Thanks for the reviews yesterday!
And so the argument continues.
Chapter Sixty-Three: Cousin Arcturus Had a Sense of Humor
January 22nd, 1995
Dear Harry:
I am writing to thank you for freeing my children from Durmstrang and the control of that madwoman. Thank you seems inadequate to express my true gratitude, but unfortunately—or perhaps fortunately, considering the use to which they would sometimes be put—English does not contain other words that approach what I mean, either. I have had the tale from Owen and Michael both, how you appeared, how you severed Bellatrix's hand, and how you destroyed it. Owen was close enough to hear what she whispered to you, and I can only say that destroying your own flesh when the Dark Lord's minions had already cut it from your body may be accounted another sacrifice. They know you could not stay and why. Thank you for pulling down the lightning ward as well; it served as a signal to us that something had changed inside the school, and not something Bellatrix would have wanted. I was part of a shift of parents watching that night. We Apparated in immediately, of course.
I am writing this letter because I understand, from speaking with Mr. Malfoy, that some people view your actions very differently than I do. A spoken communication to you may not be believed. A written letter, you may show to whomever you like, and they will then see that one of your allies stands behind you whatever may come from now on, snow or lightning or high water.
Yours in all gratitude that the English language offers, and some that it does not,
Charles Rosier-Henlin.
Harry folded the letter carefully, and slid it into his pocket. The eagle-owl that carried it had found him at the top of the Owlery, where he'd come to visit Hedwig. Harry supposed it was meant to find him at the school table, where no one could miss that someone was pleased enough with Harry to send such a magnificent bird, but this was just as well. Harry had the choice now of concealing that he'd received post, if he wanted.
Hedwig made a jealous sound as Harry fed the eagle-owl a treat. The eagle-owl gave her a look of glacial contempt which Hedwig returned. Then she turned back to Harry and ran a strand of hair through her beak, nibbling at it.
"Yes, you're still my favorite," Harry reassured her, turning around so that he could pet her. Sometimes it was a pain having no hand on the opposite side.
Hedwig hooted proudly at the eagle-owl, but it had already lost interest in them and launched itself towards the Owlery window. Harry shook his head as he watched it fly away. The sky beyond the window was a clear pearly-gray, already shedding opportunistic flakes of snow. Harry knew it would only get more bitterly cold as the week wore on. He wasn't looking forward to playing against Ravenclaw this weekend, though Warming Charms and thick robes would protect them when they flew.
"Harry?"
Surprised, he turned his head, and then blinked. Connor stood in the Owlery entrance behind him, sticking his hands into his robe pockets as the chill penetrated his skin. Harry had spoken with him yesterday and told him the story of the fight with Draco and Snape—the first of whom had tried to talk about what had happened with him in such a way that showed he wasn't ready to admit the rightness of anything Harry said, and whom he'd walked away from—but he hadn't expected Connor to find him this morning.
"I thought you might like some company when you walk down to breakfast," said Connor quietly. "I know it's usually with Malfoy, and, well…" He shrugged as if he were embarrassed to be bringing it up now, and scratched the back of his neck.
"That's welcome, Connor, actually. Thank you." Harry let Hedwig go with one final scratch to her breast feathers, and then reached up and drew Argutus gently out of his sleeve. "You said to let you know when we were leaving the cold place" he told the snake, who refused to trust Warming Charms to actually keep him warm.
"Now we are? Good." Argutus lifted his head out and tested the air with his tongue, seeming ready to hide again until Harry and Connor actually walked through the door and down the steps. "It is beyond me why you wish to come to the cold places. You should stay in the warm places and sleep when you feel bad. In fact, you should stay in the warm places and sleep even when you do not feel bad. It keeps you healthy."
Harry smiled and shook his head. Argutus understood little of the terms of the argument that Harry, Draco, and Snape had had, so he conceived it to mean that Harry "felt bad," and should therefore spend a lot of time in bed with his faithful snake coiled around him. He'd been disappointed when Harry got up yesterday and insisted on studying and eating and moving around.
"There's one thing I still don't understand."
Harry glanced back at Connor to make sure that he would speak English. "What's that?"
"I mean—you did the best you could," said Connor. "Just like the trial, and lots of other situations they've seen you do the best you could in."
Harry nodded, and then had to stop and pick Argutus up as he misjudged his ability to coil around the very edge of Harry's severed left wrist and fell on the floor. Argutus slid back up his sleeve in embarrassment.
"So why is this so different?" Connor asked.
"I don't know," Harry mused. "Perhaps the timing of it. Lots of things have happened in a few months—" Connor smothered a laugh. Harry glared at him. "Well, they have. Maybe they got tired of it. Or maybe they've been so worried for so long that it erupted like this. Or maybe they really did think that I never answered back because I agreed with them, instead of just thinking they might be right, and not wanting to say things I'd regret."
"Well, either way, it's stupid," said Connor.
"I quite agree."
They ran into several Gryffindors coming from the Tower on their way down, including the Weasley twins, Hermione, and Edith Bulstrode, who had quickly become fast friends with at least one girl in her year. Harry divided his observation between them. Hermione wasn't nearly as pale as she had been the night Rosier kidnapped her, but she still gave every shadow they passed a nervous glance; Harry thought Rosier might have grabbed her in a shadowy corner. Edith never spoke very loudly, and blushed when someone looked at her too long, but she was healing slowly, Harry thought. Her mother had stepped hard on her, but she hadn't managed to pound or crush everything good out of her. Edith still had deep roots and even a bright blossom, if she could be persuaded to raise her head.
She saw him looking and flushed again, but she smiled. Harry smiled back at her, and then had his attention insistently caught by the twin he thought was George.
"Did you say that—"
"Professor Snape argued with you?" Fred finished. "That was the rumor yesterday, at any rate."
Harry snorted. "Yes, but it's not about anything to do with Potions," he said. "Thanks for asking, though."
The twins exchanged a sly glance, and Harry could feel his eyes narrow. "What are you doing?" he asked.
"Doing?" Fred asked, a wildly innocent expression on his face. "Why must we be—"
"Doing something all the time?" George asked. "We're pure, Harry! Clean as the driven snow!"
Harry thought of the snow that blew across his face during winter Quidditch practice, and the slush it usually collected and melted into when lots of people had been stepping on it. "I can believe that," he said.
The twins snickered in unison, and put their heads together. Harry sped up a little. If they actually planned on pranking Snape, then he didn't want to know about it.
They entered the Great Hall together, much more noisily than Harry usually entered it; Gryffindors would talk about anything, it seemed, and at the top of their lungs, and at a point in the day when most of the people at the other House tables were still half-asleep. Harry caught many drowsy glares directed their way, but as he broke from them and turned towards the Slytherin table, only two remained fixed on him specifically. One from the head table and one from Slytherin, of course, beside a seat what had remained empty.
Harry didn't take it; this early, there were plenty of other places on the bench. He sat down beside Millicent, who nodded as if she understood every nuance of their argument, though Harry doubted she did. He and Draco had argued in an empty corridor rather than the Slytherin common room yesterday. He reached for the plate of pancakes, responding absently to the questions a fourth-year was asking him about Divination. Conversation about that subject didn't need much attention at the worst of times.
"I just wanted to tell you something."
Harry looked up, again surprised; he hadn't noticed Connor following him to the Slytherin table. Connor stood in front of Draco, who turned his head slowly to give him the full force of a haughty Malfoy glare. Connor didn't seem intimidated. He'd seemed much less intimidated altogether since he'd become the Potter heir, Harry had noticed.
"What?" Draco asked at last, in a voice that could cut ice.
Connor leaned forward until he was nose to nose with Draco. "You're being stupid," he said, and then turned and strode towards the Gryffindor table, leaving Draco blinking at his back.
Harry looked down at his plate, pretending he hadn't been paying attention when Draco glanced at him, and hid his smile in his breakfast.
When he finished, of course, and stood to make his way to Double Potions, Draco's hand was insistent on his shoulder. Harry looked into his face and sighed. "I'll be along in a minute," he told Blaise, who'd lingered to wait for him.
"Why wait?" Draco said, his voice steady. "After all, we have the class together. We'll walk together."
Harry bit his tongue. If Draco wanted to fight in front of an audience, then that was what would happen. He turned and began walking towards the entrance of the Great Hall, fast enough to force Draco and Blaise to scramble after him. Draco was flushed from more than exertion when he came up beside Harry, and he grabbed his shoulder again. Harry shook himself free with a movement he'd learned in his training with Lily.
"Stop this," said Draco, as if that had been his breaking point, his voice sharp as frozen crystal.
"No," said Harry in the same tone.
"You know that we have a point, Harry—"
"About calling me a foolish child who'll never learn? About expecting that I should just submit to monitoring spells like a baby? About saying that I should have considered my life before anyone else's?" Harry snorted. "Forgive me if I think none of that's worthy of a serious response, Draco."
"But you have to—"
"No," said Harry. "I don't have to."
"But I've been reading history," Draco insisted. "I've read about war leaders, Harry. And Lords, even though I know you hate the term. They all had to harden their hearts to survive war. And when they did something foolish, like trying to go out and rescue a doomed group of soldiers, then their companions had to do the right thing, and sit on them."
"You're a bit too slow, then," Harry sniped at him. "You're always trying to sit on me when the doomed soldiers are already safely back in the camp."
"If you wouldn't get into these situations in the first place, then we wouldn't have the urge to do this!" Harry didn't look at Draco, but he knew his face would be turning pink.
"Oh, yes, Draco, I get into these situations on purpose," Harry snarled. "I walk around with food in my outstretched hand, calling to Voldemort—and I think you're a child for flinching at his name, by the way—to please come bite it off at the wrist! I lure Rosier to me with a trail of bread crumbs, and beg him to kidnap Hermione so that I'll have something heroic to do! And I just can't go a week without killing someone. I long for it. I pant for it. I yearn for it. That's why you're always having to sit on me when the danger's past, not because Voldemort hates me and Rosier's a bloody madman!"
"I didn't mean it like that," said Draco.
"You never do," Harry said, distantly, and strode ahead of him, Blaise at his side. Draco willingly dropped behind. Harry didn't know what he was thinking. He'd almost think that his words had to be making an impression on that thick skull, but, on the other hand, Draco seemed incapable of giving in; he wanted Harry to admit that he was absolutely right, rather than saying that sometimes he could be wrong. Harry could have compromised if it had been understood that he wouldn't be a good little boy and always tell Snape and Draco where he was going, because that was impossible. Both Draco and Snape seemed to think that he could be a good little boy with just a little more effort.
"Wow," said Blaise at last.
Harry grinned sideways at him. "A bit more explosive than our usual arguments," he agreed, proud of himself for his calm tone. He wasn't flaying himself with guilt for arguing at all, because this time, he was right. He wasn't trembling in anxiety for the day when he could reconcile with Draco and Snape, though Merlin knew he wanted it. It felt wonderful to have honest anger supporting him. "Now, did you read about the potion we're doing today? It's tricky. The potion will congeal if you don't add a counterclockwise stir at the end of every nine clockwise stirs, even though most of the books don't say that…"
Snape noticed signs of trouble the moment he entered Double Potions that morning. Harry was sitting on the other side of the room from Draco, with Blaise. Draco sat by himself, sulking, though Padma Patil, the only one in the room who didn't have a partner so far, had planted herself tentatively at his shoulder.
Snape concealed a snarl. Harry doing that simply to hurt Draco is unworthy of him.
The bitterness that had choked him for the past day rose up again. Harry had nearly died, and still he had the gall to act as if nothing had happened! He could not even make allowances for words that Snape would not have spoken if anger and guilt—at missing Harry's descent into danger, again—and relief had not seized him in a maelstrom. He had to hold a grudge now, of all times, when at others, he had understood why Draco and Snape were worried. Snape wondered what was so different, this time of all times.
That he had to compare us to Lily Potter!
That had stung so violently that Snape hadn't even attempted to speak to Harry yesterday. He had known he would shout about that remark, and Harry would defend himself, and everything would crash further down the pit than it had already fallen. He had stayed in his rooms, brooding and marking essays, and contented himself with the knowledge that Harry couldn't really have meant it, that by the next day, things would be different.
It had been a nasty shock to come into breakfast that morning and see Draco sitting alone. And now this. Snape shook his head and drew his wand. It would be a day when he cast Potions instructions on the board and ignored the students for half the class, so that he could keep his temper when he walked among them later and tested the quality of their brewing.
He turned to the board and flicked his wand, envisioning the instructions for the Mind-Calming Potion.
A series of bright red bubbles rose out of his wand, followed by a confused kitten, who dropped to the floor and began to mew.
Snape stared. This was definitely his wand. What in Merlin's name—
He heard a helpless giggle from behind him, but when he whipped around, the students were all sitting with definitely shut mouths. Harry was looking at Blaise, as if he thought his face would turn red if he looked at Snape.
Snape turned back, this time whispering the incantation aloud under his breath. It wasn't common, but sometimes, when the caster of a nonverbal spell was sufficiently distracted, the effect would be something very different than what he'd intended without the words to shape and guide it.
This time, a second kitten joined the first, amid a series of pink bubbles. The kittens sniffed each other and began to crawl around the floor, toddling earnestly in the direction of the students. The giggles were louder now, and multiple.
Snape felt the muscles in his neck tighten. He was a few inches from snapping. That this had to happen now!
He spoke Lumos under his breath, and made the gesture with the wand perfectly; this was a spell he'd known long before he came to school, thanks to the patient instruction of his mother.
A blue pixie appeared on the tip of his wand, considered him for a moment, and flew away. Snape heard a snicker. It sounded like Harry's.
That was all it took to snap his calm, especially when it sounded as if the pixie had got into his ingredients stores.
"Out!" he screamed, whipping around. The students were already fleeing if they were Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw. Connor Potter lingered a moment, looking fascinated, and Harry was rising to his feet with an infuriating lack of concern. Snape stared directly at him. Harry looked back with no sign of guilt, but plenty of amusement. Snape snarled at him, and Harry rolled his eyes and turned his back, picking up his Potions book at a perfectly normal pace.
Snape was certain he could hear laughter out in the corridor.
He used wandless magic to slam and lock the door, and then settled down to examine his wand. It was, demonstrably, still his wand. His first thought had been that someone had switched it for one of the fake wands the Weasley twins had invented, but it was too familiar in his hand.
Then he cast Nox, and felt it. A tingle of magic ran through the wand just at the moment he voiced the spell, getting there barely ahead of his own incantation. It switched out his wand core and replaced it with a different one, one that caused a pink snake with hearts on its sides to land on his desk. The moment he stopped trying to cast, his old wand core reappeared.
Snape might have appreciated the sophistication of the trick at any other time; it took near-genius to devise a spell that would switch his core with something else without damaging the wand, and the person or persons who had done it had accomplished it without ever stealing his wand from his possession. But Snape didn't care, this day of all days. And he knew it had been the Weasley twins. He had no proof, but that had never stopped him from assigning detention.
He rose and turned towards the door, intending to find the twins, wherever they were now, and take points from them and assign detention in front of their professor and entire class. That ought to be enough for the beginning of his vengeance.
He fell, sprawling. When he looked down, he found that the pixie had tied his robes together.
The pixie, the kittens, and the pink snake all got caught up in a rush of violent wandless magic in the next few minutes.
Harry shook his head as he headed back to the Slytherin common room after dinner. Draco had tried another variation of the argument, this time saying that of course, since he loved Harry so much, he was entitled to be a little unreasonable. Harry had said, "Not that unreasonable," and it had all gone downhill from there. This time, Draco hadn't taken even the relative privacy of a corridor, instead screaming at him in the Great Hall. Harry wondered if he had thought that would encourage Harry to back down and admit he was right sooner. It hadn't. It just made Harry more and more stubborn. He could accept compromise; he could admit that the remark comparing Snape and Draco to Lily would have hurt, for example. But he wasn't just going to say that they were right, and that seemed to be what they wanted.
"Oy, Harry!"
Harry turned in startlement, then smiled. Regulus stood behind him, propped against a wall of the entrance hall in a deliberately devil-may-care position, his head cocked to one side and his arms folded. "What are you doing here?" Harry asked, even as he went to him and hugged him. He hadn't seen Regulus since Christmas, though he assumed he knew of what was happening. The papers had certainly trumpeted Dumbledore's death loudly enough, and now the Daily Prophet was having a field day tracking down known supporters of Dumbledore and asking them if their views had changed. They tended to stammer in their interviews, and most of the pureblood Light students in the school made a point of stating loudly that they didn't think anyone could support Dumbledore now that it was known he'd been a Dark Lord.
"I heard about your fight with Draco and Severus," Regulus said. "Severus ranted at me for several hours yesterday about what you'd done."
Harry sighed and stepped away from Regulus. "If you came to plead for him, then—"
"No," Regulus interrupted. "I thought about telling him he was being stupid, at first, but that just entrenches Severus further into his position, as if he thinks that he has a right to be stupid when someone else notices. So I came to cheer you up instead. How would you like to visit Wayhouse?"
Harry hesitated. The truth was that he didn't have very much homework, and he'd only seen the house once, when he and Narcissa were searching for Regulus's body, and then not for very long. "Have you spoken to the Headmistress about taking me off school grounds?"
Regulus grinned at him. "So proper, Harry," he teased.
"I really try not to get into trouble," Harry said, all his defensiveness returning in a rush. "I do, you know. But when I do, then I don't see why I should have to think of what other people would do before what I have to do—"
"Hush," said Regulus, and his hand fell to caress Harry's hair. He seemed to know the trick of ruffling it without messing it up further, which Harry had thought once that only Lily did. "I know. I don't think it was fair, either. Just because I kept silent under Severus's tirade yesterday doesn't mean I didn't pick a side." He winked at Harry. "And it's the side my heir's on."
"I'm not going to be the Black heir," said Harry, exasperation of one kind turning into exasperation of another. "Really, Regulus."
"Oh, I haven't been trying to bribe or trick you into accepting the inheritance," said Regulus, his face exactly as innocent as the Weasley twins' had been that morning. "I just think you might like to see beautiful things that won't endanger you, sometimes. And this time, you're right."
Harry wavered for a moment, but the only thing that really bothered him was a half-done Charms essay, and he didn't have Charms until after lunch tomorrow; he could easily get it done. "All right," he agreed, and followed Regulus towards the school entrance.
"I did speak to the Headmistress, as it happens," Regulus tossed back to him over his shoulder. "She seemed to think it was a good idea."
Harry nodded. It was becoming increasingly obvious that McGonagall had changed her mind about his needing to listen to Draco and Snape, perhaps because of how unreasonable they'd been. She'd taught their Transfiguration class today, and given Harry several smiles that she didn't have to.
Regulus pulled out a Portkey the moment they were out of the school, and Harry blinked. "Wouldn't it be better to just walk down the Hogsmeade road and Apparate?" he asked.
Regulus shook his head. "Wayhouse is temperamental," he said. "Currently, it's decided that no one should Apparate to it. I can't remove the wards that would let me do that, because Cousin Arcturus built that house and essentially gave it free will. So when it doesn't want me to do something, I can't. It obeys me in the big things, but the little things are all its own."
Harry smiled at that—the house sounded like the Many—and reached out, gripping the Portkey, which looked like a sweet wrapper, with his hand. Argutus watched in interest from his left wrist as they whirled around and the world changed positions. The little snake liked to travel by Portkey lately, though Harry didn't understand why.
They landed in a room that Harry only vaguely remembered, one of those he'd searched with Narcissa. He straightened up, glanced around, and nodded. Yes, this was Wayhouse. Its walls were built of silvery wood, and molded and dipped in odd shapes, as if he stood inside a hollow tree. And the magic sang around him. Not even Malfoy Manor or Lux Aeterna showed their power so obviously; Harry guessed both Dark and Light purebloods usually thought some modicum of decorum necessary. Not Wayhouse. Harry could feel the multiple spells humming on the staircases, and the room they stood in, which might once have been a nursery, had small spells fastened to the walls, apparently just because.
There was something odd about the place, though, beyond its general oddness. Harry shifted and glanced over his shoulder. He felt as though someone were watching him, even though no portrait hung in the room.
"Regulus?" he asked.
"Hmmm?" Regulus had worked his way over to the other side of the room, and a large mosaic made entirely of polished blue shells. "Watch this, Harry." He stroked the shells, and they went into motion, bending and rising to mimic waves of the sea. Harry stepped closer, and smiled to see merfolk rising from the waves, mostly to stick their tongues out at the watchers and then dive back again.
"Do you feel like someone's watching you? Is it normal?"
Regulus blinked at him, puzzled. "Well, no. I mean, Cousin Arcturus does sometimes leave his portrait and wander around the house, but I can feel him right now, and he's asleep. Is something the matter?"
"Someone is watching me," said Harry, as the instinct, sharpened through years of training, grew more and more insistent. "I don't know why. It's annoying," he added, raising his voice, just in case the eyes belonged to something that could hear him and be persuaded to stop.
The thing watching did seem to hear him, but the sensation of eyes just sharpened instead. The next thing Harry knew, teeth closed on his ankle. He hopped backward, swearing, even as he remembered one room he had seen when he was here with Narcissa, where small creatures darted out from the bed to bite his ankles.
When he looked down, he suspected that he was in rather more trouble. A long tendril of silver-green extended from the wall, resembling a thin snake. It tugged him insistently nearer to the wall, and Harry had to hop with the pull. It felt as though the teeth were hooked under his skin.
Regulus, behind him, didn't sound alarmed. "It's all right, Harry. I didn't know this would happen, but it's normal." His voice had an undertone of excitement that didn't really reassure Harry. "Just go to the wall. The house wants to taste you."
"Taste me?" Harry shook his head, but kept hopping, giving in to the snake's impatient tugs, until he stood next to the silvery wood wall it sprouted out of. Immediately, an enormous blue tongue formed and licked his face, then moved down and licked a shoulder through his robes, then swiped each arm and leg.
Harry shuddered. The tongue was cold and wet. He could imagine that Arcturus Black had probably thought this a hugely funny joke to wake his guests in the night with, but he wished he could have heard about it instead of experienced it.
The tongue let him go. Harry realized the snake had, too, and backed away from the wall, watching it warily. The tongue slid over a pair of enormous lips, and then retracted into the wood with a satisfied purr.
Harry felt a new presence in his mind at the same moment. It bedded down behind his thoughts, and purred.
"What in Merlin's name—" he said, a feeble exclamation, because he thought his voice would start shaking if he tried anything else.
"I told you Wayhouse had its own free will," said Regulus, sounding so exultant that Harry turned to him rather warily. Regulus was grinning wildly. "It's decided that it would like to bond to you. Now it'll listen to you rather than me."
"That's ridiculous," said Harry flatly. "You're still the one who owns the house."
Regulus snorted. "That's true for Silver-Mirror and Cobley-by-the-Sea and Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, Harry, but not Wayhouse, not anymore. Go on. Tell it to do something."
"And if it does nothing?" Harry retorted. "You said that it could do anything it wanted. I still think you're joking."
"Tell it to do something," Regulus repeated insistently. "It just chose you. I think it wants to show off for you."
Harry rolled his eyes, but murmured, "Would you move the mural from the left side of the room to the right one?"
The mural of blue shells vanished at once, melting into the wall like the water it resembled, and then reappeared just to the side of Regulus, who whooped and then collapsed into the chair behind him, laughing. The chair shuffled backwards, and Regulus sat down with a thump, but that didn't stop his laughter.
"Why do you think this is so funny?" Harry was staring at the mural, disconcerted. He couldn't really feel his bond to the house anymore, but he knew it must be there. And he had not the slightest idea in the world why it had chosen him. Maybe Wayhouse's motives really were unfathomable.
Regulus looked up, grinning. "This would have happened anyway, Harry, if you'd agreed to become my heir; Wayhouse would have transferred the bond to you on my death, unless it decided to be temperamental and find someone it liked better. Then you'd have to share the Black legacy with that person, whoever it was. That's a change that my grandfather worked into the legacy. The Black fortune and lands and houses are only supposed to have one heir, but he knew he couldn't control Wayhouse after Cousin Arcturus built it, so there's a single exception for it, just in case this ever happened. Now it's decided to transfer to you while I'm still alive. Don't you think it'd make more sense for you to become my heir now? I'd have to share the fortune with you anyway. Legal rules, you see, and Grandfather's." Regulus all but batted his eyes at him.
"You knew this would happen!" Harry accused him.
"I didn't," Regulus denied promptly. "Not at all. Wayhouse had plenty of chances with other heirs, you know. My cousins used to visit it all the time. And it's not like it had to choose you. I certainly couldn't force it. It does whatever it wants, Harry."
"You don't have to make me your heir," said Harry. "You could just ignore the rules. You do all the time anyway," he added. "No one else has to know this happened."
"Grandfather thought of that, too," said Regulus happily. "There's already been a change on the official records in the Ministry. And now you have access to the Black vaults, and all the treasures of Wayhouse are officially yours. Come on, Harry." Regulus reached into his robe pocket, pulled out a sheaf of parchments, and waved it coaxingly at Harry. "I have all the papers signed, finally, so that I can take an heir who's neither related to me by blood—well, you are, but so distantly that trying to take you as a blood heir wouldn't stand up against the claims of my cousins—nor in sympathy with my magic. You're practically half heir already. It would make me peaceful to know that I don't have to find someone else to leave the rest of the fortune and houses to."
"Draco would—"
"Draco is a Malfoy, not a Black, and has plenty of things to inherit," said Regulus firmly. "Besides, I don't like him all the time. And Narcissa the same. She ought to have known better than to swear that stupid oath. So. Harry. What do you say?"
Harry sighed and looked around Wayhouse. He tried to frame a question in his mind about the house taking another heir, not sure it would hear him.
Can't, came the immediate response. Won't. Shan't!
Harry sighed again and looked back at Regulus. "I have access to the vaults anyway, you said."
Regulus nodded. "Like I said, it would otherwise have been the heir's undivided, but now that Wayhouse is bonded to you, it would be shared—assuming the heir is anyone else."
Harry bit his lip. He could think of things he could accomplish with the Black money, and having Wayhouse as a sanctuary to retreat to would ease his life; that wasn't the problem. He was still unsure if he could accept it, though.
Is it too selfish, to accept the money? Is Regulus only not offering it to Draco and Narcissa because he's irritated at them right now?
"You're sure you won't change your mind?" he asked Regulus, testing.
Regulus's face softened. "I never will," he said. "I promise, Harry. Even if I met a child in sympathy with my magic, that doesn't mean I'd like him or her as a person. Lots of families adopt a child like that just because they're desperate. I never will be that desperate. And assuming I did marry and have children, I know that I could rely on you to help take care of them. You'd never refuse to give them a home if I died, or throw them out without a Knut to their names. So, yes. I can't imagine finding a better heir. I know you, and I know you're more than good enough to be my heir." He held Harry's gaze.
Harry took a deep breath. "I accept, then."
Regulus crowed softly, and shook the papers. "You have to sign in a few places," he said. "Well, more than a few," he amended as parchment tumbled to the floor in a merry rain. "But it's just signing. Your signature carries your magic, and binds you to the properties and fortune." He paused for a moment, then added, "You could take the name of Black, if you wanted to."
"No," said Harry sharply. "At least, not yet."
Regulus only grinned as if he'd expected nothing less, and held out the parchments to Harry again. Harry had to smile back as he looked around for a table to sign his name on, and found Wayhouse mushrooming one at him immediately. The way he signed was only half-reluctant.
It was silly arguing against a transfer of power that it seemed had already happened. And money, at least, and political power were tools Harry could imagine wielding without as much anxiety as he felt about his magic.
I already know the first two things I'm going to do, he thought, as he finished the final signature with a flourish. In his head, Wayhouse hummed in what felt like happy agreement.