Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Vampire Diaries.
Harry started at the unopened letter on his desk as if waiting for the letter to open itself and remove the choice from his hands. It was a letter from his godfather, delivered by a Gringotts falcon in the early hours of the morning. It was the weekend and Tyler was going to be at practice for most of the morning and had some kind of family function in the afternoon so Harry literally had all day to stare at the letter if he wanted to. He shook his head violently and reached forward with a hand that only shook a little.
Prongslet,
There are no words that can explain just how sorry I am for making you think that you were alone. I am a horrible godfather and I can't imagine what horrible things that your parents would do to me if they could see me now.
Fourteen years ago I let my need for revenge cloud my judgement and let that rat trick me into framing myself for the murder of your parents, thirteen muggles and the rat himself. I left you alone with those horrible muggles when you should have been my first priority. I will never be able to apologize enough for being such an idiot.
I made another mistake this last summer. After Pettigrew was captured I immediately went to the Ministry to claim guardianship over you but Dumbledore had gotten there first and claimed that I needed to be physically and mentally evaluated before I was even allowed to contact you. I spent more than a month holed up in St. Mungo's being poked and prodded until I was released with a clean bill of health. I went to Dumbledore and made my claim directly to him this time.
He told me that you were still recovering from the defeat of Moldyshorts and that he would only let me claim you next summer and not a moment sooner. My mistake was in trusting that he had your best interests at heart.
When the school year started and you weren't there, I can't describe the panic both Remus and I felt pup. I may have tapped into some of my family's madness in confronting Dumbledore on more than one occasion and Remus was definitely channeling Moony more often than not. He still maintained that you just needed more time. It was finally revealed that you managed to pull the ultimate prank and disappear completely at the last Order, I will hopefully get the chance to explain that later, meeting and he told everyone that you had flown the coop and he was clueless about where you were.
I knew that if there was any group that could find you, it would be the goblins. I don't know what you did to get them to like you so much but they were very strict about what I could send and this letter cost me about as much as that Firebolt, though if this does reach you than it was money just as well spent.
I love you so much pup and I only want the chance to finally show you how much, just like a certain old wolf that we both know. If you can find it in your heart to give us just one more chance, I swear that neither of us will waste it.
I solemnly swear that I am up to no good,
Sirius Orion Black, Padfoot
Harry could feel the tears falling but he made no attempt to stop them. Dumbledore just couldn't stop sticking his crooked nose where it doesn't belong! He thought that they had forgotten about him, too involved in their own lives, not that they were trying to get Dumbledore to let them have him. Harry let out a long breath and pulled a clean piece of paper, parchment wasn't something he thought he would need in muggle high school, and started to write.
(V)
"Moony! Moony! We have a letter!" Sirius Black rushed through the hallway, of the thankfully empty Grimmauld Place, and waved the letter over his head like a madman. "Get your mangy, grey furry butt out of bed, we have a letter!"
(V)
"Okay, so let me see if I have this straight." Tyler look a swig of the 'butter beer' that Harry had given him and tilted his head back to look at the ceiling. "Crazy dark witch, wizard, whatever kills a whole bunch of people including your parents and when he tries to kill you he gets his own curse to the face, kind of badass. You grow up with your mother's relatives, who should all be delivered to Damon, and eventually get invited to a magic school with the world's worst name. Every year you have someone, most of the time a teacher, try to kill you while the other teachers twiddle their thumbs. Your framed godfather escapes the magical version of Alcatraz and the cycle continues. Eventually the evil magic dude tries to come back and your magic decides enough is enough and drains him dry. Your godfather jumps through hoops to get custody of you but you hop ship because you think that nobody wants you, but he finally gets through everything and is coming here."
Harry could feel the tension drain out of him with the abridged version that Tyler just rattled off and polishes off his own drink before sighing. "Yeah, apparently Dumbledore was trying to keep Sirius away from me and then was trying to hide the fact that I had managed to pull a vanishing act out of the news. Sirius and Remus were my father's best friends and the closest thing I have to family."
"This Remus guy is a werewolf?" Tyler thought that the idea of turning into a wolf was awesome, the bloodthirsty monster bit not so much.
"Yeah, he's the kindest man I know, but on the full moon he's a giant wolf." Harry could vividly remember Moony lunging at everyone around him in third year. "He takes a potion to retain his mind on the full moon, but it's better safe than sorry."
"Maybe he'll know what I am."
(V)
Sirius and Remus were standing outside of the house their Prongslet was living in with the smallest bit of awe coursing through them. Sirius cleared his throat and looked at Remus with a raised eyebrow. "It's no wonder James was such a snob; his family must make the Malfoy's look poor if this is their idea of a second home away from home."
Remus shook his head and knocked on the door. "The Potter's are a very old family and James once mentioned that they had ties all the way back to the Peverells."
The door opened smoothly to reveal a very well dressed house elf with a surprisingly commanding presence. "You must be Mr. Padfoot and Mr. Moony. Master Harry and Master Tyler are reading and drinking respectively in the library. You will follow Torrey to the library now."
Sirius and Remus had to almost jog to keep up with the house elf and Remus could feel the curiosity building. "Who is Master Tyler?"
The house elf turned its head briefly before looking back to the front. "Master Tyler is Master Harry's protector."
"Protector?" Remus was glad that Harry had someone to fill that role while they weren't there, but didn't really like the fact that he needed one and Moony didn't like the fact that it was someone that they didn't know.
Torrey didn't bother to answer, but instead stopped in front of a set of doors twice Remus' height. "This is the library on the first floor that Masters use." With a pop and what Remus would swear was a smirk, the house elf disappeared.
(V)
The moment the door opened Remus was assaulted with the smell of his pup and the smell of another wolf. His hackles rose and he felt the growl building as he shot into the room and between his pup and the interloper.
The rogue wolf was a teenager that just raised an eyebrow and looked around Remus, ignoring the increasing growl, to look at his pup. "I would say that it is a definite yes on the Remus being able to smell what I am thing."
(V)
It only took about a half an hour to get Moony to calm down. Of course he refused to let Harry out of his lap or let Tyler out of his sight, but the growling stopped and Remus was able to take over most of the control. "Okay, so you knew that you were some kind of supernatural creature, you just don't know what?"
Tyler ruffled the hair on the back of his head and shrugged. "Harry and I have been trying to find something about my family in his library but they were more interested in affairs than what kind of creature was floating around in my family gene pool. We thought that you might be able to smell whatever I am with your werewolf senses and the display from earlier means that we were at least right about that."
Remus ignored the grumbling from Moony and took a long drag of air to sort out exactly what he was getting from Tyler. "You smell like a wolf but there's still a lot of human covering it."
Sirius cocked his head to the side from next to Remus where he had a firm hold on one of Harry's hands since Remus would not let him have all of him. "So he smells like he could be a werewolf, but still has too much human smell to actually be one?"
Harry let out an explosive sigh and smacked his forehead with his palm. A blush spread quickly when all three of the other men in the room looked at him with raised eyebrows. "We were looking for the meaning behind his ancestor wanting a moonstone and the relevance of the Sun and the Moon curse that a vampire was also interested in." Tyler's eyes widened and a matching blush started to spread over his cheeks. "Tyler is strong enough to stand toe to toe with some vampires and has anger issues that get worse around the full moon. Since he is displaying those traits without a bite he would have to be a born werewolf. The only thing that confuses me is why he is displaying increased strength and speed without activating the gene."
Tyler looked toward Harry and cocked his head to the side. "How is a werewolf gene activated?"
It was Sirius that answered, surprising everybody. "Werewolves that are born with the gene can live out their entire lives without ever becoming werewolves. The gene itself is dormant until the person in question commits the greatest act of violence." Sirius looked a little put out at the looks of shock. "Mother made sure that both Regulus and I knew the difference between all of the different kinds of supernatural creatures. Several of them are found in pureblooded wizarding lines and we needed to know what we might pass down. To activate the werewolf gene, you would have to kill someone, even an accidental death would do. As for why you have the enhanced abilities, I would guess that Harry's magic saw you as a potential protector and pushed your abilities pass the human limits and closer to what you would have as a werewolf. That's just a guess though."
Remus shook his head to eliminate the shocked fog, dodging the smack Sirius aimed at the back of his head and decided that it was time for the question that Moony was also very interested in. "What I want to know is why Harry's magic decided that he needed a protector to the point that it would try to activate your werewolf gene." The fact that neither one of the teenagers wanted to look him in the eye was doing nothing for his nerves. "I am waiting."
I thought about making this one longer, but that felt like a natural chapter end to me.
