Author's Note: Hi guys! I'm writing this blasting the very song that this fic is written about. It's by the Ministry of Magic (a Wrock band) it's called The Bravest Man I Ever Knew. I am writing this as my own tribute to Snape. I've had a basic idea for this fic in my notebook for around a year now and have only just gotten around to finishing it. I've expanded on it a lot because before all I had was one comp book page. As you can tell, this is a lot more than one comp book page.
This is probably my favorite piece of writing for the Harry Potter fandom!
This is the first fan fiction that I've written in about a year. I'm so sorry, I hope this makes up for it. As for all of the Fans of DAT, I'm not giving up, I'm still in the process of writing the next chapter. Thanks for your patience.
One thing you should be warned of: I'm not sure how JK Rowling spells Lilly. It could be spelled Lilly or Lily. In any case, I'm spelling it Lilly for the fic. I hope that the spelling (if it's incorrect) doesn't bother you too much. Don't flame if you don't like it! You have been warned. If you don't like it turn back now!
The other thing you should be warned of: If it's in italics then it's a quote from one of the Harry Potter Books…unless you're looking at the disclaimer, which is also in italics
SPOILER ALERT: If you haven't finished the series (including Deathly Hallows) and mind spoilers you may not want to read it.
-lillyflower's revenge
The Bravest Man I Ever Knew is a song that belongs to a Wrock band called the Ministry of Magic. I'm not one of the band members, so I don't own don't own the song anymore than I own the Harry Potter series.(I wouldn't have to have a disclaimer if I owned it, so, no, I don't either). I shortened it.
Summary: This is the Adult Harry's take on his experiences during the war and his new view of Snape as he tries to explain it to his children. It gives his thoughts about the events that took place. What will happen? How will they take it? It's canon up until seventh year, which will be almost completely canon.
I was idiot, he was a hero:
It had been twenty-four years since the end of the war. Harry was amazed to find that he was happy. Happiness wasn't exactly been a foreign concept to him since he began Hogwarts but now he was happy nearly all of the time. The fact that they had won was a miracle in its self-the fact that he had lived was nearly unbelievable.
Such thoughts filled Harry with a familiar combination of guilt and gratefulness. He never let himself forget the sacrifices that others had made for him- his parents, Dumbledore, Sirius, and most incredibly-Severus Snape.
Snape. Harry gave a dry laugh at that. Who would have seen that coming? Certainly not Harry, his most hated professor had been the only real reason that he had survived Hogwarts (literally). Even after his suspicion and calling Snape a Coward, he did it anyway.
His children were constant reminders. The names were to honor the people had helped him the most. Albus Severus, James Sirius, and Lilly Luna-undoubtedly the bravest people he had ever known. He wasn't quite ready to tell his children of the importance of their names, but he had to anyway. Actually, Harry generally had a difficult time talking about the war. Too much had happened, but the children needed to know. They weren't children anymore. His youngest was in her fifth year now He would tell them tonight after dinner, since they were home on winter holiday.
First he had to tell Ginny. How would she take it?
"Finally!" Ginny was set down the laundry she was folding and hugged Harry.
"I know that this is going to be more difficult for you than anyone else, but you should have told them ages ago."
"What?" Harry raised his eyebrows in surprise. Normally she would have something a while ago.
A grin slowly creeped up her face. She knew exactly what he was thinking. "I didn't push it because it is a sensitive topic with all of us, but really, it does need to be done some time."
Reluctantly, he drew away. "I was thinking that we should do it after dinner."
"I'll have tea and treacle tart for afterwards."
"Can't we have the tea and treacle tart before?" Harry pleaded.
"No, because then you could back out," Ginny said with a smirk. "I know you too well."
"Drats! You have foiled my scheme!" Harry feigned annoyance.
"Yes! I have done what no one else in history has ever done. I should get an award!"
"Will a kiss do?"
"I think so, yes." Then he silenced her with a kiss.
This time she pushed him away.
"I know how difficult it is for you to keep your hands off of me, but I really do need to start dinner if I'm going to have time to make that treacle tart of yours."
"Fine, I'll leave you to it while I go and try to recollect memories of my youth."
"You go do that old man." She patted his shoulder before exiting the room.
Harry found himself without an appetite that dinner. The children and Teddy were all there, and no one seemed to notice. In fact, all of them were engaged in an animated conversation.
"Auror Langley is very talented. You should see the man on a broom! Once he nearly fell off and took Will down with him," Teddy chuckled at the memory.
"I bet he couldn't beat Dad!" Lilly rose to defend her Dad's honor.
Teddy leaned forward toward his little god sister. "I don't know. He is getting kind of old. He could be off of his game. His reign could be over."
Despite his slowly darkening mood, Harry couldn't quite contain himself at that comment. "Why does everyone keep calling me old? I'll have you know that just last week I kicked your mother's-"Teddy had always referred to Ginny as his Mother and Harry as his Father because that's how he always saw them. It kind of stuck because they saw him as a third son. (Or a first son, depending on how you looked at it.)
"Language Harry!"
"Fine. I kicked your mother's you-know-what-on the Quiddich field!"
The godson raised both of his hands, seemingly surrendering. "Fine, you're both getting old-" This time Ginny reacted more vehemently than Harry. He never understood why women tended to react so violently towards comments made about their age.
"I'll have you know that this old lady was asked to play against one of the recent additions to the Hollyhead Harpies-Sarah, I think, and I won."
"Everyone knows that the Holly-" she cut him off.
"Don't insult the Harpies in my presence!" This time she had a familiar gleam in her eyes that alerted the whole family to the fact that she wasn't kidding. After spending time as a Harpy she felt loyalty to her former team. Insult them only at risk of death. How could Teddy forget that rule?
This time Harry's godson looked frightened. "I surrender."
"Good." She nodded in approval.
Not so subtly Harry cleared his throat. All eyes turned towards him and he took that as his cue to speak.
"Good. Now that you all have stopped debating over the excellence of your Mother's Quiddich skills I have an announcement to make. We are having a family meeting-Teddy that includes you. This is important. Have you all finished?" After a chorus of yeses and yeps he spoke again. "Alright then, everyone into the living room!"
They sat down silently. The last time they had held a family meeting was when Grandma Molly had gotten sick a year ago (she recovered, of course) so they were worried. Everyone took their respective seats on the couch.
Harry and Ginny took their chairs, James and Albus sat next to each other on couch. Teddy sat perched on the arm the couch and Lilly somehow wound up sitting on the floor at Harry's feet like on Christmas morning when she was little.
Albus asked in confusion, "Why are we here?"
Harry took a deep breath and asked, "How much do you know about the war?"
Lilly spoke up first. "A dark wizard named Volde…"
"Voldemort, his name was Voldemort. He was very powerful. You killed-" Teddy tried to correct Lilly, but it was Harry who ended up correcting him.
"Not killed, defeated." After a dramatic pause, he continued. "That's what I wanted to talk to you about. I realize that we should have told you a long time ago but-"
"You should have! We're you're kids, we deserve to know!" The temper that James had inherited from the Weasleys was starting to flair.
"Even Teddy knows more than us!"
"You will show us some respect! You have no idea how difficult this is for us! All you hear about is the glory-the glory that's hardly there at all! Yes, Teddy knows because he born during the war. He saw the aftermath. Even he doesn't know the whole story! You will sit here quietly, without disturbing us or you will leave and we will not have this conversation. Understood?" Ginny said in her mother tone, channeling her own mother, who her children called Grandma Molly. Molly had a wicked streak that the whole family was very frightened of.
"Sorry," He bowed his head in shame.
"May I continue?" Talking their silence as a yes, he continued. "It's time that I tell you about my past. You're old enough, and you deserve to learn the truth from something other than inaccurate books. You need to learn about the war and my time at Hogwarts. Although to me it was basically the same. Let me tell you the real story. Once upon a time there lived a witch named Merope who lived under the iron rule of her father. She desperately wanted to be free. Then one day she became enamored with a muggle that she could only watch from afar. She watched him day after day until-"
"She sounds kind of creepy," James inserted.
Harry cleared his throat and James's face reddened and he fell silent.
"She watched him from afar until one day she got the courage to offer him water that was laced with a love potion. They got married and soon she was pregnant. That was when she decided to stop giving him the love potion. She believed that he would stay for the baby-he didn't. She lost the will to live and went to an orphanage and died an hour after giving birth-living just long enough to name her son after his father- Tom Riddle. Tom Riddle would grow up longing for power and he already showed cruelty from a young age. When he found out he was a wizard he was ecstatic. He said that he always knew that he was special. Tom found out that his father, a muggle, had abandoned his mother, feeding a hatred of muggles. By the way, there's only eight people left in the world-including you, who know this."
They stared at him in awe.
"Later that boy would turn into a man who created a name that the world would come to fear-Lord Voldemort. Voldemort ruined so many lives. You children have no idea how much terror he inspired simply at the mere mention of him name. The majority of wizards wouldn't dare utter him name-mostly they referred to him as you-know-who or he-who-must-not-be-named. I always thought that it was pointless myself, but then, I wasn't raised as a wizard. I didn't have the same fear of the name. However, I stand by what professor Dumbledore once said 'Always call things by their proper names. Fear of the things always increases fear of the thing itself.' That's very important to remember."
"Why are you telling it like a fairy tale?" Ginny wondered out loud.
"What? It gives it a more dramatic effect. Fine, I'll stop! On with the story! An organization formed to fight him and his followers, the Death Eaters . The organization was called the Order of the Phoenix and it consisted of several brave people-My godfather, Sirius Black, My father , James-both of whom you're named after –James Sirius," Harry looked at his son "Then there was my mother, Lilly, Alice and Frank Longbottom-Neville's parents, Peter Pettigrew, Albus Dumbledore- the head of the Order, and Remus Lupin-Teddy's father. Of course there were others, but they were the ones that I knew the best.
"A few years after Sirius, Remus, James, and Lilly graduated I was born. A year later a prophecy was made in a room in the Leaky Cauldron during an interview for Dividition professor."
"Mum and Dad were informed immediately we went into hiding. They tried to make Sirius the secret keeper. Sirius refused saying that he would be the obvious choice. So instead, they made Peter the secret keeper. They had never dreamed that little Peter would betray them. No one could. Peter was never the most brilliant man. I suppose you could say that he was a follower, not a leader." Regret crossed Harry's eyes, although only Teddy recognized it. Harry had always wished that he had a chance to get to know his parents. Yet, he couldn't quite bring himself to fully hate Peter.
"He was a coward. When I first found out what he did, I wanted to hate him. But, I just couldn't. He's a man to be pitied. Who's to say that he really felt any loyalty at all towards my father or the rest? They were popular and among the most talented. They could protect him. Fear dictated his actions, not loyalty. We should always feel sorry for those without true bonds of love and friendship. Without them life is a very lonely place."
"He came on October thirty-first-Halloween, in case you've forgotten, although being your respective ages, I doubt it." For a split second Harry couldn't remember where he had left off. "Where was I? Oh yeah, now I remember. He came on Halloween. James was the first to register what was going on. He handed me off to my mother and yelled, 'Lilly, take him! I'll hold him off!' My mother ran up to the nursery to get me. After Voldemort had killed my father he went after my mother. She had just picked me up when he burst through the door. He made an offer, 'Give me the boy and live.' She died, rather than give me up. That's how I got my scar." He lifted up the hair on his forehead to show his lightning shaped scar. After the war he had considered putting makeup on it or using a glamour charm but decided that it would dishonor his mother's memory. "I didn't really defeat him. My mother did. When she died for me her love created a very powerful protection that saved my life loads of times. That protection caused The Dark Lord's Killing Curse to rebound and evict his soul from his body."
"Love?" For once it was Teddy staring at Harry strangely instead of the other way around.
"Yes Teddy, I really did say that. Professor Dumbledore believed that love was the most powerful force out there. I used to think he was crazy too. People used to say that they thought that he was off his rocker, that he had gone senile. It wasn't until later that I believed he was right. My mother's protection saved me when I was too inexperienced to fight Voldemort. I faced either him or death eaters five times between when I started at Hogwarts and when I turned seventeen. Four of those encounters were face to face with Voldemort himself. I was only eleven the first time I encountered him. He couldn't stand to touch me. My mother's love actually hurt him when he tried to touch me. After I found out I never doubted that somebody had loved me. I owe her a lot. She actually taught me a lot about being a parent."
"How could love hurt somebody?" For once Lilly looked completely confused at the concept.
"How can a dead person that you've never met teach you something?" Teddy wondered out loud.
Since Teddy's question was the easiest to answer, he answered that one first.
"Lilly taught me that parenting is all about one thing-love. I had existed for a little over a year and she loved me enough to take care of me even after her death."
Onto his daughter's question…how do you explain something like that, Harry wondered. Not to mention that fact that he hadn't thought of the explanation in years. He closed his eyes and tried to remember that far off day in the Hospital Wing after he had encountered Voldemort and Quirrel. "It's hard to explain. I actually don't really understand it myself. The gist of it is that Voldemort had never known loved. He had never loved anyone. Yes, he had manipulated people, pretended to care about them, but he never really loved them. By that point in time he had been so tainted that he couldn't understand something so pure. That's how Dumbledore explained it to me when I was eleven. That's probably why I didn't understand. I was very young."
"You were only eleven when your first faced the dark lord, and lived?" Everyone stared at him in shock.
"Yes Teddy, I was. I was incredibly lucky that I hadn't been killed. Most people believed that I was magically talented, but the truth is, I just operated off of gut instinct and luck."
"What was it like?" Albus seemed to be absorbed in Harry's story.
"Could you please clarify?"
"What was it like living during the war and fighting?"
"Can you imagine living in constant fear? Your friends are the only one you could trust, but you can never be sure they are who they say they are. They could be under the imperious curse, or they could be imposters. Every morning you pick up the prophet and scan the news to make sure that someone you know hasn't been murdered today. Wards had to be put up around your house so you can avoid be murdered in your sleep, but is it enough? Nothing's more terrifying than the moment you realize that your wards have failed. That feeling is not something that you can understand unless you've experienced it."
"Hey!" James protested. "We're not that little, or course we-"
"No James you couldn't- life is so drastically different now." Harry looked towards Ginny with a silent plea for help.
She caught on quickly. "We stopped using the floo network because it could be taken advantage of too easily. If we used owls it was only for something trivial or the message was coded. Sometimes people would switch owls if theirs was too recognizable. It depended on how involved you were with the war. Did I mention that so many people were so terrified of the war they shut down their shops and went into hiding? Muggleborns began fearing for their lives. That was particularly true when the second war picked up."
"Second war? Isn't that kinda like a part two of the war?" James pointed out. Lilly, the young scholar of the bunch, finally spoke her piece.
"It's referred to as the second war because they thought that he was defeated the first time. Secondly, the second war was different from the first. It was even worse. Voldemort got really close to winning." She looked at Harry, "Right, Dad?" James looked angry that his little sister had just bested him, Albus and the rest just looked shocked. Well, maybe not Teddy. Teddy was a closet book lover himself. He used to always hint towards a specific book she might like or sometimes a book would suddenly appear on her bed. His Christmas presents to her were always books. Harry and Ginny were the only ones who noticed their secret companionship and found little ways to encourage it. So of course, neither were surprised when she began spouting random bits of information like that.
"That's right. People were under the impression that I had defeated the dark lord, so they thought that the war was over. However, it was more like the calm before the storm. By that point most of the original order was dead and the rest of the wizarding world was left to pick up the pieces."
What should he say next? Should he explain about Voldemort wandering as a spirit? Should he focus on the wars or talk about his other Voldemort experiences? Why did this have to be so complicated? "Voldemort had been wondering around as spirit, with the exception of the time he found a home with my first year DADA professor as a host. That is, he did until my fourth year." After a moment harry realized that he had gotten ahead of himself and apologized for his error.
"Sorry, I'm getting ahead of myself."
"Maybe I should tell some of it, then." Then without waiting, she took the reins.
"His followers were a persistent lot, do you know how many failed attempts at killing him they made?" At first that piece of information greatly disturbed Ginny, but Harry had spent so long joking about it to help ease her distress that it just sort of became their own private joke.
"Five, obviously." Albus sniffed. He was insulted that she would even ask the question.
"It seems like someone has inherited the Weasley family intelligence," Ginny said playfully. Harry just looked at them sympathetically.
"I'm a sorry kids, that's not saying much. At least Lilly here took after your Grandmother Lilly-apparently she was the brains of the family. As for you Teddy-you have inherited Remus' intelligence; I just wish you would actually use it." Ginny smacked his arm.
"Ow!" Of course it didn't hurt harry, but he played along. When he received group glares from the whole family he quickly began his explanation for fear of being cursed. Teddy could get rather defensive. "What? Do you really think that blasting off the toilet seat to send back from Hogwarts was the epitome of intelligence? There's a reason that Fred and George never did it. Your father would be terribly disappointed in you Teddy. Surely the son of marauder could do better than a toilet seat?" That earned Harry a second whack upside the head, which got the expected reaction of his family laughing at him.
Once again, Ginny channeled her mother as she wagged her finger and reprimanded her husband. "Don't you give him any ideas! He might actually demolish the house this time!" Harry wondered if she was only half joking. Once Teddy had blown up James' room, hole in the ceiling and all!
Both of them knew that the joking was to break the tension so they both played along.
"Okay, we need to get back on topic here."
"Really? I was just as happy, no happier being off topic."
"The famous Harry Potter, defeater of the Dark Lord, is a coward. What is the world coming to?" His wife feigned shock.
"Ginny, I love very, very, much, but please, could you kindly shut up? When you go through half of your life being chased by an ego-centric dark wizard with a self image problem, you can talk." The expression of humor on her face turned to shame, or at least a mock expression of shame. Harry thought that it was a little of both. "Sorry love."
"You will be forgiven on a full moon on the seventeenth day of the twelfth month." With a prideful expression he turned his nose up in the air in way that was very similar to the look that Draco Malfoy used to wear around school daily.
"That's tonight," His wife pointed out. Everyone always knew when it was a full moon because Teddy had a tendency to become restless and easily irritated. Albus and Sirius always teased him about 'that time of the month'.
"I know." He kissed her and took over.
"Since your mother seems to have a problem with being overly distracted I shall continue in her place. We might as well just get this over with. Where did we leave off?"
"I think it was the failed attempts at killing you, Harry."
"Okay, let's see…I think we had decided that the failed attempts at killing me amount to five, not counting when I was one, and my seventh year, of course. Alright, let's see...ah yes, Ginny's right, as always."
"Yep!" He ignored her.
"They are a persistent lot. The served the Dark Lord for years even when he was without a body out of fear. They knew he would return somehow. That became their goal, to speed up his recovery. Their goal was finally achieved during the end of my fourth year. They had devised a surprisingly complicated plan."
"Why was that a surprise? They did spend the first, well, at that at that point it was fourteen years of your life trying to kill you."
"I say that it was surprising because death eaters generally aren't that smart. I mean, dropping a diary into someone's bag in a crowd full of witnesses is not an intelligent plan."
"A diary?" James gave a rather girlish giggle.
"Yes James, a diary. Voldemort had turned it into a weapon. I'd rather not go into that because it was not a particularly pleasant moment. Let's just say it involved the memory of a dark lord, petrified students, and a basilisk." The children and Teddy stared in shock, Ginny just shivered and Harry winced at the memory. It would probably one of the most painful memories because few things hurt more than basilisk venom. Not that he cared to tell his children about that particular incident. Why not let them wonder? Or, maybe he should tell them. It did sound particularly romantic now that he thought about it. Saving his future wife from a giant serpent sounded like something out of a muggle fairy tale.
It was hard, but that he needed to tell this. Maybe then they would understand.
"In my third year Ron, Hermione, and I were being idiots."
"Actually, you were the idiot. They just went along with it," Ginny interjected.
"That's right, we were idiots. We should have gone to a teacher, but we should have. One night I was looking at the Marauder's map and I saw something strange-a dead person and an escaped convict. I immediately went after them. Somehow we made it into the Whomping willow."
"Wait a minute, did you just say that you made it into the whomping Willow?" Oops. He had never told Ginny that particular story.
"I don't remember how we did it, but made it. I found Sirius holding a wand to a rat. It turned out that the rat (Ron's pet rat, Scabbers) was Peter Pettigrew in his animagus form. He had framed Sirius and Sirius wanted justice. In the mean time, Professor Snape had walked into the room. He told us to step back. He said that Sirius was dangerous. Professor Lupin, who was also there, was accused of helping Sirius. They tried to defend him, but Snape wouldn't believe them. He honestly believed that we were in danger. However, I did something even more idiotic than actually trying to get inside of the Whomping Willow."
"What could be more idiotic than that? Is that even possible?" He ignored those comments from Teddy, who was obviously enjoying this and continued.
"I stunned him. I stunned Professor Snape." He looked down in shame. "I had a bit of temper problem when I was younger. I was very lucky that everything worked out. I was trapped outside with a werewolf and surrounded by dementors. The only reason I survived at all was…" Would it really be a good idea to tell his children that he broke that law? Probably not. "Somehow I managed to muster a full patronus and rescued Sirius using Hippogriff that we had saved from execution. That's the only reason any of us survived. Honestly, between the werewolf and the dementors, we should have either lost our souls or been torn to bits, maybe both. Merlin!" Something had just occurred to Harry. "I was one unlucky kid. I will say it again, I was an idiot."
The kids just started laughing and Ginny stared at him.
"What is it?"
"You really did that?"
"Yes."
"Why didn't you tell me about that?"
"It never came up."
Suddenly Ginny's eyes grew round. ."That's where the hippogriff came from? What was its name…Witherwings?"
"Yep, that's also why Sirius spent so much time with it when he was locked up in Grimmuald. I think it created some sort of bond. Bye the way, its real name is Buckbeak. Hagrid still refers to it as Beaky." Harry shook his head, wearing an affectionate smile.
"Can I add something?" His wife didn't even give him a chance to answer, and took over the reins temporarily. Although he didn't show it, Harry was grateful. He just leaned back on the chair let Ginny take the reins for a minute.
"My second year-his third year was rather boring, except for him getting his Firebolt. It was an amazing broom! Actually, it was the best of its day-it was still one of the best for the next decade. There had never been a broom that flew so fast and so smoothly. It was dream to fly. Both of us loved that broom. I miss it." She sighed regretfully. Ginny had always admired the broom and could go on and on talking about brooms-especially that particular one.
"See? I told you that mother liked to go off topic. Anyway, they kidnapped one of the best aurors in Britain-Alastor Moody, also known as Mad-Eye Moody because he lost one of his eyes and had it replaced with a magical eye." Harry knew that if he didn't explain how he got the nickname he's get lots of questions that would sidetrack him either further. "Then a deatheater named Barty Crouch Jr. posed as Moody and accepted the job of DADA professor, which, by the way, was cursed by Voldemort before he rose to power because he was denied the position." He stopped, thought for a moment, and added, "By the way, that's not common knowledge. I was most likely the first person Professor Dumbledore told about that."
"Really? Why didn't you tell me that earlier?" Judging from the tone in his voice he was in trouble with his wife again. Maybe he should stop this before Ginny murdered him.
As usual, Teddy didn't hesitate to speak his mind."Ooh. Somebody's sleeping on the couch tonight."
"If you value your life, be quiet." If Harry had ever growled, that would be it would be now. "The reason I never said anything was because by the time I had learned about it, that particular topic didn't usually come up during an ordinary conversation. We had other things on our mind, dear."
"Like?"
"Quiddich, homework, how to survive while fighting against a very experienced wizard who was probably the closest to immortal that humans are ever going to get, the kids-you know, the usual."
"Point taken."
"Thank you. Let's continue on with my fourth year, shall we? The Tri-wizard tournament was held at Hogwarts that year. Only students that were seventeen could enter. Crouch, disguised as Moody, put my name into the Goblet. He made sure that I won by placing me around people who would give me hints. Ron and Hermione helped, of course, so did Neville." Although he had been almost embarrassed to admit it, there's no way that he would have survived the tournament without them.
"Why would he want to help you win only to attempt to kill you?"
"It's simple. He couldn't just come out and kill me. There was always someone around. Even if he did, he'd be caught too quickly. Instead he made sure that I would make it to the finish so that I could grab a trophy that was charmed as a portkey. What he didn't predict was that I helped a second Hogwarts champion make it. I had insisted that we grab it together so that both of us would get the credit of winning. At the time who won didn't really matter to me, only that someone from Hogwarts did win. We did, but all I won was a resurrected Dark Lord and a Dead classmate." His bright green eyes hardened as he tried to control his emotions. It was still hard to think about Cedric Diggory after all of these years. If he hadn't been an idiot he would he grabbed Cedric and ran. Maybe they would have made it. Voldemort wouldn't have been resurrected and the Diggorys might still have their only son. As a parent Harry thought that he could begin to feel the horror that they must have felt. Losing a child is a parent's worst nightmare. If anything were to happen to Teddy, James, Albus, or Lilly, he had no idea what he would do.
"I still remember what happened as clearly as ever. It didn't take long for me to register what had ever happened. I knew that we were there for a reason. The panic kicked in immediately. Unfortunately, that wasn't enough time. Voldemort knew that we were there and just as the cup was in reach Voldemort yelled 'Kill the Spare!' The spare was the other boy; his name was Cedric. They killed him immediately. Before I even saw the person casting the spell he was engulfed in green light. Just like that the light left his eyes. It was horrible." Without thinking he reached up to scar forehead, expecting pain that would never come.
"You claim that you understand what it was like, but you're just kids. You don't have the same experiences and you should be grateful. It's been twenty two years and I never could forget the look of pure terror in his eyes as he knew that he was dying. Wormtail-sorry, that's Peter Pettigrew, tied me up. He cut off his own hand to put in a potion and forcibly took my blood. He ran a knife across my arm and held it over a bubbling cauldron. Voldemort was given a new body. He challenged me to duel, that unfortunately, I was not ready for it. I had never been so terrified! I had never actually dueled him before. It didn't take long for me to realize I was out matched." Suddenly Harry's hands were particularly interesting. It might have had something to do with the fact that he could not look his family in the eyes without showing the horror that he still felt, without showing his eyes, which were wet with tears that he refused to let fall. Harry refused to cry in front of his children.
"I remember what he said. 'You have been taught how to duel Harry Potter? We bow to each other Harry. I said Bow!" He forced me to bow. I refused to give up my dignity to the monster, but there's only so long one can fight the imperious curse. 'Very good. And now—we duel.' Then he used the torture curse and forced me to get up again. 'A little break,' He was exited. 'a little pause…that hurt didn't it Harry? You don't want me to do that again do you? Answer me! Imperio!'.That's what made him so creepy. He always insisted on manners while we were fighting. "I WON'T!" At first all I could do was hide. 'We are not playing hide and seek Harry.' All I could think of was to yell, 'Expelliarmous!' while he was throwing killing curses at me. He did it so effortlessly that he might as well have been throwing darts. He pretended to be kind and merciful, but no one is that big of an idiot. I should've died! What was I thinking? Expelliarmous was no good against a dark wizard that could do both nonverbal and wandless magic. Anyway, we cast spells at each other at the exact same time. That had an interesting effect- priori incatatem. It's the reverse effect. Shadows of Voldemort's past victims came out of the wand and helped me. At first I thought that I was hallucinating because I saw Cedric and my parents."
The first one I saw that I knew was Cedric. 'Hold on Harry' his shadow said.
Next my mother appeared. She whispered, 'Your Father's coming. Hold on for your father…it will be alright. Hold on…'
My father did come. He looked like an older version of me. Actually, he looked like I do now. He spoke quietly enough that only my mother and I would be able to hear him. 'When the connection is broken, we will linger for only moments…but it will return you to Hogwarts…do you understand Harry?'
"Of course I said yes! Had he told me to bash my head in with a rock I would have said yes. I was so…shocked to actually be hearing my father's voice I would have said yes to anything."
"I said yes, but almost dropped my wand. It was hard to hold onto it, but I wouldn't have let go for anything. When they told me to I made a run for it, grabbed Cedric's body, and grabbed onto the portkey."
"Oh Harry, you still remember all of that?" Ginny's eyes were filled with tears.
"How could I not? I had watched a boy die, Ginny. I had finally really come face to face with tormenter. It's funny, even though I remember all of that so clearly, I don't really remember what happened afterwards, so let's skip over that to my fifth year."
"The speech!"Ginny suddenly exclaimed.
"The speech? What speech?" He had no idea what she was talking about.
"He warned us, didn't he? The ministry believed that Harry was either lying or delusional, but Professor Dumbledore believed us. He called for us to unite as a school, to remember what we had to fight for. It was one of his better speeches. 'Remember Cedric. Remember, if the time should come when you have to make a choice between what is right and what is easy, remember what happened to a boy who was good, and kind, and brave, because he strayed across the path of Lord Voldemort. Remember Cedric Diggory.' You didn't know Cedric, you probably haven't even heard of Cedric, but he was the first victim of the war."
"Why don't I remember that?"
"I think you had other things on your mind. Either that or you were in the hospital wing."
"I think I had a lot on my mind. Or maybe I was in the hospital wing. That's equally likely considering that I was there often enough for Madam Pomfrey to consider giving me my own bed." Now that the Cedric part was over with, Harry took back the reigns. Ginny knew a lot, but she didn't know everything. There were some things that never came up that, in retrospect, were more important than he realized.
"Ok, my turn again! Do you remember when I told you about the Order of the Phoenix? They re-formed, this time it included Sirius, Remus, Professor McGonagall, Professor Snape, and the Weasleys. Ron, Hermione, Ginny, Fred, George, and I might as well have been members, considering that we always had a basic idea of what was going on, could identify the core deatheaters, and knew most of the Order members. By that point we knew that things were going to get worse. The Minister, Cornelius Fudge, was in denial."
"Poor guy, his name was Cornelius…," James shook his head in mock pity.
"An annoying name for an annoying man. It fits." Harry approved.
Lilly just looked angry. "How could they go into denial?"
"Voldemort was so feared, he didn't want to believe he was back. Besides, it would have ruined his political career. Ron and Hermione went up to me and asked me teach students how to survive. I refused at first. It was mostly luck, but somehow I ended up teaching them anyway. Of course they won, and I spent the year working with other students to prepare for war. It wasn't much really. I taught them a few stunners, a disarming spell, and the patronus charm. We made deatheater dummies and practiced on them. I made them memorize the faces of death eaters. The name is kind of an inside joke, Dumbledore's Army. The ministry believed that Dumbledore was raising an army to take over the ministry. The ministry had taken over Hogwarts so we secretly named it Dumbledore's army. We always referred to it as the DA. The DA was discontinued the next year, although I think many of them went on to practice on their own. My sixth year was spent learning as much as I could about the Dark Lord."
"So, it was basically a dueling club, right?"
Harry smiled. He was happy that they didn't get it. "To us it wasn't just a dueling club. We thought of it as a sort of resistance movement. The ministry didn't allow practical lessons for DADA that year. The group was formed so that we could learn how to survive. We became a pretty close-knit group. They never gave up on me. Not even when it became dangerous for them to support me."
Sixth year wasn't particularly to important to the war, so he skipped over it and just mixed it in with his seventh year. "In my seventh year Voldemort had all but became the Minister of Magic because he had so much control over it. I became a fugitive. When Death Eaters took over Hogwarts they have them hell. Professor Snape was a double agent. He killed Dumbledore during my sixth year because Dumbledore made him make a promise so that he could die with dignity. We believed that he was a traitor, but he was still following Dumbledore's orders, helping Ron, Hermione, and I by carefully placing clues in out path and he protected the students as much as he could. Only purebloods and half-bloods were allowed to go to Hogwarts. Meanwhile Ron, Hermione, and I were on a Wild-goose chase to find a way to defeat Voldemort." There's no way he was telling his children about Horacruxes. That information was better left a secret, which, hopefully, would die with him.
"Soon I made my way to Hogwarts to face the Dark Lord. I came and talked to the DA who begged to help me they defended the school and the younger students, so did the professors. There's no way we would have won without them. During the battle I discovered three things:
Snape was undoubtedly the bravest man I ever knew
I would have to die to defeat the dark lord
The only things that could save the Dark Lord was remorse.
By this point everyone was leaning forward in their seats looking confused. They didn't ask questions though, because they knew he'd explain it.
"It was probably the hardest thing I had ever done." Maybe it would be best to leave out the Hallows and his parents? "I knew I had to save them. I was getting kind of desperate, so I just stepped in front of a curse. That sacrifice gave the Order and DA members the same protection that my mother gave me. It gave us the upper hand. I didn't want to be a murderer, so I gave him the chance to save himself. You see, murder splits your soul. His soul was so mangled that it was destroying him. The only way for him to live was to show some compassion, some remorse. Of course he didn't listen. We cast a spell at the same time, but because my wand was significantly more powerful, when we cast a spell at the same time Voldemort's own spell rebounded on him and killed him." Harry looked at Ginny expectantly, waiting for her to give her side of the story.
"For a while things had seemed hopeless when harry 'died'. We fought harder than before out of desperation. I was actually supposed to stay out of the fight and watch, but I ended up dueling anyway. When Harry came out of nowhere started to duel the Dark Lord all of the fighting stopped. Everyone paused to watch the final stand-off. Hogwarts was the last base for the light. If it fell…we might as well have surrendered our wands. That wasn't necessary because somehow Harry defeated the Dark Lord. Death Eaters were more like mindless puppets, when their Lord died they vanished." Ginny continued, giving her perspective of the events that happened that day.
"Everyone was terrified to find out the casualties and deaths. We had a right to be. F-F-Fred died." Tears came to Ginny's eyes. Her husband leaned over to hug her and whispered, "It's all over now."
"I know," She whispered back.
He felt that owed it to Fred to listen"Your uncle Fred literally died laughing. It was quick, but it shook the whole family. Fred had been like a brother to me from the time I had started Hogwarts-long before your mother and I had even really considered dating. It was hard on them, especially George."
"Is that why Fred's name is Fred?" James asked. Lilly elbowed him in the ribs.
"What do you think? You boys are so thick…"
"Lilly, apologize?"
"Daaaad. Please don't make me apologize for their stupidity."
Sternly, he looked at his daughter. "How do you know? Fred is such a common name; he could have been given a random name. Apologize to your brother. But yes, I think I know where you're going and you're right. He's named after his uncle Fred."
"There's something I still don't get. Why am I named Albus Severus? I get that they were headmasters, but is that it?"
Harry was getting kind of frustrated. How could they not see it? Maybe he wasn't explaining it right.
"Haven't you been listening? I named you Albus Severus because they were important to me. Professor Dumbledore was probably the most brilliant man I have ever met. He was the real reason that the war was over, but more than that, he was a mentor of sorts. I really looked up to him as a kid. Everyone did. We thought he was infallible because he was so wise. What we didn't realize was that his wisdom was hard earned. He made a lot of mistakes when he was young that I think he was still paying for the day he died." Harry recalled that night they were hunting for the horcrux and Dumbledore had to drink that potion, and how he kept apologizing to someone. It must have been his sister, who had been accidentally killed when he was young.
Harry cleared his throat and continued. "Professor Snape's story isn't very well known. He was a friend of my Mum's. He figured out that she was a witch before she got her letter. He taught her about magic."
"I don't think either had any idea of how talented he was. Snape was a genius at potions and had invented his own jinxes and hexes by his fifth year. My mum was supposed to be good at charms. It works, don't you think? Two very intelligent made made an excellent pair of friends. At least, they were friends until he made a mistake. Snape grew up calling muggleborns mu-well, you know what I mean-that name you are never to repeat. That permanently fractured their friendship."
"Remember how I told you that there were so many brave people who sacrificed everything because of the war? One of them was Severus Snape. He was a friend of my mother's. Actually, he wanted to be more than a friend. His love for her would guide him for the rest of his life. He became a death eater because he felt like he had no other option. However, he realized that he was doing wrong when he joined the death eaters." He left out the part that he joined the order after he realized that Lilly was going to die.
"After Lilly's death he dedicated his life to facing Voldemort. He's probably the least recognized wizard who did the most for the war. Without him, you wouldn't be here because I'd be dead. He was a private person, he wouldn't have wanted the recognition anyway. Everything he did was from behind the scenes. He saved me in my first year when someone tampered with my broom during a Quiddich match. He tried to save us when we went after Sirius. He alerted the Order when I came running into trouble (once again without thinking) Voldemort had tricked me into thinking Sirius was in trouble. He wasn't until he rescued me. He was murdered by a deatheater named Bellatrix." That was another memory that Harry hated drudging up.
Suddenly a ding! Came from the oven.
"The Treacle tart! I almost forgot give me a few minutes.
The Bravest Man I Ever Knew (By MoM)
I have given you a name
One that shows you can always change
No matter the way or mistake you've made.
And sometimes consequences define your life with hardship.
Will goodness will be the banner you raise?
Cause with his last breath, Severus said take it, take it.
Living in disguise.
A true wizard on the inside.
Not afraid of what he had to do.
He was the bravest man I ever knew.
Albus Severus,
You were known for two headmasters at Hogwarts.
One of them was a Slytherin
And he was probably the bravest man I ever knew.
A true wizard on the inside,
on the inside.
The bravest man I ever knew.
A true wizard on the inside,
on the inside.
All these things that tie us close
To what matters most
We cannot let go.
And sometimes consequences define your life with hardship.
Will goodness will be the banner you raise?
Cause with his last breath, Severus said take it, take it.
Living in disguise.
A true wizard on the inside.
Not afraid of what he had to do.
He was the bravest man I ever knew.
Long ago I had a teacher
A sallow skinned Slytherin with long black hair.
I hated him and he seemed to hate me too.
And though I branded him a coward he was, in fact,
the bravest man I ever knew.
A true wizard on the inside,
(the bravest man I ever knew) on the inside.
The bravest man I ever knew.
A true wizard on the inside,
on the inside.
The bravest man I ever knew.
Always, Always
There's so much in a word
Always, Always
When Ginny sat back down he continued on with the story.
"He made some mistakes-we have at one point or another. If you had actually been listening to the beginning you would know that he was a deatheater who had become a spy for Professor Dumbledore and the order to repent for his mistakes. No one believed that he could change, but he did. It's sad, but none of us really appreciated him-especially your Aunt Hermione, Uncle Ron and I. Despite it all he lived in disguise under the eye of the dark lord-something that most people couldn't survive. He even went back to the dark lord even though he knew that he would probably be tortured, and possibly even killed."
Suddenly the door burst open. They all turned around to see Ron. It appeared as if Ron had kicked the door open. Was something wrong with Ron?
"Hello everybody."He spread his arms out wide into the air. Ah, apparently he did all of that for dramatic a dramatic effect. Ah, that explains it. Ron had been spending a lot of time with George lately. Once he lowered his arms, he asked, "What's Ginny been saying about me this time?"
Ginny smirked. "I was just telling them about the time you were six and you thought that Dad was-"As quick as a snitch he covered her mouth.
Ron spoke very slowly and very you promise to take that story to the grave, I will let go. Fair 'nuff?"
Effortlessly, Ginny twisted out of his grip. "You've gotten soft Ron. But you have my promise. I will take it to the grave." "By the way," she added, "Don't you have a wife to annoy?"
"Hermione's taking the kids to a muggle history museum. Apparently she thinks it's necessary for them to learn about muggle history." Judging from the tone of his voice he disagreed.
"You know Ron, just because you slept through history of magic doesn't mean all history isn't useful."
"Really, what were you talking about?" He asked more seriously
"Snape." Harry stated simply.
Ron looked at Harry like he had suddenly been turned into a hippogriff. "Why were you talking about him?"
"I was telling them about how he had saved my life."
"What?" Although it was usually Hermione or Ginny's job, Harry rolled his eyes at his longtime best friend.
"I've told you all of this before." Ron screwed up his face trying to remember.
"Oh yeah, that's right. Merlin, it's been ages since we've talked about it though. Wait a minute!" Ron groaned at the realization that he would have to explain everything-a job he was dreading. Although he had an easier time talking about it than Harry, he wasn't looking forward to it. It was such a long story and it would probably be painful. "Does this mean they know everything?"
Yep. I just left out a few non essential things. I didn't bother telling them about that, though. It wasn't necessary to tell them about his soul." It took a second, but Ron understood that by that Harry meant Horacruxes.
"Just great! Now I'm going to have to tell Rose and Hugo when they and Hermione get back from their trip to that muggle history museum."
"I've just done it, although you did interrupt us talking about Snape." Although Harry sounded annoyed, he was secretly pleased. The conversation had been hard on him. He had a sudden desire to just sleep for a long period of time. 'Good thing tomorrow's Saturday…' he thought to himself.
"Sorry to interrupt you mate." Ron dragged over a chair and sat down quietly.
"It's okay, I was almost done anyway. If it weren't for him, our mission given by Dumbledore wouldn't have been successful. He helped us indirectly while keeping the students from being hurt too badly while Hogwarts was taken over by deatheaters. The deatheaters were particularly cruel. They had taken to torturing the students. I have a feeling that if he hadn't been headmaster they would've begun killing students as well. Even as he was dying he helped me. He gave me memories that explained things that I had been wondering for years. With his last breath Severus said take it!" Shame bubbled up to the surface. How could he have been so ungrateful? Even during school he knew that Snape had saved him (or attempted to) at least twice.
"How could you have known? You were just a kid." Ginny could read him far too well. Maybe it was the way he was looking down running his hands through his hair that gave him away.
"Maybe you're right. But still, I owe him everything. If it weren't for the fact that he was a private man I wouldn't requested that a plaque be made in his honor. I find it riduclous that people think I deserve the credit. He was the hero."
"We still could." Ginny said gently.
"Yes, but we won't." Harry said matter-of-factly. "He would come back to life just to torture me, then, murder me."
"You have a point mate. A trophy or something from a Potter? He's probably just throw it at you!" Ron managed in between laughs.
"Probably." Everyone laughed, even the kids, who had no idea what Snape was like-except for Harry, who looked terrified. He was imagining all of the horrible things that Snape would do to him. Harry stood up and concluded the family meeting. "I think that's it for today. It's getting late-it's already ten. Goodnight! Bye Ron, we'll see you tomorrow."
"Yeah, see yah." Ron disapperated and Ginny herded the children upstairs.
"Mom, we're not little anymore." She sighed.
"Fine, but no later than eleven, you hear me? If hear so much as a whisper from you after eleven I must might have to cancel that family Quiddich match…" In a flash all of the kids ran upstairs. Quiddich was the family obsession, so taking it away was worse than grounding them.
"Well, I guess I should be getting back. See you tomorrow Ginny and Harry." All they had a chance to do was wave goodbye before he left too.
"Now that they're all gone…are you alright?" She hugged his shoulder.
"I'm alright. It wasn't as bad as living them. If I can survive that, I can survive talking about it."
"You always were a brave one. Kind of stupid sometimes, but brave."
"I think that's I was a Gryffindor dear."
"Did I ever mention that I find your courage to be-"
"Incredibly attractive?"He flashed her that grin that she loved so much.
"You read my mind."
"Ginny." He said slowly, teasing her. "Snap out of it. I'm not Dumbledore, I'm Harry, your husband, remember? "
"I know exactly who you are. You've finally gotten what you've wanted, after all of these years. You're Harry, just Harry."
Author's Note: What do you think? This is the longest thing I've ever written. Counting the A/N I have 9705 words. It was interesting writing an adult Harry. I thought that since he's finally had a chance to get away from the constant fear and stress he's have a chance to be a bit more laid back. Let me know what you think! Thanks for reading. Please review!
-lillyflower's revenge