Disclaimer: I own neither Harry Potter nor The Dresden Files.

Of Wands and Staves

Chapter Twenty-Four

Had it not been for the doctors he'd called in, John would likely be panicking. And… there was a chance that even with the doctors he'd called, he was still panicking.

Harry hadn't woken up since Leanansidhe had left the mansion. That first night he'd been still and silent, and had remained so for the rest of the week after. John had called in the first doctor when Harry didn't wake up after a day, and he'd been assured that the boy was just exhausted. Each doctor he'd called after had agreed with the first doctor's diagnosis, but John couldn't quite stop himself from calling them.

His hand was on the phone to call the next on his list when Harry's hand covered his. "He's fine, John. Kid's just getting the sleep he wasn't able to while he was getting those awful dreams."

John took a deep breath and let it hiss out through his teeth. "It's been a week. I think that I'm entitled to be a little nervous."

Harry shrugged and tugged him into a loose hug. "Those visions would have really taken it out of him magically speaking, too. It could be that he's trying to recharge both physical and magical batteries. He's fine."

"But…" John closed his eyes and let himself go limp in Harry's hold. "You're right," he said tiredly. "I just can't stop worrying about him. We… we almost…"

They'd almost lost him. He couldn't even say the words out loud. But if Bob hadn't looked into his head, if Harry hadn't thought to call his godmother, they could have lost him. No. There was no could have about it. They would have. He hadn't been able to help his son. And that was... difficult, he supposed, for him to face.

"We did. But he's fine, John. Or he will be. We saved him."

"You saved him," John blurted, then winced. He hadn't really meant to say that.

Harry's arms tightened around him. "I'm just going to pretend like I didn't hear you say that," he murmured into John's hair, his breath stirring the strands. "Maybe you couldn't help him this time, but who rescued him in the first place? Who made sure that those wand-waving idiots let us keep him? Who got on a plane in the middle of the night just because his son asked to come home?"

John took another deep breath and forced himself to relax. "You're right, of course. I'm just… we almost lost him, Harry, and it might take me a while to recover from that."

"We didn't lose him. He'll be fine. And you take as long as you need to recover." John could feel Harry's hesitance when he added, "Maybe you should think about seeing Harry's therapist for a few sessions yourself."

John drew back from him far enough to look at him skeptically. "Do you really think that I need that?" he asked.

"I think…" Harry stopped. "I think that if you were serious about feeling guilty because there was nothing you could do for Harry in this one particular instance then yes. I was serious."

"It… might not be a bad idea," John muttered. He didn't like the idea of therapy, but he liked the idea of resenting Harry for being able to help their son even less. Not that he resented Harry. Because he didn't. But maybe it wouldn't hurt to talk to someone about it.

"Hey, you two. If you're done canoodling, Sirius said that Harry's awake!" Molly flung a pillow from the couch at both of them and then scampered back out of the way before they could retaliate.

Fortunately for her, John was too relieved when he heard the news to retaliate, and Harry had his hands full with his arms still around John.

"She is such a brat," Harry muttered, but it was fond. "You ready to go see your kid? And, you know, not get guilt all over him because you're feeling inadequate?"

John took a deep breath. "Let's go see our kid, then." He drew away and forced a smile on his face, and by the time he was tapping on Harry's door and slipping into the room, the smile almost felt genuine. His son was alive, and that was what mattered.

Everything else would be just fine. Eventually.

ooOOooOOoo

Without the horcrux inside of him to show him terrible things of the wizarding world he'd left behind, Harry worked on recovering. He began a regime of rather intensive therapy, seeing his therapist every other day for the following two weeks. They discussed the visions he'd had and his feelings of guilt over not being there to help the people he saw being murdered.

It took a lot of work, but Harry's therapist eventually did convince him that there was nothing he could have done. That he was a child, and that it wasn't his job to deal with the monster who haunted his nightmares even still. By the time school started up again, Harry almost believed her. Almost.

By the end of the year, he really did agree with her and focused his attention on being a normal kid. It was… more liberating than he'd ever imagined, actually, to know that something wasn't going to try and kill him at the end of the school year. Once he realized that, time began to fly. Harry mastered the magics that his Uncle Harry taught him and learned more traditional subjects at school. Before he knew it, he was sixteen and was nearing the end of his junior year in high school, and he had a monster of an entirely different sort to slay.

"So, Molly," Harry began nervously. She was nineteen, now, and was probably more beautiful than ever. Her hair was a vibrant shade of green streaked with blue this week, and she'd just gotten a new piercing in her eyebrow.

"So, Squirt," Harry's fellow apprentice answered, kicking her heels up over the arm of the chair she was lounging in. She had a magazine in her hand and was idly thumbing through it. She was a study in teenage boredom.

Harry thought that was just entirely unfair. How could she be so bored when he was so nervous? That just wasn't nice. "I was wondering..." He paused, then, and considered the ground just in front of his shoes for a minute. Really, they needed some new carpeting out here. He could still see the singe marks from when he and Molly had accidentally on purpose blown up the table when he was ten and she'd been thirteen. It was an ugly table, and it had needed to die. But really they hadn't been trying to blow anything up. That was Harry's story, anyway, and he was sticking to it.

"You were wondering... if you'd finally decided that you were going to man up and tell John that you know exactly what he's doing when he has Lara and Thomas Raith over for dinner?" Molly hazarded. She let the magazine flop onto her chest and stared at Harry with a raised eyebrow. "Ooh! Or were you wondering whether or not he and Harry actually do get into trouble when Lara stays later than Thomas? Because she's really hot. I think they do."

Harry groaned and covered his eyes. "You suck," he informed her through his fingers. "They're my parents, and they never have sex. And they definitely never have sex with a White Court vampire."

"Really? Because she's over often enough that I would think that they totally did," Molly shot back.

Harry grinned, dropped his hands, and said sweetly, "They tried. They both burn her too much to actually do anything fun with her."

"Gah!" Molly shrieked, and cackled like the mad fiend that she was. "You suck! You brat, now I have to look them in the eyes with that knowledge!"

Once she'd stopped laughing and picked up her magazine once more, Harry blurted out, "Iwaswonderingifyouwouldgotopromwithme," as quickly as he could.

Molly's eyebrows raised. "You're gonna have to slow it down, squirt, because I only heard about one in three of the words there. And I know you didn't just ask me to go get rum for you. I'm as underaged as you are for that."

Harry sighed. She'd heard him. He knew she had. She was just being an evil and wicked she-devil. He hated women. "I was wondering," he said much more slowly and through gritted teeth, "if you would go to prom with me."

Molly's magazine dropped. "Wait, seriously?" she asked, her eyebrows raised over startled wide eyes. "Harry, I didn't even go to my own prom! Also, aren't I a little old for that?"

"Yeah, well, I'd really like it if you came to mine," Harry answered with an awkward shrug. "With me. As a date. Just to be clear, here, so that there's no misunderstanding."

"And the fact that I'm too old to be going to a high school prom?" she asked, her eyebrows still up.

Harry flushed and fidgeted. "You won't be the oldest one there!" he blurted. "One of the guys on the soccer team is bringing his girlfriend, who's like, twenty-one. Or something. She buys alcohol for the parties we have that I definitely never drink. Ever. Oh god please don't tell my father."

Molly stared at him in silence for several moments, and Harry fought the urge to squirm about like a fish stuck on a hook. She already knew her answer, of course. She was just making him uncomfortable. More evidence to go into his she-devil folder, not that she knew it.

"Would you just say no already?" he finally blurted out, then winced and studied the carpet once more. Seriously, like half the fibers were burnt away. Someone should seriously replace that.

"Why would I do that? I like watching you squirm," she said cheerfully. He heard her moving, and didn't dare look up until he felt her hand on his cheek, tilting his head up. She looked him dead in the eyes, leaned down, and pressed a chaste kiss to his lips. As she pulled away she murmured to him, "Your dad is totally buying my dress." And then she left the room.

Harry stared, dazed, for a few minutes after her. When his brain finally caught up he called after her, "So that's a yes, right?"

Molly only laughed.

ooOOooOOoo

Gentleman Johnny Marcone had one of the most feared names in Chicago. He was a murderer at the worst of times, and a friend to most of the politicians in the city at the best. He'd killed monsters, allied with other monsters, and driven countless criminals to their knees with remorse. He was also a father, and as such, he was definitely not crying as they watched the limo with Molly and Harry disappear down the driveway.

"Allergies acting up a bit there?" Harry asked him, an arm slung around his shoulders. The taller wizard wasn't crying at all, but was instead grinning at John.

"Allergies? I thought that maybe a bug had flown into his eye," Sirius shot to Harry, and when John glared at the other wizard he was grinning just as much as Harry was.

They were both bastards. "I hate you both," John said conversationally. "Don't think for a moment that I'd hesitate to take a hit out on either of you." His voice was just a little bit choked, but clearly that was with rage over their mocking him. Clearly.

"You wouldn't do that. You'd make Harry cry, and you wouldn't want that." Sirius waited a beat and added, "He'd cry just like you're doing right now."

Harry snickered. "Not that there's anything wrong with a big bad mob boss bawling like a baby at the thought of sending his only child off to his junior prom."

"So much hatred right now for both of you," John muttered, and ducked away from Harry's hold. The wizard stumbled a bit, startled at the sudden loss of support, and John smirked at him. "Oops."

"That was mean, John," Harry grumbled.

"So was mocking me for my tears," John said sweetly.

Sirius was chuckling softly, but he fell silent when John sent a glower in his direction. "Sorry, sorry," the man said, and raised his hands appeasingly. "I understand. I'll probably cry myself to sleep like a little girl tonight, just like you were just now."

John growled at him, and Sirius let out a bark-like laugh and took off running, turning into Padfoot mid-stride. Mouse took off after him, barking joyfully, and John sighed.

"I'm surrounded by children," he said wearily to Harry.

"You know you love us," Harry answered cheerfully. "Now c'mon, we've got quite a few hours until Harry brings Molly home for the night. Or should that be until Molly brings Harry home for the night?" And then, as John was heading into the house, Harry added, "Do you think that they'll follow the time-honored tradition of losing their-"

"They will not," John said severely, and stormed into the house. He heard Harry follow him and called over his shoulder, "I'm going to go and do some work in my office. Don't follow me. I might accidentally shoot you if you do."

Harry's laughter followed him into the office, where he froze. There was a familiar old man sitting patiently behind his desk in lurid blue robes with bright lemon colored moons on them.

"Hello, Dumbledore," John said with a cordiality he didn't feel.

A/N: Just one chapter plus an epilogue left. I'm gonna miss this story.