Chapter Text
“I must protest the amount of help that your professor has been giving Diggory.”
Albus sighed and rubbed his head. He had enough, far more than enough, to do without pandering to Igor’s paranoia.
“I will speak with Pomona,” he said, staring out the window at the Hogwarts grounds. He could see the trails of smoke that drifted up from the dragons concealed in the Forbidden Forest if he looked, but most people would probably mistake that for the smoke from Hagrid’s hut—if they even managed to see it through the rain tearing almost sideways at the moment. “If you agree to stop the help that you are giving Mr. Krum.”
“I am not talking about Pomona Sprout.”
Albus blinked and turned to face Igor, who was sitting back in his chair with his hands clasped over his stomach. “What? Then who are you talking about?”
“Your—Professor Moody.”
Albus shook his head a little. Of course he could understand why Igor would resent Alastor, who had once hunted him across Europe, but Albus actually hadn’t seen any negative interactions between them. “I was unaware that Professor Moody was helping Mr. Diggory.”
“He is. I overheard him the other day telling Diggory that there would be dragons in the Forest!”
“And did you not tell Mr. Krum that?”
“We are talking about your students, Albus, not mine!”
“If we’re going to worry about enforcing the Tournament’s rules,” Albus said pleasantly, resting his own hands on his desk, “then we need to talk about all of them, and all at once. Are you going to deny that you were giving Mr. Krum any help?”
“That is not what we are talking about!”
“But we must consider fairness and equality in all measures,” Albus said, as smoothly as he could. At least this had distracted him successfully from the dark thoughts that had filled his head. “ And that means that we must talk about all the professors, and Headmasters and Headmistresses and so on, who are trying to help their Champions win—”
“You will tell him to cease!”
“And you will also cease, then? And you will have a talk with Olympe about what she has almost certainly been telling young Miss Delacour?”
Igor stood up without a word and stalked from the room.
Albus watched him go with a smile that quickly turned into a sigh. No, he couldn’t keep up the distraction forever. His gaze strayed back outside to the wind and the rain and the endless, pressing despair.
After months of treatment, the Healers at St. Mungo’s had confirmed that George Weasley would never regain all the magical function he had lost with his near-drowning. He might not even regain all his brain functioning, although they were more hopeful of that. He was not at school this year, and Fred had elected to set out the term with him, partially to recover his own magic, which was lower than it should be.
In truth, Albus knew, Fred didn’t want to be here without his brother.
The Weasleys had lost one child and had had another irrevocably changed. They wanted answers, or Healing, or at least revenge, and Albus was helpless to tell them who had caused all of this.
Similarly, his investigations at the Ministry into the true name of the person who had revived the Tri-Wizard Tournament kept running into a dead end. No one was talking, and Legilimency revealed nothing. If someone had bribed Fudge to consider it, they’d Obliviated him afterwards.
Albus did know the kind of Legilimency that could dig past a Memory Charm and reveal a memory’s true face, but it would cause pain to the one he did it to. And as of yet, he had seen nothing that he thought required him to do such a thing.
He clenched his teeth. He wanted answers for the Weasleys, healing for James, a way to stop Voldemort, reclamation for Harry.
And it seemed unlikely he would get his wish for any of them.
*
“This is stupid.”
Draco shrugged, his eyes fastened on the ring where the Swedish Short-Snout lay curled around her eggs. A sturdy chain drove into the ground, fastened around her neck in a glittering collar that Draco had to admit fascinated him. Colors danced around it that he thought were probably the result of charms not taught at Hogwarts. “The Champions signed up for it.”
“But it’s stupid to bring dragons here to face them, and it’s stupid to force us to watch this farce of a Tournament.”
Draco blinked and turned away from the dragon to look at the boy he was courting. Harry had his arms folded, and the expression on his face was the closest Draco had seen him come to pouting. “You’re worried about the dragons?” Draco asked.
“If one of them gets loose and attacks everybody, yes.”
Draco relaxed a little. That made sense. If Harry had been honestly worried about the Champions, he would have suspected that Harry had developed a crush on one of them. “Well, the chains are sturdy.”
“So are dragons’ necks.”
Draco started to respond, but Theo dropped into the seat on the other side of Harry with a grin so large that he had to shut up. “Harry’s upset because this dragged him away from a potion he was brewing,” Theo all but cooed.
“What potion?”
“There is no potion.”
“Of course there is,” Draco said, delighted to have discovered the cause of Harry’s sulkiness, and also how red Harry’s face was turning. “What is it? Why can’t you put it in stasis and brew it later?’
“There are reasons I can’t,” Harry hissed, his eyes darting around as if he thought that someone would come up behind them and start listening to their words to report to Dumbledore.
“Well, tell me what they are.”
“No.”
“I can tell you,” Theo said, and leaned close enough that Draco could smell a sweet scent from him that was likely the Potions ingredients he’d been preparing. Draco swallowed and fought to concentrate. “It’s because he’s working on that one potion that didn’t work as well as he’d hoped, and now he wants to hover over the cauldron every second it’s brewing to make sure that whatever mistake happened last time doesn’t happen this time.”
Draco nodded, pleased that he knew it was the poison for James Potter. “Well, you’ll just have to put it in stasis and come back later.”
“That’s what I did. But now we have to waste our time watching this stupid Task, and I can’t just—”
“Welcome to the first Task of the Tri-Wizard Tournament, ladies and gentlewizards!” shouted Ludo Bagman’s modified voice.
Draco turned to face the dragons and hid a smile.
*
“It’s remarkable that none of the contestants were injured.”
Lily stiffened a little and managed to keep from grimacing as Karkaroff spoke to her. She had stayed successfully away from him at all the events for the professors and the foreign Headmaster and Headmistress. Why had he chosen now to address her?
“I do seem to remember Mr. Krum acquiring a slight burn and Miss Delacour having some of her hair singed off,” Lily said, turning around reluctantly. They were the only people at the professors’ table, which was probably why he had chosen to speak with her. Lily had come early in hopes of studying some Healers’ notes on James’s prognosis and what might happen to speed it up. It seemed she wouldn’t be able to do that. “I think Mr. Diggory is the only one who escaped uninjured.”
“Insignificant wounds in the wake of the threat.”
“Quite.”
Karkaroff paused. Lily hoped he would go speak to someone else, perhaps the just-arriving Filius, and leave her alone, but instead, Karkaroff said in a measured voice, “I have the impression that you have been avoiding me, Professor Potter.”
“I don’t know how you got that impression, Headmaster Karkaroff.”
“I know it is true. Why?”
Lily glanced at him and then around the table. Filius had chosen to sit at the far end so that he could review notes of some kind. Lucky bastard.
On the other hand, that meant there was also no Albus around to scold her into being polite in the interests of “international cooperation.”
“Professor Potter?”
Lily turned to face Karkaroff with a sweet smile that didn’t seem to fool him, if the way he sat back in his chair was any indication. “I feel uncomfortable and half-terrorized in the presence of Death Eaters,” Lily said, also sweetly. “I never know when one of you is going to start calling me names or trying to kill me for my blood.”
“You are Muggleborn?”
Lily let her raised eyebrows and sneer speak for themselves.
Karkaroff flushed a second later, as if he realized that he had mostly proven Lily’s contention. “I was pardoned.”
“That doesn’t matter to me. At some point, it was worth it for you to take his brand and run around the world terrorizing people like me.”
“But he is dead.”
Lily just shrugged. “You still have the brand, right?” She let her eyes rest on Karkaroff’s left arm, which he promptly covered with his right hand.
“It does not matter. It is not the reason that I wished to speak to you.”
“Then what is?”
“It does not matter,” Karkaroff repeated, and stood and stalked away.
He might go to Albus, Lily supposed. That didn’t matter to her any more than Karkaroff’s apparent reason for seeking her out now did to him. She turned back to the notes and paged through them slowly. There had to be something here that would allow them to figure out how the poison had worked on James and what they could do to finally cure the effects.
*
“Shall all three of us go to the Yule Ball?”
Harry slumped back on the couch near the fire in the Slytherin common room and stared at the ceiling. There had to be something he was missing. The poison of course wouldn’t have the same potency that it would have if he had aimed it at Lily Potter, someone he truly hated, but it shouldn’t have turned out to have the exact same potency and no more as the first version.
“I think that would be a grand idea.”
What was he missing? There was a factor here that was warping the poison, Harry was certain of that. But what? Where? How could he have missed it with how hard and carefully he had gone over the notes?
“Harry?”
Maybe it was buried in some book that he hadn’t found yet? Maybe he should ask the Dark Lord to lend him a book on the poison? He had only read one original source on it and everything else had been notes he’d got from the Dark Lord or Lucius secondhand, so maybe—
“Harry!”
Harry leaped off the couch, his wand lifting into his hand from the holster, and stared around. Draco and Theo were staring back at him.
“What? What is it?”
“The Yule Ball!”
“What about it?”
Draco put his hand over his face. Theo’s lips were twitching as he said, “We were discussing if all three of us should go as a triad. Or do you want to dance with only one of us at a time? Of course some people already know that we’re courting as a triad, but others think that it’s just me courting you and Draco courting you, so it’s bound to surprise some of them.”
“Um.” Harry blinked and said the first thing that came to him. “I don’t know if my dress robes are good enough for that. Or if they have the right cloth or the right decorations to show that we’re courting as a triad.”
“I can handle that,” Draco said eagerly.
“I think you ought to run a fashion shop when you grow up.”
For some reason, Draco’s ears turned red enough to snap Harry out of the last bit of distraction caused by the potion. “Theo, you take that back.”
“I’m sure that you’ll put Madam Malkin out of business.” Theo was lounging on the couch with an unholy grin on his face that made Harry’s stomach stir with warmth. He liked seeing Theo wear that grin. He wanted Theo to keep wearing it.
“Theo, shut up.”
“Do you not want to do it because you think it’s vulgar for a Malfoy to run a shop? But just think of all the money that you’ll add to the family fortune.”
“Theo—”
“You can stare at people when they come into your shop and really put your nose in the air if you don’t think they have enough money to spend—”
With a wordless yell, Draco sprang into the air, crossed the space between his chair and Theo’s couch, and slammed into Theo. Theo grunted as the air was forced out of him, and then they were rolling on the floor, punching each other.
Harry stared at them, then stared around at the other Slytherins. Some of them appeared just as helpless as he felt, but some of them had twitching lips or eyes that had the brightness of laughter behind them. They would probably burst into true laughter in a minute, Harry thought, and that would harm the reputation of both his suitors. Maybe even himself, if they did go to the Yule Ball as a triad.
Harry thrust a hand forwards.
He hadn’t tried to use his wandless magic as pure force before, usually tying it to an element, but it slid out from him in an obedient wave and focused on the small space between Draco and Theo. And then it shoved them apart, rolling them both over until they hit the sides of the furniture.
Harry checked the faces of the other Slytherins again.
No one was laughing now, and some of them appeared in shock. Harry nodded and turned back to his suitors just as they found their feet. Theo was bleeding from a cut on his cheek, and Draco from his nose. Both of them would probably have a black eye by tomorrow.
Harry kept his voice level with difficulty. “Do you mind telling me what the hell you’re doing?” He didn’t let his tone rise above a snarl, either, but he was pretty sure that most of their avid audience could hear every word.
“He started it.”
Harry turned an incredulous glare on Draco, who looked as if he were fighting to keep from wilting in place. “When you launched yourself at him?”
“You heard what he said!”
“He was making jokes about you running a shop. I fail to see why that should inspire you to attack him with your hands, like a Muggle, instead of magic.”
Harry had tried to imagine the way Mrs. Malfoy would have talked to Draco about this, and he had hit the right note, he thought. Draco flinched and stared down at his hands. “He was calling me a ponce. Implying I was a ponce.”
“Draco.” Harry paused to rub his face. “Has it occurred to you that you’re courting, and being courted by, two boys? And so is Theo? He can’t call you that without condemning himself at the same time.”
“But he used to tease me about running a shop all the time…”
Draco’s voice trailed off. Harry shook his head and turned to Theo. Honestly, he’d said what he meant to say to Draco, and now he wanted to know what Theo had meant by teasing Draco and punching him back.
Theo held his eyes for a long moment, but in the end, his gaze dipped to the floor. Harry gave an exasperated sigh.
“Why were you teasing Draco about this, Theo?”
“I didn’t know he would react that violently,” Theo said in a subdued voice. “I just—I used to tease him about it all the time when we were kids, just because he talked about fashion all the time.”
“And you attacked him back because…?”
“I had to defend myself!”
“Instead of relying on me to defend you?”
Theo opened his mouth, then shut it. Harry nodded. That was a term of the courtships that Theo had introduced him to. If someone was arguing with a rival, or another suitor, they could appeal to their courted to defend them. And because Harry was so powerful with wandless magic and Theo knew that, Theo could have asked Harry to protect him against Draco. That would have meant Theo only had committed the relatively minor offense of teasing someone he was courting and the other person courting Harry.
“Don’t do it again,” Harry said, and tossed his head in the direction of the common room. “We have a reputation to maintain.”
Both Theo and Draco flushed as if they’d forgotten about the common room. Then Theo turned to Draco with a solemn expression.
“I promise I won’t tease you about opening a clothing shop again, Draco.”
Draco looked caught flatfooted for a moment. Harry did have the impression that he wasn’t as quick of tongue or thought as Theo, but he proved that he could do more than well enough by putting his chin up and saying, “I don’t plan to fight you again.”
Not a promise, but it was good enough. Harry watched as they shook hands, and sneaked a glance at the rest of the common room. A few people looked disappointed, but no one looked as though they were about to laugh.
Harry nodded and turned back to face Draco and Theo as they looked at him. “Yes, let’s attend the Yule Ball as a triad. But I want one of you to work on fixing my robes, whether Draco does it by himself or not. They don’t look right.”
Draco beamed at him. Theo gave him a smaller, bleaker smile.
Yes, sometimes Harry would take Draco’s bright emotions over Theo’s hard-to-decipher ones, honestly.
*
“I’m so glad that you were able to come.”
Sirius stretched out his hand towards Lily, smiling from ear to ear. Lily floated James gently down to a chair at the table and ignored the stares and whispers from people around them. They would have to get used to seeing her disabled husband out and about. James deserved to have a life, blind and finding it hard to walk or not.
Although he had got a bit better at walking, since they had come to Hogwarts. Lily hoped it might have something to do with the magic flowing through the castle, which would mean that he would get better and better.
“I’m glad that you sent us the letter,” Lily said, and firmly embraced Sirius. “Where is Remus, anyway?”
“Right here.”
Remus glided out of the back of the Three Broomsticks with a grace that Lily found spooky. But she knew that saying that or really feeling that was a sign of prejudice against werewolves, so she bent her mouth into the best welcoming smile she could.
“Remus.”
James’s voice was a gargle on the name, probably because it wasn’t a word he said often, but he said it, and held out his hand. Remus shook it, his face softening for a second. Probably he could see the kind of effort James was making to be here at all.
Lily shook Remus’s hand, too, relieved he didn’t demand a hug, and then sat down at the table across from him after making sure James was comfortably settled with a butterbeer in front of him. “What did you want to talk about, anyway?”
Having Remus here made it hard to keep her voice friendly. She couldn’t look at him without remembering the smashing, the shouting, and the final argument over Harry that had ended up with Remus leaving the country just ahead of Aurors they’d called who would have arrested him for being a violent werewolf.
“There are things I’ve come across on my travels that could possibly help you reclaim Harry,” Remus said, and leaned forwards to lower his voice. “I need to tell you about them.”
Lily swallowed hope. She had come so close to giving up on her eldest son, her first baby, but Remus could have found a way. There were places he could have investigated that only a werewolf would survive, with unknown secrets hiding at the bottom of them.
“Please, tell us.”
“Yes, tell us,” James echoed, without a change in his voice at all.
Remus nodded, no longer smiling. “Believe me, I intend to.”