Disclaimer: I don't, of course, own any of this. JK Rowling/Warner Brothers do. I do own David and Belle, though.

Summary: Broken after the war, Harry left. Now, two years later, he's finally found the strength to return, only to discover that old sins have long shadows…

Old Sins

Chapter Nine: Dobby and His Ace

"That house-elf," said Luna dreamily, pointing at Dobby, who was skulking around the living-room with mysterious movements, "Has an ace up his sleeve."

Harry and Hermione looked round in surprise; Ron glared at Luna. "What are you talking about?" Harry asked.

"Oh, haven't you noticed?" said Luna, apparently impervious to Ron's glower. "He's trying to get you and Hermione back together. He believes—and I must say, I agree—that we'll all be happier that way, especially you two and David. It could be OBHPF."

"What's that?" Harry blinked. "OBHPF?"

"One Big Happy Potter Family," said Luna serenely.

"Luna!" Hermione snapped, sounding much angrier than the occasion seemed to warrant.

"Oh, sorry," Luna went on, with wide-eyed innocence, regarding Harry and Hermione thoughtfully, "Have I embarrassed you?"

Hermione shuffled nervously. "Luna, it's not going to happen," she said in a constrained voice.

"Not going to happen," Harry repeated awkwardly.

"We're just friends," said Hermione.

"Just friends," Harry reiterated firmly.

"Are you a parrot, too?" Ron asked Harry with a grimace.

"And that goes for you too, Dobby!" Hermione called out, ignoring Ron completely.

Dobby gave them a mischievous look. "Yes, Hermione Granger."

Deciding that it would be better to leave the discussion before it got vastly out of hand, Harry stood up and with a feeble excuse, left the room. He went into the tapestry room, cast one dark look at the Black Family tapestry, and wandered over to David's crib, where the boy was playing with a toy broomstick.

"You'll make a good flier one day," he told David, hanging over the edge of the crib rather sadly. He ruffled the black hair in front of him and David turned smiling brown eyes to him. Harry smiled faintly. "You've certainly got the love for it. Your mother hates it, though. Where'd you get that from, then?"

"His father," said a voice behind him.

Harry jumped and turned to see that Hermione had followed him from the living-room. She was leaning against the doorframe and watching him and David with a rather odd and sad expression in her eyes, as if she was almost looking at what could have been…

"He should have been mine," Harry blurted, before he could stop himself.

Hermione's eyes flew wide. "It would've been a bit of a ball and chain for you, wouldn't it?" she finally stammered, a little unsteadily, with only a small drop of sarcasm.

"Maybe I want that," he said fiercely. "Maybe I want to be bound to something, irrevocably, maybe I need an anchor holding me to the world. You and Ron, you've been my anchor for so long, but what if it isn't enough? What if I want more than friends and companions and an Auror career? What if I want a family?"

"Wh-what exactly are you t-trying to say, Harry?"

He stared at her for a long moment, and then his shoulders slumped. "I don't know," he said quietly. "I don't know what I mean. I don't even know what I want anymore." He fought to recover, to change the subject, to wipe the shocked, almost hopeful look out of her eyes. "So – er – David's dad was a Quidditch player, was he? You know, for someone who never liked the sport much and never liked flying much, you certainly picked men who did…"

Hermione grinned sheepishly at that, the tension in her face slowly fading. "If you're referring to Viktor Krum and Cormac McClaggen and Ron – "

"And me," he said, leaning back against the crib, "Or don't you count me as part of your past?"

"You've always been a part of my past, Harry. You've never not been there. I don't remember much of my life before I met you and Ron – and even when Ron and I were fighting, you were there. Sometimes, I wonder whether I define myself by you… or whether you define yourself by us… we've always been inextricable." She sighed. "Or at least, we were."

Before you left… the words went unspoken, but he understood anyway, and he felt a pang of mingled guilt and anger. Would that mistake never leave him alone?

Old sins have long shadows.

He ignored the voice in his head, and said nothing. After a moment, Hermione said, "I heard what you said to my father," she blurted. "About forgiving me and about how much I love them. The other day, at the dentist's. I just… no one's ever stuck up for me quite like that before. I wanted to thank you."

"You're welcome," said Harry, smiling slightly. "I – er – Hermione, you know I'll be here, always, don't you? I know I haven't in the past, I haven't treated you and Ron the way I really should have, but I'm really trying to make up for that."

Hermione's face softened. "Your life's been hard on you, Harry. We don't blame you for anything you've done because of it. And to be honest, we've sometimes asked more of you than you've been willing or ready to give." She looked at the floor. "I know I have. But I know you're trying now, and that means more to us – to me – than anything else ever has. So, yes, I do know you'll always be here if I need you. And I do need you, Harry."

"I don't think you do," he said softly. "It's me who's always needed you."

"And I'm here," she said, smiling. "Always."

He nodded, and smiled back. It didn't really matter sometimes – friends, lovers, whatever they were or weren't – they still had each other and they would still stand, side by side, whenever the world demanded that they fight. That was the way it had always been. That was the way it would always be.

Or at least, it was, until Dobby entered the picture once more.

That afternoon, the house was particularly quiet. Harry was sitting in his bedroom and polishing his Firebolt with the Broomstick Servicing Kit Hermione had given him several years before. He was almost done when there was a knock on his door and Dobby slipped in, wringing bits of his child's jumper in his hands, two socks firmly placed over his ears.

"What's the matter, Dobby?" said Harry, half-alarmed that Dobby would throw himself at a wall again.

"Can Harry Potter help Dobby?" Dobby asked tentatively.

Harry put down his Firebolt. "Yeah, of course. What with? It's not cleaning, is it?" he asked suspiciously, reaching for his wand.

"No, no," said Dobby hastily. "Harry Potter can leave his wand behind. Dobby was just going to clean out the attic, but Dobby doesn't know what Harry Potter and his friends want to keep and what they want to throw out, so Dobby was hoping Harry Potter would help him sort boxes."

"Harry Potter'll do it just as long as Dobby stops calling him that," said Harry dryly, standing up. He left his wand behind and followed a chuckling Dobby out of the room and up the ladder on the next floor, and into the attic.

It occurred to him that perhaps the others would be better equipped to sort out the stuff in the attic—after all, they had lived here longer, technically—but then Harry remembered that they weren't home. Ron and Luna were out for the rest of the day and probably wouldn't be home until late at night, David was with Mrs. Weasley (not that he could do much), and Harry had no idea where Hermione was.

Dobby pointed at a pile of dusty boxes. "Dobby doesn't know which ones Harry Potter and his friends might want to keep."

Harry went to the pile of boxes and looked through them. One held old photo albums. He gave it to Dobby to place in the 'keep' pile; he knew Hermione would want to keep all their old photographs. The next box held moldy and broken Christmas decorations. He set them aside for disposal – Christmas had been just a month or so ago; they had plenty of time to get new decorations for the next one. The third box was also promptly dispensed with; it held old Black memorabilia, the sort Sirius would have hated with a passion (mostly photographs of his charming mother).

Within twenty minutes, Harry had quite neatly sorted out the various boxes in the attic, while Dobby set about cleaning the attic and de-dusting the items in the boxes they had decided to keep. Harry couldn't help noticing that Dobby kept shooting him surreptitious sideways glances, as if waiting for something.

There was just one box left. Harry opened it, and was surprised to see a small pile of unopened letters – about four or five in all – and each was neatly addressed to "Harry Potter".

"I've never read these letters," he muttered to himself, pulling out the little pile. His heart quickened a little; the handwriting on the envelopes was very obviously Hermione's. He frowned. Had she written him letters but just never gotten around to sending them? Had she left them here, hoping no one would ever find them?

He looked quickly at Dobby. Had he been brought here deliberately?

Very slowly, he opened the first and oldest letter.

Dear Harry,

It's been two months since you left, and I've finally worked up the nerve to write this letter to you. I don't know if you'll ever read it—you've got Hedwig and I don't know if any other owl will be able to find you. No one knows where you are, after all.

I'm sure you think we're all terribly furious with you for leaving, but we're not, Harry. Really. We just miss you dreadfully. I mean, I don't know if I can forgive you—I need to say this—but I'm not angry. Ron was, for a few weeks. He called you all kinds of names, but you know what Ron's like. Within the first three weeks, his anger spent itself and he just got awfully gloomy.

I'm sure you're wondering why I waited so long to write this letter. The truth is: I never intended to write to you at all. I intended to give you time to heal and come back, to leave you alone. I also thought that after the first few weeks, I would stop missing you so much and the pain would go away. Well, it hasn't. It hasn't gone away, Harry. I've heard about "out of sight, out of mind", but it doesn't work. With each day, it only gets worse.

Why did you go, Harry? Did we mean so little to you?

Love,

Hermione

His eyes scalded with tears, Harry read through each of the letters. Each one was quiet, without rage or rambling sorrow or grief, yet he felt Hermione's loneliness with each word. Finally, his hands shaking a little, he picked up the last letter and read it.

Dear Harry,

Maybe I'll actually find the nerve to send this letter, unlike all the others I've written. This one is a little different. I'm not going to ask you to come home. I'm not going to burden you by telling you I miss you dreadfully, or ask you what made you think you could just leave us like that…

I'm just going to say goodbye.

David turned a year old today, by the way. Ron gave him a toy broomstick; he adores it. So I suppose this makes it just under a year and nine months since that last night we really spent together, you and I. I'm not going to ask you to come home, because you deserve to be happy, and if you're happy wherever you are, that's all I can ask for.

I have David and I think I'm going to be very happy, too. He is, after all, a part of you – at least I get to keep that – and he's the best part of me.

I love you, Harry. I always will.

So, goodbye.

Love,

Hermione

Behind the tears, behind the sadness, Harry's head was in a whirl. What was she talking about? A year and nine months?

"What does she mean, he's part of me?" he asked out loud, voice shaking slightly.

Dobby looked at him, eyes very wide and innocent. "But humans always refer to sons as being part of their fathers, Harry Potter," he said. "Dobby thinks it makes perfect sense."

"I don't have a son," Harry stammered. "I—I don't—"

Dobby patted his knee, grinning toothily. "Does David not exist, then?"

Harry sprang up so fast that he sent Dobby flying. "Where is Hermione?" he said through gritted teeth, his heart pounding so hard he was absolutely certain it would burst right out of his chest.

"Dobby will take Harry Potter to her," said Dobby promptly, still beaming as though he was utterly delighted with himself.

Mutinously silent, thoroughly shaken, Harry followed Dobby down from the attic, down three floors in the old house, and to the tapestry room. There was a large, walk-in cupboard in the corner; Hermione was kneeling inside it, removing the last of old clothes, evidently sorting through various things as well.

Harry marched right into the cupboard as well, and Hermione stood up, looking surprised. "Where have you been?" she demanded accusingly. "Ron told me you were going to meet me an hour ago, to sort through these things – "

Harry didn't even bother to consider the implications of this statement.

"How could you not tell me—?" he began furiously, but never got to finish his sentence.

At that very moment, the cupboard doors slammed, leaving Harry and Hermione trapped inside in relative darkness. Hermione instinctively grabbed Harry's arm, and Harry, discovering that they were both wandless and that the door was locked, banged on it, hard. It didn't so much as budge.

They were stuck.

Slowly, realization dawned on them both. In the dim cupboard light, Harry saw a mirrored expression on Hermione's face.

"DOBBY!" they both yelled.

TBC.