Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or the song 'So Cold' by Breaking Benjamin.

My entire year group and the DA were present for my funeral, as were my teachers, the reps from St Mungos, several members of the Order of the X-Mas Turkey I had okayed and some higher-up politicians. A reporter from the Quibbler and Rita Skeeter were also present.

I was very thankful that the Goblins had agreed to oversee the security; nothing got past them.

Still, most of the students and teachers, as well as the Old Crowd, were pretty much ignoring me. Everyone else, however, were testing the waters. Draco Malfoy approached me whilst everyone was moving to their seats.

"You are Potter's brother?"

I turned from the enchanted CD player to see who was speaking. I was…surprised to see that it was Malfoy. All the arrogance and conceit of the callow youth he had been was stripped away, leaving only a stoic and wistfully regretful young man. It was as though, with the loss of his childhood rival, he had finally realised that the only one who could save him was himself…

…if he was strong enough.

I vaguely wondered if he was going to try to make 'Vashti' his saviour now that 'Harry' was dead.

"I am." I answered, hiding my thoughts behind the same mask of blank indifference I had been wearing since the beginning of this charade.

"You look a lot like him." There was that note of wistfulness in his voice that was in his eyes.

"I know. They say that we look like our father, but that's not true. We look like our great-grandmother, Danyella Malfoy, who was disowned for marrying against her parent's wishes. We only really inherited black hair and the Potter eyesight."

This was true. I had been given a genealogy book by the goblins and looked up both the Potter bloodline and its marriages within the Purebloods, as well as the genealogy of the segregated and estranged Frost family on the mainland.

To ensure I could never be called out, my mother was listed as Morina Denna Frost, estranged, a spinster, a hermit and died two years ago. Her will was carried out privately and the rest of the relatives had no idea where all her money went. Furthermore, she had had no contact with any of her relatives for eighteen years. Long enough for her to find out she was pregnant and raise a child. In reality, her rather substantial inheritance from a maiden aunt was put into liquid assets after estrangement, built up and was left to maintaining her kennels and hounds.

I had bought the kennels. I'd always wanted dogs and there were over thirty magic-orientated breeding hounds in the kennel. I was going to see them tomorrow.

"So that means we are related." I blinked out of my ponderings and turned fully to blink at the blond. I frowned and studied the boy.

"Yes. I suppose it does. On both sides considering Harry left me the Black Lordship as well." I narrowed my eyes because I had seen the sudden desperate plan be born in his. "Why?"

"Would you care to join me for a meal at the Leaky Cauldron after the wake?"

I tilted me head to the side as I contemplated. I shrugged. "Okay. I don't have anything scheduled later."

A snide voice behind him cut in. "Consorting with Dark Wizards now, are you Frost?"

I gave Weasley a condescending look. "Such classification of magics is inaccurate, not to mention biased. By the British definition, I am classified as a Grey Wizard. Now piss off, the both of you. I'm busy." I turned back and started to fiddle with the sound system.

Draco wandered off with an amused little smirk while Weasley stood seething for a while before a pair of goblins made as if to move in on him, scaring him back to standing with his sister. It appeared that they were being ostracized by the rest of the clan.

"Mr Frost, we are ready for commencement of the ceremony."

"Alright."

(space)

The ceremony was led by an old priestess from the Order of Danu. A long passage was read in Latin and incense was lit before Granger, Dumbledore, Fudge and myself went up onto the dais where we would each give a speech about how we felt about Harry and list some of his achievements.

Hermione went first.

"Harry was…sob my very first friend. No matter what happened, he was always there for me ---" I then proceeded to ignore what the three had to say, instead entertaining myself with finding patters in the seams of the carpet.

Dumbledore stood and began in his solemn, grieving grandfather voice. "Harry was perhaps the most loved student to attend Hogwarts during my time as Headmaster-"

I began picking at the seams of my coat in boredom.

Fudge stood. "Never before in history has the Wizarding world lost such an icon of Light at such a young age-"

I traced the creases on my gloves. There was about a minute of silence before the goblin standing behind me poked me in the ribs. I jerked slightly and blinked.

Everyone was staring at me.

I blinked again.

The goblin standing next to me lent over to whisper in my ear. "You're supposed to make a speech now."

I blinked one last time. I only later realized I was making an adorably surprised face when I saw the photo. That would explain the sudden cooing from the females in the crowd.

"Oh."

I stood up to the podium and blinked at the small sea of faces looking at me expectantly.

"Well," I started, "Firstly, all I have to say is, ignore everything about Harry that Fudge and Dumbledork said-" There were shocked gasps in the crowd, but I continued on, blatantly ignoring them. "- and much of what Miss Granger said, though Miss Granger may be excused because she was unaware of most of Harry's secrets, but these two stooges were just slinging political bullshit to make themselves look better." I jerked a thumb over my shoulder at the 'stooges'. "The truth about my brother, Harridan James Potter- and yes, his actual name was Harridan. Not Harry. Harridan.- was that he was illegally sent to live with his mother's muggle sister, who was mentioned in Lilly Potter's will as to never, ever gain custody of Harry because of her extreme dislike of anything magic, and she and her family verbally and emotionally abused and neglected him his entire life. Her husband and son did physical abuse as well."

I paused to assess the crowd. "Until his Hogwarts letter arrived- addressed to 'The Cupboard Under The Stairs', I might add- he was practically a House Elf to those people. An abused House Elf." The crowd appeared to be forming into a mob quite nicely. "Harry was sent hundreds of Hogwarts letters, so it is indisputable that the Headmaster knew of this." A little red devil appeared on my shoulder, rubbing his hands together and chanting 'Fun! Fun! Fun! Lotsa Fun!' "Due to his upbringing and not a little empathy- which he had a lot of, by the way- Harry had a lot of experience in pretending to be what everyone expected him to be. No flaws were permitted. All cracks were sealed up. Every smudge was painted over." The little devil was bouncing and giggling insanely. "The façade he showed to the world was that of the hero everyone expected him to be. Before his second year, after an incident involving accidental magic, Harry was locked in his five by ten foot room with a cat-flap for his food to be pushed through, bars on the window and a five minute bathroom break a day. Third year holidays, he was once again House Elf and punching bag. Fourth year holidays, he was ignored because of the threat of his wrongly incarcerated Godfather, Sirius Black, coming to get them. Fifth year he was morbidly depressed with the death of his friend, Cedric Diggory. I met him during this time and helped him through it until he was taken to the headquarters of the not-so-secret Order of the Phoenix. That brings us to this holiday." The devil squeaked and went still as the crowd rippled in anger. "He was once again left with Those People and spent his time in a suicidal depression from the death of his wrongly incarcerated godfather, Sirius Black, who was neither acknowledged for his part in the defence of the Ministry of Magic nor pardoned despite evidence of his innocence."

"Now, we all pretty much know what happened during school from Miss Granger. So we must ask; Why did all these things happen in a place where children are supposed to be safe? Could this really have happened under Dumbldore's nose without him knowing? I think not. I know I will never be attending Hogwarts. Ever." I broke out of my monotone sing-song to make my opinion firmly known in no uncertain terms.

There was an almost feral feeling emanating from the crowd. I had the feeling that Dumbledore and Fudge would soon be unemployed.

My devil cackled.

"Four days ago, members of the Order arrived to pick up Harry on his birthday to be taken to their headquarters. They arrived to find Harry covered in frost. He was taken to the Hogwarts Infirmary first, then, several hours later, when they could find no way to help him, he was taken to St Mungos. I am told that if he had been immediately taken to St Mungos, his condition could have been reversed and he would still be with us. This was undoubtedly done to cover up any sign of weakness in their cover boy."

I shifted on the balls of my feet.

"Now. Harry's condition. He was adopted by an Ice Elemental." There were gasps around the room. I had asked and it turned out that the Ministry had hidden turned Elementals from the public. Elementals were like fairies; all little kids dreamed of being one, one day. "I threatened his doctor with threats of grievous bodily harm and I was told that even if a person survives the turn, the Ministry claims them dead and locks them in a room in the Department of Mysteries for the rest of their lives." There were gasps of shock from around the room. I continued on, apparently blithely unaware of the sensitive information I was giving out. "This has, understandably, alienated a very powerful race who could potentially be allies in this war. Harry could have survived, but he decided he didn't want to live out his life in a prison as a weapon, existing only to be used at the Ministry's discretion. So I blame Voldemort, the Ministry, Harry's relatives, Fudge and, most importantly, Dumbledork for Harry's death and I shall stop at nothing to destroy every one of them. Thank you."

I turned and returned to my seat, noting that there were two goblins each holding Dumbledore and Fudge in their seats. They both looked both pissed and terrified at the same time.

The guests looked like an angry mob, all right. They looked ready to start lighting torches and transfigure pitchforks.

The little devil in my head crowed and did a victory dance, all the while singing 'Who's your daddy!'.

The four of us stood and moved back to sit with the others. I made a show of sitting between Professor Flitwick and a Slytherin I recognised as Blaise Zabini.

The black robed priestess of Danu moved to the polished ebony casket where a flesh-of-swine golem rested and began the litany of Death, Rebirth and Life.

The priestess finished and the cremation commenced. I nodded to the goblin standing beside the sound system.

A melody began on a guitar for about thirty seconds before an electric base guitar and drums kicked in and then ghostly vocals echoed around the room.

'Crowded streets are cleared away, one by one,
Hollow heroes separate as the run.
You're so cold keep your hand in mine.
Wise men wonder while strong men die!'

The vocals picked up as the pier was lit and the blue-white flames leapt across the black shroud covering the seeming.

'Show me how it ends.

It's alright.
Show me how defenseless you really are.
Satisfied and empty inside,
That's alright lets give this another try.'

Several people in the crowd began to sob. I stood abruptly and moved forwards to stand four feet from the leaping flames.

'If you find your family, don't you cry,
In this land of make believe, dead and dry.
You're so cold but you feel alive.
Lay your hands on me one last time.

Looking into the flames, I was reminded of something.

A face I both didn't know and yet did know.

Mother. The Elemental who had adopted me.

Long ice blue hair in thick braids, black eyes with bright blue slivers, high arched black brows, a vulpine face the colour of snow-shadows and full lips curved into a half-smile.

Show me how it ends,

It's alright.
Show me how defenseless you really are.
Satisfied and empty inside,
That's alright lets give this another try.'

The air was pushed into a wind by the pressure made by the flames, flairing my hair and coat dramatically silhoette against bright, leaping blue; The Tragic Prince mourning his Hero Younger Brother.

'Show me how it ends,

It's alright.
Show me how defenseless you really are.
Satisfied and empty inside,
That's alright lets give this another try.

It's alright.'

That is how it started…

'It's alright.'

As the flames leapt and danced around the form on the pyre and myself, a romantic, black clad form staring into the blue flames devouring my Saviour 'brother', I, Vashti Frost, became another icon for the Wizarding World. A rallying point if you will, but not one exclusively for the Light.

'It's alright.'

In future years, I became a rally point for Light, Twilight and Darkness. It was I who brought back the knowledge that the Dark was not exclusively Evil any more than Light was exclusively Good.

'It's alright.'

But that wouldn't happen for some time, though that faux funeral certainly set the ball rolling. Even before I left England, they were already flocking to my banner; both witches and wizards and those other races humans called creatures.

'It's alright.'

In coming years, I came to wish I had never made that speech at the funeral. I wished I had never gone into a type of hermitage during the rest of that month. And I wished a certain three Norse Priestess Seers had not been watching. Listening. Meddling.

'It's alright.'

I wished I had not been so charismic and beautiful when I turned back to the crowd, the air still stirring my hair and clothes, my face thoughtfully somber.

I wished the Photographer hadn't been using a new full colour camera.

I wished the Daily Prophet, the Quibbler and Witch's Weekly hadn't dug up everything on my fake persona and aired it to the world.

'It's alright.'

I wished, oh how I wished, that Sirius had been there at my side.

But he wasn't and never would be.

Because of him, for him, I became who I am.

Not for the people I never knew who brought me into the world.

Not for Dumbledore. For the Weasleys. Not Granger. Not even for Remus.

Only for Sirius…and for Him.

'It's alright.'

No, it's not alright.

No.

Not never.

Never forever will it be alright.

'It's alright.'

Not while the world lacks one Sirius Black.

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