Welcome to the Family
Arcturus was getting too old for the mantle of Lord Black. With arthritic hands that struggled to write out the many letters he had to send out daily, and old, rheumatic bones which struggled to carry him to the Wizengamot, it was really quite overdue that he stepped down.
Yet, with the House in the state that it was in currently, he simply couldn’t afford to. For a while, he had thought his prospects secured when he had his son, and had been even more assured in his beliefs when Orion had sired his own two heirs, even if he had done so with his own cousin, much to Arcturus’ disgust.
Then, it all went so, so horribly wrong. Sirius ran away from home at sixteen, and Walburga burned him off the tapestry herself, despite his very clear orders that she was not permitted to do so - for all his faults, at least his foolish nephew had had the decency to listen when told that he could not burn his daughter off of the tapestry for taking the Dark Mark.
As if that wasn’t bad enough, Regulus had simply vanished in late 1979, never to return, and Orion had lost whatever remained of his feeble mind over it, and kicked the bucket himself not too long afterwards.
Within the space of three years he had lost as many heirs, and his lineage was now extinct in the male line. If he abdicated the Lordship would go to his cousin Pollux, which wouldn’t be terribly bad, but Pollux was hardly better than Acrturus himself when it came down to the issue of health.
After Pollux, the Lordship would fall onto Cygnus, which would surely spell the end of House Black. The man was the very definition of a craven, losing his firstborn to the Dark Lord, his middle child to a filthy mudblood and letting his youngest lust over that fool Lucius Malfoy like a cat in heat - Arcturus simply could not tolerate the fact that his great-niece’s husband had longer hair than she did.
His nephew lacked what was needed most to be the head of such a prestigious House - a backbone. He let his peers walk all over him as though he were a house elf, as far removed as one could possibly be from the strong bearing needed to be a Lord.
Arcturus personally put it down to bad breeding. He had warned Pollux about the Crabbes, but the boy had been too foolish to listen, and managed to land himself with a daughter while he was still in his third year of Hogwarts, and she had been a thorn in his side for the next sixty years until her blissful passing two years prior.
Alphard had been by far his favourite out of Pollux’s children - the noble Black blood had evidently won out with that one, even with that silly Crabbe bint as a mother - but he had passed before his time, leaving his woefully inept younger brother in line to inherit a title he had no right to.
Arcturus sighed, dropping his quill as his hands began to shake so violently that he was flicking ink across the letter he was penning. He shouldn’t have to deal with all this pressure, not at his old age. It should be Orion at this ruddy desk, not him. He needed another heir, but as none were forthcoming…
He made to dip his quill back in the inkwell, but the gentle tinkling of a silver instrument on his desk stopped him. Someone had entered the wards - more than that, two people had entered them, and both were of Black blood. Arcturus couldn’t remember the last time that had happened, so long ago that it was. Narcissa did not bring her son with her whenever she deigned to visit him, nor did she ever join Bellatrix on her visits, and Cygnus simply never visited at all.
It had surely been some time in the seventies when this last happened, and Arcturus eagerly rose from his seat, desperate for a reprieve from the writing. He made his way out of the office and down the stairs as fast as he could - which, with his shuffling gait, was not particularly fast - and into the entrance hall, eager to see who was visiting.
Perhaps Narcissa had finally seen sense, and apologised to Bellatrix - he had gone ballistic when he had heard that his great-niece had implied that Lucius Malfoy was more trustworthy than her own sister. Better still, maybe Pollux was bringing his son who had brought so much shame to the family to be disowned. What a treat that would be.
When he opened the door and saw neither of those things, but rather Bellatrix holding the hand of Harry Potter, he very nearly had a heart attack. As it was, he clutched his chest as his heart rate sped up to a very unhealthy pace for a man of his age, and he ushered them both in with a wave of his hand rather than a greeting, lest he reveal how short for breath he had become at the sight.
“Merlin’s beard, Bella. An old man needs warnings about these things,” he eventually managed once they were in the sitting room nearest the entrance, and he was sitting down on his favourite chesterfield sofa; he didn’t trust his legs to carry him an awful lot further than they already had done.
“I’m afraid it couldn’t wait, my Lord,” she replied, her tone terse, as she tightened her grip on Harry’s hand. “I was speaking with Severus-”
Arcturus snorted, interrupting her story before it even began. She was staring daggers at him, but he simply couldn’t help himself. He knew he was not long for this world, and it wasn’t a particularly appealing prospect to him to spend his final years hiding when he was amused, which he most definitely was at present.
“My apologies, Bella, but I seem to recall your ‘speaking’ with Severus being an excuse to get indecently drunk and swap stories like two schoolchildren,” he teased. Bella huffed in annoyance, but there was amusement in her eyes, even if it was clear that she was not pleased at the interruption.
Bella had always been his favourite out of his great-nieces and grandsons. Regulus had always been too quiet, although that was through no fault of his own, and Sirius and Narcissa were both too much hassle for a man his age with all their drama, but Bella struck the right balance between talking and listening which her sisters and cousins could never seem to manage.
He still had deep regrets about the marriage contract with Lestrange - that awful Rosier woman had gone under his nose with that one, and he had been unable to annul it without Lord Lestrange’s mutual consent - and the horrible upbringing she had received, but that was just how it was,
There had never been a Black who wasn’t at least slightly messed up, so he tried not to pay it too much mind. Instead, he motioned for her to continue, and she did, if rather more snappishly than was strictly necessary. He didn’t mind. Showed she was made of firmer stuff than her disappointing father, he would say. Not to be pushed around. She would have been a fine heir, if the Black succession laws allowed it.
“As I was saying, I was speaking with Severus, and he told me that Harry had been placed with his muggle relatives.”
Arcturus instantly stilled at that. He had always wondered why Harry, a Black by blood, had not been sent to live with his rightful House. He had always figured there had been some Potter lurking around who he hadn’t known about, but now the truth was laid out in front of him, and if this harebrained scheme didn’t have Albus Dumbledore written all over it-
“- I entered the house, and it was… despicable, the way they were treating him, my Lord. I could not leave him there for a moment longer. As he is a Black by blood, I propose-” she stopped for a moment, her throat bobbing as she swallowed nervously.
“I propose a blood adoption. We will take him in as a child of Sirius, whose muggleborn mother recently passed away. If you’re alright with that, Harry?” she added, to which the boy nodded.
Arcturus narrowed his eyes in suspicion. He had been under the impression that Bellatrix had come directly to the Manor after leaving the muggles’ home, but it seemed he was mistaken, because this scheme was very clearly premeditated. As it turned out, he was simultaneously right and wrong.
Bellatrix had Apparated directly to Blackwood, but had been struck with a rather brilliant idea before she entered the gates, and had taken a few minutes to explain to Harry who his godfather was and what blood adoption would entail. It helped that she had already come up with the part about disguising him as Sirius’ long-lost bastard during the two weeks she had been waiting for the Dursleys’ car to go somewhere out of the ordinary, and the blood adoption was only a final masterstroke to her plan.
She would soon have the son she had always wanted.
Of course, Arcturus knew none of this, only that Bella had just put forward an absolutely amazing idea, which solved his heirship dilemma in a truly masterful manner. He was so excited at the prospect of having a proper heir that he failed to consider his massive hypocrisy in allowing this half-blood boy into the family, while he steadfastly refused to instate Andromeda’s girl, Nymphadora.
Once again, exactly as Bella had hoped. That would hopefully give her some leverage to get Andi’s disinheritance reversed, as they were clearly already going to do for Sirius in order for Harry to be made heir. Again, she wasn’t a Slytherin for nothing, even if she could be as brash as a Gryffindor at times.
“Very well,” Arcturus conceded. Bellatrix did a very poor job at hiding her jubilation at those words. Slytherin cunning she had in abundance; Slytherin discretion, not so much.
-oOo-
Bellatrix was bouncing up and down with excitement as they made their way down to the ritual room in the dungeons, an action which was made incredibly loud by her high heels in combination with the cobbled floor underfoot. Arcturus was doing a lot of tutting as he shuffled along beside her, and Harry’s grip on her hand was too tight, as though the noise was putting him on edge, but neither of them said anything about it. Neither could, with that bright, glowing smile across her face, as though Christmas had come early.
A son. She had always wanted a family of her own - growing up in a dysfunctional one tended to have that effect on a person - but those dreams had died when she walked down the aisle with Rodolphus. Whatever she thought of him - and it had never been an awful lot, dreadfully boring man that he was - she had known ever since they had first been betrothed that the man was not fit to be a father.
Rodolphus and his brother were both cut from the same cold, unfeeling cloth, and she did not want to subject her own flesh and blood to that type of upbringing. Better by far to feel too much as she did than to feel nothing at all like her husband.
The years had ticked on and on, and her teenage dream of being a mother was slowly forgotten. She would not allow her children to be subjected to such a disappointing father as Rodolphus Lestrange, and after the war had ended there hadn’t been enough pureblood men to go around, and those who were available would be decidedly poor fathers, seeing as they were all a decade her junior, having escaped Azkaban by the skin of their teeth through their young ages.
Unfortunate as it was, it had seemed likely that she would never have that child she had always dreamed of. She had tried to push the thought from her mind, but it never truly went away, and had stung her rather viciously at times, particularly after she had been cut out of her nephew’s life.
Now, though… Now she was about to get precisely what she had always wanted, and there was nothing that could be done to spoil it for her. Her smile only grew wider as they reached the ritual room, and Arcturus ushered them inside quickly, lighting candles in a circle on the floor as she and Harry stood by the walls.
“We’ll be a proper family after this Harry,” she whispered as Arcturus worked to prepare the ritual circle, giving his hand a gentle squeeze. He said nothing in response, but that burning light in those beautiful, emerald eyes of his said everything - he was just as excited for this as she was.
“Have you decided on a new name, Harry?”
While they had been outside of the gates of the manor, Bellatrix had given Harry a shortlist of names which could be shortened down to Harry, while still having a proper pureblood bearing to them. Hadrian had been her personal favourite, but she had also offered up Hyperion, Harrison, Harold, Henry and, reluctantly, Hardianus.
She had mixed feelings about the final name, as it was what her father had intended to name the son he had never sired, but if Harry chose it, she would not begrudge him it. She just sincerely hoped that he wouldn’t, and that he would also stay away from Harold - dreadfully old-fashioned, in her opinion.
There was silence for a moment, interrupted only by Arcturus’ wheezing breath as he shuffled about the circle, correcting the positions of the candles, and she thought that he wasn’t going to answer. Then, he responded in a small voice - so small that she only just caught it.
“Hadrian.”
If possible, her smile grew even wider, now looking as though it were in imminent danger of splitting her face in two. She wanted to sweep Harry up into a bone-crushing hug - her little boy, already so like her! - but Arcturus chose that moment to call them over for the ritual, forcing her to wait.
Harry was instructed to stand in the middle of the circle, while Bellatrix stood on the outer edge of it with Arcturus, ready for the part of the ritual in which she was needed. Arcturus cleared his throat, and began the ritual, getting onto his knees, an arduous affair for a man his age but one which he managed with at least some modicum of grace.
“Harry Potter, child of another, we welcome you into our House. Blood of our blood, flesh of our flesh, from henceforth you are one of our own,” he chanted. He was given pause for a moment by a fit of coughing, but he eventually recovered, and began the second part of the ritual.
“By the fealty of the liege Lord, willingly shown, you are welcomed into the House,” he said, bowing his head to Harry. The flames atop the candles flickered, growing stronger, but he paid them no notice, instead raising his head and nodding to Bellatrix.
“By the blood of a daughter of the House, you are born anew, a scion of House Black,” he continued, handing Bellatrix a ritual knife. She took it readily, and cut open her palm. She dipped two fingers into the wound, and used them to paint a cross of her own blood onto Harry’s forehead, before flicking the excess into the circle. The fire in the candles grew stronger still, but the ritual was still not done.
“Harry Potter, you are born again, a son of the House. Speak your new name, and walk forward a new man,” he concluded. In the circle, Harry sucked in a deep breath and closed his eyes.
“Hadrian Sirius Black.”
For an instant, the candles’ flames roared, and turned from their familiar orange to a bright, blinding blue. Then, they were extinguished, leaving only smoke in their wake, signifying that the ritual was complete. Harry Potter was now Hadrian Black.
He opened his eyes and stepped out of the circle, and the change was immediately apparent. While traces of Harry Potter remained if one knew where to look, for those who didn’t, it wouldn’t be hard at all to believe that this boy had only ever been Hadrian Black.
His messy black hair was now wavy - not as curly as Bellatrix’s, but more reminiscent of Sirius’ long locks - although it retained its previous shade. His eyes had turned beetle black, with only the faintest undertones of their original green shining through when the light hit them just right.
The sallow skin he had had - which was likely due to his upbringing, rather than genetics, seeing as James Potter was always sporting a golden tan and Lily Evans was never quite that pale - was now the perfect porcelain shared by Narcissa, Bellatrix and Regulus; Andromeda and Sirius had spent far too much time outside to maintain the bone-white complexion which the Blacks prided themselves upon.
He was shorter, although only be a hair’s breadth - just because the Potters were taller did not mean the Blacks were not tall themselves - and his appearance of unhealthy skinniness was exacerbated by his new pureblood cheekbones, which looked like two divots on his face when combined with his gauntness.
Bellatrix would have to do something about that. She would not let her son stay in the sorry state those muggles had left him in.
Her son.
Suddenly, whatever the muggles had done seemed very unimportant, as she whisked her son up into a fierce, bone-crushing hug. For his part, Harry did not struggle or try to fight it as most children his age would have done, but readily returned the embrace, his little fingers digging into their purchase on her shoulder-blades with surprising strength for a seven year-old.
“Hadrian Black, my little boy,” she crooned, rocking back and forth in a manner made very precarious by her high heels. She couldn’t bring herself to care. She had a son, at long last - her own little boy.
“Your hand is still bleeding, mum,” Harry whispered, sounding concerned. Bellatrix just laughed. Mum. Harry had called her ‘mum.’ That was far more important than her bleeding hand, even as she put him down to heal the wound and clean the blood from his back where she had been holding him.
There were a million things she wanted to say, but before any of them could escape her mouth Arcturus was shuffling out of the ritual room, loudly calling for them to follow him.
With a long-suffering sigh which made Harry giggle, she took her son’s hand and led him away after Arcturus, listening absently to the man’s ramblings as they went.
For all that she loved her great-uncle, she was not fond of his seemingly endless ability to speak. If given the chance, she was sure that he could talk the ear off of a deaf man. Therefore, she was taken completely by surprise when they arrived in the drawing room of Blackwood Manor, where the family tapestry was housed, as she had not been listening one bit to the one-sided conversation Arcturus was having, only following him thoughtlessly through the house.
“It is time to put right what that awful woman made wrong,” he whispered, shuffling over to the tapestry. Bellatrix just watched from the doorway, not wanting to go near the tapestry. She had always hated the thing ever since Andromeda had been burnt off of it, and only more so after Sirius followed in her footsteps.
Arcturus had removed it from Grimmauld Place after that particular incident, and had spent the next several weeks muttering about how Walburga could not be trusted with even the simplest of responsibilities. Bellatrix had not been into the drawing room of Blackwood Manor ever since.
Oblivious to his great-niece’s inner conflict, Arcturus pressed his wand into the burn mark where Sirius was, a hard glint in his eyes as he stared at the woman above him on the tapestry. Walburga Black, the woman whose heart was so cold that she managed to drive both of her children away from her before they even reached adulthood. He had wanted to do this for years, but it was simply too risky, with Sirius viewed as he was by the public. Now, though…
Now he had justifiable cause to undo what his deplorable niece had done, and he would have been a fool to refuse the opportunity,
“Sirius Black, your liege Lord welcomes you back into the House from which you were cast. By the magic vested in me, I restore your inheritance, and declare you a scion of House Black once more.”
The charred scorch mark on the tapestry suddenly glowed golden, and Acturus’ wand wobbled terribly as the ancient magic of House Black flowed through him and the conduit in his hand. Still, he kept it trained on the tapestry, and the damage slowly began to undo itself.
Charred threads returned to their original green, and a face and name slowly emerged from the burn. Finally, after perhaps a minute of slow restoration, the face of ‘Sirius Orion Black, 1959 - ?‘ glowed golden, and the tapestry was still.
Arcturus let out a shuddering breath, shuffled over to a nearby sofa and collapsed onto it, wiping his brow. This sort of magic was taxing on an adult in their prime, nevermind a man nearly ninety years of age. Once again, he began to bemoan the fact that Orion should have been doing this and not him, but then he stopped himself.
Orion would not have done this, even if he were still alive. For all the faults he overlooked in his son, he could not ignore the fact that he loathed his firstborn. Orion’s other shortcomings were easy to pin on Walburga, but the man’s hatred for Sirius was the only one that he could not.
Walburga despised both of her sons with equal passion. Orion, although begrudgingly accepting whatever punishment his dear cousin-wife doled out to Regulus, revelled in them when they were dealt to Sirius, and actively participated himself.
No, Orion would not have made this crucial decision, one which would save the Black line which had existed for over a thousand years from coming to an end. It had to be him, in his wheezing, rheumatic glory, to step up to the plate. He was too old for this, but that was just how things were. The heir he had been fantasising about for the last decade had arrived. There was no time for complaining, only for action.
He drew in a shuddering breath and got back to his feet, shuffling back over to the tapestry.
“Hadrian, come here.”
Harry looked nervously up at Bellatrix, who tried to give him a reassuring smile which was more of a grimace. She really didn’t want her son involved with that foul tapestry, even though there was truly no other option.
“Go on, Harry. It’ll only take a moment.”
With a slow nod, he walked over to Arcturus’ side. With the extra distance, Bellatrix noticed just how skinny he actually was, and how he was shorter than the norm for his age, despite having genes which should have made him far taller than average, by both birth and blood adoption.
“Place your hand on the tapestry below Sirius, Hadrian.”
Harry apprehensively did as he was instructed, and Bellatrix did not miss the way that he flinched when Arcturus pressed the tip of his wand into the back of his hand. Silently, she moved to stand by the tapestry, and placed her hand on his shoulder.
She hated the thing with all her heart, but she would endure it if it meant Harry was even slightly more comfortable. Judging by the appreciative smile he sent her, it seemed that he was just that.
“Magic of the House, recognise Hadrian Black, son of our blood. Append his likeness to the tree, the son of Sirius Orion Black and a mother of no significance,” he commanded. Bellatrix winced slightly at the phrasing. ‘Of no significance’ was how muggleborns were referred to in pureblood rituals like these, and, although it was necessary for the story they had crafted, it still stung slightly, both because Harry’s birth mother was a muggleborn and because Bellatrix did not want magic to think her a mudblood.
Of course, she needn’t have worried. The magic Arcturus was calling on for the tapestry was entirely different from that which he had called upon for the blood adoption, and Bellatrix was entirely unaffected as the tapestry began to warp.
Slowly, a golden line stretched out from under Sirius’ visage, and went underneath Harry’s hand. He winced, and Bellatrix knew that it was because it burned from when she was added to the tapestry, but he did not pull away, and after the initial shock did not show any further evidence of his pain.
She wondered where he had learned that kind of pain tolerance, but in her heart of hearts she already knew. What she wouldn’t give to wring the necks of those filthy muggles who had wronged her son in this way…
Suddenly, there was a brilliant gold light emanating from under Harry’s hand, and when he withdrew it his face was staring back at them all from the tapestry, with the subtitle of ‘Hadrian Sirius Black, 1980 - ?’ underneath it.
Arcturus took a step back, silently appraising both the tapestry and Harry for a moment which seemed to stretch on into infinity. Harry, although obviously nervous, raised his chin to the elderly man, as though daring him to say something, while Bellatrix held tightly onto his shoulder, waiting to intervene if her great-uncle said anything he shouldn’t about her son.
Then, the old man cracked a wide smile, and placed his hand on Harry’s other shoulder in the way a proud father might do to his son.
“You’ll make a fine heir one day, lad. Come, both of you. We have much to discuss,” he pronounced, before setting off in that shuffling manner of his once more. Bellatrix followed, guiding Harry by the hand throughout the Manor, and became more and more nervous as they went further into the depths of the place.
She had never much liked Blackwood Manor, even though it was much warmer and more inviting than Grimmauld Place and contained much friendlier faces. Despite all these positive qualities, there was something insidious at the core of Blackwood Manor, nothing quite so tangible as for her to be able to put a name to it but enough to unsettle her to her very bones when she dared venture further than the outer rooms, which was exactly what they were doing right now.
She remembered when she was young and foolish, and her little cousins were even moreso. Sirius, all of ten years old and already with too much Gryffindor bravado, had sought her out after a family dinner at the Manor and dared her to a game of hide and seek, convincing her in that nonchalant way of his with offhand comments about how much more room there was here than there was in the other Black family properties.
Regulus had been standing behind him, playing nervously with the cufflinks of a dress shirt that was too big for him but still following his big brother right into the maw of the beast, as he had always been wont to do before Hogwarts. Bellatrix, although she should have known better, agreed to the game to make her little cousins happy, and told them to go hide while she counted.
She counted to a hundred - skipping many numbers in the count, because she knew to press an advantage even if it required her to cheat - and began to seek, but something was so terribly off about the whole thing. It took her entirely too long to find her cousins, especially considering the fact that they weren’t even hiding. Instead, they were sat in front of a door, staring at it completely transfixed.
Bellatrix had felt the dark magic, seeping out from behind the door in an intoxicating cloud, more potent by far than anything she had ever encountered, and more terrible too. Wordlessly, she had taken Sirius and Regulus by the hand and led them back to the dining room.
Sirius was uncharacteristically silent for the rest of the night, and Regulus more shadow-like than ever, practically stepping on Sirius’ shoes so closely that he followed behind his older brother. Bellatrix had decided then that whatever was behind that door, she never wanted to see it for as long as she lived.
Now, nearly twenty years later, she was once again entering the bowels of Blackwood Manor against her better judgement. She was only leading one raven-haired boy by the hand this time rather than two, but this time she was leading him towards the danger, rather than away.
Great-uncle Arcturus was making no noise at all other than his usual wheezing as he escorted them along, which only made Bellatrix more nervous. Wherever the old man was leading them, she sincerely hoped it was for a damn good reason, because she didn’t like this at all. Not one bit.
Finally, after they had been walking for far too long and gone past far too many doors like the one she never wanted to see again, Arcturus came to a stop, and Bellatrix’s breath caught as she realised where he had brought them - the Study, the most revered place in the Black family..
She had never been to the Study in Blackwood, but she knew well enough of its existence. When uncle Orion was particularly drunk, he would boast to father about the Study, how it housed the most deeply private of the family grimoires and how his grandfather, Sirius Black II, had allowed him and uncle Alphard inside when they were teenagers, against Arcturus’ wishes.
Father would always adopt the same glacial smile and stilted politeness when uncle Orion told that story, and Bellatrix would know she was in for a world of pain when they got home, but she banished that thought from her mind. Uncle Orion was dead, and father couldn’t hurt her if he tried now. More important than that was the present, in which great-uncle Arcturus was pressing his Lordship ring to the door of the Study and Harry was hanging onto her hand with a vice-like grip.
“It’s going to be okay, Harry,” she whispered to him, even if the assurance was just as much for herself as it was for her son. Harry nodded listlessly, not looking for a second as if he believed her. She wanted to say something else, but Arcturus chose that moment to usher them inside, and Bellatrix thought better of it.
Father’s study had always been temperamental, and speaking out of turn once inside had often caused the magic inside to lash out against the speaker. She knew that great-uncle Arcturus was not father, but she still thought it best to err on the side of caution in case the same applied here.
Arcturus took his place in a wingback chair - grand and embroidered with the finest silk, with dragonskin upholstery - on the other side of his desk - robust and intricately carved, hewn from what looked to be a solid block of ebony - and motioned for them to take a seat on another chair, less imposing than the first but equally as well-made.
Bellatrix took her seat and pulled Harry into her lap, still feeling on edge but at least content in the fact that the Study was, if not less malignant, then more quietly so than father’s study. She could feel the magic in here, thick and heavy in the air, but it did not feel suffocating as it did in father’s study, where it had always felt as though she was a wrong word away from being set upon by it.
“Now, Hadrian, I understand you have already been through rather a lot today, for some so young and of your… background,” he bit out, as though trying not to say something scathing about Harry’s muggle relatives, “But I’m afraid there is one more thing which we must square off today.”
Harry nodded warily, and Arcturus opened one of the drawers in his desk, rummaging around inside it before procuring a ring. It was a thin, platinum band, the sort of thing Bellatrix would have said was meant to be stacked rather than worn on its own, but then he turned it around, revealing the engraving on the side; ‘Toujours Pur,’ the Black family motto.
“Surely you do not mean for him to take the ring now, my Lord? I mean, he’s just a boy!” she protested immediately upon recognising the ring for what it was, any possible backlash from the Study be damned. Arcturus just smiled condescendingly at her, as though she were stupid, and as though he hadn’t just proposed that a seven-year-old take up an heirship.
“Do use your common sense, Bella,” Arcturus chided, sounding angry for the first time since they had arrived. She felt Harry tense up against her, and she squeezed his hand, hoping to convey the message that Arcturus wasn’t angry at him. “I won’t be around forever. What do you think will happen to you and Hadrian if we do not do this properly, and the mantle of Lord Black falls to your father?” he asked, sneering the last word as though it had dealt a great personal offence to him.
Bellatrix said nothing, because she knew the answer to that question - nothing good, is what will happen to them should her father ascend to the post of Lord Black. Still, she doesn’t say as much because she knew she was wrong to question great-uncle Arcturus, and she hates being wrong. After a beat of silence which went on for slightly too long, Arcturus sighed, but not in resignation. There was a grim determination in his eyes as he looked at the pair of them, and Bellatrix knew by that look that she wouldn't be able to get her way here.
“Hadrian will not grow up the way Sirius did, if that is what you are worried about, Bella. Or the way you grew up, for that matter. We will correct what needs to be corrected,” he said, with a pointed look at the veritable rags which Harry was wearing, “But Hadrian will be raised right. As my grandchildren should have been, and as you and your sisters should have been.”
Bellatrix was halfway to nodding, but she stopped herself when she realised something very important; there was someone they forgot to ask about this plan. Bellatrix had implied that Harry would become the heir by suggesting they take him in as the son of Sirius, and Arcturus was acting as though that plan was set in stone, but it suddenly became known to her that they had neglected to ask Harry for his opinion on all this.
Bellatrix remembered how much she hated decisions being made for her as a child, and that was just the little things - what dress she was wearing to this ball, or what necklace she ought to buy from that shop. She couldn’t imagine how angry she would have been if someone had volunteered her for an heirship without consulting her first, so she doesn’t nod her head, and instead looks down at Harry.
“We can’t make this decision for him, my Lord,” she intoned, and Harry looked up at her, frowning.
“What do you mean? Aunt Petunia decides everything for me,” he said, in a tone filled with such genuine bewilderment that it shattered Bellatrix’s heart into a million little pieces. She wrapped her arms protectively around him, whispering that that would not be the case anymore, but was cut short by Arcturus clearing his throat.
“Do you know what a Lord is, Hadrian?” he asked. Harry slowly shook his head, although he did volunteer an answer.
“They’re like… Posh people with lots of money, right?” he responded tentatively. Judging by the long-suffering sigh which Arcturus emitted, and the slight heaving of Bellatrix’s chest behind him as though she were trying to contain a laugh, that was not the right answer.
“In the most basic of senses,” he replied, drumming his fingers on the table for a moment before continuing. “Well, a Lord has vassals, you see, who pay him tribute. Think of it like a company. The Lord is the boss, and his vassals are his employees. The Lord makes money from the vassals’ work, and in turn they get certain benefits. Does that make sense to you, Hadrian?”
Harry nods, because it does, really. To say he wasn’t fond of the Dursleys would be an understatement, but they did teach him some skills. Vernon, in particular, had led him to having quite a good grasp on business for a boy his age with his talks of affairs at Grunnings, and Arcturus’ explanation fit rather well with what he knew of how companies operated.
“Excellent. Being a Lord is mostly about managing your vassals’ benefits, which usually involve protection and representing their interests in the Wizengamot, which is something I can explain later. It’s a lot of work, but it’s a powerful position. As an heir, you’d be trained on how to be a Lord and, when you’re old enough, take up those duties. Does that sound good to you, Hadrian?” Arcturus continued.
Harry nods, because it really does. Ever since he was little, he had always wanted to be powerful. To be a boss, like uncle Vernon, or a leader, like Dudley. He wanted to know what it would be like to have people listen when he talked, and this heir business sounded like a very good way to fulfil that fantasy.
“Yes, I’d like that,” he decided. Arcturus smiled widely at him, and once more picked up the ring with the funny words carved in it. Behind him, Bellatrix still looked apprehensive, but he wasn’t looking at her, and, as she had said before, it was his decision to make. Not anyone else’s.
That thought made Harry’s chest swell with pride. He’d never gotten to make decisions for himself before - not really, anyways. Anything that really mattered, aunt Petunia made the choice for him, on pain of death if he disagreed with her, and that was that.
The idea that he got to choose what he was doing now was intoxicating, and he hardly paid attention as Arcturus said some chant which he didn’t really understand, before sliding the ring onto Harry’s finger.
Bellatrix watched as her son accepted the heirship ring without displaying even the barest sign of discomfort, and knew she had been right when she had taken him as a powerful Wix.
She had never seen someone accept an heirship or lordship ring before, but from what she had heard the influx of family magic was supposed to be rather overwhelming. Seeing Harry absorb it like it was nothing; well, she knew that her boy was going to be great later in life, to say the least.
Then, she squeezed his hand again and he looked up at her with such fierce determination in those fathomless eyes, with only a sparse smattering of emerald green speckles betraying his previous appearance, that she was forced to amend that statement - Harry would be great sooner rather than later, and Wizarding Britain best be ready for it, because she was going to be helping her son every step of the way along that path to greatness.