Switched

"You didn't sign the list," Danny said accusingly, as he stalked through the doorway of his and Harry's room.

With absolutely no context, it took a moment for Harry to realise what he was talking about. "Well, no, I'm not planning on staying here over the holiday, so."

"So where are you going to go? Not back to Knockturn?"

"Yeah, probably." Danny was well aware that Harry had no intention of returning to Little Whinging for any extended period of time. He didn't seem to understand what Harry meant when he said there wasn't enough magic there, but then, Harry didn't really expect him to. His family lived in Hogsmeade, so he practically never left the Valley. Honestly, Harry wasn't even particularly keen on going back to Knockturn for the three week holiday, but he couldn't stay here over Yule, and it was at least better than Little Whinging, even if it wasn't quite as magical as Hogwarts. "I mean, I might visit the Dursleys on Boxing Day and take Dudders some Every Flavour Beans or something, but honestly the holidays are always awkward enough, even without me."

Aunt Petunia hated Aunt Marge, Dudders always got stroppy when he broke his first Christmas present of the year, and Uncle Vernon tended to be in a mood because his mother routinely tried to guilt him into coming over for Christmas Tea. He routinely refused because his parents didn't approve of Aunt Marge's "lifestyle choices" — and while Uncle Vernon generally had nothing but scorn for dykes and homos, Aunt Marge was his baby sister, and if she was, it was hardly as though she'd admitted it, much less went around flaunting it, and if she wasn't welcome — which she wasn't — he wasn't going either, and his parents should be ashamed of themselves for maligning their own daughter's reputation like that.

Technically, Uncle Vernon didn't support Aunt Marge being a lesbian any more than their parents or Aunt Petunia (who only complained about Aunt Marge's dogs in front of Uncle Vernon and Aunt Marge herself, but complained about her "ways" to her friends when she didn't realise Harry was listening, and definitely knew that she was). He just refused to believe that she was one. No, she'd never had a serious suitor, but she'd always been married to her work, made a successful businesswoman of herself and all, and yes, she had had that lady tenant who'd let her spare room for a few years, but he'd visited while she'd lived there and they had had two bedrooms. Until she actually told him that yes, she did fancy ladies, he would continue to deny it, up to and including defending her from their parents' hurtful insinuations.

Harry, for his part, hadn't told any of the Dursleys about the time three years ago when he and Aunt Marge were the only people still awake — Aunt Marge getting steadily more drunk by the fire, and Harry tidying up — and Aunt Marge had drunkenly expressed a certain degree of...not quite sympathy, exactly, but sort of sympathetic advice he was fairly certain was well-meaning, about trying to fit in better, and it was a hard life for "people like us, boy," and if he was smart he'd find a lady friend who wasn't interested in him either, and marry her so they could both live their own lives...discreetly. She'd passed out shortly afterward and had never mentioned it again. Harry wasn't even sure she remembered it, and hadn't really understood what she was talking about at the time, but in hindsight he was pretty sure she'd at least strongly implied that she was a lesbian.

"Blaise invited me to Mira's New Year's Bash, but I wasn't planning on doing anything special for Yule or Christmas."

"No," Danny said firmly.

"No?"

"No, you're not going to go stay in some flat by yourself over the holiday. You're coming to ours. I've already asked Mum, she says it's fine."

...Well, shite. Harry didn't really want to offend his roommate and he did want to stay here in the Valley, but, "Danny, mate? I was sort of looking forward to having some privacy for a few weeks." Really, constantly being around people was slowly driving him (more) insane. But more importantly...

Yule was always the night Harry felt his connection to the Little Crow most strongly. The night he was closest to being able to reach them, and the night it hurt the most not to be able to. He didn't want to have to explain to Danny why he locked himself in his bedroom crying all night. Especially since if he were to spend the holiday with Danny, he wouldn't have his own bedroom. It would be impossible for Danny not to notice Harry having a breakdown in the loo or something.

"Fine, then sign the list so you can stay here and just visit us for a few days. Like, Yule through Christmas. Mum and Dad live five miles from here. You can walk back up and have this room all to yourself for the rest of the holiday."

That did absolutely nothing to solve Harry's problem. Even if he skipped out on Yule and just visited them for Christmas, he didn't want to have a Dark Night here, either.

Unfortunately, Danny didn't know about the Little Crow or the Black Family Magic slowly starving to death, and Harry really didn't want to try to explain, given that Danny currently believed himself to be Bella's kid. If Harry told him that the Black Family Magic was trying to contact him to tell him how to kill someone to save its life, and if he didn't he would die with it, he'd have to explain that he was actually Bella's kid or imply that he was Sirius's kid and leave Danny thinking he was in the line of fire, too (as "Bella's" son).

He settled on, "I'd really rather not." He shouldn't have to justify himself, he thought.

"Pleeeeease? Just come down for Yule, at least. Mum wants to meet you in person, and if you spend the night, you'll get to meet Dora, too."

"No, Danny. I don't want to—"

"Please, Harry. Why don't you want to come?"

"Why do you want me to come so badly?"

Danny pouted at him. "I asked you first." But when Harry just raised an eyebrow at him, he caved. "I don't want to do Mum's Yule ritual with just the two of us," he admitted. "Dad will be at work — the Hospital doesn't get holidays and he drew a short straw — and Dora's on call, so even if she doesn't end up going in she can't be in the circle, just in case, you know?"

"Why don't you want to do it?" Sure, Mabon hadn't gone great for Harry, and he'd completely missed Samhain, but he couldn't imagine why Danny would be uncomfortable with his mum's Yule ritual. He very clearly was, but...

His roommate huffed out an exasperated, slightly embarrassed little sigh. "Wehavetokillthedog," he muttered, quickly and quietly enough it took a second for Harry to make out what he'd actually said.

"You have to kill a dog?"

Danny nodded. "Every spring, Mum gets a puppy, and no matter how much I try not to care about it, I always do, and then every year we have to kill it, and it's awful, and it wouldn't be a sacrifice if it were easy, but I hate it, and I don't want to have to do it alone. With just Mum, I mean. It doesn't bother her like it does me, and I don't know how, because she's always the one who loves the dog the most, and most of the time she's pretty much the best, but on Yule she's just so cold, and I hate everything about it!"

"...And you want me to come along...why? I mean, why don't you just tell her that you don't want to do it?"

"I can't tell her I don't want to do it. She already knows I don't like it, and Dad doesn't like it, and Dora...doesn't dislike it as much as Dad and I do, but she's not really into it either, but this is the only thing Mum ever asks of us, and she'd let me skip it if I told her I didn't want to, but it's like... It's super important to her, and refusing to do it wouldn't just be rejecting Yule, it'd be like rejecting Mum. I want you to come because I don't want it to be just the two of us."

"Yeah, okay, but you don't really think I'm going to hold your hand and, I dunno, sympathise with how awful this is, or whatever, do you? Because I can tell you right now, nothing about that is really likely to bother me." In fact, depending on how powerful the magic was that they called, and how dark, he'd probably enjoy it. A lot. Maybe even enough to make the prospect of yet another Dark Night less terrible.

Danny scowled at him. "I have met you, Harry. I expect you to be unnervingly enthusiastic about the whole ritual, calling the Dark thing, and probably get high on dark magic, and not find the idea of partaking in the lifeblood of the sacrifice — a.k.a., murdering and drinking the blood of the family pet — the least bit horrifying. I just...don't want all Mum's attention on me. Not when she's...like that. All cold and dark and just...Andromeda Black."

...Right. Sometimes Harry really was an idiot. How had it not clicked until just now that Danny's mum was (had been, she wasn't anymore) a Black, and might have some idea of how to help the Little Crow, even if she didn't know where the Keep was to get there through normal travel? He hadn't written to her about the Family Magic specifically because he hadn't wanted to put anything in a letter that might be intercepted, but...

"You being a dark, creepy little psycho is sort of like, just, Tuesday? But Mum is supposed to be...Mum, not this scary dark witch I barely even recognise."

Harry rolled his eyes at that, but he couldn't really argue with it. "Fine, I'll come."

"You will?" Danny said, sounding weirdly surprised.

"Well, obviously — I'm a dark, creepy little psycho. You had me at 'Yule ritual'."

"Great! Excellent!"

"Just don't get jealous if your mum likes me better than you," Harry teased him, genuinely amused by how very relieved his roommate clearly was.

Danny pulled a face, sticking his tongue out at him. "You actually asked for etiquette books. I'm pretty sure she already likes you better than me."

"Probably," Harry agreed, more cheerful than he had been in days, with the prospect of the upcoming Dark Night looming ever larger.

"Oh, piss off."

"Mum!" Danny shouted, throwing open the door of his parents' house and leading Harry inside. "We're here!"

"Mum had to run into the office!" Nymphadora shouted back, coming to meet them in the entryway. "Said she had to write up a something or other to file first thing tomorrow, because...reasons? I dunno, I got the impression Ned Turner is a crafty cunt for trying to sneak something past her over the holiday, but that's not exactly news, is it?" She (Harry assumed he was supposed to refer to her as a girl even when she didn't really obviously look like one) skipped across the room to ruffle Danny's already-messy hair. "How's it going, Shaggy?"

"Alright. This is Harry. Harry, Dora."

Well, obviously, no one else would be calling Danny's mother "Mum". She didn't look much like she had over the summer, at the duelling tournament, but then he wouldn't really expect a shape-shifter to. She actually looked like she could be a third- or fourth-year, and it was sort of hard to tell if she was supposed to be a boy or a girl at the moment. Her hair — a tinsel-like silver, with threads of blue and pink and yellow running through it — was shoulder-length, which could go either way, and she was wearing one of those weird magical outfits Harry hadn't seen enough to know whether it was for boys or girls — skin-tight golden trousers and a floofy white shirt, with a sleeveless, open over-robe that slowly shifted from green to blue, and then a pastel purple as he watched.

"Harry...Potter?" Both Danny and Harry nodded. "Huh. I sort of thought the Boy Who Lived would be taller," she said, managing to keep a straight face long enough for Harry's to fall into a scowl. The fact that she was the coolest person he'd ever heard of did not mean he liked being called the Boy Who Lived. Also, easy for her to say, she could be taller whenever she wanted.

She smirked. "Just fucking with you, kid. I was sort of expecting you to look like a Potter, but hey, I'm all for more baby cousins. Especially since I hear you're more fun than Blondie. My condolences on the lack of interest in the Castle Climbing Club. If it's any consolation, if I were still in school, I'd definitely join."

"Of course you would." Danny rolled his eyes. "You're insane, and falling off the damn castle probably wouldn't actually kill you."

"I'm pretty sure falling off the Castle wouldn't kill me, either," Harry pointed out. "I mean, I walked away from my broom going on the fritz in flying class just fine, and that had to be, what, fifty, sixty feet?"

Madam Hooch had been horrified, flying class had been cancelled for the past two weeks so she and Professor Flitwick could go over all the brooms and make sure none of them were cursed and they were all in good working order, because a broom trying to buck off a student and then just stopping in mid-air could easily have killed someone. Or so she claimed. Harry had managed to pull off sort of just crumpling as he hit the ground feet-first, like a parachuter coming in a little too hard (apparently landing those things was harder than it looked, there had been a special on telly last summer), and rolling to bleed off some of his momentum, and had gotten away with just a few bruises and the air knocked out of him. He hadn't even broken an ankle. She'd made him go to the Hospital Wing anyway, because she refused to believe he was fine, and then declared it to be some sort of miracle that he actually was, even though people took worse falls playing quidditch every day.

(Yes, the Quidditch Pitch did have enchantments to slow falls, and the ref normally kept an eye out to further arrest momentum and/or soften the ground when they did, but still. It wasn't like he'd been knocked out by a bludger first, or something.)

Danny gave him a very unimpressed look. "I'm not worried about you, lunatic. I'm worried about me. Since, you know, I'm not a metamorph and didn't inherit whatever the hell it is that makes the Blacks bloody well indestructible."

"Er...getting the piss beaten out of you on the daily for a few years?" Dora suggested.

Harry shrugged and nodded at the concerned look Danny threw him. That did line up with what Snape had said about Malfoy's magic not being trained to resist physical harm.

Dora didn't seem to notice. "I mean, not saying the House of Black didn't get into some sketchy blood magic over the centuries, but Mad-Eye says that kind of resilience is mostly a matter of conditioning. And also that recruits these days are too damn soft because no one 'toughens up' their kiddies before letting them out to face the real world anymore. Bloody madman. Have I mentioned lately that my S.A. is insane?" she asked, probably rhetorically. "Because he absolutely still is."

"Yeah?" Harry said, before Danny could say anything about Uncle Vernon smacking him around as a kid. "That's Auror Moody, right? Is it true he once deputised an entire pub full of drunken warlocks to burn a vampire nest to the ground?"

"Where the hell did you hear that?"

"In Knockturn, last summer. Is it true?"

"Er, sort of. 'Vampire nest' is sort of a racist thing to call upyri squatting in muggle flats. Mad-Eye recruited a bunch of travelling cursebreakers — unofficially, Aurors can't actually deputise civilians — to make a frontal assault on a cabal of dark necromancers and actual vampire vampires while he and a couple of other others broke into a neighbouring building and burned through the wards on the adjoining walls with fiendfyre to take them by surprise. They did lose control of the fire when one of the casters was cut down with an Avada, but as far as collateral damage goes, burning down a few abandoned buildings to take out an entire vampire cult, with only two casualties on the side of the angels? Totally worth it. Why was Harry fucking Potter hanging out in Knockturn last summer? I thought Danny said you were raised by muggles."

"I was. That's why I was in Knockturn. I wasn't going to stay in Little Whinging after I had a wand and was actually allowed to do magic without Ministry Goons popping out of nowhere to obliviate everyone and their mum. And for some reason, people in the nicer parts of Charing weren't willing to let a room to an eleven-year-old for a few weeks, even when I promised to pay in advance."

"Uh-huh."

"Also, I got to watch the Duelling Tournament, which was the coolest thing ever! I can't wait until next summer! I'm so going to enter! And you were amazing! Did you ever get that rematch with whatshisface?"

Dora, clearly flattered, went pink, the colour creeping into her hair more than her face, which Harry found really funny for some reason. "I can neither confirm nor deny that, but if I did, I would have taken him out with a nasty little twist on the Wound Sealing Charm that makes skin grow over your mouth and nose, which," she added, turning to Danny, "you'd better not tell Dad about, or else."

Danny smirked. "Or else what?"

"I don't know yet, but I'll think of something, brat."

"Yeah, okay, whatever. I'm going to dump my shite in my room. Have fun being fawned over by your number one fan."

"Piss off, wanker!" Harry snapped, feeling his face grow brighter than Dora's hair.

"Fan? Harry Potter, Boy Who Definitely Has His Own Fan Club, is a fan of me? Well, I mean, of course you are, I'm amazing, but— This is so flattering! I don't even know what to say!" she said in a high, vapid tone, and giggled, the laugh becoming decidedly more of a cackle as she watched Harry try to figure out how to respond to what was clearly some kind of mockery. He wasn't entirely sure if he was the butt of it or not. "Lighten up, kid. I'm just fucking with you again."

"She does that sort of a lot," Danny called over his shoulder as he moved farther into the house. "Be nice to Harry, he's not used to people who literally only speak sarcasm."

"Hey! Give me a little credit! I also speak hyperbole and profanity! Ooh, speaking of hyperbolic profanity, I hear McGonagall's still the world's biggest twat. If you're open to pranking suggestions, I never got around to breaking into her rooms and transfiguring all of her clothes and books and shite into cat toys, but I bet she doesn't lock her windows. You know, something to keep in mind if you just so happen to be in the area of the little jug-handle tower that sticks off Gryffindor Tower on one of your castle climbing expeditions. And if she asks you if you know anything about it, you have to tell her maybe Peeves did it, so she knows I put you up to it."

"Er, one problem: I don't know how to transfigure a book into a toy mouse or whatever."

Dora grinned, a vicious, toothy expression Harry really couldn't help matching. Her malicious glee was just infectious. "No, no, no, young prankster, we're talking about the world's biggest twat, here. Transfigure her knickers or something into toy mice. Transfigure the books into scratching posts, so if her instincts get the best of her, she'll shred her own library."

Harry sniggered. "Okay, but I don't know how to do that, either, and won't they just un-shred themselves when they revert?"

"Not if you do it right," she murmured in what could only be described as a conspiratorial tone, wrapping an arm around his shoulders and turning him toward a doorway on his left and what, from here, looked like a sitting room. "I mean, she'll still be able to use a Repairing Charm on them, but she'll have to sort out all the scraps first. Step into my office, and let's discuss the wonders of free transfiguration..."

Free transfiguration was probably the most difficult magic anyone had shown Harry yet. He got the general concept, but trying to understand exactly what a thing was and what he wanted it to become, with enough clarity that he could actually cast the spell (and incidentally clearly enough that physical effects would carry over from the needle when it reverted back to a matchstick), was frustratingly difficult.

Dora assured him that there was no rush, it wasn't as though he couldn't prank McGonagall in a few years, and that free transfiguration was probably the most difficult wizardry period (for normal, non-metamorph people) — even harder than free conjuration from a visualisation and intent perspective, because he'd need to know and understand the matchstick just as thoroughly as the needle, instead of just knowing the needle he wanted to conjure. (Half of the Free Transfiguration Spell was sort of scrying the matchstick to understand what it actually was.) She did show him free conjuration, too, but that was much harder from an initialisation energy perspective, so he only managed to conjure a needle about the size of a staple before Danny's dad got home.

The sketches Danny did in the meanwhile, of him practising while Dora watched and offered advice and let Socks (the dog they would be sacrificing in a few hours) drool on her lap, were much more impressive in Harry's opinion. Danny obviously didn't agree, staring at him all wide-eyed like conjuring a single bloody staple — that wasn't even staple-shaped — was a big deal. Dora didn't act like it was. She was obviously a little surprised, but Harry figured that was just because he tended to pick up spells quicker than most people.

Ted, who insisted he didn't stand on formality like those noble types and didn't need to be called Healer Tonks, was only home for his mid-shift break (though it was closer to one than noon, because obviously the Healers had to take lunch in turns). Healers, apparently, worked twelve-hour shifts when they were shorthanded, which they were because it was a holiday. No one said as much, but Harry suspected Ted might have volunteered to work from eight in the morning until eight in the evening today specifically so he wouldn't have to be here when they killed the dog. It was something about the way his eyes kept drifting over to her as he made polite small-talk, asking Harry and Danny about their lessons, and promising to make breakfast, since he was going to miss dinner as well as the ritual. He had to go back to the hospital before his wife came home, but assured Danny (and Harry) that he'd be home at eight-o-three, if they wanted to talk to someone after the ritual.

After he left, Danny, somewhat bitterly, noted that that would still be about four hours after the end of the ritual, which occurred at sunset. Dora tried to cheer him up, or at least spin it so it didn't seem quite so much like he was leaving Danny to suffer while he got out of this thing neither of them really wanted to do — he was a Healer, he did have a legitimate obligation elsewhere — and she would be here— But that fell flat when their mother returned from her errand, because apparently neither of them really wanted to talk about how uncomfortable Danny was with her ritual when she was right there. And then Dora was called in to work about ten minutes later, so she actually wouldn't be there, anyway.

Andi, as Danny's mum said Harry could call her, was nice enough. From the few letters they'd exchanged, he'd expected her to be a very proud, formal sort of person, but in person she was much more relaxed and friendly. There wasn't much time between her return and beginning preparations for the ritual. Just long enough, really, for greetings and to confirm that Danny had told Harry all the important things about the ritual, and yes, he did actually want to join them.

Danny shot him a rather resentful scowl behind his mother's back, apparently annoyed that Harry was given the choice, even though he was the one who had asked Harry to join them in the first place. Harry, meanwhile, was finding it very surreal that Andi clearly knew who he really was — which, yes, he'd known she did, it had been referred to in their letters — and was sort of...treating him like family, he thought, not even questioning whether she ought to allow some boy she'd never met in person, who was really just her son's roommate to her, participate in what Harry gathered was a very private family celebration.

Ted knew, too, Blaise had told him he did, and Dora...might know? Harry honestly wasn't sure. She had called him her cousin, but Danny and Theo thought he was Sirius's son, so it was possible that was what she thought, too. If she did know he was Bella's son, she hadn't given any sign of it. Neither had Ted, aside from a wary glance or two, and that hadn't been until after Harry had said that he was actually looking forward to the ritual, and expressed his confusion about why they might want to talk to someone who hadn't been involved afterward. He suspected that the fact that he'd been petting Socks (who was a Good Dog, it was sort of sad she was going to be sacrificed) while they were talking about it had something to do with it.

But neither of them had been going out of their way to include him in what he just knew was a family activity, and one which was clearly very important to Andi, like he actually belonged here.

And it was even weirder because Danny didn't know. Maybe he hadn't really thought about it, just glad to have someone else here to take the pressure off of him, or maybe he thought it was okay and his mum had said yes because Harry was Sirius's son, but he had no idea that, in another life, Harry would have been doing this for years, and Danny would've grown up with the Dursleys. (Harry imagined Aunt Petunia would like Danny much better than she liked Harry. Danny was really very normal for a magic freak.)