Having payed for his purchase from Flourish and Blotts, Harry made his way out into Diagon Alley and headed towards the Leaky Cauldron. Today he wore a pair of female muggle jeans, a loose fitting shirt, his trainers, and cloak. His hair had grown to a length that with some brushing and a good washing, Harry didn't absolutely need to use the straightening charm. He had gone to Diagon Alley today to meet with the Goblins after having received a missive from them, by owl. Harry's meeting with the Goblins had been eye opening, although, he shouldn't have been surprised that Mycroft had managed to get money deposited into his account. The man's knowledge of the inner workings of the magical world more than likely put most magicals to shame.
Clutching the sack of his purchases close to his chest, Harry bit his lip trying not to smile. Mycroft was impossible. Shifting the bag to his hip, Harry dug out his mobile after feeling the it vibrate, a text. Quickening his step, Harry made it into the Leaky Cauldron and out into muggle London before flipping open his phone. All the text read was Bishop and the text indicated that the message had not been immediately received. Harry stepped back into the Leaky Cauldron, headed up the stairs and apparated to Mycroft's office.
"Mycroft?" He whispered into the dimmed room. Papers were strewn across the floor and the previously pristine office was trashed. Stepping further in from the corner he had apparated in to, Not-Cynthia's lifeless eyes met Harry's. Her body lay, rolled on its side, near the spot where Mycroft's plant had been, chest and thigh covered in blood as it pooled around her body. The bloody trail made it obvious she had been moved, and a shiver ran down Harry's back. Shrinking his bag and cloak and stuffing them into the pocket of his jeans, he scanned the area with his eyes, and then with his magic. Harry could feel Mycroft nearby, the wall?
A safe room.
Harry pictured Mycroft in his mind and apparated again.
The safe room wasn't very large, enough room to stand maybe four or five people. Harry was thankful he hadn't landed on Mycroft and splinched them both. He found Mycroft, huddled in the farthest corner, eyes wild, and suit in disarray. Harry kneeled down in front of the shaken man. "Mycroft?"
Mycroft's eyes seemed to focus a bit and he looked directly at Harry. "Report."
"Your office was trashed. Not-Cynthia is dead. No one was out there when I arrived a moment ago. We should move though, to be safe." Came Harry's clipped and precise reply, like he normally would give, as he stood and held out his hands to Mycroft. "Come on."
Mycroft's hands trembled in Harry's as he got to his feet. "I need you to hold on tightly to me, don't let go for any reason, alright?" Harry whispered in Mycroft's ear as he pressed their bodies together. Harry had gripped one arm around Mycroft's waist and another around his neck.
Between one blink and the next they were gone.
The condo was large, expanded much in the way Harry pondered, that Grimmuald Place was, and its wards sang upon Harry's entrance. He hadn't every been here before, but he did remember the property listed in the documents the Goblins had given him for his keeping. The documents contained the properties he now owned and would need to maintain. Situated on the outskirts of London, the flat made for the perfect place to lay low, in Harry's opinion anyway. Not that he had been consciously thinking that when he had apparated Mycroft and himself out of the safe room and away from what was left of Mycroft's office.
Harry held on to Mycroft for a moment longer than necessary, then slowly back away, seeing if the man could stand on his own.
"Where are we?" Mycroft asked, voice low, giving the flat a sweeping glance.
"A flat I own."
Mycroft looked at Harry questioningly. "You own a place to live and yet…Ah, I see."
"Do you?"
"There were some…gaps, in your file."
Harry turned away and Mycroft seemed to get the hint. "I'm sorry I didn't get there sooner and about Not-Cynthia. Never actually knew her real name."
There was a lengthy pause before Mycroft answered unevenly. "Emma. Emma Wildes, of Surrey."
Looking back at Mycroft, Harry grinned solemnly. "Figures the two of the three people who like you most would come from that fucked up little corner of the world."
"Three?" Mycroft asked, eyebrow raised.
"Myself, Sherlock, and Emma, of course."
Mycroft pulled the dust cover off the couch in the sitting room, distaste written clearly on his face, before sitting down. "Given the nature of my brother's and my genius, our childhood was difficult, only made easier by our presence in each other's lives. I've often wondered where I went wrong, where my path veered farther and farther away from Sherlock." Mycroft chuckled self-deprecatingly. "I told him when we were young, that caring is not an advantage and I've tried to live my life based on that philosophy. Perhaps in our genius, we lose the ability to understand each other. I never meant it to push him away, if anything I wanted to bring him closer, to protect him from the rest of the world. Emma was a surprise, one I never thought would get past my defenses. I will miss her, I admit."
Harry paused, face blanching. "What did you just say? That phrase, to Sherlock, what did you say?"
"Caring is not an advantage."
Harry stumbled back into a seat, collapsing into it. "You knew. All this time, you knew."
Mycroft's eyes widened and he stood, taking a step towards Harry. "You didn't know." Mycroft swallowed. "You didn't know and that's what it says."
"I need to leave. I have…things." Harry rose on shaky legs. "Things to do and I need some air."
"Harry…please." Mycroft pleaded.
Harry's heart wrenched, Mycroft shouldn't be that vulnerable. The perfectly crafted control that Mycroft presented to the world lay cracked and crumbled in Harry's living room. Today had been too much, and as much as he just wanted to turn and run. Looking at Mycroft, Harry knew he couldn't. This was his soulmate after all. The person he had fought so hard, just to meet.
Harry took a few deep breaths and allowed himself a moment to let the shock pass. "Trust me?" He asked, holding out his hand. Mycroft glanced at Harry's hand and studied Harry's face, seeming to gain back just a bit of his control. He gripped Harry's hand in turn and allowed Harry to lead them to the bedroom.
Harry brought them into the master and with a few quick charms cleaned and cleared the room. As they both settled on top of the bed, Mycroft on his back and Harry on his side facing Mycroft, Harry slipped his hand out across the covers, palm up. "Witches and wizards, here in Britain at least, don't put a whole lot of stock into soulmates, blood purity and all. With my mark, those words, I never expected to find you and if I did, I feared the person I would find. The person those words belonged to."
Mycroft placed his hand in Harry's.
The next day dawned cold and dreary, neither occupants of Harry's condo having gotten much sleep. Harry had dozed off a time or too and when he would startle awake from a nightmare just sinking its claws in, a squeeze of his hand would wake him. Mycroft did not seem outwardly perturbed by his nightmares, but Harry suspected that much of the vulnerability Mycroft had shown the night before had been locked up tight by morning's light. The little that hadn't been locked up was proved by their still clasped hands. Harry had very little inclination to get up and move just yet, he wasn't quite ready to face the world. Facing Mycroft on the other hand…
"Good morning, Mycroft." Harry whispered across the distance and was met by inquisitive eyes.
"You do realize that the clothes you are currently wearing would be typically found in the female garment section of stores." Mycroft replied, tone just as soft and Harry nodded in return.
A moments silence lapsed and Harry continued, yawning. "My disguise. For when I need to go to Gringotts or visit Diagon Alley. Magic, that is strong enough, can attract attention even when you are trying to dispel it. A few hair and cosmetic charms hardly garner a second glance. Well, not of the find of variety I need to worry about anyway."
Harry allowed the silence that followed to carry him. The minutes ticked away comfortably, before Harry knew what he needed to ask. "How long have you known?"
Mycroft's response was slower coming. "When you first fell on to my radar due to your interactions with my brother, the file I received on you came up curiously short and on a hunch I went to the Queen. My department has come across this occurrence a time or two before." Mycroft paused and it looked to Harry as if he were attempting to gather his thoughts. "She was most helpful in filling in the blank spaces and was actually the one to suggest I offer you the job. Later, when I had time to go over the more completed file myself, I saw mention of the prophecy. The words were too precise and obscure no to be a fit."
"Do you think it ever clouded your judgment?"
"No," Mycroft turned his head to look Harry in the eyes. "My brother and I aren't the types to blindly believe that fate has been writing on our bodies, marking us with information to help us find the perfect person."
Harry was the one to break the spell, rolling off the bed and stretching as he walked to the master bedroom. "I'm going to go shower and start breakfast, join me when you're ready."
As he shut the door he heard Mycroft clearly call out. "Lunch."
"I can make that too."
Harry stared into the bathroom mirror currently engrossed in ignoring his reflection. He had removed his cloths from the day before, remembering his cloak and purchase that had been stuffed in his pocket. He knew that if he raised his left arm, just a bit, then his mark would be there, would be seen. Harry wasn't trying to see his reflection, though, he was trying to see what others had. When they had shunned him, praised him, despised him, worshiped him, and expected the world of him.
As he turned away from the mirror and stepped into the shower, the warm water rolling down his body and easing some of the aches and pains of a sleepless night, Harry wondered what it was that Mycroft saw when he looked at him.
Breakfast, since Harry absolutely refused to acknowledge the late hour or the not quite smug look on Mycroft's face, ended up having to be ordered out. The downside to owning a flat and never having been in it before was that there was no food to eat. Waiting for the food to arrive had left Harry time to do a quick walk through of the condo and tidy things up a bit, riding the furniture and knickknacks of years of dust and grime. The condo appeared almost entirely muggle friendly, the exception being a locked guest room that included a few wizarding photos of people Harry didn't recognize and a small brewing area. He made a mental note of asking the Goblins who the property had belonged to before his parents.
Harry felt a ripple in the wards and peered out of the room, noting Mycroft still sitting at the table, an began making his was cautiously to the door.
"Problem?"
Harry checked out the door, no one was in the hall.
"I'm not sure. I felt a ripple in the wards, but I don't see anyone."
"Could it have just been a mundane tenant?"
Harry stepped back from the door, eyed it for a moment, before joining Mycroft at the table. "I suppose it's possible, although, I would think it a bit unlikely. This building is primarily muggle, myself being the exception. Having the wards so finely tuned as to indicate when a muggle walks by…"
"I see."
"I never felt anything like it when I was living in Grimuald Place either. Granted the wards are probably different. Still, I guess it just spooked me a bit. After the food gets here I'm going to need to go out for a bit. Think you can hold down the fort?"
Mycroft looked a tad disgruntled. "Is it really necessary that you leave?"
"Do you want mundane delivery boys showing up in what had used to be an empty condo? Might draw attention." Harry mentioned, thinking off the top of his head. "Plus, there are a couple of people I should check up on and I'll need to retrieve Bishop."
"Is it safe?"
Harry opened his mouth to answer, but paused at the look on Mycroft's face, the look of fear just breaking through the surface. "No one should be able to get in, or out, without me. Mundane or otherwise. Unless, it was my kind that attacked you, there isn't a much safer place I could bring you to, and even my kind would run into some trouble, they'd really have to work for it. I'm attuned to these wards now, in a way I wasn't before, something happens and I'll be back here in a snap of your fingers. This place isn't attached to the floo network either, so you don't have to worry about the fireplace magically enlarging."
"That wasn't something I worried about before." Mycroft snapped.
Harry just shrugged and answered the com when it buzzed to let their food delivery in.
Harry saved stopping by to check in on Willow for last, curious to how she would take the news of his soulmate and to retrieve Bishop. He found her at home base, she had set up next to his corner of the building. Bishop staying with her didn't leave Harry the ability to surprise her.
"Mrooow. Mrow." Bishop intoned running towards Harry and about knocking him over when Bishop jumped up on him at full speed.
"Hey buddy, miss me?" Harry chuckled while enduring Bishop's mothering.
"You didn't come home last night." Willow chided as Harry came over and hugged her.
"Rough day yesterday, got called in for a job. Had to stay at the safe house with my charge."
"And you need to go back." Willow added before he could finish, a knowing look in her eyes.
Harry frowned. "Yeah, for a few days at least, but I wanted to check in on you. Did you come back here last night?"
"Thought it'd do me some good, shelters get too crowded and the Spring's not so bad to be out in."
"Do you want me to stay with you?"
"Oh no, Harry." Willow patted his cheek and moved around their area to sit down by a large box she must have found. "Don't you worry about me love, I'll be fine for a couple of days. You go help that person."
"Do you want me to leave Bishop? We both know he talks just to hear himself sometimes, I'm sure he'd be more than happy to stay. Plus, I've got some good news."
Willow waved him off, smiling at his concern. "Take him with you dear, I'll be fine. Save the good news for when you get back."
Harry and Willow exchanged their good byes and Harry left his home for the first time with a sense of unease in his stomach.
Bishop promptly invited himself onto Mycroft's lap as Harry apparated into the condo and deposited the feline on the floor. "Well, I see who he really likes in this relationship."
Mycroft glared at Harry as he passed into the kitchen, enlarging his shopping and putting it away. "I got us enough to last us a few days, everyone knows not to expect me to be around and I'm sure Willow will find a way to get in touch if I'm needed."
Mycroft just hummed in agreement.
"I was thinking of going an getting Sherlock later…" Harry could feel Mycroft's intense stare on his back. "You aren't the least bit worried about your brother then?"
When Mycroft didn't respond Harry turned to check on him and grimaced at the new cracks in Mycroft's defenses. He walked over to Mycroft and sat on the arm of the chair, his hand resting palm up on his thigh. "I know you care deeply about Sherlock, Mycroft, the jab was ill timed. I'm sure he's fine on his own, but I can honestly say I haven't a clue about what your job really is, and well with the attack yesterday, I'll admit I'm a bit worried, yeah?"
"Sherlock will never agree to come."
"Trust me? I think I have got a few tricks up my sleeve."
Mycroft gripped Harry's hand.
Harry entered Sherlock's new apartment building and thought it a much better improvement on the last. He didn't know what agreement the brothers had come to, but if this helped in even the least to keep Sherlock sober, Harry was impressed by the compromise.
Sherlock's door opened after the first knock. "You."
"Really, Sherlock, some manners might be nice every once and a while. Maybe you could shock me one day, hmm?
"What does my brother want now?"
"How about you let me in and we'll discuss it." Harry stated pushing his way past Sherlock, surveying the room and deciding to sit on the small love seat. Sherlock threw himself haphazardly onto a well-worn arm chair.
"I need you to do me a favor Sherlock. No, no don't look at me like that. I'm asking for me."
"Not just you." Sherlock muttered.
"Not just me, alright, I can concede to that, but your brother isn't the one asking, Sherlock. I am."
"What did he do this time?"
Harry raised an eyebrow. "I somehow feel that that is exactly what Mycroft asks about you on a regular basis."
Sherlock snorted in amusement.
Harry grinned and allowed the moment to pass naturally, before setting back to his goal. "I would like for you to pack a few days' worth of things and come with me. Your brother and I are laying low for a bit." The next few words seemed impossible to say around the lump forming in his throat. "Someone attacked your brother at his office yesterday."
Sherlock sat up in a fluid and graceful manner, face blank. "Someone died. You feel guilty."
Harry wasn't above pleading. "Please, not now Sherlock. Just agree?"
"This has affected you more than it should have. You have no emotional investment in Mycroft's employees and as you've previously stated my brother is with you and thus is fine." Sherlock frowned. "You have something else to tell me."
Harry gave a grim smile. "Show you actually, I figured I wasn't getting out of here without at least showing you." Harry brought his arm up and out over the arm of the loveseat, his other hand reaching over to pull back his sleeve and reveal the entirety of his mark.
Harry startled when he felt another hand cover his own. He raised his head to find Sherlock watching him with a curious expression, so mixed Harry couldn't describe it.
"I'll need some time to pack some things and take care of a few experiments." Sherlock announced before bounding off into the recess' of his apartment.
That night, lying next to each other in bed, much in the same way they had the night before, Mycroft finally broke down and asked the question that had shown on his face since Sherlock and Harry had returned. "What did you say that convinced my brother to come?"
"It wasn't words that I used to convince him."
Breakfast had been a cluster fuck. Whatever truce the Holmes' brothers had come to the night before had apparently passed. Sherlock had woken Harry and Mycroft up by playing his violin, if such screeching could be considered music in any way shape or form, in the living room nearest the master bedroom. Mycroft had pointedly ignored his brother's antics until after he had showered and dressed for the day. Harry was now burrowed under the covers, hoping to get some more sleep. After Mycroft had left the room, Sherlock's violin playing had come to an abrupt stop and the antagonistic sniping at each other had begun. This had lasted until Harry had appeared from the bedroom rumpled and bleary eyed, in desperate search of some sustenance.
Mycroft and Sherlock had then both volunteered to cook breakfast which had, seemingly between one blink and the next turned into some sort of contest, that Harry felt could only truly be understood by the two idiots hell bent on destroying his kitchen. By the time Harry was awake enough to fully understand the situation, he felt both honored and terrified. It appeared that Mycroft and Sherlock, whether consciously or not, were fighting over Harry.
Harry was Mycroft's soulmate, employee, friend and Sherlock's partner in crime, friend, and on occasion confidant. Sherlock and Mycroft did not like to share, wasn't that just great.
One realization, destroyed kitchen, take out call, and bit of magic later, Harry decided he needed a plan of action. Sherlock sat sprawled over one of Harry's arm chairs, hands steepled in front of his face, and Mycroft had disappeared into the one of the rooms. Sherlock looked so young to Harry, in that moment, despite being two years older than Harry himself.
"Have the two of you always acted like this?" Harry inquired.
Sherlock's eyes looked in his direction, but he didn't move otherwise.
"I only ask out of, well curiosity, I guess. I don't have any siblings myself. I was raised with my cousin, but we were worlds different." Harry shifted uncomfortably.
"Mycroft wasn't around much by the time I was old enough to truly understand, truly and fully comprehend, how different we were from the others around us. He was off to college by the age of thirteen."
"You only would have been about six right? You both must have matured young then." Harry thought out loud.
"Society can be cruel to those who are different, my brother and I experienced our own fair share of that." Sherlock's eyes cut to Harry's arm. "Societal rules would say that I'm not supposed to inquire about your arm and what lays on it."
"You've never struck me as one to play by societal rules."
Sherlock just arched a brow. "How old were you when it appeared?"
Harry gazed at the flames, watching the flickers of light. "I would have shown it to you yesterday, there aren't many that haven't seen it."
"I didn't need to see it to know."
"I suppose you wouldn't." Harry kept quiet for a few minutes, clearing his head of unwanted thoughts. "I'm not intentionally trying to judge your relationship with your brother, but when I see you two get at each other, I find it almost physically painful. I don't understand your relationship, I didn't live your lives and when I watch the two of you go at each other, I'm only reminded of my own life experiences and they don't shed a rose tinted light on things." Harry stood and stretched, the fire no longer warming him. "I was born with my mark."
Arms wrapped around Harry's waist from behind and Mycroft's voice whispered in Harry's ear. "I am sorry you had to grow up with that on your shoulders."
Harry turned in Mycroft's embrace and stared into his eyes. "Don't be, it wasn't something you could control and to be honest, it wasn't the worst thing I had to carry. I wouldn't trade this for anything." Harry leaned in and kissed Mycroft tentatively and was welcomed by Mycroft in return. The kiss was wet and a bit sloppy, it wasn't fireworks going off, just perfectly imperfect and way better than anything he had ever tried with a female. Hearing Sherlock make gagging noises in the background was just icing on the cake.
"Perhaps it is time we talked." Mycroft stated as he pulled back from the kiss.
"I had thought the same thing, I think I just got off track."
Mycroft led Harry over to the small couch and sat Harry down on the couch next to him. Harry immediately turned and looked up at Mycroft. "I know this has been a rough two days, but I have to know, before we do this. Is this the only time I'm going to know you like this Mycroft? The only time I'm going to truly get a glimpse of the man under the mask? When we leave in a few days, week, month from now, will it go back to the way it was before? It's isn't that I don't like that part of you in my own way…" Harry rambled, as Mycroft put a finger to Harry's lips to quiet him.
"I cannot guarantee that things will be the same from here on out, but neither will they be exactly like before. I suspect we will be able to find an agreeable compromise."
Quirking his head to the side Harry nodded, held his hand out to Mycroft and took a deep breath to gather his thoughts. Mycroft's near instant grip on his hand was reassuring. "School ruined a lot more for me than it helped me in the end. It was in primary school that I learned just how ostracized I was by the people who were raising me and how much worse it could get when everyone treated you that way. I often have a recurring nightmare about 'The Talk' we all got in primary school and the mandatory counseling that followed." Harry bit his tongue in distraction. "Grew used to the stares and whispers after a while, when I went to Hogwarts and was starting to integrate into the Wizarding World it was a lot of the same, just for different reasons. Got used to it I guess, the pain lessened a bit.
"Couldn't figure out families though. I knew by then that the way my aunt and uncle were raising me was wrong, that the way they let Dudley treat me was wrong, but there wasn't anything to replace the wrong. Mrs. Weasley would call me her son, but the term only ever seemed to apply when I was in trouble in her eyes. Then there was Sirius…
"I don't know how much you know about our legal system, but we have a prison called Azkaban and since its known inception it has been guarded by Dementors. Creatures that quite literally suck the happiness right out of you and, when allowed, feed on a person's very soul. Our prisoners become quite deranged from the constant exposure, but everyone just assumes that all the prisoners justly belong there. So why should they be spared a second though."
"Sirius Black, the alert was passed through my office, but without sufficient cause to proceed it was thrown out, we had been looking into the leak that allowed the story into muggle news. I'll have to see what that investigation turned up." Mycroft interrupted in a manner that seemed to indicate to Harry that he was thinking out loud. Sherlock remained a passive observer.
"Sirius Black was my godfather and he died an imprisoned man. I was too young, too angry, too naïve, to realize what was going on. How the "good guys", the people fighting for the ways of the Light never lifted a finger to help prove his innocence. There had been every chance. He escaped Azkaban only to be confined to his own home." Harry continued. "He never got the help he needed either and being confined in the house he had been raised in, had rebelled from. He never really stood a chance. I didn't get to spend nearly as much time with him as I wanted, what with Mrs. Weasleys disapproval and all."
"Sirius Black died? The Yard still has him listed as wanted." Sherlock interjected. "Sally and Anderson talk about it incessantly on crimes scenes, always speculating that Black has stuck again."
"Huh, his death registered with the Goblins, but the Ministry and Order both did a lot of covering their collective asses after it happened. I guess he may have fallen through the cracks, again. Black is legally part of my last name now, at least with them it is."
"He was a mass murderer or so we had been led to believe."
"He was innocent, he never even had a trial." Harry replied morosely.
"A topic we shall be going over more in depth at a later date, but perhaps for now we should make dinner and take some time to relax. I do believe that your beast would like to spend some quality time with you."
Harry squeezed Mycroft's hand and smiled. "You only call him that because you care."
Harry had insisted on making dinner himself, in fact he had banned both Mycroft and Sherlock from the kitchen following the disaster that they had created just that morning. He had even gone so far as post a sign the wall above the kitchen explicitly listing the reasons why the brothers could not enter. Sherlock had scowled at the sign for fifteen minutes before stalking off to his bedroom to sulk. Mycroft had taken a more reserved approach and sat at the kitchen bar reading one of the books from the potions room/study. He appeared to be reading anyway, but the hairs on the back of Harry's neck suggested otherwise.
"The two of you are acting like children."
"I would have thought that you would approve of our agreeing on something."
"I approve. I would prefer being able to cook in peace. You know, the opposite of what happened this morning?"
"Would it help if I apologized?"
"Would you mean it?"
Harry heard a page turn and Mycroft said no more on the matter. Harry had to remind himself that they were all under stress at the moment and that Mycroft and Sherlock should be up to their normal annoyances soon enough.
"You seem quite adept at cooking."
"Thank you, I hope you'll both enjoy the meal." Harry grinned over his shoulder. "It will be a bit basic today I'm afraid."
Mycroft, still not looking up from his book, added. "While the compliment was a pleasant aside, it was more of an observation."
"Oh, well I've been cooking most of my life." Harry skirted the subject.
"I see."
"I'm sure you do." Harry retorted flatly.
