Chapter Fifteen

Accidental Legitimacy … Again

Harry couldn't even look at Charlie Weasley during his Care of Magical Creatures lesson—how could Charlie fall victim to Tabitha's lies? Would he feel guilty when he found out who she really was? But Charlie and Hagrid carried on a very interesting lesson about Swedish Short-Snouts, with Charlie giving no indication that he felt he was being deceived by anyone.

Harry arrived at Defense Against the Dark Arts later that morning with a desire to send Tabitha flying across the room again, straight into her desk. She looked a little peaky today, but then she had been on Monday, as well. It would be even easier to catch her off-guard ...

But Harry kept to himself. Their planned practical lesson was to be postponed, Tabitha told them, her skin pasty, her eyes bloodshot. She must have seen her parents' pathetic faces in The Daily Prophet today, Harry thought bitterly. They were to read directly from the book.

Her room was hot and stuffy, odd considering the crisp, cold air outside. Despite his best intentions to glare at Tabitha all class, Harry felt himself drifting to sleep. He tried to keep himself awake, but Tabitha was sick. She wouldn't notice if Harry just rested his eyes for a moment ...

Because of his rigorous Occlumency practice, he hadn't dreamt in nearly a month. Yet he was at his parents' wedding again. In fact, it was the same dream he'd had that night at Grimmauld Place. He yelled when the little girl conjured up the Dark Mark that swallowed her mother and Sirius and Harry's parents, but this time no one woke him—he could hear her speak ...

"You killed my parents." She did not sound like a little girl. She threw the wand down. It landed at his feet. Horrified, Harry saw that it was his wand ... his wand had killed them ...

"I didn't kill them!" he screamed. "You did! You killed my parents! You killed Sirius! You killed them! You killed them!"

He suddenly found himself very much awake, struggling out of Tabitha's firm grasp. He opened his eyes and found himself face-to-face with her, still screaming, "You killed my parents!" Then he was slammed with an onslaught of images ...

The little girl—the one from his dreams, with the dark hair and the dark, piercing eyes—was giggling as a man with sleek, stylishly messy black hair tickled her ... it was Sirius, tickling Tabitha, buying her ice cream, bringing her to the home of their cousin, a little girl who could change her appearance at will ... and there was a terrified Tabitha, clutched in Sirius' arms as they approached a large, beautiful house with a ghastly green skull suspended over it. Harry could feel Sirius' anger swell up just as Tabitha felt it ... and finally, there was Tabitha, perhaps ten years old, clinging to Sirius' back as they flew over London on his gigantic motorcycle, landing beside a house that had been reduced to nothing but a pile of rubble ...

Harry felt himself being propelled backward. He slammed into the desk behind him as Tabitha broke the Legilimency he was using on her.

"Everyone out!" Tabitha barked hoarsely, her eyes wide with terror. She looked even paler than she had earlier. "You, too!" she told Ron and Hermione.

She sank onto the floor beside Harry, trembling. Ron and Hermione shoved the Slytherins out of the room and shut the door behind them. Harry could almost sense the entire class gathering around the door, trying to hear what was happening.

"How dare you!" she screeched. "How dare you use Legilimency on me. To think, I defended you against Snape this summer when he said you used his Pensieve to see his memories ... I said you would never do something like that ..." Tabitha let out a long, shuddering breath.

"How would you know?" Harry said coldly. "You only met me three months ago."

"I know you much better than you could ever imagine, Potter," she spat in an icy voice.

"You killed my parents," Harry croaked. She stared at him, silent. "In my dream. And Sirius. And someone else. I thought she was your mother, but she can't be. Because I know who you are."

Tabitha nervously ran her hand through her dark hair in a manner reminiscent of James Potter—at least from what Harry had seen in the Pensieve last year. She gave a short laugh. "Oh? Who am I then, Harry?"

"You're Bellatrix Lestrange's daughter," Harry said. "You look just like her and you hate me and I saw your memories just now. I know Bellatrix and Sirius and Tonks are all cousins and you were with them, just now in those memories ..."

Tabitha let out a high, nervous laugh. All of her cool composure was gone. "Come on, Harry," she said shakily. "Bellatrix Lestrange? Why would you have seen me with Sirius just now? She hated my father!"

She clapped her hand over her mouth, her eyes wide with the realization of what she'd just let slip.

The little girl at the wedding. The pink-clad baby James and Lily were holding in that picture. She was Tabitha. She was Sirius' daughter.

Harry suddenly felt sick. Tabitha hated him because Sirius died trying to save Harry. That's what Dumbledore had meant ... as if Harry didn't feel guilty enough, here was Tabitha, hating him for the very reason he hated himself. She wasn't a Death Eater, she didn't work for Voldemort; she just hated Harry because her father was dead.

But she couldn't be Sirius' daughter. She was far too old, and Sirius would have surely told Harry that he had a daughter.

"I don't believe that," Harry said. "You're trying to trick me. I saw Bellatrix Lestrange's picture in The Daily Prophet today. You look just like her."

"I look like a Black," Tabitha replied coolly. "My cousin Bellatrix and my father and I look like my great-grandfather. Our cousin Andromeda looks just like us, too, in case you were curious."

Harry shook his head. "Sirius would have told me that he had a daughter."

"He didn't want to tell you until you could meet me," Tabitha said. "Actually, he didn't want to tell you until he was sure I didn't hate him. It was very hard for me, Harry," she continued, tears springing into her eyes.

"And it wasn't for me? Do you think you've made it easier for me?"

"No. I know I haven't. I know all about your first year here ... everyone staring and gawking at the famous Harry Potter. Well, I went to Hogwarts when that scar was still fresh in the minds of every witch and wizard in Britain. As a Black, looking just like my father and my cousin, people knew that I was one of those Blacks. It's not easy being the daughter of a famous murderer and—"

She looked away. "And?" Harry asked. "Who was your mother?"

Tabitha wiped her eyes and began to speak, her voice shaking, "She died fifteen years ago today."

"The same night as my parents," Harry whispered.

Tabitha nodded. "You know, I was in Egypt when I found out Dad had escaped Azkaban. By the time Remus wrote me to assure me he was innocent, I was working in Africa, and then South America. So Dad flew down there on Buckbeak and I hid him. I hadn't seen him in almost thirteen years ..." Tabitha stopped to wipe thick tears from her cheeks. She looked as if she was wasting away; her cheeks were sickly white and sunken in, making her eyes appear even larger and darker. She looked just like Sirius has after he escaped from Azkaban. "I didn't speak to him for a long time. We lived together, but I couldn't bring myself to speak to him. I knew, even when I was a nine-year-old girl, that he couldn't have killed all those people, but I knew it was his fault he was in Azkaban. He never thought before he acted. If he'd thought about it, he'd know it was a bad idea to go after Peter Pettigrew ..."

Something suddenly clicked in Harry's mind. "Phineas Nigellus," he said softly. "He's your great-great-grandfather?" Tabitha nodded. "He said Sirius gave up being Secret-Keeper for my parents to protect someone. He meant you, didn't he?"

Tabitha nodded miserably. "Dad knew Voldemort would go after him first. So Dad and Uncle James decided it would be safest for us—you and me—if Peter Pettigrew were Secret-Keeper. U-uncle Peter was always so eager to please them that they never imagined he would double-cross them. Dumbledore cast the spell, making Uncle Peter Secret-Keeper, and he put a different kind of protective spell on me and Dad, and my mother."

"Who—who was your mother?" Harry asked again.

"We were in Godric's Hollow." Harry knew that he and his parents lived in Godric's Hollow until they were killed. "My mother was visiting with Uncle James and Aunt Lily. She hadn't seen you in months. My father and I were flying around on his motorcycle. He saw something and got very tense all of a sudden and started flying straight down towards the ground. We landed in front of your house, but I didn't even realize then that it was their house. It was destroyed, a great smoking pile of debris, with the Dark Mark towering over it. Even if the house had been standing perfectly still and quiet and intact, I would have known what that mark meant. I was only nine, but I already saw it once before. Hanging over my great-grandfather's house. Everyone was dead then, too."

Something clicked in Harry's mind. One of the memories he'd just seen reentered his mind: Sirius, holding a very young Tabitha as they approached a beautiful home with a green skull suspended above it.

"Besides, I haven't got a family for the Death Eaters to slaughter. I can't believe Dumbledore trusts Snape after that. After he did that to Lily and James …"

"Tabitha, your mother … was she related to my family?"

Tabitha looked at Harry and nodded slowly. "My grandfather was the first Squib ever born to the Potter family, and one of the first to ever hold a high position at the Ministry of Magic. He was on business in the United States when he met my grandmother. He married her and worked in Muggle Relations for the Federal Bureau of Magical Secrecy in the US for a few years. When my mother, Laura, was born, they moved to Ireland and my grandfather started working for the Ministry again. Your grandfather, Frank, was Grandad's baby brother. They were very close, and so were Uncle James and my mother. That's how she met Sirius.

"They were in love the moment they met. That's always what they told me. They were eleven then, and Dad always spent his holidays at Uncle Frank's. He and Mum married during the Christmas holidays of Dad's seventh year. That's was Dad's final blow to his family, who were still trying to get him to 'come around' to the Black mindset, even after he officially left home. Once he married a Muggle, that was it for them." Tabitha laughed. "They didn't expect to have me so soon, just a year later. They were young, but they had money to live on and they were in love. Neither of them had to work, so we all lived in London for a time. But then Dad got worried about Voldemort. He didn't think we'd be safe, so Mum and I moved back to Dublin with my grandparents. Dad visited when he wasn't doing work for the Order, but our trips to London were very rare." Tabitha took a deep breath and looked Harry right in the eye. "She wanted to see you. Aunt Lily kept telling her about how you were walking and starting to talk, so we flew to London, and Dad took me out. And Mom ... well, she was just a Muggle blocking Voldemort's path to Harry Potter." A bitter tone had crept into her voice at this point.

"So you lost your parents the same night I did," Harry said angrily. "How can you blame me for Voldemort killing your mother? My parents died because Sirius was trying to protect you when he gave up being Secret Keeper for my parents!"

"And that was wrong of him, to want to protect me and my mother. Your mother died to protect you!"

"I just don't understand how you can blame me for all of it. I was just a baby."

"Because it was the easy thing to do," Tabitha said simply. "If I inherited one thing from my father, it was my irrationality. And besides, even if it wasn't your fault that my mother died and that my father went to Azkaban, it is certainly your fault that he died last spring," she said sharply. "You were far too busy snooping around other people's memories to bother with your Occlumency lessons, and you ended up getting my father killed. Do you know what it's like to get your father back, Potter, but have to see him in secret and then lose him again after two years? And to have to find out the way I did ... they didn't even tell me until that day that we arrived at Grimmauld Place, did you know that? I last saw Dad in March. I stayed with him for three weeks, but I had to go to Australia and then back to South America for work. The Order wasn't allowed to send me owls because I either wouldn't find me or they'd be intercepted by the local magical governments. Finally, I was taking a short break at my grandparents' summer house in the States when an owl came from Remus, saying I had to go to Grimmauld Place as soon as possible, and pick you up on the way." Tabitha shook her head. "I couldn't talk to Remus or Tonks for days. I was so angry with them ..."

"But you did talk to Lupin," Harry said. "I overheard you both, talking about being glad you 'didn't wait' for something, and then you brought up my parents' wedding. Lupin's already told me that the two of you aren't married, but he couldn't say what you were talking about. He said it 'wasn't his place.'"

Tabitha actually looked amused. "You thought Remus and I were married? He's like my father! I've known him since I was just a baby ... he's the one I talked to when Dad was in Azkaban. And besides, he fancies my cousin."

"Then what were you two talking about?" Harry asked.

Tabitha looked slightly embarrassed. "I shouldn't be telling you, Potter, not before we tell his family ..."

"Not Charlie?"

Tabitha looked shocked. "How did you know?"

"Ron and I saw you. Down at the Quidditch pitch … we saw you kissing."

"We're married," she said softly. "But very few people know. We had a Muggle ceremony last year at my grandparents' house in America. We wanted a large wizard ceremony in the spring, but now that Voldemort's back, I don't think we're even going to bother."

"Did—did Sirius get to go?" Harry said. As much as he—still—disliked Tabitha, he hoped, for Sirius' sake, that the answer was 'yes.'

She nodded, tears pouring down her cheeks. "It's silly," she said with a laugh. "But I was happier standing beside him than I was standing beside Charlie. I think it's because I knew I'd have Charlie forever, and my father's job was to give me away when he'd only just gotten me back. I was also scared that day that, somehow, he'd be caught. It was the first time since going back to Grimmauld Place that he'd left the house for so long. But we were so far from London, and Arthur and Bill and Remus were there to keep things in order—"

"The Weasleys were there?"

"Just Molly, Arthur, and Bill. None of the other children know Charlie and I are even together—except Ginny. She—"

"I know," Harry interrupted. "She and Hermione told Ron and I that they saw Charlie at your flat."

They looked at each other for a moment. "Well," Tabitha finally said. "I don't expect us to be best friends now, Harry. I won't ask you to forget how I've been treating you. I'll try to be nicer, really."

Harry looked at her, for the first time looking for evidence of the Potters in her. Crying had brought some color into Tabitha's sunken, mourning face. He couldn't believe that—finally—he'd found a relative other than the Dursleys, and it was Tabitha. Finally, struggling a bit with his words, Harry said, "So you don't really hate me?"

"No," she said softly, "I try to. It's horrible to say, Harry, but I need someone to be angry with, and you're the easiest person for me to hate. Voldemort's not here, Uncle Peter's not here, Bellatrix is not here. It's not like you're the only family I have left. I have my grandparents and I have Tonks and my cousin Andromeda ... and though they don't count for much, I have Bellatrix Lestrange and Narcissa and even Draco Malfoy ... I'm not alone in the wizarding world, the way you are. I know I should be sympathetic and I should be nice to you because I am your only wizarding family, but it's hard." She sighed.

"Tell me more about your years at Hogwarts," Harry said. "Why did you switch houses?"

"Who told you that?" Tabitha asked sharply.

"Hagrid. He told me you were a Slytherin, and then a Gryffindor."

Tabitha nodded. "I was. I was, very strongly, a Slytherin when I was Sorted. It was in my blood. And the Slytherins, well, most of them, like the rest of the school, thought I was a treacherous murderer just like they thought my father was. They were terrified of me. A few of them downright hated me, because they were the children of Death Eaters, and they thought Sirius Black had betrayed Voldemort. They thought my dad set him up to be destroyed at your house the night he killed your parents and my mother. My grandfather encouraged me to use the name Potter, but that was nearly as bad. No matter what I did, I was associated with what had happened the night Voldemort was destroyed. Not to mention that Snape had just become Head of House, and he hated me, for the same reason he hates you, because our fathers tormented him in school."

"How did you come to spend time with Hagrid?"

"He was a kindred spirit, in a way. He knew what it was like to be an outcast, and I loved helping him with his creatures. Charlie was always there; that's how we met." Tabitha smiled. "I fell in love with him when I was only eleven, just like my mother and father. After that awful first year, I asked Dumbledore to let me leave Slytherin. He re-Sorted me in his office, and I begged the Sorting Hat to change its mind. I wanted to be in Gryffindor. I knew I was brave enough and strong enough, even if I wasn't brave enough to endure six more years as a Slytherin."

"And the Sorting Hat put you in Gryffindor?"

"In a second. Best decision it ever made, too. I came back to Hogwarts my second year as a Gryffindor, with the name McNoira. Bill and Charlie were several years older than me, but they were my only friends for a while. Charlie and I became even closer after I made the Quidditch team. I loved being a Beater. I ended up with a lot of people who admired my Quidditch playing, but I still didn't have very many friends. Tonks was in my year, but she was a Ravenclaw and we hardly ever saw each other."

"Fred and George said you were a real troublemaker," Harry said. He was surprised at how nice Tabitha was being, and that he was actually having a good time listening to her. She was right, he couldn't forgive her previous behavior yet, but he couldn't disregard a relative who wasn't a Dursley.

Tabitha laughed. "I was. I couldn't help it. I have too much of Dad in me. Quidditch and pranks … that's how people started to come around to me." She smiled at him. "You know, Harry, maybe this will work out for us."

"I was just thinking that," he said.

She patted his arm. "I am sorry. You don't have to forgive me yet, but just know that I am. Dad would be so angry if he knew I was doing this to you." She stood up, hugging herself as if she was suddenly cold. "You should probably go now," she said. "You've got a lot to tell your friends." From the wistful tone of her voice, Harry could tell she was jealous of him. No wonder her best friends are her cousin and two of her students, Harry thought. No one wanted to be friends with a murderer's daughter when she was at Hogwarts.

She went to her desk and busied herself with papers as Harry gathered his things to leave. "Potter, wait," she said as he started to push the door open—he felt some resistance and knew that curious classmates (if not just Ron and Hermione) were still lingering there. He left the door slam shut as he walked up to Tabitha's desk, where the Marauder's Map lay.

"We'll skip Occlumency, just for tonight, okay? And you can have this back," Tabitha told him. "Thank you, for ... well, for letting me borrow it, I guess."

"Can I, er, ask why you needed it?" Harry asked, very much expecting Tabitha to admit that she was spying on someone at Hogwarts.

She looked surprised that he asked. "After all I've told you," she said. "Don't you know? I used it to talk to my father."