I updated again in less than two months? That must be a record! As always, ignore the typos – if I waited until I had time to proofread and edit, you'd end up waiting another two months.

Words: 4,565

Chapter 13

16 August 1995. Godric's Hollow.

Lily and James Potter had attempted, with the help of Severus and Barty Crouch Jr managed to get the meeting under control [while Dumbledore hid giggles behind his steepled fingers and tried to look like he was not laughing at their pain]. They watched, unsurprised but a little annoyed, as the Dark Lord had rushed out after their son, abandoning his own negotiations, and had felt it prudent to bring an end of the meeting once the fighting was under control. They had achieved more than Lily had expected to at their first negotiation, and she would much rather make sure her son was ok now than wait in uncomfortable silence for the Dark Lord to return.

They flooed into Godric's Hollow to find one son unconscious at the Dark Lord's feet, arm snapped almost clear in half, and the other son shrieking uncontrollably while Lord Voldemort took his pound of flesh. James' wand was out and ready before his brain had even finished processing what was happening. Lily dropped to her knees beside Harry, hands and wand carefully running over his still form, cataloguing his injuries methodically. Lord Voldemort turned around with a snarl, his wand in James' shaking hands; he had been so absorbed in torturing the wretch who had dared to curse him, who had tried to curse Harry, that he had not even noticed there were other people in the room until his wand was ripped out of his hand. Tarrant stopped screaming, but kept making tiny, broken whimpers with every breath. James glanced quickly at his second son and then away, he could not afford to take his eyes off of the Dark Lord for too long. Fortunately for him, the Dark Lord's ire was diverted to his wife, when she softly asked what had happened.

"He needs to go to the hospital. I don't think I can heal this fully, and his has bruises on his right-side ribs and hip, I'm not sure if there is any internal bleeding but he is definitely bruised. I only have basic medical knowledge. He needs to," she trailed off, eyes watering, "he needs-" she cleared her throat and tried again. "I am taking him to the hospital. You are coming with me, but not like that."

She met James' eyes, looking up at him from where she knelt at the Dark Lord's feet, before giving a side-eye glance at their other son, and then to the Dark Lord. James understood perfectly what his wife wanted him to do (stay with Tarrant) and what she was trying to do (save Tarrant's life by distracting Voldemort with Harry's injuries). He gave an infinitesimal nod. Lord Voldemort melted away with a shimmer of magic that made James eyes burn if he looked directly at it, and by the time he finished blinking away the tears that had formed, Cadmus Gaunt had switched places with the Dark Lord. Gaunt also had Harry carefully cradled in his arms, the broken arm carefully tucked over his stomach, the other arm crossed over his chest to hold it in place.

"What happened?" Lily asked hesitantly. She wanted to know, desperately, what had happened to her children, but she was almost afraid enough of the answer to wish she had never opened her mouth.

"Tarrant cast the Cruciatus curse on Harry, but I was in front of him, so it hit me instead. When Harry tried to stop him, Tarrant threw him into the table and broke his right arm." The words were slow and soft, dangerously soft, and Lily almost hesitated to throw the floo powder into the fireplace if it meant taking a deranged Dark Lord out in public. "So, I liquified his internal organs. Fortunately for Tarrant, this was after I Cruioed him, so you interrupted before very much actually liquified."

Wide green eyes met James' hazel, and she threw the floo powder in and hurriedly called out the address for St Mungos. Unleashing him on the general public was better than keeping him in the same house as Tarrant, Lily thought unkindly, even as James frantically tried to figure out how to get Tarrant to St Mungos without the Dark Lord seeing them follow him through the floo.

Finding a Healer was surprisingly easy.

Lily had taken Harry to St Mungos 2 years ago after a one on one Seeker match with Draco had ended with Harry flying head on into a tree, and they had first checked if he was alive, then made them wait for 3 hours before a room was available – only after Harry had been moved to an empty bed did they actually search for an available Healer. Honestly, with the amount of charity support and funding St Mungos received, Lily expected more, but each time she was disappointed. Tarrant might be seen as an emergency (if James could sneak him past the Dark Lord), but Harry's broken arm would never be prioritised, so Lily had sat down stiffly while the Undersecretary continued to cradle her son beside the reception desk and prepared herself for a long wait. A tall, thin brunette in lime green robes with the symbol of a bone and wand crossed over the breast almost ran over to greet them; he moved so swiftly, that his shoes slid on the polished floor and he skidded to a stop beside the Undersecretary.

"Follow me," he said reverently, and Lily could hear the unspoken 'my Lord' that should have followed. Well, she thought as she swiftly followed the two men down the hallway, that explained the unrealistically quick service.

Harry would be fine, as it turned out. There was no internal bleeding, the bruises were healed with a paste on the skin and a potion for the internal injuries, and a small cut from where he had bitten his lip when he fell was healed with a small tap of a wand. The radial bone was vanished, and a batch of Skelegrow was administered with strict instructions for Harry to remain in the hospital overnight for observation, even if the bones grew back faster. There were 3 other empty beds in the room, but no one so much as popped their head in to check if they could admit other patients. The Healer left immediately after finishing his job, and disappeared back to whatever he had been doing before his Dark Mark had started to burn at Voldemort's arrival. Lily left the Dark Lord carefully stroking her son's hair while he slept: some instinct telling her that Harry would be safe, that Voldemort could calm down faster if he was left alone with his mate. He didn't even notice her go.

In a small private room in the spell damage ward Tarrant Potter was bound to the bed to keep him from thrashing while the team of three Healers undid the internal damage. He was suffering from the after effects of one of the Unforgivables, as well as early onset liver and kidney failure. He seemed to be missing most of his small intestine, which needed to be hastily regrown, and there was scarring on his heart (like he had suffered repeated heart attacks in his life but was actually from the spell attempting to liquify the organ but the Dark Lord being disarmed before the spell could come to fruition). His brain activity was steady, which was a positive sign, and James Potter clutched his knees to his chest in the small chair in the corner of the room and tried not to panic or interrupt the Healers with his concerns. Lily slid into the chair beside him after an hour, whispered that Harry was going to be ok, and reached out to squeeze his hand.

"What are we going to do?" James asked, squeezing his wife's hand back just as tightly.

With the Dark Lord who would probably want to try again to kill their son or with their son who hated his brother enough to use the Cruciatus on him, Lily wondered but kept silent. Now wasn't the time to start an argument and the Vow they made to Voldemort would prevent them from talking openly with others in the room. So instead, she just squeezed his hand again and shifted sideways to lean her head on James' shoulder.

XXX

28th August 1995. Diagon Alley.

The booklist for the upcoming OWLs year had finally been set and the students received their Hogwarts letters that morning. It was cutting it rather close, but apparently there had been a disagreement (or seven) over who would be the new Dark Arts professor. There had been some discussion about Barty (under his current identity of Professor Somner) switching from Defence to Dark Arts, but when the Board thought they had a chance of picking a Defence Professor it had led to a 3 weeks of arguments over who should be picked, who was qualified, who was a Death Eater in disguise, who should be sent to Azkaban instead of Hogwarts, and in the end Undersecretary Gaunt informed Barty that he would keep the Defence position ("Yes, My Lord, but I really wanted to-" "teach the Dark Arts, I know, Barty, but-" "Yes, My Lord, as you command."). Antonin Dolohov, an Unspeakable with a Mastery in Defence and Curse Breaking, was eventually picked as the Dark Arts Professor. That made Lily feel a little better: she had applied for the Defence position and been overlooked due to her heritage, but she had no interest or experience in teaching the Dark Arts, so this decision suited her down to the ground.

Unfortunately, the delay in coming to this decision meant that everyone fourth year and up was in a rush to buy their supplies. Certain electives were available from third year, but those like the Dark Arts and the Beginners guide to Curse Breaking (BCB) were available from fourth year for the OWL students, and Necromancy, Blood Magic, and the Beginners guide to Medical Magic (BeMM for short) were available in sixth year for anyone who had the inherent talent in those subjects. Harry, as he was going into his fifth year, would have missed out on the opportunity to take the Dark Arts as an elective for his OWLs if not for the fact that Aurors Moody, Black and Potter had vouched for him at the Ministry (on account of their private lessons) and arranged for Harry to take the fourth year exam at the Ministry on 21st August. Some of the Death Eater children had managed to secure a private exam session at the Ministry too, but ultimately it looked like Dolohov would be teaching a very small number of fifth years in his first year of tenure at Hogwarts.

Diagon Alley was packed. Harry had gone with Draco and the other Malfoys to buy his school supplies. They had most of their books, utensils, and robes purchased, Lucius had disappeared to collect potions supplies, and Narcissa had gone to collect as many sweets as she thought her precious son would need to survive until the Yule holidays (as well as small trinkets for both boys like she surprised them with every year). They needed specialised uniforms for their Dark Arts classes, and the boys waited patiently in Twilfitt and Tattings while the seamstress measured them for dragonhide battle robes while the elder Malfoys completed their outstanding shopping. Lord Voldemort had offered to help Harry weave runes into the lining of his robe as part of their last in person meeting before he returned to Hogwarts, and Harry was surprisingly looking forward to it, in spite of everything else that had happened between them.

Lily and James were at St Mungos again. They weren't allowed to stay overnight, but they tried to visit for a few hours every day (Lily tried to spend longer with her youngest son, because from September she would be back at Hogwarts full time and Tarrant would still be in St Mungos). He was healed and perfectly healthy, but the Dark Lord's stipulation for letting him live was that he needed to no longer be a risk to Harry's safety, and so Tarrant was in the mind ward of the hospital under the full time care and supervision of a Mind Healer. Therapy was not going well so far, but apparently that was a good sign – the Mind Healer had insisted that if Tarrant had gone along with everything easily then he would only be pretending to give them what they wanted, but the constant denials, sulks, and outright tantrums were apparently a common symptom of finally being told that you are not the centre of the universe. Fortunately, Mind Healer Wilkes was a Death Eater, and so was perfectly aware that Pettigrew had poisoned the boy's mind with thoughts of being the Dark Consort, and with pained attempts to avoid disparaging the Dark Lord she worked hard to convince the teenager that it was a good thing that Pettigrew was wrong. That the fault lay with Pettigrew and the Dark Lord for perpetuating the belief. But it was not Harry's fault, and it was wrong for Tarrant to try to hurt Harry because the Dark Lord was mated to him instead.

It was slow going however, and Mind Healer Wilkes had recommended keeping Tarrant full time until he was discharged – Hogwarts would have interrupted any process she felt that they had made. In fact, it might even make it worse, as Undersecretary Gaunt had routinely visited the school before and he would continue to do so but this time he had the Headmaster's permission (as much as Voldemort considered it to be needed) to spend time privately with Harry. It would not help Tarrant to see that when he was trying to heal.

Harry had been hesitant to agree to further visits after the disaster that was Tarrant finding out about his relationship with Voldemort, but his parents had signed the betrothal contract on his behalf and he didn't really have a choice unless he wanted to risk losing his magic and breaking centuries of Pureblood tradition. He had spoken with James and Lily, both of them had been understandably terrified to leave either child alone with a furious Dark Lord, and then he had spoken to Severus who had been the one to pragmatically point out the betrothal contract essentially forced Harry to at least pretend to participate (avoiding and ignoring was outside of the question). It had been Lucius though who had once again saved the day. He had asked Harry what he would have done to someone who had injured Draco while they were betrothed, or to Luna who was one of Harry's few actual friends (instead of associates), or to Elphaba his beloved familiar, or to Theo who was Draco's godbrother though due to Theo's shy nature and his overbearing father the three of them were not as close now as they used to be. Harry had asked first what that had to do with anything and then blinked twice before his mouth pursed into a small o of realisation. It was a little easier to forgive Voldemort after that, and the blatant concern he expressed when Harry had finally been released from St Mungos had done away with the rest of his reticence.

They had missed their scheduled Sunday meeting, but the Dark Lord had visited Harry in St Mungos shortly before his release and then waited impatiently for Healer Yaxley to discharge him. They both figured that in the circumstances that counted as an in person meeting. Now, just over a week after their disastrous impromptu revelation, Harry couldn't wait to see Lord Voldemort again. He just had to survive Diagon Alley first.

"Oi, Potter!" An unnecessarily whiny voice called out from the doorway. "What have you done to Tarrant?"

Harry and Draco turned their heads, keeping their bodies still to prevent needles poking into uncomfortable areas, to stare at Ronald Weasley. Behind him, glaring over each shoulder, stood Hermione Granger and Ron's sister Ginny. She was batting her eye lashes at Harry, and he almost asked her if she had something in her eye but Draco's chortle prevented it. What followed was a horribly uncomfortable twelve minutes of Harry explaining Tarrant was in the hospital (yes mum and dad know they are with Tarrant right now) with Ron and Hermione defending their friend's honour by accusing Harry of cursing his brother (and no Harry hadn't put him there but yes he has to stay there) while Draco sneaked in as many insults to Ron's intelligence as he could manage. Hermione was eventually prompted to move out of the doorway, taking Ron and Ginny with her, by two other customers snootily demanding entrance to spend their gold: the proprietress obviously chose to accept their gold instead of allowing children to drive off her customers, and made anyone not paying leave her establishment.

Fortunately, Narcissa returned to collect them shortly after and Ron's mother started calling for him from the entrance to Flourish and Blotts, so Ron didn't have the chance to gang up on them in the alley outside. Ron continued to moan about how Harry had clearly done something evil to Tarrant and they should go and rescue him right now (to which Molly repeated what Harry had already tried to explain, because Lily had told her personally that Tarrant had been admitted for long term care, blaming Peter's unexpected death for Tarrant's sudden and severe need for a Mind Healer). Ron continued to insist that wasn't true, and even tried to convince Percy to help them (even though Percy was only there because his mother had promised to buy him news robes for his new Ministry promotion and did not want to be seen in public with his rambunctious and often times rude younger siblings). Fred and George met each other's eyes over their brother's shoulder, shrugged their own, and silently lamented the lack of intelligence in their younger siblings. They snuck away to Quality Quidditch Supplies while their mother shook Ron by his left ear and scolded him loudly for all to hear.

XXX

27th September 1995. Hogwarts.

It was official. Dark Arts was an evil subject and Dolohov was an evil Wizard.

"This is your OWL year. If you are here it is because the Ministry saw fit to exempt you for a year's worth of studies, which means you will be expected to work twice as hard as the forth years who have started my course in the correct year. I will not tolerate any complaining, whining, moaning, whinging, or pitiful letters home begging for assistance. I would have cursed you in strange and irreversible ways but I have been advised by the Board of Governor's that that is not appropriate or educational punishment. Instead, the only assistance you will receive is being unceremoniously thrown out of my class for the rest of the year and whatever punishment your parents see fit for you once you inevitably fail your OWL exam as a result. You will also spend each of my missed classes in detention with Filch, who I understand does have permission to use corporal punishment on repeat offenders."

Dark blue eyes had skimmed from one student to the next, mixed between all of the houses as there were so few students in fifth year, and narrowed on the one Gryffindor who had managed to get into his class. Parvati Patel sat next to her twin sister Padme who was the second Ravenclaw to make it into the class, along with Anthony Goldstein. Susan Bones (the niece of Amelia Bones) was the only Hufflepuff who had been able to take and pass her exam at the Ministry to ensure a place in the class this year. But every Slytherin student was present. They were not glared at or talked down to and only rarely used to test the curses when enlarged spiders proved inefficient: it wouldn't do to torment his Death Eater comrades' children after all.

They had only had three lessons so far but already Harry had 15 feet of parchment due for four different essays and they had been expected to learn and demonstrate each of those four curses. He was half looking forward to testing out the curses (under the supervision of Professor Dolohov and Undersecretary Gaunt who always made time to 'supervise' the fifth year Dark Arts class) on other students, but he was never selected to act as the test subject (never ever would Dolohov condone the torture of the Dark Consort and expect to live; well, maybe he would live for a little while, but he would much rather die quickly than live through whatever the Dark Lord would put him through). Most of the curses required access to the Restricted Section of the library, which meant that these handful of students had a signed pass from the Professor valid as long as they attended and participated in his classes. Harry was currently sitting at a table as close to the Restricted Section as he could manage, while Draco dived between the stacks trying to secure the books they needed to complete their last 4 foot essay.

Granger sat 6 tables away glaring furiously at the discrimination that was rubbed in her face on a weekly basis. She had not known she could sit exams at the Ministry over the summer, and when she had complained to Mrs Weasley about it the woman had patted her on the shoulder, laughed softly, and declared that there was no way a nice girl like Hermione would have been able to pass an exam on the Dark Arts with a month's notice anyway. The Goldsteins and Patels came from dark families and the Slytherins were all baby Death Eaters and Harry had received personal lessons from Mad-Eye Moody as the Boy-Who-Lived so of course they had all managed to pass the exam with little notice and no formal education, but there was no way according to Mrs Weasley that Hermione would have managed to pull it off. It was just one more example of the discrimination Muggleborns faced in the Wizarding World as far as Hermione was concerned. If Tarrant was at Hogwarts, Hermione was sure he could have convinced his father to get them both testing slots at the Ministry, but Tarrant wasn't here, and because Hermione was not sitting an OWL she was barred from taking the Dark Arts at NEWT level next year. She hated it. There was nothing she could do about it though, except study hard and work her way up inside the Ministry until she could change everything so that Muggleborns were no longer pushed out and left out like she had been.

Harry ignored the eyes burning into the side of his head in favour of skimming furiously through the two books that he had grabbed before swapping places with Draco. So far there was nothing about the 'purple curse' Dolohov had assigned them to write a 4 foot essay on the effects of and how the curse is formulated. Harry was due to see Voldemort tomorrow, and at this point was ready to beg for his help since the essay was due in three day's time. Draco however was determined to find the answer for himself (spoiler he would not be able to because Dolohov had invented that curse himself at the height of the last war and while Voldemort would recognise and be able to explain how the curse had been invented the only students with any hope of doing so would actually be seventh year Necromancers, of which there were none yet). Draco eventually caved and begged Harry to share the answers with him the following night in their dorm after Harry had cajoled Voldemort into explaining it to him first.

The two of them, and Theodore Nott who hoped to get into the Necromancy class for NEWTs next year, were the only ones who were able to turn in an essay (though no one had managed to write 4 feet). Despite Dolohov's attempts to teach them the theory behind that curse (and his separate promise to teach it to Harry properly) only Harry and Theo seemed to understand the concept of combining Necromancy with a flesh eating curse to make it irreversible and lethal. Both of them would be recommended for the elective next year, taught by an Unspeakable who insisted on wearing their Unspeakable robes at all times and went by Rook to protect their anonymity. Dolohov knew who it was of course, they had also worked together in the Department of Mysteries and both were Death Eaters, but he agreed that some roles required privacy more than others and he did not begrudge his colleague theirs.

XXX

12th November 1995. Hogsmeade.

They had exchanged their mandatory 3 letters a week since Harry had returned to Hogwarts and they had met twice so far in person. However it was a Hogsmeade weekend and Lord Voldemort had been unable to resist the desire to ask his mate if he could accompany him (despite their next meeting not due to occur until the end of the month). Harry had agreed, and now here they were, awkwardly sitting opposite one another in a private room at the Hogshead pub on their first official date.

Voldemort sighed. They were able to have intelligent, flowing conversations through letters, and when Undersecretary Gaunt randomly dropped in on Harry after class he bantered and teased like he had done before Harry knew he was Voldemort's mate. But for some reason using the word 'date' had turned Harry into an awkward ball of nerves. He clutched his butterbeer with both hands and kept his eyes lowered as his cheeks got steadily pinker as the silence stretched on.

"There is no need to be nervous," Lord Voldemort whispered. He brushed his dark hair out of his eyes, then reached out to pry one of Harry's hands off of the bottle so that he could hold it in his own. "This is just like every other meeting we have had. Nothing is different. Nothing has changed."

Harry looked up with wide green eyes and Voldemort got lost staring into them. He forgot what he was going to say, what he planned to do, because all that mattered was Harry staring at him so trustingly, so beautiful, and he couldn't have stopped himself even if he tried. Undersecretary Gaunt leant over the table, one hand still curled around Harry's hand, and the other reached out to cup his cheek. And then he kissed him.

It was a soft, careful brush of his lips against Harry's own, but the boy pushed into it, tilting forward in his seat to get closer instead of pulling away. It was nothing like the wild kissing that Voldemort had dreamt of, it wasn't hot and aggressive like his wanking fantasies, Harry wasn't crawling into his lap and begging to be fucked, and yet somehow it was better than anything he had previously imagined possible. Harry moaned softly, and tried to chase after Voldemort's mouth when the Dark Lord pulled away.

"That was nice," Harry declared, cheeks still dark pink.

"Very nice," the Dark Lord agreed, before leaning forward to steal another kiss.

XXX

I was meant to go to sleep 3 hours ago, for work tomorrow. But I guess not. Enjoy!