I don't own Harry. Sorry.

"So, I'm Ron now?"

James and Charlie were at the very back of their small group. James nodded. "It was either you or Sirius. Funny how Sirius kept his own name." James tried to keep his voice light. Tried to forget that less than ten minutes ago he was talking to a tombstone about people he'd never even heard of. Tried to forget that history seemed to be repeating itself.

Charlie glanced sideways at James before changing the subject. "So, this Dark Lord, Voldy-whatever? You, or Harry, I guess, defeated him? Using magic?"

James shrugged. "Yeah, I guess so." He looked up, saw a castle looming over him, and blinked. The castle was beautiful, huge, with towers at each end, looking majestic, graceful, and a little imposing. James blinked again and the image was gone, replaced with the crumbling ruins of reality.

"What? What was it?" Charlie seemed to know he'd seen something else. James shook his head. "It was nothing, really, just a trick of the light."

Charlie seemed unconvinced but let the matter drop. "You know, the twins used to come up here all the time. They used to play hide-and-seek in the ruins. They told me all sorts of stories, like how there were ghosts still living in the castle, or how they saw the lake monster." Charlie looked at the huge lake that stood between them and the castle and shuddered.

James was no longer looking at Charlie, or at the lake. To the right of the steep climb was a large, relatively flat area that had been long since overgrown with bushes and small trees. He headed towards it.

"James? Hey, James, what the bloody hell do you think you're doing?" Charlie tried to grab James' sleeve, then ran after him.

Molly's high voice carried over the grounds. "Where are you going?" She sounded frightened. James didn't look back.

He stopped running only when he was well inside the huge, overgrown area. He breathed in deeply, smiling. James looked over at Charlie, pushing his glasses back up to keep them from falling off the bridge of his nose. "Do you feel it?"

Charlie looked terrified; he gazed around the place with wide eyes, then nodded. "It feels...exciting, wonderful."

James nodded encouragingly. "That's exactly how I feel." He turned to Molly and Sirius, who had arrived next to them. "What about you guys? DO you feel it?"

"Feel what?" Sirius asked grumpily, though he too was gazing around the place in admiration. Molly just shook her head, "I don't feel anything different. Am I supposed to?"

James took another deep breath. He felt like he was flying. Excitement like he'd never felt before washed through him. He was free here. He was wonderful and graceful.

Molly was gazing back up at the school. James forced himself to look away from the huge field ― for he now knew that it was, indeed, a field of some sort ― to look back at the ruins of the old school. Any progress they had made up the hill was destroyed now. They'd have to start again.

Sirius and Molly shook their heads and left, though Sirius was a little more hesitant. James glanced at Charlie and saw that he too was reluctant to leave this place, leave the extraordinary feelings that seemed to swirl around it.

The climb back up to the school was quiet for the most part. James still walked next to Charlie, but he was looking over the grounds and found that if he looked at them a certain way, he was able to tell what it had looked like a thousand years ago. Just outside the huge forest, James could swear he almost saw a house with smoke curling out of a chimney.

Charlie seemed to sense these things too, though Molly and Sirius both seemed oblivious. "Does this place seem...odd to you?"

James nodded just before Sirius let out a very dog-like yelp and pointed to a tree that was standing fifty yards to the right of the path they were taking. "That tree moved." Molly put a comforting hand on his shoulder and he shrugged it off. "I swear, it was like the whole trunk was moving, then the branches."

Charlie and James looked at each other, a shared though flying between them. They were right to bring Sirius, and they were close.

The path ended abruptly in front of the ruins. There was a small gap between two enourmous pieces of rubble. James glanced at Charlie, Molly, and Sirius. "Like I said before, this might be dangerous. If you want to..."

"Just shut up and go inside already." Said Charlie, rolling his eyes at Molly. Sirius let out another dog-like bark of laughter.

James bit his bottom lip. He was sure he had to go inside the school, for reasons he couldn't even explain to himself. He was also sure that something was waiting for him, whether evil or benign he didn't know. Glancing cautiously back at his friends (Charlie gave him an encouraging nod) he took one step inside, then another.

There was a floor. A dusty, dirty, cracked floor covered with pieces of brick and debris, but a floor nonetheless. The beginnings of a majestic sweeping staircase rose in front of them before being cut off by a gigantic boulder. Ornate doors were slightly open to their left, broken in places. It was bigger than James had seen it from the outside, and so beautiful, with the aching sense of familiarity. He glanced at his friends. Even Molly felt it this time and was standing with her mouth slightly open.

But it wasn't the doors or the staircase or the rooms that took James' interest when he first walked through the door. It was a person, semi-transparent and floating, that was coming towards the four of them where they stood huddled together in the entranceway, and a deep voice that seemed to echo around the deserted castle, "Harry Potter, we knew you'd return."

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