Chapter 7
After Harry had waltzed out of the room and Hermione had followed him with an apologetic smile, informing them all that they would be in the Great Hall, eating, since they truly were starving, Albus and the four friend sat in silence for a long while.
It was, as usual, Lily who summed up their evening so far.
"Did that really just happen?" She asked her three friends. "I mean, I distinctly remember it, but it seems weird even for our standards."
"Planning's easy," Sirius whispered, then began to laugh. It was a mere chuckling at first, but soon it turned into the true, deep bellow that seven years of Slytherin hadn't been able to train out of him, and before the end Sirius was howling with laughter, only the back rest of his chair keeping him upright. "Brilliant system! You can tag along!"
In the end, Lily simply did the only thing that worked with a Sirius in this condition – she reached out and smacked him in the shoulder.
"Oi! We've had enough violence today!" Sirius complained, but he was markedly calmer now.
"And enough dealings with mad people," Remus remarked sharply, then sat up straighter and took over, as they'd all known he would. Sirius might be the charming one and Lily the headstrong one, but it had always been Remus' job to organise their thoughts and plan what they were going to do.
"The magical theory behind her explanation was valid," he said, and Severus, their resident expert for the more exotic fields of magic, nodded his agreement.
"The girl's first reactions, unusual as they were, lend further credence to their story," he added. "The boy, however, could as well have escaped from an asylum."
For the first time since the dimension travellers had left the room, Albus Dumbledore stirred.
"Quite to the contrary, my dear boy," he disagreed. "Harry Potter is as sane as I am."
This statement led to an embarrassed silence among the four friends. Nobody would ever point it out to Albus, of course, but he wasn't the best character reference where sanity was concerned.
"He's unhinged, Albus," Severus finally said, choosing this as the most diplomatic venue. "Did you not notice his mood swings? And this mad tale about being Lily's son…"
"His mind is wounded, certainly, and from their tale we can assume that their past has been traumatic," Albus said. "But he has a sharp eye for detail, excellent strategic abilities and reflexes of a warrior. I cannot yet estimate his magical strength, of course, but the girl's ease with highly complicated spells and her grasp of theory is extremely unusual for her age, and if she accepts his leadership, I think we can expect great things from him."
He paused, poured himself another cup of tea and delicately sipped it.
"As to his genetic identity… they were telling the absolute truth. I performed a genealogy-spell under the table – noticed by both of them, I must add – and he is, indeed, Lily's and James Potter's biological son."
To Severus' left, Lily breathed in sharply. Severus did not turn to look at her, just took her right hand and squeezed it, just as he knew Remus would sling his arm around her. The subject of children was painful to her, to all of them, really, and she would need time to deal with the facts. One couldn't rush Lily, just support her quietly. And change the topic.
"So… does that mean we can trust them about the Horcruxes?" He asked, both to give them something else to think about and because this question had been burning inside him since the girl had brought it up.
Again, Albus hesitated. He himself seemed not quite recovered from that particular piece of information, and the way he clutched his teacup was not as steady as befitted his serene personality.
"I must confess that I find the idea of a soul split seven times hard to believe, even if Tom Riddle is the perpetrator," he then said quietly. "It is a frightening thing to consider. However, it would explain much that has been a mystery to me, and it would shed light on the complex relationship between Voldemort and the Boys-Who-Lived. Tom's unhealthy obsession with Neville would be entirely more understandable, as would the events of that Halloween night 19 years ago."
Severus hesitated. He could see how shaken Albus was – a fact that shook him -, and he didn't like being confrontational – that was Lily's job in their dynamic, after all -, but this was too important to let it slide.
"You didn't answer my question," he therefore said. "Can we trust them? This could mean the turning point of the war, or it could lead us into a dangerously wrong direction."
And Albus Dumbledore, the arguable wisest wizard of their time, just shrugged, an entirely untypical gesture.
"I don't know," he answered.
Remus nodded.
"Our knowledge of their character and background isn't enough to judge their trustworthiness," he said in the slightly stuffy way he always used when deep in thoughts. "Too much of what they said is impossible to prove."
"But how could we hope to evaluate their claims without access to their dimension?" Lily now asked, calm and as scientifically objective as Remus, although her face was very still and white.
Sirius, the only one of them without academic training, just leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs and grinned.
"Well, that's easily done," he announced. "The girl clearly has a thing for Snappy and his robes. So why don't we just make him go down there and chat her up?"
The rest of the group stared at him, nonplussed.
"We're talking about a complex personality evaluation," Severus then said drily. "I hardly think it would be that easy, Fluffy."
"Why not?" Sirius asked, grinning even broader. "She's a pretty girl, you're a good looking guy, and you even understand what she's babbling about most of the time. Sounds like a recipe for romance to me. Just go and try it, Sev."
Severus opened his mouth to protest again, but was interrupted by the soft sound of Albus' chuckle.
"An excellent idea, my friends," he said.
While it was a relief to find the Headmaster amused and relaxed again, the reason for it was anything but acceptable. They couldn't do this to him, could they?
He exchanged looks with Lily, who was actually smirking, and with Remus, who raised his hands in a silent gesture of defeat. No help from that side, then.
"You do know this isn't an American spy novel, yes?" He then asked his best friend weakly.
"Nonsense," Sirius replied happily. "Just get to know her. One of your smouldering looks and she'll fall head over heals. Go get her, tiger!"
Before the innuendo could reach an unbearable level, Severus fled the room. Sirius' laughter was still audible in the corridors.
"Slowly, Harry. You haven't eaten much of anything this past week."
Severus heard the admonishment before he'd rounded the last corner of the hallway and slowed, unsure for a moment what to do. Listening in on other people wasn't polite, but these two had been too mysterious by far, and perhaps they would let something slip if they were unaware of his presence?
So he very nearly crept the last steps to the entrance doors, pausing in their shadow. He was close enough to hear Harry sigh, now, and drop his cutlery to the plate in irritation.
"I understand what you're going through and that you need to reassure your control, Hermione," Harry said calmly, sounding more intelligent and understanding than he had the whole evening. "But I really don't need you to count my calories right now. I know how to eat."
"I just don't want you to get sick again, Harry," she said unhappily, and he sighed again.
"That was once, Mione. Once. And I still claim that the meat was off. I've been on and off starving since I was a toddler, for Merlin's sake, so I would really appreciate it if you trusted my judgment right now."
There was a moment of utter silence.
"Sorry," she then said, her voice small and very unhappy. "Sorry, I know, I'm just…"
"Yeah," Harry agreed.
Again, they fell into companionable silence.
"Did you see how Sirius looked?" Harry then asked, longingly. "All happy and healthy, and without that expression in his eyes…"
"And Remus," Hermione added. "Every single piece of his clothing looked new. And he doesn't have the scars anymore."
"And Snape…" Harry whispered, then trailed off, as if he lacked categories to describe what he'd seen. For God's sake, Severus thought crossly, only because he was wearing burgundy in this reality!
"It's like looking into a mirror of our world," Hermione murmured. "Only that this side is all shiny and polished, and full of sunshine."
"Yeah. Turns out me not being born wouldn't have been such a bad thing after all," Harry commented.
There was silence, then a smack and a suppressed sound of pain from Harry.
"Would you stop doing that all the time?" He demanded, and got rewarded by another smacking sound.
"Only if you stop being such an idiot," she sniffed. "I don't know if you noticed, but I'm dead in this world, and so is Ginny, and it's both because you didn't come and rescue us. So shut up, will you?"
Harry sighed again, then chuckled tiredly. There was the sound of cloth rubbing against the bench, and then his voice again, muffled, and as Severus leaned forward carefully he could see them both sitting very close, Hermione's head resting on Harry's shoulder and his face half-buried in her hair.
"What would I ever do without you, my weird, scarily-brilliant almost-sister?" Harry whispered.
Another moment of silence, during which Severus slowly retreated from sight, then the distinct and shocking sound of female sobbing.
Hermione was crying. He never would have pegged her down for that sort of normal human behaviour.
"Oh Harry," she now whispered. "What if he's part of the Order? His parents must be! I couldn't bear to see him, to talk to him without…"
"Shh," Harry murmured. "It's alright, Hermione. We'll get through this. We've gotten through worse. You'll be all uber-English and I'll be my usual unhinged self and we'll be back home in no time. Trust me."
"I do," she sobbed. "I've always trusted you, Harry, but this is a bit much even for me, and I really, really want Luna to tell me that it's the Wrackspurts' fault right now!"
Harry chuckled.
"Hey, there have to be advantages to alternate dimensions," he mused aloud. "I don't know… perhaps Umbitch is still alive here! We could hunt her down, kidnap her and then you could sacrifice her to the centaurs again. Wouldn't that be fun? Perhaps they would even eat her this time, who knows what's different here, after all!"
Hermione sobbed, but it almost sounded like sniggering now.
"Do you know that the latest studies in anthropology question the general assumption of widespread anthropophagy in early human tribes?" She asked, very quickly and with that high, nervous voice. "Researchers claimed that the cutting marks found on ancient bones might in fact be a result of specific burial practices, not cannibalistic rituals. If that were true, a huge part of prehistoric ethnology would have to be rewritten!"
And Harry chuckled again, his cutlery scraping across his plate as he reclaimed his food.
"That's it, Hermione," he whispered. "We'll get through this just fine. Don't you worry."
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