Disclaimer: All recognizable characters and settings belong to J.K. Rowling.
"Harry!"
Cassius sighed as he turned. He was still trying to get used to his real name, it would help if his peers didn't still call him Harry. Since he looked completely different, it should be easy to remember. They all surely knew by now, after all. He watched as Ginny approached him. "What?" He had already visited Pomfrey and since Draco hadn't come by yet, decided to walk to McGonagall's office to meet up with him. It surprised him a little, that he wanted to find Draco and not his friends but...he didn't think he could trust his friends. Not after how Ron had acted. At least Draco was being good to him.
Ginny stared at him, her lip curling somewhat. "How are we going to fix this?" She gestured at his appearance. "We need to get you looking like how you used to. The prophet wants to interview you and it wouldn't do, you looking like this."
"This is my real appearance." Cassius protested. "I was never Harry Potter."
"Yes you were, you defeated Voldemort!" Ginny said. "This isn't right, you shouldn't be a Malfoy and you shouldn't be a child. Change back into a seventeen year old."
"I never really was a seventeen year old," Cassius said wearily. "I'm twelve." Again, he thought ruefully.
"I bet the Headmaster could change you back," Ginny said hopefully.
"No," Cassius said flatly. "I don't want to see the Headmaster, not after what he did to me." He had trusted the man and it turned out, Dumbledore had stolen him from his family. He had made him think destroying Voldemort had been his sole responsibility. It was cruel, what Dumbledore had done.
"He made you the boy-who-lived," Ginny said, her eyes wide. "You were famous, thanks to him. That's much better than being a Malfoy," She sneered the name.
"I am a Malfoy," Cassius said quietly. It was shocking and crazy, but he couldn't deny it was true. "And I would have rather grown up with them than be Harry Potter." He would have loved to have grown up with a real family. He wished he had the chance to know the Malfoys as Cassius. At least he had Draco. And, well, Uncle Sev, he smirked to himself.
"But Harry -"
"Cassius."
"I'm not calling you that." Ginny said stubbornly. "I had thought we would start dating and I could accompany you on your interviews."
"I think I'm too young for you, Ginny," Cassius rolled his eyes and turned away.
"Ron's right, you are a traitor!" Ginny hissed. "You'd rather have that slimy snake Draco as your brother than Ron! And Ron could have been your brother, if you had married me!"
Cassius spun around. "Why would I have married you?" He asked in confusion. He had never seen Ginny that way, he had just thought of her as a friend.
"You little brat!" Ginny pulled out her wand, ready to cast her famous Bat-Bogey Hex.
"Furnunculus!" Cassius snapped after quickly pulling out his wand and watching as boils popped all over her face. Gasps came from nearby students.
"Mr. Malfoy!" Professor Sprout hurried over. "No jinxing your peers!"
"She was going jinx me first!" Cassius protested. "She had her wand out first."
Professor Sprout looked at the wand in Ginny's hand. "Miss Weasley, were you about to jinx a second year?"
Ginny was too busy feeling her face. "He's a traitor! A horrible brat! Oh, my face," she wailed.
Professor Sprout sighed. "Go to the infirmary and see Madam Pomfrey. I will be speaking to your head of house about this."
Ginny gave Cassius a look of hatred before leaving.
Cassius looked up at Professor Sprout, biting his lip. "Sorry." he offered. "But she was being really horrible to me."
Professor Sprout patted his shoulder. "I'm sorry about that, but you shouldn't have jinxed her. It's against school rules. You haven't been resorted yet and I don't know where your brother is but your godfather should be in his office. I'll take you to him."
Cassius glumly followed. He could tell her where Draco was but what if he was angry? At least he was used to Snape being upset with him. With his history with Professor Snape, the man would likely have him expelled.
"What has happened?" Professor Snape asked as they entered his office, looking at Cassius with concern.
Professor Sprout cleared her throat. "Apparently, Miss Weasley accosted him in the hallway and said some cruel things. She took out her wand and Mr. Malfoy believes she was about to hex him so he cast Furnunculus at her."
Snape took a deep breath. "I see."
"I brought him to you as I don't know where Mr. Malfoy is. And you are his godfather and could up being his head of house, so I thought you should handle it," Professor Sprout said. "I will inform Miss Weasley's Head of House of what happened as well."
"Thank you," Snape said. He raised an eyebrow at his godson once she left. "What do you have to say for yourself?"
"Ginny was being a right cow," Cassius huffed. "She wanted me to go to Dumbledore and have him make me look like Harry Potter again."
"Oh?" Snape immediately began thinking of reasons to give the girl detentions.
"She said Ron was right, that I was a traitor," Cassius continued. "Apparently she expected to marry me... I mean, Harry Potter."
Snape snorted. "I would hope you would set your sights on someone better than her."
"Like a troll?" Cassius asked cheekily.
Snape hid a grin and shook his head. "Still, you should have walked away."
The door burst open and Draco ran in. "Are you okay?" he asked urgently, looking his brother over. "Everyone is saying you were dueling a student."
"Not exactly," Cassius hedged.
"Perhaps you would like to tell your brother what happened?" Snape said.
With a sigh, Cassius relayed the incident. "I was just defending myself," he finished.
Draco raised an eyebrow. "Why didn't you just disarm her?"
"Uh," Cassius scratched his head. "I didn't think of it, I guess. I was mad at her."
"I don't blame you for being mad," Draco said. "But still, you know the rules."
Cassius hated that both Draco and Snape were looking at him with stern expressions. He felt himself getting defensive. "So what are you going to do about it? Have me expelled?" He glared at Snape. The man had tried to have him expelled before.
"No, of course not," Snape said, raising an eyebrow. "I believe a detention will suffice. You will report to my classroom after dinner and help me catalogue ingredients." It would give him a chance to spend some time with his youngest godson. And if tea and biscuits happened to show up, he supposed he could let Cassius take a break.
Feeling embarrassed and like his godfather was already reverting to his old ways, Cassius spat rudely, "Whatever, Snape." He turned to go when suddenly he was stopped by Draco, who grabbed his shoulder with one hand and gave him a swat on the backside with the other. "Apologize to Uncle Sev for your attitude. Now." Draco ordered.
Cassius stared at Draco, unconsciously pouting as he rubbed out the mild sting out of his backside. "Why did you do that?" he whined.
Draco hadn't even realized he was going to do that and was surprised himself. Nevertheless, he gave Cassius a firm look. "You were being very rude. Uncle Sev is not only your godfather, but also your Professor. Do not disrespect him again."
Cassius bit his lip and looked up at Snape. "I'm sorry," he said softly.
"You're forgiven," Snape said simply.
Cassius's eyes widened a little, not expecting that response. He had thought the man would yell at him or something.
"I'll let Uncle Sev's detention be your only consequence," Draco said slowly. "This time. You and I need to have a talk about rules and expectations, though." He hated the fearful look that came across his brother's face and figured the sooner they talk about it, the sooner Cass won't worry about it.
/
Draco led him through the dungeons to show him their new rooms. "So, that door leads to Uncle Sev's personal quarters." he pointed. "And this one leads to ours."
"We have quarters?" Cassius asked in surprise.
Draco grinned. "Yup. The Headmistress arranged it, she thought it would be good for us since we're still getting to know each other as brothers." He tapped the door with his wand. "Fratres." The door opened.
Cassius entered eagerly. There was a sitting room, with dark green walls, a gray sofa and recliner, dark green throw pillows. To the right was a small kitchen and down the hall was two bedrooms. "Which one is mine?" he asked eagerly.
"Which one do you want?" Draco asked, pleased to see that Cassius looked happy.
"Um, this one?" Cassius asked, pointing to the first room. There was a bed, a desk, a bookshelf and a dresser.
"It's yours," Draco ruffled his hair.
"Hey!" Cassius laughed, ducking out of the way.
"You can decorate it any way you want," Draco said.
"Really?" Cassius grinned. He had two bedrooms! The one at the manor was larger but this was still much better than sharing a dorm. He began to unpack his trunk, thinking that maybe this new change in his life wouldn't be so bad.
/
An hour later, Draco called him into the kitchen. "Okay, so I know you're still adjusting to everything," Draco said as he put a cup of hot chocolate in front of Cassius. "And I think you're handling everything really well, considering your life's been turned upside down." He said a little wryly. "But I just want to go over some rules and the consequences for breaking those rules."
Consequences? Cassius remembered the Dursley's, always starving him and locking him up. He stiffened slightly.
"First thing is, I don't want you to lie to me. Ever." Draco said seriously. "Trust is important, I want you to trust me and I want to know I can trust you. So no lying. Okay?"
"Okay," Cassius said softly.
"I expect you to do your best in your classes," Draco frowned. "I'll need to look at your past report cards to see how you have been doing. I won't be mad if you don't get O's as long as I know you're trying your best. If you need help with your homework, you can always ask me or Uncle Sev. Either one of us would be more than happy to help you. I'd like you to aim for E's and O's though. I know you are capable of it."
"Well, history of magic..." Cassius said with a shrug. It was the most boring class in the world.
"I know it's duller than a box of rocks but you still need to keep up in it." Draco said. "If you follow along in the textbook while Professor Binns lectures, it helps."
"I'll try," Cassius said. "But Divination...oh, wait. I don't have that class yet," he said in relief. That was a third year elective, he didn't have to worry about Trelawney this year.
"And you won't. Next year, I don't want you taking it," Draco said flatly. "Ancient Runes is interesting, I think you will like that one. But that's not until next year, so we'll talk about it later."
"Okay," Cassius agreed. He didn't want to take Divination again anyway.
Draco tapped his fingers on the table. "I know you're probably going to think I'm being overprotective, but I don't want you going anywhere without me knowing. No going outside without letting me know. I also don't want you wandering the hallways alone. You'll be escorted to your classes by either me, or a couple of my friends like Daphne or Theo." He might include Granger in that, she hadn't turned on Cass in the infirmary. He needed to talk to her first.
"Escorted? Like my first time doing second year? No way!" Cassius protested.
Draco sighed. "It's not a punishment, Cass. I just want to make sure you're safe. We don't know how students are going to react. Look at what already happened with the Weasley girl."
"I can take care of myself," Cassius huffed.
"I'm not saying you can't," Draco said patiently. "It's really for my own peace of mind, all right? Can you do this for me?"
"Okay," Cassius gave in. He supposed it made sense, from Draco's point of view.
"Thank you. Now to continue, there is no doing anything dangerous, no sneaking around the castle or anything. I also want you to be respectful to me and the professors," he gave his brother a pointed look.
Cassius remembered the swat he had gotten when he had been rude to Snape. "What are the consequences?"
Hating the fear in his brother's eyes, Draco reached out and clasped his hand with his own. "I will never starve you or lock you away." He promised. "Never. And I will never send you away or not want you."
Cassius relaxed.
"If you break a rule, you may be put on restriction, given lines, have your broom confiscated, be sent to the corner -"
"The corner! That's for little kids!" Cassius exclaimed.
"You are a kid and I know from personal experience that corner time can be very effective," Draco said. "These were the consequences I had growing up." He took a deep breath. "Another consequence would be a spanking."
Cassius's eyes widened. "You wouldn't!"
"I don't want to ever have to," Draco said honestly. "But if I have to, I will."
"But - but these are little kid punishments," Cassius whined.
Draco hid a smile at how little kid his brother was acting. "You are a kid, Cass. Didn't your friends ever have these type of punishments?"
Cassius shrugged. "I don't know. Well, Ron did. He would get grounded and once said his mum has a wooden spoon she would use sometimes. I never asked Hermione, I think Neville mentioned his grandmother smacking him now and then but...that's when they were young!"
"Like twelve?" Draco smirked slightly.
"Yeah!" Cassius paused as he realized he was twelve. "Oh."
"Lying or putting yourself in danger are mainly what would land you over my knee," Draco said. "Don't do those things and you don't have to worry about it."
"So no more flying cars, fighting trolls or Basilisks, night flying," Cassius teased.
Draco frowned. "Definitely no more of any of that. Merlin, when I think what could have happened to you over the years...wait, night flying?" He asked suspiciously. He shouldn't be surprised, it was something he had done once his third year, however Uncle Sev had caught him and it hadn't ended well for his backside.
"Uh, yeah," Cassius said a little guiltily. "Ron and I would sometimes sneak out at night to fly."
Draco stared at him. "Flying in the dark with no supervision? Yeah, that is definitely not allowed." He took a deep breath. This next thing would be hard for his brother to accept. "Also, I need your cloak."
"What?"
"Your invisibility cloak. I'm going to hold onto it for you."
"But it's mine!" Cassius yelled, standing up.
"Sit down Cass, and calm down," Draco said in a warning voice. "I know you have used it to sneak around this castle for years and I don't want that to happen anymore. I'll hold onto it for you."
"No," Cassius snapped, still standing.
Draco slowly stood up, his eyes sternly on his brother. "This is not negotiable. Having access to that cloak will just tempt you to use it to sneak around."
"So you don't trust me." Cassius accused.
"So you aren't thinking you want to keep the cloak in case you want to use it to sneak around?" Draco countered.
Cassius opened his mouth to protest this but then closed it because yeah, that was what he was thinking. Before he had treasured the cloak because he had thought it belonged to his father but now that wasn't the case. He just thought it was fun to walk around the castle with no one knowing you were there. He resisted the urge to pout.
"Don't think I've forgotten about your floating head in Hogsmeade my third year," Draco said knowingly. "Frankly, you were too young for it then. Having it will just tempt you to use to break the rules."
Cassius's resistance faded and he gave in to a full blown pout.
Draco bit his lip to keep from smiling. Merlin, his brother was adorable. "Give me the cloak and I'll hold onto it for you. And perhaps sometimes the two of us can use it to sneak down to the kitchens to get biscuits from the house-elves," Draco offered.
Cassius slowly smiled. "So I can sneak around the castle?"
"Only with me." Draco smiled back.
"Okay, I'll let you hold onto it for me," Cassius gave in. He supposed it wasn't worth arguing about and it would be easier to not have the cloak to tempt him to sneak around and get into trouble, especially now that he knew what consequence that would likely get him.
"Thank you."
TBC: