It was, Harry thought as he walked into the dining room, a slightly surreal feeling. The table had been put back together, and it held seven set places.

Snape sat at the head with Narcissa to his left, then Draco, then Hermione on that side. To Snape's right, an empty place lay, then Miriam, and then Gringwad.

Harry had been upstairs, trying to figure out what to wear for supper. He had gone through five shirts and three pairs of trousers until he settled on a dark red shirt, dark gray waistcoat, and black trousers. It had felt overly-stuffy in his room, but as he entered the dining room, he realized that everyone else was slightly dressed up as well, and he felt relieved at fitting in.

All eyes fixated on him as he sat, and he could feel the emotions churn: resentment, hostility, disapproval, pity, anger.

A few hours ago, in the privacy of the family room with Snape, Harry had felt assured and confident that everything would be all right, but now . . .

He raised his head resolutely. "I want to apologize."

The words sounded silly the moment he said them. Gringwad snorted and reached for his full wine glass.

Harry didn't even wasted time glaring at him. "I think I own all of you an apology."

"You think?" Narcissa raised one eyebrow. Harry looked away from her blazing eyes.

"I'm very sorry," Harry said the words slowly.

Nothing except for Hermione and Draco exchanging glances. Then Narcissa snapped her head towards Snape.

"You! You caved!"

A moment of stillness, and then Snape assented with a short bow of his head.

"You promised," Narcissa slapped her hand on the table. "You promised you would not cave to him, would not let wrap you around his finger like you always do."

"Darling –"

"Do not even start with me, Severus. Months of agony and searching and waiting, and you cave the moment he gives you those sad orphan eyes. He should be locked up in his room or sedated or tied up. Any minute now, he could alert the Ministry and they'll throw us all in Azkaban where we can't escape like this horrid boy here."

"We came to an understanding," Snape began, but she shook her head.

"No, no, we are not sweeping all this under the rug. We have all been hurt in one or another but his carelessness, his selfishness, his disregard –"

She faced Harry straight on. "I do not like you. You keep hurting people I love. I care about them," she reached hands toward Draco and Hermione, Snape and Miriam, "and you keep hurting them."

"I'm sorry," Harry leaned forward. "I thought leaving was the best thing, and I didn't realize the torture the Legilimency was causing everyone. I am going to make it up to everyone."

"You can't even give us promises that this won't happen again. I have seen evil, witnessed it firsthand, but you are worse. You are unpredictable, careless, rude, and selfish."

"I said I was sorry."

"You might be sorry," Hermione spoke up, "but we're still allowed to feel hurt. Apologizing doesn't wipe the slate clean."

"Maybe not normally," Draco put in his bit, "but Harry's not normal. A regular friend, sure, you tell them to shove off, but the Chosen One? What do you expect from the Boy Who Lived?"

"Don't call me that," Harry scowled.

"That's the point," Hermione insisted. "If you give him special permission to be awful, he won't correct his behavior."

"He's carrying Voldemort's magic," Draco argued. "We're lucky he hasn't blown us all to bits."

"That's nonsense. He's sitting right here, and he looks upset, but his magic is under control. We need to learn more, discover more about the magic. Research and logic, that is the answer, right, Harry?"

"Don't you want to study me?" Harry said blankly.

"To find answers. And yes, I was still angry this afternoon and treated you coldly. I accept your apology because I realized I was in the wrong."

"But you still want to study me?"

Hermione reached for her wine glass and took a few sips, not meeting his gaze.

"This is an adjustment period," Snape began, but Narcissa interrupted,

"You promised me you would not let him waltz back in here and become the center of attention again. You said we would not center our lives around one 17-year-old. You said we would make decisions as a family."

"But we became a family because he took us all in," Draco protested.

"We had to join together because the outside world hated us. And don't you talk back to me."

"I thought we were discussing how we felt about Harry."

"Maybe," Narcissa pursed her lips, "but you have to be on my side. Every time I look at you and see your deformed eye, I remember what happened."

Draco self-consciously raised a hand to the eye that Harry had replaced. "You . . . said it wasn't that noticeable."

"It's not," Hermione quickly said. "I can't even tell which eye was replaced."

"Are you blind?" Gringwad scoffed. "It's the eye with the diamond pupil that twitches. Have you tried a glamour spell?"

"I have!" Draco wailed. "It won't stick."

Hermione turned bright, wide eyes on Harry. "His magic is too strong for Draco to combat it. I knew it."

"You knew nothing," Harry said between gritted teeth.

"Don't you speak to her that way," Snape admonished.

"You used to speak to her worse than that at school," Harry tossed back.

"Yes, and I apologized her for that."

"Ha!" Harry almost bounced in his chair. "Apologies work. You all heard him."

"This is going nowhere," Narcissa glared at Snape.

"Where do you want this to go?' Snape asked.

Narcissa swept her eyes over the table. "Nanny, you haven't said anything. How do you feel?"

Miriam had been stiff and uncomfortable through the whole exchange, but when she spoke, her voice was calm and firm. "I think we have many issues to uncover and deal with, but we should address them one at time. These loud, unfocused fights only confuse and upset us. Perhaps we could eat dinner now and talk later as a family."

The implication in her tone meant when Gringwad was not present, and Harry nodded before he realized he had reacted.

Gringwad gave a short huff. "What molly-coddling manners you all have. I'll bring the food over."

They all watched Gringwad walk to the sideboard where trays of food were covered.

"Are the house elves not . . ." Harry trailed off when he saw Hermione's outraged look. The house elves used to serve each meal when Harry had lived there before, but he supposed Hermione had persuaded Snape that they could serve themselves.

The smell of fish hit Harry as Gringwad brought the tray over. Grilled cod with juices and oil swimming around the edges.

Harry glared at Snape, but save for a slight twitch of his lips into a satisfied smirk, Snape kept a blank expression.

The fish dish came around, but Harry passed it without taking a piece, holding his breath so as not to have to smell it. Gringwad soon returned with other platters: rice, vegetables, fruit, and bread.

"You know," Narcissa commented as she took a piece of fish, "I've heard muggles take cod fish oil for the health benefits. Perhaps we should add a spoonful to your regiment," she looked at Harry, "to see if you could benefit."

"Ha-ha," Harry grumbled, "so amusing."

He took servings of all the other food, wishing the aroma of the other dishes would overpower the fish. If he never took another bite of that wretched food, it would be a blessing. Gringwad must feel the same way; he avoided the fish as well.

He stole a look at Narcissa when she wasn't looking in his direction. She had all servings of food on her plate arranged with the largest amount—the awful fish—at the top and the servings in smaller sizes placed down an inch apart from each other. She reached for her water goblet and accidentally nudged the edge of her knife, but she re-centered it before sipping from the goblet.

Harry pretended to start eating but he kept his eye on her—not a difficult task as she sat directly across from him. The awkwardness of their situation, her hostile dislike of him, the fact that she was wearing that stupid ring . . . it all rankled him. She didn't belong here.

Maybe, said that horrid little voice at the back of his mind, but she probably has more right to be here than you do. She was invited. You just burst in.

Harry chewed harder, refusing to argue with himself (mainly because he was afraid that little voice would win). Instead, he looked at Snape.

The man seemed tired but accepting, that same way he looked whenever Harry got into trouble and they had a fight and feelings were almost right again but not completely healed. Awkwardness there too.

It was a shame, Harry reflected, as he jabbed a forkful of rice into his mouth, that he couldn't invent a spell that make his world less awkward. Magic had its limits, and even wizards had to endure feelings despite everyone wishing they didn't have to.

Narcissa kept her utensils arranged neatly as she ate, and the straight way she sat, the control she exercised in eating in a near perfect way, the rigid coldness of her demeanor—the impression was overwhelming. Harry could barely remember enough manners to keep Snape happy normally; he tended to spill his drink or drop food off his plate from carelessness, and once he had flung pudding out of his bowl when he was energetically describing a flying move from a close Quidditch match. Snape had usually admonished, "Stop making a mess," but Harry couldn't eat, talk, and remember manners at the same time.

He glanced down the table at Hermione to see how she was eating. To compare Narcissa to Hermione seemed absurd at first, but the longer he considered, they did have the common trait of becoming cold and distant when upset. Perhaps they both were exacting and controlling in their own way, a need to see their world through order and established rules. But Hermione wasn't so precise with her manners.

In fact, she was rather making a mess of herself.

She dropped her fork on the floor and clawed at the table, knocked her plate sideways.

She next knocked her glass over, one hand reaching for her throat in desperation. Trying to reach her feet, she scrabbled back against her chair, gasping as white foam gurgled up between her lips.

Harry froze as he watched her, but everyone was getting up, rushing towards her.

Hermione gagged, spewing up white bile and blood and then fell back into her chair, jerking in pain with tear-soaked eyes. The blood splattered up from her mouth again, dotting the white tablecloth with red.

"Out of my way," Snape said from somewhere far away. "Let me have her."

Time had stopped, the silence roaring in the horror of Hermione's agony, and then everything came into sharp clarity, the razor edge of the sense of being, the perception of life and its fragility as –

"I poisoned her fish," Gringwad said. He gave a half-smile, almost like a Satyr's mocking smile, the smirk of ancient evil.

The world went black.

The windows all blew out.

Hermione was dying. Hermione was dying, choking and gasping as Gringwad sat there, and it was too much, all of it.

Harry looked at Gringwad who was so close now, floating before him, a gloating monster who had killed Hermione.

The memories rushed over him, sweet Hermione who wanted to learn and to know, who needed to follow rules but broke them to help her friends, who hated seeing suffering, who sacrificed and loved with enthusiasm for others –

Harry drove his dinner knife into Gringwad's chest.

He held it in, the blade submerged, as blood soaked his fingers, but he was going to watch Gringwad die. And he was going to enjoy it. No fast Killing Curse – no, he would watch the man fade away.

Gringwad would die. And Harry would watch until the end.

And then he would incinerate the house.

After that he would go to the Ministry, and he would kill every person he met, every person that every stood in his way, that allowed someone to hurt those he loved.

The void of pain screamed in his ears as he locked eyes with Gringwad, but the man was still smiling. Smiling, almost laughing, with a knife in his chest.

The darkness kept pulling at him, almost like hands, but he wouldn't let go of the knife.

Gringwad gave a harsh bark of laughter, and Harry reached out.

He would take the man's eyes first. Once he held the eyeballs in his hands, he would reach into Gringwad's skull and ignite his brain on fire.

Something hit him on the back of the head. The darkness pulled at him, and then it wrapped itself around him. He was pulled back and down, a thousand hands on him, covering him like vines and pulling him down, down, into the pit of darkest night.

Something was touching his face.

Harry snarled, baring his teeth.

The touching was stroking him, calm downward movements down his cheeks.

He tried to lurch forward to bite, but he couldn't move.

"Shh, shh," a muffled voice spoke. "Shh, it's all right."

He squirmed in frustration, but the blackness had started fading away.

He could make out the dining room.

"Shh, shh, calm down. Calm down, good boy. Such a good boy."

Someone was stroking his face.

Narcissa was stroking his face. She kept whispering for him to calm down.

The late summer evening shone through the empty windows.

Harry blinked. He was in chair.

Snape, Draco, and Miriam all had their hands on him, pinning him to the chair.

Harry tried to move his head to look away from Narcissa, but he couldn't. A second later, he realized Snape stood behind him, the man's hands clamped over his ears, with his thumbs grinding into the back of Harry's neck.

But he could see Hermione. Hermione sat in her own chair, spitting blood into a napkin held up by shaking hands.

Gringwad had the knife in his chest, and he sunk down to the floor.

"Ah, the boy's very strong," Gringwad admitted. "I'm spelled to keep myself from quick death, but I'm going to need something to heal me up."

Narcissa looked up, and she must have had a response from Snape, because she turned and left the room.

"Hermione," Harry strained at the hands holding him, "she was poisoned."

"I'm fine," Hermione managed a weak smile. "Snape saved me."

"But you were poisoned."

The pressure eased off the back of his head, and Snape stomped around to stand in from of him.

"I'm a potions master," he barked. "No one's going to be poisoned in this house. What was the first thing I told you the first day of class the first time you were in my classroom?"

"She was dying," Harry tried to push off Draco and Miriam, but they didn't budge.

"Do not let him up. Stupefy him if you have to." Snape whirled around and went to Gringwad.

Narcissa was back with a vial, and she uncorked it and knelt down beside Gringwad.

"Hold still," Snape ordered. "I want you to swallow a mouthful of the healing drought, then I will pull the knife out, then you swallow the rest."

"Ugh," Hermione shrank back in her chair so she wouldn't have to watch.

Narcissa poured some of the potion in, and as soon as Gringwad swallowed, Snape grabbed the knife and yanked it out. Blood gushed out and Gringwad groaned, but Narcissa grabbed his jaw and poured the rest of the potion into his mouth.

A second later, the blood flow stopped.

Gringwad groaned again, slumping back on the floor, his hand over the bloody mess of his waistcoat. He stared up at the ceiling and then said, "I told you so."

"Shut up," Snape rose to his feet.

Narcissa stood, too. She shrugged and then tossed the glass vial away. It broke among all the glass from the windows, so much broken glass that half the room was carpeted in glittering, shiny bits.

"Is Hermione really all right?" Harry asked. "He could have used some new poison no one knows about."

"No," Gringwad didn't move from the floor, "it was a mixture of nightshade and belladonna, brewed to be fast acting."

"Why?" the word broke as Harry's eyes misted. "Why would you hurt Hermione?"

"I poisoned one of the fish. I knew you wouldn't eat it, and I avoided it so it was a matter of seeing who would eat it and be poisoned."

"But why?"

"Because I had a bet with your father."

Snape glared down at the older man. "I will kick you."

"Ah, please," Gringwad rolled to his side with an agonized groan, "he's going to find out. This afternoon, I discussed our situation with your father here. I told him that you would try to kill someone at the table tonight. He said that was absurd. I said if you if try to kill someone, I would get to stay here as long as I liked. I won."

"I did not make a bet," Snape was loud and insistent. "I said Harry would not be violent ever unless he were provoked or under the Imperious Curse. He clearly was provoked. You did not win anything. You do not get to stay here."

"If you turn me out," Gringwad staggered to his feet but immediately sat down in an empty chair, "I will march straight to the Ministry, ask for veritaserum, and then tell them everything that happened here. They will know he's here and he tried to murder me. I'm staying."

"You made him hurt Hermione!" Harry yelled at Snape. "She's not a pawn in your sick games."

"I am not playing games," Snape said. "I am trying to decide a course of action that does not get us all Kissed or thrown into Azkaban. You told me you would behave yourself."

Harry kept his face blank, pretending not to see the obliterated windows, the bloody knife on the floor, or the blood on the tablecloth and pretending he was not being held in place by Miriam and Draco. Draco's healed eye was twitching with the pupil going into a clear diamond shape, but Harry stared straight ahead.

Snape leaned against table. "This is exhausting. You're right," this to Narcissa, "it's too much. He's not safe, he's unpredictable, he's dangerous."

Narcissa looked down at her fingers. She had Gringwad's blood on them and she rubbed the ring clean before raising her head.

"No, he was provoked. I'm sorry, Gringwad, but you can't come storming into other people's houses, demand to stay there, trick your host into a bet he doesn't know he's making, poison a member of the family, and then pretend like you had acted nobly the whole time. I'm not playing by these rules."

A little of the tension eased out of Snape's expression, and Harry wondered if the presence of another adult was actually a comfort in the midst of such chaos. Narcissa might be demanding, and selfish, and bossy, but in moments of crisis –

"Furthermore," she went on, "you provoked a young man that was practically outcast from his family and just returned home and is carrying the dark magic of the most evil wizard of our time, and you made him think his friend was dying? His friend, who is the closest thing he has to a sister, gets poisoned, and you sit there smiling like a villain? No, absolutely not."

Every eye watched Narcissa as she put her hands on her hips, a woman radiating with righteous indignation. "You may stay tonight, but there'll be no money for you. You can't go to the Ministry because you didn't bring them Harry right away, so you're just as guilty as the rest of us. And now you owe Hermione because you can't poison her for the fun of it."

"The boy's hurt her, too," Gringwad tried to protest, but she shook her head.

"Harry hurts us inadvertently, which doesn't excuse him, but he's a careless child who doesn't think. You planned this, and you put the poison on the fish deliberately. You owe her. Tomorrow you can make an Unbreakable Vow to her for something that she wants or whatever she likes. I am done feeling helpless and at the mercy of fate, and it stops now."

Gringwad looked at Hermione and then gave a grudging nod.

Narcissa continued, "Nanny, Draco, take Gringwad up the spare room at the end of the west hall. If he's hungry, give him a filling potion. Once he's settled, go into the kitchen for dinner."

Miriam and Draco finally let go of Harry, and they warily approached Gringwad. After a short pause, he stood, put an arm around each of them, and allowed himself to be helped out of the room.

Harry stood up, not sure what to do.

"Carry your sister up to bed," Narcissa motioned to Hermione. "Make sure she's safe, and you can come help your father and me clean up this mess."

The clear instructions of her words wore away the last of the darkness in him, and Harry went gingerly, glass crunching under his shoes, to Hermione.

She tried to stand but wobbled.

"I got you," Harry swooped her up, bridal style, and carried her to the door.

"This is silly," she protested. "I'm too much for you. Put me down and let me walk."

"Shh," he kept moving, "don't let her hear you. She'll get on to you next."

Hermione reluctantly put her arms around his neck, holding on while he mounted the stairs and then pointing to the hall which led to her room.

He put her on the large bed in her room and looked around, almost awkwardly. "Where are your night . . . things?"

"Go out, and I'll change, and then you can come back in." When he didn't move," she reached into her pocket and pulled out her wand. "I'm one of the few people here who still has a wand. I'll summon what I need and when I'm decent, you can come back."

Harry obliged, going outside to lean against the wall and breathe deeply while she cast small summoning spells inside. Now that that darkness was gone and everyone was safe, he felt jittery and anxious, his eyes prickling as the memory of the table scene played, replayed, and played again.

A soft "Alohomora" unlocked the door, and he went in.

Hermione sat in bed, but the pale white of her nightgown only showed the ashen pallor of her face and hands.

"You were poisoned," Harry swallowed hard.

"Come here," she patted the bed. "Come sit beside me. You are going to promise to never tell Ron about this, and then you are going to tell me about the beach of Ghana, and you are going to talk softly until I fall asleep."

He did as she asked, and the room gradually darkened as twilight fell. They were interrupted twice the house elves, first to bring her tea and sandwiches and then to bring her more potions to drink.

"I'm almost to fall asleep," Hermione admitted in drowsy contentment. "I get to sleep and you have to go downstairs and face the parental front."

"Narcissa's not my mother."

"You heard her – we're a family now. I don't need another set of parents, but who could argue with her when she's like that? She even got Gringwad to shut up."

A ghost of a smile played on Hermione's lips. "I thought of something amusing."

"What?"

"You won't have to eat fish here ever again. No one will touch it after tonight."