Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or Reborn!
AN: Holy sweet muffins, thank you all so much for your support, comments and questions! I guess I'm going to be continuing this story o/o
I'm trying to sort through the wonderful reviews, I'm just using a low pain moment to post this, I swear I'm going to try and get back to you all. If there are other continuity issues or typos please please point them out. I am doing the best I can, I will continue to try not to disappoint you lovely readers 3
Tsuna had been late for school. After the bell rang he put off leaving the classroom as long as he could. Hibari Kyouya was waiting for him anyway.
"Hieeee! H-hibari san! I'm s-sorry!" Tsuna gasped cringing and crouching down.
Tsuna expected a beating. What he didn't expect was the body that shielded him at the last moment. Harry looked down at him with that inscrutable face and eyes swirling with mist and shadow behind his glasses. But he looked more… lifelike. His eyes were brighter. Harry didn't make a sound as the blow caught him in the middle of the back.
Hibari pulled back astonished, "Hm. You'd take a beating for that herbivore."
"We both know I'm not strong enough to fight you." Harry admitted without qualm "But I'll be damned if I let you hurt this kid."
"Why?" Hibari demanded hiding his surprise that the boy could speak
"He's worth protecting." Harry said quietly.
Frankly? It pissed Hibari off. The beating he gave Harry was brutal, but the boy didn't make a sound besides the involuntary sounds of dragging air desperately into lungs. Eventually Harry collapsed on top of Tsuna fighting to remain conscious. Hibari looked at them appraisingly making Tsuna shake in his boots. He left with a quiet "Wow." At how long the boy had managed to stay silent and upright.
"Aki-san!" Tsuna squeaked "You-"
"Aki." Harry corrected dazedly. Harry pushed himself to the side so he was on the floor rather than on Tsuna. Harry panted and tried to force his body to move so his back didn't hurt so much. He looked up at Tsuna "You ok Tsuna?"
"Lets get you to a hospital!"
"No!" Harry snapped scaring Tsuna, Harry's face softened a bit, he grit his teeth to speak through the pain "J-just help me get somewhere safe? Before Hibari chucks us out."
Tsuna looked at him like he'd grown a second head "You could be hurt really bad!"
Harry reached out and patted the boy's leg. "Calm down kid. I've had worse beatings, though that guy does pack a punch." Harry said eyebrows knit slightly as sweat dripped down his face from pain. He knew it'd be worse in the morning. Too bad muggle medicine and wizards didn't always mix well.
"How far away do you live?"
"Few miles." Harry sighed. Tsuna fretted, Harry just patted him again. "Call me a cab?"
"What about your parents?"
Harry just gave Tsuna a strange look and Tsuna obeyed, thank Merlin. Tsuna helped Harry stand and walk to the front gates, where the boy collapsed again waiting for the cab. Tsuna held him upright, Harry let his head fall down to Tsuna's chest. Harry hadn't lied, he had worse beatings in the past… but he hadn't moved after those beatings.
Hibari stood on the roof watching these proceedings. He was intrigued, what about the little herbivore was worth protecting?
The cab arrived and the two boys disappeared.
...
...
In the cab Tsuna fidgeted, Harry fought back the encroaching darkness. The cabbie kept sending them concerned looks. The ride was short, and Tsuna was surprised to arrive at an apartment building instead of a house.
"Please tell me you're on the ground floor." Tsuna pleaded.
"I am." Harry said with a slight smile. Tsuna was so nice… both of him.
Harry handed over the money, a bit too much but he couldn't be bothered at that point to count properly. Harry swayed as he stood, his hearing went for a moment he thought he'd faint right there. They managed to make it to 1c.
"Be welcome." Harry panted formally to unlock the wards. That was the last of his hospitality. Harry headed straight for the bed of his simple studio apartment. He collapsed face first into blissful black.
Tsuna hieed and didn't know what to do… So he called his mother. She arrived in a hurry while Tsuna was pacing and sending Harry concerned looks.
"Tsu-kun?" She asked appearing in the open doorway.
"He - hurt!" Tsuna stuttered
She seemed to speak Tsuna Speak since she rushed over to the collapsed boy. "Help me sit him up we need to get his shirt off to see how bad it is."
Harry didn't stir as they took off his shirt, or hear their exclamations over the new substantial welts and spattering of old scars. Nana's face took on a scary cast for a moment before she ordered Tsuna out for ice. Her fingers traced over a strange looking bracelet but let it be as her mind was processing the fact that the quiet boy who befriended her son looked like a battlefield! Tears welled in her eyes. Most of the scars were old and too many of them to be accidental. He even had what looked like a bullet wound in his forearm! She bit back her tears. If she ever found the person that did this to him…
"I got the ice!" Tsuna ran through the door almost tripping.
Nana got up and found old towels to make ice packs. She settled them on the worst of the bruises. Her mind went back to her long-ago first aid training. Twenty minutes on twenty minutes off.
It'd be a long night.
"Tsu-kun, what exactly happened?" She asked quietly
He sat next to her on the floor. "I was late for school. Hibari was going to bite me to death for it, Aki got between us and protected me." He said just as quietly, the guilt was eating at him. Having a friend wasn't always rainbows and kittens as it turns out.
She nodded and hugged her son. "It's not your fault."
"Mom… he said he'd had worse beatings before." Tsuna said looking at Aki's scarred back
"I imagine he has." Nana sighed
"Who hurt him mom?" Tsuna asked wide-eyed. He looked so young, too young to deal with this. But… She couldn't lie.
"His parents I'd imagine." She admitted as she petted Harry's hair like she would her own son. "The scars are old."
Tsuna started crying, sobbing as he babbled incoherently about parents and death. Nana wrapped an arm around him and held him close. "It'll be alright Tsu-kun."
He could almost believe her.
...
...
Harry stirred a few hours later… and felt someone touching him. He snarled, grabbed the knife under his pillow and rolled up to face his attacker his eyes wide. Instead he saw Sawada Nana and Tsuna staring at him. In his apartment. He lowered the knife. What the hell had happened? His confusion must have shown on his face.
"Tsu-kun brought you here after Hibari hurt you. I'm just here to help." Nana said softly her hands held up in the universal 'I'm harmless' gesture.
Ah well then. Fuck. He bit back the curse when the pain in his back made itself known.
"Please lay back down Aki!" Tsuna asked with big eyes. Harry couldn't say no to that face.
Harry lay down cautiously. He made sure his magic focusing bracelet was on his wrist and placed the knife back under his pillow cursing his paranoia. Some of the charming effects of PTSD(or so claimed his Ministry Shrink). Harry watched them warily but they seemed as unsure what to do in this situation as he was.
"Um welcome to my home?" Harry choked out with an uncomfortable smile
Tsuna smiled unsurely back at him, while Nana was silent. She wasn't used to being threatened with a knife.
"The knife-"
"I'm sorry Ma'am it was a reflex." Harry muttered blushing slightly
The sight eased something in her "Aki-chan I've told you before to call me Mama." She scolded smiling
Harry blinked at her blankly for a moment.
"You should be more careful." He muttered blushing deeply he added the word that changed everything "Mama."
Flowers bloomed behind her as she convinced Harry to let her continue treating his back. Harry felt strange… this was the first time someone treated his injuries out of concern. It felt terrifying…and good. He found himself drifting to sleep lulled by presence of his friend.
...
...
Harry didn't sleep long, his past crept up on him plaguing him with vicious nightmares.
"Aki-chan wake up! Please wake up."
Harry whimpered and curled up in a tighter ball. Tsuna could hear him whispering under his breath "Cedric! No please! Not Cedric!" Harry whimpered lost in his nightmare. His memory.
The flash of green. Cedric falling. Harry tugged at his bindings to the gravestone uselessly. Terror. Absolute terror. And then pain.
"Crucio!"
"No one kill him, he is mine to finish."
The binds releasing. And the rage.
Harry didn't bother with his wand that was already broken and thrown aside, he reached into the back of his pants and cocked the gun he stole from Dudley. He fired before Voldemort could react. A lucky shot, up through the snake-man's cheek and out the back of his head.
Harry ran to Cedric and accioed the cup to him.
"Cedric! Please wake up! He came back! He was there! I killed him, I killed him!" Harry muttered incomprehensibly as hysteria crept up on him.
He flailed caught in the bed sheets. Those words had sent him on a one way trip to Azkaban. No questions. No trial.
"Aki-chan wake up! Please wake up."
"Forgive me." Harry cried still in the dreamscape. His body thrashed franticly almost hitting his head against the wall.
Tsuna reached out as if to shake him only to be stopped by his mother. "Don't touch him." Nana said pale with tears in her eyes, but she still remembered the knife under his pillow.
"Wake up!" Tsuna yelled into his ear making Harry's eyes fly open. Harry scrabbled until his back was against the wall. Finally there was some recognition in Harry's eyes as he saw the blur of fluffy brown hair that could only be Tsuna.
"Tsuna?" Harry whispered coming back to reality his eyes latching on the boy. Harry stared at him for a moment taking comfort in his presence. The tension in his face drained leaving behind a haunting expression of loss that his masklike expression usually hid.
"Who is Cedric?" Tsuna asked quietly
"He was my friend." Harry's voice cracked as his eyes filled with pain. He hugged a pillow to his chest like a small child reaching out for comfort.
"Was?" Tsuna whispered brokenly
"Yes." Harry reached out and held his hand and squeezed it. "I'm sorry kid. Don't worry about it."
Tsuna's eyes gained a different light, he looked at Harry seriously "You're my friend, you were nice to me when no one else was. I am going to worry about you." The new light faded, the poor kid was shaking "I'm just sorry I got you hurt."
Harry pulled Tsuna into the bed and wrapped an arm around him "Listen to me, it's not your fault, it was my choice. And I'd make it again in a heartbeat."
"W-why Aki? Why would you do that for me?" Tsuna whispered
"Before I came here I lost everything. Everything. You showed me why life is worth it. You gave me something to believe in and a kind of friendship I've never had."
Tsuna eyes welled up a bit and Harry just pulled him closer until Tsuna could cry into his shoulder. Harry just patted him and held him. The supporter became the supported. Harry slashed a look over to where Nana was watching "I'm sorry…he shouldn't have to deal with this."
"No one should Aki-chan." Nana said quietly reaching out to pet his hair "Including you."
Harry hid is face in Tsuna's fluffy hair "You and I both know life doesn't work like that, Mama."