Chapter 1
"Oi! James! Zachary Dalton waved to an unfortunate fifteen year old boy in the midst of a large group walking the streets of Diagon Alley. Two first years excitedly bought new school items while James, an older fifth year, tried desperately to escape the 'family bonding'.
"Can I just go with my friends?" James asked his mother as she bought first and third year supplies for his for his younger siblings, Albus and Lily, and his cousins, Rose and Hugo.
"Yes, fine, James," Ginny said irritably. She had been trying to rein in five children for three hours and it was clearly taking its toll on her.
Gratefully, James rushed to meet his friends Zach Dalton and Carter Wilkins.
Recalling her husband's past trip to Knockturn Alley Ginny called after her son, "Don't leave Diagon Alley!"
James turned only to smirk at his mother.
Not feeling much better, Ginny allowed herself to be pulled off by her only daughter. "Mum! Is it time to look for wands yet? James said if you don't get there fast enough all of the good wands are gone and you have to use one of Uncle George's trick wands."
"James!" Ginny turned to reprimand her oldest son, but the raven-haired boy was already gone.
CRACK! Two men materialized inches in front of Ginny, who let out a cry of mingled fright and frustration.
"RON! Will you ever grow up? You do realize don't you that I have not only been lugging around our children" –she paused to glare at Harry—"but yours, too, for the last three hours. I—"
"Mum," Albus interrupted, "I see Seth and Adam over there." He pointed to Flourish and Blott's. "Can I go?"
"Me too?" Rose chimed in. "Noelle and Kylie are over there too." She glanced at her father and aunt for approval.
"Yes, fine," Ginny said absently.
"No boys," Ron said sternly. Turning to his sister, he added, "and if you must be so cranky, I must remind you that I had an important meeting with the Minister of Magic."
"Don't you mean that I had an important meeting with the Minister?" Harry countered. He added to his wife, "Ron was only there for the pastries."
Ginny fixed them with a stern glare that uncannily resembled her mother's and continued walking. Harry and Ron hurried after her but an oh-so-familiar store front caught there attention.
In the window of Quality Quidditch Supplies was the newest and fastest broom out there, the Sonic Boom. "So, you want to go in?" Ron asked without even looking at Harry.
"Yes, but only to browse," Harry responded as he started towards the door.
"Of course, we're just browsing," Ron said, his eyes glued to the broom.
Once inside Ron and Harry looked over every Quidditch item imaginable and were only planning on buying a few. As Harry walked over to a pile of portable broomstick servicing kits, something caught his eye. A black stone in a gold ring, with maybe something scratched on the surface. He squinted to see if there was a crack down the middle, but he was too far away to tell. His heart beat fast as his legs carried him towards the ring.
It looked just like the resurrection stone. His numb fingers reached down to the ring and picked up the hard object. Harry examined it closely. The ring was just a normal ring; it had no crack down the middle where Dumbledore had stabbed it and there was no scratch on the surface of the mark the deathly hallows. Why it was in a barrel of Quidditch things was another question.
Harry looked at the ring. "What's that, mate?" Ron asked as he walked up behind Harry and saw the ring.
"Just a ring. It looks quite like the resurrection stone, doesn't it?" Harry asked as he placed the ring back down.
"I suppose; I never really saw the ring. Whatever happened to it?"
Harry gave Ron a questioning look before he answered. "It is somewhere that no one will find it, not even you."
"Hey, I was just curious. I'm not going to go and find it just to bring people back. You know that I know the story and that the people come back as ghosts."
"Ron, they don't come back as ghosts and do not even think about trying to find that stone," Harry said as he walked out of the store leaving Ron thinking about the stone. Ron paid for his things and walked out to meet Harry.
Harry and Ron walked down the street towards Madam Malkin's Robe Shop. Before they could enter, however, they ran into a very angry Hermione, dragging along Harry's oldest son, James.
"So do you know where I found James and his group of friends?" Before Harry or Ron could answer, Hermione cut them off. "In Knockturn Alley, to be even more specific Borgin and Burkes. He was pawning something but they wouldn't show me what it was because he already sold it. Zachary Dalton, Benjamin Harrington, Carter Wilkins, and Chase Lowry, not to mention that girl Riley Daniels, were with him." Hermione fumed.
James did not seem worried that he had been caught but he gave a smirk before asking "May I ask, Aunt Hermione, why exactly were you in Knockturn Alley?"
"You have become such an impossible child, James. I was supposed to check in on one of the shops for the minister. Harry, are you going to do anything about this? He deserves to be punished, and so should the other four children.
"Hermione, all I can say is we've tried," Harry said sarcastically. Hermione gave him a motherly look before Harry added, "Don't worry, he will be punished, but I don't think this is the place."
"Fine. Do Rose and Hugo have all of their supplies?" She asked Ron.
"Well, Ginny is doing the shopping for them. She's in there getting their robes and things, I think."
"To think, I have been working since last night on this stupid project to make sure poison does not get put on the market and kill people, Harry had an Auror meeting, which I know you were not required to attend, and you have your younger sister doing all of the hard work."
"Sorry," Ron muttered.
"James, let's go get your robes. Did Ginny get everything else?" Harry asked his son.
"Yeah. Can I get a new broom?"
"After the stunt you pulled in Knockturn Alley, no. Your mother's old Firebolt is fine, unless you broke that too."
"I only broke a few things this summer, for your information, and the Firebolt is…"
"The second fastest broom in the world."
"Yeah, so what do you say? Can I get the new Sonic Boom?"
"No, you can get new robes, new books, and all of the other school supplies that we buy you every year." Harry said as he walked into the shop, smiling, with his son closely behind.
Ginny was paying for the robes for Lily, Hugo, Albus, and Rose. The third years had come in to be measured and were now ready to leave unlike the two first years who were still mesmerized from buying their first sets of school supplies.
"Hey" Ginny said as she kissed her husband. "If you get James, we'll head back home. I've got to look over the evening edition of the Daily Prophet's Quidditch section before we print it."
"Alright. By the way, we need a new punishment for James."
"Again? I'm running out of ideas. What did he do?" Ginny glanced at a bored looking James.
"Hermione found him in Knockturn Alley."
"Doing what? James, why are you always making more trouble than anyone else?" Ginny asked her son, raising her voice with every word she said.
"He was pawning something, but we don't know what. It was probably nothing," Harry said, trying to calm his wife down.
"Right, well, I will deal with you later. Bye, Harry." Ginny kissed her husband and walked outside with the four children. "Hermione, do you mind taking Albus and Lily until Harry can get them after he buys James' robes?"
"Sure, you did enough for us." She glared at Ron.
"Thank you so much. I have to get to the Daily prophet." With that, Ginny apparated.
"Ron, I'm going to go home. Why don't you stay here with Harry?" Hermione said as she gathered the four children, preparing for side-along apparition.
"Alright, see you when we finish." Ron leaned in to kiss his wife, but she had already apparated. She was obviously angry. Ron waited for Harry and James to finish. The two walked out of the robe shop.
"Harry is that you?" an old friendly voice called. The three people turned around to see Katie Bell.
"Katie! How have you been?" Harry asked as he walked away from Ron and James.
Ron took his opportune moment to ask James what he had pawned. "So James, what was it that you sold? I won't tell you parents."
James gave him a look then shrugged. "Even if you do, I'm leaving in a few days anyway. It's a ring that I found last year in the Forbidden Forest. I got a good amount of money for it, and most of it your wife didn't take because she never saw it. Genius, right?"
"Interesting. Well, tell Harry that I had a place to be." Ron left his confused nephew as he apparated to Knockturn Alley. Ron had a feeling that the ring was the stone that he wanted. Only in the last few hours did he really want the stone but it could bring back Fred and everyone else who had died in the war. It was perfect and it would work, it had to. The story was just a story.
Ron walked into the shop. "Do you have a ring that was brought in this morning? I was looking for something vintage."
Borgin or Burke, he could never remember, looked him up and down before walking over to a shelf and taking the ring out. It was the resurrection stone with the symbol of the deathly hallows on it and a huge crack down the middle for some reason. "It will cost you."
"How much?" Ron asked as he looked at the ring.
"3,000 galleons. Take it or leave it."
"That scratch should take the price down. I want lower."
"I did lower the price; the person I bought it from, well, it cost me near 5,000 galleons. It's a very old ring and is worth a lot of money, but if you want I'll raise the price to 5,500 pounds."
"That's okay I'll pay 3,000." Ron said.
"No you reminded me you can pay the price I said before 5,500 galleons, pay or leave my shop right now."
"Fine." Ron paid the man and would have to thank Hermione for making such a high amount of money. She would kill him, but he would have to keep this under his hat for a while, at least until the children left for school and everyone got back into work again.
Ron put the stone in his pocket and walked into the alley before apparating home. He was going to bring back his brother, and Sirius, and Lupin too. Maybe even more people, too, because he could. With a CRACK Ron was gone from Knockturn Alley with the resurrection stone in his pocket and the power to raise the dead in his mind.