“Love isn’t something you earn, kiddo.”
“Reneverate.”
Sirius groaned when he was abruptly drug from unconscious to conscious. He brought a hand to his pounding head and opened bleary eyes. He…
Where was he?
Sirius tried to remember the last thing he’d been doing before he woke up in a damp and dirty tunnel…
Oh!
He’d been planning on killing Dolores Umbridge. Harry had called him and said his teacher was torturing him for detention. Sirius went to Hogwarts, made it in the castle, and had been evading his too-forgiving-godson when someone stunned him…
Hermione.
That girl was a pain in Sirius’ arse. Worse than Moony was, really. All rule following until it suited her then she was as ruthless as anyone.
Sirius growled softly and a snort had him twisting his head around to peer in the semi darkness.
“Morning.” Harry was sitting on the floor with his back to the wall. He lit his wand with a quiet lumos and Sirius had to blink through the sudden light to see that Harry’s face was pale and he looked terrible. His eyes were swollen, like he’d been crying, and there were bags under his eyes heavy enough to cause the slump in his shoulders.
“Morning,” Sirius said lightly. He used the light to discern where they were. “Drug me back in the passage by yourself?”
“Nope.” Harry had Sirius’ map open on his crossed legs and he nodded down to where two dots - Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley - were crossing in the Gryffindor Tower. “Hermione and Ron helped.”
Sirius scooted over to sit against the wall beside Harry, rubbing his head ruefully as he did.
“You know, I can’t say I’m too fond of Hermione,” Sirius said conversationally. “Is she always getting involved in things that aren’t her business?”
“No,” Harry said with staunch loyalty. “And I can’t say I’m real fond of you right now, Siri. Do you ever think before you do mad things or did the dementors destroy your brain?”
Sirius scoffed. He loved Harry, but Harry (thankfully) had no idea how close to the truth he jabbed. Sirius had been willing to die or kill for the people he loved before Azkaban, spending twelve years being tormented by the memories of all the times he didn’t protect his loved ones only left him more determined to never let them down again.
Once he realized that the only person left he truly loved was Harry, well, it wasn’t mad to want to get rid of the witch torturing him for fun.
“Never and probably,” Sirius said, forcing some cheer to his voice. He dropped his hands limply to his lap. “You expected me to do nothing about you being attacked by your teacher?”
“Precisely,” Harry emphasized. He pulled his left hand in his jumper sleeve when Sirius’ eyes dropped down to it. Harry could hide it, but Sirius wouldn’t forget the bloody rag that Harry had shown him earlier. “I thought maybe you liked having a soul, but I was clearly wrong.”
“I don’t need a soul as much as you need to be safe,” Sirius scowled. What was his soul if his godson wasn’t safe? Sirius would trade the air in his lungs for Harry, a soul was nothing. “It’s illegal what she’s doing.”
“I, for one, am truly shocked to have a defense teacher commit a crime against me,” Harry drawled sarcastically.
“Remus didn’t.”
“Remus forgot to take his potion and tried to eat me.”
Sirius grinned, “Touché.”
They were silent for a few minutes while Harry struggled to roll the map up with one hand. Sirius breathed slowly, inhaling the cool air and clearing his mind. Harry kept sending him little sideways glances until Sirius cleared his throat and quirked a brow at him.
“Yes?”
Harry scowled at Sirius, pinching his exhausted face up and looking more weary than any teenage boy had reason to look.
“Don’t play stupid, it only suits you occasionally,” Harry said rudely. Playing stupid was one of Sirius’ best talents, truly he’d missed his calling in the field of acting. It was no wonder Regulus had always been a little drama queen when they were younger, it was quite fun. “Will you go home? Please?”
Sirius hummed as he considered it. “Who all have you told about that bitch?”
Harry apparently couldn’t even muster up a grin at the incredibly creative insult. “You, Hermione, Ron, McGonagall,” he said.
Sirius momentarily ignored the twitch of Harry’s limbs when he growled low and deep.
“You told Minerva and she did nothing?!” Sirius snarled. What the hell was wrong with her?! Minerva had once struck Argus across the face when he’d grabbed a student by the hair to pull her through a corridor; what happened to that mad witch they’d celebrated in the Gryffindor Tower?
Harry ducked his head and mumbled out a brief conversation he’d had with Minerva while he ruffled his own hair anxiously.
Sirius sighed when it came clear that Harry had not actually told Minerva.
“You told her you were doing lines,” Sirius said with a bite of accusation in his tone.
Harry snapped back defensively, “I am.”
“In your fucking blood!” Sirius snarled. He tried to push away the anger that didn’t need to use Harry as a convenient outlet. “How bad’s the hand?” he asked once he felt slightly less murderous.
Harry’s sleeve rustled as he pulled his hand further in his jumper sleeve. “Not bad, really. Hermione’s a bit soft, you know how she dramatizes things,” Harry shrugged.
Sirius wished Harry were more soft. He wished Harry had grown up with two parents who babied him and made him soft.
“Let me see,” Sirius said.
Harry clamped his lips shut and shook his head no.
“Show me your hand or I’m going to Umbridge and rip the memory from her mind before I choke the life from her body.”
Harry kept his face closed off and said nothing, so Sirius smiled widely and jumped to his feet, ducking his head slightly to avoid grazing it across the top of the tunnel.
“Go kill her,” Harry called at Sirius’ back. “It’s fine, I adore when you choose revenge over me. An old hat, isn’t it? At least this time I won’t end up back at the Dursleys.”
Sirius winced at Harry’s targeted reminder of his worst mistake in life, a guilt tactic, really, but he didn’t back down. He wasn’t going to let Harry down again.
“Fine.” Sirius smiled blandly over his shoulder. “See you later. Wish me luck.”
Sirius had grasped the rungs of the ladder to go back up inside Hogwarts when Harry called out his name.
“Sirius! Wait! Damn you, you dick.”
Sirius turned his head and saw Harry inching his hand out of his sleeve.
“You’re a blackmailing arse,” Harry muttered.
Sirius chuckled humorlessly. “Says the kid who throws my worst mistake in my face every other day.”
Harry paused as he unwrapped his hand. He looked up at Sirius and his green eyes flashed with a shadow of remorse.
“Quit trying to leave me then,” Harry said quietly.
It wasn’t ‘I’m sorry’, but Harry didn’t do apologies.
Sirius didn’t either, so he leaned to read between the lines.
“I won’t.” Sirius nodded at Harry’s hand. “Let’s see it.”
Harry hissed when he removed the rag and Sirius clenched his jaw so tightly that his neck was sure to be sore for days.
There, in the middle of the back of Harry’s bloodied hand, were the words ‘I must not tell lies’.
Dolores Umbridge had permanently branded Harry a liar for the rest of his life.
Harry jerked away when Sirius thoughtlessly reached out for his hand. Sirius wanted to offer some comfort, offer anything, but the heated anger fled him and left behind only misery at the harsh look on Harry’s face.
“Don’t touch it,” Harry told him. He softened his voice at Sirius’ devastated expression, “It’ll hurt.”
Sirius nodded absently and laid his head back against the rough and grimy rock wall.
“What are you even doing here, Harry?” Sirius asked. “You hate this fucking place.”
“I don’t,” Harry lied immediately. It was as if Harry thought that Sirius hadn’t memorized every teary and rage fueled conversation they had last year - Hogwarts wasn’t the place Harry once thought it was, Harry was miserable there and had been since his name came out of the bloody goblet.
Harry glared at Sirius’ look of doubt. “Maybe you forgot, Pads, but I can’t exactly vanquish Voldemort with all my knowledge about muggle chemistry, can I?”
Sirius chuckled and slumped down, paying no mind to the grimy walls behind them.
“You’re not going to vanquish anyone,” he said. He held his hand up when Harry began to argue. “The prophecy is bullshit, Harry, I told you that. No, listen,” he insisted. “Don’t be an idiot, so much of that prophecy is already wrong. Tony’s never defied Voldemort, and you’re definitely born from him.”
The roll of Harry’s eyes and the scathing look on his face was just further proof. James could never have pulled off a look so cynical.
James never had to.
“But ‘marked as his equal, neither can live while the other survives’,” Harry pressed stubbornly. “That’s what you said.”
“If the beginning is bullshit, then the end is too,” Sirius said, impatient to force his godson to understand. There was no reason for Harry to be there, if his only goal at Hogwarts was defeating Voldemort, then Harry should go back to New York where he was safe. “Your dad didn’t defy Voldemort and you’re not going to vanquish him. It’s not happening,” he said firmly. “Let’s call Tony, see if you can’t get home to that puppy and Joey by the end of the week.”
Harry blinked and his irritation melted to quick confusion at Sirius’ lame joke.
“I’ve only got the one dog?” Harry said slowly.
Sirius smirked at him. “Yeah? So there’s not a shaggy haired boy with big brown eyes that follows you around with his tail wagging?” Sirius made his eyes go big and goofy like the posh looking boy from Harry’s party.
Harry’s cheeks darkened and he ducked his head again. “Peter is not a dog,” he said. “Merlin, Sirius.”
Sirius took the chance to reach over and gently place his hand on Harry’s head, curling his fingers in his hair when Harry didn’t fight him.
“Go home, Harry,” he said softly, pleadingly. “This isn’t it anymore, is it?”
Harry scratched his leg with his right hand and shrugged his shoulders up defensively.
“Can’t,” he whispered. “You don’t understand.”
“What don’t I understand?”
Harry didn’t say anything and Sirius kept up his silent stroking of Harry’s hair while he mentally begged Harry to talk.
He couldn’t help him if he wouldn’t talk to him, and Sirius would do anything to lighten the load on Harry’s shoulders.
Anything at all.
“Tony said he loves me,” Harry said, still whispering, as if worried that speaking up would startle Sirius… or perhaps himself. Despite Harry’s constant act of cold defiance, Sirius though he was a pretty sensitive kid.
And since he didn’t get that from Lily, Sirius assumed that Tony had to be pretty sensitive as well. Deep, deep, down inside anyway.
“That’s great,” Sirius said genuinely when Harry didn’t say anything else. “You deserve that, kiddo.”
And Harry did. More than anyone, Harry deserved to have a parent tell him they loved him, were proud of him, and things like ‘don’t worry, I’ll handle this’.
Sirius got that once he moved in with James from Effie and Fleamont and god knew it changed his whole life. Sirius had been on a fast path of self-destruction with the booze and the boys, the bikes and the nights Sirius didn’t remember his own name.
And if someone didn’t do something for Harry, something more than the piss poor job Sirius was doing, then he’d be on just as fast of a track to a half-sized coffin after another plunge from a tower.
Harry didn’t look like someone real thrilled to have a parent - a biological parent who loved him and wanted to protect him and make him happy even - he looked more miserable than ever at Sirius words.
“Do I?” Harry asked. He kept his face ducked and his tone soft. “Do I deserve it if I run away again? Hide out and act like a coward?”
Sirius’ hand froze and he tilted his head as he tried to get a look at Harry’s face.
“You came back to… to earn Tony’s love?” Sirius asked him, trying to clarify the nonsensical thing Harry just stated so simply. It had baffled Sirius when Harry told him he wanted to go back. Harry leaving England altogether had been the best day of Sirius’ life, and it hadn’t made sense when he returned.
Sirius had assumed it had something to do with Voldemort and Albus finding Harry’s location, but… but Sirius forgot about all of Harry’s insecurities and his disbelief that anyone would simply care about him without cause.
Harry nodded shortly and Sirius pinched his brows together while he tried to find the best way to give Harry a hard truth.
“Harry…” Sirius stroked Harry’s hair slowly, waiting for the tense muscles in Harry’s neck and shoulders to relax. “Love isn’t something you earn, kiddo, it’s just… just something people give you for free.”
Harry scoffed and turned his head away. He raised his hand to swipe at his face and Sirius politely pretended not to notice.
“What would you know? Your mum was worse than the Dursleys,” Harry muttered. “You said she didn’t love you.”
Sirius grinned with a bit of nostalgia as he thought of the family that did teach him about love and why he didn’t have to buy it or earn it.
“She didn’t,” Sirius said, the old hurt mostly gone from his heart. “But your dad James did, and your grandparents did. And they never asked for anything in return.”
Effie and Fleamont wouldn’t take Sirius’ money when he’d gotten an inheritance from his Uncle. They wouldn’t let him work for his keep. They wouldn’t accept anything he tried to give them.
“We just want you to be safe and loved,” Effie had said after Sirius burned breakfast in an attempt to earn the affection they kept suffocating him with.
“Perhaps mildly less vulgar,” Fleamont added gruffly as he eyed Sirius’ rather crude tshirt with a bikini model on a bike.
“All Tony wants is for you to be safe and happy,” Sirius told Harry confidently. He moved his hand from Harry’s head to his shoulders and pulled him close to his side. “Maybe less of a sarcastic prick,” he added drily.
“Wonder where I got it from,” Harry scoffed weakly. He leaned in Sirius’ side and they sat peacefully for a few minutes. Sirius anguishing over Harry who was too like him and Harry with whatever thoughts clouded his brain that just didn’t draw the same conclusions as everyone else.
When Harry yawned, Sirius checked the time and poked Harry in the shoulder gently.
“Time for bed,” he said.
Harry nodded and slowly got to his feet. He looked exhausted too, just physically, mentally, and emotionally wrung to hell. Sirius supported him then made an indignant noise when Harry yanked the invisibility cloak off the ground and wrapped himself in it.
“You lost invisibility privileges,” Harry said, sounding mildly more like himself. “I can’t have you coming and killing the professors every time they piss me off.”
“Snivellus would deserve it,” Sirius said cheerily. “Miserable old bat.”
Harry gave him a brief grin before he narrowed his eyes and edged toward the ladder to take him back to the corridors of Hogwarts.
“You’ll go home?” Harry asked.
Sirius nodded, “Yeah. You’ll call me tonight?”
“Yeah. Night, Padfoot.”
“Night, kiddo. Love you.”
Harry gave him a crooked smile then disappeared beneath the cloak.
As soon as the trapdoor closed behind him, Sirius turned and made his way back to Hogsmeade.
It had been rather impulsive to go kill Umbridge himself. Why kill her and risk his freedom, upsetting Harry, when Harry had a parent perfectly willing to make Umbridge as miserable as he had Lily’s sister and her husband?
Tony had the ability, and creativity, to scar Umbridge worse than she had Harry. And all Sirius needed to do was make one quick little phone call and he could get Harry out of that hell hole and ruin the witch who had tortured Harry for kicks.
Maybe he could get Tony to ruin Snape too - a pleasant idea after a nightmarish day, anyway.