Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or the new, totally awesome TV show, Sherlock- they need to hurry up with season 2, seriously!

Why, hello there! Welcome to my little corner of fanfiction. net

This is a crossover of Sherlock/Harry Potter. I would say that the universe is heavily based off of Dayja's "Harry Potter of Baker Street." It's filed under just Sherlock fan fiction, not the crossover file. YOU SHOULD READ IT! Go read it!

Anyway, both John and Sherlock are muggles in this. They are raising a young Harry Potter, so the time-frame (?) is shifted slightly.

Ever since moving in with the self-proclaimed sociopath, Sherlock, and ever since discovering this bizarre 'wizarding world' filled with magic- which was only about a year ago- John Watson had seen many strange and startling things.

But this- well, this almost topped the severed head in the fridge. Almost.

It all started out perfectly normal (doesn't it always?). It had been left to John, once again, to buy the much needed milk.

John left Sherlock to look after Harry on his own. He'd long ago put aside doubts in doing this- Sherlock had been responsible enough with the young boy up until then, after all.

Let that be known as his first mistake.

The routine trip didn't take him any longer than usual. He fiddled with his keys for a moment before he stepped into the flat and by doing so, abruptly received one of the biggest shocks in his life.

Papers and books were scattered across various surfaces and the floor, as though someone had gone through them frantically. What looked to be one of Sherlock's experiments sat on the already cluttered kitchen table; new, yet seemingly disposed and forgotten.

Sherlock's skull had found it's way back to the mantelpiece, where it sat, its empty eye sockets staring ominously into nothing. He'd have to talk to Sherlock again about having it there- same went for the experiment.

Five-year-old Harry sat on the couch. He still had a very small frame for his age- John hoped he would reach a more normal height soon- so his feet couldn't quite touch the ground.

None of this was unusual, but the snake sitting contentedly on Harry's lap as he quietly patted it like it was some kind of cat was.

John froze and spluttered for a moment. Finally, he managed to blurt out what was a panicked kind of question, asking Harry just what the hell a snake was doing in the flat (but hopefully with not such a choice of language).

Brilliant green eyes turned up to look at John. He seemed confused by his guardian's perturbation.

"Sherlock said I could," the young boy answered simply, still stroking the snake. At first glance, it didn't look to be a poisonous snake. In fact, it was fairly unremarkable in appearance- quite like the kind people often kept as pets.

But anyway, where was Sherlock? He was supposed to be watching Harry. Supposed to be making sure that nothing happened to the boy that ended up in their care. John was pretty sure that included keeping potentially harmful snakes away from him.

"Where is he?" John asked.

"Sherlock? I think he went down to 221c to-"

Taken abruptly by a surge of anger and frustration, John didn't give Harry a chance to finish whatever he was about to say. Instead, he yelled, "SHERLOCK!" and stomped out of the room to confront and pulverize the man in question.

Quite stupidly, as it was, he left with the snake still on Harry's lap. That was his second mistake.

As he marched, John's angry surge started abruptly losing its fuel. Who was he kidding, he could never pulverize that stupid, idiotic high-functioning sociopath. A man could dream, though, couldn't he? No, he couldn't even seriously think about hurting Sherlock in virtually any way.

Thanks to Mycroft sticking his nose into what shouldn't have been his business (John was starting to see why Sherlock was always so peeved with him), John was legally partnered with Sherlock- that's right, folks, they were married. Something to do with since Sherlock was blood-related to Harry, they offered each other some sort of magical protection… or something. And, for John to be included in the blood-whatever-it-was, he had to be married with Sherlock. On top of all that, with absolutely no prior consent or even warning, they were thrown into the guardianship of Harry Potter, apparently famous in this wizarding world they'd only recently learned about.

So, there they were, probably the oddest family in Europe. They were all still alive and doing fairly well, though, so that counted for something, didn't it?

It was hard for John to admit, but he thought he felt his affections for Sherlock blossoming out into something more than friendship. Maybe. That might've, of course, just been the enigmatic bond that forms between two people raising a child together. Was it non-platonic? Whoever knew the answer to that one, John would've loved to schedule a nice, long chat with.

John gave himself a little shake. He was supposed to be storming down to tell off Sherlock for being an irresponsible, insufferable moron. Now was not the time for him to be musing over his feelings for the man like a love-smitten teenager. Come on, John, and he weakly fanned his flames of anger back into a pitiful spark.

That'll have to do, he thought, approaching the door to 221c rather quicker than he had expected. Sherlock, for whatever reason, never locked the door to the basement when he was actually in it, and rarely even when he was not. John had a feeling that sometimes Harry took advantage of that fact and would sneak into 221c, and that worried him. The young boy often showed great interest in the experiments Sherlock set up, and although it helped connect the two, John knew it would one day get Harry into trouble.

John didn't wait or hesitate, but grabbed the door handle and swung it open forcibly and suddenly. He was pleased to see that he had made the normally still and composed Sherlock jump violently in surprise. But, although startled, the consulting detective never looked up from… whatever he was doing.

The ex-soldier tore his eyes away from Sherlock to survey the room. 221c was where Sherlock was supposed to perform and store all of his experiments, a rule John had placed into effect with the arrival of Harry and why he would have to talk to the man about the experiment left on the kitchen table.

In the last year, the entire flat had been converted into a kind of make-shift lab in which Sherlock spent much of his spare time. There were shelves filled with mostly unlabelled vials of violently colored, as John could only guess, chemicals and mason jars holding items ranging from blood to human body parts. The counters housed the typical lab equipment like vials, microscopes, Petri dishes and Bunsen burners- now, why did John get the feeling Sherlock nicked most of those things?- and the fairly less typical equipment such as the riding crop, an electric mixer, a broken-down microwave, and a sword that Sherlock refused to disclose the origins of when John asked several years ago.

In the very middle of the room was a large table that was normally littered with trays of experiments and heavily scribbled-in notebooks. Instead of that, though, the normal items were shoved haphazardly away and piles upon piles of books dominated the table, and Sherlock seemed to be determined to go through each and every one of them.

"Oh, John- I thought I heard your loud octaves," the deep voice mumbled as a way of greeting, but never once did Sherlock tear his narrowed eyes filled with intent away from the text he was scanning through.

For a while, John was confused. He could only imagine the books were for research, as Sherlock was never one for pleasure-reading. But, when Sherlock needed to do research in the past, he always used the internet, which was much faster and more efficient for searches, except of course for…

Obviously having not found what he was looking for, Sherlock tossed aside the book he had been browsing through, and moved on to the next one. John caught the discarded book and looked at the cover- Magical Serpents: A Guide to Fantastic Snakes by Noctus Medusa was written at the top in large, intricate silver writing. John only barely registered that the picture of the striped, three-headed serpent (a runespoor*, as it was labelled) ripping its own different heads off, was moving- it's one of those magical books, apparently- before he was reminded of his purpose.

He meant to berate, but he felt much less angry then before, and so it came out quite weak and rather pathetic, "Sherlock, there's a snake in the flat," John said, but Sherlock seemed uninterested in the news and continued thumbing through pages.

"See, Harry told me that you let him have that snake in the flat," John continued, crossing his arms.

"Yes, I did," ice-blue eyes finally looked up and met John's, "Problem?"

John broke the direct eye-contact- funny how those icy blue eyes could make him feel like he was melting- and instead focused on the wall behind the taller man, "Normal people don't allow their children to bring snakes into their homes!"

For a small moment, Sherlock seemed to become pensive, but it didn't last and, apparently disregarding John's cause of concern, absorbed himself back into his original task.

John huffed an "impossible" under is breath and made to leave.

"I don't know why you're so rattled up about it," Sherlock said.

John spun back to his spouse (he felt odd at how natural that designation sounded).

"What?"

"You shouldn't be so rattled up about it," said Sherlock from behind a textbook, "the both of them got along just fine."

John was baffled, "Who got along just fine?"

"Harry and the snake, of c-AHA!" Sherlock exclaimed with a sudden triumphant force.

It was John's turn to startle- whether at the exclamation or Sherlock's last sentence, he wasn't sure.

Sherlock abandoned the other books laying on the table and, carrying the one in his hands, strode past John, wearing his trademark 'I'm a Genius' smirk. He offered John no explanation, but John was determined to get one. He darted up the stairs directly behind Sherlock.

"Sherlock, what are you doing?" John asked, managing to squeeze in an authoritative tone that might- or might not have- made Sherlock stop abruptly and spin back toward his flat mate, still wearing a maniacal smile. John narrowly missed colliding with him, which would have no doubt led to an embarrassing situation.

"He's a Parstlemouth," Sherlock said and looked at John expectantly. John knew that there was supposed to be some importance to that word and that Sherlock expected him to know it (hell, maybe he should), but he just couldn't understand what it was for the life of him, and he was left feeling much like a moron. Sherlock noticed the incomprehension on his best friend's face, and although he did deflate a little, he moved to the explanation in a blissful frenzy, "A Parstlemouth, John- look here," he opened his book up to a marked page and held it out for John to see and pointed briefly to one, short paragraph.

Parstlemouths- speakers of Parstletongue (snake language)- are a rare occurrence in wizards and witches. The remarkable ability is believed to be inherited by bloodline, and is impossible to learn otherwise…

John stopped reading. In the back of his brain, wheels were turning and perhaps a few points were clicking together, but consciously, John just didn't see what Sherlock was playing at, unless he was actually suggesting…

John pressed a hand to his face.

"What?" Sherlock demanded.

John let his hand fall to his side, but that shadow of dread still hovered in the depths of his chest. Wizards, spells, voo-doo- maybe he just wasn't quite used to it, even then, but he always got the dreading feeling whenever it was brought up in their lives. His hesitance- he preferred to think of it as caution- to magic, however, didn't hinder in any way the caring he felt for Harry, who he obviously knew to be magical.

Although John's approach to magic had been like this, Sherlock's had been quite the opposite. It intrigued him, interested him. He wanted to know as much about it as he could. When Mycroft first told them about this whole other world that existed amidst their own, Sherlock bought piles of books and poured over them for days- thus the ones he had been using for research in the lab.

"So," John said slowly, each word tasting of 'stupid' on his tongue, "Harry was talking to that snake?"

Sherlock made to answer, but John, knowing what he was going to say, stopped him, "No, don't just tell me 'yes,'" said John, "I want to exactly what happened."

Sherlock gave an impertinent snort and shuffled his feet impatiently. John just tilted his head and gave Sherlock that special, admonishing look. Rolling his eyes, the taller man delved into the story.

"You'd just left to get the milk, when I found out that conducting that experiment I was working on indoors wasn't exactly… a good idea, so I moved it outdoors," Sherlock explained, "Harry was quite interested in it and you had told me to watch him, so he came outside as well.

"Even outdoors, the experiment was a bit hazardous, and since I knew you wouldn't be very happy if you came back to see burns all over the boy, I had him sit a good distance away. He was a bit disappointed to be at a such a length away he couldn't properly see what I was doing, but he obliged without a word and occupied himself with other things.

"What he occupied himself with, I didn't pay any mind to, at first. When Harry started to make hissing noises, I did give it a bit more attention. He had obviously found a snake in the gutter- it looked like a harmless species- and started to play with it. So, I thought perhaps he was purposefully making nonsense hissing noises, amusing himself by imitating a snake- it seemed the thing a child would do. But, as I thought about it, I realized that couldn't be it. Harry seemed to be completely unaware of the sounds he was making. When the snake began hissing back, he jumped back, exclaiming to me that the snake was talking to him.

"From what Harry told me, as far as he knew, he had just been saying hello to the snake. He thought he had been speaking English, but I knew he had been hissing. He also told me that the snake said hello back, also in what he understood as English, but I only perceived as hissing.

"So, they were both speaking in some kind of snake language, although Harry was completely unaware of it? This was interesting to me, much more interesting than my experiment had any promise of being- it was ruined by then anyway. I wanted to be able to research this, but it would have to be from those books, as I had no doubt that it would be part of this whole magic business.

"I made to go inside. Harry asked me if he could bring the snake inside, too. I didn't see the harm in it, so I allowed him."

John stood, soaking in the information in silence. Sherlock watched him tentatively, waiting for his reaction.

"Harry can talk to snakes," John stated quietly. This time it wasn't a question, just a simple, blunt statement.

They both gave nods, each quietly accepting this new addition into their knowledge base.

Sherlock shrugged, trying to fight a small smile off his face, "A skill that could easily come in handy with my line of work."

"No," John said firmly, knowing that Sherlock was referring to his- their, really- detective business.

Sherlock pulled a pouting face, making him look like an overgrown child, "But-"

"No," John repeated.

They both started up the stairs again. It was another rule that John had made sure to be very, indisputably clear on- Harry was to NEVER be involved with any cases. Ever. More than once, Sherlock had tried to bring him along, either because he thought magic would have made things easier, or he wanted to use it as some sort of 'learning experience' for Harry. But each and every time John had been very firm with his position- for God's sake, the boy was only five!- and Harry had never since been to a crime scene.

Their little trip was made in complete silence. That silence hung until they reached the door back to 221b, where nothing could be heard. Not a sound...

Uh oh…

They weren't entirely sure that snake wasn't poisonous, were they? They'd both left Harry alone with it. That was the reason why John had gone to berate Sherlock, for Christ's sake!

There was a sudden surge of panic as John wrenched open the door. Even Sherlock seemed to show it, though just barely. But as their vision of the room opened up to them, they were lost in confusion.

At first, they only saw Harry, who sat frozen and pale on the couch, tense. John and Sherlock walked in to get a better view of the five year old. His face seemed petrified, stuck in an expression of shock and horror. They heard his breath hiss in and out of his slightly ajar mouth, and saw a slight sheet of sweat on his forehead.

What John noticed most were Harry's eyes- wide and fixed on something.

He cautiously stepped towards the boy, "Harry?"

Harry flinched, his eyes darting towards them, as though he only just noticed John and Sherlock.

John was very bothered at how small Harry looked, white and scared on that couch. He hadn't seen him like that since last year- the first time John had ever seen him- when Harry was fresh out of the horrific abuse the Dursleys had given to him.

He checked Harry over, but he saw no bite marks- or the snake, for that matter- so, what was the matter with him?

Harry's eyes wandered back to their previous position, and this time, John followed his gaze and found himself looking at the mantelpiece.

This only confused him more. He now knew where the snake had gone, though. Apparently it had become quite interested in that skull, as part of it was nestled inside of it, it's head slithering out through the mouth.

This was obviously what Harry was fixed on, but why did it bother him so much?

Sherlock had apparently noticed the mantelpiece, too, and with a shout of, "No, not my skull!" set into furiously untangling the snake out.

Finally having separated the serpent from his precious skull, he stood holding the offender an arm's length away from him.

"You know what John?" Sherlock said, heading towards the front door, "You were right- snakes are most certainly not suitable inside of the flat."

What ever Sherlock did with that snake, they never found out- they never saw that particular one again. But whether or not the consulting detective was breaking any animal abuse laws was far from John's mind as he tried to comfort the scared little boy on the couch, still completely lost as to why he had been so terrified at what he'd seen.

And if he was to be quite honest, Harry was, too.

*information on runespoors can be found in Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them

Yes, the snake and the skull formed what looked a lot like the dark mark, bringing back some pretty bad barely-memories for poor Harry. This is an in-progress fic, I will hopefully be uploading more, though not for several weeks (projects suck XP)

By the way, should I make it slash? Just want to know your guys' opinions…