I'm not a huge fan of the Harry-Potter-character's-read-the-books! trope as I've found that very few of them stay true to the actual characters and their traits (personal pet peeve - don't come for me in the comments). It's very difficult to write/accomplish and because this story takes place where characters have already lived/interacted with others longer than in canon, and are already a little OOC, I'm going to try to do less actual retelling of the memories as my take on this, and try to focus on the conversations/reactions.
I hope you like it all! *Thank you for your patience*
OoOoO Chapter19 - Toast to the Ones Here Today (Part 1) OoOoO
Wisps of Harry's memories solidified into being around he, Ron, and the Order members, and Harry recognized the attic of Ron's house. Memory Harry, Ron, and Hermione stood together reviewing the objects Dumbledore had left to them.
James and Lily stood to the left of Harry's shoulder watching the scene play out, and Ron was at his right.
"Yeah, well," Harry said, looking between his two friends. "I wasn't going to try too hard in front of Scrimgeour, was I?"
"What do you mean?" Hermione asked, looking at the Snitch in his fist.
"Ah, we get to see what's inside the Snitch," James concluded, studying the three teenagers.
"Hope it's more helpful than a children's book," Sirius added, eyeing Hermione's Tales of Beedle the Bard that she had carried up with her from earlier.
"I'm sure Dumbledore had his reasons," Marlene frowned beside Lily, studying the room.
"That was the one you nearly swallowed!" Ron said excitedly, their conversation moving forwards.
Harry grinned. "Exactly."
The Order members grew still as the memory of Harry pressed his mouth to the Snitch. They sat in bated breath for several moments before it was obvious that nothing had happened. The Snitch had not opened.
Memory Harry's eyebrows furrowed, and it matched the frowns of those invisibly watching.
"Writing! There's writing on it, quick, look!" Hermione suddenly crowed, pointing at the golden sphere. She was right. Eyes narrowed at the small object, and where seconds before there had been nothing, five words written in thin slanting handwriting, Dumbledore's handwriting, said, "I open at the close."
"What the fuck?" Sirius's statement filled the room and it reflected the faces of those around him. "Albus, the hell does-"
Conversations from both the memory of Harry, Ron, and Hermione, and the present Order members flowed back and forth on the meaning of the words, and why such things were left for three seventeen-year-olds.
Ron watched his younger self with a grimace. "We really had no idea what was comin, did we?"
No, no they hadn't.
Harry frowned. Flashes of what came next rolled across his eyes, and he swallowed the horror, fear, and anxiety that came with them. Harry tucked his hands into his robes, hands clenching under the material, and tried for nonchalance. "I think we made it out all right in the end, despite everything."
Ron didn't notice Harry's unease, eyes locked on the memory. "The next day is one of the last times we ever see Fred," he said softly, too quiet for anyone else to hear.
Harry's head snapped back to the younger vision of himself. Of course. The next day would be Bill's wedding. Then they'd be on the run until the Battle of Hogwarts.
Conversations silenced as the blue translucent smoke of the pensieve wiped away Harry's memories and deposited them into something new.
It was Bill and Fleur's wedding.
Order members materialized wildly around the backyard of the Weasley's home, party in full swing.
The band had begun to play, and the newlyweds took to the dance floor. The train of Fleur's dress gracefully followed her effortless turns, and the partially hypnotized guests surrounding the bride and groom burst into great applause.
"Well this looks familiar," James smiled at the couple in the memory, and Harry turned in surprise.
"It's the same?" he asked, eyebrows rising.
"Nearly," Lily answered with a smile, clearly remembering their own experience. "A little more people, maybe more guards. But very nearly so."
Ron had been looking back and forth between Harry and the older Potters before he turned back to the memory, forehead furrowed. "Weird."
"Where are you?" Tonks asked, her head scanning the crowd of witches and wizards.
Harry pointed to the red-headed 'cousin Barney' that Harry had polyjuiced into for the wedding. Eyes followed his finger. "We took extras precautions so that no one knew where I was," Harry explained. Order members nodded.
"Not that it helped," Ron muttered.
"I like this song," said Luna, swaying in place. A few seconds later she stood up and glided onto the dance floor, where she revolved on the spot, quite alone, eyes closed and waving her arms.
"She's great isn't she?" said Ron admiringly. "Always good value."
Some among the Order smiled. Harry felt a small pang of loss. Would he ever see his Luna again?
Harry's eyes traveled away from Luna and around the backyard, taking in the joyous festivities. It was then that he noticed that most of the present Weasley family stood together, separated from the Order, huddled in seclusion. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley stood very close to where the memory of a smiling Ron sat, while their children: Bill, Fleur, Charlie, Fred, and George, spread around behind them. Percy had been sent to America the week prior for some secret Order mission, and it was starkly clear to Harry which children were missing from Mrs. Weasley's usual bunch.
At random moments, Mr. or Mrs. Weasley would look up from the red-haired man they watched, and study the present Ron at Harry's side. None of the Weasley family members had said much to Ron and Harry since Ron's arrival over a month ago, but Harry knew that they wanted to. He could see it from the siblings that had never known Ron, but got to see through Harry, and their wondering eyes. It was most visible on the parents of the wizard that this world's Ron never got to be. They both watched Ron smile, or eat, or laugh, and Mr. Weasley would look away or stare for much too long while Mrs. Weasley would overly dote on her other children, or clench and unclench her hands, frozen in indecision.
Ron didn't make an effort to smooth their awkward encounters, and Harry didn't think he had the right to intervene on either behalf. It was strange enough with Harry's own 'parents'. He didn't have advice for what to do, he was still figuring that out himself.
The smile vanished from Ron's face as Viktor Krum dropped into Luna's vacant seat. The international quidditch star had a deep scowl on his face as he said, "Who is that man in the yellow?"
"Gods above, I miss professional quidditch," James said under his breath, and Sirius huffed in agreement.
"That's Xenophilius Lovegood, he's the father of a friend of ours," Ron answered shortly. His tone indicated that despite Ron's earlier statement about Luna, only they were allowed to partake in their joke, not Krum. Ron stood to his feet. "Come and dance," he said abruptly to Hermione.
She looked taken aback, but pleased too, and got up. They vanished together into the growing throng on the dance floor.
"Ah, they are together now?" asked Krum.
"Er- sort of," said Harry.
Ron grinned at Harry's side. "You should have told me he asked, I would've made it more clear," he boasted.
Harry raised an eyebrow. "Didn't it take you a trip to the Chamber of Secrets in the middle of a war before you did something?"
James sniffed, hiding a laugh, and Sirius didn't even try to conceal his.
Ron colored. "Shut up, Harry."
"You, Barny, you know this man Lovegood well?" Krum asked. They hadn't missed much of the conversation.
"No, I only met him today. Why?"
Krum glowered over the top of his drink, watching Xenophilius. "Because," he said, "If he vus not a guest of Fleur's I vould duel him, here and now, for veering that filthy sign upon his chest."
"Sign?" said Harry, looking over at Xenophilius too. The strange triangular eye was gleaming on his chest. "Why? What's wrong with it?"
Many of the older Order members glared at the sign, while the younger ones looked on in confusion. "The Deathly Hallows," James recognized, quietly. His eyebrows furrowed, eyes on the necklace.
"Grindelvald. That is Grindelvald's sign."
"Oh, shit," Fred mumbled.
"It's a family sign," James argued lowly, exasperated, and shaking his head. Sirius put a hand on his shoulder, looking like this hadn't been the first time they had been through this conversation.
"Grindelwald took it and twisted it, love, we know," Lily said, and her voice traveled over the Order members. "No one knows what it really stands for now. It's very similar to the swastika and the muggle World War in the 40's. It used to have a wholly separate meaning before history wrote it down as something evil."
Fred spoke up from the cluster of his family. "Well, if it's not Grindevald's sign, what is it then?"
Heads turned. James stood a little taller under the Order's eye. "It's an ancient sign from the Peverell family, long thought to be the original creators of the Deathly Hallows," James explained evenly.
Jaws unhinged and eyebrows were raised.
"Everyone knows that's just a story," Fred argued. "The Hallows aren't real."
Harry eyed Dumbledore, who had his hands inside the sleeves of his robes, and was frowning lightly.
"The symbol was carved into the Peverell tombs long before Grindevald was born," Lily stated. "Whether the Hallows exist or not-"
"Didn't the Peverell's marry into the Potters?" a short wizard Harry had never seen before asked next to McGonagall.
Harry didn't like where that line of thought was going. True, they'd figure it out eventually- Harry was showing them his family secret, but he didn't want it all out now. "Eons ago," he confirmed. "But it doesn't matter."
Krum cracked his knuckles menacingly and glowered at Xenophilius.
"Strange," Tonks said, tipping her head. Harry's memory continued to play out before her, but she stared at the face of Xenophilius intently. "That the last memory we see has to do with a children's story that Dumbledore's personally passed on, and randomly, and then the mark that it's shared with is brought up with the wizard he defeated, randomly again."
"Coincidence?" Marlene asked, following her trail of thought.
"Doubt it," Sirius answered instead.
"Strange," Remus echoed in confirmation.
"Where is that mad old coot?" Ron asked, eyes scanning the Order members present.
"Xenophilius? Stationed at Hogwarts currently," James answered. "He's got an old press that Hagrid helped him set up in one of the housing areas. He prints the truth of you-know-who every week and gets them delivered when he can."
"Come off it-" Ron's eyes widened. "He's still printing the Quibbler here?"
"It's been renamed 'The Phoenix Song'," Lily said, cutting off her husband before he could answer. "And I'd watch the tone, I co-write."
Ron colored again, and Harry turned to her in surprise. He hadn't even thought of what Lily did in her spare time between the Order and her other children. She had never been allowed out publicly under Voldemort's regime, but it never occurred to him that she'd have a job of her own. A life.
"Ah- yeah, sorry," Ron backpedaled. "Definitely'll have to uh - to read it then."
The tip of Lily's smile reached upwards, and she crossed her arms over her chest in amusement.
The scene blurred- as if it was skipping time, and the memory of a red-faced Hermione sat herself down at the table Harry was at. Krum was long gone, and it was night now.
"It's a bit odd. I've just seen Viktor storming away from Luna's father, it looked like they'd been arguing." She dropped her voice, taking in memory Harry's pale face and clenched teeth. She stared at him, and then tipped her head. "Harry, are you okay?"
But the memory of Harry never got to answer. Something large and silver came falling through the canopy over the dance floor. Graceful and gleaming, the lynx landed lightly in the middle of the astonished dancers. Heads turned, those nearest it froze absurdly in mid-dance. Then the Patronus's mouth opened wide and it spoke in the loud, deep, slow voice of Kingsley Shacklebolt.
"The Ministry has fallen. Scrimgeour is dead. They are coming."
Silence spread like ripples across the memory of the wedding guests and the Order members watching, completely immersed in the moment.
Harry and Hermione jumped to their feet. Wands were taken out, and quiet confusion fell over the mass.
And then someone screamed.
Witches and wizards threw themselves at family members and loved ones. Guests were sprinting in all directions. The steady cracks of Disapparation filled the night, and then spells were suddenly flashing through the darkened air.
Memory Harry, Ron, and Hermione twisted on the spot in the middle of the dance floor- Hermione half sobbing and clutching Ron's hand- and then the wedding was swept away.
"Merlin." James's pale face was evident as he watched the blue mist turn into the next scene.
"World went to crap at a Weasley Wedding?" Sirius blinked. "What an anniversary."
"Sirius!" Marlene swatted the wizard with the back of her hand against his arm.
"Ow! Woman-"
Harry whisked into being, the blue smoke-like tendrils creating the environment of a worn, dirty kitchen with stark stone walls. Grimmauld Place.
Sirius frowned. "Can we never get away from this damned place?"
"It was protected and in my name after you died," Harry answered, eyes studying the door plate, and completely missing Ron's look between the older wizard and he.
Moments later, Harry realized what he'd done too and colored. He'd called his Sirius and this Sirius the same person, hadn't stumbled through it- was comfortable enough to just say things... Harry then refused to look at the older wizard in question.
Sirius swallowed uneasily before he turned and surveyed the house with a disgusted look. "Well, looks like shit, Kreacher obviously not doing his-"
The ghostly image of Remus appeared before the other memories, and the Order went silent.
Ron, apparently, knew suddenly exactly what memory they were in. "Oh shit." His eyes glanced from the current werewolf among the Order and then to Harry. "You had to pick this one?"
Harry bristled, mind racing. "Well, it's not an exact science is it!? I'm still working out the-"
"I'll understand if you can't confirm this, Harry, but the Order is under the impression that Dumbledore left you a mission."
The Order members were silent around him, but Harry frowned, trying to remember when this was.
"He did," Harry replied, "and Ron and Hermione are in on it and they're coming with me."
"Can you confide in me what the mission is?"
"None of the Order knew either?" Lily asked, aghast. "How were you supposed to get help?"
"We didn't," Ron answered her, eyes going to Remus again. His answer did not please those around him. Dumbledore looked on wearily, the lines of his wrinkled face seeming deeper in the cold shadow of the forgotten house.
"You're mad if you think that anyone would leave the fate of the world to three seventeen-year-olds," Marlene muttered.
"Absolutely looney," Sirius agreed with her, taking her hand.
"I can't, Remus, I'm sorry. If Dumbledore didn't tell you I don't think I can."
"I thought you'd say that," said Lupin, looking disappointed. "But I might still be of some use to you. You know what I am and what I can do. I could come with you to provide protection. There would be no need to tell me exactly what you were up to."
"Good man, Remus!" Sirius barked loudly, clapping his hands. "Only one of us has common sense it seems in this world."
"He was the only one to offer?" James asked, confused.
"We were in hiding," Harry reminded them all, quietly. "And anyone associated to us at that point would've been arrested, perhaps killed or tortured. Remus had just finished telling us how bad it was going outside," Harry motioned to the memory playing out. A dark pit crawled through his stomach. He knew exactly where they were now, and sorrow filled him.
Hermione looked puzzled. "But what about Tonks?" she asked.
Surprisingly, there was no comment from a single person amongst the Order. In fact, the air suddenly became tense.
"What about her?" said Lupin.
"Well," said Hermione, frowning, "you're married! How does she feel about you going away with us?"
"WHAT?" Sirius burst out, spinning to the current werewolf. "Married?! You- They-"
"Well I'm glad someone had the balls to," James said, crossing his arms over his chest.
Lily gave Harry a low look. "Missed that bit of information earlier did we?"
Harry fought off a shrug. "If I went through every moment of every memory, we'd be here all year too."
"We'd have been cousins, Remus!" Sirius yelled again.
"Tonks will be perfectly safe," said Lupin, "She'll be at her parents' house."
There was something strange in Lupin's tone, it was almost cold.
"I bloody well doubt I'd have wanted you to go off on your own," Tonks said crisply, eyes forwards at the memory.
Harry saw Remus recoil like she'd physically hit him.
"Remus," said Hermione tentatively, "Is everything all right... you know... between you and-"
"Everything is fine, thank you," said Lupin pointedly.
"Can you jump into another memory?" Ron asked hurriedly, "Now?"
"I don't know how!" Harry hissed back.
Hermione turned pink.
There was another pause, an awkward and embarrassed one, and then Lupin said, "Tonks is going to have a baby."
There was a deathly silence around the room.
"Oh, how wonderful!" squealed Hermione.
"Excellent!" said Ron enthusiastically.
"Congratulations," said Harry.
"Oh, shit," Lily said, and Harry swung around to her with a dropping jaw.
Eyes flickered to Remus, and then to the suddenly short, midnight-colored-haired witch in question some feet away.
Lupin gave an artificial smile that was more like a grimace, then said, "So... do you accept my offer? Will three become four? I cannot believe that Dumbledore would have disapproved, he appointed me your Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, after all. And I must tell you that I believe we are facing magic many of us have never encountered or imagined."
"Oh, Remus," Lily frowned painfully.
"Figures," Tonks drawled, and her words reverberated through the room. Harry and Ron exchanged a glance.
Ron and Hermione both looked at Harry.
"Just- just to be clear," he said. "You want to leave Tonks at her parents' house and come away with us?"
"She'll be perfectly safe there, they'll look after her," said Lupin. He spoke with a finality bordering on indifference: "Harry, I'm sure James would have wanted me to stick with you."
James blinked and took a step back. "The fuck?"
"Remus!" Mrs. Weasley rounded, and everyone jumped.
"He's not me!" the werewolf called loudly, reminding everyone.
Tonks snorted. "Could've fooled me." Harry's eyes widened. The hell had happened between them? Their child had been killed at some point, he remembered, but this coldness between the two... he had never seen the like before.
"Well," said Harry slowly, "I'm not. I'm pretty sure my father would have wanted to know why you aren't sticking with your own kid, actually."
"Oh fuck," James said.
"Right on!" Sirius added. Mutters from other Order members rose amongst them.
Tonks looked on in disgust.
Lupin's face drained of color. The temperature in the kitchen might have dropped ten degrees. Ron stared around the room as though he had been bidden to memorize it, while Hermione's eyes swiveled backward and forward from Harry to Lupin.
"You don't understand," said Lupin at last.
"Explain, then," said Harry.
Lupin swallowed.
Remus's head dropped, his face turned away from his friends, the Order, from Tonks, in what might have been shame.
"I- I made a grave mistake in marrying Tonks. I did it against my better judgment and have regretted it very much ever since."
Harry wished he could have skipped this. Whisked them all away, this was too personal - too much for those present. But his eyes wandered to the only real Remus left, and could see the same edge of self-hatred his other Remus had too. They both had felt fear and shame for a child born. Regret, helplessness. And then here, the child had been murdered. There was no redemption from that.
"I see," said Harry, "so you're just going to dump her and the kid and run off with us?"
Gasps broke out amongst the many watching.
Lupin sprang to his feet: His chair toppled over backward, and he glared at them so fiercely that Harry saw, for the first time ever, the shadow of the wolf upon his human face.
"Don't you understand what I've done to my wife and my unborn child? I should never have married her, I've made her an outcast!" Lupin kicked aside the chair he had overturned. "You have only ever seen me amongst the Order, or under Dumbledore's protection at Hogwarts! You don't know how most of the Wizarding world sees creatures like me! When they know of my affliction, they can barely talk to me! Don't you see what I've done! Even her own family is disgusted by our marriage, what parents want their only daughter to marry a werewolf? And the child- the child-"
"Remus!" Lily and a few other women of the Order called out. Remus ducked his hed even farther.
"Sorry," Harry couldn't help but whisper.
Lupin actually seized handfuls of his own hair; he looked quite deranged.
"My kind don't usually breed! It will be like me, I am convinced of it- how can I forgive myself, when I knowingly risked passing on my own condition to an innocent child? And if, by some miracle, it is not like me, then it will be better off, a hundred times so, without a father of whom it must always be ashamed!"
Lily looked heartbroken. "You must know that's not true, Remus," she whispered. Marlene nodded in commiseration, and others who had heard did too.
Those who hadn't nodded turned their heads away in shame from the private moment Harry had unwittingly unleashed. Tonks watched straight on. Her shoulders were hunched, her eyebrows furrowed in the center of her head, and tears streamed down her face. Heartbreak, easy as the morning sun, was clear across her face.
Ron looked to his shoes. Harry was crushed. All he could think of now was the beautiful baby boy waiting for him in his own world. His godson, not a werewolf, but a metamorphmagus - an infant blessed with an incredibly rare ability that showcased the power and beauty of his parent's union.
"Remus!" whispered Hermione, tears in her eyes. "Don't say that- how could any child be ashamed of you?"
"Oh, I don't know, Hermione," said Harry. "I'd be pretty ashamed of him."
The bitterness in past-Harry's voice made him flinch. Others around him did as well. Eyebrows were raised, and mouths dropped open in shock.
Harry did not know where his rage was coming from, but it had propelled him to his feet too. Lupin looked as though Harry had hit him. "If the new regime thinks Muggle-borns are bad," Harry said, "what will they do to a half-werewolf whose father's in the Order? My father died trying to protect my mother and me, and you reckon he'd tell you to abandon your kid to go on an adventure with us?"
Harry looked to his feet, following after Ron. Gasps came again, and Harry heard someone whispering his name, but he did not look back up.
"How- how dare you?" said Lupin. "This is not about a desire for- for danger or personal glory- how dare you suggest such a-"
"I think you're feeling a bit of a daredevil," Harry goaded, "You fancy stepping into Sirius's shoes-"
"No," Marlene winced and clutched Sirus's hand as the wizard watched on with sorrow-filled eyes.
"Harry, no!" Hermione begged him, but he continued to glare into Lupin's livid face.
"Don't," Harry heard Lily whisper. The other Order members were too far away for Harry to hear what they might have been saying as well.
"I'd never have believed this," Harry said. "The man who taught me to fight dementors- a coward."
The silence in the room was the heaviest thing Harry had ever felt heaved onto his shoulders.
Lupin drew his wand so fast that Harry had barely reached for his own; there was a loud Bang and he felt himself flying backward as if punched; as he slammed into the kitchen wall and slid to the floor, he glimpsed the tail of Lupin's cloak disappearing around the door.
"I struck you," Remus croaked, aghast.
"I would have too," Marlene murmured.
"Merlin, What a mess," James shook his head.
"Remus, Remus, come back!" Hermione cried, but Lupin did not respond. A moment later they heard the front door slam.
"Harry!" wailed Hermione. "How could you?"
"It was easy," said Harry. He stood up, he could feel a lump swelling where his head had hit the wall. He was still so full of anger he was shaking.
And then the scene vanished.
Blue whirled around them all, sweeping them from the fury of past-Harry's reaction and the shame of Remus's announcement, but the tension of the moment was still thick among the Order Members.
"I would never think less of you for living your life, and having a child," James said to his lifelong friend.
"I would if you ever pull a stunt like that Remus did though," Sirius added. "Leaving a seventeen-year-old up to his eyeballs in problems while the fate of the wizarding world rested on his shoulders."
Remus stood supported on both sides by his friends as the blue mist started to take the form of the next moment, eyes downcast, but looking to the woman that might have been once his wife.
"I didn't mean it," Harry felt he had to confess, if not to the man he had hurled the insults at, then the man who had felt them keenly in the shadow of the moment anyways. To Tonks too. "I was so angry- and with Voldemort in my head all the time- I've never thought that of you either. Not really." It was the closest he could get to an apology.
"It's alright," the werewolf answered back, forced tilt of his lips showing over his scarred face. His eyes traveled back to Tonks. "I feel as if... it needed to be said."
Her muddy brown eyes met his as the scene around them solidified, and they were thrown into something new.
This will be a multi-part section of the story. I want the Order to know how the Horcruxes were found/destroyed as they wanted, but I also want to add in the little moments in between that Harry and this new world can experience together.
Anyways, thank you for the reviews and likes! I am still currently working on updating/editing/ fixing some plot holes you guys have pointed out to me, so I appreciate the patience!
~Missmusicluver