Disclaimer: I don't own it.

A/N: Ok, so here's my premise - Harry has already destroyed the locket, so there's no reason to steal it off Umbridge at the Ministry. Also, he knows Snape isn't a traitor; therefore, Grimmauld Place is never burned as a safe house. Lastly, since they aren't carrying around an evil horcrux and have a little more support, Ron didn't have a reason to leave Harry and Hermione.

Just after Christmas Day, Harry stood dejectedly inside a heavily warded grove within a forest somewhere within England, he wasn't even sure where he was at this point. A deceptively small tent was behind him and an equally dejected Hermione Granger and a limping Ron Weasley emerged from it. Hermione wrapped her arms around Harry's shoulders as he breathed in a sharp breath of pain. "Sorry," Hermione said, but didn't pull away.

Harry touched his split lip with a wince as Hermione took in his black eye. "I'm fine 'Mione. How are you and Ron?"

Hermione pulled back as he inspected the small cuts and bruises on his friend. Ron just waved him off as he came over. "It looks worse than it is, I'm sure, mate," Ron tried to laugh, but only succeeded in a dark chuckle and a glare to his still bleeding leg.

"Do we still have any Dittany, 'Mione?" Harry asked as he knelt to take in Ron's leg, who was now heavily leaning on Hermione's shoulder.

"No, we ran out after taking care of Ron's shoulder when I splinched him," she sighed as she lowered her boyfriend to the ground instead of holding him up. "I'm sorry."

Harry scoffed. "You have nothing to apologize for! If it wasn't for you even thinking to bring it, we'd have been lost well before now. And, if you think you're apologizing for splinching Ron, then I would like to remind you, we'd all be dead if you hadn't apparated us out of there."

"It's just disheartening that we've only succeeded in staying alive. We haven't actually done anything," Hermione now ran her fingers through Ron's hair that definitely needed a cut soon. "Plus, we lost the fang. How're we supposed to take out the last horcrux if we do manage to find it."

"Don't forget that you're now missing a wand as well, mate," Ron added on to the pity-party.

They had been wondering around the forests and hiding from snatchers for months. Since they had left the Burrow in August, the trio had succeeded in finding and rescuing several of their classmates and muggleborns who were on the run to safety at Grimmauld Place, which had been set up as a safe house with a much healthier Kreature and Andromeda Tonks's husband Ted in charge of running things there. The trio refused to stay as they continued to find those who needed to be ushered to safety, and they wanted to keep looking for the last horcrux (besides Nagini).

Harry looked lost out into the woods. "We've gotten a lot of people to safety; I wouldn't call that nothing. However, I know how you're feeling. I wish we could end all this," he said sadly. "I think it's time to get some help."

"From who?" Hermione agreed, but everyone they knew who could help was either in hiding or at Hogwarts, which was under control of the Carrows. They didn't even have a means to get a message to anyone as Hedwig hadn't survived Harry's escape from Privet Drive and Pig had been left at Grimmauld Place for emergencies.

Harry pulled a small whistle out of his pocket. "There's something I haven't been very straightforward about with the two of you," Harry nervously played with the whistle in his hands. "It was for a good reason, but I still hope you can forgive me. I just don't know how you're going to take it."

"I think we've been through enough together at this point for us to go on a little faith," Ron said, struggling to stand. "I know we've all had our arguments and shouting matches since we've been cooped up together, but after fighting off Death Eaters, Snatchers, and that bloody huge snake yesterday, I don't think anything you tell us will break apart this family. If you haven't figured it out in the last seven years, we're in this together, to the end."

Harry and Hermione both looked at Ron like he'd grown a second head. "What?" He looked at them confused.

"That's just, probably the most mature thing I've ever heard you say," Hermione said, quickly kissing Ron solidly on the mouth.

After a very awkward few moments, Harry cleared his throat to remind them of his presence. "Well, I can actually get in touch with Dis, that's what I was going to tell you. You're not going to like how though."

Hermione finally pulled away from Ron with a smile on her face. "Oh, Harry! A DADA professor could at least get us some more Dittany if not help with getting you a new wand. You should have mentioned this earlier!"

"Yeah, well, I've been sending him messages since we went on the run, but this is the first time I think we actually need him to come to us, and I don't think you all will like my messenger."

"Hey, if he brings food with him, I'll kiss your creepy Professor Osiris and the messenger on the mouth," Ron laughed, but was surprisingly serious about it. Hermione and Harry both punched him in the arms. "Hey, injured here!"

"At least he's back to normal," Harry nervously looked at the whistle and his two friends. "Well, here goes nothing. Please don't freak out."

Harry blew the dog whistle to the confusion of his two friends who looked around them. "Nothing can find us in these wards," Hermione reminded him.

"Just wait…" Harry said as he saw a cloud of dark smoke appear just at the tree line.

A large, shaggy, black dog the size of a mastiff looked around catching sight of Harry. "Sirius?" Hermione gasped in shock as the dog let out a happy bark and started gamboling over to them.

"NOT Sirius!" Ron exclaimed as he pushed Hermione behind him. He had just caught sight of the dog's eyes. Instead of eyes, the dog had burning flames illuminating dark caverns. "That's a real grim!"

"And, that's why I said not to freak out," Harry rolled his eyes at them and started scratching the grim under its chin. To Ron and Hermione's surprise, the grim flopped over and presented its belly for Harry to start scratching. "Guys, meet Phobos. He's just a big softy, yes you are," Harry said with some definite hints of baby talk.

"Phobos? Fear? You have a grim named Fear…as a pet?" Hermione squeaked, but she and Ron did stop slowly backing towards the tent. They didn't move forward any though.

"You hear that, you're terrifying. The scariest pup in the whole world," Harry said in full baby talk mode as he kept scratching the belly as Phobos's back paw started kicking.

"Um, mate, you know you're baby-talking a grim, right? We just need to check," Ron said as if talking to someone who'd completely lost their mind.

"Yeah, Ron, I haven't gone mental," Harry stood as the grim whined for him to continue.

"And, how is a grim going to carry a message for you?" Hermione asked, now actually coming out from behind Ron even as he shot her a warning look.

"Like this," Harry laid his hand on the grim's head and looked into his fiery eyes. "Hey, boy, tell your master that we need help. We've lost the basilisk fang and my wand was broken when we were attacked by Nagini in Godric's Hollow. We're fine, but we need another way to destroy a horcrux, and I would really like another wand."

"Food too!" Ron bravely added.

"Yes, and we would really like some food if that's possible," Harry patted Phobos's head one more time. "Thanks boy!" The grim immediately disappeared into a dark cloud.

"According to legend, the grim's master would be death itself," Hermione contemplated from behind Harry. Harry raised an eyebrow at her seeming to tell her to continue her line of reasoning. "And, Dis is the name of the Roman underworld, and they called Death Dis Pater."

"Uh huh, and Osiris is the Egyptian god of the underworld, figure that," Harry said with a smile and a shrug as settled himself on the ground to wait the return of his grim.

"Harry…" Hermione began with a look towards Ron and nervousness in her voice. "Are you dating Death?"

"More like engaged," Harry corrected as he pulled the necklace with the bonding ring of hallows out from under his shirt. "You have to admit, of our DADA professors, he was the least murderous. So…point in his favor?"

"Er, and how long have you been on speaking terms with Death?" Ron said with a look that spoke of him trying to decide between fight or flight.

"Since old Voldy killed me the first time," Harry smiled at him reassuringly. Before he could continue, the grim reappeared in front of Harry, holding a rolled-up piece of parchment in its mouth this time.

Harry read it quickly and then passed it to his friends as he scratched behind Phobos's ears. "You're such a good boy, yes, you are!"

Hermione unrolled the parchment so that she and Ron could read it:

Harry, Love,

You can't just say you were attacked and leave it at that! What happened?! You know I don't actually believe you're ok! How bad is it?

Never mind, I'm on my way. Give me about an hour. I need to round up something you can use to destroy a horcrux. I have an idea, but it'll necessitate me tracking down an old git (I know ha, ha no one is old compared to me).

If you are currently knocking on my door, proverbially speaking, from your injuries send Phobos back, and I'll forget it and hurry faster. If you die again, I swear I'll make you put on that bonding ring whether you've destroyed that abomination's horcruxes yet or not!

Miss you!

Love,

Dis

"Erm, what does he mean 'if you die again?'" Hermione asked after she read the letter about three times.

Harry shrugged, "It's just a thing I do. No worries. Now, Phobos," He said addressing the dog. "You tell Fluffy to be good, and I'll see you soon, ok?"

The grim barked an eerily echoing bark and disappeared in the dark cloud once again. "I have too many questions," Ron said, sinking to the ground beside Harry and stretching out his injured leg with a wince. "I'm too hungry to process all of this," he waved his hand up and down in front of Harry.

So, the next hour had Harry explaining his relationship with Death as best as he could while his friends kept asking over and over again if he, Harry, actually was alive or not. "For the final time, yes! I'm alive!" Harry huffed as he finished telling how Sirius and Death plotted for Dis to follow him to Hogwarts in sixth year to keep him safe from the DADA professors.

"And…he has tea with your parents?" Hermione asked, for the third time.

Harry rubbed his scar out of habit. "Yes, my parents, Sirius, and Cedric have a standing tea date with him."

"Not Dumbledore?"

"No, I'm pretty sure my mum's tormenting him right now in some form or fashion and Dis plans to have a go when she's done," Harry said nonchalantly. "They really aren't happy with him for putting me with the Dursleys and not keeping me safe and all."

Ron shivered, not wanting to know what Death tormenting you would be like. He screamed like a little girl (not that he would ever admit it) when another dark cloud appeared in front of them.

Death had a grip on the arm of none other than Severus Snape who collapsed on the ground as soon as Death let go. "Are you ok, Professor?" Harry asked rushing over as Snape looked to be having a panic attack.

"I'm…fine," he breathed out in gasps, trying to slow down his heart.

"And, that's the normal reaction to people shifting with me," Death explained to Harry as he pulled him into a hug followed by a long kiss.

"Never again," Snape said from the ground as he finally started breathing normally. "I'd say 'over my dead body' but you might take that literally."

Death laughed. "Yeah, one day, we will do that again over your dead body."

"You know he's evil, right?" Ron asked in a deadpan pointing to Snape. After a grim and Death himself, Ron was a little numb to everything going on, so he couldn't bring himself to really get up the right amount of reaction to the Death Eater recovering from a panic attack in front of him.

"Nah, he worked it out with Dumbledore ahead of time, who was already dying by the way," Harry said, finally coming up for air.

Death waved his hands over Harry's face and it was immediately healed. "Please look at Ron's leg and shoulder too," Harry said, giving Death a peck on the lips in thanks.

"What happened?" Death asked as he slowly approached Ron who looked like he might try to run away, injured leg and all.

"We went to Godric's Hollow and ran into Bathilda Bagshot, only it was Nagini in disguise. She tried to eat us, but Hermione apparated us out just in time. We used all our Dittany on Ron's shoulder because he got slightly splinched in the escape. My wand got broken in the struggle, and the pocket the basilisk fang was in got ripped, so we lost it too," Harry explained as Death finally was able to get hold of Ron's leg and start healing it.

"Ms. Granger, are you injured?" Death asked Hermione.

Hermione looked at him uncomfortably. "I'm fine, just a couple scrapes. Nothing bad."

"If you are sure," he said, striding back to Harry who he put his arm around the waist of.

Snape cleared his throat. "Yes, and that's why I'm here," he said as he pulled something that looked like a silver toothpick out of his pocket. He enlarged it to Gryffindor's sword. "Osiris insured me this would destroy a horcrux," he said, handing the sword to Harry.

"Thanks professor," Harry said experimentally slashing the sword a few times.

"And," Snape said, holding a wand out to him. "This is my back-up wand. It won't serve you as well as your original, but hopefully it will help you until you can get one better."

Harry tried a quick Lumos spell, and it lit the wand, but disappointingly not as well as his normal wand. "It'll do for now. Thank you, Professor," he nodded to Snape.

"Um…didn't we ask for some food?" Ron said out of the corner of his mouth to Harry.

Death laughed, hearing Ron's stage whisper. "Let's go inside your tent, and I'll summon some from the Hogwarts kitchens. Distance means less to my spells than it does to yours."

After they were all sitting comfortably at the enlarged table in the trio's tent, Death summoned a large meal from the Hogwarts kitchens. Without a second thought, Ron dug into a piece of chicken.

"Thank you, Professor, for the sword and wand, but may I ask, why did you come?" Harry asked Snape as he filled a plate with mashed potatoes. "You could have just sent the items with Dis."

"Now that I know what traveling with him is like, I guarantee you, I will not make that mistake again," Snape grimaced in a dark tone. "I do have news for you as well though."

"So…Snape is a spy for us now?" Ron asked between bites.

Snape rolled his eyes but couldn't really disagree with him. "Before, I tell you, I want you, Osiris, to guarantee me you will tell her that I helped Harry."

"It depends on how useful the information is," Death said, leaning back and glaring at Snape.

Harry sighed and put his hand over Death's mouth. "Quiet you," he warned. "Don't listen to him, of course he'll tell mum you helped us. He's just being grumpy because I won't invite him over for any 'extracurricular' activities since I'm sleeping in the same room as Ron and Hermione."

"That's what silencing charms were invented for," Death said, pulling Harry's hand away from his mouth.

"Oh, please no!" Ron exclaimed with a shudder as both Snape and Hermione sputtered into their tea.

"Anyway," Harry said pointedly at Ron and Death. "What do you have to tell us, Professor?"

Snape wiped the tea from the table in front of him. "I figured if the Dark Lord were to hide something, it would either be with Lucius or Bellatrix. Since we all know what happened with the diary, I decided to give Bellatrix a go and cornered her after the last meeting to break into her mind and then obliviate her," Snape shuddered like Ron had moments before. "Which, by the way, necessitated me taking three showers to even remotely recover from her insanity."

"Understandable," Ron nodded sympathetically, probably the first time he had ever looked sympathetically at Snape before.

"Well…she has something in her Gringotts vault. I think it might be Hufflepuff's cup, but I'm not sure. The Dark Lord gave it to her to keep safe," Snape told them. "It may be what you are looking for."

Harry groaned. "Between, Nagini, the main soul-piece, and Gringotts, I'm thinking Gringotts might be the most difficult one to get."

"Yeah, you can't just stand out in the open and say come get me to a bank," Ron laughed.

"Which you will not be doing," Death glared at Ron who nervously cleared his throat before going back to his peas.

"Well, what do you plan to do to get into a secure vault at the most secure wizarding bank in the world?" Snape asked with a raised eyebrow as he poured himself more tea.

"We could polyjuice ourselves to look like Bellatrix," Hermione suggested. "We might need to break into Malfoy Manor to get a hair though."

"Why don't I just ask for it?" Death suggested while looking at Hermione like she'd gone crazy.

"The goblins will never turn over something that has been entrusted to them," Snape snorted.

"Even if it doesn't belong to the vault's owner but does belong to me?"

Snape looked at him confused. "It belongs to you?"

"It's a piece of a soul not in a body. I think that constitutes belonging to me," Death said thoughtfully. "Besides, who's going to say no to Death when he asks for something?"

"The goblins are pretty strict," Harry said doubtfully.

"Harry, Love, your friends are scared of me, and I'm doing my absolute best to project calm and happiness. What do you think the response would be if I actually try to act scary? Huh?"

"He's got a point, mate," Ron interjected. "I'd do anything he asks, and apparently he isn't trying."

"You said you'd kiss him if he brought food, so I don't think you count," Harry scoffed.

"Is that so?" Death asked with a mischievous grin.

"It was a joke!" Ron squeaked and looked for a place to hide.

"It would be worth a try," Snape reluctantly agreed with Death and blatantly ignored Ron. "What about Nagini and the Dark Lord though?"

"We need to get them together in the same place. Maybe at one of the meetings?" Harry asked Snape.

The potions master shook his head. "The Dark Lord has been obsessed with finding some wand. He kidnapped Ollivander to get information about it. We haven't been having as many meetings while he's on his search."

"What do you know about the wand?" Death asked, with a glance over at Harry.

"Not much," Snape shrugged. "I think he mentioned it was made of elder wood at some point."

"The Elder Wand?" Ron asked. "Like in the fairy tale?"

"Like the Three Brothers?" Hermione looked at him confused.

"Yeah, The Tales of Beadle the Bard," Harry answered to Ron's surprise.

"The muggles have those too?"

"No, Dis showed me the story," Harry said touching the ring under his shirt.

"That was the book Dumbledore willed to me," Hermione added. She then went on to tell the story of the three brothers to Snape who wasn't familiar with the children's story.

"So, the Dark Lord is after a fairy tale?" Snape obviously disagreed with their theory.

"Only, it's not a fairy tale, or at least the items aren't," Death explained. "Unlike the story, the Peverell brothers did me a great service long ago. There was a bit of very dark magic that was honestly worse than the horcruxes, and they helped me get rid of it. I asked Fate what I could do to repay them and cancel my debt. She instructed me to make the hallows and give them to the brothers. I was told they would return to me again one day, when their true owner was found."

Harry pulled the ring from under his shirt. "These are the Deathly Hallows," Harry showed them. "They're combined into my bonding ring."

"Harry is the true owner," Death kissed the side of Harry's head.

"I'm having a really hard time grasping that you are actually Death, mate," Ron said rubbing his neck. "It's just so…out there. That you made the hallows, that you're some sort of immortal being, and that you graded my essays all last year. And then, I have to process that you're with my best friend on top of all that."

Death shrugged. "I don't know what to tell you. Most people don't meet me until they're already dead, so I don't have much experience with live people knowing who I am, well, besides Harry."

"It helps that I've known him almost my whole life," Harry said. "Just think of him as the eccentric DADA professor if that helps."

"Ok," Ron sighed and shook his head, seeming to physically shake a new kind of thinking into his mind. "So, Harry has the wand?" Ron asked in awe. "Why did we need Snape to bring you a wand then?"

"When Harry puts the ring on and has access to all the hallows, he will no longer be a part of this world," Death explained. "He may come and go, but he will cease to be a resident of this realm. So, I've instructed him to only put on the ring when he is absolutely certain he is ready."

"And, he keeps telling me I'm not ready," Harry added with a narrowed eye towards Death. "Even though I disagree."

"So, we pick a place and we get the word to You-Know-Who that the wand is there. Then we just need a plan that takes advantage of our element of surprise," Hermione planned.

"That sounds like a good idea, Ms. Granger," Snape agreed, looking very surprised. "Who had the wand before Harry? That might help with location."

"Dumbledore," Harry said simply. "We are not letting Old Moldy anywhere near Hogwarts though."

"Agreed," Snape said quickly. "Let me give it some thought. How can I communicate with you all?"

"I could send Phobos once we get the cup, and you could send anything you've thought of back with him," Harry said appreciatively.

"I assume Phobos is an owl?" Snape asked, already knowing it probably wasn't with all the crazy that was Harry Potter.

"It's a bloody grim," Ron grumbled.

"He likes his belly scratched though," Hermione laughed.

Snape stood to walk out of the tent. "I will under no circumstances scratch a grim's belly. However, I'll try not to die of a stroke if one shows up bearing a letter," He said with a sneer. "Now, if you will excuse me, I must return to the school and will certainly be apparating myself there."

After Snape left, Harry pulled over a large slice of cheesecake and smiled. "So, Gringotts tomorrow?"

"Can I stay the night?" Death asked with a smile.

"Oi, no funny business," Ron waved the bone to his chicken leg threateningly.

"Of course not," Death said, but wiggled his eyebrows suggestively at Harry who chuckled.

Ron looked off into the dark of the tent. "Hey, Harry, what if the goblins refuse tomorrow? Do we have a back-up plan?...Harry?...Harry?" Ron turned over and waited, listening for any sound.

"Oh, bloody Hell, Hermione! They've put up a silencing charm!"

"Shhh, go to sleep, Ron," Hermione called soothingly from her cot.

Up next: Death visits the bank.