Thank you for the reviews yesterday!

Warning: Slight cliffhanger on this chapter. Also, a bunch of different emotions.

Chapter Fifty-Two: Walking on Eggshells

Harry stretched his hands above his head, and tried to ignore Draco's gaze burning on the side of his face.

"When were you planning to tell me about this?" Draco's voice pushed at him, demanding his notice. Harry looked down at his toast instead, and started eating as though it were the most interesting meal he'd ever had. In a sense, it was. He didn't think he'd ever eaten another meal with Draco staring at him quite that hard.

"A bit later," said Harry, and cast a Tempus charm with one hand, pleased that the wandless magic obeyed him so easily. It is much more convenient to have it come through my fingers than my shoulders or my eyes or my feet or wherever it likes. "In about two hours, actually."

Draco hesitated a moment, caught flat-footed by Harry's admission. Harry kept on eating. He refused to feel bad about Draco's reaction. It wasn't Harry's fault that Blaise had noticed Harry packing his trunk while Draco was in the loo and opened his mouth about it when he came out. Then Draco had asked Harry where he was going for Easter, and Harry had said that he was going to Lux Aeterna, with perfect truth. Draco hadn't asked why before starting to fire other angry questions, so he might as well put up with the inconvenience of Harry answering calmly and when he wanted to.

Draco grabbed his wrist. Harry turned and looked at him. Draco's eyes were blazing. That's unusual, Harry thought, leaning back enough that the hold on his wrist didn't hurt. He normally doesn't show emotion that way, but through the flushing of his cheeks and the way he sits in his chair.

"I want to know why you're doing this, Harry," Draco said.

"You'll know in two hours." Harry tugged lightly on his hand, but Draco wouldn't give it up. Harry shrugged and returned to eating. "I was planning to tell you and Snape about it at the same time, and I don't see any reason to change that plan."

Draco was silent for a long time. Then he said, in a voice so low Harry had to strain his ears even though he was leaning close, "I thought you wanted to come back to the Manor with me."

"You didn't ask," said Harry quietly, even as the toast turned to a sticky little lump in his stomach. "I would have told you the truth if you'd asked, Draco, though I still would have wanted to wait to explain my reasons. You just assumed I was coming with you, and now you're upset because I messed up your schedule."

"That's not the only reason." Draco brushed the back of his hand across Harry's cheek, and Harry shivered, because that wasn't playing fair, damn it. "How can you think that's the only reason?"

Great, Harry thought in dismay. Now he'd hurt Draco, when the whole reason he'd waited was so that he wouldn't have to. He was going back to Lux Aeterna for Easter, with Connor, and he wouldn't bring Draco or Snape along. He was going to tell them both at once on the last day of term, so quickly that their major emotion towards him was anger and not hurt. If Blaise had kept his big mouth shut, then everything would have been fine.

A post owl appeared with another Howler at that moment, and Harry had never been so glad to see a distraction. He reached out with his free hand to accept the letter, which began yelling at him about the dangerous irresponsibility of a boy of fourteen wielding such power.

Harry's determination to get away increased as he listened to it. The major reason was peace, just as he'd written James. He'd been inundated with so many insults and pranks that they had started to blur together in his memory, which normally never happened. He wanted a place where he could take some deep breaths unhindered, and Lux Aeterna was that place, from James's letters: quiet and peaceful, stern and austere, with wards that no Howlers could get through.

But the other reason had taken root in his mind two days after he had Skeeter release the article, as he received more and more evidence that moving so boldly, and in a way that impinged on so many people's lives, was a mistake. He had to switch tactics. He knew a way to do that, a way that would draw on him and a few people who might want to help him, no one else. It had several steps, and the first one he could only accomplish by going to Lux Aeterna.

However, he was almost certain that neither Draco nor Snape would let him go through with the tactics switch, because they would worry he was endangering himself. There was a simple solution to that. He was not going to tell them he was doing it. The decision had seemed so simple to him when he was lying in bed the night he made it, aiming for a greater goal and stepping over a few obstacles in the way.

But he was being reminded now that Draco wasn't an obstacle, but a human being who, Merlin knew why, loved him, and was listening to the Howler with an expression that truly frightened Harry.

Harry turned his head away, and pretended that his upset came from the insults when Draco asked him.

Draco had dragged Harry to Snape's office immediately after Potions—it was a half day of classes—and settled him on one of the Transfigured chairs with a forbidding expression. Harry nodded and faced his guardian, who already looked grim.

"It is obvious that you have something to say to me, Harry," he said. "The way you were squirming throughout class rather confirmed it. Now."

Harry nodded again. "Draco already knows this," he said. He had decided that he could get through this best if he adopted an expression and tone of gentle regret. It was perfectly true that he regretted hurting them. It was also perfectly true that that wasn't going to stop him from staying with James for Easter holidays. "I'm going to Lux Aeterna for Easter."

Snape's nostrils flared like a Grim's scenting prey, but he simply inclined his head, as though the news had not been unexpected. His voice was clipped, staccato. "Why?"

"I need some peace," said Harry, and made a vague gesture that he knew would encompass the Howlers and the pranks and the rest of it in both Draco's and Snape's minds. "I didn't know what I was doing with this article. I admit that."

Snape tilted his head to the side. "I knew you were calling a storm," he murmured. "I did not anticipate all the winds."

Harry nodded back. Snape had listened to him when he complained and offered him dueling lessons to distract him from his troubles, but he hadn't mentioned a desire to ignite the people who sent the Howlers and the Dungbombs like Draco had. Snape thought he should know the consequences of his own mistakes, Harry knew. "And Lux Aeterna is peaceful. It keeps letters out if my father doesn't want them to come in, and I know that he'd keep the Howlers away from me. And it's a very different environment from school. That's what I need most of all."

"It was not peaceful this summer," said Snape quietly, "when I rescued you from the Blood-Burning Curse."

Harry sighed and bowed his head. "I know. I've learned my lesson, sir. I don't intend to venture outside the wards this time."

"Nor was it peaceful inside the house," Snape went on, with a mildness that Harry was coming to fear more than his sharpness, "where your father and your brother sent you into a near-frenzy."

Harry shrugged. "This time, James knows more about me. We've been writing back and forth. He's changed now, I think. I was the one who suggested coming home for Easter. He never would have said anything about it, because he promised not to. It'll be awkward in close quarters, but awkward's a lot better than the closeness he thought we had and which I feigned this summer."

"A man may appear one thing in letters," Snape murmured, "and another when you actually meet him."

Harry let out his breath. "I know that, sir. But I really think he has changed. Connor's still angry with him—"

"I thought you said you needed peace," Draco interrupted him. "This doesn't sound like you'll get any, if your brother's going to be yelling at your father." He'd taken Harry's wrist again, and stroked it in small, soothing circles.

"I talked to Connor yesterday." Harry could still see his twin's hazel eyes widening in surprise when Connor realized that he intended to come home, and why. "He said that he would make sure not to yell at James in front of me. Really, what they need is to clear the air. A big fight, and they'll be back on the road to healing, although not quite there yet. They've talked to each other in letters except for James's visit to the hospital wing after the Second Task, and then Connor was still weak and woozy from his wound. Once they can see each other and have a long talk, or maybe shouting match, then they should be able to—"

"Harry."

Harry jumped. He'd actually forgotten Snape, occupied both with memories of what Connor had said to him and with Draco rubbing his wrist. He glanced up and found his guardian leaning forward, watching him with eyes that made Harry drop his gaze at once. Snape was simply too good a Legilimens. He might enter Harry's mind without even realizing it and spy out his hidden motive, and then there would be no way he would let Harry go.

"I do not care that much about your brother," Snape said. "I still want to know how this visit will affect you, whether you think it is a wise thing. You need peace, but I could give that to you. I did so this summer." He lifted his chin slightly, as though daring Harry to deny it.

Harry swallowed. That does sound wonderful. That August, bar Rosier's attempt to kill him at the beginning of it and the kidnapping at the end of it, lingered in his mind as one of the best times of his life. He knew he could relax here, that he would sleep more deeply than usual, and that he might actually be able to forget about the article and the shame of the mess he'd created—

But then he remembered the Howlers, and sighed. "I'd still get a barrage of post each day," he pointed out, lifting his eyes to Snape's. "You told me that you couldn't ward me against Rosier's letters reaching me, sir, without driving post owls away altogether. That means that you couldn't ward against Howlers either, could you?"

Snape slowly shook his head.

"Malfoy Manor has the necessary precautions, Harry," said Draco. He'd leaned against Harry by now, and Harry wondered what it meant that he hadn't even noticed Draco's face so close to his. "You could receive ordinary post there, but not Howlers. And you know that the wards will let you through." He touched the back of Harry's neck. "And we'd be together there."

"With your parents," Harry pointed out, tamping down on the little cry of loss that wanted to rip out of him. "I'm more uneasy around your father than I am around my own."

"He would stay away from you if you wanted," Draco promised. "He's your formal ally now, Harry, and that's a small request. Besides, he's busy with some secret project of his own, always bustling in and out of the house. And I know that you don't mind my mother."

Harry felt his resolve waver. A holiday with Draco and Narcissa when I'm not out of my mind with pain. Merlin, that sounds wonderful. I want to.

But though that would give him the rest he needed, it wouldn't move him a step towards his final project, his more important goal, of switching tactics so that he could actually free the magical creatures without stamping on so many wizards' free will.

This is stupid, Regulus snarled in his head. Harry, for Merlin's sake, no one expects you to solve the problem of the magical creatures tomorrow. They've been imprisoned for centuries. Go to Malfoy Manor and relax. If James has really altered, he won't mind if you change your mind.

Harry ground his teeth. Are you ready to tell me about the journal yet?

Regulus gave another snarl, this one wordless.

Harry nodded back. You don't want to talk about that, and I don't want to talk about this. So be quiet. He glanced back at Snape and Draco. Draco had a hopeful look on his face. Snape's was closed, and his eyes held nothing but blankness.

"I do not think that this is a good idea, Harry," he said.

"I do." Harry kept his voice firm, and as gentle as he could. He turned to face Draco, who was blinking as he realized that he wouldn't be able to persuade Harry to come to the Manor after all. "I promise, this isn't a reflection on you. Neither of you. I just want to step away for a while, into a different place, and think about different things. I'll come back the stronger for it."

"With a man who abused you," Draco said. "I don't call that a different place, Harry, or one likely to make you stronger."

Harry felt the fretful panic lash at him again. "Draco, you said—"

"I promised about your mother, Harry," Draco said. "Not about James. Let's be honest, here, the way you're always telling me we need to be." He met Harry's eyes squarely. "I think you'll come back broken."

"I am willing to trust Harry when he says he will not."

Harry gave Snape a quick, grateful glance, but his guardian's face had not altered. Nor had his opinion, as he proved when he added, "If he comes back broken because of something James did, then he will not see James Potter again."

Harry opened his mouth, then ducked his head. I can't blame him for saying that. Besides, argue too much, and he might think there's something I want to see there beyond James.

"Thank you for trusting me," he said, and then glanced at Draco.

Draco's face wavered several times, before he looked away. Harry squeezed his shoulder. "Draco, I promise I'll come back. Trust me?"

"I do," Draco whispered. "But sometimes I think you trust yourself too much. You might try to bear more than you really can."

"Connor's going to be there, and he wants to yell at James," Harry pointed out. "He should protect me."

And I will be there, too, said Regulus in the depths of his mind. If I cannot persuade you out of this, I will at least go along and make sure nothing too terrible happens.

Draco muttered something about Connor not being able to protect a fly from spiders, then sighed. "I understand," he said. "Come back safe." He gave Harry a quick, rough hug, but pulled away when he tried to return it, and trotted out the door. Harry understood. His empathy as well as his own emotions would be telling him there was no chance for Harry to change his mind, and he wanted to deal with his disappointment in private.

"I do wonder, sometimes," said Snape, his voice gone remote, "if Draco is right, if you subject yourself to pressures that you cannot bear."

Harry faced him. I can't give up now, not when I'm so close to winning my goal. "Does that mean that you'll forbid me to go after all, sir?"

Snape raised his eyebrows. "Of course not, Harry. I trust you, as I said. I was merely echoing an interesting observation." His eyes locked on Harry's face for a moment. "I doubt Draco realizes how interesting it is."

Harry looked away. Snape had been much better lately—dueling with him, not mentioning his family at all, quietly giving him headache potions when he awakened from another vision. But there were moments like this when he would go quiet and thoughtful, and the things he said made Harry feeling as if he were looking straight at Harry's heart and soul.

"Thank you, sir," he said, choosing to respond to one part of Snape's declaration and not the other, and then slipped out the door.

This has to be the right thing to do, he thought, as he made for the Slytherin common room and his trunk. He would join Connor in the hospital wing, and they would Floo to Lux Aeterna from there. I made a mistake. I see that now. I'm going to make up for that.

Your priorities disturb me, Regulus said at him, but sulked when Harry brought up the image of the journal again. He'd refused to say anything about it, retreating into a stubborn silence that had a strong tint of shame. Harry decided that he could wait until Regulus was ready to speak. For now, he seemed safe, and Harry believed him when he said that he still had no idea where his body was, and that the journal could provide no clues to that.

Snape leaned back against his desk and followed Harry's departure with his eyes, in silence. Harry was hiding something, he was almost certain of it, but he had trained the boy too well. Harry could raise the Occlumency shields without thinking now, and they kept almost all of his emotions in check and a good portion of his motives. Snape would have pushed, and Harry would have felt it, and that would be another chipping away at the trust between them.

Snape was willing to wait. He did trust Harry, but he did not have quite the same level of blithe trust in his ward's ability to recover from shattering events. Harry seemed to think that because he survived, that made everything all right, without realizing that suppurating wounds were not, in general, a sign of good health.

And if Harry had stewed and brooded on that article, as Snape knew he had, then he would almost certainly have come up with some plan to use instead of it, or, as Harry would conceive of it, to make up for his stumble. And if he was not telling them about that plan, it was risky or dangerous or both.

Snape clenched his hands. I promised. I will wait. I will hold back. He needs an adult he can trust absolutely.

But let him return in pain from any abuse or neglect, and I meant what I said. He need not concern himself with James Potter again. Nor will I kill him, though I am sure Harry would fear that I meant that.

Snape's gaze went to the innocent-looking desk in the back corner of his office. One drawer held the Pensieve Potion. Another held rolls of parchment covered in close writing. Another contained books.

I have my weapons. I need not use them if there is no need, but I have them ready if there is.

James wiped his hands on his robes. It was the fourth time in five minutes. They were so sweaty that if a troll had appeared in Lux Aeterna's waiting room at that moment and charged him waving its club, James wouldn't have been able to fumble his wand up to react in time.

His sons were coming through the fireplace in a few minutes. Harry and Connor were coming home.

He'd wanted to go to Hogwarts and meet them, but Connor had sent him a letter that forbade even the possibility of that, and James was not anxious to push. His letter-writing in the last month and a half had been an exercise in holding back, in not mentioning Snape, or Lily, or the past, or anything that might hurt or anger Harry or Connor. Surely, now that he was finally going to see his boys again, he could exercise a bit more patience.

It was harder than he thought. James supposed the letters and the writing he'd done had moved him closer to Harry and Connor in a way that neither could appreciate yet, because it was all in his own mind. He would remember that. He would be conscious of that this time. Too much of the pain in the past had resulted from his ignoring what he should have paid attention to. This time, he would wait for one of his sons to make the first move, and when they did, then he would let his own moves be guided by theirs.

The fireplace flickered to life, and the flames glowed green. James took a deep breath, as much to reassure himself he wasn't hyperventilating as to be ready to say something when Harry and Connor stepped out of the fireplace.

Harry came first, springing adroitly out of the hearth and over the slight step that might have tripped him. He whirled his trunk out of the way, dusted soot from his robes with one hand, and still had the other free to help Connor as his brother stumbled out, coughing and choking.

James swallowed. He discovered that he wasn't ready after all. He'd dreamed of his sons at all different ages throughout the late winter and early spring, but it was nothing to seeing them now, turning and looking up at him as the teenagers they really were at this point.

Well, Harry's eyes are nothing like a teenager's, James corrected himself, as he noticed the glaze of exhaustion on Harry's face, and the deep circles beneath his eyes. They never were, really.

He held out a hand, not ready yet to risk an embrace, and Harry took it. "Welcome to Lux Aeterna," James said, not quite daring to call it "home" either. "Do you want the room that you had this summer?"

Harry smiled at him, which was a much more pleasant expression than he'd worn in a lot of the ways James had imagined this moment. "Thank you, that'd be fine," he said. "I'm very tired, and I'm going to lie down and go to sleep right away, if it's all the same to you."

James nodded. His self-consciousness felt awkward, but this was still so much better than he'd done with Harry during the summer. "Of course. I do think that you'll find you have a visitor soon."

Harry paused, so arrested that James felt a bit bad for trying to make it a surprise. He's trying to figure out who it is, what he'll have to do to deal with it. "Who?" Harry asked at last.

"Fawkes," said James. "He showed up here yesterday, and he's been flying the grounds most of the time, singing. But he spent the night in your room, and I think he'll be happy to see you."

Harry blinked in wonder. "I—yes, and I'd like to see him." He smiled at James. "Thank you." He dragged his trunk out of the room without waiting for anything else. James watched him go for a moment, then turned to face Connor.

The moment he saw his younger son's face, he had a good idea why Harry hadn't wanted to wait around. James swallowed. Connor glared at him. In some ways, Connor looked more like him than Harry did, and eye color was a minute part of it. James knew, very well, that expression of mulish stubbornness. It was the kind he'd seen in mirrors just before battles. Connor didn't intend to abandon this battlefield, that much was certain.

James nodded at him. "Hello, Connor," he said.

"Oh, that's a good beginning," said Connor, and James flinched. He'd only heard Connor use that sarcasm on a few occasions. Most of the time, he didn't need it. He'd been an indulged child, and he tended to get his way by fussing or yelling—straightforward, honest anger. Harry was the one who'd had the tongue dipped in acid, or at least James had thought that when he allowed himself to notice anything strange in his elder son's behavior. "At least you're not going to pretend that I'm a statue or a chess piece. What, got tired of having one of them to pick up and move around?" Connor's eyes flickered in the direction Harry had gone.

James stiffened. That was unfair. "He and I have been much better to each other," he said. "It's the reason he agreed to come home. And—"

"But see," Connor cut in, "I don't trust you."

James flinched again, more sharply this time. He had not imagined that Connor would say the words, nor that they would cut so deep.

"You've changed your mind before, apparently." Connor's eyes were narrowed, steady with something that James thought was dislike. "You were going to be different when Harry was in the hospital wing second year, and then you weren't. You changed your mind at the end of term last year, and then you slipped right back into hurting Harry and insulting Snape. Oh, yeah, some of it wasn't deliberate, but a lot was. And then you didn't write Harry for months and months, just because you were childish enough to want him to write you first. And then you wanted to start over again. But how do I know that this is the real starting over this time? Maybe you'll collapse again and run like you did after—after Harry took Mum's magic away." Connor took a deep breath, and the soul-deep horror in his eyes sliced off another piece of James's heart. "Do you even know what that was like?" Connor whispered. "You don't. You just ran. Harry had a reason for leaving, but you didn't. You should have stayed and helped me."

"Connor—" James began.

"But this isn't even about me," said Connor, pulling himself back together again with a snap. James felt another pang, that both of his sons had had to learn to do that. "It's about Harry." His eyes burned as he took a step forward. "This had better be real, this change of your mind. You'd better want what's best for him. You'd better not let something happen to him through negligence. Frankly, I think I have to be more afraid of that than of you hurting him on purpose, though after you brought charges against Snape, I don't know that for certain."

James bowed his head. "I didn't—I didn't realize that affected you so deeply," he whispered.

"Harry's never talked to me about it," said Connor. "He knows that Snape and I don't get along. But of course it affected me. He's my brother. And I've made plenty of stupid mistakes in the past, but I've changed my mind now, and I'm not some stuffed toy that he has to protect, either. I can protect him back." He paused for a moment, breath heaving in and out of his lungs, and then added, "And I will. Protect him back, I mean. Harry's too Slytherin, sometimes, and way too forgiving. He'll hold back and try to placate someone who wants to hurt him, to see if he can calm them down and get out of the situation. That's why it's a good thing I'm in Gryffindor. I can just launch a good, hard hex if there's need."

James let out a breath that seemed to catch at several places in his throat. Then he nodded. He was sadder, and prouder of Connor, than he could say. "I know," he whispered. "I'm sorry."

Connor studied him for a moment, then nodded in turn. "I hope that'll be good enough this time," he said quietly. "That's another way I'm not as good as Harry is. He just keeps giving people chances, you know? But it's more limited with me. And a damn good thing, too. Sometimes you have to stop forgiving people."

James smiled at him and said, helpless to stop it, "I'm so glad you've grown up this way, Connor."

Connor blinked twice, then relaxed with a huge whoof of air. "Good," he said, and his speech wavered for the first time. "I—I do want us to be a family again, Dad. I'd like that. You and me, I mean. I don't think you and Harry can. But I can't do that if I think you're going to hurt him."

"I won't," said James. "I promise it, in Godric's name."

Connor scanned him intently. James looked back, and wondered if Harry really was, all the time, the more complicated of his sons.

"Good," Connor said, and then abruptly stepped forward and hugged him. "I did miss you," he whispered against James's robes.

James slowly, carefully, put his arms around Connor, and thought of him as he'd been the last time he saw him, lying in a hospital bed with bandages swathed all around his chest and belly. "I missed you, too."

Harry had barely put his trunk down on the floor of his room when a bright burst of flames coalesced over his pillow, and transformed into Fawkes. Harry put out a hand, smiling, and the phoenix soared over and landed on his shoulder, a warm, comforting weight, nudging him until Harry petted his neck. Fawkes closed his eyes and crooned.

What's he doing? said Regulus abruptly. Go away, bird! I was here first!

Harry blinked. What are you talking about? he asked, but felt it a moment later. While Regulus's presence in his head was limited to a voice and occasional touches on his memories, he could feel a presence of light and heat now. He closed his eyes, and saw a brilliant orange glow behind his eyelids.

For a moment, he panicked, thinking of the phoenix web. But the orange glow was different from the golden one, and Fawkes trilled reassuringly into his ear. Harry relaxed. The warmth spread around his brow, soothing away a tension headache he'd barely noticed he had, so constant was it now. Harry let out a long breath and sat slowly down on the bed.

I think he's bonding with you, said Regulus in awe.

Harry blinked and tried to move, but the warmth had bound his limbs like the cocoon of sheets that tied him on a lazy summer morning. Then it let him go, and he found himself leaning back against the pillows. Fawkes sat on his shoulder chirping at him, and Harry could see visions in his head when he listened, rather like the images that might form from a vivid piece of music.

He could see Fawkes winging above an unfamiliar sea dotted with brilliant islands. Fawkes dipped and skimmed over one of them, and Harry caught his breath as a woman's head covered with snakes thrust into view. Fawkes sang to her, and though Harry didn't catch a sense of words from the music, he knew that the phoenix was telling her that a vates was abroad in the world. The woman cocked her head as she listened, and the snakes ceased to snap and hiss at each other and lay down tamely.

Fawkes coasted above a wide expanse of sand, and an enormous creature bounded into view. Harry caught his breath. It was a unicorn, he knew that, but its tail streamed out like a lion's instead of a horse's, and its feet revealed multiple hooves on each one, and its horn was black. It reared up challengingly at Fawkes, screaming and trying to stab him with its horn, but Fawkes sang, and implanted a vision of freedom in the unicorn's mind that stayed with it when it lowered its head and began to run again. Fawkes soared along above its back, casting his shadow down to mingle with its and releasing a chorus in praise of stern, proud power.

Fawkes sat on a branch in silence, until a giant leopard prowled beneath his perch, paws shaking the ground with soft thunder. Harry gasped as he recognized a nundu, which could destroy whole villages if it wanted, and which a hundred wizards working together could barely bring down. Fawkes chose a different song, understandably, a darting, trilling thing that made the nundu whirl about, chasing shadows that gradually resolved into an image of the vates. Fawkes vanished in a ball of flames that time. The nundu was so dangerous that he could only plant the idea in its wild mind and hope it took root eventually.

More and more images, and Harry knew Fawkes had been all over the world, and given the message to more and more magical creatures. There was a vates, and while he might never reach them or free them, they deserved to know that he existed. It might at least bring some hope and make the waiting in confinement easier.

Harry opened his eyes, and let out a long sigh.

It's so big, Regulus said quietly. How can you do this?

Harry shook his head. "I don't know yet," he whispered aloud. "Step by step along the road, I think." He thought of the letter he'd sent to Scrimgeour, proposing that they meet some time after Easter and discuss their differences. It wasn't the perfect solution, but it was a step to a solution. "Bit by bit." He reached up and gently stroked Fawkes's feathers. "I'm honored that you chose to bond with me," he told the phoenix.

Fawkes crooned at him, as if to tell him to stop being silly, and then began the soft song that had lulled Harry to sleep before. Harry smiled, and lowered his head to the pillows, and obliged, taking the seed of hope that Fawkes had meant him to have, rather than the idea of duty.

Harry took a deep breath of wonder. From what James had said in his letters, he'd thought that Lux Aeterna would still be caught up in that muddy vision of half-spring, somewhere between seasons, and that he would see only the most stubborn and earliest of flowers, if any at all.

Instead, Fawkes had led him straight to a flourishing patch of blossoms in a corner of the lawn, flowers with delicate red-gold petals surrounding a blue center. They had shot up through the mud as if disdaining its power to hold them back, and now they rippled and shone like—

Like flames, Harry realized. He touched one of the petals, and found it softly warm. He gave Fawkes a suspicious glance. "You had something to do with this?"

Fawkes lifted with a cry and hovered over the flowers. They twitched and rippled as if called by the wind from his wings, and when Fawkes began to sing, they spun around on their stems, increasing their resemblance to small, dancing fires.

Harry wasn't sure exactly how Fawkes had made the flowers grow, but James had said he was flying over the grounds the day before Harry and Connor arrived. He might have had time to make them grow. Maybe.

Fawkes interrupted his song long enough to give the smooth warble that Harry already recognized as a smug equivalent of I'm a phoenix, therefore I make the impossible possible.

Harry leaned back against the yew standing nearby and enjoyed the song and the flowers, feeling the memory of Howlers crisp away into ash and leave him at peace.

…and they protected each other, and they taught each other, and they lived happily ever after.

Harry very gently closed the book and stared at it a moment. He knew his cheeks were wet, and he was very aware of James's tense, nervous stillness on the other side of the room. He hadn't refused when Harry asked him if he could look at the journal in which he wrote about Harry and Connor each night, but he had hesitated, and hadn't seem that relieved when Harry had told him he'd only wanted to read the retelling of the wizarding legend.

Harry knew the legend, of course, about the wizarding children who had brought the unicorns out of the sun. The original children were brothers, not twin brothers, but the story worked even better when they were. Harry hadn't got used to his name appearing on each page, along with Connor's. He touched the book's cover as if he were touching something sacred.

Or is it that I haven't got used to knowing James cares enough to write about us like that?

He met his father's eyes, and felt a deep, satisfying lurch somewhere in him, as though something in flight had finally settled. He smiled, and for all that James couldn't possibly have known the reason for it, he smiled back.

We'll be all right, Harry thought in wonder. We really will be. Not father and son, but something else. Even friends, maybe.

Harry woke, slowly, and stretched luxuriously. He'd gone to sleep at seven that evening, tired beyond bearing, and though it was five in the morning now, that still meant he'd got ten hours of sleep. He stood and looked through the window of his bedroom briefly, wondering what Draco was doing.

Probably still dead to the world, he had to admit, as he reached out gently towards his sense of Connor's and James's magic. Still in their bedrooms. What had been an oppressive sense of constant presence during the summer was comforting now, even though he'd only been in Lux Aeterna two days. Draco is not a morning person.

In a way, it would have been a comfort to have Draco with him now. Harry took a sharp breath as he reminded himself why that was impossible. Draco would never have let him do this.

Fawkes let out a soft noise, and settled gently on Harry's shoulder. Harry scratched his neck. The phoenix ducked his head, and rubbed it against the side of Harry's throat.

I suppose that you have to do this, if you're ready, said Regulus reluctantly.

"I'm ready," Harry whispered aloud. "As ready as I'll get. And I want to. I do have to make up for my stumble with the article, but more than that, I want to know more about myself. Snape and Draco help, but they can't force me to be honest with myself, just with them."

Regulus stayed silent, making his opinion quite clear, but Fawkes crooned and took off, soaring ahead of Harry to his bedroom door.

Harry left his room, and went downstairs, and traveled the appropriate corridors, and opened the right door.

In the room before him, glittering, silver-edged, he felt the Maze's alien awareness open one eye.