Summary:

WORLDBUILDING times a thousand. Just a lot of worldbuilding tbh. And just a LITTLE nugget of a hint there in the middle. Plus the beginnings of a plot at the very end. We are slow, but we are steady. Not BETA'd. Who do you think I am?

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Summer at Grimmauld place was turning out to be the best month of Harriet's life. Despite the looming date of her ministry hearing hanging over her head, and a separate hearing for her godfather that seemed to hang over the entire manor; spirits were high, and fun was to be had at every corner.

Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had kept the children busy in between order meetings by assigning them jobs around the house. Harriet and Ginny were responsible for clearing out the atrium. It had been used as a stable for Buckbeak since March and now that he had once again returned to Hagrid under the guise of a new identification, the room needed washing from the floor to the ceiling. The girls would work up a sweat only to open the high windows and hang their waist out the frames catching the summer breeze.

Ron, Hermione, and the twins were removing Willow Mites from the furniture. Going room to room with potions Professor Snape had reluctantly donated to the cause, poured into spray bottles. The twins would beat the couch with one of Charlie's old racing brooms and when the Mites flew up in the air it was Hermione's job to spray them drunk. Once the fumes affected their fight or flight, it was Ron who would then catch them by the hand and deposit them safely into the bin bag.

There was work to be done, yet.

Sirius had explained to the group that there would be dark artifacts scattered amongst the house. His family having an affinity for the arts, and enough gold to support it had become collectors of sorts when it came to cursed objects. To Harriet, some of the oddities would almost glow with a hue of wretched magic around them. A set of silverware that would cut anyone attempting to move them in their display cabinet. Volumes of novels in the library that seemed to come straight out of the restricted section of Hogwarts. A music box that when opened played a sinister lullaby, cursing the air of the room into a slow slumber, until Fred had the good sense to reach up and slam the lid.

After finding a handful of strange objects of his own, Arthur had assigned the children jobs himself. Placing Harriet and Ginny in the atrium which had previously been cleaned out for the Hipogriff's occupancy by Remus. Hari wondered if Arthur was thinking back to a diary, two years ago that had destroyed his daughter's life and very nearly taken Harriet with it. Perhaps they were given the easy job because they were the least trusted around items that could think for themselves.

Kreacher was a hindrance.

The house-elf reminded Harriet a bit of an old man's ball-sack, which she had become accustomed to seeing when her Aunt Marge and the Colonel would come to visit in the summers. Colonel Fubuster had no children, only dogs; which convinced him it was perfectly fine to walk about the house stark naked in the mornings or while performing his before bed routine at night. Dudley and Harriet had been on the receiving end of many a flash in the morning light. Uncle Vernon, never the confrontational man when it came to someone bigger and louder, had told Dudley it wasn't as if he was seeing anything he couldn't see if he were to look in a mirror. And as for Harriet? Well, she ought to plan her mornings better around the houseguests.

Aside from flashbacks of the Colonel, Kreacher was a bit horrid all on his own. Hermione had banned Hari and Ron from being unkind to him. Stating that this was HIS house and they were the unwanted intruders. "How would you feel?" She asked, "how would you feel if you had all these strangers in your home trying to get rid of all your things?" The house-elf had quickly replied with a comment about how brazen this mudblood girl must be to think she could speak for him.

Kreacher flitted from room to room fretting and weeping over dust bunnies, and dead rats. He would throw insults at any and everyone with a lesser status than the Noble Blacks. Harriet was convinced he must have some special powers, must know their blood by the look in their eyes.

"Ahhh the Potter child," Kreacher had greeted Harriet on her first night in the Manor. "She is not as extraordinary by sight as they seem to make her by word of mouth."

"Well excuse me, I apologize for not living up to your expectations," Harriet replied sarcastically. Sirius and Remus overhearing the pair, laughed from their seats in the lounge.

"Don't mind him!" Her godfather called, "he's like a weed. The more attention you give the less likely he'll die off."

At Hermione's shocked expression, Harriet shrugged a kindness. "Well. I don't suppose I want that to happen. I should try to be a bit more extraordinary the next time we pass in the halls."

"The Potter child speaks as if she is well-bred, like her father." Kreacher continued his narrations into the air. "But she has the stench of her mongrel mother's bad blood."

"Fuck, off!" Sirius yelled, jumping up from his seat and rushing into the room. "You don't speak to her, you sodded vermin. Go!" He withdrew his wand as if he were going to curse the elf, only for Kreacher to snap his fingers and disappear from the room. Hermione let out a breath she seemed to have been holding since the conversation began.

Since their greeting Harriet had tried to avoid the elf at all costs. It was not necessarily that she was wary of him, she only worried for Hermione's sanity and her godfather's temper.

"I don't understand her," Ron commented days later after Hermione had broken down over the house elf. Kreacher was seen throughout the house walking into mirrors, talking to the walls. It was very clear he had suffered insanity in his years of isolation. Hermione, ever the tender heart out of her friends had become wholly emotional any time they caught Kreacher coping with himself in his own head. "She's mad about these bloody elves. I've tried to tell her what it's like. They WANT to serve the houses. All pureblood families have them. Bet your dad did, Hari. Bet they treated theirs a bit better than some I suppose but still."

Ron was from one of the oldest pureblood families in wizard Britain. Part of the Sacred 28, on both sides of his heritage. They were considered "Blood Traitors" during the early days of the war because of Arthur's position in the opposition.

Before, Molly and Arthur had been well off.

Molly's brothers, Gideon and Fabian were consummates of the Prewett estate and Arthur himself was Viscount of the Weasley Vault at Gringotts bank. In the early days of Bill and Charlie's childhood, they were just as spoiled and primped as any pureblood child ought to be.

However once the war began, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley lost their social status. The couple was loud in their oppositions of blood purity and superior races. Arthur used his position at the ministry to open doors for The Order of the Phoenix. He believed that silence was just as damning an injustice as joining the Death Eaters himself and that his status as the head of a pureblood family would open the gate for other pureblood witches and wizards to oppose Voldemort and his ideals. Their money, their social standing; it all meant nothing to Molly and Arthur if it meant their children would grow up in a world accepting of injustices.

And nothing it became.

By the time the twins came along, the family's scaricity was steadily declining. Molly's brothers were killed on a mission for The Order. Their Estate, turned over to the Ministry, Molly had been deemed forfeitable due to "illegal proclivities" during the war. Shortly after, Arthur was stripped of his title to the Weasley vault at Gringotts, the money remaining idle and untouchable. It was claimed he was in breach of contract held in the family will. The family seat in the Wizengamot had remained empty on both sides. The Ministry had successfully cut the Weasleys off, making an example of them for any pureblood families in the future that thought they might put their status to the side to fight in the resistance.

Now, the Weasleys were dirt poor. They lived in a small home in Ottery St. Catchpole. They grew and slaughtered most of their food and passed hand-me-down school items from one child to the other. Ron had never known anything but what it meant to struggle. When Harriet asked her about it over a late-night tea in the Black family kitchens, Molly had laughed. Told the story as if it were a Fairytale with a sad ending and smiled down at her lovingly. Did she regret it, Harriet had asked.

"Regret it," Molly laughed sharply. "Do I regret standing up for the same things my brothers lost their lives for? No, dear. I never will. And you know, if it means that bright young girls like Hermione can continue to learn in the same classrooms as my children, or clever men like Remus can teach my children everything they know; I'll stand up even taller this time around."

"She's just obsessed with them," Ron continued his rant. "I can't make her understand that this is just the way things are. It's not as if they're people or anything. They're only elves."

Ron might have known what it was like to be less than. To be looked down upon because of his last name. But he would never know the prejudices Hermione was born into and could relate so clearly to when it came to Kreacher.

"Ron," Hari began in a soft tone. "Remember when we talked about how muggles have a problem with 'blood status', as well? Remember I said it was racism amongst the people instead of creatures or inheritance? Because of the color of their skin?"

After a beat, Ron replied. "Oh," He said quietly, realization dawning shamefully.

Ron had been schooled on all things muggle politics over the years of knowing Hermione and Hari. By way of Hermione's parents, updates were given to the trio weekly about the NF and the supremacy riots going on in the UK during the school year. Hermione seemed to be just as invested in the abolishment of white supremacist groups as she was the blood-purists in the wizarding world. Ron had no other attachment to the muggle world but a fierce love for his best friends welcomed the updates and cheered on the fight from his comfortable place in Gryffindor tower.

Harriet was on the fence for the most part. She had experienced what it meant to be hated for the color of her skin. In her Aunts home, she had been called 'dirty skinned', told that her hair was 'ugly and unkept' like her father's. When she was younger, Petunia would bring home bottles of Super White and rub Harriet down with it before bed. The thick creamy treatment bleached and burned her skin a light yellow hue that was somehow still not what her Aunt envisioned. There was a time that she hated her skin, her raven hair, her straight nose. The wizarding world had changed that.

Hogwarts was the first experience Harriet had of going to school with a diversity of children. Long gone were the days that Harriet could sit in a classroom full of white children and be the odd one out. Her dorm-mates; Hermione Granger, and Lavender Brown; two beautiful black girls with hair as full as the moon. They could plait it in rows, and swish small baby hairs to their foreheads in intricate swirls. Pavarti Patil, a small Indian girl more loud and boisterous than Hari had ever been told she had a right to be. Her hair, smooth and silky. Her long dark locks treated with Sleakeasy; a hair potion and scalp treatment invented by Harriet's own great-grandfather for the maintenance of ethnic hair. Lastly, Septima Keller, a Jewish girl with sandy brown hair, an interesting holiday schedule, and a Yiddish phrase for every circumstance. The girls loved to hear her tell stories of her family out in Norwich.

Over half the families in the Sacred 28 were families of color. And none of them seemed to have any idea that the color of their skin ought to place a difference from one family to the next. Instead, the prejudice came from a blood status, from a bred inheritance. From something, even Ron seemed to unconsciously take into accordance.

Hermione still fell into a minority when it came to the wizarding world. A Muggleborn. Slurs relating to her blood had been cast in her direction just as quickly as the ones she had grown up trying to avoid in the Muggle world. Harriet a half-blood witch on her Muggle-born mother's side, experienced much less. Being The Girl Who Lived always seemed to help, as well.

"House-elves are slaves, Ron. I know it's not the same. But, can't you just be kinder to him? For Hermione's sake."

From that moment on, Ron doted on the elf. If Kreacher was bringing food to the table, Ron grabbed glassware as well. If the elf broke down during their cleaning sessions over a trinket or picture, Ron would put it aside for him to keep. When Kreacher had a meltdown over a locket Sirius made to throw away, Ron snuck into the bin himself and placed it into the elf's cubby hole of a bedroom as a gift. Every time a task was complete, Ron would thank him loudly to Hermione's pleased expression, and the rest of the family's amused confusion. It was a bit of an overkill if you asked Harriet. But never let it be said Ron Weasley was not an ally.

Some nights, the trio would climb the winding stairs up to the fourth floor. Release the catch door and take the ladder to the attic. Ron's brothers would sneak up wine from the cellar and cigarettes from Hari's godfather's stash. The twins and Ginny would join them and conspire about just what exactly happened in those private meetings downstairs. They would play exploding snap and wizard's chess, the moonlight filling the room and catching each of their smiling faces. It was easy to forget the rest of the world on nights like this.

Fred would always want to flirt once they had gotten rid of a few bottles. He would call Hermione "lovely", or wax poetic about Hari's quidditch stats. Ginny would gag and roll her eyes, pulling Hari out the window to lie on the awning and watch the stars. Ron would get angry. Red in the face, and quiet. Fred never meant a thing by being amorous, and everyone else seemed to know it but Ron. One day, Harriet thought longingly. One day he would realize just why he could not stand the way Fred would tuck Hermione's hair behind her ear. Why he felt such a seething rage when she would play along, laughing and blowing kisses at the twin.

Other nights were spent with her Godfather. The pair would grab biscuits from the kitchen pantry and sneak downstairs into the basement. A lone lamp in the corner, and a makeshift mechanics shop, Hari would sit stool side beside Sirius as he laid belly up on the cement floor, tinkering underneath his motorbike. The very one, Harriet found out, that had led her out of Godric's Hollow that terrible night fourteen years ago.

Sirius would tell her stories of her father's childhood. Tell her about her grandparents and a family of brown skin and honey-eyes. Hari could picture them; the man in the lower-left corner of the Mirror of Erised would have been her great uncle. The woman to her mother's right would have been her cousin who lived with her father for a time before she was married and sent back to the home she was born into. Sirius would laugh as he retold stories of her father, accidentally breaking his fast for Shawwal and lying to his mother in his next letter home.

"If he breaks it, he disbelieves," James had said in a high pitch tone, mocking his mother. "No muma, I just can't play quidditch without cursing our shite keeper."

Harriet smiled fondly every time Sirius told a story of her mother and father that reminded her of herself. He spoke of how blunt Lily could be. How matter of fact in the way she spoke to James as if boys were just a bit beneath the lengths she was willing to go. Her Godfather would struggle through stories of the war. Rub his temple with a grease-sodden hand and apologize to Hari for repeating himself. "It all just clouds together there at the end," he would say. "I don't have the same memories I used to."

Sirius would reach down into his pant pocket and pill out a flask. Drink the pungent liquid in large swigs and continue with his reminiscing, his eyes glassing over more and more as the night went on.

Remus was in and out. It was clear to even the children of Grimmauld Place that he was on assignment for Dumbledore. He would come and go in the middle of the night, eat like a horse at breakfast only to disappear for the rest of the day. When he was gone, Sirius was quiet. Moody and worried. He would stay by the windows, gazing out into the London streets as if Remus would just so happen to appear on them.

When he was back, Sirius was too in a way. He seemed to breathe easier and take a joke more like the Godfather Harriet had grown accustomed to knowing. However, the tension that evolved between the two men on the night Harriet arrived, never really went away. They sat together, ate together. From what Hari could tell, they still slept together. But Sirius treated Remus with a cold chill that Hari had never been on the receiving end of. Remus was patient, however. Sirius would make it a point to talk over the man, or deliberately ignore him if Remus asked him a question. The whole house could tell there was tension. Ron and Hermione would look to Harriet as if she had some type of inside source as to why Sirius was behaving the way he was. It was all very childish, In Hari's eyes.

When she voiced as much privately to Remus one night out on the terrace, the man laughed and led her over to a pair of wicker chairs. He gestured for her to sit and did the same, staring out into the night sky at a waning crescent of a moon.

"Your Godfather is… Well, he. He isn't for everyone." Remus sighed, continuing to laugh.

At Hari's confused and offended expression, he continued.

"He is upset with me, Hari. And rightfully so. But he acts the way he does because he has never known how to cope otherwise. I don't believe I will ever fault him for it."

"He said you were having a lover's spat, he is acting like a child," she replied quietly, feeling foolish. Remus's laugh grew louder and wiped his eyes and settled down with a smile.

"Yes, well. I suppose you could call it that. What you must understand about Sirius is that while he might be a grown man, he is still in a lot of ways a twenty-one-year-old boy. I know you think that is old, but really. Sirius was still very much a child when he went to Azkaban. We grew up together; but I am a good bit older than him in the way I think, the way I might react to hearing bad news, or the way I would handle an argument. I have a lot of years on him, and I think it is very unfair for you and I or anyone to hold him to a standard he can't quite reach because of his circumstances."

That all seemed very reasonable. In the past, Harriet knew herself to always move towards leniency when it came to her Godfather. His stay in the cave out on Stile Road worried her more than she was willing to admit. More than anything she wanted to tell him to run. Leave her to her own devices and leave the country. But he refused. In his mind, the best place he could be was as close to Hari as he could get. And as irresponsible as it was, he could not be swayed.

Of course, Remus would be no different. From what Hari knew of their relationship, Remus was a caregiver. As wild and unruly as Sirius seemed in his tales of their childhood, Remus always seemed to pick up his pieces.

"Why is he upset with you?" She asked quietly, Aunt Petunia's voice in her ear telling her to get out of adult's business and stop asking so many questions.

"Well, he is upset with me because of you," Remus smiled.

"Me? What have I done?"

"You haven't done a thing!" He replied, amused. "And apparently I haven't either."

Confused, Harriet remained quiet as the professor readjusted himself in the chair. He turned fully into Harriet, and crossed one leg over the other, grabbing his ankle.

"Sirius is upset with me because he believes I could have done more to make sure that you were being taken care of in your father, and Sirius's absence. And he is right."

This was new territory. The subject of adults in Harriet's life and the roles they should have taken was always a sore one. She tended to block the idea of "what-ifs" out completely. They somehow always made the hurt a little worse.

The Weasleys had tried. Merlin had they tried. Mrs. Weasley was at the school every May asking Dumbledore for permission to take Harriet home with her.

There was always some excuse, some reason for one or a handful of the Weasley children to not be able to make it home for Christmas, Harriet had never spent a Christmas alone since she met Ron. She knew that was Molly's doing. However, Dumbledore stood firm. He had explained the need for Hari to remain with the Dursleys to more people, more times than Hari probably even knew of. And at the end of the day, none of them had any rights to her. None but Sirius. And what could a running fugitive do to gain legal custody of a child? Hari could only hope that could change.

Peter Pettigrew's bleeding sacrificial arm severed and mangled in Harriet's hand as she appeared back into the Quidditch Pitch with Cedric's body in toe. The missing finger proof enough that Alastor Moody had convinced the Ministry to open an investigation the moment he woke up from his ten-month hostage.

"I want you to know, Hari. I want you to know that I tried." Remus said quietly, pulling Harriet from a flash of memory-making her sick and sad all at once.

"Back then, when it happened... I was not the same man I am now. I was working a lot. Out on assignment for The Order. The only good use I ever seemed to be was getting in good with other werewolves. Infiltrating their packs. A seeming friend. I did a lot of things I would not have otherwise done, or at least would have been more responsible with. Drugs. I was doing a lot of drugs. I was working so much and had to be so hushed about almost everything that I was doing, it was hard for the people around me to trust me anymore. It was hard for Sirius to trust me. James and your mother. There was a spy in The Order. We knew that much. They thought it was me. Sirius did. Peter encouraged it, I know that now. Dumbledore knew better, but in those times… he must have been so overwhelmed. He never told them otherwise. I don't like to dwell on it, but your father. Your father might have suspected me at the time of his… I am afraid James and Lily thought it was me. I am so afraid that when they died, they believed it was me… that I had…"

Remus rambled on like a man pleading for mercy. It did not take an empath to feel the guilt in his voice. After a breath, Hari grabbed his hand in hers and scooted closer to him. She did not know what to say. Had no words for the remorse that seemed to ooze out of her old professor. Perhaps just holding his hand was enough, however. Because when he began to speak again, he was steady and sure of himself.

"I was a wreck by the time I worked it out to go to Dumbledore about you. I was alone. Drinking my weight and doing a few other things I am embarrassed to say just to cope. Your father and mother were my family, Peter, all of them. Sirius. This man I had known over half my life, loved over half my life, suddenly he was a stranger to me. I was sleeping alone for the first time in years. I must have been in a right state coming to Dumbledore asking to take you home with me. But then you must have been with Petunia for a week or so by then. I had no chance in the world. Some strung out, homeless, werewolf. I did not have a chance in the world. We were not told where you were, just that you were safe and cared for. Two things I never could have promised you. I didn't push.''

I don't remember much of the next few years. It is no excuse, but I grieved for much longer than anyone should have allowed me. I am equally grateful as I am sorry that you did not know me when I lived like that, Hari."

Remus was speaking with a choked-back whisper as if he could not speak louder for fear of falling off the edge. Hari had never seen the man so emotional.

"Sirius is upset with me because he believes I should have tried harder. Done more to be in your life. Went over Dumbledore's head and searched you out. And he is completely right."

Hari shook her head and tried to catch Remus's eye.

"He is not. You couldn't help it. You were… you had so much to happen all at once. The last thing you needed was to put up with me. I'm not your responsibility."

"Oh yes, you were. Yes, you should have been."

Remus leaned back in his chair, taking Harriet's hand with him, gripping tightly and smoothing the top with his thumb.

"You should have been. The day you were born, Sirius and I cried like we had spit you out ourselves. Your mother had to banish us from the room, or the pair of us would have been right in there on top of them while she was giving birth. And every day after, we were there. Fighting each other to hold you or feed you a bottle once Lily stopped breastfeeding. You had no privacy, Sirius and I, and Peter on the good days… we never allowed you to be just a family of three. And James loved it. Lily, she probably could have done without the extra mouths to feed, but we were brothers. We always had been, family. You were ours as much as you were your mother and father's. You were our responsibility, and after Sirius… after he was unable to take you, it should have been me. He has every right to resent me for it."

Shaking her head, Hari took her hand out of Remus's and folded her legs underneath her. "Well, what a funny way to do it. Wait until I'm under the same roof to be upset about something so stupid. We are all here together now, why does it matter anymore?"

"I believe it has less to do with the fact we are all together, and more to do with the state you were in when you arrived."

Remus had stayed behind that wonderful day he had come to take her away from Privet Drive. Had wanted a word with her uncle. Her face burned with red shame at the notion that it was so obvious what Hari tried too hard to keep hidden.

"Oh that," she said in an offhanded tone. "That's nothing."

"Yes, well. The idea that that means nothing to you is the most worrisome part."

She could feel it now. The monster. This anger inside of her she could not quite explain. Harriet had always been known for her smart mouth. For her offhanded comments. However, this monster that had lived inside of her all summer was something else entirely.

It set out to injure. Strike. White-hot, and savage. Her embarrassment at being spoken to about something so private, so deplorable only fed the monster. Fed the word vomit that would inevitably make its way past her lips.

"Well," the monster began. "Sounds like if you couldn't get it together enough to make sure none of that happened to me, then you would think you shouldn't have a say in how I deal with it."

It was out before she could reign it in. Without moving her eyes from the skyline, she could hear Remus beside her, gasp a quick breath as if he had been slapped.

"I'm sorry," Hari said in the next breath. "I didn't mean that."

She finally turned her face back to Remus and saw the hurt she had caused. He masked it quickly and nodded his head. A sad smile graced his lips as he stood from his chair. Hari remained, stark still and shamefaced.

Slowly, Remus leaned down. Placed his hand on the back of Harriet's head and brought his face close to her's. His lips brushed her forehead and he sighed into a kiss.

"Yes, you did," he whispered at her hairline. "You meant it, and you are right. And It isn't enough, but I'm here now. And I am not going anywhere, I promise." He spoke as if he were speaking to a child. Reassuring and slow. No one ever spoke to her this way.

Remus rose from his place at Hari's forehead and sat back down into his chair. After a beat of silence, he changed the subject. HE began to tell Hari how to follow the moon cycle with the tip of his thumb. She tried her hardest to pay attention. To put what she had done behind them, as Remus seemed to have. But she struggled.

Her mind was elsewhere. Fighting a monster no one else seemed to see. Screaming at it in fear of how easily it could take her over these days. What would happen when it became bigger than her? When it stopped feeding intrusive thought, and grew hungry for more? One day would it take her over? Possess her?

Would she be more monster than girl?

Notes:

Hari is a horcrux, friends. And if one thing is accomplished in this story it is going to be the fact that the horcrux is more than just some stagnant piece of her. It's literally a leach on her soul. Them things change people, I'd say.