Chapter Fourteen "Forced-Resolve"
DISCLAIMER: The characters and story plot of the Harry Potter franchise do NOT belong to me, I am just one of the many privileged enough to write on J.K Rowling's marvelous novel series.
Waiting for the bookcase to move so to grant him access, Remus Lupin carefully made his way purposefully down the steep steps of the dimly lit, narrow staircase he found himself treading on towards Severus Snape's secretive potions lab. Cobwebs hanging heavily overhead as he crouched down low to avoid them, at the foot of the stairs he could make out a weak looking wooden door with cracks giving way to little light, the light being the only sign that let Lupin know Snape was in fact behind it.
To be sure Harry hadn't followed him down, Lupin gave a look over his shoulder before giving a stern knock to the potion master's door. There was a deafening silence for a long moment until Snape's cold voice called for him to enter.
Turning the doors brass wobbly handle, Lupin stuck his head in first with a friendly smile on his face. "I'm sorry to disturb you, Severus."
"If that was true, you wouldn't have come down here at all. Though I take it you've come down here with good reason." Snape replied, his sleek voice kept in a tone that showed he wasn't to bothered with the disturbance even though he tried to make it seem that way as he went quickly to hover over a brewing potion.
"Yes, in fact it's about the full moon tonight actually." Lupin answered, taking the other mans word as an invitation to step further into the room.
"You've been taking the potions I've been giving you, I cannot see what reason would give you concern for tonight." Snape said, looking up from a thick looking text laid out on the counter top he leaned over.
"I know, and I haven't missed a day of taking it, thanks to you," Lupin said gratefully. "But my concern is mainly the idea of Harry, I think it would be best to have him not be here during my transformation."
"... Is that so? Well as much as I'd love to see Potter anywhere else than here, I doubt Dumbledore will move the boy so freely." Snape commented, he cocked a thin dark brow at the opposing wizard as he wasn't quite sure of the man's sudden aim to rid the Potter brat of his presence.
"Dumbledore is not his keeper, Severus," Lupin replied, his soft tone growing to a harder more stating one. "Where Harry chooses to go and stay is ultimately up to him, he is a guest of the Order's, not a prisoner. Dumbledore is not his warden, guardian, or caretaker in anyway."
Snape slowly closed the textbook in front of him, standing straight, he folded his arms over his chest. "And you're suggesting we place the boy where?"
"Lily and James'." Lupin answered simply.
There was a snort of amusement that came from Snape at that. "Did you perhaps not see the way Potter is with his son? He will surely object to this."
"I'm sure he would, however it is not his house or his son alone, I think Lily has a say in this and you saw as I that she has made the effort to get to know, Harry. I think it would be beneficial for them all if we were to place Harry there under the ruse of my transformation." explained Lupin in greater detail.
"Ah... I see now, you're trying to patch their family back together are you, well Lupin, as I've said before I have no care in what happens to the boy. Though to be frankly honest, to have the brat out of my home which the Potter's seem so free to trample through whenever they so wish to would be fine by me." Snape said, his face set in his usual grim stone expression.
"So you will help me spin this tale to Harry and the others?" Lupin asked.
"If it will assist me in contributing to the Potter clan leaving me alone in my home in peace, and without the unwelcome whom they have been pressed upon me, I shall," Snape agreed, he gave a curt nod to Lupin and pointed to the door. "Give the boy the news now?"
"The sun is going down, now is better than later." Lupin said, pulling open the raggedy door of the room in which he first entered.
Snape shook his head with the grim look that seemed to be permanently fixed upon his face. "Then do go on, Lupin, lead the way. You've stayed here long enough to know that you do not need me to show you the way out."
Giving the darkly mooded man a light smile, Lupin headed up the narrow stairs. The heavy foot steps behind him letting him know Snape was with him. He tried to keep a neutral, unaffected and a look of expressionless on his face as he stepped into Snape's study and began calling out Harry's name. Yet through the silence of the house he could hear movement from the floor above as Harry responded to his calling.
Still standing in the center of Snape's study, Lupin watched as Snape came up from behind and took a seat in the plush armchair of the room before Harry could have the chance to join them.
"I do not have all day Lupin so let us do try and make this chat quick, I've a list of ingredients for a potion to still write." Snape said, he clutched the arm rests of his chair and let his head fall back so he could close his eyes. When he opened them he saw the offspring of his nemises standing in the doorway of his study.
"You called, sir?" Harry mumbled, looking directly at Lupin.
"Hello, Harry, would you take a seat, We've something to tell you." Lupin said with a smile, his eyes flickering to the chair that was tucked neatly into Snape's study desk.
"It's alright, I can stand." Harry replied, chancing a glance at Snape before returning his focus back on Lupin.
"If you're sure," Lupin said, he tucked his hands into the pockets of his trousers as he thought on how to tell Harry his plan. "As you know the full moon is tonight and I will be going through a phase that concerns my bodily form and mind."
"Yes, sir, I know." Harry confirmed, his eyes fixed keenly on who should be the former Professor of his own world.
"Good, good, now that should bring us to what we have to tell you." Lupin continued, he was momentarily caught off by an abrupt interruption by Snape.
"What he has to tell you, I am merely here to agree with his idea." Snape said, his cold onyx coloured eyes diverted to his bookshelves instead of meet the eyes of the other occupants of his study.
Harry began to grow suspicious. "Your idea, Sir?" he asked, his eyes shifting back to Lupin.
Letting out a sigh, Lupin placed a hand on his forehead, why he thought it would be easier with Snape's assistance he didn't know. The man lived to make things harder for others. Meeting Harry's eyes, he sighed again. "My idea is to place you at your parents home, for your own safety of course."
"What?" Harry asked, thinking he had misinterpreted the mans words.
"You're going to be staying with your parents." Lupin supplied hesitantly.
Harry immediately shook his head from side to side. "No, I refuse to go."
"It's for your own well being, Harry, I wouldn't be asking you to do this if I didn't feel it a necessary precaution." Lupin stated, his voice going stern for once with his friends son.
Harry bit his tongue lest he lash out in defiance against the man who had been so easily welcoming to him unlike most. Thinking the other mans request over, he found he couldn't deny the only person to kindly accept him into this world other than Dumbledore.
"Alright, Harry?" Lupin ventured, looking for some form of compliance to his idea.
"... Fine I'll go, but just for the night." Harry grumbled.
A small smile crept onto Lupin's face. "Thank you, Harry, you've put my mind at ease."
"Yeah, sure." Harry said beneath his breath, he let his head shake as he pictured the time he'd have at his alternate parent's home. A father who didn't want anything to do with him, a mother who looked ready to cry whenever she saw him, and a sister he knew nothing about. If a situation like that didn't make him already feel awkward, when he was actually there he would surely feel it then.
Lupin tried to give Harry a supportive, encouraging smile but it was never returned. Turning his warm pair of eyes onto the cold hard face of Snape, he gave the accomplished potioneer a nod. "I think we should be giving Lily and James a Fire-call then, yes?"
"I leave it to you, Lupin, as I told you before, I merely support the boy not being here." Snape replied simply.
"Of course, it seems to keep slipping my mind," Lupin noted, he looked back to Harry with a hand gesturing to the staircase that lead to the second floor of Snape's home. "If you would go and collect your thing's Harry, I'll inform your parents of your arrival."
Snorting as Remus said for him to collect his things, Harry turned and went to climb the stairs to the room he had been occupying over the last few days to 'collect his things' that being just the wand he had been given days earlier.
With Harry out of the room, Lupin watched as Snape got up from his chair. "Your floo powder, Severus?"
"On the mantle of the fireplace," answered Snape, he pointed out the wooden bowl filled with the green powder before he vanished behind the bookcase that lead down to his lab, his crisp, black robes swaying in his wake.
Brushing some of the hair he had falling loosely into his eyes, Lupin walked over to the fireplace that had a mountain of ash lying at its entrance and poked his head inside once he had fallen to his knees at its threshold. Looking up he found the ancient looking bricks of the chimney coated in a thick layer of filth.
Caught in a coughing fit from the ash of Snape's chimney, Lupin got to his feet and slung a hand out to the pot filled with floo powder, with the tiny particles of the powder sifting through his fingers, he grasper what he could and tossed it into the base of the fireplace. His head following suit once he got to his knees and stuck his head inside, the destination of his firecall to the Potter home in Godric's Hollow.
With a flurry of colours clouding his vision, Lupin blinked blindly for a moment until a new room miles away came into focus. Gently decorated with a loving sense of crimson and gold, he found himself comforted in the home of Lily and James Potter.
"Prong's? Lily?" Lupin called out, his voice sounding like an echo from where his head appeared within the flicker of flames from the fireplace of the Potter dwelling.
It wasn't long until he received a response, the sound of footsteps giving way to the answer of his calling long before he saw who. The sight of the receiver made Lupin all the more at ease when he saw the image of Lily come to greet him.
"Remus? Is that you? Is something the matter?" she asked with concern when she knelt down to meet Lupin's eye level in the fireplace.
"No, nothing of the sort, Lily," Lupin replied, a half smile gracing his aged face. "I've come with a request... A favour if you will."
The look on Lily's face was apprehensive at most once she processed her husband's friends words. "A request?"
"Mhmm, I am here to ask you if you will be so kind as to accept Harry as a guest for the night, I am afraid to report it is that time of the month that I must meet my other half so to speak," Lupin said in a somber tone of voice. "Would that be alright, Lily? I hope it isn't an inconvenience..."
"Oh no, of course not, please Remus, I'd love to have him... I want to see to be honest, has he been eating?" Lily asked slowly, a nervous nibble on the bottom of her lip showed her true worry for the boy who was not her own but as close to being it.
"He has been eating I assure you, Lily, he's as healthy as he can be at this point, perhaps a night with you and your wonderful cooking might make him even more so, thank you for taking him in for the night." Lupin said humbly.
Lily felt a pain in her stomach when the man who was considered one of her husband's best friends asked her to take in her own son, not that he was, but he was close enough and in her opinion he was what her son ought to have been. "Please, Remus don't thank me, it's what I should have done when he first came here."
With the flames of the fireplace still flickering enough to show his face, Lupin smiled a pleased looking sort of grin. "Of course, Lily, of course. I'll have Harry over in a little. Have a pleasant night."
"And you as well." Lily said, she drew away from the fireplace feeling seemingly at ease. The decision of her own to house her oddly far distant son making her feel happier than she had been in quite some time. For once her Ex-Auror husband didn't decide what was best for their family, she did.
With a light bounce to her step, Lily Potter moved through her home feeling empowered and positive with her decision, in all honesty to herself, it felt like a dream. She would have her son back, her baby boy, the one person so far in the stretch of her lifetime who she would gladly give up her own life to see well and as kind hearted as she had imagined to be.
This was to be her chance, tonight with accepting the offer presented to her by Remus she could do all that she had hoped to have done with her own son, the one who had been born from her womb with body and original soul intact. She would make due with the fact that perhaps her son wasn't the same inside as the one she had raised, but if she were to have him in anyway it didn't matter as long as she had him.
The only thing that pulled Lily from her plotting mind was her title as a parent being called in the near distance, when she turned to the voice her heart beat picked up fast as she expected it to be Harry. yet once she had turned halfway around the feminine voice registered and she knew it to be her daughter without even having to lay eyes on the young witch to know so. "Rose, what is it?"
"I can't find Scruffy, you know, the Pygmypuff Dad bought me for school?" Rose' asked as she popped out from behind the corner wall of the living room, her vibrant red hair tangled in a curly mess. "Have you seen him?"
"Have you been standing there all that time, Rose?" Lily asked, ignoring her daughters question about her recent pet of sorts. If her daughter had been there in the living room the entire time she knew the conversation she shared with Remus wouldn't be kept from James long.
"Me? Mum, must you always assume I am up to no good and sneaking around?" she asked with an expression which was probably her best impression of an innocent one.
"Yes I must, you are your father's daughter after all. As for you Pygmypuff, I haven't seen the dust ball since your father agreed to buy you it." Lily answered, her eyes watching her daughter in an all to suspicious manner.
Groaning at her mother, Rose' let her shoulders sag while her facial movements showed off her depression. "He's not a dust ball, he's my pet! Can't you accio him for me?"
"Accio doesn't work on living organisms, Dear. Perhaps if you studied what you were supposed to over the summer you would know that. Now please do go upstairs and freshen up before your father gets home for dinner, which includes combing your hair young lady!" Lily said, her voice calling out the last bit as she saw her daughter run for the closest exit.
Left alone to herself once again, Lily shook her head with the thought of her daughter, she had no idea where the girl got her cluelessness since even her husband wasn't like that, he had never misplaced things constantly or forgotten something as important as another life under his watch and care. She dare not think it, but her own daughter closely resembled those of the Longbottom family.
Sitting down into one of the few couch's laid out in the living room of her home in Godric's Hollow, she sat looking most at ease other than the fact of her eyes twitching towards the fireplace when any noise was made around her house. In her mind she wondered two thoughts, one being when her son from another land would arrive, and second being what she would say upon his arrival, in all honesty to herself she couldn't think of much other than embracing the boy and making him feel welcomed.
Though as time ticked by and the fireplace remained uneventful, Lily began to ponder if it all her far distant son would ever be coming to the home he should have been raised in. Checking the muggle wrist watch her father had given her as a graduation present from Hogwarts, she knew within a half hour of time James would be returning to their home.
Her husbands usual whereabouts since his semi-retirement never discussed, for Lily she rather didn't know what her husband was up to, be it mischief or the benefit for all good, it wasn't her responsibility to monitor his behavior in any establishment or environment, solely her responsibility in her own opinion lay in the prospect of her own children's well being.
Hearing a booming sound off in the distance, Lily turned her head over her shoulder with her eyes looking towards the direction of the living room of her family home. With a nervous step, she slowly approached the room she visited on a regular basis, this time however she felt nervous and jittery when she stepped inside the room, her eyes going to lay upon a boy who many would have considered part of the Potter family but was truly far from it in one way, he was a universe apart of differences from her and her family.
"Harry..." Lily spoke slowly, uncertain of what to say or do, she simply tried to smile. "Welcome."
"Thank you for having me," Harry replied awkwardly, he shifted his stance from foot to foot as he looked around the room he had flooed into, anything was better than looking at the woman who was his mother but wasn't at the same time.
"It's our pleasure to have you I promise you," Lily said quickly back to him, her eyes following every movement the boy made, her eyes looking to the things he looked at for a split second before watching his body motions.
Nodding his head as he couldn't think of anything else to say, Harry let his head twist to the side to look at the fireplace, inwardly hoping Lupin would arrive right then and there, yet as luck had it he was not so fortunate.
With an awkward silence filling the rooms air occupied by mother and son, not a word was spoken, not that there was much to discuss or say anyhow. Harry could feel the tension through the course of his body as he inhaled a breath of air, it almost made him choke, he didn't dare look at her or strike up a conversation.
Time ticked by slowly perhaps even slowing to a stand still as Harry waited for Remus to show, even as his palms began to sweat a little with nerves as he stood waiting for Lupin to show with his mother of sorts. However, when time seemed to come to a complete stand still the fireplace roared with green flames.
Stepping out with a brush of his shoulders from the soot that covered them, Lupin gave a lopsided smile as he looked between Lily and one of his best friends children at least a child he saw as his best friend. "Lily, you look more prettier in person than you did through the floo."
"Please, Remus, no need for compliments." Lily gushed with a smile, her eyes resting softly on Lupin's form.
"Not a compliment if it's the truth," Lupin replied kindly, his head seemed to poke around as he looked around the Potter house from where he could. "James still not home?"
"No, he's... Honestly, I'm not sure where he is Remus, but the last few times he's come home, he's been..." Lily began in reply before cutting herself short as she remembered Harry in the room. "This conversation might best be discussed in a room where certain ears aren't listening in."
Lupin didn't even have to look at Harry to acknowledge his presence in the room. Giving Lily a nod, he put a hand forward as if to say lead the way.
Returning Lupin's nod, Lily smiled and looked to her son from a distant world only to say a few passing words of 'We'll be right back.'
Left alone to the silence of what was his family's living room, Harry stood unsure of what to do in such a time as this even though his eyes began to get attracted to such things as family photo's along the wall and upon the few shelves that rested there as well, moving around the room he made to absorb it all in, this was what his life should have been if Voldemort hadn't take it from him.
Eyes passing over each photo, Harry took in everything about them, most of them being images of his counterpart of this world and his sister. Sometimes the occasional photo of his godather and parents were thrown in along with other people he recognized. All images though had one thing in common, they showed a much happier time.
After awhile when time had passed by thoroughly enough to have had Harry look at every photo of the room Lily and Remus returned with minimal surprise from the boy who had been left alone.
"I am sorry for the delay there, Harry," Lupin began with a lopsided smile, his expression looking a little wondrous mixed with worry. "I'm going to be returning back to Severus' now, so take care and be good. I'll come check on you in the morning."
"Check on me?" Harry responded quickly, his thoughts being the understanding of him returning to Snape's hovel tomorrow after the full moon.
"We'll talk tomorrow, Harry." Lupin said as if ending the conversation between them completely.
With another spoken word said to any of them, Lupin disappeared into the green flames of the fireplace in a matter of a few seconds. Now Harry had a sickly feeling there was an awkwardness to come.
"So..." Lily started in a slow manner, her words hanging on thin air as she searched for something to strike up a conversatin with her son from another place. "Shall I show you to your room?"
"Yes, thank you that would be... Brilliant." Harry answered, his tone sounding just as slow and uncomfortable as his mothers.
Giving him a slight tilt of her head, Lily headed from the living room to the stairs however sitting a few steps up awaited Rose Potter, her elbows resting on her knees with her head supported on her hands.
"Rose!" Lily exclaimed, her daughters eaves dropping something she should be used to by now but never able to get over.
"Hi Mum, and hello again, Harry." Rose responded softly, her eyes fixed solely on none other than her brother. "Are you going to be spending awhile with us?"
"It's uncertain for now, but how ever long he stays is entirely up to him, now what have I told you about listening in?" Lily asked, her voice laced with frustration.
"You aren't seriously getting cross with me over this are you mum, you two didn't even say anything interesting... Though you and Uncle Moony did exchange some interesting wor-" Rose said, she never finished her sentence as Lily stomped her foot down and ordered her to be quiet. "That is enough, Rose, thank you very much, and you didn't and shouldn't have heard that at all. Now if you will excuse yourself I am going to show Harry to his room."
Head popping up from her hands, Rose perked up with an enthusiastic smile on her impish face. "I can do it, mum. I can show him his room!"
Lily looked a little weary of the idea but deep within her she found she couldn't refuse the offer. "Okay, just his room though, Rose. I expect to see you both down here again in a few minutes."
"Why certainly mum dearest," Rose said, clambering to her feet, she waved Harry to follow after her. "Come on Harry!"
Blinking like a lost child as his sister whom he had never known existed until this reality ran up the staircase, Harry spared a glance at his mother before hurrying up the steps after her. "What's the rush?"
"Don't be a slow poke, Harry," Rose called out from up ahead.
Trying not to be pulled into the younger girls giddy happiness, Harry followed after her until she stopped outside a door at the end of the hall. Waiting for him to join her, he watched as she rocked on the heels of her feet as he neared closer to her.
"Here we are, back to your old room," Rose said happily, her hand gesturing to the closed door, yet after a moment of silence and her words sunk in, her happy expression seemed to damper a little. "Well, Harry's room..."
Scratching the back of his neck, Harry took pity and saved her from her the undesirable uncomfortableness and opened the closed door. Inside the room which awaited him was nothing like himself. It lay bear for the most part, piles of books stacked up high around the room on the floor and a twin sized bed. "He liked to read."
Smiling a little, Rose stood in the doorway of the room and looked about with a sigh. "It was the one thing he enjoyed above all else, knowledge. He loved to learn, that and get ahead. Harry, or the Harry I knew sorry was an achiever, he always made mum proud."
"I'm sure he did, your mum sounds like the type to be pleased over good grades." Harry mumbled, stepping further into the room he crouched down to look over one pile of stacked books.
"She isn't just my mum, she's your mum too, Harry. You're still family, even if you came from where ever you came from." Rose said.
"Thanks I think," Harry said, peering over his shoulder to her a few seconds before sifting through the stack of books, all of which appearing to be some link to dark magic. "Do you miss him, your Harry?"
"Yes, how can I not," Rose replied easily. "I don't like to think what he turned into, but before all the wrong things he did he was my brother one that was just as sweet and caring as any other."
"And after he went dark?" Harry asked.
"I still loved him at the same time I hated him, it isn't easy to lose someone you care about Harry." Rose answered, her hands fiddling together as she stood observing him.
Harry's fingers dug deep into the book he was flicking pages through when he heard her last words. "I know that well enough you don't have to tell me."
Seeing him tense up, Rose quickly went forward to rest a hand on his shoulder when she thought of causing some offense to him. "I didn't mean anything by it..."
"I know, trust me I know," Harry said, shrugging her hand off as he got to his feet. Closing the book in his hands he tossed it carelessly to the ground. "What do you say about getting out of this room?"
"Eager to see mum again?" Rose asked brightly, the smile on her face radiant like a rising sun.
"Honestly? Not really, she's accepting and well wonderful, but there's something off between us, and I can't blame her," Harry rambled, he headed towards the door without looking around the room anymore. "Anything is better than being here though."
"What?" Rose managed to say as Harry pushed her out of the doorway and pulled the door closed behind him.
"I'm not going to relive his past, he's not me and I don't plan on being like him in anyway," Harry said in passing to Rose as he went back in the direction the red haired girl had first lead him in to the room. "I'm going downstairs,"
Firmly planted where she stood, Rose watched as her brother, or half-brother as she was trying to see him bounded off down the hallway to the stairs. "I wasn't asking you to be him!" she called out after her him but Harry didn't hear as he was already gone from her sight.
Once on the first floor of the house that belonged to his family of sorts, Harry was at a loss, he had no intention of running into his mother again or speaking to the girl who would have been his sister in his own world. If anything, he wanted to get away from it all.
This was just to much at one time Harry thought, he couldn't handle it. The idea of his parents living was one thing hard enough to comprehend, the fact that they were holding house to him and for the most part as far as he knew accepted them was something entirely else. He didn't know how to interact with them, he wasn't who he was positive they thought he was, he wasn't taking the person they love's place, he was a different person entirely and he didn't want to change to suit their losses.
Shaking his head, Harry could see out of his perpheral vision that Rose was coming down the stairs. Not ready to face her up beat attitude, he headed from the bottom of the stairway and went to explore the rest of the Potter household, or more so anyplace in the close vacinity that didn't hold a different universal family.
Harry's luck wasn't so lucky however as he turned a matter of corners that brought him to the living room, the person who greeted him there had him frozen where he stood. Much like himself in appearance but different in a grand amount of age stood a stoned faced James Potter.
"Harry?" James asked for a moment in a soft voice before it turned cold and hard. "What is are you doing here?"
"It's... It's Professor Lupi- Remus, he's going to change tonight, he made me c-come here." Harry stammered, he swallowed a lump in his throat and instinctively took a step back.
James stood stoic still in a silence that was less than uncomfortable. "Where is your wand?"
"I have it." Harry answered simply.
"I want it, now." James responded, he didn't use an aggressive tone of voice, but more of a light tone as Harry did.
Finding it easier to obey by the rules of this world as such, Harry slowly reached into his robes to wrap his fingers around the handle of his wand until he stilled. "No."
"What?" James asked, his brows cocked up in surprise from the younger boys response.
"I'm not giving you my wand, you aren't my father which you seem to know as well as I do you aren't," Harry began with his hand holding his wand securely in his pocket. "If there is one thing I've learned since arriving here, never give up your defence. If you would excuse me now, I am going to my room."
"It isn't your's, it's my son-" James said in a reply, but again caught off guard he stood in shock as the boy before him spoke over him.
"It isn't mine, I know, but I am going to sleep there for the night. Now excuse me as I have nothing left to say to you." Harry stated. With that said, he felt a confidence in himself he hadn't felt since first arriving in this world, brushing past the man that was his father he headed up to his room with oddly enough a smile on his face.
A/N: Hello, sorry it's been more than a really long time with this update but I have been busy with many different thing's and I apologize, for those who are still following my story I hope you like the new chapter. And for those who have just come to find my story, I hope you like it as well. For the next chapter, beware there is a spoiler alert here now so look away if you don't want to know who and what surrounds the next coming chapter... Here it comes! It will be based on the side opposite of Harry, in specific think Black. That's all. Not much of a spoiler? Well for those who read this note, thank you and I don't care to divulge to much into my story.