Morning came like the tide, creeping slowly and yet arriving all at once. Dawn broke against his feet and Harry blinked the sleep out of his eyes. Something brittle and had settled in his bones over the night, his body shivered under his robe and his legs felt numb as he tried to stand from where he slumped against the columns of his porch.

The sachet was still clutched close, and Harry lowered it, but the morning breeze pushed away its scent and the air felt empty for it. Like leaving a meditation hall where incense had been burning, the change was startling not for the unfamiliarity of a new scent but for the lack of a scent he hadn't realized he became accustomed to.

How...unsettling, to have become used to such a thing so quickly. How unsettling that its absence left him bereft, wanting to press it close and fall back asleep – never mind the needles in his calves which should have been alarming, or the harshness of his swallows warning of an upcoming cold. Lethargy had never been Harry's vice and these impulses were unwanted, so Harry spent few moments testing his aching legs and pushed himself inside.

It was cold here too, the coal long since smoldered in its cage and the venting windows chilled the room. Harry considered his bed, he could curl up and wait the day out – it was so tempting, to hide from the overwhelming cascade of shit about to hit. But the quilts were as cold as everything else.

He heaved open his good chest instead, rifling about for something thick which would warm him faster. Most of the fabric felt worn or rough under his fingers, he passed these by. He remembered the fine clothes of the xiunu at the palace – just yesterday but somehow still a lifetime ago – gowns sewn with golden thread, necks lined with fwooper feathers, pants of dragon hide.

Harry's best piece was a caplet made of deep maroon raw silk, lined in soft grey rabbit fur, with embroidered cranes along the hem. His mother had worked on it in secret for months and Harry thought it was one of the most beautiful things he'd seen, but even this would not fit at the palace.

His mother had salvaged the silk from a stained wrap-skirt of Lady Selwyn's. The furs were mismatched, speckled, and imperfectly stitched. The cranes had imperfections they wouldn't have been back when his mother's hands were more dexterous. Harry thought of these things as marks of his mother's love – she had made this herself in stolen moments and he wouldn't trade that for anything – the cape was still far from what was expected of him. It might do for leisure, but it couldn't be worn formally.

A bird began its first call, the day soon to start. Harry frowned down at his options.

He began gathering anything passable, silk or leather or even fine linen, compressing the material into a stack that rose from his hips to his neck. Harry scooped it all up. He listened attentively for a second at the door and, hearing little, pushed his way into the courtyard. Less than twenty quick paces had Harry balanced against his mother's door, awkwardly pulling it aside with a laden-down hand.

This, at least, was warm – but Harry couldn't relish in it. He heaved his stack onto a side table and pulled off the first piece.

"Darling?" His mother mumbled, stumbling into the r and sleep-groggy, "What are you doing?"

Harry smiled at her as winningly as one could manage when stuffing a blouse into an ornamental vase. "Hiding things."

A patterned beizi followed the blouse into the vase. Lily rubbed at her tired eyes and picked up the next piece on the stack, shaking it out to inspect the stiff olive shenyi. She frowned, looking from it to Harry, then to the vase, then back again to Harry where he now tucked a skirt in the drape of her pulled curtains.

"Your father bought you this," she said, her words slow and considering, "It's a shame you've not had the occasion. You should wear it at least once."

"I will," Harry agreed easily. He stopped a moment in the middle of his stride, head turned sharply towards the side courtyards. "That'll be the kitchens. We don't have much time."

Lily listened, hearing the reluctant heave of the pipes as someone pumped the first water of the day. She folded the robe in her hands and crouched, pushing the ramie fabric into the cross supports of the table where it would be hidden by a decorative hanging edge.

She rose to find Harry studying her tentatively, but she just took a pair of pants and crouched again to hide them too.

"I won't abandon you." Harry promised, "no matter what it looks like."

And wasn't that ominous. Lily smiled sadly. "Lady Selwyn is quite persuasive, and she doesn't like competition for her toys' attention."

"That's what this," Harry gestured around, "is for." He squatted next to his mother, resting his head on her shoulder. "No matter how despicable Lady Selwyn is, I'll need her backing - and for once she will offer it, if only I make myself seem a good investment. She is pretentious and rude, more manticore than woman, but she's not stupid. She wouldn't trust a boy spent spent years ridiculing; I don't think she even trusts the boy she raised. She'll have to trust what leverage she holds against me instead. What leverage that is I can at least guide, and I don't want you in the crossfire."

"Making you some socks is hardly threatening."

"Competence will always be threatening." Harry countered. "You are my mother. You made me from nothing - but she needs to think me yet unmade. If I come to her as a little boy - in over his head, visibly dependent on her - she will trust me. Children who've never had candy before would do anything to preserve their supply of it."

Lily took a shawl from his hands, minding the fraying edges and eyeing its fading colors before pressing that too up and under the table. "What you've said is true enough; I've hardly been able to keep you fat with sweets."

She sounded bitter, ashamed, and Harry would have none of it. He grabbed her hand and pressed his lip against the back in a quick kiss, "My days have been the sweetest any boy could have known."

He meant it. His mother's hand felt clammy in his, but Harry didn't mind. In a month, in a year, he'd not have the comfort of even a clammy hand – so he committed his mother to memory and only wished he were not the cause of such pain on her face. "In any matter, she has control of the maids, and I would not be able to pretend with any believability that I prefer her gifts to yours. It is better to not shove that in her face."

His mother's hand gripped Harry's a little stronger then, and she brought her other hand to rest against the plane of his face. She kissed his forehead gently, whispering, "I shall play the part you wish, but do not remember me as the pitiful woman I must become."

They pulled each other up and Lily reached to the dwindling stack of clothes again. "I would sooner mistake a mouse for a lion," Harry said, and they made quick work of the rest of the hiding.

He met Lady Selwyn not four hours later.

A maid Harry didn't recognize had rushed breathlessly into his mother's pavilion looking for him – apparently the first of four new maidservants who were assigned to Harry 'to remedy the grave dereliction of duty his previous maidservant had exhibited.'

Harry was certain no 'previous maidservant' ever existed. He welcomed the girl anyway and asked her opinion on which of his mother's dresses he should borrow. He didn't personally have anything suitable.

Harry explained, but he wanted to make the best impression on Madam McGonagall he could.

The girl had looked at all his mother's dresses in distaste, eventually apologizing because of course the light was too low, and wouldn't His Ladyship like to take a bath first? The maid promised she would personally ensure he had something lovely to wear once the sun was a little higher.

So Harry took a bath with fancy herbs and oils and when he came out there was a finely embroidered blouse and skirt set waiting for him – right next to a jewelry box, a pot of particularly expensive tea, and a full, decadent breakfast. He ate sparingly, mindful that his mother was not receiving the same and guilty that he could do nothing about it.

To save his mother he had to forsake her, it felt very wrong but there was no having it both ways. To sequester his leftovers would only be an insult. Lily Evans wanted nothing unless she could sit at the table and claim it herself, this was how she always had been. The only thing Harry could do was engineer the future to provide such, so Harry pushed away his food and set to making it so.

Lady Selwyn wouldn't be able to summon Harry, he was part of the imperial family now, so he put on a timid face and asked one of the maids if 'Noble Mother' had arrived back yet.

She had, with a contingent from House Black.

Harry made slower time than he would have liked going to greet the group. Two of his maids insisted on carrying parasols above him, another kept fanning him steadily, and the last held his arm as he walked so to balance him. Only, it wasn't hot – the breeze seemed more to keep his dangling hair-sticks moving – and he wouldn't have needed help balancing at all if the two maids holding parasols would stop crowding him.

The rest of the compound's servants abandoned their tasks and knelt, brows against the ground, as soon as they saw him. They knelt in the dirt, in food scraps, in spilled water – whatever it took to have at least two feet of space between himself and the workers on either side.

One maid in training, a girl no more than 15, tried to peek up at him. Her older companion shoved her head down; the girl whimpered as her nose hit stone.

Harry barely kept his eyes forward. It was a rule that Harry normally ignored (or rather, one that never applied to him before,) but protocol dictated that servants were below notice unless Harry was ordering their punishment or dictating his desires. Interference outside that 'disturbed the natural order'. He hardened his heart for now, the feeling was brittle and uncomfortable.

Lady Selwyn was holding court in the central garden, loudly commenting on the chrysanthemums. She heard him coming, if not alerted by his clacking steps then surely by the rest of the group suddenly bowing his direction, but Lady Selwyn pretended not to notice.

Harry stopped at the edge of the garden terrace. "Bless·ed Morn', Lady Selwyn," he demured.

The woman looked up at him with a strange, slothful, sharpness and lifted her arm towards one of the kneeling servants, who scuttled over on their knees to help her stand. A petty way of delaying her respects, she was barely in her 30s and magically young besides.

"My Lady Concubine, Bless·ed Morn'," she replied, bending slightly at the knees and raising her hand above her shoulder, open palm up, in a straight-backed curtsy. Her shrewd eyes kept on Harry's, who smiled sweet and hopeful, and she smiled twice as sweetly back. "Though it must be a sad one as well, for such a loved daughter is so distant."

Never mind that if yesterday Harry had even looked her in the eye he would have been punished.

"This humble concubine intends no distance between us, mother. I only worry that I am an unworthy son. To represent the family like this - I am still stupid and undeserving of the honor." Harry gestured for Lady Selwyn to sit and turned to the family Black, "Our honored guests need not be so formal, of course."

The group rose from their bows, but of the three only the tallest of them did so with a wild grin and winked unabashedly at Harry. "Aim a little higher next time you get engaged, won't you? The Potters have a reputation to uphold." The older man beside him blanched, elbowing his gut sharply.

On his other side, Dorea weathered the literal treason with a practiced face. "I think Sirius is quite done with his wine, thank you."

But Harry's godfather only refilled his cup, scoffing. "How could I 'view the blossoms' without some good peach wine?"

"It is not even peach season."

Sirius considered, then nodded seriously, "You're right, poor taste. Bring out the chrysanthemum wine!"

"Perhaps chrysanthemum tea," countered Lady Selwyn blandly. "Good weather and fortuitous news need drink and music to be enjoyed. We have plenty of the drink, but as for the music - I'm afraid the doctors said to rest my hands and it would be terrible manners for me to ask guests to entertain us."

Lady Selwyn didn't look directly at Harry, but her intent was clear enough; she wanted to checking the value of her investment. Sirius, at least, thought her maneuvering gauche – rolling his eyes over the woman's head at Harry – but the obviousness of the move didn't lessen its sway.

"I doubt my meager skill will do the blooms justice, but let us bring out a guzheng and I will play," he said, waving a maid to fetch his finger-picks and sliding back his sleeves.

Two eunuchs brought in the guzheng, a large 21-stringed standing zither Harry had never touched before. It had rich, solid wood and gold-leaf embossing; the strings were a taut, enchanted silk; its bridges were made of carved antler. Harry sat before it on a carved stool and strapped on his chipped picks.

He strummed it tentatively, checking pitch and tone, but the silk strings were quite different than the cheaper metal ones with which he practiced normally.

"Is everything to Your Highness's satisfaction?" Lady Selwyn asked smugly at his hesitation. Harry didn't bother hiding his appreciation of the instrument. He was amazed with it and it made him nervous, there were so many subtle differences in the high-end instrument that could trip him up when he played.

He measured the strings, spaced wider than he was used to, and tested the give of them. Silk turned out to be much more responsive than steel, every brush of his fingers setting the strings aquiver; Harry found himself finally understanding why his zither tutor was such a hard-ass about hand posture.

This was manageable though. Difficult, but manageable. He just had to analyze field conditions and execute his play, just like quidditch.

Harry Potter played best against a challenge, anyway.

He ran through a few glissando as he looked up to his audience, his jury. It was good to see Sirius there, someone who'd back him even if he played like dragon dung, but the other faces were hawkish.

Marietta Selwyn, who held control of the Potter finances as matriarch. Dorea Black, who'd soon enough assume that control and any subsequent financial or political gains by Harry's brother. Orion Black, a dour traditionalist of a man and as well-connected in the palace as anyone not working there could be. When Sirius disgraced the Black name before his brother replaced him as heir, it was Orion that saved his son from recourse and maintained the family's positioning - proof enough of his influence.

Harry began to play. It was an elegant piece, an ode to flowers, but not simple. Zither was as much about the playing as it was about song selection, and flowers were a very specific subject to perform.

There was a sorrow to flowers; something you listened to in-between notes, in the fullness of silence where the strings reverberated still, but you couldn't place the sounds. There was breath like petals falling, a tonal curve where string flexed against finger and pick.

Songs about flowers were not singular compositions, just as gardens were not singular forms – every bloom of note had to live and die by the ear, not confused for another. They were love songs to the ephemeral.

The silk beneath his hands treated Harry softly, forgiving where metal was awkward. He played with a wondering curiosity, running the song several times to see how it could vary before pulling his hands back to his lap and letting the instrument settle out undisturbed.

He looked up expecting to have missed some conversation, or for the group to be watching the flowers or eating cakes like they normally would be. Instead, everyone's attention was fixed on him. Harry flushed darkly.

"That was A Mile of Peach Blossoms, was it not?" said the Lord Black, voice jarring after so long focused on the guzheng. Orion Black spoke like a stone wheel, deep and cracking but with the wheeze of effort and age.

"Yes. My repertoire is lacking, I don't know any songs about chrysanthemums," Harry dipped his head, "but Sirius seemed to long for spring."

The Lord hummed and sat back, considering. Lady Selwyn was considering something too, but Harry couldn't read her. Her face was pinched, but it was in none of the ways Harry was familiar with. Sirius seemed to have no such considerations, burping loudly and raising Harry a toast.

"If you want to use my name to show off, I'll certainly reap the benefits," he declared. Harry suppressed a grin.

"Oh? Did you want me to start showing off?" He flexed his fingers. He could do with a mood change; he'd never been into the whole literati thing and something a little rowdier would get Lady Selwyn off his back. It wouldn't do for her to overthink him. While he needed to seem skilled, he also had to seem vulnerable to her predations.

Sirius waved him on, and Harry scooted his stool closer – taking a more aggressive stance over the strings.

Harry played again, a much faster piece now which worked his shoulders and had him bouncing his heel with a grin. Sirius clapped a few times, leaning over to tease a scowling Dorea about her own zither lessons.

This had Lord Black lightening minutely, but turned Lady Selwyn's face to a scowl. That was alright though, this was her 'Lily Evans is a damned menace' scowl – the one she wore when Father came home with a hair-stick for her and an endangered species of fairy willow for Lily. The one she wore before buying out the shop which made a dress James complimented Lily on. The one she wore before half their compound burned down in a "kitchen accident" that destroyed that fairy willow tree.

It was a dangerous look, but it meant that Lady Selwyn – Noble Mother – was determined to outdo Lily Evans, and Harry could use that.

A few more songs in, Madam McGonagall came to fetch him for whatever lessons she had planned. Harry was glad, since he'd been running out of impressive songs.

Sirius had wandered off into the greater gardens at some point, so Harry left Lady Selwyn and the more politically inclined Blacks to make veiled comments about him and followed the Gugu back to the rooms they'd provided to her for the duration of her time with the Potters. The woman sternly turned away Harry's entourage of maids, smiling at his relief.

Having seen his zither, McGonagall first had him fetch any embroidery he'd done, potions he'd brewed, or spell-work he'd managed. Harry had little of embroidery or enchantments, but he managed to make a good showing of decent Pepper-Ups and various pain-relieving droughts.

She had him run through his sword dancing, first in the courtyard, and then again without the sword in the main area of her rooms, which she'd cleared for this purpose. Then a third time, only this time without his outer robes to better see his line – the slope of his shoulders, his posture, the angles he bent his legs.

"You need to flow, my Lady," the Gugu reprimanded, tutting at his stance. "Your hand should not extend straight from your forearm like that– unclench you hand like so, and tilt it back here, about the same angle as your bicep is if you need to reference."

"This is a very bad position to hold a sword." He frowned and lightly rolled his wrist, considering how much weight he'd be able to support with the distribution so unbalanced.

She sighed at him, "We'll get a lighter sword then. The point of a lady's dance to be enticing, not deadly."

"Well what'll I do in a fight, then?"

"No fights, Lady Potter."

Harry supposed that made sense, but still. He frowned. "There are plenty of sword styles for women, those seem better to know than this . Even if I'll never use them."

"Any form of combat is a strenuous sport. It is prohibited for your own health, same as racing, exploding snap, rugby, puffskein-fighting, riding thestrals, merry-go-rounds, quodpot, and quidditch."

"Exploding snap is hardly a sp- wait, did you say no quidditch?"

Madam McGonagall gave him a very uncharacteristic, sympathetic look, "No quidditch, Lady Potter." Then she hit his leg outward into another pretty but unpractical position with the long stick she'd acquired.

"Well, what can I do?"

"Dance. His Majesty can take you out on one of the animals we can ensure remain on the ground. Yoga is mandatory."

"Yoga?" Harry questioned, incredulous. "Why on earth is it mandatory?" Harry didn't know how the palace intended on enforcing exercise, especially something like yoga. Madam McGonagall seemed to take his question as a transition though, because she was laying out a large mat.

"For your own safety, my Lady. Now, down to your obscene-clothes please, we'll do basic warm-ups, test your mobility and strength, and improve from there. Imperial med-wizards will be available to you once you receive your ranking, rest assured they are fully educated to give recommendations for this, and the other things we will be discussing today."

Harry did this slowly, feeling exposed in just his underwrapping. He left on his diamond edged dudou , which at least felt covering since he'd never worn one before two days ago. He could almost pretend it was a shirt - if he didn't pay attention to the air on his belly, back, and shoulders. At least his nipples were covered.

TheGugu dictated the stretches to him, sometimes miming the poses, sometimes pushing him further into them with her very long stick.

Harry settled into a deep lunge and watched McGonagall pull over a stool. "I suppose I should start with a warning," she said, Harry eyed her warily. "Meaning no disrespect to your mother or whatever friends you may have talked with or will talk to – do not attempt to reenact the things you hear about with His Majesty."

He tried to think of what his mother would have told him that applied to the Emperor. Always err on the side of politeness, only make commitments you can back up, ask questions if you don't understand something, these sorts of things seemed solid life advice and he didn't see how they wouldn't have their applications in the palace. In fact, they were good advice now. "I don't understand, Gugu, " he confided.

The woman squinted back at him. She twirled her stick at his feet, Harry switched the side of his lunge. "No two men will like the same things, and the Emperor is more god than man besides," she spoke with a careful deliberateness. Harry nodded obligingly; these were both true enough. "I am saying, Lady Potter, do not go and try to slap the Emperor's arse."

Harry recoiled so hard he fell out of balance, sputtering as he caught himself hastily on one hand. "I'm not- I would never -"

"It has happened before, my Lady. Some people hear bawdy advice and, in an attempt to differentiate themselves, try such things at risk of their own lives. So, I am warning you, do not stick things where you are unsure they should be stuck; do not grab His Majesty unexpectedly, or with intent to move him where he does not wish to move; and I would not advise calling him any... imaginative names."

Sex. They were talking about sex, now. All of yesterday's conversation and his mother's worried looks were like a book Harry only just realized he was reading upside-down. They were all thinking about him, getting fucked by the Dark Lord.

Harry didn't really think about sex, but he really should have done - while no longer being a virgin would have barred him as bride in a political marriage if he had needed it, it would have significantly decreased his likelihood of being selected as well. He'd just not really paid attention to the prospect, he saw pleasure-houses in the city and he'd even been mistaken as one of the workers back when he wore his hair down, but when it came down to it Harry never really got to know anyone in his age bracket.

"I cannot say I know what my mother would recommend, or what anyone else would," he enunciated clearly, ignoring his flushing face and any hint of an indecent thought in favor of one of the more difficult poses in the book the Gugu now held open for him. One-legged Pigeon - he could do that, maybe.

McGonagall raised a delicate brow at him. "Then it is good I am here to instruct you. Do you understand how two men have babies?"

"Er- His Majesty puts his, well, his penis in me." Legs spread like this, Harry was very aware of his lower body. He shifted uncomfortably, the Gugu's poking stick thunked warningly against his moving leg. "In my bum, to – you know – make the...babies." Did she really have to be looking right at him while they talked about this?

"Yes. The med-wizards will advise on the fertility aspects of your duties, I have arranged for one to see you tomorrow. For now, we will discuss His Majesty's pleasure."

The woman spoke about the Dark Lord's sex life like she was settling shop accounts. Practically, almost perfunctorilly. The affairs of the imperial household were the nation's business, but this seemed too much. Harry almost felt sorry for the man.

Almost, because Harry needed every ounce of sympathy for himself.

TheGugu had put her long stick away, but in its place she'd pulled out a shorter, thicker stick – no, carving. He felt a little weak, "Is that..?"

"I would not know how accurate it is to His Majesty, but it will suffice for practice." She held the statuette by the base of its shaft. "I will hold on to this to prevent untoward usage, but you should observe for anatomical reference when we go through certain positions."

"What is an untoward usage of a dildo?" That probably should have been one of his lower priorities when looking at an incredibly lifelike phallus in the hands of a woman older than his mother, being told he was going to 'practice' on it in front of said woman – but Harry was so far out of his depth he could barely process the situation himself.

McGonagall frowned sternly at him. "Masturbation is strictly prohibited. This is not to enter anywhere but your mouth. Now sit here on the bed."

"Masturbation is prohibited?"

"Is your Animagus a parrot, Lady Potter?"