Summer of Enchantment

by Warviben

Summary: Harry is not dealing well with Sirius' death. Professor McGonagall is concerned enough about his mental health to approach the Headmaster. A surprising solution is proposed.

Disclaimer: I do not own these characters or the basic premise of this story. I am making no money from this endeavor.

Warnings: This story contains detailed heterosexual liaisons. If that disturbs you, please stop reading now.

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12 Journey

Harry awoke on the hard floor of the shed with Sera, still sleeping, beside him, not realizing at first what had woken him. He took a moment to ponder the sheer luck they'd had so far, making it this far without leaving some part of themselves behind in another country. Had he known how difficult the task actually was that he'd accomplished, he probably never would have attempted it.

He turned his attention to Sera, even more beautiful in sleep than she was awake. He hoped he'd done the right thing, bringing her here. As he stared at her, he felt the black curtain fluttering, and he guessed right away that their absence had been discovered and that someone was attempting to locate them by accessing his thoughts. (Dumbledore? Snape? Dumbledore probably. Snape had told him that legillimency was difficult over long distances. Dumbledore, being the much more powerful wizard, was probably capable of reaching Harry here.) Ha! he said to himself. Not so easy now, is it? He guessed it was a prior attempt that had woken him.

He checked his watch and reckoned it was time they got moving. People would begin showing up here at any time, assuming they hadn't already on this Sunday morning, and it wouldn't do for them to be found, not so close to the Dursleys especially. Someone might recognize him. "Sera," he said, smoothing her hair back away from her face. "Sweetheart, it's time to get up."

Her eyes fluttered open, then she closed them again quickly. How was it possible to feel dizzy while lying flat? If this was morning sickness, she wasn't sure she'd survive this pregnancy.

"Good morning," she said after a deep, hopefully steadying breath. She opened her eyes again and smiled up at Harry.

He smiled back at her, then bent close to give her a quick kiss. "Good morning. Hungry?"

Her stomach flipped over at the thought. "Not really. You go ahead and eat. I brought sandwiches."

Harry rummaged in her backpack and removed two sandwiches. "You really should eat," he said, holding one out to her.

She sat up, fighting the shock to her equilibrium that simple movement produced. "I'll try," she said, taking the sandwich. She nibbled at the crust as Harry wolfed his sandwich down. She took another out and tossed it to him. "Go ahead and finish them. We can get something else later." Harry ate the remaining two sandwiches, then the half that Sera didn't eat, and washed them down with a large drink of water.

"Think they know we're gone yet?" Sera asked.

Harry nodded. "I'm sure of it. I think we need to get to the nearest bank and change your money over. Damn! It's Sunday! We won't be able to visit a bank until tomorrow. Well, perhaps we can find someplace that will take your currency. If not, well . . . we'll just have to hold out until tomorrow. " It wouldn't be the first time either one of them had gone without food.

"I think we need to get to a bathroom first," she pointed out. "So how are we getting to London?"

Harry helped her to her feet and began packing away the remains from their breakfast and folding up his invisibility cloak. "It's about twelve miles to London from here. (AN: I got this number from the Harry Potter Lexicon, where it states that "Little Whinging is located approximately 12 miles from the Leaky Cauldron.") Up for a walk?"

##########

It had taken eight days to walk to London. Sera's condition didn't allow them to move very fast, and they had to stop frequently for rest breaks and water. Harry was getting quite impatient with the pace, but every time he looked at Sera's drawn, pale face, he held his annoyance inside. On the first day, they hadn't been able to find a merchant who would accept Sera's American money from a couple of teenagers, and they'd gone without food.

On Day Two, they'd visited the first bank they came across and converted all of Sera's money into pounds, convinced now that they'd be able to stay alive until they could access Harry's vault at Gringott's. They'd been sleeping outdoors at night, wrapped up in Harry's cloak, and walking during the day. They tried to avoid heavy traffic areas, but when they couldn't, they walked under the cloak, because they never knew who might be watching. On the more deserted stretches of road, they took the chance of walking uncovered.

Hygiene was accomplished in public restrooms, by splashing water on their faces, washing out one set of underclothes while wearing the other, applying a layer of deodorant over yesterday's layer of sweat and dirt, brushing their teeth. Sera especially was troubled by the inability to wash her hair, and her normally gleaming tresses hung dull and lifeless after only a few days, reminding Harry very much of her uncle, though he was tactful enough not to say so.

It was slow going, but they had no real motivation to hurry, other than Sera's money running out, and they were good for a couple of weeks if they didn't spend it on hotels. They bought food as they went, although Sera wasn't eating much. She had no appetite, and when she forced herself to eat, it usually came right back up. Harry was getting more and more worried about her – she'd already visibly lost weight, and he didn't know how much longer she could continue this way.

When they reached London, Harry realized it was September 1 and that his classmates were on their way to Hogwarts to start a new term. For the first time in six years, Harry wouldn't be joining them. What would Ron and Hermione think when he didn't show up? Would everyone know why? Would Harry Potter once again be the subject of everyone's gossip? Harry shook his head to dispel these thoughts. He was where he needed to be right now, and that was all that mattered.

Harry convinced Sera to rent a hotel room on the edge of the city. He didn't want her going into Diagon Alley with him for many reasons. He might be captured there, although he didn't know if "captured" was the right term. They hadn't committed any crime, after all. Still, it was possible that the larger wizarding world had been alerted to his disappearance and that everyone was on the lookout for him. He planned to wear his cloak until he got into the bank. He was depending on the goblins' infamous discretion to keep word of his visit there from leaking out. If someone tried to grab him up and keep him there, he didn't want Sera caught up as well. He told her that if he wasn't back by late that evening, she was to go to the US embassy in London and explain as best she could how she'd gotten there without a passport or papers of any kind and ask for help.

He also didn't want her with him because he knew she wasn't quite ready for the things she'd see in Diagon Alley. She'd come to terms with Harry and her uncle being wizards and had seen them performing magic all summer, to the point where it had become something she no longer marveled at. But Harry remembered his first time in Diagon Alley and knew she'd see things there that had never even entered her imagination: goblins, giants, hags, floating heads, who knew what?

So they found a ratty hotel on the edge of the city that would let them a room without identification and for cash. After they'd both showered for the first time in over a week, he left her there, wondering if she was safer in that fleabag than she'd be by his side. He didn't leave until he heard her lock and chain the door, and his steps were hurried by the thought that he didn't want her there alone any longer than she needed to be. As soon as he left, Sera collapsed onto the bed, not allowing herself to worry about whether it was clean or not, and fell into a deep sleep from which she didn't awaken until Harry returned.

##########

Harry's visit to Gringott's had gone as well as he could have expected. He'd worn his cloak into the Leaky Cauldron and waited until someone else opened the archway to Diagon Alley, then slipped through. He kept to the edges of the buildings, flattening himself against a window more than once when the sparse crowd threatened to brush against him.

He made it to the bank and slipped inside behind someone else. He stood in the lobby until the amount of traffic had slowed as much as it was probably going to, then slipped into the loo and removed his cloak in the stall, tucking it into his backpack. Keeping his head down, he approached the first free goblin, produced his key, and asked to be taken to his vault.

The goblin who escorted him down into the bowels of the earth didn't seem inclined to chat, and Harry was just as happy to remain silent on the ride down. He loaded his backpack with as much as he dared, suspecting that if he had to make this trip again, his chances of being caught at least doubled.

He then told his escort that he'd like to convert all he'd taken to pounds. The goblin simply nodded as though this were an everyday request and escorted Harry back topside. Once there, the goblin handled the transaction with no questions asked and handed Harry his money.

Harry slipped into the loo again, put his cloak back on, and exited Diagon Alley the same way he'd come. When he returned to the hotel room, he'd had to bang on the door for a couple of minutes before Sera woke and let him back in.

"So now what?" she asked after she'd eyed the large stack of money Harry had placed on the bed.

##########

"Severus, it is time for us to pack up and go home," Dumbledore advised Snape.

"But, sir, they're still out there somewhere," Snape protested feebly.

They'd been looking for the runaways for over a week, and had come across no sign of them. They had decided that if there was no word from them or if they didn't turn up soon, they had no choice but to involve local law enforcement authorities. They'd avoided notifying the wizarding community back home of Harry's disappearance, sure that Voldemort would double his efforts to locate Harry if he knew Harry was outside Dumbledore's immediate protection. Dumbledore had gone to the Secretary of the US Council on Magic on the second day and informed him of their situation, and they had received the complete cooperation of the local wizarding community (including Karen Crawford, who had made a several personal visits to Snape to offer whatever assistance she could), but still Harry and Sera had managed to evade them. Harry would have been easy enough to track back home, if he was using magic, but since there was no restriction on sixteen-year olds performing magic in this country, no one was watching for it, and they had no way of knowing if it was happening.

"They're no longer here," Dumbledore advised him. "My source inside Gringott's Bank informs me that Harry visited his vault yesterday and withdrew a large sum of money, which he then had converted into pounds. They're back home."

Snape was astounded. "They're sure it was him?"

"Had they any doubt, they never would have let him into the vault. It was him. Right down to the scar."

"And was . . . was Serafina with him?"

Dumbledore shook his head. "They saw no one with him. They did not see him enter or leave the building. I suspect he used his cloak to slip in and out without detection. It is possible Miss Mallory was somewhere nearby."

"But how did they get there? Is it possible they flew? In an airplane, I mean?"

"Council officials assure me they were watching for that very thing. Neither of them has a passport, and even if they'd managed to come up with documentation somehow, no one fitting their descriptions has boarded an airplane in this country in the last week."

"Canada, perhaps?" Snape asked, speculating out loud.

"Perhaps. Perhaps we won't know the truth of how they managed to pull this off until we catch up with them. And we will catch up with them, Severus. But it makes no sense to remain here any longer."

"And what do you propose we do about the social services people who will want an explanation for Serafina's absence?"

"I've spoken with Council officials about that as well," Dumbledore told him. "They'll simply make her disappear, from the records and from the memories of anyone here who ever met her, which will make it difficult for her to return at any point in the future without their cooperation. But it's either that, or we just leave, and the authorities here think you kidnapped your niece and world-wide alerts are issued for your arrest. I prefer the former option."

Snape smiled weakly. "As do I."

"They have offered, however, to see to this house and the land. Should we request it, they will administer the estate on Sera's behalf and ensure that the proceeds are kept safely for her benefit. And they'll also keep an eye on the house, should the fugitives decide to return here. I find that unlikely, given that Harry converted his money into pounds, but it doesn't hurt to cover all of the bases."

"Very well," Snape nodded his approval. "I'm packed and ready when you are."

"I'm going to pack Harry's things. He'll need them when he returns to school," Dumbledore said with more assurance than he felt. That Harry had managed to keep ahead of them for more than a week and actually make it out of the country had astonished him. With the financial resources at his disposal and that head on his shoulders, it might be a long time before they saw Harry Potter again if that's what Harry wanted. "If there's anything that you think Serafina might want, I would suggest you pack it for her and bring it with us."

"And what do we do with that?" Snape asked, indicating Lenni, who was pouncing on a dustball that had emerged from under the refrigerator.

Dumbledore scooped Lenni up. "Well, we can't leave her here, can we? She'll have to go with us."

##########

Harry and Sera stayed at different cheap, disreputable hotels in London for the first two nights after their arrival in the city. On the third day, they stumbled across a little furnished cottage at the end of a deserted lane on the outskirts of the city which was advertised as for let. They spoke to the elderly owners who lived in a larger house nearby, and although they were suspicious about the very young couple who wouldn't really answer any of their questions, they needed the money that Harry made sure they got a look at and buried their hesitation and accepted them as tenants.

They moved in their meager possessions and tried to make the little house a home, with no idea how long they'd be here. Their first week passed quietly. Sera, still suffering from bouts of morning sickness that lasted all day, kept the little place clean and cooked their meals. Harry tried to keep busy during the day, but it grew increasingly difficult because there was just nothing to do here except think about where he should be, where he would be now if he hadn't gotten them into this mess. His inability to use magic at all only compounded his misery, as did the fact that he hadn't flown for weeks and should be training hard for his first quidditch match. He tried to keep these feelings at bay, but with each day that passed, it became more difficult. When he was alone, he thought about Ron and Hermione, wondering how often they stopped to think about him, sure that they missed him as much as he missed them.

##########

The argument which had started on their daily post-lunch walk dogged behind them into the house. It had started over nothing, as arguments sometimes do, but neither one was willing to let it go. Just before reaching the front door, Harry had commented on the fact that Sera was better off than he was because she had had time to get to know her mother, whereas he had been so young when his parents died that he didn't know either of them. They would have needed a map to retrace the wandering trail their argument had taken to reach this point.

"Your logic is a little screwed up there, chum," she told him, opening the door and going inside. "You're saying that it doesn't matter how lousy my mother might have made my life by being in it?"

Harry followed her in and closed the door behind him. "At least you got to know her."

"At least you had a roof over your head every night," she pointed out.

"At least you didn't have a cousin who was twice as big as you pounding you every other day just for fun."

"At least you didn't have to get up at four in the morning to milk some stupid cows."

"Your mother made you milk cows?" Harry asked, confused.

"No, my grandmother."

"We were talking about your mother and how miserable she made your life," Harry reminded her. "Try to stay on topic."

"Well, now we're talking about how miserable my grandmother made my life!" Sera said heatedly. "Besides, I thought we were trying to figure out which one of us was more pathetic."

Harry couldn't suppress a smile at that. They were trying to one-up each other in the most miserable childhood contest. Who would ever want to be the winner of that sweepstakes?

"At least you didn't receive used socks for a Christmas present!" he offered, but the tenor of the argument had changed, at least for him, to a much more playful one.

"At least you got a Christmas present," she countered, studying him, sensing the change in his mood but not understanding it.

"At least you didn't have to wear hand-me-down clothes that were three sizes too big for you."

"At least you didn't have to wear the same filthy clothes for days at a time."

"At least you didn't have to scrub the driveway with a toothbrush," Harry said.

"You did not!" she challenged, not believing that the Dursleys had actually made him do that particular awful chore.

"You're right," he admitted. "But at least you didn't have to live with people whose greatest joy was pretending you didn't exist." He smiled at her, wanting her to realize that he wasn't arguing with her any more.

She, on the other hand, wasn't ready to concede defeat. "At least you weren't traded for drugs!" She looked near tears.

Harry's smile faltered. That obviously wasn't a topic to be joked about. "Sera, I . . . I'm sorry. I . . ."

Now Sera smiled, triumphantly. "I win!" she crowed.

Harry realized she'd played him. "You evil little . . ."

"What, Harry? What am I?" she taunted.

"You're a cheater!" he declared, unable to come up with anything better that he actually dared to say to her.

"No, what I am is a winner!" she gloated. She opened the refrigerator and bent to place the chops they'd bought for supper inside. She felt Harry step up behind her, and she straightened up.

"I think you need to be taught a lesson in how to play fair," he said into her ear as his arms snaked around her waist.

"And do you think you're man enough to teach me?" she challenged.

He pulled her tight against him, pressing his groin into her backside. "What do you think?"

"I think we haven't christened the kitchen yet."

##########

By the second week, they were barely talking to each other. There was no overt hostility; neither was angry with the other. They'd simply stopped communicating. They continued to take long walks after lunch, and in the evening, they watched television together, but they hardly ever spoke. For two people who hadn't been able to stop sharing everything about themselves since the day they'd met, the silence was strange and uncomfortable. A sleeping monster lay between them, and neither wanted to poke the beast and risk waking it, because once it woke, the carnage it could wreak might not be repairable. The monster's name was Hogwarts. Even being able to share the comfort of each other's bodies whenever the urge struck wasn't enough to keep the growing storm at bay forever.

##########

"You have to eat," Harry said more forcefully than he'd intended as Sera, once again, pushed her untouched plate away from her.

"Don't tell me what I have to do!" Sera snapped, and to her amazement and his, she burst into tears.

Harry stared at her, unmoved. What had he done to cause that? One part of him wanted to reach over and comfort her, but he figured they had to have this out sooner or later. It had been going on too long already. Now was as good a time as any. He sat back and waited for the storm to pass, his arms crossed stoically in front of him. When she finally stopped crying, he said, a little more gently, "You haven't been eating enough to keep a bird alive. You need it, and the baby needs it."

Sera sniffed pitifully and wiped her eyes with a napkin. "I know. I just can't! I'll just throw it up again."

"Maybe we need to take you to see a doctor," he suggested, for perhaps the thirtieth time.

"A doctor won't help," she told him. "I read about morning sickness. It usually lasts for the first twenty or so weeks, and then it goes away. There's really nothing that can be done to stop it, so there's nothing a doctor could do."

Harry counted quickly in his head. "So you'll be feeling this way for another three months?! There must be something they can do!" Surely they didn't let pregnant women suffer for that long. Surely they didn't allow unborn babies to go malnourished just because their mothers couldn't keep food in their stomachs.

Sera shook her head emphatically. "The only thing going to the doctor will do is get us caught."

"What makes you think that?"

"Maybe they're watching doctor's offices, waiting for us to show up there!" she said a little hysterically, aware that she was being irrational, but unable to change the fact that she felt as though they were being watched constantly, that if she turned around suddenly on the street, she'd find someone there, quickly feigning interest in something else, like some incompetent private investigator on a bad television show.

"Sweetheart, there's no reason to think that they know you're pregnant," Harry said reasonably. "Why would they be watching doctor's offices?"

"I don't know," she said miserably. "It just feels like we can't live our life because we always have to worry that someone is watching. Maybe I'm getting paranoid."

Harry had felt this way, too, and he understood what she was saying. He reached over and held her hand. "I know. I feel it, too. And it's not paranoia if someone is actually looking for you. We just have to give it a little time."

She snatched her hand away. "Time for what?" she demanded.

"Time for things to work out," he said vaguely, without any idea how they were going to do so.

"And what happens if we're still 'waiting for things to work out' when the baby comes? What then? Do you want your son born in this tiny little cabin? What if something goes wrong? What if we need a doctor? Have you thought about any of this?"

My son. Those words shot a bolt of feeling through Harry – fear, pride, happiness, more fear, expectation, anxiety. Harry tamped them down because they weren't helpful to the situation at hand. He had thought about what would happen when it was time for the baby to come, but only in general terms. Obviously, once it was time, they'd need to go to the hospital. He didn't know how they'd explain themselves when they got there, and he really didn't care. His child wasn't going to be born here. But that was a bridge that needed to be crossed much later. If she didn't start eating soon, his child wouldn't be around long enough for them to worry about his birth. His child.

"I have," he assured her. "And I will take care of you. Both of you."

"How, Harry?" she demanded. "We can't live here forever, with you sneaking off to the bank every time we need money. Eventually, it will run out. Or they'll catch you. And then what will happen to us?"

"I don't know, Sera," he said, exasperated that she was pushing this now. "Maybe we should have just stayed back in America and let them wipe our memories clean!"

"Is that what you want?" she asked, the tears starting again. "Why did you bring me here if you wanted to be rid of me?"

"I don't want to be rid of you, Sera! I came here with you, didn't I?"

"Do you think I don't see how much you hate it, though?!" Sera couldn't help it. She kicked the sleeping beast as hard as she could. It was time to wake him up and see just how much damage he could do. "Do you think I don't know how much you want to be back at school?! I can see it in your eyes every time you look at me! You were made for better things! You can't live like this forever, and you know it! I'm holding you back, and you're beginning to resent me for it!"

"I can't talk to you when you're like this!" Harry said, getting up from the table so quickly he knocked his chair backward, afraid he'd say something he could never take back if he stayed here a minute longer and that the beast would do permanent damage. Too much of what she'd said was true. "I'm going out!"

"No, Harry! Don't leave me!" Sera cried.

But Harry didn't look back. He stormed out the door, slamming it shut behind him.

"Harry!" Sera moaned, clutching her stomach and getting to her feet quickly as well, although it was to the bathroom that she ran, where once again she gave back what little she'd eaten.

When she was sure there was no more, she threw herself onto the bed and cried herself into a headache. Why had she pushed him so? Why couldn't she just have let him be? What was wrong with the way things were? They were happy here, weren't they? What if he never came back? What if he just kept on going, back to school, back to his old life? What if she never saw him again? What if their baby grew up never knowing him?

She was so relieved when she heard the door open some time later that she sat up and tried to wipe the tears away so he wouldn't know she'd been crying, wouldn't know that she'd let doubt creep in. But he came to her directly, and he knew.

"Sera," he said. "I'm sorry." He sat beside her and took her into his arms, and she couldn't help it – she cried again, this time in relief that he'd come back to her, that she hadn't driven him away forever.

"No, I'm sorry!" she wailed. "I shouldn't have pushed you! You're so wonderful to me, and I'm being such a bitch! Can you forgive me?"

"There's nothing to forgive, Sera. I shouldn't have left you. I know things aren't that great, and I wish I knew how this was all going to turn out, but I don't. I only know that I love you, and that I love our baby, and that I will keep the two of you safe."

"I believe you," she said, wanting desperately to do so. "I was just so afraid that you weren't coming back. That you missed school and your friends too much. That I'd driven you away."

"I'd be lying if I said I didn't miss Hogwarts and Ron and Hermione," Harry confessed. "But there's no place else I want to be right now." He kissed her cheeks, tasting her salty tears, sorry he'd made her cry.

"Oh, Harry! Thank you for coming back to me!" She pulled him close and kissed him. He pushed her gently backward onto the bed and lay beside her, kissing her still, their argument quickly forgotten in their mounting passion.

Afterward they lay side by side, only their hands touching. They talked late into the night, apologizing once again, planning for their future, and avowing their love for one another and their baby. Finally drowsy, Sera dropped off to sleep. Harry watched over her for a time, gently stroking her hair, his affection for her rippling through him like liquid heat when she smiled in her sleep. As he lay there watching her, he reached a decision. He had a feeling she'd need some convincing, but he felt it was the only course available to them, and he practiced what he'd say to her in his head until he, too, fell asleep.

Some time later, in the wee hours of the morning, something woke Sera, and she stared up at the ceiling for a time, thinking about their argument yesterday and their situation. There was a lot she didn't know – like where she'd be a month from now, what they'd do when the baby came, how they'd survive going into the future – but there were two things she did know. She loved Harry Potter, with all of her heart, and she loved the little child growing within her with a love she'd never known was possible. As long as Harry didn't leave her or send her away, she thought she could deal with anything.

Harry snorted in his sleep and turned onto his back. Sera smiled at him and snuggled close to him. Still sleeping, Harry put an arm around her and pulled her closer. Sera rested her head on his chest, placing her ear directly over his heart. She listened to its beating rhythm pulse through her for a time before moving her head to rest on his shoulder. She should sleep now. She closed her eyes and waited for sleep to take her, but it didn't come right away. She tried to match her breathing to Harry's deep, measured pace, but that didn't feel right. She waited half a breath, then inhaled while Harry exhaled, and exhaled while Harry breathed in. It was as though they were giving each other the precious gift of life, over and over with each breath. Sera fell asleep this way, convinced that one could not survive without the other.