Ascension: Rogues of the Fallen Sun

by Define Anachronistic

(AU) After the traumatic end to his first year, Harry Potter is a man on the run, pursued by friends, foes, and forces unknown. But that's only the most immediate of his problems. Ancient monsters, Rogues, escaped convicts, and Witch-Hunters are all waiting for him over the horizon. His second year is shaping up to be even crazier than his first.

24. Chapter 24

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Family Ties

"Godmother?" Harry could hardly process the word. "What does that even mean?" Thinking on it now, Harry was fairly certain that he had never even set foot in a church before, much less been baptised in one. "Do you mean like a fairy godmother?" Harry knew the words were ridiculous even as they left his mouth, but so many other myths and legends had turned out to be true so why not a fairy that protected down-on-their luck orphans?

"What? Fairy-? No! Of course, not." Maia denied, looking rather embarrassed at the assumption. "Cinderella isn't real, it's just a Muggle fairy tale. You do know that?" She seemed almost concerned for his level of maturity.

"Of course, I do." He said calmly, trying to mask his increasing confusion. "It just makes more sense than the other meaning for godmother."

"Well, it shouldn't." She smiled at him again. "Your father was never a religious man, but your mother felt her parents would have wanted their grandson to be christened. It was a private ceremony, so Remus and I were the only guests. I suppose that we became your godparents by default."

Harry felt as though he had been punched in the stomach. "Lupin is my godfather?" These words made even less sense to him. From the few stories that Remus had taken the time to share with him on Christmas Day, Harry had known that his teacher had been pals with his dad back at Hogwarts, but he had never so much as hinted at their deeper connection, always keeping his tales superficial.

Before he could even think to ask Maia for proof that would validate her claims, she held her hand out for him. "We need to leave. The Dementors would have sensed my presence by now."

Harry stared at her. "You were running from Aurors back in London as well. Are you in some kind of trouble?" He wasn't sure why he had asked that. Even if she had just saved his life, he wasn't sure if he was capable of risking his neck by covering for a criminal.

Maia grimaced. "That's a long story, and to be perfectly honest, I was hoping someone else would have gotten round to telling you the worst of it." She shook her still proffered hand. "I know going with a stranger is a terrible idea, but I need you to look at me and know that you can trust me."

Harry stared at her. "Err…no."

Her lips twitched. "Then at least do it out of common sense." At Harry's obvious confusion she replied, "I can't make a Patronus with a stolen wand, so I'll be Apparating away like any sensible person. When the Dementors arrive and see that I'm gone, they'll be disappointed enough to Kiss the first human they see even if they happen to be innocent." She raised an elegant eyebrow at him. "I'm guessing you can't conjure a Patronus, can you?"

Harry scowled up at her, but he had to respect her manoeuvrability. She had taken a situation where nothing should be in her favour and turned it into one where there was no option but her victory. Just wanting to see what she would do, he stubbornly said, "I'll take my chances with the Dementors."

Maia huffed and reached for him. "For Thoth's sake!" Harry knocked aside one hand, but the other landed on his shoulder, and that was all she needed. The familiar squeezing, constricting sensation of Apparition came over him and he was forced along for the ride.

When the terrible squeezing sensation finally came to an end, Harry immediately began to examine his surroundings while tightening his grip on his wand. They had landed on the other side of the Hogsmeade Barrier, as Harry could recognise the mountain range to his east as the same sight that he woke up to every morning but from the other side. They were standing in craggy terrain, the kind where even crossing a short distance could take hours, and there were all kinds of little drops in the land around them that were half-hidden in the mid-winter mist, and his companion was headed right towards one.

"Come on!" Maia called happily, as though she were leading him on a serene weekend stroll. "I promise its much warmer inside!" After a minute she glanced back, only to find Harry was rooted to the same spot. "What's wrong?"

"I'm not exactly keen on following a stranger home." Harry said, obstinate. "Especially one who just kidnapped me."

"I didn't kidnap you!" She seemed aghast at the idea.

"You took me somewhere against my will. That's the definition of kidnapping."

Maia scowled. "Fine." She tossed her wand at him and, startled at the unexpected motion, Harry's Quidditch instincts kicked in and he caught it without thinking of the possible consequences. When nothing happened, he looked up from the second wand in his grip only to see Maia walking away from him. "I'm not going to hurt you." She assured him, either unaware or unafraid of the possibility of him attacking while her back was turned.

As he began to follow, Harry called after her. "You could still be leading me into a trap!" He insisted. "You could have a partner waiting for us wherever we're going."

"By the Great Sage," Harry could hear Maia say to herself as she continued walking, "you really are Lily's son." She stopped when she reached a non-descript dip in the ground which had an opening much like a badger den. "Home, sweet home." Maia said before shapeshifting into the same big, shaggy black dog she had back in London, and clambering into the hole. Swearing underneath his breath, Harry was forced onto hands and knees as he followed.

After a minute or two of crawling in the dark, where he twice banged his head into an earthen wall and scrapped his knee on more than one rock, Harry finally emerged into the sweet home Maia was talking about.

It wasn't much. A low ceilinged, round room that had clearly been carved out by magic and the earth beneath transfigured into hardwood floors. To one side there was a comfortable looking bed and to the other there was a sitting area with an Odeon playing a Witches' Brew rerun in the background. Most curiously, were the smokeless balls of bluebell flames that were floating in the air, providing both light and heat to the little den.

Upon seeing the room, Harry could only think of one thing. "Big fan of The Hobbit, are you?" He had expected her to turn her nose up at him, as most wizards did to Muggle literature, but again she surprised him.

"Yes." Maia smiled, crashing down into a seat, looking happy to talk about a children's book despite everything that had just happened. "It was assigned reading during Muggle Studies back in my day, but I wasn't able to put it down." She smiled, shrewdly. "Your mum wasn't much of a fan of non-fiction, and your dad didn't like reading in general, so I'm guessing Remus gave you the book?"

Harry nodded, her knowledge of Remus and his parents slowly putting him at ease. Sitting in the armchair across from hers, he said, "He lent me plenty of books to read. He said it's a good hobby that keep your mind occupied."

Maia made an aborted movement, as though she wanted to reach for him but stopped herself at the last moment. "I think that was something he and I had in common growing up. We lost ourselves in our books to distract ourselves from the world around us. Well, at least until we were old enough to do something about it." He shrewd smile turned a little sad. "You're getting to that same age now, aren't you?"

Something about the way she was looking at him was making him uncomfortable, so he directed the conversation back to its original topic. "So…you said you were going to explain the whole "godmother" thing." He prompted.

"Right, yes, of course." Maia shook herself out of it, clearly pushing her melancholy to one side in order to discuss the matter at hand. "Have you ever heard of the Fidelius Charm?"

"Yeah," Harry said, wondering where she was going with this. "It's an advanced concealment charm that hides a location within the soul of a person, who is called a Secret Keeper." He was quoting directly from the Auror's Enchiridion here, and judging from Maia's raised eyebrows, this was supposed to be restricted knowledge. "What makes it so powerful compared to other concealment charms is the requirement: everyone who resides within the hidden location must trust the Secret Keeper unconditionally."

"Yes," Maia was staring at him, clearly on the backfoot, but only momentarily, "Your mum and dad were on the run with you after you were born. Voldemort had tried to kill your entire family and he didn't like the fact that three Potters had managed to get away." Harry nodded impatiently, knowing all of this, so Maia skipped ahead to the relevant part of the story. "Well, the Auror Corps weren't free of spies, and the Citadels and safehouses you were hiding in were repeatedly attacked so your parents sought to take their protection into their own hands."

"They used the Fidelius Charm on their last safehouse?" Harry guessed.

Maia nodded. "With only Lord Dumbledore and I knowing of the location. Wait until I tell you everything!" She added hastily as Harry levelled his wand at her face. "I wouldn't blame you if you wanted to attack me, but at least do it when you know the entire story!" The hands that she had raised placatingly slowly lowered in time with his wand.

"Make it quick." Harry said coldly.

"It's not really a something that can be told in a rush, but let's have a go anyway." She muttered. "Everyone knew that me and your dad were best mates since our first year in Hogwarts, we were family really, so when their location couldn't be plotted and no-one on either side of the war had seen or heard from them in months, it became obvious that they were under the Fidelius Charm and that only I could be their Secret Keeper."

"Why were you the only option?" Harry demanded. "Didn't they have any other friends?"

"That's exactly what I wondered." Maia agreed. "Every spell, no matter how powerful, has a flaw and the fact that the Secret Keeper cannot linger within the confines of their own protection is the Fidelius'." Her voice seemed distant now, as though she were speaking to herself rather than to him, and her eyes were staring right through him. Harry could just tell that if he left right now, she would remain seated here, telling her tale to an empty room. "I had done my best to go into hiding, but it proved just as successful for me than it did for your parents. No matter where I hid, they always seemed to find me."

"You said there were traitors in the Corps." Harry reminded her, and she seemed almost startled to find him in the room with her. "Did one of them rat you out?"

"I was ratted out by a traitor, yes," Maia ground out, "But at the time I suspected all the wrong people. Those were a hard few months for me, filled with constant running and close calls. I never felt safe, but I made sure to never show it when I came round to see you three. James and Lily were never the kind of people to sit back when others were in trouble, especially if it was a friend who was in a tight spot, but it would have defeated the entire purpose of the Fidelius if they tried to help, so I put on a brave face whenever I visited."

If she was looking for sympathy, she came to the wrong place. "Would it have been so bad if you were captured?" Harry asked, bluntly. "The secret was hidden in your soul. They wouldn't have been able to get it out."

Maia nodded sadly. "I hope you never learn it from experience, but I've known plenty of Aurors who've cracked under torture and were blamed for it afterward. But the truth is, while everyone has different breaking points, no one can withstand torture forever and Voldemort's Cruciatus Curse made forever a lot easier to get to than it used to be."

Harry felt a twinge of empathy, but he quickly squashed it down. "You were scared?"

"I didn't relish the idea of being tortured, no." Maia said sharply. "But what really kept me up at night was the idea that enough pain would make me give up what little family I had left."

Harry didn't want to hear excuses about why she had given up his family. "Why didn't you just redo the charm and ask Lupin to be Secret Keeper for a bit? Keep the Death Eaters guessing?"

A familiar expression of guilt crossed her face, and Harry was beginning to realise that this witch was swimming in it. "While your mum and dad were on the run, Remus began to pull away from the rest of us, disappearing for long periods of time before reappearing at random. I noticed that a few of his visits coincided with your safehouses being compromised, so I assumed the worst."

"You thought Lupin was the traitor?" The idea seemed ridiculous in his mind. Even while he hadn't been speaking to him, Harry would never have assumed that Remus would be capable of such a traitorous act. "Wasn't he working for Dumbledore back then?"

Maia's head, which had been hanging in shame, shot up. "What?"

"He was spying on the wolves for Dumbledore back during the war." Harry clarified. "He told me over Christmas." He waited patiently for her to say something, but when she continued to stare blankly at him, he prompted her impatiently, "So what did you do to take the pressure off yourself?"

"We had a Healer within our little group, one we trusted with our lives." Maia explained once she shook herself out of her stupor. "She used to run around with your dad, Remus and me back in school and whenever we needed to be patched up in a hurry and didn't want our superiors to know and couldn't afford the time to waste on St. Mungo's bureaucracy, she was there to save us." Maia made a little noise of discontent. "We all trusted her with our lives, because she saved them all more than once."

"Who are you talking about?" Harry asked, his mind going to Hestia.

"Charlotte Pettigrew." Maia said the name as though it brought her pain to do so. "I asked her to switch with me, become the new Secret Keeper while I continued to be the obvious target."

"You turned yourself into bait?" Harry couldn't quite wrap his head around that. "I thought you were afraid of torture."

"I told you, I was more afraid of anything happening to the three of you." She reached a hand out towards him, but Harry quickly leaned away and she withdrew. "I was there when you were born, you know? Your grandparents had taken me in after I ran away from my parents, and while they and the rest of the Potters were laying down their lives in order to slow down Voldemort from getting to you, I couldn't help but wonder why." She said this almost apologetically, as though Harry didn't already agree that his life hadn't been worth the lives of his entire family. "But when I delivered you in that dark clearing, when I held you in my arms for the first time, I finally understood why your family was so ready to die for you."

Again, her words made him feel a sensation that he wasn't entirely comfortable with, so he asked her, "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I should have seen it then." Maia smiled sadly. "There we all were, Remus, myself, James, Lily and all the other Potters. There was only one person missing. Instead of our resident Healer delivering you, I was forced to do it myself."

Harry's eyes widened. "You think your Healer pal, Pettigrew, was the traitor?"

"It would explain why your grandmother's whereabouts were leaked the night you were born." Maia explained. "Why your parent's safehouses were always compromised and how Voldemort always seemed to be aware of their movements."

"And how he found them back on Halloween of '81." Harry finished. "Did my parents ever find out?"

"No. My best friends died thinking I turned on them," Maia said hoarsely, "and I was arrested and spent over a decade in Azkaban for Charlotte's crime."

Harry jumped in his seat. "Azkaban? You're an escapee?"

"Err…yes." Maia appeared equally as startled. "I thought you would have known that. They published the list of the escapees last June."

Harry grimaced. "I had a busy summer, so I only found out about the breakout in September." After a moment, he tried to shrug off his worries about his lack of preparedness. After coming face to face with their master, I don't think I need to worry about the riffraff.

Maia seemed to read his thoughts from his expression, or perhaps she was just sensitive about this sort of thing. "I escaped from Azkaban! Without outside help like the others too! You would think I would be a little more notorious." She seemed genuinely exasperated that people weren't more terrified of her.

"I think notoriety is the exact opposite of what you need right now." Harry corrected her, before adding, almost against his will, "You know, from everything I've heard about them, my mum and dad seemed like really good people. They wouldn't want you to tear yourself apart for something that wasn't your fault." Maia, expression sobered, and after a long moment, she simply nodded.

He had already decided against telling her about their true fates, as she clearly didn't already know. He didn't know how she would react, or even if she could be trusted with such sensitive information.

"There's one thing I don't get." Harry stated, and when she urged him on, he asked, "Why hide here, underneath the Dementors noses?"

"Because it's the best lead I've got." Maia sighed. "Charlotte was never suspected by the Aurors, because no one had ever questioned me. I was sent to Azkaban without trail or interrogation and little Charlotte got away scot-free."

Pushing aside her illegal imprisonment for the time being, Harry asked quickly, "She's still out there? Walking free?"

Maia made an unsure gesture. "Free from Aurors? Yes. Free from Death Eaters? No."

"What does that mean? I thought she was on their side?"

"Yes she was, but she was also the one who lead Voldemort to a trap." Maia explained. "Don't forget, he only went to Godric's Hollow that night on her information, and enough of his followers would have known that."

"So, for the last eleven years she's been on the run from Death Eaters?" Harry shook his head. "How do you even know she's still alive? They wouldn't have advertised her corpse on the front page of Wizarding World News."

"She needs to be alive." Maia ground out through gritted teeth, as her dark eyes danced with a mad rage. "Finding and killing her was the only thought that kept me going in Azkaban all these years. Hunting down an old friend isn't exactly a happy memory, so the Dementors couldn't take it away from me." Suddenly realising what she was saying, she snapped back out of it and said desperately, "I know how this all sounds, but you believe me don't you?"

Harry nodded, the certainty of his expression hiding the wariness he felt underneath. He wasn't sure what to think, and her constantly shifting emotions was making it more difficult to take her far-fetched tale seriously.

If he wanted to verify her story, he was going to have to speak with Lupin about it.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Harry had asked Maia to drop him off back in Hogsmeade, as he saw no other way to traverse the mountains and still make it back to school in time, and he departed from her gratefully, as he needed to alone with his thoughts after everything he had just heard.

However, even with a long carriage ride back to the castle, he was still wrapped up in his own thoughts, so much so that he didn't even realise that two individuals were hurrying towards him until they called out his name.

"Harry!" "Potter!" The sun had set while he had been within the carriage, so it took a minute for his eyes to adjust to the darkness, but he recognised the two from their voices alone: Terry and Susan.

Halfway through disembarking from the carriage, Harry froze with one foot on the step and the other on the Entrance Courtyard's cobblestones. It was strange enough to see Terry and Susan alone together but seeing them look so harried and the latter not giving any thought to her previous fear of being associated with them took him completely off guard.

"What is it?" He asked worriedly, finally putting both feet on the ground. "What's wrong?"

They came to a clumsy stop in front of him, breathing hard as though they had been chased quite a distance, and it soon became clear why. "There's been another attack." Susan gasped.

"What?!"

"It was that bloke you had a tiff with last term, and the first victim's girlfriend." Terry explained quickly. "You've got to find Flitwick or Hagrid or someone, cause she's blaming you for it. She's looking for you right now!"

Harry was struggling to keep up with this sudden deluge of information. "Who? Who's looking for-?" He suddenly stopped speaking, as the answer became all too clear.

There, silhouetted by the light from the Entrance Hall, was Professor Vector, and she looked furious.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

The next hour wasn't much fun.

Vector had dragged him off from the others and marched him right towards the Headmaster's Tower, refusing to speak a word to him the entire time. After his second attempt to question why he was being taken to see Dumbledore was met with stony silence, he decided to hold his tongue. It was clear that Vector suspected him and, if he were being honest, it was clear to see why.

The griffin statue admitted them without a password needing to be spoken, and that was how Harry knew that Dumbledore was already aware of the situation, making him feel relieved. He had been afraid that she was taking him straight to the Board of Governors, or worse, the Aurors. While Dumbledore was still an unknown quantity for the most part, and the reports of Slughorn's "accident" came at a very suspicious time, Harry knew that the Headmaster wanted him at Hogwarts for one reason or another, so expulsion was an unlikely outcome at this junction.

By the time he had come to this conclusion he was seated in front of Dumbledore's desk while Professor Vector made her displeasure towards him known. "Three of my students, Albus! Three! And all of them were known to have problems with Potter!" As she spoke, she paced back and forth in the centre of the room, having denied the Headmaster's offer of a seat as she was clearly restless.

Harry made a face at her. "If you knew that a group of Sixth Years had "problems" with a Second Year," he made air quotes around the word problems, "then why didn't you ever step in?"

Vector looked at him as though he were something she had found on the bottom of her shoe. "I think you've proven that your more than capable of taking care of yourself." She said coldly. "The three of them are in a petrified state while you sit here, without a single scratch."

While he had already begun to suspect that the Heir of Slytherin was deliberately trying to frame him for the petrification attacks, he still couldn't believe that an actual teacher was falling for it. "Myrose, Fredricks and What's-Her-Face aren't exactly beloved by the student body." Harry snapped. "There's literally dozens of people they've hurt who'd pay good money to have them get their comeuppance."

Vector looked incensed before, but she now looked as though she was going to outright attack him. "Her name is Holly Carter! If you're going to attack her then the least you could do is remember her name!"

Harry pretended to look confused. "So, considering the fact that I didn't attack her, does that mean I'll never have to pretend to know her name?" Vector took a step towards him, as though she was about to strike him, but she was stopped by Dumbledore's first word since they had entered the office.

"Enough." The Headmaster raised a single hand and the Arithmancy Professor stopped as though she had been put in a Body-Bind Curse. "I do not think that Harry is responsible for this. The boy has been in Hogsmeade all day."

"The attack happened sometime after curfew," Vector explained as she breathed through her nose, "their dormmates did not hear them come in last night or depart in the morning. Just because Potter was in Hogsmeade doesn't mean he couldn't have attacked them yesterday and went into town today as an alibi."

"No, it does not," Vector looked vindicated, but only momentarily as Dumbledore continued with, "but all the other Heads of Houses had ensured that their Prefects would keep a closer eye on curfew when it comes to W.O.M.B.A.T students through the use of shift rotas, meaning that I know for a fact that Harry did not leave his dormitory until curfew was lifted this morning and departed for Hogsmeade not long after. Your two Sixth Year Prefects on the other hand," Dumbledore continued, looking contrite, "were enjoying each other's company outside of bounds after curfew when they should have been enforcing curfew among the younger students. It was you who chose Mr. Fredricks and Miss Carter as Prefects this year, Septima. Do not blame a student for your own error."

Harry knew that he wasn't out of it just yet, but he would be lying if he said he took no pleasure in seeing a teacher being reprimanded for their unfair treatment.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Anthony could feel himself stagnating.

Since the day he saw Harry duel Marcus, a Seventh Year on equal terms, he had wanted to kick his training up a notch to at least match his fellow Second Year, but he had been denied at every turn. Marcus had been too focused on his own training, apparently aghast that Harry had nearly gotten the better of him, and the rest of the Marauders were either too busy or lacked the discipline he required from a training partner.

When he returned home for Christmas, Joan and the Commander had denied his request for a harsher training routine. Anthony couldn't understand why, as they had been all too pleased in providing him with aid during the summer holidays, and he told them as much.

"Well, we don't think distracting yourself from what's happened would do you any good, darling." Joan had said softly, as though wary of spooking him. Anthony knew that he had been on edge since June, but his parents had been looking at him with far too much concern upon his return to the Citadel.

"You haven't been to see Andrew since July." The Commander said bluntly. Joan elbowed him, but he didn't look abashed in the slightest. "He's your dad, Anthony. He wants to hear from you."

Andrew set his jaw and prepared himself for an argument. No matter what they said, or how they tried to guilt him, he would not go to see his father this Christmas, or any other until Vincent Lancer had been killed by his hand.

His stubbornness wasn't the only thing that made Christmas awkward that year. Terry had been cold to him ever since he hadn't gotten his way last summer, and Anthony had no time for his immaturity. Even though he was only a couple of months older than the other boy, Anthony had always been forced into the role of the responsible older brother when it came to Terry, and he was sick of it.

He had enough problems without Terry creating more for him to solve.

However, he had grown so used to seeing his little brother in a morose mood over the last few months, that his quick turn around at New Year's had caught him completely off guard. When the new term began, it became clear what was the cause of this change when Harry had cornered him and gave him an awkward apology for acting like a moody git all term. Terry, who always yearned for attention, now had Harry's completely undivided and he returned to his normal self.

On the last Sunday morning of January, as he left his dormitory and looked through the open door parallel to his own, he saw Harry and Terry sitting on the floor while the former was turning a glass of water to ice and back again while the latter was busy preparing ingredients for a potion.

They were both wearing pyjamas and snickering about something he couldn't hear while the floor was littered with sweet wrappings and empty bottles of butterbeer, so it was clear that they had been up all night and Anthony felt pang at the fact that he had missed out on a fun time with his friends, but he quickly squashed it down.

Forcing himself to turn away and head down the stairs, he also repressed questions that bubbled up within him, about the potion Terry was making or if Harry had used a premade Anchor to expand his dorm or if he had simply created his own like Anthony had. He didn't need the answers to those questions as they were meaningless to his life's purpose.

Vincent Lancer, Anthony reminded himself every day in order to keep the murderous rage close to the surface, nothing else matters until I killed Vincent Lancer. But that was only if he could find the bastard, and with the entire Auror Corps searching the world for him and his fellow Acolytes, it only had to be a matter of time.

As though his thoughts had been heard by a higher power, the front page of the Sunday edition of Wizarding World News had a familiar face on the front cover as well as the description of the grim murder of a Muggle family.

Experimented on for weeks. Forced to consume prototype potions that are torturous in nature. Children were not spared. All of it fit the modus operandi of his target.

It was happening now, years before he was ready. But even though he knew it was a terrible idea to hunt him down now and that it could only lead to his own torture and murder, every day spent without vengeance had become agony in and of itself.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Harry had expected the school's reaction to the second attack to be taken even more seriously than the first, especially as there had been two victims this time around and it was clear that the Heir's work was not just a one off with Myrose, but the student body seemed to be too focused on all the wrong details.

While Harry had been worried that more people would begin to think that he was the Heir of Slytherin due to having a member of staff, a Head of House no less, accuse him of being such, all anyone could talk about was what Fredricks and Carter were doing before they were attacked.

"I heard they were right in the middle of it." Su whispered to Harry in Transfiguration. Like the other Second Year Ravenclaw girls, Su hadn't spoken to him since the school year began in solidarity with Lisa for standing her up at the end of year party, but juicy gossip didn't seem to count in her mind. "They were taken to the Hospital Wing naked," she gave an embarrassed giggle at the word, "even though she's supposed to be with his best mate!"

That was the gossip Harry overheard being whispered around the next few days, as everyone seemed to think the entire thing was amusing rather than being concerned at the attack itself.

"It couldn't have happened to a nicer bloke." A group of Fifth Year Gryffindor boys were gossiping about it in the Library Tower at a dangerous volume. "I hope I'm there when Myrose wakes up and hears the news. I want to see him try and fight someone his size for once." The groups laughter was cut short as Madam Pince came over to shush them.

"First Myrose then Fredricks? I swear Carter has no standards." Cho Chang, the new Ravenclaw Seeker was telling her friends in the common room. "That's probably why the Heir of Slytherin went after her, to stop her from making such a mistake."

"Yeah," one of her friends snickered, "the Heir is all about charity work for the desperate, and who's more desperate than Holly Carter?" This time there was no Madam Pince around to stop the laughter.

Harry was amazed at the priorities of the teenagers in this school, as they all seemed more concerned with the scandalous nature of the attack rather than the attack itself. "I mean," he was complaining to Terry, "it's not like I'm not glad their diverting their attention from me, but how stupid are they?" He asked. "There's a thousand-year-old monster roaming the school and attacking the very house it was bred to protect and being commanded by someone who's identity and goals are still unknown, but they're just sitting there talking about some Slytherin love triangle. How thick can you get?"

"First of all, calling the drama between Myrose, Carter and Fredricks a love triangle is like calling a Dreamless Sleep Potion the same thing as the Draught of Living Death. Don't try to elevate their nonsense into something it's not." Terry said, as they strolled towards the common room. "Besides, I heard that they were caught in the Prefects bathroom together." He said this as though it were earth shattering news, but Harry merely wrinkled his nose.

"Why would they want to take a bath together?"

Terry shrugged. "I dunno, but they were naked." He said this with certainty. "I heard about it from one of my pals in Advanced Potions Club." He took pleasure in stressing the last three words.

Harry rolled his eyes. Terry never failed to mention that he was among the select few in Potions Club that had been taken aside for an elite group by Professor Snape. Rather than mention again that being one of Snape's favourites didn't make them an entirely new club, he instead asked, "Is that really more important than the school being under attack?"

"I think they're just using it as a way to distract themselves from the danger that we're all trapped with."

Harry grimaced. In today's edition of Wizarding World News, it had been announced that they were now imprisoned in the castle with whoever was attacking the student body, more or less. In more formal words, the Aurors were stretched so thin in trying to track down the escaped Death Eaters and clean up the damage they were causing in the Muggle world, that they were unable to sufficiently investigate the attacks happening in Hogwarts. Unless the Heir stopped petrification and escalated into murder, this was going to be treated as a cruel prank that needed to be dealt with by the Hogwarts staff.

"On the bright side, at least the Corps are giving Sprout priority on new Mandrake seedlings." Harry pointed out. "When I asked Flitwick, he said it will only take a couple of months for them to grow enough to be used in the Restorative Potion."

"Nine weeks." Terry said. When Harry stared at him, he added, "Just because you're too afraid to ask Snape, doesn't mean I am."

Harry rolled his eyes as they approached the diverging point. "Right, I'm off for training. See you later." Terry waved as he turned right for the common room and Harry headed for his training hall. When he entered, he was surprised to see Nicolas waiting for him.

"What are you doing here?" He asked, not unhappy to see him. "It isn't Sunday."

"But I did miss our last meeting, so I thought I would make up for it today." Nicolas smiled, even though it was Harry who had asked him to skip it so he could investigate what had happened with Slughorn's sudden demise.

"No complaints here." Harry said, as he removed his school bag. "Any findings at Azkaban?" He knew what the answer was going to be even before Nicolas began to shake his head.

"No, whoever was responsible knew how to cover their tracks very well."

"It was probably Snape." Harry grumbled. "Why else would Dumbledore keep him, a Death Eater, on the payroll?"

"We don't know that for sure," Nicolas said sternly, "and please tell me you haven't voiced your suspicions of Albus to anyone else."

"Of course not. How thick do you think I am?"

"You don't want me to answer that honestly, so you?" Chuckling, Nicolas dodged Harry's swipe before getting to the lesson at hand. "So, are you ready to begin?"

When Harry got through his entire exercise process without Nicolas voicing a single criticism, they moved onto Occlumency training, where Harry revealed his improvement. "It only works one hundred percent of the time when I'm meditating," he lied, not wanting to reveal anything about his bubble baths, "but I've had some success in doing it before and after sleep." Nicolas asked him to demonstrate, and even though he wasn't used to doing it in this environment and with another person watching, he managed to slip into the recess of his mind with far more ease than he had a fortnight ago.

"You know," Nicolas said slowly after testing Harry's new defence for himself, "I think you might be at the right level to begin conjuring water."

"I have been conjuring water." Harry reminded him. "You've seen my Water-Making Spell."

Nicolas waved him off. "I meant real elemental conjuration." Before Harry could ask what the hell he had been doing for the last month if the Water-Making Spell didn't count as elemental conjuration, Nicolas continued on. "Do you recall the characteristics of water?"

Harry nodded. "Adaptation, intuition and calmness."

Nicolas smiled. "You have possessed the former two qualities for as long as I have known you, and with you growing skill in Occlumency, I think you have the latter well in hand. At least enough to begin conjuring water." He added after a moment.

"How am I supposed to use this in the real world?" Harry asked anxiously. "It's not like I can begin meditating in the middle of a duel, can I?"

"My advice for this is the same as it has and will be for everything you ever seek to learn." Nicolas said reassuringly. "Practice, discipline and time. Nothing else will ever work."

Harry withheld a sigh, realising he should have known better than to expect a short cut to be revealed at this juncture. "Right, so I use Occlumency to put myself in the correct state of mind to conjure water over and over until it becomes second nature, and I can use it in a duel?"

"That's right, now close your eyes." Nicolas instructed, and when Harry obeyed, he began to speak in the same slow, soothing voice he used when he had first guided Harry into Occlumency. "Water is impossible to damage, as it forms around whatever impacts it and envelops it within its hold. It adapts to whatever space it is given, no matter how big or small, and it can wear down any solid given enough time and force."

Harry, who had receded into his mental anchor briefly in order to adopt the calming sensation, saw the images that Nicolas was describing clear in his mind. A pebble he had thrown in the river behind St. Greggs, the water from the kitchen tap filling his glass and forming into its shape, and the image of the eroded cliffs in the beach near Brightstone House.

Almost without realising it, Harry pointed his wand in front of him and said clearly, "Aguamenti!"

A torrent of water as powerful as a firehose exploded out from the end of his wand, the force of it causing Harry to take several steps backward, but his wand arm did not waver. The powerful stream collided with the wall on the other side of the hall and began to flood the floor, but Harry was too pleased with himself to stop.

It was only when Nicolas finally said, "Alright, that's enough," did he finally bring the stream to a stop with just a thought. "Well, you seemed to have mastered the Water-Making Spell, so I think we should begin to focus on waters changing state." Nicolas told him, as he wandered off to the sodden side of the hall in order to assess the damage. "Have you ever considered changing the physical state of water-?"

"Glacius!" Harry intoned, waving his wand with ease along the ground. While he had struggled with turning a glass of water to ice just a few days ago, he now froze all the water in the room with ease. Unfortunately, this had the side effect of freezing Nicolas ankle-deep in ice as he had been standing in the water when he cast the spell.

As his master cried out, Harry merely winced and called, "Sorry!"

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

A few minutes early for his six o'clock appointment, Harry knocked on Remus' office door and waited until he heard the "Come in!" from inside.

"Evening, Professor." Harry greeted politely, wanting to keep up appearances.

"Good evening, Harry." Remus said as he looked up from where he was grading assignments. "I'll be with you in a moment." Harry nodded and took his seat in front of the desk, trying to calm his nerves.

He wasn't sure why he was so anxious about this, as he wasn't even sure what outcome he desired, but his heart was racing even when Remus was finally finished with the last essay. "Sorry about that. I just really needed to get that done before tomorrow."

"I understand." Harry waved him off, as he was eager to move things along and get this over with. "Shall we get started with the lesson then?"

Remus hummed. "About that," he said in the same way he had whenever he was trying to avoid upsetting Harry when he was growing up, "I feel I must warn you that while I'm proud of your initiative in seeking out a solution for your Dementor problem, the Patronus Charm is among the most difficult spells for a sorcerer to master. There are many powerful and fully qualified sorcerers who have never even managed it."

While Harry didn't doubt that he felt the need to point something out. "The Auror Corps require applicants to at least conjure a non-corporeal Patronus in order to become qualified."

"For the rank of Sentry, yes," Remus agreed before explaining, "However, Cadets are not even taught the spell until their fifth and final year of training. You are only a W.O.M.B.A.T student, Harry. There's still plenty of time for you to learn this spell."

"I understand that it's difficult, but I still want to try." Harry said, before suspiciously adding, "Unless you don't want to teach me?"

Remus denied that immediately. "No, no, no, of course I want to teach you." He jumped up from his seat and waved Harry up from his seat and led him out of the room. "I just want you to be aware that success may not be in the cards for you today." Harry nodded along understandingly, smothering his sneaky smile. Remus had always been susceptible to guilt trips.

When they entered the Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom, Harry saw that the same massive trunk that had contained the Boggart back in October. "Is that how I'll be learning then? By fighting a Boggart Dementor?"

"Yes, so in a way it's fortunate that your greatest fear is represented by a Dementor, as the Auror Corps keep a strict control on their population and would have never allowed our personal use of it."

"Silver linings," Harry muttered, as Remus stood beside the trunk.

"Now, did you complete the reading I assigned to you?" He waited for Harry to nod before continuing. "Good, then tell me how one even casts a Patronus?"

"There is no wand movement aside from pointing your wand at the target, and the incantation is Expecto Patronum." When Remus did not look pleased with only that, Harry added, "Emotional control, intent and determination is paramount for mastering this spell, as intense positive feelings are necessary for conjuration but not so much that it interferes with your conjuration."

"Correct." Remus looked pleased even though reading was only the barest of efforts as far as he was concerned. "I take it you've practiced on your own?" Harry nodded, so he asked, "Any luck?"

Harry shook his head this time. "No even a wisp."

Remus wasn't the best at hiding his true thoughts, as Harry could clearly see him withhold a sympathetic wince. "Well, you've always done your best work when you're under a bit of pressure. Are you ready?"

Alarmed that this was already happening, but not wanting to show how frightened he was, Harry fumbled for his wand before drawing it out and nodding at Remus who in turn opened the trunk.

And just like that, Harry was returned to his own personal hell.

It was similar to his previous experience with the Dementor, but now that he had experienced both the Anguish of the Damned and the Hollow, it was enhanced from the horrifying things he had realised about himself there.

Harry, who had raised his wand when the trunk had been opened, was just about to lower it and give up if only to spare himself further pain, when he remembered.

His wand.

While each of those experiences had left their mark on him, they had also helped make him stronger in a way, teaching him resilience in the process, and this fortification was symbolised best by his wand. Their connection grew infinitesimally stronger with each horror Harry endured and learned from and he became a stronger wizard because of it.

I've survived this long. Whatever else comes my way, I'll weather it and become all the stronger for it.

Raising his wand at the swooping Dementor, Harry shouted, "Expecto Patronum!" A puff of silvery smoke was released from the end of his wand and, as though emboldened by this tangible result, the swell of proud determination in his chest grew even further and a sudden rush of silver vapor shot out and formed itself into a thin, fragile shield between himself and the Dementor.

"Yes! That's it, Harry! Keep going!" Remus urged, looking more excited than Harry had ever seen him, but as much as he would have liked to continue, Harry knew when to call it a day. He shook his head rapidly at Remus, and catching on, the Defence Professor whipped his own wand out and muttered the incantation. His wolf Patronus forced the Boggart-Dementor back into its trunk. "Well done, Harry! I never would have expected a W.O.M.B.A.T student to able to conjure a non-corporeal Patronus, especially on their first try. How'd you pull it off?"

Harry, who had stumbled over to a seat on the front row, merely shrugged as he struggled to catch his breath. The Mana requirement for the Patronus Charm was rather steep, but what really had him winded was the level of concentration that he had been forced to summon in order to conjure anything at all.

Still, he was rather pleased with himself. As he was a few months ago, he never would have been capable of what he had just pulled off, as he had been ignoring the obvious about himself. His experience in the Hollow had really helped him understand himself on a level he hadn't before.

He was a survivor. While that had been something he had been ashamed of previously, it was now something he took pride in. Enemies had tried their best to kill him, turn him, but he remained what he always was: his own man. This pride might not have been enough for anyone else to summon a Patronus, but Harry's barometer for happiness would be lower than plenty of his schoolmates.

"Would you like to go again?" Remus asked. "We have time-"

While Harry was pleased with his efforts on the Patronus front, he decided it was time to get to the other reason he had booked these one-on-one lessons with Remus. "Were you and my dad friends with Maia Black?"

Remus, who had been in the middle of drawing out a large bar of Honeydukes chocolate from his bag, dropped it on the ground as he stiffened in shock. Whirling around towards Harry, he asked, "Why would you ask me that?"

"Because she's in almost every photograph in the album Hagrid gave me." That wasn't a lie, so Harry felt no guilt in saying it with a straight face. "You were in Gryffindor together, right? The three of you and Charlotte Pettigrew?"

Looking as though he had been dreading this conversation for years, Remus nodded. "Yes. The four of us became very close during our first year and remained that way until that Halloween." He looked so anguished saying those words, that Harry didn't want to continue his line of questioning, but he knew that he must.

On the way back to Hogsmeade, Harry had told Maia that he would need to verify her story, so he asked her for a secret that only Remus would know. "Did they know you were a Werewolf?"

Remus looked for confused for a moment, before answering, "It was impossible to hide the truth forever from the people who I surrounded myself with, all day, every day. They figured it out eventually."

Harry waited for him to continue, but when he didn't, he prompted, "How did they help you?"

Remus raised his eyebrows. "Who's to say that they did?"

"I found my father's transfiguration notes in my Gringotts vault." He fell back on his pre-prepared lie. "He mentioned becoming an Animagus while he was still at Hogwarts. When you told me about your condition, I assumed it was to help you."

"That's a bit of a leap." Remus asked suspiciously, before sighing. "But yes, James, Maia and Charlotte became Animagus during our Hogwarts years in order to make my transitions smoother. During the full moon, Werewolves yearn for a pack and those three became mine. I stopped attacking myself, hurting myself and started playing with them instead."

"It helped you that much?" It seemed rather ridiculous when Maia had explained it to him, but Remus spoke as though it had been akin to a medical treatment.

Remus nodded. "Waking up to my friends surrounding me, knowing that there was joy on the other side of all that pain? Well, it made things easier to bear."

"Perhaps it's just my memories playing tricks on me but looking back I can swear that it helped me just as much as the Wolfsbane Potion does now." Remus smiled sadly. "I seemed to retain some portion of my humanity when my friends were there with me, and I came to rely on them for many years."

"What animal could my dad turn into?" Harry asked curiously. "His notes didn't say," he added hastily.

"A stag. It's why we called him Prongs." He seemed to miss Harry's jump at the name. Maia had told him the whole story, right down to how they got into the Shrieking Shack every month, but she had failed to mention this. "Maia was Padfoot because she would turn into a dog, and Charlotte was Wormtail because of her rattail."

Despite being gobsmacked at what he had just learned, Harry forced himself to ask, "Did you get a funny little nickname too?"

"Moony." Remus groaned at Harry sudden laughter and tried to explain. "I was twelve when I came up with it alright?"

"I'm twelve, and I think it's still stupid." Harry laughed harder while Lupin covered his face with his hands.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Later that night, as he was lying in bed, Harry was still marvelling at the fact that his dad had been one of the original Marauders. Hagrid had mentioned that he had been a bit of a troublemaker in his day, but Harry hadn't taken him seriously. How could a Head Boy be anything but a rule-abiding student?

Now, Harry had an image of a boy who looked like him but with the temperament of someone like Cedric Diggory, someone who was smart and responsible in front of teachers but had a bit of an edge to him when he was just with his mates.

Harry liked the idea of that, as it made the image of his father more real and gave him a standard that he could one day reach. Maybe.

Yawning, Harry thought it was rather amusing that his dad had been so fond of passcodes. First the Marauder's Map and then the letters that he and mum had left for him-

Harry sat up in his bed. There was no way, was there? But he couldn't find a reason why it would not be plausible, so he reached for his wand and summoned his cherry lockbox and drew out the two letters that he had given up on opening over a year ago.

With a shaking hand, he tapped the tip of his wand on the seals and whispered, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." Both seals broke.

Harry opened the letter that was on the top first and began to devour every word greedily. It read:

Harry,

I didn't want to be a mother.

I know that is an undeniably cruel thing to write to one's child, but please take solace in the fact that this lack of desire died long before you were born.

As you grew within me, so did my love for you. With each day that passed, I believed I could not love you more than I did in that moment, but the next day you would prove me wrong. When you were born, I fooled myself into believing it again, but you have continued to prove me wrong every day since.

As I write this you are upstairs with your father, where he's reading the Tale of the Three Brothers to you for the third time tonight because neither of us know how to deny you a thing, we love your rare smiles that much. That is why I want you to know, above anything else, that we would have remained with you if we had the choice, but fate tore our options from us a long time ago.

I wasn't always as happy as this. I was twelve when my parents were killed for the crime of birthing a Muggle-born witch, and ever since then I swore that I would only exist to ensure such a tragedy would never occur again. A lofty goal I know, but for quite some time the idea of forging a peaceful world was the only thing that allowed me to climb out of bed in the morning.

At that time in my life, my purpose was to one day become Magister of the Confederacy, the first Muggle-born Magister since the Great Uniter and his brother, and I desired to become so powerful that I could drag the entire world towards peace, kicking and screaming if I had to.

Now, as death nears for your father and I, I have come to accept that even possessing such a noble purpose would not have been possible if it weren't for your father and our friends, whose loyalty and patience I am still unaware of how I earned.

I didn't know it at the time, but the luckiest day of my life was when I was assigned to the same Auror Cadet Squad as your father and godmother. In the field, they saved my life more than once when I was at my most reckless after my parent's passing, and prevented my death wish from becoming a reality. I am pleased to say that I have returned the favour many times since, as I do not know what I would do without either of them.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because it's a parent's responsibility to protect their child from all dangers, even their own mistakes. As I am not there to guide you in person, then let me tell you just one thing that would have spared me years of loneliness and pain:

A life without companionship and love is a hollow one. Cherish those who cherish you, be they friends, family or lovers and you'll find that the burden of life becomes so much easier to bear.

I wasted years thinking about the state of the world at large, and it took me far too long to realise that my friends are my world. Your father is my world. You are my world.

I do not know if it is a blessing or a curse that you are unlikely to even remember us, but I do know what it is like to lose your parents at a young age, and while I cannot tell you that it gets easier, the pain does become more manageable as time passes. You'll learn this in your own time, I promise.

Even beyond death, I will be watching over you.

Your mother,

Lily

Harry read and reread her letter, at first not even taking any of it in, simply marvelling at how similar her slanted handwriting was to his own. When he finally read it all the way through, he paused, trying to let the weight of his mother's words, perhaps the last words that she might ever write, settle over him. But he couldn't. It was too much for him to take in right now.

Even though he was aware that it would do him little good at the moment, Harry knew that he wouldn't be able to go to sleep if he left his father's letter unread. He withdrew it from the envelope's confines and began to read much slowly than he did his mother's, wanting to take it all in the first time around:

Henry,

I named you after the man who raised me, my grandfather. I tell you this because you already remind me so much of him. How an infant could be so solemn, I will never know.

I've got you here with me now, playing with your toy Snitch on the carpet while you babble newly learned words at me. Cup and broom seem to be the favourites of the day.

Looking at you now, I cannot believe how much you have changed in such a short amount of time. Crawling, then walking, now speaking and it all seems to happen between the spaces of a heartbeat. I want to ask you to slow down, but knowing our time is near, a part of me wants the process to speed up, so that I can see with my own eyes what kind of boy you become, and what kind of a man you will grow into.

When I was a boy, my own parents were kept busy with their careers, so much so that it was rare event for me to see them both at the same time. I didn't understand why it had to be that way, and no matter how my grandfather tried to explain it to me, I didn't appreciate what they were doing at the time.

However, I eventually did. My father made enough gold with his potions so that I would never have to worry about money the way he did when his own father lost his position in the Wizengamont. My mother worked such long hours so that no child would ever have to worry about receiving a free education in the Esoteric Arts, regardless of their ancestry. In their own little ways, they were dedicating themselves into improving the world around them and it took me far too long to realise that.

Bring forth what is within you. Those are our family's words, and for many years I didn't understand them either. It was only when I went to Hogwarts, where I met the people who would eventually become part of my family, did I realise what it meant.

To bring forth what is within you is to bring forward the very best of yourself, the greatest version you could ever become. Alone, I was at my worse and I gave in to silly impulses and childish cruelty, but with those who I cared for, the people who needed me, I found myself rising to meet challenges and dangers in ways that I never would have thought possible for myself.

Only you can decide what will draw out the best of you, but if you care about someone then being there to support them will always be the right thing to do. It will bring forth the greatness within you, I swear it.

I'm writing this down because I know that we will never meet in person, and I wished to impart at least one piece of paternal wisdom to you while I had the chance. I wish I could write down more, but to do so would be to give you instructions on how to live your life, and that would rob you of the chance to make mistakes.

Don't fear making errors, because as long as you understand the consequences of your actions and make amends, they could lead to the best lessons you could ever learn.

Bring forth what is within you, Harry, in your own way. It is the only thing I will ever ask of you.

Your father,

James

Harry knew that he had lessons in the morning, but he couldn't stop himself from reading both letters over and over again, until both pages lay completely flat.