Chapter Text
“Malfoy’s shut up about Buckbeak! I heard he even wrote to his father insisting that no legal involvement would be necessary!” Ron has made up his mind to just talk to Harry nonstop until Harry answers back. He expects Harry to avert his gaze this time as well, and is pleasantly surprised when Harry smiles at him with a rather smug expression on his face.
“You did something, didn’t you?” Ron exclaims, elated both about Hagrid and about Harry being responsive again. “Well don’t just stand there. Tell me what it was you did!”
“I threatened Malfoy then hexed him when he wouldn’t listen,” Harry answers.
Ron stares at him for a good three seconds before bursting out laughing. “Godric, what I would’ve given to see that! Serves him right, the pompous bastard. I should go tell Hermione there’s no need for any more research, then.”
Harry’s face shifts into something a bit cranky. “I don’t remember you being this friendly with her last year. Didn’t you once say something about how you wish a troll would eat her?”
“She’s not so bad. Her and Ginny are good friends, so she came over to visit during the summer and-”
“ What ?” Harry stares, looking horrified. “You spent the summer with her? But you’re supposed-”
Harry’s eyes fall to the ground. Ron doesn’t understand it at first, and he makes it all the way to the end of the day to dinner before realizing what it meant. Merlin, that took an embarrassingly long time to piece together.
“Harry,” Ron says, catching up to Harry before he can disappear off into the Slytherin Common Room, “You’re not… Are you jealous of Hermione?”
Harry scowls at this, which Ron takes to mean a yes.
“Well, it’s true I’m friends with her now, but obviously you’re my best friend. Hermione and I aren’t even that close anyway, at least not as friends,” he assures Harry, only Harry seems even more upset by this. “Harry, you and I are best friends, alright? Nothing is ever going to change that.” And then, with an awkward pat on the shoulder, Ron adds, “See you in Defense tomorrow.”
Remus Lupin breaks into the castle.
It’s clear he wasn’t acting alone, because the destruction he’s left in his wake- Dementors absent from their posts, students and professors alike having been Stunned in the corridors- Speaks of at least a three-person job, according to Pansy, who heard it from her father. Oddly enough, Lupin headed neither for the Slytherin dormitories where Harry slept, nor for the Gryffindor dormitories where Lupin might have assumed Harry was sorted into. Instead, it’s the professors’ quarters Lupin and his company broke into. Theories speculate widely, everything from how Lupin’s first priority is going after faculty members who were once a part of the secret Order of the Phoenix, to how Lupin is aiming to take revenge upon Snape, who was a spy like him but one working for the other side.
Dad sends Harry a letter the very next day, promising him that everything is fine. It’s Bellcurk they have to worry about, not Lupin, Dad insists, although he won’t say why he’s so certain of this. It’s for Harry’s own good that he doesn’t know, something about plausible deniability when the Aurors come knocking, according to the letter. Harry doesn’t know what he’s meant to think of this. On the one hand, he wholeheartedly trusts that his dad has his best interests at heart. On the other, just because someone has your best interests at heart doesn’t necessarily mean they really do know what’s best for you… But still, it’s his dad .
“Is something wrong, Harry?” Theo is asking from a short distance away, where he completes his assignment by the light of the fireplace.
“Just something on my mind,” Harry replies absentmindedly. “I’m sure it’s nothing. I’ll talk to Ron about it tomorrow.”
Theo looks like he wants to say something. Harry waits a beat, giving him the chance to, then goes back to the Potions book he was reading with a shrug when Theo says nothing further.
“You… You could talk to me, you know,” Theo mumbles, a near quarter of an hour later, when Harry has forgotten what they were even discussing. But then the offer registers, and Harry realizes that Theo is technically right. He’d gotten so used to confiding in Ron about everything, but just because Ron is Harry’s best friend doesn’t mean that Harry can’t find a similar kind of companionship and comfort in conversations with his other friends, too.
So Harry summarizes the contents of the letter to Theo- He doesn’t actually give him the letter, that’s between Harry and his dad and Harry refuses to share anything that is just theirs with a third party- And waits patiently for Theo’s response.
“It could be that your father really does know something the rest of Britain’s magical populace doesn’t,” Theo considered. “It could also be that he’s just so blinded by old friendships that he can’t see the threat that’s staring him right in the face. I mean- He’s saying you don’t have to worry about Lupin at all. But even if we were to push aside the werewolf factor, everyone knows that he blew up all those Muggles the night of the Dark Lord’s defeat. He’s a notorious Death Eater.”
“So… What do I do now? Carry around, like, extra silver or something? Look out for anyone suspicious who might have helped him inside?”
“He managed to break into a fortress with centuries-old wards, one guarded by Dementors day and night. We’re obviously dealing with someone who knows what they’re doing. I think the best course of action would be to be wary of absolutely everyone until this whole thing blows over.”
“There’s no harm in being extra cautious, I suppose,” Harry nods. “Thanks, Theo.”
“But are you sure we can’t tell him?”
Liv fidgets anxiously when James Potter asks Lupin the same question for the seventh time. Her boss would’ve blown a fuse six questions ago had it been anyone else, but Liv has quickly grown to learn over the past month that James Potter doesn’t fit under the category of anyone else .
“We can’t have Harry getting accused of consorting with an Azkaban escapee, James,” Lupin says in a soft tone Liv hadn’t known he was even capable of. “It’s better he knows nothing about who I am or what I’m doing at all.”
“But then that means he’ll be believing all the shit the public has been saying about you. I don’t want that. I never wanted my kid to know you as anything less than his Uncle Moony, and now you’re some deranged lunatic follower of Voldemort in his eyes.”
“I know,” Lupin smiles sadly. “I’ve been trying to clear my name all this time, you know. I wanted to be there for Harry in the years that you couldn’t. I’ve had my people trying to locate Peter for years, but…”
Potter’s expression contorts into something uncomfortable.
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have brought him up.”
“What? No, no- I’m the one who’s being stupid. I just.. Sometimes… Most of the time, I can’t think of him as… As a traitor, you know? How? Why would…”
Liv watches with her mouth practically agape as Lupin continues to comfort Potter in the most uncharacteristic of ways. And what’s her boss doing, making it sound as though the only thing he’s been doing in the past decade has been tracking down Peter Pettigrew? The majority of his time and resources was spent cultivating his underground network of criminals, expanding from just the shunted magical beasts that once belonged to Greyback, and breaching into the black market of the Muggle world.
“I still have people searching for Peter, but our priority right now is Regulus Black,” Lupin says in a strained voice. “We need a new theory for why he tried to- To kill Harry.”
Potter winces at the reminder, then shakes his head. “I thought we’d agreed it’s because he was a Death Eater, and he’s trying to get revenge on Harry? I mean, sure, it’s a little odd that he waited until the summer before Harry’s third year to attempt it, when Harry had already been in the wizarding eye for three years by that point, but-”
“Liv managed to figure out who it was that had been sending those assassins after me all these years,” Lupin gestures to Liv, who sits up immediately. By figure out , Lupin means tortured said assassins extensively over the years until the tidbits of information they each let slip finally led to a name , but Lupin likely thinks that Potter’s soft stomach won’t be able to handle the truth. Either that, or Lupin doesn’t want to let Potter know of his darker natures, which is just plain ridiculous, Liv thinks. Lupin has made a name for himself in both the magical and Muggle world. It’s something he ought to be proud of.
“It was Black who sent them.”
Potter blinks at this. “But… If he, like the rest of Magical Britain, assumes you were a spy for Voldemort all along… Why would he be trying to kill a fellow Death Eater? It makes no sense.”
“Unless his loyalties don’t lie with Voldemort at all,” Lupin says. He hesitates. “It’s only a theory, but I think we have to assume we’re dealing with a third side when it comes to Black. In any case, two out of the nine leads we have to go on have been crossed out as of this week.”
Nine leads, nine names that Remus’s network of people had pulled up as a list of those who’d suddenly popped up in the magical community of Britain with no solid past to speak of. One of those people had turned out to be who they said they were, and another had been a vampire in disguise trying to get away with illegal business on British soil. They’d attempted to gain clarity on a third name the other day- A new Hogwarts professor by the name of Deveraux- But that plan flopped when they failed to locate Deveraux before the Aurors came rushing in.
“Once we manage to track down Black, we’ll have the answers about his motivations and his loyalty.”
Potter nods. “Thank you, Remus, for helping me with this.”
Lupin appears downright horrified to be receiving words of gratitude for this. “No- Don’t mention it, James. Anything for you.”
Theo couldn’t be happier. Professor Deveraux tried to kill Harry.
Theo’s line of thinking screeches to a halt. That did not come out right.
A better explanation for Theo’s current delighted state of mood would be this- The Defense professor told Harry to remain after class, which was a conversation Theo missed entirely and therefore would have led to him leaving his future lord behind on his own- Only, not only did Harry remember the advice Theo gave him, but he listened to it, too. He kept his guard up even around the unassuming professor just like Theo said he should, and it paid off. Harry insisted that Theo remain with him, and it was Theo who recognized, thanks to lessons with his father, that the tiny little box the professor casually placed on his desk was actually a dangerous artifact that slowly released a powerful sedative in its gas form.
It was easy for them to remove themselves from the situation once Theo hissed in Harry’s ear about the nature of the matchbox the professor had brought out. It seemed Professor Deveraux or whoever he really was had been relying entirely on the fact that Harry wouldn’t be realizing what was happening until it was too late. Unsurprisingly, it turned out that they’d ended up with yet another incompetent professor of Defense, because the wizard didn’t even get a chance to raise his wand before Harry knocked him out with a Stunning Spell. Come to think of it, Theo didn’t think he’d ever seen Professor Deveraux using his wand before.
“Black,” Harry choked out, breathing heavily. “I need- I need to write to my dad, I have to tell him-”
Only once they had sent an owl off and returned to the Slytherin Common Room did both Harry and Theo rest easy. Harry had tried to return to Devereaux’s office to make sure he couldn’t escape, but Theo, for what was probably the first time, had gone against Harry’s wishes and held him back, telling him that it was too dangerous and that it wasn’t Harry’s job to go around securing dangerous prisoners. And again, Harry listened to him, eventually seeing the reason in Theo’s suggestion! This was the best day of Theo’s life! He was finally rising up from the position of foot soldier he’d stupidly anchored himself to, and was settling into the role of trusted advisor, the same as his father had been to the Dark Lord.
Theo’s high spirits were short-lived. The very next day, after half a dozen Aurors had stormed the castle at the behest of James Potter, who had all but properly secured himself now as one of the most influential members of the Wizengamot and the magical society of Britain in general, Ron Weasley finally got the opportunity to rush over to Harry and took it without delay. Harry spent the next two hours happily being coddled by Weasley, laughing in the courtyard and playing wizard’s chess and the likes, while Theo watched on furiously from the sidelines.
“I know what you’re doing,” Pansy says to him in a sing-song voice. “Poor Theo, don’t you know all your efforts are pointless, if not downright dangerous? It’s one thing to decide to make a Dark Lord out of Harry so you can spend forevermore kneeling at his feet-”
Theo snapped his head up and stared at her with wide eyes.
“Oh please, as if that were a great secret of any sort. Your family has a track record of serving directly beneath pinnacles of power, and you were hardly going to be any different,” Pansy scoffs. “But as I was saying- It’s one thing to do that, but it’s quite another to start wanting to be the object of your lord’s affections as well. This is a dangerous and absolutely foolish line you’re treading, Theodore. You’ve gotten what you want. Know when to stop, and don’t reach for more.”
And because Theo couldn't bear to admit the truth, he lashed out with an immature bout of anger. “You'll forgive me if I don't take advice from someone who's stupid and shortsighted enough not to be seeking either of those two options,” he snaps.
“Who says I'm not?” she returns. “I've got my own plans, same as you. The difference is, I know how to tell realistic goals from fantasy.”
Pansy walks away, leaving Theo to wallow in his misery once more. That misery soon shifts into rage all over again when Harry and Weasley double over in fits of laughter about one thing or another. Logically, Theo knows that not all of his problems are going to be solved if Weasley just disappears - In terms of conventional friendship, Harry is on far friendlier terms with Pansy or even the other Weasleys than he is with Theo, and would likely choose one of them as his next best friend were a mysterious accident to befall Weasley- But Theo feels like they would be, and he has to put all of his willpower into dampening the urge to make something bad happen to Weasley. Not because he feels any sense of loyalty to Weasley or because ridiculous moral qualms would stop him from going through with it, but because Harry might be lost to him forever if Theo ever did something to directly harm the person he clearly cherishes most in the world.
Theo wonders if his father ever went through something similar with the Dark Lord. Perhaps Theo ought to reach out to Thaddeus Nott. An update on how things are faring with Harry is long overdue, anyway.
Regulus tears through the air, hurtling past the trees of the Forbidden Forest with a pack of mutts on his tail. The damned broomstick refuses to work properly for him, and it is only thanks to his talents as a flier that he is able to maneuver the thing at all.
He tried and failed to kill Riddle’s final Horcrux yet again, which frustrates him to no end. It had been a perfect plan. He'd put the Black name to good use and come up with the perfect backstory to obtain the professor position at Hogwarts. He'd disguised himself just like the last time he'd seen Harry Potter, and had spent weeks biding time until the Auror security around the school got just lax enough that he might be able to sedate Potter, destroy him and the Horcrux, then get out of the school unscathed. Potter would have had no way of recognizing the artifact Regulus had dug up from the Black family archives- It was a terribly old and dark instrument that had stopped circulating in Britain centuries ago, and no self respecting Potter would ever have affiliated themselves with the likes of it.
But then, Potter had insisted on having a Nott present, and just like that, Regulus's plan had gone to shambles. He'd barely roused himself to consciousness and made it out of his office before the Aurors came charging in, slipping out the window and clinging to the balcony just in time. As he stood overlooking the expanse of the castle grounds, a single slip away from certain death, Regulus seriously contemplated the idea of coming clean to Dumbledore so that they might work together to rid the world of the Horcrux in Potter for good.
Regulus had decided against it in the end, however. While he wasn't under the illusion that Dumbledore was a saintly old man sent to earth by the will of Merlin himself, which was undoubtedly something all the naive and stupid members of the Order of the Phoenix had completely fallen into, Regulus didn’t believe Dumbledore to be some kind of a ruthless mastermind, either. Dumbledore would try to find a way to save Potter first, to make sure that the boy lived. But that route was much too roundabout for Regulus's tastes. Who knew what could happen in the time it took Dumbledore to come up with a solution for Potter's predicament? So many more lives lost, the whole world kneeling to that conniving piece of filth calling himself a Dark Lord- No, Regulus would not take that risk.
Besides. If Regulus's understanding of the political climate was to be believed, and it was always to be believed, Dumbledore’s influence over Magical Britain's politics was slipping. The half-blood metamorphmagus woman who'd claimed the Black seats in the Wizengamot that should've belonged to Regulus was pulling Dumbledore's supporters over to her side, and Regulus's secret sources had informed him that Nymphadora Tonks and James Potter were working together. This, combined with Harry Potter's fame and all that he stood for, would surely lead to the Potters becoming the new face of the Wizengamot in only a few years’ time.
Times were changing. Even if Regulus somehow found a middle ground with Dumbledore, it might not end up meaning much soon.
Dodging a knife that went whizzing past his ear, Regulus thought back to the brief exchange that had taken place with Potter and Nott back in his office. The two young wizards had exchanged conversations with their eyes alone, with Nott responding to Potter's body language in an almost subservient manner. It reminded Regulus a little too much of how the inner circle would act with Riddle, and only served as further proof that Potter needed to be taken down before he became something even worse than his famed nemesis.
“BLACK!”
Regulus is taken off-guard when a spell , not a weapon, misses him by a hair's width. He tries not to see the almost laughably cruel irony in this whole chase- For years, he sent assassin after assassin in Remus Lupin's path, and now, it's Lupin who hunts Regulus down like a mutt.
After the failed attempt on Harry Potter's life, Regulus had just gotten out of the castle past the Aurors when Lupin's pack materialized from the woods and started chasing him down. It’s a major inconvenience to Regulus, and an aggravating one, too, because he and Lupin should be working together if anything, as both their objectives lie with killing Harry Potter. But Lupin is too immature to let go of old grudges like how Regulus sent people to kill him over the years, and also, Regulus refuses to work with a despicable Death Eater who doubles as a creature .
An excruciating burst of pain slams into Regulus's left shoulder, and his broom plunges downwards. Lupin- Because the spell must have been sent by Lupin, no other mutt in his pack can wield such precise magic- Sends out an identical curse, this time to Regulus's right shoulder. The pain of it has Regulus blacking out even before he crashes into the forest ground.
“Harry?” Ron says, staring up at the pretty patterns of the lake reflected on the ceiling. His family and all his Weasley ancestors would have a fit if they knew where he was- A Weasley from a long line of Weasleys, having been snuck into the Slytherin dormitories by his best friend. Ron wasn't too eager to go along with this idea at first, but Harry insisted, clinging to Ron more than ever, and it made Ron feel nice and needed, which was a feeling he never felt with anyone else, certainly not his family, and only with Harry. So he'd agreed to it in the end, concealing himself with Harry's Invisibility Cloak and following him into the dungeons.
“Leave,” Harry had told the other boys in the dormitory, and much to Ron's delight, a handful of snakes had scampered off to sleep elsewhere for the night. Malfoy, the slimy git, tried to stick around, but eventually ran off too, when he realized neither of his goons had stayed.
“Can I please stay,” Blaise Zabini had whined, saying something about how his delicate back couldn't possibly last a night in anything that wasn't his custom-ordered fwooper-down mattress.
Ron didn't really understand the whole ridiculous Slytherin hierarchy system, but it was clear who stood at the top of it, so he just waited by and let Harry handle it. Eventually, Harry and Zabini came to the agreement that Zabini could stay only if he kept his mouth shut about a Gryffindor being present.
Nott stayed, too. With one livid glare at Ron, he slammed the curtains around his bed closed, which was just fine by Ron.
Ron is in Harry's bed now because Harry insisted. Upon hearing Ron call his name, Harry gives a small hum of response.
“You should come home with me for the winter holidays,” Ron murmurs. “You can spend Christmas with us. With family.”
Harry is silent for a while. “Are you… Are you saying I’m your family, Ron?”
“‘Course you are. It’ll be you, me, and all the rest of us Weasleys.”
“That sounds nice,” Harry sighs, snuggling into the pillow right by Ron’s head. “I suppose I can ask my dad if we can come over around the holidays.”
Ron clenches his fist tightly, not wanting to ruin Harry’s peaceful expression but also wanting to yank away Harry’s pillow so he can yell into it in frustration. Sure, Harry’s dad seems to have been acting more decent recently, but doesn’t Harry know that it’s only a matter of time before things go back to the way they were? People don’t change that easily or that drastically. Mr Potter was a rotten dad before, which means he’s going to keep being a rotten dad, and because Harry’s so trusting of his dad, he’s going to get hurt all the worse for it.
Ron doesn’t want to see Harry get hurt. He wants to protect Harry from all the bad in the world, firstly because Harry’s his best friend, but also because no one else seems to be putting much effort into doing it, so without Ron, who will Harry have? No one should be alone in the world, not like that. No one.
“Harry?”
“Mm?”
Ron thinks hard in his mind whether or not to give voice to his internal thoughts. The last time he said something bad about Mr Potter, as well as every single time before that, Harry did not react well.
Ron sighs. “I’m glad you’re safe. I’m glad you’re here with me.”
Harry’s already half asleep at this point, but a smile makes its way onto his face anyway. “I’m glad you’re here, too,” he murmurs, and that’s the last thing he says before soft breaths take over, signifying his falling into sleep.