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Chapter Six—Moving the Shadows
Harry pauses on his way back to the Slytherin common room when he hears someone mention the Dark Mark next to a shadow that he's keeping half an ear on. It's the work of a moment to jump to that shadow and peer out through it.
It's Igor Karkaroff, the Headmaster of Durmstrang, and he's showing his left arm to a skeptical-looking seventh-year Slytherin. The Slytherin's eyes widen a moment later, and Harry can see the edge of the Dark Mark squirming as the serpent comes to life.
Harry releases his hold on the shadow and smiles a little as he continues back to his room. So that's what Voldemort is getting out of this tournament, the chance to recruit students. It seems he's forgiven Karkaroff, who Aethelred described as a traitor, enough to use him.
Harry is pleased to have figured it out.
Harry marks the Weasley twins on the new moon of December, which luckily is before the Christmas holidays. Harry thought they would joke and laugh their way through the process, which would give him a chance to cut it short. Honestly, being bound to Theodore is enough for him.
But the twins are quiet and serious about the whole process, other than laughing when Harry actually marks them because that apparently tickles. Harry shakes his head. He really doesn't need the painkilling potion after all, at least not as long as he doesn't mark someone who is unwilling.
He recalls the rumors that no one could take the Dark Mark unwillingly. Now he understands why.
Fred and George both receive the lightning bolt with the wolf high on the backs of their shoulders, where shirts and their hair can cover it. It would have been safer to mark them on the back of the neck, like Theodore, but Harry can't bear to. He's possessive of that bond and his first vassal, and they're going to bear marks that are similar but not the same.
Fred and George examine each other when the ritual is done, and smile at Harry. Harry feels the bonds snap into place. It is less intense than it is with Theodore, to his relief, but he can still feel a general sense of their direction and distance. He would know if they were in danger, that's certain.
It's a relief. It makes the protection part of the bond much less onerous than it would have been otherwise.
"Now, our Lordship sir," Fred says, when both the twins are satisfied with their marks and have adjusted to the apparent feeling of Harry's magic, "will you tell us what the secret is to your appearing and disappearing around the school like that?"
"Please please please please please please," George adds, fluttering his eyelashes.
Harry sighs for effect. "Very well. But it will be hints at first, while I see if you're smart enough to figure this out." The twins nod eagerly, probably more thrilled than they would have been if Harry just told them outright. "Whenever I move around the school, I do it through the use of something nearby. I can't do it everywhere in the school because not all places are the same. Think carefully about it, and you'll find out."
George looks at him. "Through doors?"
Harry laughs before he can stop himself, one of the few times he's done that when he's not with Theodore, and the twins clap their hands together before Fred says, "Not through doors, don't be so obvious, Forge."
"But the school doesn't have doors everywhere!"
"Well, we can probably remove stone from the list."
"And floors!"
"I don't know, think about some of those moving staircases…"
Harry finds himself relaxing as he listens to their ridiculous speculations. It occurs to him that having the twins around might be good for both him and some of his other—friends, vassals, whatever. Theodore is serious, Luna is often off in her own little world, and Dean's sense of humor is more like that of the other Gryffindors and thus not all that comprehensible to Harry or Theodore.
But the twins will lighten the mood.
As he becomes more fully involved in his research to destroy Dementors, Harry's mood could use lightening.
He loathes them more and more the more he learns. No one knows for sure whether Dementors were created by some ancient wizard and then used by modern wizards to guard that bloody prison, or whether they're a kind of natural creature that modern wizards offered a bargain to, and of course none of the books are specifically about their effect on shadow magic, but Harry can read around the edges. Dementors eat souls. That means they foul the places where soul-bearing creatures walk. The atmosphere around Azkaban is reportedly unbearable for both prisoners and guards, which is why prisoners usually go insane and guards are rotated in and out on a regular basis.
It would make sense for them to foul the shadows the same way, even if soul-bearing creatures who can use shadows are extremely rare.
There's also distressingly little information about how to kill Dementors. Patronuses drive them away or hold them at bay, but that's all. There are a few, conflicting reports of killing. Harry discounts all of them as he reads them. Among other things, Gilderoy bloody Lockhart is the source for a few of them.
But then Harry finds a single, solitary sentence in a book that's mostly about how to deal with Dark creatures in general, similar to the single sentence about shadow magic that he found in the book on Horcruxes.
Dementors feed on both memories and souls, although they are most notorious for their soul-stealing Kiss.
Harry knows the sentence is important, but not exactly how. He begins to wrestle with it in the privacy of his brain, and he wrestles with it on the walk back from the library—for once, he doesn't leap through the shadows to make it shorter—and he wrestles with it as he flops down on the couch in the Slytherin common room in front of the fire and stares at the flames.
"My lord."
Theodore's voice is soft and respectful. He doesn't call Harry that loudly in front of the other students anymore, but Harry knows that has a lot more to do with what they might hear in his voice when he does it and nothing to do with the death of his conviction.
Never that, Harry thinks as he smiles at Theodore, and leans over to kiss him. They got a few stares for that, too, but not many. Theodore pointed out when Harry asked that most of the Slytherins assumed they were already dating, since they spend so much time together.
Sometimes Harry assumes he will never understand people, but then he realizes he understands Theodore and Fred and George and Dean and Luna, and that's really enough, and he becomes cheerful again.
"Tell me what you're worrying about," Theodore says, unceremoniously shoving Harry's legs out of his way so he can also sit down on the couch. In some ways, he treats Harry more casually now than he did before he was marked, probably because he knows that their bond will tell Harry what he really feels. It's nice.
"A line to kill Dementors," Harry says, bringing up their favorite privacy charm around them. "Or rather, I think it has relevance. Hell, I know it has relevance. I just can't figure it out, and my brain won't let it go."
"Tell me what it is."
Harry tells him about the difference between eating memories and eating souls, and Theodore spends a second tapping his fingers on the couch arm before he says, "It's two different methods of eating, right?"
Harry raises his eyebrows. "I did just say that."
Theodore ignores his tone. "But when they eat souls, it's obvious how they do it. They bend down and Kiss someone, and that sucks up the soul through their mouth. It's not as obvious how they eat memories. Just being near someone can apparently do it, since they don't have to Kiss all of the prisoners of Azkaban, or go into their cells."
Harry nods slowly, and Theodore gives him a slightly exasperated look and says, "You probably can't get them to eat anything else through their Kiss. But if you could poison the air or whatever it is that they use to suck up memories…"
"And use something other than guilt, which attracts them," Harry says, and sits up. He can feel his eyes widening, and his mind leaps and then comes down without telling him where it's going. "For example, something that relates to the magic I have and that I hate them for having, and if they suck it up and die, that's something."
"My lord."
Harry starts badly as he turns around and realizes that Theodore is kneeling on the couch, his head bowed. The privacy charm and the fact that he's on the couch instead of the ground will keep most people from realizing what he's doing, but it's still an enormous risk and might tell people what's really going on. "Theodore!" Harry hisses, yanking at his arm. "What the fuck?"
"Will you not tell me what the magic is that you have?" Theodore whispers, not looking up. "I have been patient. I have never asked, even when I suspected. But I think I deserve to know."
Harry sighs, gets up, and uses the shadows to check that no one else is in their shared bedroom. Then he yanks on Theodore's arm again. "Come on."
Theodore follows him in silence that makes the bond that links them vibrate. He's apparently very content to finally know the source of the secret. Harry, by contrast, is trembling a little, and sweating more than a little.
They can't cage you, he reminds himself as he turns around in their bedroom, locks the door, and faces Theodore. If he hates you, if he reacts negatively to you, you can still retreat through the shadows. You can come back just when your vassals are threatened, and that will be enough.
But he doesn't want to, that's the hell of it. The bonds that link his vassals to him also tie him to them. He doesn't want to leave them. And he doesn't want to leave Hogwarts with its library that might still give him important clues about how to use his shadow magic and destroy Dementors.
Facing Theodore's shining expectation, Harry pulls shadow to him and lets it pool in his palms, the way he did right before he cost Luna's bully her sanity. Theodore's mouth opens slightly, and his eyes widen.
"I can use shadows in any way I wish," Harry says quietly. "To spy, to travel, to blind people. Sometimes I attack people with them, but not often. It's really obvious. And if you tell anyone, I am going to leave forever, Theodore. I mean that."
Theodore stares at him still, not moving, mouth still the same, eyes still the same, but bond vibrating in an odd way. Harry forces himself to face it. He doesn't know what he's going to do if Theodore is afraid of him.
Theodore is not afraid of him. Theodore is shaking with desire.
Harry blinks and lets the shadow go. "Oh," he says, and nothing else, because he doesn't know what to do.
Theodore settles it for him, seizing him and snogging his face off. They don't stop until their roommates impatiently hammer on the door, demanding that it be unlocked so they can take showers and go to bed.
And Harry lies there with his mind whirling and his smile probably looking stupid and his brain buzzing.
He has someone to share things with.
Once, he thought he would never have that, and he was okay with it. Now he never wants to give Theodore up.
Harry marks Dean at January's second new moon, since Harry and Theodore both went to the Nott house to avoid the bustle of the Yule Ball even though Dean stayed at Hogwarts. Dean accepts the mark with a laugh like Fred and George's, then shakes his arm a little and conjures a mirror to study the wolf and the lightning bolt. "It tickles a bit. Why a wolf?"
"One of the illusions I used to torment Malfoy," Harry says with a grin. Illusions is a good explanation for his shadow magic if he has to mention something specific, and Dean apparently heard about that, because he nods.
But he doesn't move away even when the bond settles between them and they're more used to carrying the weight, like an iron crown around their heads. Dean hesitates and hesitates, and Harry finally sighs as he cleans up the last remnants of their ritual circle of flattened grass and asks, "What is it?"
"Neville would like to be marked."
Harry snaps straight before he thinks about it, his wand aimed at Dean. The shadows at his feet are trembling as well, though with only Lumos charms lighting the area, it's not noticeable. Dean raises his hands. "It's okay, Harry. Really. I didn't tell him. He listened and figured it out and—I think he maybe saw one of the twins' marks. It's impressive that he figured it out in such a short period of time, don't you think?"
"It's bloody concerning is what it is," Harry snaps back. His paranoia is already turning outwards, wondering what he missed. What if someone else slips up? What if Dumbledore or Voldemort figures out what he's doing? It's true that Theodore is so quiet in Slytherin that almost no one pays attention to him and almost everyone gives Harry a wide berth, but—
"Harry. My lord. I promise, it's all right." Dean grabs his wand hand and forces it down. "Neville didn't tell me everything, but he said that's because he wants to talk to you. And he told me that he'll accept a Memory Charm if you determine that's necessary."
Harry narrows his eyes. He isn't good at casting the Memory Charm. But there's the possibility of losing Longbottom in shadows. That makes him calm enough to listen to what Dean is proposing. "Why does he want to be marked?"
Dean gives him a sharp glance. "You've never noticed how the other Gryffindors bully him?"
"No. I thought only the Slytherins did."
Dean shakes his head. "I think it's been worse this year. He asked Ginny Weasley to the Yule Ball, and she did go with him, but that made Ron upset. And people are getting tired of the way he messes up in Potion and loses Gryffindor points all the time. They'd just about decided it was Neville's fault and not Snape's before the holidays."
Harry puts his hand over his face. Yes, more minions, he should have realized. "It's going to be several bloody months before I can trust him enough to mark him, you realize that? I'll have to know everything about how he found out and seal the leak so it can't happen again. I'm going to—why the hell are you smiling?"
"Because you still gave him his protection when he asked for it. You'll protect a lot more people than even you assumed. That shows that Neville was right to ask."
"Most people's response to being bullied is not to swear to a Dark Lord."
"I don't know that you're so much Dark as in-between." Dean shrugs, unconcerned. "I'll tell Neville in the morning, and I'll make sure that we're in a place where no one's listening. Thank you, my lord."
Harry nods sharply back and sweeps up to the school. At least he can probably put off his marking until after the end of the school year. He doesn't know Longbottom at all well, and really only remembers him as Malfoy's victim from their first year and someone who lurked on the outside of the Gryffindor group who thought he was the Heir of Slytherin.
He'll have to prove himself.
It's only later that night, lying in bed with his lips tingling from Theodore's kisses, that Harry realizes even giving Longbottom that chance is more than he would have done a year ago. He scowls into the darkness.
As it turns out, Neville did indeed figure out the truth from seeing George's mark and realizing that the wolf looked like the one Harry used to save him in first year. So that's mainly Harry's fault. At least he takes the wand-vow to keep things to himself without prompting.
But Harry still hasn't been able to trust him enough to mark him when the Third Task of the Tournament comes, and with it, a sudden burst of green light that transforms Harry's plans for the summer entirely.
Cedric Diggory, the Hogwarts Champion, lands on the grass holding the Tri-Wizard Cup and very obviously dead, his neck twisted back and his mouth open as he gapes at the sky. He's also holding a small token that bursts as people begin to scream, and the Dark Mark rises into the sky in lurid green above his body.
Voldemort's voice speaks from the Mark, which Harry thinks is a neat trick. "Everyone who does not join me will be crushed and bow," he says, his voice a long hiss just on the edge of Parseltongue. Harry thinks he is probably the only one who can hear the extra threat, though. "Everyone who is of the blood of Death Eaters who does not bow to me is dead. I am your Lord. I am Lord Voldemort. I have returned."
More screams rise into the sky, but the only sentence that matters to Harry out of those five is the second one. He turns and meets Theodore's gaze, and Theodore shakes his head slightly, unflinching.
Theodore doesn't intend to bow to Voldemort. He doesn't intend to follow his father. Which means they'll need a different sanctuary than the Nott house for the summer.
And Harry will need to fight Voldemort. Which means at least pretending to cooperate with Dumbledore, and letting the man's reputation and contacts do some of his networking for him.
Damn it.
"I'm glad to see that you're finally extending your concern to the rest of the world, my boy. I was worried about you when you were Sorted into Slytherin and didn't seem to care about traumas that the rest of the school was experiencing…"
Dumbledore went on and on that vein for enough time that Harry's teeth are sunk into his tongue by the time he comes back to the Slytherin bedroom. Theodore is waiting for him. He reaches out and draws Harry into his arms. This close, Harry can touch his mark, and their bond can softly soothe him.
"We're going to one of Dumbledore's safehouses?" Theodore asks into his ear.
Harry nods and leans hard on his vassal. God, he didn't want this. He would prefer to scarper through the shadows with Theodore and live in Knockturn Alley or some other place where they could be independent. But he was right about Dumbledore thinking the Boy-Who-Lived is more important now than ever. They would have been hunted. And Aethelred's house isn't safe now and never will be again.
"We'll make it," Theodore says into his ear, and strokes his hands through Harry's hair. "We always do."
That makes Harry a little more cheerful. Yes, that's true. So far they've survived Harry's own indifference and his circle of vassals expanding and capturing Pettigrew and the revelation of Harry's shadow magic and Voldemort's resurrection. They're going to get through this, too.
"Dumbledore was unhappy when I told him that you were coming with me and that's not negotiable," Harry adds, treasuring that one thing from the meeting that made him smile. "I think he wants to surround me with Gryffindors and charm me into caring about them."
"He'll get used to disappointment. He's had more than a hundred years to, after all."
Harry laughs, and closes his eyes. It feels good to lean on Theodore, for once.
It turns out that the safehouse Dumbledore takes them to for the summer belongs to none other than Sirius Black, who let Pettigrew escape because he's an idiot. But Dumbledore is hiding him because he belongs to Dumbledore's Order of the Phoenix, and he has an enormous house that's filled with lovely shadows and a library with more interesting books than Harry can read in a week.
Harry only puts up with him for his house, honestly. Black is intent on reclaiming his place as Harry's godfather, and that means inundating him with stories about his parents and telling him he should spend more time around Gryffindors and presenting him with gifts in red and gold colors and telling Harry earnestly that the littlest Weasley fancies him.
"So?" Harry asks blankly when Black tells him that last. They're eating breakfast in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place. The old house-elf who works here seems to spend a lot of time staring at Harry, but it results in good service for him and Theodore, which is fine with Harry. In fact, things would be fine here in general if not for Black and the younger Weasleys who cluster in corners and whisper about him. Granger is here, too, for some reason. Harry supposes she was closer friends with the Weasleys and more under Dumbledore's sway than he thought.
"So, I'm just saying. Your dad married a beautiful red-haired woman. You might, too." Black nudges Harry's ribs in what might be the most obnoxious touch he's ever felt.
"Er, no," Harry says, and eats the bacon that Kreacher plops in front of him.
"You don't know what's going to happen in the future," Granger says from across the table. She gives the youngest Weasley an encouraging smile.
"I know what's happening now," Harry counters, "which is that I have a fit dark-haired boyfriend." He's glad to watch the residual tension completely dissipate from Theodore's tight shoulders. He smiles at him.
"What?"
It seems like everyone says that at once, although it's more a bellow from Black and a squeak from Weasley. Harry sighs, rolls his eyes, and leans across the table to kiss Theodore. He enjoys it, and enjoys the pale faces and dropped jaws he gets even more.
"I'm surprised that you didn't know that," he adds, as he goes back to his breakfast. "Most of Slytherin was gossiping about it last year."
"Like we listen to what Slytherins say," mutters the Weasley whose name Harry has forgotten again. Right, Ron.
Harry turns his smile on him. "Then nothing I say can possibly matter to you, either."
Weasley promptly babbles something about how he's different, and Harry sighs. He's willing to do some public appearances as the Boy-Who-Lived and attend Order strategy meetings as payment for the safe housing during the summer. But it seems that Dumbledore and the Weasleys and Black all want more than that.
They want him to act more like a Gryffindor. They want him to be the perfect hero that Harry's never been and which they didn't even dare demand of him for the last few years. They want him to abandon Theodore and his independent ways.
They want him to be his parents.
Harry realizes that when Black corners him in the library one day when he's reading about Dementors. It's more than fascinating reading; it's giving Harry all sorts of new information about how he might kill them. He's taking busy notes when Black plops down in the chair across from him and stares at him.
"What?" Harry asks over the top of his book.
"Your father wouldn't have been caught dead reading a book like this."
"I hope he would be happy that I'm more informed than he was."
Black sags into his chair. "You don't care about them at all, do you?" he whispers. "James and Lily? I thought Albus was exaggerating when he told me how cold you were, but he wasn't."
"Exactly what is left for me to care about? No one told me about them before I arrived at Hogwarts. I didn't even know my father's first name before then. Then people gave me some comparisons, but always negative ones. That my parents were Gryffindors and would be disappointed in me. That they were heroes and I'm not. That my parents were friends to everything that breathed and I'm not. I have no desire to be like them. I survived on my own. All they did was protect me once, and then die."
Black is gaping at him by the time he finishes. Harry shrugs at him and keeps writing down notes on Dementors.
"I'm your godfather," Black whispers. "I didn't know—when you sent me Peter, I thought you liked me and you'd figured out I was innocent."
"I figured out you were innocent. But I thought you wouldn't be able to use Pettigrew for the best. And I see I was right."
"Then why didn't you tell Dumbledore and figure out a way to live with me?"
"Why didn't you? There's only one chronological adult in this room, and it's not me."
Black looks away. "After I messed up and Peter escaped, then it would have been too dangerous for me to try and claim you."
"And it was probably convenient for you. After all, I'm not the godson you wanted. I'm a Slytherin. I don't care about my parents' legacy. I never wrote to you and asked for stories about them."
"I don't—Harry, if you had just been different!" Black bursts out. "It could all have been so different!"
"I know. For example, if you had cared to write to me at some point and inform me that you were my godfather instead of leaving me to find that out from other people. Or if you had cared as much about writing to me as you did about capturing Pettigrew."
Black gives him a whipped look and trots out of the room with his head lowered. Harry shakes his head and continues his notes. It's not his fault that Black won't make any effort to get past his prejudices. He hasn't even apologized for putting Pettigrew in front of all else, and then losing him. Honestly, Harry gave him vengeance or justice gift-wrapped in a cage and he threw it away.
There's no helping some people.
It's easier when Fred and George join them in Grimmauld Place. Without even being asked, they direct Black's attention away from Harry, and sometimes prank their younger siblings when they're involved in trying to make Harry behave like a Gryffindor, or Granger when she's involved in self-righteous lecturing. Harry tells them once that they don't have to.
"We can't let our lord suffer, can we, George? Exactly what kind of minions would we be?"
"Terrible minions. We have a reputation to uphold! For the sake of all minions everywhere!"
Nothing Harry can say dissuades them, so in the end he gives in and leaves them to it. They're having lots of fun anyway.
Mrs. Weasley won't let Harry and Theodore share a room when she finds out that they're boyfriends, despite them pointing out that they share a room all year round at Hogwarts anyway. So Theodore sneaks in at night to talk about their plans with regards to Dementors and Voldemort, and sometimes falls asleep in Harry's bed. He sneaks out again before anyone can come in in the morning, despite how hard they try to figure out the counter to the locking spell Harry has put on the door.
"Sometimes I want to lead them into the shadows and leave them to suffer," Harry says darkly after one evening when everyone ganged up on him for not being exactly like the parents he has exactly one memory of.
"Not worth it, my lord." Theodore lies with his head on Harry's outstretched legs, his eyes closed. "Leave them to their idiocy. You can employ your powers to better effect."
Harry grins, remembering the discovery he made today and hasn't yet told Theodore about. "You're right. I've figured out how to use shadows to poison the Dementors."
"Tell me." Theodore turns his head but doesn't sit up. Harry is confident that he has his full attention anyway.
"It wouldn't work without my other magic," Harry admits. He lifts his hand and hisses at the same time. Shadow forms into several serpents around him. Cobras with their flared hoods, kraits small and dangerous, a black mamba that has a darker shadow around its throat to represent its threat display. Harry strokes their heads, feeling coolness and slight solidity under his fingers. "I'll put them into shadows the Dementors are going to walk through."
Theodore looks back and forth between the snakes. That he's utterly fearless pleases Harry greatly. "Can you put them into shadows and actually have them do anything, though? I thought you said Dementors made shadows useless for you."
"Yes, but only after they've walked through them. I had no problem manipulating shadows on the train ride before third year until after they'd passed me. I intend to make these snakes—stronger since they're based on Parseltongue magic as well as shadows—into the shadows before Dementors pass through, to wait for them. They'll strike and poison them then."
"It should work?"
"It should."
"I'm so glad that I've chosen a genius for my lord."
Harry puts his book aside and starts snogging Theodore, satisfied that they're on their way. That he'll have to go to Azkaban or capture a Dementor otherwise to test his theories is left unsaid. For right now, he wants to concentrate on the shape of Theodore's shoulders under his hands.
"The Ministry may be refusing to acknowledge Voldemort's return, calling it a prank. But I have beside me the Boy-Who-Lived himself, who has personal knowledge of Voldemort's tactics."
Harry hides a sigh as he stands at Dumbledore's side on the little platform that the Minister was standing on a few minutes ago. Dumbledore arrived and promptly took over this press conference, announcing that Voldemort has come back and that the incident at the Tournament with Diggory's death isn't a prank.
Harry knows it isn't a prank. But Dumbledore is handling the crowd all wrong. They're flinching at Voldemort's name and they're muttering about the fact that he doesn't have any proof except Diggory's death and the word of a few former Death Eaters.
Harry wouldn't care, except it might taint his own name and chances now that he's associated with Dumbledore.
Then Dumbledore steps aside and gestures him forwards, and Harry steps up to the podium. There's a hovering sphere there that applies a Sonorus Charm to the voice of whoever speaks into it. Harry says, "Um, hi." He ducks his head and rubs his hand over his scar.
This is his tactic, which he, Theodore, Fred, and George developed over some intense discussions. He's going to appear innocent and confused and embarrassed, and if people think he's a tool of Dumbledore, that's fine with Harry. Open rebellion has never been something he's been interested in.
Cameras flash, and a woman with blonde hair piled up on her head asks, "Why haven't you said something open about fighting Voldemort before now?"
"Um, because I didn't know he was back?" Harry fidgets and casts a glance at Dumbledore as if for reassurance. "I mean, I believe he's back now. I was there when he made that announcement right above poor Cedric's body." He lowers his voice, but of course everyone can still hear, and they look transfixed. "I recognized that voice. From my oldest memory. The one I hear when Dementors are nearby."
"What's that memory?" It's an older woman Harry believes reports for Witch Weekly, her voice so soft it's breathless.
"I hear someone telling my mother to stand aside, and then my mum screaming."
A sigh runs around the audience. Harry wants to smile, though of course he doesn't. He has them.
"I recognized his voice," Harry continues, and lets a small tremor enter his words. "So I know he's back. I think you should believe Professor Dumbledore. Voldemort's horrifying and he's powerful, and we all need to band together to fight him." He nods and steps back before someone else can ask another question.
Dumbledore watches him with narrowed eyes for the rest of the day. Of course, Harry has done exactly as Dumbledore asked in one sense. He's supported his public position that Voldemort is back, and contradicted the Ministry.
But he hasn't acted the heroic part that Dumbledore wanted him to act.
It doesn't matter if he doesn't forgive Harry, though. Harry isn't inclined to forgive, either.
They have a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher that year, of course, since Moody was paranoid enough to curse the wrong person at last and end up in Azkaban. Her name is Dolores Umbridge, and she simpers and talks constantly about how they don't need spells to defend themselves, that the Ministry is enough.
She also sends Dementors after him when they've been back to Hogwarts for a fortnight.
Harry knew she would. He overheard her discussing the need for the appropriate paperwork, and threatening to reveal some secret she holds, with a Ministry flunky through her fire. Shadows fires throw are always so useful to hide in.
Harry is going to make Umbridge pay later, of course, but for right now, he's mainly excited to test his shadow-snakes on the Dementors. He makes sure that he's out on the Quidditch pitch in the evening after Umbridge was discussing it, the shadows absolutely full of cobras and kraits created from Parseltongue.
Theodore, Fred, and George are hiding out of sight. Fred and George don't know exactly what he's doing, but they know he plans to ambush Dementors somehow, and they're excited to be part of it. They'll intervene if something goes drastically wrong.
Harry grins as he feels the cold approaching. He steps into the glow of the moon, making himself visible. Around him, the shadows at his feet seethe and boil. Harry knows some of them will be useless after the Dementors appear, but it's one reason he's doing this confrontation out here. He rarely comes to the Quidditch pitch or has a reason to escape from it, after all.
The lead Dementor comes sweeping towards him. Harry remains poised to leap if he needs to, but he also watches as intently as a lover for the moment that the edge of the Dementor's robe touches the shadow where he's concealed a snake.
It happens. A churning grey shape lunges forwards, and the Dementor screams in a thin, high-pitched voice at the edge of hearing, like a dying bat.
Harry laughs aloud as he watches more snakes manifest, all of them biting and tearing loose pieces of what appear to be the Dementor's cloak and hood. For a moment, he sees a gaping skull floating in the air as its garments—really shadows it's corrupted—are stripped away. Then a cobra bites that, and the skull fades away.
The second Dementor circles around to the rear. That's not a help, either, considering that Harry's trapped every single shadow in sight. It ends up rolling a few centimeters above the pitch while writhing bodies cover it. A krait is the one who has the honor of diving beneath its hood and making everything fade at once this time. Harry reckons this one was simply overwhelmed with the venom.
The shadows fade back into regularity, all trace of cold gone. The ones that stay are clean, and his. Harry laughs aloud.
"If I may say so, Your Lordship, sir, that was a proper maniacal laugh," Fred says approvingly from the edge of the lake where they're concealed.
"Takes practice, that," George adds.
Theodore stands up and gives him a slight bow and the smile that is all the approval Harry needs.
Neville's marking is a quiet thing, done on October's new moon. Harry watches as the lightning bolt and wolf form, hearing Neville's breath catch. The wolf is a little larger than it is on the others, but it matters more to Neville, so that's not unusual.
"Thank you," Neville says, standing up and bowing when everything is done. The bond is lighter and more fragile than the one Harry shares with his other vassals, but he and Neville are pretty new to each other. That makes sense. "If—Dean didn't tell me. If I want to recruit other people for you, how do I tell them about this?"
Harry points one finger at him. "You don't recruit others for me. Dean told me about you, but you'd already figured out part of it on your own. I don't need any more followers."
"But how are you going to be a Dark Lord if you don't have more followers than us?" Neville flinches a little when Harry glares at him, but goes on stubbornly. "I m-mean, V-Voldemort had a lot of them."
"I know, but I'm not Voldemort," Harry says. Neville's eyes are big and doubtful. "If there's someone else who's being bullied, then you can tell me about them and I'll approach them. But that's the only thing you can do."
"Okay," Neville says doubtfully.
Harry shakes his head and goes his way. He doesn't understand why wizards are always wanting to fling themselves at others' feet and follow them around. Yes, most people don't have Harry's shadow magic because most people aren't Horcruxes, but they could become strong and lead themselves if they wanted to. Theodore and Dean both picked up the Shield Charm well. Fred and George learned the Patronus when Harry taught it to them.
Most wizards are more powerful than they think, Harry decides. They just don't want to use their gifts.
Maybe laziness and not stupidity is the besetting fault of the wizarding world.
Ron demands angrily if Neville is still dating his sister, and Neville says he isn't. But Ron doesn't believe him and yells at Neville and tells him he's an idiot.
Harry learned a useful fact about Ron during the weeks they stayed at Grimmauld Place together and Ron utterly failed to persuade him to become a hero. Harry flicks through shadows into the Gryffindor fifth-year boys' bedroom—easier to find than it should be thanks to his connection to Neville's mark—and releases a privacy ward and a box of real spiders on Ron's bed.
Ron screams hysterically and swats at them, but they are too small and moving too fast, and they climb all over him and bite him and bite him. Harry smiles a little. By themselves, the bites don't hurt, but multiplied like that? Their venom is going to make Ron sick for a week.
By the time Ron is sobbing and almost catatonic with panic, Harry judges it enough. He gathers up the spiders with a simple Net Charm and herds them back into the box, then asks from his invisible corner by the shadow of Ron's bedpost, "Are you going to tease Neville alone?"
"Yes! I promise!"
"Because next time it won't be a few spider bites."
"I promise! You wanker, whoever you are!"
Harry vanishes into shadows without speaking again, allowing Ron the last word. At least he believes the boy about not harassing Neville again. He seems bright enough to learn his lesson the first time, unlike Amanda Serling.
Neville tells him the next morning, in a hushed voice on the way to breakfast, that Ron actually apologized for yelling at him and calling him an idiot. He's watching Harry with worshipful eyes.
He doesn't ask what Harry did to make Ron stop, and Harry doesn't volunteer it. Poor Neville is gentle and soft in a way that almost none of the others are. He doesn't need to know.
Harry is planning his revenge on Umbridge and Dumbledore, but surprisingly, it's Voldemort who moves first and forces Harry to respond.
It's almost Christmas holiday of fifth year, and Harry is not really looking forward to going to Grimmauld Place. Remus Lupin wrote to him the other day, revealing that, like Black, he was one of the Potters' closest friends and wants to see Harry again and get to know him. The fact that he didn't say anything about that during third year isn't something Harry is going to forget.
Neither of them want him, Harry Potter, shadow mage and boyfriend of Theodore, Slytherin and apparently budding Dark Lord, necessary opponent of Voldemort and destroyer of Dementors. They want his parents back again.
Harry is brooding over that when Theodore begins to scream from down the Slytherin table.
Harry is on his feet so fast that for a blinding instant he thinks he may have flowed through a shadow. But he realizes it's not so, and he sprints to Theodore, who has demanded to sit apart from Harry for a few days in an attempt to recruit some of the other Slytherins to their side.
A large black owl dropped a letter in front of him a moment ago, but that doesn't surprise Harry. Theodore has received almost daily communications from his father demanding that he return and join Voldemort.
This time, the letter was cursed. Harry sees the deep black curse spreading, along with boils, up both of Theodore's hands to his arms, and he almost drops into panic as blind as Ron's thrashing when he saw the spiders. But then he reaches out and cups a hand around Theodore's neck, cradling his mark, and forces Theodore's magic to listen to him.
Part of the lordship ritual involved linking their magic together. Harry never visualized using it this way, but he pushes now, hurling waves of pure power at the curse, forcing Theodore's body to remember what it's like to be healthy and strong.
Together, they stop the curse from advancing. Then they force it back down Theodore's hands into the letter again. Harry watches Theodore's skin turn pink again and the boils fade with a relief that makes him want to pant.
Then the letter is there glowing red, and with Voldemort's signature clearly visible at the bottom, and Harry's relief turns into rage.
He gestures with one hand, and because he's still cupping Theodore's mark, the letter roars into the air like a comet, powered by both their magic. It turns into a whirling pinwheel of fire over the heads of the cowering students, rent apart. For a second, lurid green magic flickers around the edges of the ashes. No doubt Voldemort intended to imprint a floating mark in the air over Theodore's body the way he did with Diggory.
Everyone watches as Harry's magic—they all think it is Harry's magic alone, not the magic of Harry and Theodore and their lordship bond combined—eats the green power of Voldemort's Dark Mark in a burst of silver.
Harry is the only one who feels relief that the color is silver and not grey, the color of shadows.
He slumps on the seat next to Theodore when he's done. Theodore is watching him with very little less than the worship Neville gave him earlier, but Harry glares at him, and Theodore retreats from it, nodding.
"Thank you, my lord," he whispers nevertheless.
Three things happen as a result of the letter exploding.
First, Dumbledore steps up his efforts to convince people that Harry Potter is a great warrior on the side of right and good. He requires Harry to come to his office more often for "chats" and finally shares a few of the things that the Order of the Phoenix is doing with him. It turns out that most of them are guarding a prophecy in the Department of Mysteries. A prophecy that concerns him and Voldemort.
Harry would have exploded in laughter if he hadn't honestly already recognized that the reason Voldemort had gone after him in the first place was going to be something ridiculous.
Second, Harry determines his revenge on Voldemort. He isn't going to kill him. That would require killing the Horcrux inside Harry, and require giving up his shadow magic at best and probably dying himself at worst, and no, thank you. But the man's survival when he tried to kill Harry as a baby and failed means that he must have had at least one Horcrux before then, and probably more. Harry is going to find and destroy them. Then he'll destroy Voldemort's main body and confine his spirit in a trap for the rest of eternity, aware and screaming but unable to leave.
It's what he deserves, for trying to touch Theodore.
Third, suddenly Harry has recruits who are coming to him on their own, wanting to serve a man of such immense power, not people who have come in through anything Dean or Neville or Theodore or the twins have said.
It's utterly maddening.
But Harry also recognizes that his goals are going to need manpower. So he interrogates the people who quietly offer, swears them to wand-vows, and has the twins use some of their memory-removing potions—at which they're scarily good—on those who turn out to be either untrustworthy or unwilling to follow someone "Dark."
He marks Millicent Bulstrode, Pansy Parkinson, and Daphne Greengrass in February. All of them are Slytherins whose families were never that close to Voldemort, or only pretended to be to avoid his attention during the first war. And they were more than half-listening to Theodore already. Harry offers them the same deal he did the twins: protection and secrets in exchange for using their talents when he wants them to on various people. Millicent is particularly enthusiastic about this, since even fellow Slytherins taunt her as a half-blood.
Harry has to shake his head at people sometimes. Have none of them ever noticed that Millicent makes herself the master of their secrets while pretending to be as dumb as Crabbe and Goyle actually are? Have none of them seen that Daphne prattles and gossips while her sharp eyes watch everyone around her, and she's the first one to know when a prefect is coming around a corner or when a professor is in a bad mood? Have none of them realized that Pansy flirts with all the boys and makes them think of her as harmless while she gets their protection against girls in other Houses?
The answer is no, because of course it is.
Harry sighs, and continues on.
In March, Harry marks his first Hufflepuffs, Justin Finch-Fletchley and Wayne Hopkins. It's a bit of a surprise since neither of them are pure-bloods and they've also never been close to Harry; he couldn't actually remember their first names, either, no more than he could remember Ron's. But Justin explains it to him while he's still shuddering a little from the coldness of the bond settling into his mind.
"I'm Muggleborn," he says quietly, leaning back on his heels to look up into Harry's eyes. "I know that Voldemort is going to come for me, and maybe my parents, and I suspect that there are students here in the school who would gladly see me dead, too. This way, I get a bit of protection."
Wayne is a half-blood, but besides having a Muggle father, he has a stutter. That causes enough scorn from some of the people in the school, and constant comparisons of him to Quirrell even four years later, that he came in the minute Harry confirmed that he'll protect people from bullies.
"It's w-weird, but people here are a lot worse th-than even the Muggle k-kids I went to school with when I was l-little," he whispers as he rubs his hand over his wolf and lightning bolt. "I don't know why."
Harry knows why. The wizarding world hates difference, or at least difference that doesn't fit into neat little boxes. They're fine with Gryffindors and Slytherins being different from each other, but even in those Houses, half-blood Slytherins and shy Gryffindors get bullied. And look at Ravenclaw, House of the "smart," and their prejudice against Luna. Hufflepuffs are more loyal to each other, so few of them seem to be bullied, but there are the popular and unpopular ones, like any other place, and enough pure-bloods at the top of the House's hierarchy to push Muggleborns to the bottom.
"Are you going to create a world of equality and justice for everyone?" was one of the first questions Justin asked Harry.
"No." Harry saw no reason not to be honest. Justin was already under a wand-vow at that point. "People who touched someone under my protection are never going to be equal to those who are."
And Justin smiled, and said, "Good."
April sees his first marked Ravenclaws. Luna still doesn't want to be marked—she says it would interfere with her connection to the Heliopaths—but she's been an ambassador in her own way. At the very least, people can notice that she's close to him and he's powerful, and reason that they'd like that protection, too.
That's the motivation behind Terry Boot joining him. "I watched people be in danger every damn year here," he tells Harry darkly, rising from where he knelt in the circle of grass under the new moon for the marking ritual. "It was never a Ravenclaw, except sometimes in Quidditch, but it could be any time. And I don't think being a half-blood or a member of a certain House is going to protect us. And Dumbledore didn't keep the monster in the Chamber of Secrets out."
Su Li has been waiting behind Terry while he gets his mark, although, wisely, she doesn't try to continue the conversation until after she's received her own. Then she nods fervently at Harry. "Some of the Ravenclaws are coming back from detention with the Umbridge woman with strange marks on their hands. If danger hasn't come for us before, it's here now."
Harry sets his new Ravenclaw vassals promptly to research. He needs to know more about Voldemort, and some idea of what objects he might have chosen for Horcruxes. As relatively neutral in their approach to Slytherins, they can also talk to Slytherins Harry can't approach, those whose families are close to Voldemort. By hemming and hawing and hinting that they might think about joining Voldemort, Boot and Li can winkle out information on what he's like.
Harry does turn away one Ravenclaw, Marietta Edgecombe, who couldn't even get through the initial interview without threatening to betray him if she wasn't treated well. He sends a few shadows to stalk her while he's at it.
And then, it's time to do something about Umbridge.
The matter becomes all the more urgent because Harry marks two more people in May, little Colin Creevey from Gryffindor—who particularly hero-worships Harry as the Boy-Who-Lived and did so before his destruction of the letter—and Padma Patil, who was brought in directly by Su Li. They've both been scarred by Umbridge's quill.
Harry waits until she's alone in her office one evening. Then he deepens and darkens the shadows until only the fire is left, and even that's struggling. To his combined amusement and disgust, Umbridge is so deep in a report for the Minister that she doesn't glance up for long minutes.
"Who did this?" Umbridge demands at once, snatching up her wand. She gets up and turns in a circle, as if that would help her locate anything. "Detention and fifty points off for whoever is doing this!"
Harry simply darkens the room further, although he leaves the fire alive to cast shadows. Then he wraps bonds of shadow around Umbridge. He blinds her, as he did with Serling, but he also attaches bands to her fingertips, around her mouth, around her ears, and around her nose. Then he pulls her through shadow to the tank that he has prepared.
He read about an interesting torture technique in the Black library last summer.
Harry dumps her into the tank, located in an obscure corner of the dungeons that not even the Slytherins venture down into. It's full of lukewarm water that will remain continuously lukewarm thanks to a spell that Harry has attached to Hogwarts's stones; it can only fail when Hogwarts falls. The water surrounds Umbridge on all sides, thanks to a Bubblehead Charm Harry has wrapped around her head. Other spells fill the water with traces of nutrients that will keep her alive for a long, long time.
The bonds of shadow remain. They will keep her from seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, or touching anything, while the water creates as little sensation as possible on her skin.
Umbridge is going to stay there, and sense nothing ever again.
Harry flickers away through shadow while she tries to scream, and can't. He's smiling. He reminds himself to check on her in a month or so, when she'll probably be insane.
He makes a bet with himself that it'll be sooner than that.
"I want to tell you that I am terribly disappointed in you, my boy."
Harry widens his eyes innocently. He's sitting opposite Albus Dumbledore again, on the last day of school. June was a relaxing month, with no one needing to be marked, and Harry was able to concentrate fully on his OWL exams. Theodore teased him that he was probably going to get an Outstanding in Potions and give Snape a heart attack. Harry would like to see it, honestly.
Voldemort hasn't attacked again, at least not anyone Harry cares about. There are a few rumors of raids in the north, which are annoying, but also far away from any of his vassals' houses.
And Su Li has come back with useful information from Malfoy, whose aunt was one of Voldemort's most faithful Death Eaters. Apparently, Voldemort is obsessed with Founders' artifacts. It gives Harry a wide arena to look, still, but a much narrower one than he started out with.
"Disappointed about what, sir?" Harry asks, when Dumbledore keeps looking at him over his glasses, and says nothing.
Dumbledore sighs. "I can't prove it, Harry, but I know that you were involved in Madam Umbridge's disappearance. I had my own plans for taking care of her. Miss Granger and I had spoken about it. And I understand that you haven't written back to your guardians at all."
"They're not my guardians," Harry says blandly. Black is still a fugitive and Lupin is a werewolf. There's no way they can claim him. And now that Harry has a healthy network of vassals to help him, he and Theodore don't even need to spend the summer at Grimmauld Place. They'll be staying with the Patils for at least a few weeks, and then on to the Parkinsons, and then the Greengrasses, and then probably Wayne's mother. Harry's criteria is large houses where they can keep out of the way, and lots of shadows.
"They want to be family to you, Harry."
"Where were they for fourteen years?" Harry asks. "Lupin had every chance to tell me about his connection to my parents when he was teaching here, but he didn't. Black had every chance to contact me when he broke out of Azkaban, but he didn't. They want me to be something I'm not, something I'll never be."
Dumbledore doesn't seem to know what to say to that, but he never does. "You had something to do with Madam Umbridge's disappearance, Harry."
Harry merely smiles blandly. So long as he never looks Dumbledore in the eye or speaks a lie, Dumbledore can't know.
"I wish that you would spend more time with Miss Weasley," Dumbledore says, abruptly changing the subject. "She would greatly enjoy it, and the Weasleys could tell you more about your parents and the war they fought, if you don't want to spend time with Mr. Black and Mr. Lupin."
Harry blinks at the non sequitur, and then understands, and chuckles. Dumbledore is looking for some leash to put on him. If Harry falls in love with Ginny Weasley or even just toys with her, Dumbledore is probably thinking, then he'll be vulnerable. Dumbledore will know where he is and what he's doing.
"I don't think it would be kind to lead her on. I'll never return her affection."
Dumbledore finally dismisses Harry from his office, as helpless as ever when he can't actually pin down what Harry did, and because he refuses to believe in what Harry actually is. He would have taken decisive action by now if he thought of Harry as an enemy. As long as Harry dances on the right side of that line, he has nothing to worry about. Dumbledore is too compassionate for his own good.
He meets Theodore outside the Slytherin common room, and indulges in a long kiss. Then he notices the packed trunks at Theodore's feet. He raises his eyebrows. "We're leaving now?"
"Malfoy tried to kill me this evening."
Harry is already turning towards the door of the common room when Theodore grabs his arm. "No, my lord," he says softly into Harry's ear. "He was doing it on Voldemort's orders, I'm sure. He left a cursed necklace near my bed, charmed with the compulsion to put it on. Malfoy isn't powerful enough to have cast the curse or the compulsion."
Harry pauses, then nods. "But I should still punish him."
"I want that honor, my lord. Later. It will take some time for me to think of a fitting one that can't be traced."
Harry nods again, understanding. All of his vassals insist on taking care of their own problems sometimes: the twins with pranks, Dean and his Ravenclaws with vigorous arguments with their Housemates, Neville and Wayne by going unnoticed, Colin by taking some interesting pictures, the Slytherin girls with their well-developed tactics for protecting themselves already, Justin by being aggressively friendly and stereotypically Hufflepuff at enemies until they go away. Theodore hasn't insisted so far, but when he does, Harry is hardly one to deny him.
"I have a lead on a Founder's artifact that was supposedly in the possession of the Smith family at one point, and the Patils are acquainted with them," Harry says, and extends his hand. "Come with me, Theodore?"
Theodore takes his hand, and Harry leads him through the paths of shadow, the sliding grey roads that take so much less time to walk through than covering the same distance in the physical world. They cross what seem to be shimmering silvery moors, wade crashing rivers of grey foam, and step out through an argentine door into a shut-up guest room in the Patil manor that Padma told them about.
Theodore is swallowing hard when Harry turns to look at him. He's traveled with Harry before, but it's by far the most extensive journey he's ever taken. Harry waits patiently for him to recover from it.
Theodore leans against him and kisses him slowly. Harry kisses him back, and they don't get around to dusting the room or unpacking their trunks for a full twenty minutes.
