand the grief of an orphan - but it’s love, all the same.

“I want to keep you safe,” Harry says, gently, and tilts his face into Ron’s palm, something he hasn’t done since they were very young, “You and Hermione both. Your family, and hers. And I know that I can. But I also know that I don’t think you would approve of the way that I’m doing it, or who I’m doing it with.”

Ron looks at him; really stares at him. He rubs his thumb across the bone of Harry’s cheek, pale skin bright against light brown. “You do whatever you have to do, Harry. I won’t stop you. But the minute that you get hurt, you have to come to me. I won’t let you suffer just so that I don’t. It doesn’t work like that.”

Harry smiles at him, something real and heartbroken and genuine, because he knows it’s true. He remembers the beat of Ron’s heart when Harry fell asleep against his chest; the way that Ron cried as he comforted Harry after the graveyard; the gentle pressure of Ron’s fingers as he rubbed bruise cream into Harry’s skin after a particularly hard summer with the Dursley’s. When Harry suffered, Ron did too. It was how brothers worked.

“I don’t know if you’ll like who I am anymore,” Harry admits, “After all of this is over.”

Fiercely, simply, Ron replies, “I would follow you to the ends of the earth, Harry. Liking you has nothing to do with it.”

-

Heir Black,

I write this missive as a formal invitation to attend a feast and lively discussion within my family’s manor at a time of your convenience over Yule break. My father is incredibly interested in my new alliances, and I do believe you would be interested in his knowledge regarding international law, specifically on past conquering.

Your father is more than welcome to join us. House Greengrass looks forward to breaking bread with you both.

Heiress D.G.

-

“Left!” Zabini’s voice calls, and Harry hits the floor instead, narrowly missing a purple jet of light that would’ve hit him square in the ribs.

“That did not look like a stunner!” Harry yells back, jumping back onto his feet.

“Think of it as motivation, darling,” Greengrass’ voice echoes all around, but the smoke that surrounds him makes it impossible to know where she truly is. “Turn right for me.”

Harry dives to the left. A small bomb explodes on his right, leaving his ears ringing. “Honestly, Greengrass!”

She tells him to go to the right again; Zabini cries something about jumping up. Their voices overlap against one another, making Harry’s sudden headache throb. And then Nott’s voice, too, saying “Down, left, up, left,” and Harry listens, focuses on the drawl of it, blocks the rest of the chaos out.
When Nott’s voice trails off, so does the smoke clouding his vision, and he’s back to standing in the center of the room of requirement, surrounded by mats and cushions.

Greengrass lounges casually on a floating sofa, twisting a curl around her finger. “Passable, Black.”

Zabini laughs from his spot on the floor, robes splayed around him. “How hard was it for you to just listen, and not to fight back?”

“Nearly impossible,” Harry admits sheepishly. He’s sweating a bit, even though he’s clad in muggle joggers and a thin shirt - that is now singed nearly to shreds after that bomb that the blonde Slytherin had thrown. “Especially when I got bombed,” he adds, glaring sharply as Greengrass.

“Nevertheless,” Nott says, appearing suddenly on Harry’s side. It would’ve made the Harry of last month jump; now, he simply sighs, used to Nott’s silent movement. “That was very good, Potter.”

Harry blames his flush on the heat. “Thanks, Nott.”

Greengrass clears her throat. “What is your defense group working on this week?”

“Hexes,” Harry says dryly. It wasn’t something that most of the DA was very happy about; hexes were classified as dark magic more than anything, which was a well known fact to anyone who had a drop of magic in their blood. But Harry believed them necessary to learn, and had firmly told the group that anyone who disagreed was more than welcome - and encouraged - to leave.

He wasn’t exactly popular right now. But then he was used to that, and everyone was learning hexes anyways. He could deal with anger if it meant survival.

Zabini’s eyebrows raised. “You’re really feeding them to the lake monster, aren’t you?”

Harry scoffs, and rolls his eyes. “I’m having Ginny teach them the Bat-Bogey hex. That’s nearly harmless. I’m teaching them ones they’ve already heard of; tickling hex, the stinging hex, all those.”

“And did you tell them that if they leave the tickling hex on their victim for too long, it could cause a heart attack? Or that if you aim the stinging hex at the right point of the body, you could paralyze someone from the neck down?” Zabini says, propping himself up on his elbows. “Just because you’re not teaching them the scalping hex, or the blood boiler, doesn’t mean you aren’t still teaching them dark magic.”

Harry accepts the glass of water that Nott offers him, taking a long sip before he answers. “I thought you didn’t believe that magic could be dark.”

“I don’t,” Zabini agrees. “I know it’s about intent, and I know that you know that too. But do they?”

“They’ll learn soon enough,” Harry says roughly.

Theory has always been harder for him than practical work. He doesn’t know how to explain intent to the DA, mostly because as the days pass, Harry finds it harder and harder to truly care what magic he does, as long as he can keep his loved ones alive.

Zabini opens his mouth and then closes it abruptly, looking away. “Of course.”

“Don’t push yourself too hard,” Greengrass says demurely. “Otherwise this will all be for naught.”

Harry hated how proper they spoke, mostly because he was starting to sound like them too. He’d spent the past month with the three of them whenever he had a free moment - Hermione and Ron were convinced that he had a secret lover. And sometimes, loathe as he was to admit it, the way the trio of Slytherins acted around him almost made him think so too.

Regardless, what mattered was that Harry was quickly becoming what he knew was the absolute best version of himself. Greengrass had started him on nutrition potions - secured from her mother, who was a healer at St. Mungo’s - and Harry had shot up nearly 12 centimeters since. Zabini taught him etiquette, politics, and, strangely enough, Italian. Harry was now the (slightly embarrassed) owner of a new wardrobe, random jewelry pieces and different types of shoes included. His hair had been cut, his glasses replaced, and the carvings in his hand from Umbridge were re-healed after every detention - because for all of Harry’s newness, he refused to stop speaking up.

Nott, meanwhile, had quickly become Harry’s shadow. He answered all of Harry’s questions - about spells, about religion, about people and families and what they were having for supper - and when he didn’t have an answer, he would do anything to find one. He sat on the ledge of the lake while Harry ran circles around it every morning, regaining the muscle and stamina he had slowly been losing at the Dursleys. He came up with training ideas, encouraged Harry to agree to teach the DA, and gathered information quietly to add to Harry’s notes.

Harry didn’t truly understand the nature of all of this. They still didn’t call each other by their first names; they never spoke in public; the trio stayed silent when Malfoy was sprouting off blood purity nonsense, and they stayed silent when Harry screamed at him right back. It didn’t make much sense. But then Harry was being taught things, was being nurtured and perhaps even cared for; a piece of him relaxed the moment he saw Greengrass’ princess curls, or Zabini’s slow smirk, or Nott’s glinting eyes.

They didn’t talk about Voldemort, not really. They didn’t talk about Greengrass’ grandfather or Zabini’s mother or the fact that it was only a matter of time before Nott’s father presented him like a prized cattle for the taking to Voldemort, offering up his son’s left arm. Harry wanted to bring it up, with a desperation that verged on madness, and yet he made himself wait.

They had taught him patience. He didn’t think such a thing was possible.

“We’ve been here hours,” Harry agrees, letting his shoulder brush softly against Nott’s. “I need a shower. And to speak with Sirius.”

Communicating with his godfather had become nearly impossible. Umbridge had closed all the fireplaces, was checking their mail, and Sirius seemed to never be around his half of the mirror. When Harry did manage too catch the man, it never seemed to be a good time; Sirius always looked distant, bags heavy under his eyes and surrounded by countless tomes, though he still refused to tell Harry what he was researching.

“I’ll walk you back,” Nott says. He hands Harry a robe before they go, makes sure it’s tied appropriately so that no one can see his ripped mess of clothing underneath, and then nods firmly at Greengrass and Zabini.

“I’ll see you both tomorrow,” Harry says absently, flicking his wand up into the holster on his arm.
The door closes gently behind them, Zabini’s laughter cut off suddenly. It’s late - they’d missed dinner practicing. Nott was quiet beside him, as if taking Harry’s lead.

“I’d like you to answer some of my questions at some point in the future,” Harry says finally, when they’re walking through a hallway that has no moving paintings. “In the near future, that is. We don’t have much time left.”

“I know,” says Nott, his voice strangely small.

“Do you?” Harry asks, genuinely curious. “It’s nearly Christmas break, Nott. Voldemort won’t be willing to wait much longer. He’s incapable of staying out of the light.”

“Ironic,” Nott snorts, then gets serious again. “I understand - and it’s Yule break, we’ve spoken about this - that’s why we’ve been sending out all your political letters recently, you know. Trying to get a leg up before the Dark Lord can do it too.”

All Harry does is sigh. Greengrass and Zabini had written long missives with beautiful, swooping handwriting the week before and sent them all over the place; to the directors of several different ministry branches, to the heads of families that his family had once had alliances with, to shopkeepers and restaurants. He didn’t think it would do much, not when the smear campaign against him was still very much active within the paper, but Nott said that when Voldemort eventually exposed himself, Harry would look better for being early on top of things.

“Nott,” Harry says quietly as they descend the stairs toward Gryffindor tower, “You’re avoiding my point.”

“Black,” Nott parrots, “I know I have a choice to make. I’m just…” He hesitates, awkward to admit, “I’m not ready to do it, not just yet.”

Harry stops just out of sight of the Fat Lady, and reaches out a hand, grabbing Nott lightly by the wrist. “I’ll be honest with you. I think you’re funny, and honest, and maybe not a good person, or a very moral one, but a decent one all the same. I think I know why you’re helping me. I think I know what you want. If I’m right, and you make the choice I am expecting, then I will do everything in my power to protect you.”

Nott’s throat bobbed.

Harry tightens his grip on Nott’s wrist hard enough that he knows it has to hurt, but Nott doesn’t look away from his gaze, only stares steadily back. “If I am wrong, and you make a choice that directly harms the people I care about,” Harry took a deep breath, and took a step forward, so close to the other boy that their chests touched, Harry’s lips nearly pressed to Nott’s ear. “I will kill you, and I swear that on Merlin himself, and all those gods you believe in too. They won’t be able to save you. Not from me.”

Nott’s breathing hadn’t changed; he had made no sound. But then Harry felt Nott’s hand grasp the top of Harry’s arm, right in the middle of the scar Wormtail had gifted him. He didn’t flinch.

Nott’s eyes were wide and blown. “No one will ever need to save me,” he said lowly, like a prayer, “And certainly not from you.”

Harry shudders. Then he nearly shoves Nott away from him, turning on his heel toward the entrance to the tower.

“Goodnight, Nott,” he says briskly, trying to hide an almost imperceptible shake in his voice.

Nott is very quiet when he responds. “Goodnight, Harry.”

-

Harry Potter-Black,

My apologies on how we never got to finish our last discussion due to your rather abrupt departure from Hogwarts. I find myself worrying that you are upset with my lack of explanations, and I wish to give you all that I can.

On a similar front, you were right. I don’t have much time left. At the very latest, we have until the end of this new year to find a solution.

Do not let my trust in you be a mistake.

Theodore

-

Harry curls into the corner of Sirius’ bed, covered up in a mountain of his soft blankets. It’s still chilly, somehow, like the very essence of the Black Manor is projecting Harry’s bad mood.

Harry thinks it will remain chilly forever, then, because even though Ginny has said that he’s not been possessed (within her own personal expertise), there’s still the small matter of Harry having visions of Voldemort’ life. The others don’t seem to understand his upset - and talking about his feelings regarding his parents’ murder always seems to put a damper on things.

Which leads to now, with Harry in a tight ball, back to the wall, and Sirius trying to coax him out like a scared dog. Christmas music floats softly from the hallway; the festivities were ongoing, despite the fact that the new year had passed four days ago, and winter break was coming to a quick end.
Sirius’ bedroom had changed. The posters of naked muggle women had all been taken down, and the photo of the four original marauders had been replaced with one of just Sirius and James, both in leather jackets and holding up muggle concert tickets between their fingers. The picture of Sirius and Bellatrix that was once in a beautiful gold frame on the nightstand had been replaced with a solo of Lily’s laughing face, red hair twirling around her smile. And next to that - a picture of Harry reading by the fireplace in the library, glancing up and grinning at the flash of the camera, his scar bright against summer-tanned skin.

It wasn’t just Sirius’ bedroom that had changed, but also Sirius himself. He had gained a healthy amount of weight, some of which Harry could tell was turning into muscle, and his hair had been cut into something that made him look almost regal, the curls falling against his cheekbones. Even his tattoos, which had before looked faded and been nearly impossible to read, were now vibrant and clear. It was as if someone had begun to breathe the life back into his very soul. Harry, in comparison, felt as if he was falling short. Four months had passed and all he had to show for it was slightly longer hair and a new scar etched into his hand.

So he didn’t particularly want to crawl out of the nest he had made for himself. He hasn’t wanted to do much at all, actually - other than Christmas dinner, and lunch on New Years, he’s seldom left Sirius or Regulus’ bedrooms, preferring to be left with the comfort of his own thoughts or the familiarity of his favorite books. He hadn’t even opened his Yule presents.

Sirius wasn’t giving him much of a choice, it seemed. Harry was nearly flung out of the bed, dragged to the edge and with his blankets ripped off, shivering in an old sweater that he was pretty sure had once belonged to one of the Weasley twins. “Sirius,” he groaned, more than a little cold, and much more than a little annoyed.

Sirius shook his head at him. Strangely, he was dressed in nicer muggle clothes; jeans with no rips or stains, a plain shirt instead of one riddled with music references, and a respectably plain overcoat instead of his usual leather jacket. “We’re going out, Haz. Put this on,” and he threw a pile of clothes at him, ignoring the dumbfounded look in response, “And then we’ve got a portkey to catch. Hermione and Ron are set to distract Molly and the rest of whoever stops by today. If all goes well, no one will even notice that we were gone at all.”

“I hate portkeys,” Harry mutters, but goes into the washroom and puts the clothes on anyways. He’s wearing practically the same thing as Sirius, and struggles to contain a snort. He looks in the mirror and barely recognizes himself; his hair, long and wavy instead of its usual short and wild curls; skin that has paled dramatically in the cold weather and sickness; his eyes, still a striking green that Harry knows can genuinely scare people, framed by new square glasses that Nott had ordered for him two months ago. Like this, he almost looks like a younger Sirius.

Sirius stares at him when he steps back into the bedroom, head tilted like a dog. He hums, walks a half circle around him, then holds out his wrist. “Hold my hand, mate, then I’ll say the word - don’t want you getting lost, do we?”

And Harry is suddenly, absurdly, glad for Sirius Black, because only Sirius would assure Harry’s fears in such a kind and subtle way. Because Harry knows that Sirius will never let him get lost again. So when he says the word, and they spin into a whirling mess of light before landing hard on wooden floors, Harry feels nothing but his godfather’s warmth, and the gentle pressure of a palm in his own.

They’ve landed in a dining room, but not the large and fancy sort of dining room that exists within the Black Manor, but the kind of welcoming one, like in the Weasley house. Less cluttered, yes, but just as homey- there are framed pictures of crayon drawings and awards on the walls, cushions on the chairs, and obviously expensive but still mix-matched plates and cups along the table.

Sirius helps him up from the floor, but does not let go of his hand. Harry, feeling a bit like a child, does not loosen his grip either.

“Always landing where you aren’t supposed to,” a wry voice says from behind them. Harry spins around, his hand halfway to his wand, but stops at the sound of Sirius’ laugh. The real laugh, the one Harry barely hears anymore.

A beautiful woman with wild, curling hair grins at them from the doorway that Harry assumes leads into a kitchen. She’s got the same glinting silver eyes as Sirius, the same fair skin, but her face is softer, laugh lines set deep into the corner of her eyes. When she comes to stand before them, to look at Sirius in the face - her face tilted up, just a bit, as she’s slightly shorter than Harry - she has the same devastatingly mischievous grin.

“Andi,” Sirius says, and ducks his head, allows her to kiss both his cheeks, then the tip of his nose, “You haven’t aged a day.”

She scoffs at him, then promptly turns to Harry, “And you must be Sirius’ famed son,” her eyes flicker to their hands, still clasped together, to the tattoo of Harry’s birthday in Roman numerals that climbs up the side of Sirius’ neck, “You would have called me Aunt Andi, if you were raised as you ought to have been. As it is - just Andi will do.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Harry gets out, and then he and Sirius are getting pushed into seats at the table, and food is being scattered across, music playing softly from the other room. A man comes in and introduces himself as Ted, shakes Harry’s hand firmly, and then forces his wife to sit down before pouring them all wine, plus a glass in the empty seat across from Harry.

“Our daughter,” he says, shaking his head in fond exasperation, “Perpetually a mess, that woman.”

Sirius grins at the table. Harry feels as if he’s missing out on a joke, but it’s no matter; he thinks that he’ll understand it soon, or Sirius will explain if Harry needs to know.

Dinner is entertaining. The food is good, and the wine better. Harry’s on his third glass when Ted and Andi’s daughter finally graces them all with her presence, and who is it but Nymphadora Tonks, who laughs so hard she gives herself a chicken’s beak when she realizes him and Sirius had snuck out and weren’t actually having a heart-to-heart like everyone at Grimmauld had been told.

“You can just call me Dora,” she sighs, put upon, “It gets confusing here otherwise, everyone is a Tonks.”

Andi is hopelessly behind on any sort of pureblood gossip, and Sirius has the absolute time of his life updating her on what she missed after she ran away. She’d been betrothed to Lucius Malfoy, Harry learned, but after running off that betrothal had been pushed off to Narcissa, her youngest sister, who, “I think will never forgive me for it, although their marriage is one of the happiest I’ve witnessed, and I’ve certainly kept my eye on them,” Andi says.

Sirius replies, “Narcissa never wanted anyone’s leftovers, Meda, and that’s really all you ever gave her.”

“I gave her a fighting chance,” Andi sniffs, “Better a weak willed Malfoy than a brute like McNair, or worse. Everyone knows what happened to Tiberius Nott’s wife.”

Harry, unbidden, flinches. He thinks of Theodore Nott’s hand brushing against his in the training room, his gods and the absent manner in the way he speaks of his father. “What happened to her?” He interrupts, soft.

“Those sorts of curses aren’t appropriate at the dinner table,” Ted evades, then says to Sirius, “My wife knew what she was doing. Narcissa would get Malfoy, fool that he is, because no one at all wanted Bellatrix.”

Sirius stiffens. “Anyone would have been lucky to have Bella,” he says, which is so completely not what Harry was expecting that he ends up gaping like an idiot, “She was an incredible force. Not a single one of those,” his jaw clenched, as if he was holding back several foul words, “leeches deserved her.”

Andromeda laughed. It sounded slightly mad.
“Always the first to jump to my sister’s defense, Sirius, even a decade in Azkaban by her side couldn’t change that…”

Dora’s hand is frozen halfway to her mouth; a bit of mashed potato falls off her spoon with a muted plop.

“Yeah, well, no one else ever did,” Sirius says starchily, “And anyways,” he begins to add, and there’s a mean glimmer in his eye, and Harry knows he’s about to say something cruel, “Even in Azkaban, Bella believed I was innocent. Even helped me escape. And you couldn’t even visit me. Didn’t even send a letter.”

“That’s unfair,” Andi says, her lip trembling.

Sirius asks, “Is it?”

Dora, slowly, sets her spoon down. “Hey, Haz, why don’t we go get the dessert?”

“I’ll come with you both,” Ted agrees, already rising from his chair.

Harry looks at Sirius. Sirius looks back at him, his brows drawn. There’s a film across his eyes, an angry flush to his cheeks; the muscle in his jaw works furiously, as it often does right before he gets into a screaming fight with Mrs.Weasley.

Slowly, Harry takes another sip of his wine. “I’ll stay.”

Dora gives him an exasperated look. Ted throws his hands up in the air but slips through into the kitchen all the same, making a truly unneeded amount of noise as he begins to prepare dessert.

“Sirius,” Andromeda says, and there’s a movement like she almost reaches a hand out to him but stops herself, “I’m so, so sorry that I never checked up on you. I truly am. I should have - written to you, at the very least.”

“There’s a ‘but’ in there,” Sirius drawls.

Andromeda nods. “But, truly, what did you expect? And don’t -“ she held up a manicured finger, the deep black polish reflecting off her nail in the light, “Don’t you interrupt. Listen to me. You loved Bellatrix something fierce, everyone knew that. I was working as a healer during the war, but I heard the rumors all the same; that you two fought, and you both bled, and suffered, and hurt, and yet somehow you both stayed alive. After Regulus died - and I still don’t know whether it was the Light or the Dark or himself that finally did him in, but regardless - I thought you must’ve found out it was someone on your side, that it was one of those big reasons you defected, and then after Bella was arrested for,” and at this she finally chokes, and stops her monologue for a long moment.

She takes a deep breath, spins the wedding band around her finger, and continues. “After Bellatrix committed that awful crime against the Longbottom’s, I suppose I assumed she had a reasoning for it. That Alice must’ve been the one to kill Regulus, and somehow my sister had found out and exacted her own revenge.”

There’s a long silence. Harry tries to put the pieces together with what he knows; the Longbottom’s were Neville’s parents, who Bellatrix had tortured to insanity shortly after Voldemort had perished. Neville’s dad, Frank, had been a healer (Harry assumes that meant he had been mates with Andi) and Alice, Neville’s mum, had been an Auror, working in the same squad as James and Sirius and a couple of their other mates from Hogwarts.

Sirius laughs, and it sounds hollow. “You’re still, somehow, blaming Bella for it all. My fake betrayal, Regulus’ death…”

“The way she tortured two of your closest friends to insanity?” Andi snaps brutally. She smirks meanly when Sirius flinches. “You would have followed her to the ends of the earth, cousin. Past it, even - you would have dived off the edge of it with her.”

Sirius’ lip curls. “I grew up, Andi. Things changed after you left.”

Andi didn’t physically flinch, but her eyes seemed to darken with the reminder.

“As in, you found new people to obsess over,” is all she says in response, voice dry, “James and Lily Potter, I suppose.”

Sirius’ hand clenches and then relaxes very quickly around the stem of his wine glass. “I loved them, yes, if that’s what you’re asking.”

Harry felt as if he was rapidly losing understanding of the conversation. Across from him, Dora’s eyes were flicking between her mother and Sirius as if she were watching a ping pong game. Harry could still hear Ted banging around in the kitchen; the music had been turned up just enough to be mildly headache inducing.

“Not the way you loved Bella,” Andi says, and it’s like a sing-song, a mocking lilt to her words.

Sirius snaps, “I could never love anyone the way I love Bella, and I could never love anyone the way I loved James. Nor Regulus, nor Lily. There was never a competition, Andromeda, that’s not how it worked.”

“So you were allowed to love all the people you wanted too, but they were allowed to love only you?” Andromeda shoots back.

Sirius is just as quick. “Is that not how the Black madness works? Is that not how you felt with Cissa, with Ted? With Dora?”

“That possessiveness isn’t normal,” Andromeda hisses, and she finally seems to break out of the careful, nonchalant front she had been presenting; she leans forward, teeth bared. “It isn’t natural, Sirius, it twists up inside of us and will ruin us all completely if we let it. I left our family for a reason. I don’t have that madness that you speak of, not anymore.”

Harry thinks about the way Sirius always says Bella instead of Bellatrix, like he has to remind everyone he knew her more intimately then the rest of them; the way he says my idiot little brother and keeps Regulus’ room locked and secured against the Order; the story of how only he had been allowed to call James by a nickname, how he had slowly seemed to secure a spot in James and Lily’s bed between them. Each little puzzle piece forming together, until slowly Harry begins to see the way Sirius’ love floats just a little past overprotective and hovers into something that looks a lot like control.

Sirius stares at her, his expression stormy. “I left too, you know.”

“And you ended in Azkaban,” Andromeda spat, “And right back in the very house you ran away from. Your best friends and brother dead, your sweet Bella rotting in a cell. And for what, exactly?”

Sirius looks at Harry, and his gaze softens, and Harry remembers the way Sirius had yelled at Mrs. Weasley over the summer (“He’s my godson!”) and their subtly matching clothes and the countless tattoos dedicated to Harry that were riddled across Sirius’ body; and the way Harry grew out his hair and had started to respond more quickly when people called him Black than Potter, and he thought that he knew what Sirius was going to say before he said it, and that maybe he didn’t even really particularly mind as much as he should.

“For Harry,” Sirius says softly, and places his hands flat against his thighs, his shoulders relaxing, like his entire body had exhaled, “Always for Harry.”

“Every person that you have ever felt that possessiveness over is dead,” Andi responds, and she says it quietly, but it feels heartbreakingly loud. The music, abruptly, shuts off completely.

Ted leans against the doorway, holding a hot pink tray. “Cupcakes?”

-

“Mum was just being dramatic, Harry, don’t you worry,” Dora tries to soothe. Her and Harry are sitting together on a dark green sofa in the living area, which reminds him quite starkly of the Slytherin common room. It does not help his mood.

Harry stabs at the cupcake in front of him. It’s neon orange and covered in those little edible googly eyes. “She shouldn’t have said it. She had to have known it would make Sirius upset.”

They both glanced behind them, toward the doorway that led to the kitchen and subsequent dining room, where two voices were screaming at one another, shrill and angry. Their words were hard to make out, but the emotion was clear.

Dora winces. “I think that was rather the point, darling.”

And, well. James and Lily were dead, Regulus too, and Bellatrix was practically worse off than them all - not that Harry could even begin to understand her and Sirius’ relationship or whatever it was, Sirius had certainly never mentioned it to him before, barre the few pictures of her that had once been pasted around his bedroom - so maybe Andromeda had a bit of a point. And Harry had heard about the Black madness, of course, from Sirius himself, but also from the books in the Black library, and from rumors throughout school when Sirius had first escaped two years ago. Mostly, he remembers third year, when Crabbe had made a comment about it being inherited and the way Draco Malfoy had gone ghostly pale and snapped at him to shut the hell up, which, now that Harry knew Draco’s mother was Sirius’ first cousin, made a lot more sense.

Dora makes a halfhearted attempt to divert his attention. “Let’s be normal for a bit, shall we?”

“What’s normal?” Harry asks, and shrugs off his coat so that he’s left in just the soft green shirt Sirius had thrown at him so many hours earlier.

Dora’s eyes flicker to the purple scar on his left shoulder, and then linger on the mottled scar that traces down the length of his right arm. “Point proven. How about you tell me where you got that monster?”

Harry laughs. “It’s a long story,” he says, but tells her the tale all the same. Fawkes’ tears had sewn his skin up, but a thick, silvery line remained, and likely always would.

Dora is shaking her head by the end of it. “I just can’t believe Dumbledore didn’t get the Aurors involved, with that many children petrified.”

Harry remembers the cold of Hermione’s skin, her glassy and unseeing eyes, and shudders. “He should’ve. It was pure luck that me and Ron figured it out when we did.”

And it was. Luck and Hermione’s brain, even when she wasn’t there to tell them herself. And then it had been Harry’s fight to protect Ginny, to keep Ron safe, that had given him the strength to thrust the sword into that basilisk’s head as he had. That’s all it ever comes down too, in the end.

“Have you told Cousin Sirius about all this?” Dora asks, and she’s tracing the inside of his arm, and he lets her. He thinks about how different she is here; speaking the way his Slytherin friends do, with a different name, a slightly different attitude. Her appearance, too - she looks like her mother, but with straight black hair instead of curls, the same silver eyes glinting at him. He thinks about how, in another life, in the right life, she would have been raised as his cousin, or maybe they would have been raised as siblings, like their parents before them.

“Of course I have, he knows everything about me,” Harry says flippantly, and looks down at his hands, where there are several scars littered below his knuckles, little splotches where the oil jumped up and burnt him when he was first learning to cook at the Dursley’s. He had been about five, he thinks, maybe six, standing on a chair in front of the stove and trying to read from a cookbook without glasses. “Almost everything.”

He can hear Andromeda shout, “There was a difference!” And Sirius groans, “Come on, Meda,” and he’s not sure if they’re arguing about the same thing or if they’ve moved onto something new. Ted has turned off the music, but continues to clatter on in the kitchen, albeit more quietly this time.

“At least they’re speaking,” Dora says, and at Harry’s disbelieving look, laughs. “Mum hasn’t talked to Narcissa since she ran away nearly thirty years ago.”

Harry hums. “Or that’s just what she’s told you.”

Dora takes it with grace. “I suppose you could be right, but honestly, Harry, my mother holds grudges like no other. I’m afraid I’ve got the opposite problem - my Huffepuff shining through compared to her Slytherin - and even I doubt I could forgive a sister for doing what Narcissa did to my mum.”

And so Dora gives him more details, halting and slow. Andromeda running away hadn’t just resulted in her younger sister and Lucius Malfoy’s engagement, but also several years of physchological war after the fact. Andromeda was hounded by letters, howlers, animals and even random acquaintances - not pleas to come home, but a reminder that she had permanently tainted herself and the Black blood. A reminder that she would never be allowed back. Ted was turned away from every job he applied for and eventually ended up working in the muggle world with forged documents, despite the fact that while at Hogwarts, before he and Andromeda had come out publicly, he had obtained an apprenticeship in ward casting, and his expertise should have been extremely sought after, especially as the war picked up. Andromeda had not been allowed at Regulus’ funeral, and had to fight tooth and nail to secure her job at St. Mungo’s hospital. At one point, when she had finally believed it over, Narcissa placed a curse that made every item of jewelry or clothing that Andromeda had ever touched burn itself to ashes. Nevermind the fact that the two sisters had shared mostly everything, so many of Narcissa’s own belongings had burned too - the idea of revenge was just too great to pass up. Andromeda had been 25 years old with a newborn and no clothes or sentimental belongings, right back at the beginning, feeling as if she was 17 and hopeless all over again.

“She’d never admit it, but I’d say it nearly killed her,” Dora says conversationally. “She’s still a bit mad about it, you know. She gets scared to touch anything expensive. Sometimes she won’t even touch me.”

Feeling vaguely horrified, Harry nodded along. That was an entirely new avenue of hate that he hadn’t seen before. Petunia and Vernon hated him, surely that he knew, and they could be right awful, but he imagined that if he left their house they would probably throw a damned party. They would never try to reach out to him in any way at all, not even to gloat, and they certainly didn’t care enough about him to terrorize him throughout the years. Because that’s what it seemed like to Harry - like Narcissa was pulling on Andromeda’s pigtails, a little sister begging not to be forgotten and left behind. A cruel, perhaps evil little sister, but a little sister all the same.

“I’ve seen Narcissa a couple of times. Usually at the train station or in Diagon,” Harry offers, and makes himself take a bite of Ted’s terrible cupcake, “I know her son, Draco, he’s in my year. A Slytherin, and… well, he’s a bit of a berk.”

Dora laughs. “Language.”

“Prick, then,” Harry says, grinning at her snort, “Not all the Slytherins are bad, but it’s like he’s trying to encapsulate the evil stereotype. And his dad…”

The glint of blonde hair under the moonlight. The cackling laughter and the sound his knees made against the mud as he knelt before his lord, kissing the bottom hem of his robes. The crooning of Voldemort’s voice saying, “Malfoy”.

Harry shivers. “Lucius Malfoy is as awful as they come.”

“To you, I don’t doubt it,” says Andromeda’s bemused voice from behind them. She’s leaning on the doorframe, Sirius by her side, although he promptly moves forward to sit next to Harry on the sofa instead, their knees clanking together.

Harry grins sideways at him. “Better, now?”

“Getting there,” Sirius sighs. “The more I learn.”

“Lucius is a wonderful husband to my sister,” Andromeda continues, coming around the room and sinking into an armchair across from them, legs crossed daintily. “He truly is. He loves her, and their son, very much.”

“There’s just that small matter of him being a terrorist,” Dora says snidely, her palm still resting against the basilisk scar on Harry’s arm. Harry’s cheeks warm from the defense.

Andromeda gives her daughter a sharp look, and then concedes with a nod. “Yes, there is that. But what I’m trying to say is that when I left, I wasn’t damning Narcissa to a life of hatred and abuse. I knew that she was a survivor. I was too - but I wouldn’t have survived in that house much longer.”

“There was always this disconnect,” Andromeda explains, and talks at length about how Andromeda had been closest to Narcissa, and Bellatrix closest to Sirius, and how they had all shielded Regulus as best as they could together. Sirius scoffed at that, which made Andi admit that she had left when Regulus was rather young, but that she had been playing the role of protector for her two little sisters and her younger cousin for as long as she could remember before him.

“I appreciate that, Andi, I don’t want you thinking I don’t,” Sirius interrupts, like he needs her to understand, “But I was so young when you left, and Bellatrix took your spot as my guardian. To me, she’s all I’ve really ever had.”

Andi makes a face at this, so Sirius takes over the story. He talks about how eventually he had grown up too, and then it was just him and Bellatrix protecting Narcissa and Regulus, two broken and cracked souls shoved together and forced to survive in a house of pure horrors. They had taken turns protecting each other - and then Bella had won her round.

“She told me to run away,” Sirius reveals, “She said that if I didn’t, I was going to be sent to Voldemort before the next moon fell. I asked her about Reggie - and you know what she told me?”

Harry, who felt as if his brain was melting, shook his head. Dora’s fingers squeezed around his arm so tightly that he could feel her nails digging into the skin.

“‘You’re a brother, but you’re a Black first. And if you don’t leave, we’re all going to die.’” Sirius quotes it like it’s never left his mind, and maybe it hasn’t; maybe this has been his real motivation all along. “So I left. And I survived, and my baby brother didn’t.”

Andromeda has a shaking hand pressed to her lips.
Sirius leans forward and presses his forehead against Harry’s own. “Sweetheart,” he says, like a prayer, like a promise, “In the last war, I owed Bella my life. We made it into a game of cat and mouse. But things are different now. It won’t be the same this time around.”

Harry says, his eyes closed, “You still owe her your life.”

“No,” Sirius says, and it’s so fierce that Harry starts, “She owes me yours.”

“Sirius won’t play with her this time around,” Andi adds, her voice soft. “He has a son to think about.”

“A son to keep alive,” Sirius adds, his voice deadly serious, and something in Harry cracks and breaks and heals all at once, his heart beating like a bullet, happy and humming. Harry has been a lot of things; a leader, a friend, a lover, a brother - but he’s never been a son. He never thought he would be again.

Still; “You won’t be able to protect me,” Harry warns, “Not from this. Not from him.”

Dora’s hand clenches tightly around his arm. He glances back at her, watches the way her face twists, like his words bring her physical pain.

“I know,” Sirius admits, “But I can certainly try.”

“The only person who can save you, is you,” Dora says quietly. The chain around her neck sparkles, diamond catching the light. Harry, idly and absently, wonders who gave it to her. “That doesn’t mean we can’t help you at all, Haz. You aren’t alone.”

He’s been told that sentiment so much recently that sometimes he feels as if he’s living inside of a dream. He’s been alone in his whole life. He doesn’t know how not to be.

But Dora’s hand is soft in his, and Andi and Ted’s gaze is kind, and the glint in Sirius’ eyes is laced in love. He welcomes it, for once.

And maybe Sirius sees the wary acceptance in Harry’s eyes, because that’s when he tells him about blood adoption.