So my semester is coming to an end, and as a result exams are starting soon. And in typical 'me' fashion, this is when I start to productively write fanfiction. Procrastinating? Nahhhhhh.

In any case, I would like to point out that I have almost no knowledge of the Royal Family and of the proper protocol. Everything is researched. I am neither British nor American - the Royals don't really appear in our news much. So please forgive me for my mistakes!


"…which means," the assistant secretary was saying, "that you are the second in line of succession to the British throne, sir."

Harry gaped at Charteris, face completely still as he attempted to process the information he had just been given. From the kitchen, he heard a small yelp and Harry knew that Petunia and Vernon had been listening in. He wondered what they were thinking — Merlin, he didn't know what he was thinking!

Charteris had bowed his head and was looking up at him through his eyelashes, evidently waiting for a reaction. Harry leaned back into the pristine pink sofa and closed his eyes. He felt a headache coming on and pinched the bridge of his nose.

"Your Royal Highness, this—"

Harry waved his unoccupied hand, interrupting the Assistant Private Secretary. "Don't call me that please." The silence that followed was somewhat tense and Harry got the feeling that this man was a stickler for protocol.

"That would not be appropriate, sir."

Jumping to his feet in a small fit of hysteria, Harry grimaced at the man. "Tea, Mr. Charteris?"

"Allow me—" Charteris rushed to say, having jumped to his feet the moment Harry had moved.

"I've been making my own tea for almost seventeen years, I can make one more. Please, sit."

The Assistant Private Secretary gingerly lowered himself back into the armchair, evidently feeling very uncomfortable in doing so. Harry's breath was shuddering and he could feel his fingers trembling as he crossed the threshold into the kitchen.

Petunia and Vernon were standing at the stove, whispering in low tones. Harry reckoned that that was the first time he'd ever seen his uncle standing in said kitchen. The moment Petunia spotted Harry over his shoulder, her eyes widened and almost began to bulge. Vernon spun around. They, much like Harry didn't seem to know exactly how to react. Petunia's long neck bent in an unwilling way into a parody of a bow and Vernon attempted the same.

He seemed to be in conflict with himself. Harry knew he was a staunch monarchist — the portrait of Queen Elizabeth hanging in the living room was proof enough. And that woman had just been revealed to be his grandmother.

He avoided their stares and set about making the tea. They didn't exchange a word while the water boiled which made for a long awkward silence in which they all took turns in staring at each other. Finally pouring the tea into two separate china cups, Harry looked around the cupboards until he found Vernon's gin. He poured a generous amount into his own tea.

Once he was seated in the living room and Charteris had placed his tea un-sipped upon the tabletop, Harry reinitiated their conversation.

"Ok, so how did you find me?"

"The disappearance was widely reported in the media but within a year they had forgotten about it. Every year, on the anniversary of the disappearance a short article appeared in the papers. It was very quickly assumed that Your Royal Highness was… dead, sir."

"But?"

"The Queen insisted on further investigations. Your Royal Highness' mother, the then Princess of Wales was distraught when death in absentia was declared, and officially, nothing could be done. The search continued and new investigators were contracted who eventually began cross-referencing orphans' and Your Royal Highness' characteristics, sir."

"Isn't your evidence a little circumstantial?" Harry said a little meekly, and wishing very dearly that so much hope hadn't seeped into his voice.

"Your Royal Highness, nothing about this is circumstantial: your fingerprints match those of the Duke of Wales' son. Your Royal Highness' appearance, the timing of the adoption — everything matches up perfectly. Of course, a DNA test will be done, but that will be a purely formal confirmation."

"So what now?" Harry downed the rest of his 'tea'. Charteris looked relieved for the first time in their entire conversation. "I can't really fulfil this whole 'second in line to the throne' thing, I'm in the middle of a crisis."

"Crisis, sir?" Charteris asked, a frown marring his face. Harry wondered if the man knew about the wizarding world and whether the rest of the royal family were also 'in the know', so to speak.

"Doesn't matter," Harry said whilst waving his hand. "And stop calling me that."

"I'm afraid it's protocol…" there was a long pause. "…Sir."

"Who knows so far — about me being alive?" Harry stood up nervously and began pacing.

"The Queens private secretary, myself, a private investigator, our solicitors Farrer & Co., evidently your… adoptive aunt and uncle, and the driver standing outside, sir. The Queen and the HRH Duke of Edinburgh are in Balmoral, as are HRH the Prince of Wales and Your Royal Highness' brothers… they have not yet been informed of the situation. Your Royal Highness' existence came to light earlier this morning. There is no precedent for a situation such as this, therefore I was sent here to confirm. Sir."

"Right. Is there a way you could withhold all of this for a while?" Harry gestured at himself, feeling suddenly a little hysterical. It wasn't every day one was told one was a prince.

"I'm afraid not, sir. The media has become very adept at figuring out the smoothest cover-ups. We must act now; a statement must be released by the end of the week, sir."

"And there is no way around this?" Harry asked running a hand over his tired face. Charteris was shaking his head when Harry turned to look at him. He'd have to somehow find a way around this later on. Voldemort, after all, wasn't going to stop hunting him down, even if he was a prince. And with high exposure… well the entire royal family and everyone surrounding it would be under extreme threat. And if the war spilled over to them, the war would spill over to the muggle world, and that would be disastrous on every single level.

"Arrangements are being made to transport Your Royal Highness to Balmoral, to be introduced to the Queen and HRH the Duke of Wales."

Harry sighed and glanced down at his palms in contemplation.

"Where is this Balmoral?" he asked after a moment. Charteris, finally sipped some of his now cold tea.

"Scotland, sir."

Well, Harry thought, at least he hadn't unpacked yet.

.

"Hey is it just me, or is that Charteris, y'know the Assistant Private Secretary?" Janine Watson, Royal Corespondent, said, pointing her finger at the computer screen, depicting said man — or at least one of his likeness. The dark haired and moustached man was exiting a nondescript car on a very ordinary looking street. Now what would a man such as that be doing on a street like that?

"Hm, could be him," Paul Dacre, the editor of the Daily Mail, said, squinting a little and adjusting his glasses. "What is he doing on — what street was that again?"

"My source said he was hanging around Little Whinging, apparently waiting for someone."

"Little Whinging?" Dacre said, pushing a few papers aside and sitting on the corner of the desk. Janine pursed her lips as she zoomed in on the picture. It really did look like Charteris. Not many men could pull off such an impressive moustache.

"Yeah, a small town in Surrey."

"So what the bloody hell would he be doing there? Isn't the Queen in Balmoral?"

"That's what I've been wondering for the past hour."

"What? Instead of working?" Her editor said with a smirk. Janine rolled her eyes. She jutted her chin towards the computer screen. She clicked on the second picture that her source had sent her: it depicted Charteris strolling down the street, evidently looking at house numbers and attempting to find the correct one.

"It's not really news: not much to go on," Janine said slowly, but a small smile crept onto her face when she saw Dacre's smug expression.

"Then make it news," the editor in chief said.

.

For the second time that day, Harry was watching the countryside rush by, albeit this time from the air. And this time, the journey was considerably louder. The helicopter that Charteris had hired was as small and private as possible — everything to keep the media out of things. Personally Harry thought it was probably safer and easier for him to take a bus up to Scotland, but he supposed there was some sort of protocol against that.

There were only four seats in said helicopter: Harry and Charteris sat diagonally across from each other and the latter kept shooting him considering stares only to look away the moment the wizard's eyes flickered over at him.

Laid out before Harry were a little stack of documents on protocol. Amongst them was a dossier with faces that he recognised from the news and from various posters he'd seen during his muggle school days. He recognised the Queen of course, and her husband (whose gaffs were always gleefully captured by the media) and prince Charles. It was the picture of princess Diana that brought him to a stop and he stared at it for a good long while.

He'd lived his entire life believing that his parents had died on Halloween when he was barely a year old. He'd lived under the assumption that they had been his real parents, and he'd often use a vague memory of them as comfort during his early years at the Dursleys. Now it turned out that they had just been a couple eager to have a child — which begged the question: how in the hell had he been stolen from his biological family?

It came as a stark shock to him to be able to say, or rather, think the word family. For so long, he had been deprived of using that word and he had yearned for it for so long that now it even felt a tad anticlimactic. He'd been an orphan for so many years that now, to, within several hours, gain an international family came not only as a jarring feeling but also as a panic-inducing one.

"Beginning descent in ten minutes, sir," the pilot said in an almost robotic voice. It occurred to Harry that in a few moments he would be meeting the Queen, not as a monarch, but as his biological grandmother.

"Your Royal Highness," Charteris said with a cough. "Upon meeting the Queen, Your Royal Highness must bow, address Her Majesty—"

Harry toned him out, feeling a slight sense of hysteria rise within him as he saw the green fields of Scotland appear through the fog. He wasn't prepared for this; he had to be hunting Voldemort. Merlin, he'd take a hoard of dementors over this whole thing.

The helicopter began descending in earnest now and soon they were touching down. Charteris was first to exit the helicopter when the engines had shut down. Looking very nervous himself, the man held open the door for Harry. The wizard stumbled out of the contraption, ears still ringing from the sound. Previously hidden by fog and clouds, a castle now emerged.

To Harry it looked much like Hogwarts, and only lacked in size and gothicisim. Instead, it radiated a sense of calmness and peace. The grounds had evidently been freshly mowed just recently and the scent of freshly cut grass still hung in the air. To the side, gardeners were employing large shears to trim the bushes into perfect circles.

"Your Highness?" Charteris said to get his attention: he had extended his hand in the direction of a small back door. Taking a deep breath, Harry followed the man. Behind him, the pilot was instructing a servant to take up his trunk to a specific room. Harry dearly hoped this did not mean that someone was going to unpack his things: certain items would not do well in a muggle's hands.

The back porch was littered with house-shoes and a few children's boots. A coat or two hung on a coat rack, joined by tartan scarf. Evidently this was a corridor, an entrance, that no one from the public ever saw. It occurred to Harry that the reason they had entered though this side door was because the media was most probably camping out at the outside gate, attempting to get a view of the Royal Family.

They finally entered a sitting room, that all things considered, looked quite ordinary. The portraits of Kings and Queens of ages past aside, it looked like quite a regular Hogwarts common room. As it was summer, the fireplace wasn't roaring and the curtains hadn't been drawn to conserve heat. Instead rays of light beamed through the beautiful dormer french windows, lighting the entire room in honey-coloured afternoon light. Harry's view into the back garden was beautiful and he felt almost instantly at peace.

"The sitting room, sir," Charteris explained. "The Queen and her party have been informed of the situation. They are being driven back as we speak."

"Right. Thanks Charteris." Harry awkwardly sat down in one of tartan armchairs.

"Sir." Charteris departed after that. The single sound in the room after that was the ticking sound of the grandfather clock standing under a mantlepiece and Harry's own nervous breathing. He could feel his heart thumping in his throat.

Harry was gazing out the window when a very familiar and welcoming sight greeted him. He instantly jumped to his feet.

"Hedwig!"

The snowy white owl was hovering in front of the central window, looking rather happy that she had found her friend. Harry instantly rushed to the window and after fiddling with it for a moment, threw it open and let the owl in. Almost instantly, Hedwig attached herself onto his arm and nuzzled her head against his neck. Harry laughed quietly and gently stroked the soft hairs on her head.

"Sorry, girl. Must've been quite a flight, Scotland to London and back to Scotland?" Hedwig nipped his ear in admonition.

"An owl!" cried a young voice. Harry spun (almost throwing Hedwig off of his arm in the process).

Standing there was a young boy, about 12 or 13. His eyes were bright and mischievous and clashed so wonderfully with his bright red hair that Harry almost believed him to be a distant relative of the Weasley. Harry could already almost see him getting along with Fred and George Weasley like a house on fire.

"Her name's Hedwig," Harry said with a smile "You can pet her if you want." The boy approached her eagerly. Hedwig trilled cheerfully and in pleasure as the boy gently — much gentler than one might expect a mischievous boy like that to treat an animal — stroked her soft and groomed feathers.

"I love her," he breathed excitedly.

"Harry!" called voice from the corridor. Seconds later, a middle aged man that Harry recognised very well indeed: his ears stuck out a little and his hair line was receding. The eyes were small and deep-set and the nose was large and slightly hooked. It occurred to Harry that the man was looking at at the boy standing at his side, and not him. Harry almost face-palmed himself at his own stupidity — the boy at his side was Prince Harry!

And the man now very slowly approaching them was Prince Charles of Wales.


It was pointed out to me that it might be confusing to call both Harrys Harry, so that might change in the future. Our Harry will stay Harry, but the other prince Harry might change to Henry or something of that sort. His official name IS technically Henry.