With a crack, Harry appeared in his bedroom, and noted that Tom was sitting on his bed, the concern on his face being slowly replaced by relief at seeing Harry again.
"Tom?"
Just as Harry took a step towards him, his head spun. Something seemed to constrict his chest, the pain becoming unbearable, and as the world went black in front of his eyes, Tom rushed to hold his brother, who collapsed.
When Harry opened his eyes again, he found himself in a dark room, on a bed, his body covered by an emerald blanket.
"Hello, Harold."
Harry quickly looked around, and saw the man sitting at his side.
Salazar Slytherin stared at him, this time definitely not from the portrait, but in flesh.
"You're here?"
"Ancient blood magic." Salazar said, "Your mind has been put into stasis by your magical core, and your blood called up the nearest blood-relative you know of age who could help. So no Thomas, only me. I'm here by the bidding of our blood to keep your mind at rest while your magical core revives itself. Apparently, your magical core wasn't able to withstand the fatigue of bearing the brunt of fighting fifty wands at once."
Harry was aghast. Salazar had seen everything?
"You….you…"he croaked, trying to get up, but Salazar held up a hand.
"I am in your mind, lad." He said pointedly. "And I know everything. Even as I tend to you here, my portrait should be explaining your misadventure to young Thomas."
Harry looked Salazar straight in the eye.
"Did I do it wrong?"
"If I told, 'nah, lad, you did it all wrong' wouldn't you think it was rich coming from me? After all, you have seen me doing whatever I have done." Salazar remarked, with a strange tone, as though forecasting the weather.
"You know what, Granddad? I do not possess the thousand years experience you do, and I would like if you kept the riddles and fairy tales to Tom and stated just the facts to me."
Salazar sighed. "Always the eager, weren't we all?"
"Sorry, but that's not what I wanted to hear, Granddad."
"Watch your tone, lad. This is your granddad you're speaking to. To answer your question, I'd need to tell you a story."
Harry yawned sarcastically. "Oh, wow. Story time! Tell me, daddy!"
"Petrificus Totalus." Salazar calmly said.
Just as soon as Harry had gone rigid, Salazar started.
"All four of us, Harold, had our own weaknesses. Don't look at me like that; we all had two legs, two arms, and parts of anatomy you already know about, which all proves we were human beings, so we had our defects. Godric had his irritating stubbornness, inability to see the Dark as not necessarily the lack of light, Helga had her rare, yet shots of misplaced loyalties, and Rowena had her inclination towards obsession with little theoretical details and missing the practicality of the big picture. But we are not here to discuss what those three lacked. We are here to discuss what I lacked, and what weakness runs today in the blood of the only two living descendants of Slytherin."
He looked at Harry, who glared back mutely. Unperturbed, Salazar continued.
"My anger. It made me blind….to everything. To good, as well as bad. To the worst, as well as the best. To myself, as well as to others. Remorse, Harold is feeling bad for what you've done; that's a positive approach, because only the desire of self-improvement follows it. But anger at oneself is the most deprecating; because it is followed only by self-loathing. My line, the true line that criticized themselves a bit….too severely, perished from this. And I will not see a repeat of that. My weakness might run in the veins of both you boys. But I will not stand and see both of you suffer my fate."
Salazar's eyes grew wistful, and he looked away. He cancelled the petrification charm, and Harry sat bolt upright.
"I-I'm becoming a monster. What has happened to me? I-I killed…no, I blasted people out of my way not because they attacked me, but because they were just there! I….I'm just like…."
"Shut up, lad." Slytherin spoke sharply. "Don't make me hex you again. You are no killer. I have seen your heart, lad, and let me assure you, it still hasn't got rust on it. I lost everything because of this self-loathing when I had the chance to get up and make right what I did wrong! I let the time go by wallowing in self-loathing when I should have got up and cleared the rust my actions laid on my heart! My anger, my self-loathing, like you fool, was my undoing! And Harold Slytherin, I will not stay aside and let my line fall into that same old story again!"
Harry stared at Salazar in was not the smooth, sarcastic, aristocratic wizard he had been seeing. This looked more like a man who had held a millennia of guilt on his shoulders. With a start, Harry realized that indeed that was the case. Indeed, Salazar had stumbled into the rupturing of the friendship between the four Founders.
Salazar shook his head as if to come out of a trance, and fixed Harry with a steely gaze.
"That is a story for another time. Listen here, lad. We, Slytherins, always take stock of all consequences our actions might have. Never blame yourself without judging each and every action that might be a reaction to what you have done. And always remember; the world is ruled by balance. Magic is ruled by balance. No one can topple the balance. There will be a positive and a negative to every action, because balance will command it. Now look at your handiwork here. Fifty wizards butchered by a single wizard, stopping them from battling and maybe defeating the Aurors, and torturing the helpless people. Many men in the fifty will not be going home to their family. Certainly, that means it was outright abuse of your powers and your abilities, not to mention your then mental state. That's negative. Now look at the other side. The butchering of fifty wizards sends a very clear message to the terrorist named Grindelwald: that however bad he might try to hit and take over the magical folk, there are people here who can throw his doings straight into his face, five times back! Maybe because of that display of instant punishment instead of some getting five years at Azkaban and some getting a lifetime and some the Kiss, maybe because of that, where five raids would have happened in the next week, none will happen. Families of the dead will curse your name, but families of those who will taste a terror-free week for once will bless you. So now, stop blaming yourself and get up!"
Harry kneaded his back muscles and stood up.
"Tell me why you should make no more examples like this." Salazar said.
Harry looked thoughtful for some time, then said, "Because it will create anarchy. Because people will start to look to one man rather than themselves for their own protection. Because then, we will forget the utility of the Wizengamot itself, however much I dislike it. Because then, one man would have to save the world, again."
Salazer nodded. "You've got it. Make up your case and arrange a trial in the Wizengamot. Test and reaffirm our many old Alliances. Start building your side, Harold Slytherin. War is coming, be it Grindelwald, or be it somebody else. Work fast. No more massacres. Wake up, then, will you?"
Harry opened his eyes and sat up in his bed.
"Harry?" Tom's worried voice greeted him.
"Tom." Harry turned to him.
"I-I nearly thought you…."Tom didn't finish the sentence.
Did I notice a tremble in his voice?
"Had died?" Harry supplied helpfully. Tom just looked at him, and then, suddenly was upon him, hugging him fiercely.
"You prat, you got me scared over there!"
"I'm all right, Tom. Was just having a pleasant conversation with Granddad. Say, Tom, Granddad told us to prepare our side. Would you like taking the world with a storm?"
Ouch. What did he just say! Did he just tell the soon to be eleven-year-old version of the greatest megalomaniac he had ever seen whether he wanted to take over the world?
No, Harry told himself. This was Thomas Slytherin, not Thomas Riddle Junior. And he was his brother. Tom was slowly becoming a regular boy, and he could hold regular conversations with Tom, couldn't he? But why wasn't Tom answering yet? Could he be…..
Tom gazed at the window a bit, then turned to Harry with a look of distaste on his face.
"I don't like the world. Mrs. Cole called me freak behind my back. The children called you a freak behind your back. I don't like taking over something I don't like at all."
Harry heaved a sigh of relief.
"However, I love our Manor, Harry. Can I take over it, please?"
Harry groaned.
That evening saw Harry and Tom at a table in front of the roaring fireplace in the sitting room of the Manor, writing letters.
"Let's just repeat it again, Tom."
Tom rolled his eyes.
"You don't have to worry about me. You worry about yourself. I don't understand how you can remember the two witch's names and forget the wizards."
Harry didn't look up from his notes as he said,
"It's a man thing, Tom."
"Yeah, it's a man thing, Thomas,"smirked Slytherin from his portrait, "But I find your father acting like a teenager."
"For the umpteenth time, Granddad," Harry groaned, "I am not this abominably git of a boy's father."
"Yeah, Granddad. " Tom said, "For Merlin's sake, I am not this frustrated of a bloke's son!"
Both Salazar and Harry turned to him.
"Frustrated?" They narrowed their eyes.
Tom said innocently, "Oh, you know. I read a bit in the library. It's a man thing, I understand, Harry. I haven't seen any girl around you any time."
"This is all your fault, you know," Harry told Salazar, "I don't remember showing the library."
"And you hadn't cared to let the boy learn a little ahead of his time. For Merlin's sake, I'm Salazar Slytherin! I'm not a librarian!".
"Oh, is it? You put the boy up the tree and now it becomes my responsibility to see that he doesn't eat the apple?"
"Yes, it is. Lad, you're his father for Merlin's sake!"
"I'm not!"
"There you go again." Tom said.
"What?" two voices cried out at him.
"You." Tom pointed to Harry, " are shouting at a portrait of all things about my doings and not at me. That gives away your frustration, Harry. After all, frustrated blokes do not get the whole picture." He ended, sagely.
Harry had just opened his mouth to utter something so scandalous that it would shock Tom out of his sudden-sage-like demeanour, when Tom again said something, wiping the smirk off Salazar's face in the portrait. Pointing to Salazar this time, he said,
"And you, Granddad, are supposed to give some good advice to cool off his frustration. Instead you are shouting at him from a portrait. Pardon me, but I do understand you. Harry is not much old; but you have a millennia of frustration to make up for, but still, it doesn't go well with your manners, Granddad."
Now Harry smirked at Slytherin's portrait, where Salazar's face was turning steadily scarlet. Before matters could worsen, he decided to intervene.
"Er….aren't we getting off topic?"
Salazar nodded, relieved at the change of subject, and Harry started reciting names, while Tom checked them.
"Orion Black. Desmond Lestrange. Hector Rosier. Patrick Nott. Abraxas Malfoy….." the names continued, till Tom said, "you've got them mostly allright. Now, say the two names you have been saving up for the last."
Mock-saluting Tom, Harry said, "Patricia Greengrass, and Sophia Davis."
Tom sighed, and said, "You've got them right. Now, Harry, stop being dramatic. We both know that nobody interests you."
Harry raised an eyebrow at him. "How do you know that?"
"Pft! I've seen you, and believe me, I do remember the older boys of the orphanage, who liked anyone."
"Had someone you liked?" Harry asked.
"If I had, would I have enjoyed being here from everyone I had known?"
Harry instantly felt bad for the boy. "Good Merlin, Tom, I'm sorry…."
"Don't be. Now go and do what both Granddad and I made you learn the names for."
Harry nodded. It was the wizengamot meeting day, and he had plans…..he had to put into action.
Suddenly changing plans, Harry looked to Tom, remembering Tom saying his isolation here.
"You can come with me?"
Harry was amazed at the play of emotions on the boy's face. He looked scared at the prospect. Then hope took its place. And then, there was determination to make good of the opportunity.
"You'll be apparating for the first time."
Tom nodded, and took a deep breath.
Harry smiled at him and ruffled his hair.
"Brothers, or father and son?"
Tom squinted at him. "People like the latter better, I think."
"And you?"
"As long as I'm related to you, frankly, I don't care."
Smiling widely, Harry and Tom disappeared with a distinctive crack.
Miles from the manor, in front of a dilapidated building which was one of the many entrances to the ministry, a boy and a man covertly appeared in the shadows, both wearing black, flowing robes.
The man smiled at the boy.
"Let's take them, shall we?"
The boy's eyes were dancing with excitement.
"Yeah, dad, let's go shock them out of their wits."
The man burst into laughter at the address, and nodding, lead the way into the Ministry.
In the opposite path beside the road, two women stood, their faces shrouded by hoods. One of them, a tall, willowy woman, whispered to the other,shorter and plumper woman, standing beside her.
"I do not know why, but the Lord Slytherin appears to have a boy with him, who is calling him father. Keep an eye out for both of them then from now on. I will deal with Slytherin."
As the shorter woman nodded, the taller woman entered the ministry, and moved the wand over her whole body. The hood didn't drop, but her robes changed from black to a royal scarlet, fringed with gold, while on the back of her robes, a golden, roaring lion appeared.
