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Chapter Thirteen—A Young Prince

Harry studied the ravine in front of him, where Mariana had told him to Apparate, with a frown. He didn't think she would have anything to gain from betraying him, not when people would find out that she'd known he was a time traveler for a long time and done nothing, but this place looked like a deserted patch of overgrown woods.

Then Harry took a single step forwards, and the woods changed.

It was the most disorienting set of wards Harry had ever been through, assuming it was wards at all and not some other kind of defensive spell. The boulders that had ringed the edges of this slash in the earth were suddenly gone, and the trees bowed down and whirled like dancers and formed the sides of a fence. The earth itself grew green and shook a spring into existence, and Harry was on the edge of extensive, fenced grounds, so far back from the house that he wasn't sure where it was.

Well, at least I know she didn't betray me, Harry thought, and started towards the gates, one hand on his wand. Mariana's warnings about her husband hadn't slipped his mind.

But no one accosted him, and the gates swung silently open at his approach. They parted down the middle through a large silver decoration that, when Harry looked at it more closely, formed a crown.

Harry snorted. Someone took their Prince heritage overly-seriously. Of course, from Mariana's stories, it was her husband and not her, especially since she hadn't been born into the family.

The path led on and through shady trees, past flowerbeds and more springs and streams and ponds and pools, and swaying grass that rustled as though a predator was stalking Harry through it. Harry kept his gaze fixed straight ahead and walked on, and eventually the motion stopped and left him to round a corner and come upon the house.

It was a bleak grey place. Harry studied the few windows that looked towards the path and then shrugged. He wouldn't see anyone looking out at him from behind the high shutters. At least they didn't have bars on them.

Visible ones, anyway, Harry reminded himself, and walked on.

The front door swung open before he could get there, but it was Mariana waiting for him, not a house-elf. She gave him a relieved smiled and held out both hands to take his and draw him into the house. "I'm so glad you came, Harry. Seneca is out of town on a business trip, so you don't have to worry about him."

"Or about the house-elves reporting to him?" Harry inquired, watching out of the corner of his eye as one of the little creatures appeared and tried to take his cloak. He seemed miffed when Harry wouldn't give it up, and popped away again.

"If the house-elves are loyal to anyone in this house, it's Severus," Mariana said simply. "They recognize something special about him." She motioned towards an open door at the end of a dark corner. "He's this way."

Harry passed shut doors and shrouded mirrors and pedestals in alcoves that held stern busts, silently reciting in his head what he was going to say. He wanted to stay and help Severus, of course he did, but things would be safer for everyone if he left. He hoped he had the right tone of sadness and sternness when he spoke to Severus. There was no need to be hard on him. He was just a kid, after all.

He entered the room that looked to be the schoolroom, with a set of cauldrons in one corner and a huge slate on the wall held numbers and letters. Harry hardly had time to take it in, or the carpet on the floor that had dazzling swirls of white and grey, before Severus stepped forwards and claimed his attention. "You're not going away."

"I wish I didn't have to," Harry said quietly. "And it might be that I could come back every few months by Floo or Apparition and see you. But it's not safe for any of us if I stay here longer."

"Why?" Severus folded his arms. Even like this, he looked imperious.

"Someone might find out that I've used magic they don't approve of, and take me away," Harry said. "And then you'll suffer, too. I know your family has enemies, and you do because of the scar on your forehead. I don't want to contribute to that."

Severus stared at him in silence. There was so much silence, in fact, that Harry found himself glancing towards Mariana out of the corner of his eye. She just gave him an amused smile and shook her head a little, as if to say that she was going to stay out of it. Harry understood the impulse, but it annoyed him she was following it.

"You need to stay and help me study magic," Severus said.

"It would be dangerous for you. I just said—"

"Would my enemies go away if you went away?"

"No, but they would stop paying as much attention to you as they'll pay if I'm here."

Severus nodded as if everything had already made sense and been arranged. "Then my choice is between enemies with you and enemies without you. I want enemies with you. You're going to stay." He turned to Mariana. "Grandmother, can the house-elves bring some biscuits? Mr. Harry doesn't look like he ate yesterday."

Harry stared at him with his mouth open, then turned to Mariana. Sometimes he hated Severus's magically-influenced intelligence. "Can't you explain it to him?" he asked. "The kind of danger that he's going to be in?"

"I hardly understand it myself, Harry. You weren't very clear in your message, and I don't think any excuse you can make for leaving would be acceptable to Severus."

She was definitely smiling at him. Harry exhaled in slow disbelief and faced his protégé again. Severus was picking up a chocolate biscuit from a tray that had arrived without Harry even noticing and was sitting on a small table next to him. "You need to eat," he said, and held it out.

"No, thank you. I'm not hungry.'

"That's why you're so skinny," Severus said, in the tones of someone who had discovered an essential truth of the universe and was about to share it with everyone he meant. "You've got to eat, Mr. Harry. Even when you're not hungry and you might not enjoy the food, you have to eat."

"Why?" Harry took the biscuit, to please Severus, but didn't eat it.

Severus put his own biscuit in his mouth and chewed carefully, as if to show Harry how it was done. "Because otherwise you won't grow up big and strong," he said. "And if I have all these enemies, then I need all the strength I can get. And you need to be strong, to be my protector."

At the moment, Severus sounded so serious and so much like the man who had been destroyed when Harry had destroyed the timeline that he had to swallow back tears. He shook his head and ate the biscuit because he was hungry, and then turned to Mariana. "There's no way I can stay here. Not with your husband and the house-elves being more loyal to him than any guest. They won't hide me from him."

Mariana smiled. "I am still pleased that you're considering it. You never wanted to leave at all, did you?"

Harry took a deep breath and shook his head. "No. But the Minister and his husband are searching for me. You don't have a choice."

"We have a choice." Severus finished his biscuit and took a step towards Harry, staring up, but not in a way that made him any less intimidating. "I'll use my power to make them leave you alone."

Harry blinked at him. "You can't."

"Of course he can," Mariana said, and stepped further around the small table to put a hand on Harry's shoulder. "You forget that he's the Boy-Who-Lived. That's the power he's talking about, Harry, not his magic."

Harry snorted. "You think that's a source of power? The papers will turn on him as soon as look at him."

He knew his voice was more bitter than it should be, and from the narrow-eyed look Mariana gave him, she'd noticed it. But she shook her head and said, "Perhaps for some Muggle celebrities it works that way. I've been carefully cultivating Severus's image for the papers, though, and Seneca has done even more. We've made sure that the people of the wizarding world feel like they know Severus, and they would do a lot to protect him. I thought you knew that, but—you don't pay much attention to the papers, do you?"

Harry shook his head. Laocoon had brought them into the shop often enough, so Harry had known the photographs of the Minister and his husband to recognize them, but he had avoided all the articles about the Boy-Who-Lived out of instinctive self-defense.

"I would still bring a lot of danger to you." He glanced at Mariana. "The Minister and his husband know—a lot about me."

Mariana's eyes widened this time, and Harry relaxed a little. At least she understood the danger about him being declared a time traveler, and that meant she was more likely to be on his side.

"We know a lot about you, too," said Severus, still frowning up at Harry. "We're going to keep you here."

"There could be a compromise," Mariana said swiftly. Harry wasn't sure who the swiftness was for, him or Severus or herself. "For example, we could ensure that you be placed in a position where the Minister would find you acceptably under his eye, but also where you would still have access to reach Severus. And the Black children, too, if that's what you want."

"Black is an—" Harry glanced at Severus.

"I know the word 'arsehole,'" Severus said proudly.

Mariana only shook her head. "With his grandfather, it was inevitable," she murmured. "And yes, there are positions that would satisfy the restrictions I am thinking of. For example, from what I've head, the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts wants to retire, but is picky about his replacement."

Harry felt his left eye twitch violently, and Mariana stared at him. "Is something wrong?"

"Nothing I could really explain," Harry sighed. Well, there seemed to have been no curse on the Defense position here. "It's just that from the way they came after me, I don't think Dumbledore or Grindelwald will agree to that. They want me in prison or dead, I think." He glanced down when something nudged his hand and found that Severus had shoved the plate of biscuits at him.

"They want you under control, if I know them."

Harry considered Mariana carefully as he took another biscuit. "And do you? Know them, I mean." He had only interacted with this Dumbledore and Grindelwald for a few minutes, of course, but they hadn't seemed the sort who would compromise, to him.

Mariana nodded. "By now they will have overcome some of their surprise that you exist, and they will be able to start planning for the long run. They also have to suspect that you would be able to get out of a prison cell or the Department of Mysteries, if they tried to place you there."

Harry snorted. "How? The only way I got away from them at first was their sheer surprise."

"And you have remained away from them," Mariana said. "Whatever they used to track you, can they do it again?"

Harry shrugged. "I have to admit I didn't know what that object they used to track me was. I damaged it, but they could probably make or use another one. Whatever it was."

"But you might also be able to break it again." Mariana was staring at him intently, one hand combing absently through her long black hair. "They'll be thinking of that. And time travelers can give knowledge and possibly magic to those they choose to help. And it will not look good for the Minister if someone comes to know that they let a time traveler slip through their fingers for two years."

Harry looked anxiously at Severus. Severus just looked unreadably back, and Harry sighed. "Someone could read the knowledge out of his mind."

"Legilimency on a child so young is something not even Grindelwald would do," Mariana said, and then she smiled briefly. "Not when he is married to our Minister. And as he grows, we will teach him to shield his mind."

Harry kicked one of his boots idly against the table leg, and stopped only when Mariana gave him a look. "Then you're thinking that you could contact them, and—propose a compromise? Is that what you're saying?"

"We will. Severus is not wrong about his power as the Boy-Who-Lived. We will tell them that they could have a political mess on their hands, or they could have a quiet little compromise that will also stand the chance of making Headmaster Dippet indebted to them, and allow Professor Greyhand the chance to retire."

Harry considered that in silence, at least until Severus poked him in the side and said, "You're not thinking of leaving again, are you? You'd better not."

"Severus," Mariana chided, with a shake of her head. "I've taught you better than to poke people."

"You said I could do it when I had to," Severus retorted, and turned that intense gaze on Harry again. It had always been hard for Harry to meet, and it was more so now that it was beneath that lightning bolt scar. "I know you. I know you don't want to leave, and I don't want to let you leave, either. So you're going to be the Defense Against the Dark Arts professor at Hogwarts. There, that's settled." He nodded in satisfaction and picked up another biscuit.

Harry chuckled a little. "You did teach him well."

"I don't think you had a plan," Mariana said quietly, instead of commenting on that. "Other than to run and hope that you could draw any pursuers away with you and they wouldn't find out about your connection with Severus. Is that true?"

Harry sighed and gave in to the temptation to run his hand roughly through his hair. "Yeah. But—I mostly wanted to get away from here before they could track you down, or Severus, through me."

"It doesn't matter if they do." Severus had got his nose as high into the air as Malfoy had managed once upon a time. "I'm the Boy-Who-Lived. They can't touch me."

"Maybe that's true," Harry said, although privately he wondered if Mariana had really cultivated Severus's image as carefully as she thought she had. "But there's also the other kind of peril time travelers can bring."

"What do you mean?" Severus demanded.

Harry glanced again at Mariana, uneasily, but she gave no sign of disapproval, so he took a deep breath and decided to explain. "I destroyed one universe when I came back in time. A different universe replaced it. I knew—some of the people who are here now in my original universe, but they were different."

"Was I there?"

"You were." Harry nodded carefully. "But you weren't the Boy-Who-Lived."

Severus's mouth dropped open. Mariana looked more amused than anything as she gently ruffled his hair. "And me?"

"I didn't know you then," Harry said.

He had no idea what had happened to Severus's grandparents in the original world. All he remembered hearing was that they had disowned their daughter for marrying a Muggle. And who knew after that? They could have died early, they could have lived through the war sad and bitter, they could have left the country.

Most likely, Seneca and Mariana Prince hadn't even been Severus's grandparents at that point.

"Very well. Then tell me how you believe you have hurt us?"

"You could have been happier in the original world. How do I know that I didn't deprive you of that happiness?"

"How do you know that you didn't make us happier?"

Harry paused. It was true that he thought Severus was probably happier being raised by a loving grandmother than he had been being raised in an abusive household, but Seneca was abusive in his own way, and the burdens Severus would have to face as the Boy-Who-Lived were ones no child should ever pick up.

Harry should know that.

"I can't know," he said finally. "But from what Laocoon said, I could also have broken the universe into nothingness."

Mariana snorted. "That is one theory of time travel. But the magic I used to sense you never would have become possible if every time traveler ran that serious risk. There have been more of you than you think, Harry. Obviously I don't think it should be something that's done casually, but the idea that you have to bear a burden of guilt about it for the rest of your life is nonsense."

"You can't be guilty the rest of your life," Severus added in an authoritative voice. "You have me to teach."

Harry smiled down at him, and felt something in his chest that had been tight since the talk with Laocoon shift and warm and lighten. He gently touched Severus's hair again. "I could still teach you if I felt guilty, you know."

"But you wouldn't be as good a teacher."

"And I think I now know why you seem to be resisting the suggestion that you could be the Defense professor at Hogwarts," Mariana added. "You think you don't deserve it, don't you? You believe that you should be—I'm not sure, but punished, perhaps."

Harry hesitated again. "It would make me feel better," he said at last.

"Then here is your punishment," said Mariana, in an unexpectedly ringing voice. "To live in this world that's not perfect, in a way that's not perfect. To accept that you aren't perfect but some people want you around them anyway. To negotiate from a position of strength instead of running. To maintain the bonds you have created rather than forsake them."

Harry stared at her in amazement. It sounded difficult, it sounded rewarding, it sounded exactly like what he—

Like what he could live with as the price he had to pay for breaking the universe.

Harry swallowed. "As long as you accept that I might have to leave if I ever do put you in danger."

"We'll fight for you, though." Severus sounded puzzled. "Didn't you know that?"

Harry took a long, slow breath. "I might have forgotten."

"Well, don't."

And Severus pushed him into a chair, and sat him down, and climbed into his lap and ate more biscuits, while Mariana started discussing the plan she had in mind for approaching Dumbledore and Grindelwald.

Harry swallowed, and listened.