A Vessel Formed

Harry held Severus’ hand, as he had for the past week, terrified and alone at his bedside.

One day, a little over two weeks into their stay at the manor, Severus had fallen ill. He had gone to work on whatever project Narcissa wanted him to do and he had not returned.

The Malfoy house elves had ushered him to bed. He had refused to eat dinner. He did not want to eat unless Severus was near him to tell him it was okay — if he even could tell Harry it was okay. Harry still had not forgiven him for being a Death Eater and they had not spoken of it.

But still. Severus was familiar and he had never hurt Harry before, not really, and eating without him telling Harry he was safe felt wrong.

That night, for the first time in a long while, he snuck into Severus’ room.

It had been empty.

“Dad?” He asked as he snuck into Severus’ room, ever careful in case someone was listening in. He received no answer.

He poked his head out into the hallway, “Dad?”

Nothing.

He retreated back to his room. He did not dare wander the manor. He did not dare call for anyone. Harry had been taught better than that. If something was wrong, and it most certainly seemed to be, then he had three simple jobs: keep his eyes open, keep his ears alert, and wait quietly.

So he waited. He stayed as attentive as he could for as long as he could, waiting.

He awoke tangled in the bedsheets. He had crawled into bed to wait quietly while pretending to be asleep, wanting to throw off anyone watching. But he had fallen asleep for real.

Dread filled him. What if he had missed something? What if something important had happened?

Narcissa broke the silence of the room, making him jump and move to hide under the comforter, “Adam, would you come with me please.”

No.

He shook his head, one eye peering through a gap in the covers, searching Narcissa out despite his vision being blurry. His glasses were on the bedside table. “Where’s my dad?” He asked, trying not to sound frightened.

“I mean to take you to him. There was an accident.”

Harry pressed his hand to his mouth to hold in a squeak. So something had happened. Had Lucius hurt Severus? Would a Death Eater hurt another one? Severus had said they were horrible, blood thirsty people. Did that apply to each other? Or perhaps the Order had come and taken Severus. Maybe they had taken Lucius too. Harry knew the Order and the Death Eaters hated one another and they both wanted Harry to be theirs. It was likely that the Order had found out about Lucius having Harry at his manor. Lucius did not seem nearly as careful or discreet as Severus.

“He’s alive, but unconscious.” Narcissa said, her voice level and calm, “We do not know when he will wake up. I am sorry.”

He was still in the manor? He hadn’t been stolen away so that was good, wasn’t it? He would recover. They didn’t know when, but he would. Narcissa had said ‘when’ — when and not ‘if’. Harry clung to the idea.

“What happened?” He asked, still hiding and unwilling to move.

“I am unsure. While he was working on his project he lost consciousness and hasn’t awoken since.” She was sitting in a prim looking chair by his table. She wore a pale, robin’s egg blue dress robe and black kitten heels. She crossed one ankle over the other and folded her hands in her lap. Harry could not make out her expression, but her body language spoke volumes. Severus had taught Harry to be attentive to such things and Harry had only ever observed Narcissa in absolute control of herself and her surroundings. “He is in his room. My elves are tending him.”

“Was he hurt?”

“Physically? I do not believe so.”

Then why had he passed out? Severus was tough. He wouldn’t have simply fallen asleep while researching or whatever it was he did in the Malfoy library all day.

“I—” Harry swallowed thickly. “I’m still tired,” he lied.

“Yes it’s rather early, not quite breakfast.”

“I want to sleep some more.”

Narcissa tilted her head, her pretty hair tipping over her shoulder with the motion, “Oh?”

“Yes,” Harry said, “If my dad’s asleep then he’s not going anywhere and… and he says I’m a growing boy, I need my rest.”

Narcissa laughed a bit at that, warmly and Harry thought that perhaps it was genuine. “Yes, I suppose he’s right about that.”

“Call me for breakfast and I’ll - I’ll eat but I —” he faked a yawn, “I’m still tired, Draco showed me the Abraxens yesterday. It was very exhausting.”

“I’m sure,” Narcissa said, standing and brushing dust that likely did not exist off the front of her legs. “Alright Adam, you sleep. I’ll see to it that you are called for breakfast and then you can see your father.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Malfoy.”

A hand reached out, touching the comforter over Harry’s head, rubbing his hair gently through the fabric, “Of course Adam, it’s the least I can do for family.”

She left him alone, his bedroom door closing too softly behind her. He wondered if she had used a cushioning charm to quiet it so as not to frighten him.

He waited for a long moment, straining his ears to try and pick up the sound of her walking away. He heard her footsteps going down the hall and after a minute, felt somewhat assured that she hadn’t come back and didn’t intend to do so immediately. Praying he was right, Harry slipped out of bed and went into their conjoined bathroom. Yet while the door on his side opened, allowing him access if he needed it, the adjacent door to Severus’ room was warded.

Narcissa didn’t want him inside.

That more than confirmed that she had done something, that Harry was not safe. But it did not confirm that Harry was powerless. Harry had slipped through Severus’ wards and pushed Black back with them as well, he had also managed to apparate Severus from the alleyway where he and Black had fought despite the wards laid down to prevent such a thing. Why would Narcissa’s magic be any less flexible? Nothing had stopped him so far.

Sliding his hand across the expensive walnut door, Harry focused. The ward didn’t feel anything like Severus’ or Black’s. It was lighter, not in strength but in construction. It was flexible too, almost airy. It exuded confidence, just as Narcissa did, and quietly said it didn’t need complex layering, bells and whistles, to be effective and useful. It was simplistic and unflinchingly powerful.

And yet when Harry asked, it shivered.

The whole manor seemed to flex and sigh, breathing out in what felt like a hello.

Had he been here before?

Surely not. But something recognized him, or some version of him.

The lock clicked and the ward fell.

He pushed into Severus’ room, finding the curtains drawn, the dark clinging to the corners. He didn’t care though. Severus was there, laid out under the covers.

Harry ran to him, crawling up into the bed and shaking him, “Dad!” He said, just in case, just in case - but it didn’t work. He shook Severus’ shoulders. He looked dead. He looked dead and Harry had told him not to die.

Please don’t die again.

“Come on,” he said, shaking harder, wanting to jostle the entire bed, wanting to cause an earthquake. “Severus please.”

Harry spoke quietly, leaning over Severus’ form, but he did not wake. He was breathing, slow and shallow — alive. But Harry didn’t trust it. Harry didn’t want to see Severus here, quiet and too pale and barely breathing, asleep and unresponsive. He wanted Severus awake and speaking to him and it didn’t matter that Harry was mad or Severus was a Death Eater, Harry needed him.

Who cared if Severus had tricked him? Severus belonged to him, was a vessel like him. The Voice had given Severus to him, by fate or divine right or whatever else and forget that Merlin had messed it all up, Harry wanted Severus there with him.

Severus may have been a Death Eater, but he was Harry’s first.

“I found him like that,” Narcissa said behind him and Harry jumped, turning around quickly and wishing he had a wand to ready at her. How had she gotten in without him noticing? Had she always been there and simply been hidden? How did she keep sneaking up on him? “You were asleep by the time I brought him into the room and I didn’t want to disturb you. You’re a growing boy. You need your rest.”

Harry winced as she threw his words back at him with such casual ease.

“What did you do to him?” He asked, positioning his small body in front of Severus as best he could as she stepped closer.

“Nothing,” Narcissa said, hands folded carefully in front of her, “other than making sure he was comfortable of course, running some diagnostic spells.”

Harry glared at her, glared at her perfect smile and hair, her dress and her jewelry. Who bothered to dress so nice before breakfast? Why was she always so immaculate in a way that was off putting, that was too perfect? Harry hated her. He hated her calm demeanor and this huge, spotless manor. He hated Draco and his posh attitude and how he always talked as if he knew everything and carried on about his father. He hated Lucius and how he stalked about as if he could own the whole world, as if nothing and simultaneously everything annoyed him.

It was all infuriating and Harry almost wished the Malfoys would treat him poorly, treat him in the ways Severus had described - the ways Death Eaters were supposed to act instead of making him play some pretend game of house where he was Severus’ son and oh- ah wonderful - he got along with little Draco and Leo the crup and oh Severus look our boys are going to go to Hogwarts together and of course they’ll be Slytherins, ah they’ll be the best of friends.

It was all bullocks!

Bullocks!

And Harry didn’t think that word very often because Severus said it was a bad word, but if this wasn’t a bad word situation then Harry didn’t know what was.

“I don’t believe you,” Harry said because he was tired of pretending. He could have swallowed Narcissa’s answer and just gone on pretending that Narcissa was a good person with no ulterior motives, but he was tired. It had been weeks since they’d arrived and now Severus was hurt. Harry didn’t want to play anymore.

“I can show you the results of the diagnostic spell,” Narcissa said and Harry shook his head. He knew very well that she knew what he was saying.

“I don’t believe you didn’t hurt Severus.”

Severus, not his dad, because enough was enough.

Narcissa smiled, expression shifting into one far more knowing than before, the innocent look in her eyes gone. “Perhaps you’re a Gryfindoor and not a Slytherin. A Slytherin would have kept up the act longer, Harry.”

Harry’s heart stuttered, his breath catching.

She knew?

Harry scrambled from the bed, drawing himself up defensively. He’d never fought before, but he would. If he had to, he would. He would take Severus like he had taken him out of the alley during his confrontation with Black. He would run and if Narcissa tried to stop him he would take everything from her too. He would make her forget like Black forgot. Apparition was nothing, breaking wards was nothing, taking someone’s mind was nothing. Harry would do that and more for Severus.

“Stay back,” he said, trying not to sound as terrified as he was. The last time he’d told an adult what to do Severus’ ward was between them. “I’ll hurt you, if I have to. I’ll hurt you.”

She laughed and Harry felt patronized. She likely believed he was just some normal child. A flower vase on the bedside table shattered.

“Now, now,” Narcissa said, mending the vase with a wave of her hand. At the display of wandless magic Harry grew tenser still. “There’s no need for that. I’ve been trying to speak to you since you arrived, Harry. Severus’ … accident, just allows this conversation to happen sooner rather than later and although I had no hand in it I believe you did.”

“I didn’t hurt him! I would never!” Harry said, balking at the idea. The worst he had ever done was make Severus go to — Harry looked back at Severus quickly before realizing his mistake and refocusing on Narcissa. He shouldn’t take his eyes off her. He couldn’t let his guard down. “I made him sleep once, on purpose. Not like this.”

“You’re very powerful,” Narcissa said and she smoothed her dress robes down for the billionth time and Harry wanted to scream. Each and every one of her mannerisms aggravated him and he didn’t want to hear how he was powerful.

“I don’t care,” he stressed the words, “I want to know what happened to Severus.”

“And I want to know what you did to my cousin, Sirius Black — the dog. Because I know it was you.”

The dog — the Order member that Severus had watched for days, Black who had fought Severus in the Alleyway, that was Narcissa’s cousin?

It was Harry's turn to laugh, the sound joyless. It felt too old to come from him, ancient and long exhausted, “I don’t know where he is and even if I did I wouldn’t fix him until Severus was better.”

He didn’t reveal that he had no clue what he had done to Black let alone how to fix it. But if she wanted anything from him then she better get used to being disappointed.

“He’s here,” Narcissa said, unfazed to the point of smiling like she’d won some fight and judging by what she said next she might as well have, “Severus was trying to fix him and I found him like this, harmed by your magic.”

Harry faltered, false bravado wavering. So that was the mystery task Narcissa had set Severus to, fixing Black. He was meant to reverse whatever it was Harry had done to him. No one had ever tried to reverse Harry’s magic. Black had tried to fight Harry as he’d pushed on Severus’ ward, but Severus had never tried to undo anything Harry did by accident, let alone on purpose.

“My magic wouldn’t hurt Severus,” he lied, lied because he had no idea if that was true. Magic was often volatile when someone tried to go against its master’s wishes. Honestly it was surprising Narcissa’s wards hadn’t shocked him when he’d undone them. They had yielded to him when really they should have pushed back. Likewise Black’s anti apparition wards should have hurt him in the alley, but they hadn’t. Harry had blown right through them. If Harry’s magic hadn’t wanted to yield for Severus then they very well could have hurt him.

“Neither of us believe that,” Narcissa said and then moved around Harry, not behind him, just besides, and sat down at the edge of Severus’ bed. “I’m going to tell you something, and I’ll trust you to listen. Then, after, you can decide if you’re going to help Sirius.”

“Why would I do that?” Listen, help Sirius, tolerate Narcissa so close to Severus while he was defenseless, any of it. Why would he do that?

“Because, I knew you, before.”

Harry froze, searching her face and finding absolutely nothing there. She was as unreadable as ever, “When?”

“When you were Merlin, of course.”

Narcissa was right, he had been willing to listen to her after that and in the following days, to see Black.

But what came first was her leading him down a long hallway into a library he had not yet visited. He knew of the main one, Draco had been sure to show it to him, carrying on about all the important texts hidden within — but this one was different, the shelves towering ever higher.

It hid behind a large door with a ward so powerful it seemed to vibrate the entire wall and once within they moved to the back, not pausing to look at strange items or the numerous artifacts hidden under glass or hanging from the walls.

At the back there was a tapestry, more intricate than one Harry’d ever seen, Carrickfergus included. It depicted, in shocking detail, an apple tree at the base of which was a silhouette of a man partially phased into the trunk.

Harry reached out and was surprised when Narcissa said nothing, letting him touch the wool of the weaving. “That’s me,” he said, soft, almost only thinking it.

“Yes,” Narcissa said and as Harry moved his eyes from the base of the tree he found the apples in the boughs filled with names.

He traced a familiar one, “Arne.”

“Arne Ollivander,” Narcissa said and as Harry followed the names she continued to list them for him, “Oriana Lestrange, Emmrick Abbott, Godfrey Prewett.”

“These are all the people that—” Harry paused. He was not sure if he should admit to what Merlin had done.

It didn’t matter though, Narcissa taking the reins easily, “the people you gave the apples, the pieces of your soul — your horcruxes, to.”

“Horcruxes?” The word felt heavy in his mouth, like his tongue had swollen too much to be comfortable behind his teeth and gums.

“An object or entity that holds a piece of a soul severed from its original body,” Narcissa answered, the response rote, as if repeated a thousand times.

Harry’s fingers traced a few other names, he was short and could not reach many despite the tapestry hanging almost to the floor, dominating the entire back wall — Leoric Selwyn, Finnian Gaunt, Ursula Malfoy, “Grimwald Black?”

Was that the same Black as the one he had hurt? Surely it must be, the same as Ursula Malfoy must have been from the same family as Malfoys he knew now.

“One of my ancestors, yes,” Narcissa nodded, “I was a Black before I married Lucius and the ancestral home of the Blacks is at Grimmauld Place to this day — supposedly named after him, despite there being so many muggles about. The spelling and pronunciation is a touch different, but a thousand years tends to do that to language, change it.”

“Why are you showing me this?” Was it just to convince him to fix Black? It couldn’t be. If she knew about him and about the Carrickfergus library then there had to be a deeper ulterior motive, especially seeing as she had promised to show Severus the Carrickfergus library only after he reversed whatever Harry had done to Sirius.

“Despite being the manifestation of our greatest failure, it is a pleasure to have you in my home, vessel.”

His hand dropped from the tapestry, mind spinning with questions. Not only did she know about Carrickfergus, his life as Merlin, and the horcruxes, but she knew he was a vessel. She must have known about the Voice then too. Perhaps the correct question to be asking wasn’t - what did Narcissa know, but rather - what didn’t****** she know.

“What do you mean, failure,” he asked instead of something more broad. He had to start somewhere. He had to find out how much information she was willing to give.

She placed her hand on his shoulder. It felt cold.

“Merlin selected twenty-eight powerful witches and wizards to join him, to gather around him, to be marked by him. It was to these twenty-eight that he granted a piece of his soul in the form of an apple.”

Harry remembered, sitting beside the tree, looking out to Avalon. He remembered Merlin’s body in the woods and the apple like ash on his tongue.

“Merlin split his soul twenty-eight times?”

It sounded horrific. It sounded painful.

If he thought too hard about it Harry could feel his bones throb, his teeth ache in his jaw, his blood vessels squeeze in his eyes. If Harry thought too hard about it he could feel the phantom pains of struggle and desperation.

“I think I did something. A very long time ago and I can’t remember.”

But he did remember didn’t he? Remembered enough, anyway.

“Yes, only the first harvest held pieces of your soul.”

Your.

His.

It really was his, wasn’t it.

“One shard for each of your followers— by your design. They ate the fruit, imbibed you, became a part of you.”

Narcissa’s voice sounded so far away now.

“The families soon found that marrying others, fathering and mothering children with the unmarked, the unchosen by your hands, diluted the horcruxes as they were passed down to their children, made it difficult for the sheds to remain on the material plane. They determined to marry only with each other to keep the power and responsibility you had given them close and did so for a thousand years.”

Harry wondered if Narcissa were to take off her robes, if she would hand two handprints burned into her arms at the biceps. Had the mark been passed on too, or only the remnants of his soul?

“The fact that you are here means we have failed the job you gave us. We have allowed enough pieces of your soul lost, to die, for you, Merlin, to be reincarnated. The death you wished delayed occurred and you, as always, have returned.”

Merlin had wanted the cycle to stop. He had stopped it, but only temporarily and only for himself and now, now he was back. The twenty-eight witches and wizards, they had died off, or diluted the shards of his soul enough for those pieces to slip away into who knew where — the place where the Voice could coalesce them, gather them up and form him whole or whole enough. Who knew if he even had his entire soul or just enough for the Voice to force him to reincarnate.

He felt faint. He pressed his forehead to the tapestry, to the names of his twenty-eight and their children and their children’s children, all the bearers of his desire to put an end to the cycle of vesselship he had not chosen to be a part of and had ultimately failed to stop.

And what of the others? What had happened to the others? He’d already wondered if Severus was mad at him, if he was hurt deep in the parts of him that had been Arthur and everyone else before him. What of the third vessel? Were they mad too? Did they know what Merlin had done?

“If … if it’s an honor to have me in your home,” Harry asked, trying not to stumble over his words. “Then why are you making Severus and I work to get to the Carrickfergus library?”

Narcissa’s grip on him grew tighter, “Two reasons,” she removed one of her hands and Harry wanted to sag with the momentary relief. She held up one finger, “First, my cousin is important to me. Blacks stick together,” she held up a second finger, “Secondly, you and Severus are not the first vessels to come into my home — and yes, I know of Severus. Merlin’s soul would not reform far from Arthur’s, he assured my ancestors of that. I didn’t know it back before you were born, but I certainly know his identity now.”

“Who was the other vessel?” The third, Narcissa had met the third, the last vessel and an important piece in the puzzles he and Severus were attempting to solve.

“Lord Voldemort.”