Uncomfortable Truths

They had relayed the story to the others when they returned to the common room after lunch, but no one had any helpful ideas. (Ron did suggest surrendering Malfoy to the clearly-enraged Slytherins, but that idea was quickly shot down by Hermione, who had thrown a rather large ancient runes textbook at him).

Harry knew the conversation with Scorpius was coming. He was surprised it took the boy nearly two hours to finally cross the common room and at preach him tentatively.

"Uh, Mr Pot -"

"- I really think you can call me Harry, Scorp," he said kindly, closing the potions book he had been reading through idly after finishing his last essay just before sunset. "Grab a seat, bud."

Scorpius joined him tentatively at the table by the window where, during the daytime, one could look out over the grounds and marvel at the beauty of the grounds. Tonight, however, all Harry could see was the missing lights of Hagrid's hut.

He waited patiently until Scorpius eventually asked, "... Is my dad okay?"

Harry sighed and look the kid dead in the eye. "I'm not going to lie to you, Scorp. He's -"

"- Oh, since when?!" James piped up from the couch opposite them. "All you do is lie to us!"

"To be fair, he doesn't technically lie," Al said thoughtfully.

Lily rolled her eyes dramatically. "A lie by omission is a lie all the same."

Ginny looked at Hermione pointedly and asked, "Remind you of anyone?"

"My point," Harry said to the room at large, though he was still speaking to Scorpius, "is that I'm going to be honest here: I genuinely don't know if Draco is okay. But I am going to do everything in my power to make sure he is."

Exactly what that would mean, he had no idea. No one did. All they did know was that if there was a way to help, Harry would find it.

Though there was so much more to be said, they were interrupted by the tapping of a beak on the window above the table. A handsome screech owl was standing on the windowsill, gazing into the room at Ron.

"Isn't that Hermes?" Hermione said, sounding amazed.

"Blimey, it is!" Ron said quietly, throwing down his quill and getting to his feet. "What's Percy writing to me for?"

Above the chaos, Ginny's eyes met Harry's. Somehow, though she hadn't woken up like he had, she still knew what was about to happen.

Over by the fire, Lily frowned. "So Uncle Percy's writing you. Big deal! We see him at Gran's every Sunday."

"'Sunday lunches are important,'" Al and James quoted in a monotone that was eerily reminiscent of Percy Weasley. "'Family is everything.'"

Hermes flew in through the window as soon as Ron opened it and held out a leg, to which a letter was attached. Ron took the letter off it and the owl departed at once, leaving inky footprints across the outside of Harry's potions essay.

"That's definitely Percy's handwriting," he said, sinking back into his chair and staring at the words on the outside of the scroll: Ronald Weasley, Gryffindor House, Hogwarts. He looked up at Hermione. "What d'you reckon?"

"Open it," Hermione said eagerly.

Behind them, Harry rose from his seat and spoke to the children. "Guys."

Four sets of eyes settled on Harry, who for a moment looked exactly as he did twenty-something years from now.

"Uh, this is ..."

"This is hard," Ginny said, speaking up when she knew her husband didn't have the words. "You've not heard this part of the story before. Because at home, it's ancient history. But right now, well ..."

She gestured to Ron, whose scowl was becoming more pronounced the further his eyes moved down the page. By the time he was finished, he looked disgusted. He all but threw the letter to Harry, who caught it deftly and waited for his best friend's nod before he read it.

Dear Ron,

I have only just heard (from no less a person than the Minister for Magic himself, who has it from your new teacher, Professor Umbridge) that you have become a Hogwarts prefect.

I was most pleasantly surprised when I heard this news and must firstly offer my congratulations. I must admit that I have always been afraid that you would take what we might call the 'Fred and George' route, rather than following in my footsteps, so you can imagine my feelings on hearing you have stopped flouting authority and have decided to shoulder some real responsibility.

But I want to give you more than congratulations, Ron. I want to give you some advice, which is why I am sending this at night rather than by the usual morning post. Hopefully, you will be able to read this away from prying eyes and avoid awkward questions.

From something the Minister let slip when telling me you are now a prefect, I gather that you are still seeing a lot of Harry Potter. I must tell you, Ron, that nothing could put you in danger of losing your badge more than continued fraternisation with that boy. Yes, I am sure you are surprised to hear this - no doubt you will say that Potter has always been Dumbledore's favourite - but I feel bound to tell you that Dumbledore may not be in charge at Hogwarts much longer and the people who count have a very different - and probably more accurate - view of Potter's behaviour. I shall say no more here, but if you look at the Daily Prophet tomorrow you will get a good idea of the way the wind is blowing - and see if you can spot yours truly!

Seriously, Ron, you do not want to be tarred with the same brush as Potter, it could be very damaging to your future prospects, and I am talking here about life after school, too. As you must be aware, given that our father escorted him to court, Potter had a disciplinary hearing this summer in front of the whole Wizengamot and he did not come out of it looking too good. He got off on a mere technicality, if you ask me, and many of the people I've spoken to remain convinced of his guilt.

It may be that you are afraid to sever ties with Potter - I know that he can be unbalanced, and, for all I know, violent - but if you have any worries about this, or have spotted anything else in Potter's behaviour that is bothering you, I urge you to speak to Dolores Umbridge, a truly delightful woman who I know will be only too happy to advise you.

"What?" Al asked, looking up when he got this far in the letter. "But - but this is Uncle Percy, dad."

"I know," Harry nodded, all too aware that his children's perception of their uncle was falling apart before his very eyes. "It's not as simple as you think it is."

"Yeah, it really is," James countered. "Uncle Percy's a prat!"

Ginny shrugged. "We're not disputing that. What we're saying is -"

"- No, what Ginny's saying is this is forgivable," Ron said, speaking right over the top of his sister. "And it's not."

"Yes, it is," Harry said. "Don't write your brother off like that, Ron. Yeah, he chose the wrong side today - so what? We all know better than anyone that people can change."

"Like Malfoys," Scorp said quietly. "Right?"

Harry nodded. "Exactly. Some people change for the better, like your dad did. And some people change for the worse. Like Wormtail."

Everyone went silent. The kids looked from one to the other, no one game to even so much as breathe. They'd heard the name before, of course, in passing here and there. But until right now, they'd never really stopped to think that 'Wormtail,' whoever it was, had once been an actual person.

"There's more to the letter," Al said, still holding the letter in his hands.

This leads me to my other bit of advice. As I have hinted above, Dumbledore's regime at Hogwarts may soon be over. Your loyalty, Ron, should be not to him, but to the school and the Ministry. I am very sorry to hear that, so far, Professor Umbridge is encountering very little co-operation from staff as she strives to make those necessary changes within Hogwarts that the Ministry so ardently desires (although she should find this easier from next week - again, see the Daily Prophet tomorrow!). I shall say only this - a student who shows himself willing to help Professor Umbridge now may be very well-placed for Head Boyship in a couple of years!

Al looked over to Harry, concern in his eyes. "Dad? What does that mean?"

Harry sighed and took his glasses off tiredly. "It means exactly what toad-face's speech meant at the start of term."

"Harry!" Hermione whispered, clearly upset he was not showing respect for a teacher.

"Oh, come off it, Hermione," Harry said. "That's the least of the insulting names for the woman, and you know it."

Hermione didn't answer.

"Wait a minute," Scorpius said, slowly turning to look at Harry again. "You mean - the Ministry's interfering at Hogwarts?"


Come midnight, Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny were the only ones left in the common room. He'd taken longer than even he cared to admit to finish his homework - it'd been decades since he'd last written an essay, after all. Reports, he could handle. But essays? The word alone was starting to make him shudder. The only sound was that of Hermione's quill scratching out sentences here and there on the boys' essays and the ruffle of pages as she checked various facts in the reference books strewn across the table.

Harry was exhausted, in a whole new way than he'd ever been before. Not only was he juggling the kids - and now Scorp, who needed someone to look out for him - but he was also worried about protecting the timeline, and the impending war, and whether they would all have to live through it (again). And whether they'd all make it out alive a second time. On top of all that, he now had an odd, sick, empty feeling in the pit of his stomach that had nothing to do with their situation and everything to do with his brother-in-law's letter, which was now blackened and curling as it crackled in the heart of the fire.

Having done this before made no difference to the discomfort of knowing half the people inside Hogwarts thought him strange, even mad; he knew the Daily Prophet had been making snide allusions to him for months, but there was something about seeing it written down like that in Percy's writing - Percy, who insisted on Sunday lunches with the family; Percy, who insisted he do the big white wedding to marry his sister, because quietly eloping in a registry office was not enough pomp and circumstance for his sweet sister's big day; Percy, whom Harry was proud to call his brother - that made the situation real to him all over again. This Percy, in 1995, thought him unbalanced and possibly violent.

And with a surge of sympathy for his godfather, Harry thought Sirius was probably the only person he had ever known who would understand just how he was feeling right now. In this day and age, nearly everyone in the wizarding world thought Sirius a dangerous murdered and a great Voldemort supporter, which couldn't be further from the truth.

Harry sat up straight in his seat and blinked. He had just seen something in the fire that could not have been there. It had flashed into sight and vanished immediately.

"Okay, write that down," Hermione said to Ron, pushing his essay and a sheet covered in her own writing back to him, "then add this conclusion I've written for you."

"Hermione, you are honestly the most wonderful person I've ever met," he said weakly. "And if I'm ever rude to you again -"

"- I'll know you're back to normal," Hermione said.

Beside her, Ginny frowned. "Harry? Is everything -?"

"- There!" Harry exclaimed, pointing to the fire. He slid off his chair onto his knees and crouched on the singed and threadbare hearthrug, gazing into the flames. Glancing over his shoulder, he said to Ginny, "Did you see that?"

"See what?" she asked cautiously, approaching him slowly. "You're not seeing things, are you?"

"No, Gin. I'm telling you," he said, turning eagerly back to the fire, "it's Sirius, he's -"

"- Sirius?" Hermione repeated. "You mean like when we wanted to talk to you during the Triwizard Tournament? But he wouldn't do that now, it would be too - Sirius!"

She gasped, gazing at the fire; Ron dropped his quill. There in the middle of the dancing flames sat Sirius' head, long dark hair falling around his grinning face.

"I was starting to think you'd go to bed before everyone else had disappeared," he said. "I've been checking every hour."

"You've been popping into the fire every hour?" Harry asked, half-laughing, at the same time as Ginny offered, "Are you insane? You could have been seen!"

"It was just for a few seconds," Sirius said conversationally, grinning at Ginny's outrage.

"That's not the point, and you know it," the red head countered.

Sirius paused, looking at her closely for a moment. "You know, Ginevra - may I call you Ginevra, by the way?"

"No," she growled.

Ignoring her entirely, Sirius continued on, "You remind me a lot of my dear friend Lily. I can see why her son likes you."

Ginny sat back on her feet, smiling. She punched Harry's shoulder good-naturedly and said, "Yeah, well. Her son's alright too, I guess."

"What are you doing here, Sirius?" Hermione asked anxiously as she and Ron joined the other two on the floor by the fire. "You're taking an awful risk -"

"Okay, you sound like Molly," Sirius said. "This was the only way I could come up with of answering Harry's letter without resorting to a code."

"And codes are breakable," Harry and Ron quoted in unison.

In response to Hermione's confused frown, Ron said, "What? Auror training, 'Mione."

"You didn't mention you'd written Sirius," Ginny said to Harry, who shrugged.

"I forgot," he said. "Hey - there's kind of a lot going on right now, you can't blame me, Hermione. Besides, there's no way anyone would have got secret information out of it. Right, Sirius?"

"No, it was very good," Sirius said. "Anyway, we'd better be quick, just in case we're disturbed - Al's friend."

"Scorpius," Ginny told him. "His best friend from back home."

"And he's got family here?"

"He's a cousin of yours," Harry whispered. When Sirius raised an eyebrow, he elaborated quietly, "Malfoy."

Sirius swore.

"Okay, language," Ginny said. "What's that about?"

"We were afraid of this," Sirius said. "It's spreading."

"We know," Ron said. "Neville woke up."

Sirius nodded. "I heard. How's he doing?"

Harry shook his head. "He, uh ... Right now, he just wants to be left alone."

"I don't blame the kid," Sirius said. "And what about your scar?"

"What about -?" Ron began, but Hermione interrupted him.

"We'll tell you after. Go on, Sirius."

"Well, I know it can't be fun when it hurts, but we don't think it's anything to really worry about. It kept aching all last year, didn't it?"

Harry sighed. "That may be, Sirius, but it hasn't been a problem in more than twenty years. It's just ... taking some getting used to."

"Well, now you're here and he's back, it's bound to hurt more often," Sirius said. "I know where you're going - I doubt it had anything to do with the Umbridge woman. I know her by reputation. She's foul, but no Death Eater -"

"- Technically," Harry said darkly, though he didn't elaborate any further.

"You and I both know the world isn't split into good people and Death Eaters," Sirius said with a wry smile. "She's a nasty piece of work, though. You should hear Remus talk about her."

Ginny snorted. "You should hear her talk about T -"

Harry quickly slapped a hand over his future-wife's mouth. He smiled and told her pointedly, "Spoilers, love."

Beside him, Ron shuddered. "Please don't call my sister 'love.'"

"Well, I do have other nicknames for her, but you'll like those even less."

Four sets of slightly-confused eyes landed on Harry.

"What? Oh, like Ron's never called 'Mione -"

"- Okay," Ron said, pulling himself to his feet and moving back to the table of homework. "I'm out."

"So, what are Umbridge's lessons like?" Sirius asked them, pointedly changing the subject. "Is she training you all to kill half-breeds?"

"No," Ginny said, still grinning at Hermione's wildly uncomfortable expression. "She's not letting us use magic at all."

"All we do is read the stupid textbook," Ron offered from the table.

"Ah, well, that figures," Sirius said. "Our information from inside the Ministry is that Fudge doesn't want you trained in combat."

Harry rolled his eyes dramatically. "Trained in combat. He's stupid. I mean - what does he think we're doing here? Forming some sort of wizard army?"

"That's exactly what he thinks you're doing," said Sirius. "Or, rather, that's exactly what he's afraid Dumbledore's doing - forming his own private army, with which he will be able to take on the Ministry."

There was a pause at this, then Ron said, "That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard, and I have a lifetime subscription to the Quibbler."

"So we're prevented from learning Defence Against the Dark Arts because Fudge is scared we'll use spells against the Ministry?" Hermione asked, looking furious.

"Yep," Sirius said. "Fudge thinks Dumbledore will stop at nothing to seize power. He's getting more paranoid about Dumbledore by the day. It's a matter of time before he has Dumbledore arrested on some trumped-up charge.

Ginny sent Harry a significant look. His nod was the only response she needed. The very unladylike word that came out of her mouth actually made Sirius' jaw drop.

"And you're telling me off for my language?"