Title: The Boys Who Lived
Author: Shara Lunison
Beta: Batsutousai
Rating for this Chapter: M
Pairings: Harry/Henry (OMC), several others—none of them canon
Warnings: SLASH, twincest, slightly manipulative!Dumbledore, grey Harry/Henry, OoC-ness, others as I think of them.
Summary: The Potter twins are attacked by Voldemort and somehow defeat him. Now the Dark Lord has returned and they have to choose between light and dark. SLASH, Twincest, rated M for later chapters.
Disclaim Her: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
A/N: THERE IS A LIME AT THE END. SKIP IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ IT.
Chapter Twenty-Seven: Developments
The next day, of course, the twins had no idea how to go about telling their friends about their new relationship. Admitting that you were dating your own brother wasn't exactly something most people would take calmly.
In the end they just cornered everyone one at a time and confessed.
"So…we're dating now," Harry told Hermione in the library after lunch.
She looked up from the book she was referencing and looked between them in confusion for a moment before laughing. "Very funny."
"It's not a joke," Henry responded with a wince. They raised their joined hands above the table where she could see and smiled sheepishly at her.
"It's the soul bond," Harry said. "We tried not to, but it just didn't work."
A slew of emotions passed over their muggleborn friend's face. Disgust, fascination, worry, and fear being the most easily recognized.
"But, how are you going to make this work? You're brothers. Twin brothers. That's almost like…like…" She blushed furiously as she realized what she was thinking. They were only thirteen, for Merlin's sake!
But not for long, she thought to herself. How long until they're…
Turning pale, Hermione stood and gathered her things to leave.
"Mione, I…" Harry tried, but she interrupted him gently.
"It's not that I can't accept it, I just need a little time," she assured them. "It's just so…strange."
They nodded sadly and let her leave.
Surprisingly, Draco took it the best. He just shrugged and said, "I'm a pureblood. Do you have any idea how closely related my grandparents were? And we've married into the Black family at least once before, and my mother is a Black. This is almost normal to me."
They both dreaded telling Ron, and in the end it was the redhead who confronted them.
"Hey, why is Hermione acting so weird around you two? And Draco always seems to be amused."
"Well…" Henry began. "You know how we're soul-bonded, right?"
"Yeah?"
"Well, we realized that we're only attracted to each other and now we're dating," Harry finished in a rush.
None of them were sure, afterwards, who was more surprised when Ron paused with a very thoughtful look on his face and then suddenly punched Henry in the jaw. "That's for leading on my sister, you jerk!" he cried. Then he helped his friend off of the floor and escorted him to the hospital wing so Madam Pomfrey could mend his jaw.
Hermione and Ron got over it quickly, of course, but Sirius and Remus were another matter entirely. There was no way they could keep it secret from them when they were going to be spending the summer with Sirius—and Remus was his best friend! And they respected the two men too much after all the time they had spent together practicing defense spells. By the end of March, it was apparent that their adult friends were beginning to catch on that something was up.
They entered the Defense classroom and greeted Padfoot and Moony warmly. The animagus had them do some warm-up stretches while the professor placed several protective wards around the room and on the objects inside.
"Right," Remus said when they were finished. "Tonight we're going to have you duel each other. You're both at a pretty equal level, so you should have a good bout and a bit of a challenge trying to beat each other."
The twins looked at each other dubiously. Since they had gotten together, the bond between them had strengthened to the point where they were in each other's head practically 24/7. Most of the time, only a thin barrier separated their thoughts and feelings from one another, and it was fragile. There was no way they would be able to cast a spell against the other without them knowing it.
Remus just smiled at them and pushed them together so they were standing back to back. As he was stepping away, he suddenly froze and frowned at them.
"Moony?" Harry asked with worry.
"When did it happen?" Remus asked sharply.
"Remus, what's…" Sirius started to ask and then noticed how agitated his friend had become. "Moony…"
"When did what happen?" Henry asked at the same time.
"When did you give in to your attraction to one another?"
They froze and stepped back from their angry professor, while Sirius stepped between his friend and them.
"Moony, stop this."
Remus snarled—it was quite uncharacteristic to see their favorite professor like this. "They smell like mates, Padfoot!"
Sirius looked over his shoulder at them in surprise, while the twins paled. Smell? How on earth could someone smell that they were together?
"I-it happened a month ago," Harry whispered. "We tried, really we did."
"But how can you stop your soul from feeling?" Henry asked.
Remus' shoulders dropped and he turned away with a sigh.
"How could you possibly tell that by smelling us?" Harry asked, seeing that they were out of the woods for now.
The Marauders stiffened and Sirius gave Remus a very pointed look. "I'm surprised we haven't had to tell them before this, Remy."
Their professor sighed and looked around the room, determined to avoid their eyes. "I'm a werewolf."
Henry immediately glanced out the window to look at the moon.
"Don't worry," Remus smiled at them, his eyes glowing a slight golden color now that they knew to look for it. "The full moon is tomorrow. That's why I was able to smell you so clearly. It normally isn't this strong."
"Boys, you haven't…" Sirius trailed off delicately and the twins giggled as Remus rolled his eyes.
"No, Siri, they haven't," Remus said firmly. The twins blushed hotly as they realized that their honorary uncle would be able to smell it on them when they had sex near a full moon.
"Oh, good." Sirius nodded several times, looking extremely awkward. "To be honest, I've been expecting this since you told us about the soul bond. I understand that there's not much you can do to fight it. And you'll be much happier if you don't." He held open his arms with a grin and the twins gratefully accepted the hug.
"Right, about that duel," Moony said pointedly.
"About it," Harry said. "We wouldn't be able to land any hits on each other. Not only because we can't block our thoughts from each other anymore, but because we can't hurt each other either. At least not physically."
"Then how about a duel against both of us?" Sirius suggested, waggling his eyebrows at his best friend.
"Padfoot, I really don't think…"
"Oh, come on, Professor!" Harry wheedled.
"This close to a full moon, I don't know if I should…"
"Don't be silly, Moony. You only reacted that way because the wolf in you is the dominant in our pack." Sirius winked at the twins. "Don't be surprised if he acts like that when you two get more serious."
Remus blushed, but explained anyway when the twins gave him confused looks. "In a true wolf pack, only the alphas are allowed to breed. They are the strongest, oldest, and wisest and therefore will make the next generation stronger."
"Oh," Henry said softly.
"Are we really a pack, Remus?" Harry asked hopefully.
"Well, Moony seems to think so," their professor said, referring to his wolf half.
"It would be wicked if we could be animagi like Sirius and our dad," Harry said wistfully.
Sirius smiled and rubbed his hair. "I could try teaching you. But some other time. For now, we duel!"
The twins were trounced by their elders, which was to be expected. But it was a near thing.
-o-0-o-
On the first of April, Hermione waylaid them on their way to lunch, a roll of parchment clutched in her hand.
"I figured out the potion!" she exclaimed when they stopped to listen to her.
Henry led her into a nearby unused classroom and threw up some privacy wards that Remus had shown them.
"So, what does it do?" Harry asked once they were safely hidden away where no one could hear.
"It changes your magical signature to match that of a donor. It's a lot like the Polyjuice Potion—you just add a hair from the intended person and voila, your magic will look the same as theirs."
"But why would Voldemort want something like that? Just to pin things done by Death Eaters on someone else?" Harry asked.
Hermione shook her head. "It wouldn't work like that anyway. When your magical signature changes, so does your compatibility with a wand. You would have to have the donor's wand on hand to cast anything, or at least something similar to it."
"Then it really doesn't make sense for Voldemort to want it," Harry said.
"Can you make it?" Henry asked, "I know you said that some of the ingredients didn't exist when we first showed it to you…"
"Oh! I forgot to tell you, I already made some. Most of the ingredients were just archaic names for modern ingredients. I only had trouble with a couple of rare items."
"Wait, you made some?" Henry asked.
"Of course! I had to be sure the recipe actually worked, didn't I? That's how I know that your wand won't work once you've taken it."
"Whose hair did you use? And when?" Henry asked.
"Ron's. And I only took a very small dose, so it only lasted about an hour." She finally noticed the incredulous looks the twins were giving her. "I was fine. There was nothing in the potion that would have had dangerous side effects. It's actually a rather stable potion compared to most of the things we've worked on in classes."
"But I still don't understand why Voldemort would want it so badly as to kill Slughorn for it," Harry said.
"Wait, what?" Hermione asked.
They quickly told her about their vision of the Death Eater meeting where Voldemort had claimed only one more person needed to die before they could take over everything.
"We thought it was Slughorn, because Voldemort has been hounding him for this potion. But it doesn't make sense," Henry admitted.
"No. It's more likely to be the Minister or Dumbledore," Hermione said.
"How is the Ministry protected?" Harry asked. The others shrugged.
"It seems like practically anyone could get in to see the Minister or Dumbledore. I don't know what stops Voldemort from getting to them in the first place." Henry sighed.
"Well, there's no use speculating. Why don't you two talk to Dumbledore now that you know what the potion does? He might have a better idea of what it could be used for." The twins nodded at Hermione's suggestion.
"Come on, let's get to lunch. We can send him an owl afterwards," Harry said.
-o-0-o-
They received yet another response from McGonagall after History that afternoon, telling them that the Headmaster had left the castle for an unspecified period of time again.
"Now what?" Harry asked his brother.
"I suppose we'll just have to wait until he gets back. He's the only one we can trust…" Henry trailed off.
"What is it?"
"Well, we got the recipe from Slughorn, right? We can trust him with what it does. And he'll have a good idea what Voldemort might use it for."
"That's brill, Hen! Let's go ask him after dinner!"
Unfortunately, they were the only pranksters in the castle who had forgotten that it was April Fool's Day.
Sirius was blocking one of the doors into the Great Hall when they arrived for dinner, telling everyone that tonight they had to go through the main doors on the other side. That alone should have tipped them off—none of the doors into the hall were ever blocked off. So when they walked through the double doors at the back of the hall, they only had a split second of surprise as a voice above them called out "RAVENCLAW" and "SLYTHERIN" before a mild compulsion forced Henry and Harry respectively to those tables.
The Weasley twins were also sitting at the Slytherin table when Harry sat and the compulsion lifted. Their expressions shifted between horror, pride, and glee as they watched the students entering the hall and being 're-sorted' to new tables.
It took Harry several minutes of confusion to see that when a person sat at their new table, their robes changed to match their new House, himself included.
"What's going on?" he asked the twins, rightly assuming that they were the most likely culprits. But they surprised him.
"The Marauders have struck again!" George said with excitement.
"They've completely bollixed our own prank of course," Fred added. "We'll have to find out how they did it, Gred."
"Quite right, Forge." George broke off with a grin of anticipation as Draco Malfoy walked through the doors into the hall, a cry of "HUFFLEPUFF" coming from over his head. The blonde boy promptly walked to the Hufflepuff table and sat down, his robes turning yellow in the lining, cuffs, and hood while the crest changed to the badger.
His look of utter horror was priceless, made more so when Ron sat down across from him a moment later. Both of their faces turned white, then red. Harry could almost swear they were blushing.
"What was your prank, then?" Harry asked the twins when most of the students had entered the hall. Hermione was with Henry at the Ravenclaw table, no surprise there. Meanwhile, Neville had joined the Hufflepuffs and Luna sat down at Harry's elbow, her robes turning green.
"We arranged the robe color changes," Fred said. "Except, it was supposed to make everyone's robe in an entire house change color. Red to green, green to yellow, yellow to blue, and blue to red. The banners would have changed, too. Harmless enough, but worth a good laugh."
"Compared to this, we're nothing but amateurs," George moaned. "I told you I thought I heard someone when we were laying the spells last night, Forge."
"But there was no one on the map!" Fred protested.
"What map?" Harry asked.
"Nothing, never mind," George said quickly.
A commotion at the doors distracted Harry from pursuing the question. Professor McGonagall was arguing loudly with Sirius, a hint of her Scottish brogue coming through—she was truly riled.
"You cannot block off entrances into the Great Hall, Sirius Orion Black. Especially not the teacher's entrance! What if something terrible had happened and we were unable to enter the Great Hall to protect the students?"
"Now, now," Sirius said, holding up his hands pleadingly. "We made sure to keep an eye on things just in case."
"WE!" McGonagall's fury was worse than that of a lioness protecting a cub. "Who is your accomplice? WHO! When I find out what you're up to, I'll box your…" her rant was interrupted as she walked through the doors and the voice of the Sorting Hat called out "RAVENCLAW" from above.
Titters were heard as the professor was compelled to walk to the blue table and sit down. When she did, her teaching robes promptly turned from deepest black to midnight blue.
Sirius followed a step behind when the hat called out "SLYTHERIN". He looked like he might be sick to his stomach when he sat at the table beside his godson, but he didn't look surprised to be there wearing forest green robes.
The other professors entered, looking resigned to their fate as they stepped through the doorway. Sprout went to Gryffindor, Sinistra to Ravenclaw, Burbage to Gryffindor, Vector to Slytherin, Babbling to Hufflepuff, Flitwick (to everyone's surprise) to Slytherin, and Hagrid to Hufflepuff. Trelawney rarely left her tower, so they didn't have to deal with her grim portents of doom on her being sorted into (probably) Slytherin and Dumbledore was, of course, absent.
Last, but not least, Moony walked through the doors and placidly joined the Hufflepuffs in his bright yellow robes.
McGonagall had remained silent when the compulsion released her, and she seemed to be struggling between outrage and amusement at her situation. Amusement won, thankfully, but when she tried to stand and return to the teachers' table as was proper, she got the unfortunate feeling of her bottom being stuck fast to the bench.
Everyone tried to stand after that, but no one could move. Many people were giggling nervously if not outright laughing. Finally, McGonagall sighed and quietly told everyone to tuck in, allowing the feast to start. "The sooner we eat, probably the sooner the spell will be released," she muttered darkly, shooting glares at Sirius and Remus, though they were sitting in opposite directions from her.
"I would have loved to see which house Dumbledore ended up in," Harry laughed, filling his plate, "And Snape too, if he were still here."
"I wonder how they got the hat to cooperate." Luna mused. "It was ever so difficult to convince it that I belonged in Ravenclaw. I do hope that this isn't a permanent sorting, don't you?"
George laughed. "I'm sure it's just a prank, Luna. It is the first of April, after all."
She nodded seriously. "You're right. I've heard that the wrackspurts are particularly active on holidays. People are always in such a tizzy that it makes it that much easier for them to muddle the head."
"I'm sure that's it," Fred told her with a fond smile.
Luckily, the magic vanished when the plates disappeared at the end of the feast. Everyone's bum unstuck from the benches and their robes returned to their proper colors. Henry came over and ruffled his brother's hair as their friends gathered to head to the tower for the night. "I never would have pegged you for a Slytherin at heart, Harry. Have you been holding back on me?"
He laughed. "The hat said I would do well in any of the houses, but that Slytherin would swallow me whole. I can't disagree. Perhaps I would have done well in a house of second place Slytherins like the one tonight."
"Perhaps." Henry's eyes shone as he looked at his brother. "And perhaps our spat on the train in first year separated us unnecessarily. I was rather horrible at the time. And so was Draco, though I don't regret it now."
"Me either." Harry grinned at his brother as they entered the Fat Lady's portrait.
Hermione yawned as she gathered up her books from the corner where she had been studying before dinner. "I'm for bed, I think. Good night!"
"Night!" the twins and Ron bid her farewell.
"I think I'll try to chat up one of the first years for a game of chess," Ron decided. "There's a girl from Wales who's pretty good. With a little more practice, perhaps I'll have some competition."
The twins smiled and waved him away.
"What do you want to do?" Harry asked his brother.
"I think…" Henry gave him a shy glance through his lashes. "I think I would like to head to bed myself. I could use some company."
Harry stared at him and then blushed furiously. He could only manage a nod in reply. Henry took his hand and led him upstairs to the third year dorms. None of their housemates were trying to sleep yet, but they closed the curtains on Harry's four-poster and cast the privacy wards that Remus had taught them (though never intended for this purpose when he taught them).
Henry turned shy, then, lying on his back in the middle of the bed while Harry knelt awkwardly beside him.
"What…exactly are we doing, then?" Harry asked.
Henry shrugged uncomfortably. "Not…that. I don't think I'm ready for that yet."
"Me neither," Harry said quickly. It was the truth, though the idea of being with Henry so intimately made his stomach clench.
"Can we just…kiss?" Henry asked, blushing. They had only shared brief pecks on the lips most nights since that first kiss that had changed everything. Between sorting through the bond and explaining to their friends, they hadn't wanted anything more.
For answer, Harry leaned down and gently pressed his lips against Henry's. Once. Twice. Three times. Feather-light brushes of one warm mouth against another. He waited until Henry relaxed and threaded the fingers of both hands through his hair and then licked the seam of his brother's lips. A small gasp was his reward, and he used the advantage to sweep his tongue into Henry's mouth.
Awkwardly at first, they moved their tongues against one another. The kiss was messy and not terribly pleasurable—they both kept trying to explore the other, getting in each other's way. Harry started to pull back to take a breath to try again, but Henry bit his lower lip between gentle teeth and it was Harry's turn to gasp.
This time the kiss was wet and rough, both of them moving more eagerly now. Hen's hands scratched Harry's scalp as they moved down to his neck, leaving tingling trails of sensation that made him shiver and arch his body against his brother's. Their groins met in one firm brush and Harry realized that they were both getting hard. And all they were doing was kissing!
Feeling more daring, Harry reached one hand under his brother's shirt and firmly stroked his hand up Henry's side to touch his chest. The firm nub of a nipple brushed his thumb and he pinched it between two fingers, rolling it gently.
Henry arched and gasped into Harry's mouth, then groaned with his head thrown back. Harry stared at the smooth column of his brother's neck and couldn't resist the temptation to lean down and kiss it, then nibble, then lick. Henry's gasps came hard and fast, making Harry want more of them. He would give Henry more pleasure—as much as he could take.
With one hand still tweaking a nipple, and his lips devouring a sensitive spot just behind Henry's ear, Harry's idle hand reached between them to rub the hardness twitching insistently against him. Henry cried out at the touch, and then started making mewling noises, his hips jerking wildly.
Harry took his lips in one more passionate kiss and then moaned as Henry arched against him, his body stiff with release and a cry of pleasure losing itself where their mouths joined. Henry's pleasure broke down the thin barrier between their minds and Harry found himself feeling everything his brother was feeling and feeling himself the way Henry felt him. He came violently, thrusting with jerky motions against Henry's sated form.
They had barely enough energy left to strip off their soiled pants before sleep captured them.
-o-0-o-
A/N: So sorry it took so long to update! I have many excuses, but it boils down to this: I moved, then I had grad school, then I forgot where I was in the story and had to re-read it, then I started working an exhausting full-time job in a warehouse. Forgive me! I hope the little lime here at the end makes up for the long wait!
Also, I have NO IDEA when the next chapter will come out. This one has been half-done since I posted the last one. I have notes from my re-reading to keep me on track. I've got a few plot threads to pull together, but I don't expect this fic to last more than another couple of years of the boy's lives.