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, major character death
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: It shames me to realize that it has been more than a year since I updated this fic. And so close to the ending, too! This time last year I was finishing up thesis things and getting ready for graduation. Then I went through a breakup, moved back in with my family, got another job I hated, and applied to doctoral school. My aim is to finish this before I begin my PhD in August.
Also, there is another LEMON in this chapter!
Chapter Thirty-Five—The Fall
Horace Slughorn smiled with delight upon seeing the letter from the Potter twins. He opened it immediately, his grin quickly replaced by a furrowed brow and a frown.
Dear Professor,
We are in need of your Slug Club. Enclosed you will find directions to our location. Please burn it after you read it.
Sincerely,
Harry and Henry Potter
P.S. First meeting at 10 o'clock sharp.
He looked at the small slip of paper that had fluttered out from between the pages and read it with a small smile:
The Headquarters of the Potter Brigade
are located at
No. 12 Grimmauld Place, London
With a flash of fire, the slip of paper disappeared from his fingers.
-o-0-o-
When Amelia Bones received a missive from the Potter twins just after nine, she immediately told her secretary to block the calendar from ten to twelve. The slip of paper that accompanied the letter was thrown into the fireplace, where she watched to make sure every curl of ink and parchment was turned to ash before tackling her duties for the day.
The Aurors were due for a surprise test anyway, something her squad leaders could handle without her help for an hour or two.
-o-0-o-
Everyone gathered in the kitchen of Grimmauld Place, each one anxious for the meeting they had scheduled with their allies for that morning. Ron and Draco were studiously working their way through the last few days of names—Ron doing January ninth and tenth, while Draco tackled December twenty-second and twenty-third. They had a list of names gathered from the other days already, and everyone agreed that the focus of the prophecy wasn't as likely to have a birthday so far out from the New Year, but they were checking just to make sure.
Harry was speaking quietly with Remus, Sirius, and Henry, but he couldn't help occasionally shooting glances at where Ron sat at the end of the table. His friend had changed since coming back from St. Mungo's with Draco. He was more mellow, more focused, and had proven to have some great ideas which he'd brought to the table as they settled their plans.
A knock sounded on the front door out in the foyer, and the portrait of Walburga Black began wailing and shrieking about "blood traitors" in her house. Sirius left the kitchen quickly, flicking a silencing charm at his mother's portrait before the sound of the front door opening and closing was heard.
A moment later, Amelia Bones entered the kitchen with a large folder held in her arms. "Hello, everyone!" she said brightly. "Who else are we waiting for?"
"Professor Slughorn," Hermione answered with a smile for the older witch. "Can I fix you a cup of tea?"
"That would be lovely, dear," Madame Bones said, picking one of the empty chairs and settling into it with a relaxed air.
Another knock sounded from the foyer and Sirius disappeared again.
Madame Bones noted Ron and Draco working their way through the pages of names and asked, "Is that the list I sent you?"
"The last of the names for Britain," Draco agreed, flipping to the last page. Ron made a similar motion a second later.
"I should have thought to sort it along those lines before I sent it," Amelia said ruefully. She took her cup of tea from Hermione with a small thanks just as Horace and Sirius entered the kitchen.
"Hello, hello!" Slughorn boomed. "How wonderful to see you all again! I trust..."
Ron's voice cut him off. "Oh my God!"
"What, what is it?" Hermione asked, rushing around the table to see what set him off.
Ron pointed numbly at a name on his list. It was near the top of the page.
"Severus Tobias Snape," Hermione gasped. "Born 9 January 1960."
Harry and Henry turned to stare at one another in the same moment. "'And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal," they said together, remembering the small crown that had been added to Snape's dark mark almost a year ago.
"Well," Amelia said with a bemused expression. "I can tell this is going to be a fascinating meeting."
-o-0-o-
They apprised Horace and Amelia of their grand plan to secret away the main targets of the Dark Lord in safe houses and the need for a loyalty test of some kind so they knew who was safe to tell their secrets to.
Those names they had selected from the list were discussed, but since it now seemed clear that the person they needed on their side was Severus Snape, discussion was fleeting and served only to solidify their decision about what to do with the man.
"We'll have to wait him out," Amelia said firmly. "He's loyal to the Dark Lord now, but perhaps that is changing, or it will change. I know Severus, and he's a stubborn man. If we try to turn him ourselves he'll simply about face and return to his master."
"But surely we can try to get some kind of reading from him," Hermione said. "It won't do us any good to wait if he doesn't know we're willing to take him in if needed."
Henry shook his head. "Snape would see any offer of aid to be highly suspicious coming from us. He's just killed Dumbledore, he's the Dark Lord's right hand. Why would anyone on our side of the war offer him amnesty? He'd discard it offhand as a trap."
Hermione nodded reluctantly.
"Do we have any contact within the Death Eaters that we can trust?" Ron asked. "If we can have them keep an eye on things and let us know if anything happens, then we'll know when to approach Snape for the best result."
"The Aurors don't have anyone," Amelia said sadly. "Our agents were no good at hiding their true intentions from the Dark Lord. After I lost a few too many good men and women, I decided it wasn't worth it."
"Most of the students I knew who became Death Eaters are from the older generation," Horace offered. "The ones from Hogwarts now didn't trust me enough to reveal that they had joined the Dark Lord's side."
Draco sighed, running a hand through his hair. "My father is still in St. Mungo's, but my mother is presumably still hosting the Dark Lord in the Manor. She might be able to help us, but I have no way to contact her safely. A letter is too easy to intercept."
"Has she visited your father in the hospital?" Harry asked.
Draco shook his head.
"Send her a letter saying that Lucius is doing poorly and wants to see her," Ron offered. "At the very least, that's not suspicious and might let you see her and speak to her."
There were murmurs of agreement around the table.
"It's worth a try," Draco agreed.
"As to the safe houses, it would be best to devise our loyalty test first and approach my Slug Club contacts individually to determine their usefulness," Horace said. "Have any of you given thought to what we need for the test?"
"It needs to be simple," Hermione said, "Something that doesn't require hitting a target or getting them to drink it to learn the truth. Something that makes it apparent at a glance whether someone is loyal to the Dark Lord or not."
"I wonder if we could make something that reacts to the Dark Mark," Harry said with a touch of excitement in his voice. "That would work, wouldn't it?"
"But that doesn't help us identify people like Abe who are just supporters but don't bear the Mark," Henry argued. "And if it needs to be visual, then something that changes color based on the result seems simplest."
"What about a combination?" Ron asked. "Something that changes to black if a person bears the Mark, combined with a truth potion so you can ask if they support the Dark Lord as well. That way, we won't rule someone out for the opposite problem of them bearing the Mark but not actually being loyal to the Dark Lord."
"But truth potions have to be ingested to make someone tell the truth," Hermione said with frustration.
"Perhaps not," Horace said, stroking his upper lip thoughtfully. "What about a vaporized truth potion combined with a Dark Mark detector?"
Hermione picked up a quill and started doing some calculations on a bit of parchment she had in front of her on the table. The arithmantic calculations went right over Harry and Ron's heads, but Draco and Henry leaned in close along with the adults to see what she was writing.
It took about ten minutes of shared calculations for anyone to speak again. "It might work," Hermione conceded. "But it will take time, and I don't think I have the skill to do it myself."
"I am at your disposal," Horace said, bowing slightly at the waist. "I am free for the summer until school starts again—though I hope to be teaching at the Black Academy rather than Hogwarts given our predictions for this summer."
"The Black Academy," Sirius said, stroking his chin with a grin. "That has a nice ring to it!"
Remus smacked him upside the head, bringing him back to earth.
"If you're free, Professor, perhaps you ought to just stay here in Grimmauld until we get everything arranged for the Academy and the safe houses," Harry offered.
"You're certainly free to take one of the spare rooms," Sirius said.
"I think I shall!" Horace exclaimed. "Thank you!"
With their business largely concluded, they arranged for another meeting in two weeks' time and broke apart to work on their various projects.
Harry and Henry had taken over the task of finding and destroying the horcruxes. With the locket gone, they were left with just the cup and the piece inside of Henry. The only problem was that they had no idea where to find the cup. Neither of them had wanted to add to the troubles piling up on the group by bringing up the problem of Henry being a horcrux, either.
They had been through all of the notes Dumbledore had on the subject, but nothing gave them a clue about where Hufflepuff's cup might be located. And it was clear that Dumbledore hadn't had any more idea how to free Henry of his piece without killing him.
"Maybe we should just leave it for now," Harry suggested, lying on his stomach in the bed in their shared room on the third floor of the house.
Henry looked over at him incredulously from where he was sitting at the desk below the window.
"I'm just thinking," Harry elaborated, "Maybe once we have Snape on our side again he'll already know where the cup is. And if we have to wait for that, it won't hurt to wait and figure out what to do about you."
Henry sighed, pushing back from the desk. "You're right."
Harry studied his brother's profile for several long moments. Finally, he folded up the notes in front of him and tucked them inside a book he had been referencing. The book was dropped with a bang onto the floor beside the bed, making Henry jump and look at him questioningly.
"Come here," Harry said simply, rolling onto his side and patting the space beside him in the bed.
Henry obliged, allowing his brother to fold him into a warm embrace. He tucked his head into Harry's shoulder and closed his eyes with another sigh.
"I think we should do something else for a while," Harry said softly.
Henry opened his eyes and peered up at his brother. "What did you have in mind?"
For answer, Harry's head dipped until their lips could meet. Warm breath mingled as they kissed languidly for several minutes.
"I was thinking," Harry finally murmured against Hen's lips, "That it's your turn."
One long arm snaked under Henry's shirt, running up his side and across his stomach until it reached his chest. Harry tweaked one nipple, pinching the bud between his fingers as he kissed Henry a little bit more feverishly.
"Yes," Henry gasped, giving himself up to the feelings.
Before long they were both naked and Harry was trailing hot kisses down Henry's neck and chest while two slick fingers worked to loosen the tight ring of muscle below his spine. Henry's knees were drawn up and back as he worked to open himself for his brother. Harry wasn't using spit as Henry had done, but a deliciously warming substance that defied words.
"Now," Henry finally gasped, "Please!"
Harry kissed him hard, and replaced his fingers with a lube-slicked cock. They both groaned at the first joining, and the barrier between their minds fell with a shudder. Neither of them lasted long after that as sensation bled into sensation and they rocked their way to oblivion.
-o-0-o-
With Slughorn in residence, the potion they needed to test the motives of anyone wanting to join them took only a few short weeks to complete. This was an excellent thing as the Quidditch World Cup loomed closer than ever, due to begin on 8 August. The potion Hermione and Horace came up with looked like white smoke in the thin glass vials they had prepared to hold it. When the vial was smashed, anyone in the vicinity of the vapors would inhale a potent truth serum that would last just long enough for one or two questions to be asked before losing effect.
If anyone nearby bore the Dark Mark, the smoke turned inky black and had a tendency to cling to their eyes, mouth, and nose, as they had discovered when testing it on the twins.
Everyone was given a small pack of the vials to carry on their person at all times, and Hermione was busying herself with mass-producing enough to test the Slug Club members in the coming weeks, as well as all of the students when they ambushed the Hogwarts Express on 1 September.
Slughorn and the other adults set out to start testing the best candidates and setting up the safe houses, leaving the children to begin converting Black Manor into a proper school. Every morning, Harry, Henry, Ron, Draco, and Hermione would floo to the large property in the countryside and practice their transfiguration and charm work by cleaning various rooms of dusty furniture and transforming the more solid bits into desks and chairs for the students.
Draco and Ron focused on the creation of four dormitories, two in each wing of the huge mansion. Sirius had to come with them on the first day, to lay expansion charms on the areas they intended to use so that each year would have its own space as well as a common room for each house. After that, it was just the back-breaking labor of portioning off each space and adding the furniture needed for more than a hundred children to live day to day.
Hermione didn't trust any of the boys with the teacher's quarters, so took it upon herself to turn the airy rotunda in the middle of Black Manor into a balcony overlooking the foyer. A door opened from the dome into a set of quarters with every possible amenity. Five of these rooms had an extra door that she had cleverly charmed to open into any of the house common rooms or to the back of the entrance hall so that the Headmistress and the Heads of Houses could be anywhere they were needed at a moment's notice.
That left Harry and Henry with the classrooms. In a way, their job was the most difficult as they had to account for the special needs of certain classes. Care of Magical Creatures required an outdoor space, not to mention the creatures themselves. Luckily, the Manor had a good bit of land attached to it and an ancient stable that was in good enough shape to house the larger creatures they thought they'd be able to bring in during the coming weeks.
Since Hermione was using the rotunda for the teacher's quarters, they decided to let her place the Astronomy equipment on the roof of the dome, which left them with the rest of the building to convert into more standard classrooms.
The question of who exactly would be teaching at the Black Academy had come up in the second Potter Brigade meeting. Each of the current Hogwarts professors would need to be tested with the potion, but several positions had been left open with the deaths of Flitwick, Hagrid, and of course Dumbledore. Everyone assumed that McGonagall would be taking over as Headmistress, which meant they also needed a new Transfiguration professor. All of this on top of the fact that if anyone proved untrustworthy, they would also need replacing.
Remus and Sirius were the obvious choices to fill some of the gaps. Remus could continue Defense Against the Dark Arts and Sirius, as an animagus, would be a natural for Transfiguration. That just left Charms and Care of Magical Creatures as well as any other that were needed.
In the end, they decided not to worry about it until they could get the new Headmistress in residence.
By the time the Quidditch Cup was upon them, enough safe houses had been created to hide every Muggleborn and their family, which they did with alacrity. All of the Aurors had been tested by Amelia, with half a dozen weeded out as Death Eater spies. She left them in place, of course, and informed them that they would be security at the Cup the next day.
The Slug Club had proved invaluable. With the Muggleborns hidden, there were still enough trustworthy people left to hide anyone else from the Wizarding world that needed to be hidden.
The Academy was completed, though none of the professors had taken up residence yet. McGonagall had been brought into the fold of the Potter Brigade and provided with the potion to test her professors. To everyone's pleasure, every single remaining professor, including the cantankerous caretaker, Argus Filch, had been proven trustworthy and would be joining the fight at Black Academy. Professor Grubbly-Plank had been enlisted to teach Care of Magical Creatures, and Auror Proudfoot, surprisingly, would be taking over Charms.
With McGonagall also came the not-insignificant resources of the Order of the Phoenix. Though the members of the Order were not inducted in any way into the Brigade, there was a certain amount of information trading that seemed prudent since they were all aiming for the same thing.
Draco had contacted his mother, who agreed to come to St. Mungo's on the morning of the Quidditch Cup. Most likely, this was the only time she would be guaranteed to escape from the Manor without a watchdog, as the Dark Lord would be planning his attack on the Ministry and would not notice her absence.
The morning of the Quidditch Cup Final dawned bright and crisp and the Brigade waited nervously for all the key players to get into place before they made their move. It was important for everything to look as it should when Voldemort came calling. They waited until the game had begun before Amelia ordered the Aurors to the safe house they had prepared, yet another of the Black properties put to a better use.
The game ended much more quickly than anyone could have anticipated; the snitch caught by the Bulgarian seeker, Viktor Krum, though Ireland had scored enough points by then that they still won the match.
The festivities at the campsite near the pitch ramped up and it was nearly morning before anyone knew that the Ministry had fallen. Word first came through one of the Minister's aides who had attempted to return to his office, only to stumble upon two Death Eaters ransacking the Minister's files. Had they not been so intent on their task, the man might not have escaped with his life.
All hell broke loose after that. The Dark Lord announced his return, and his place as the new Minister for Magic. Within hours, new laws were being put into place.
The Brigade, jointly with the Order, began publishing their own newspaper after the Daily Prophet began printing only Death Eater propaganda. The Freedom Watch informed the populace of the truth behind the overtake of the Ministry, revealing that the Aurors were not dead and defeated as Voldemort wanted everyone to believe, but alive and well and still fighting.
In the few weeks before 1 September, however, Voldemort had managed to cow the populace, and every student who wasn't a Muggleborn in hiding was expected to be on the train at King's Cross when school started. This worked perfectly for the Brigade's plans. On the morning of 1 September, the children of the group armed themselves with several dozen vials of the potion each and flooed to the station to catch the train.
They waited as all of the students boarded the train, noting the pinched looks on the first year's faces as they said goodbye to their families. As far as those families were concerned, this might be the last time they saw their children. No one was under any illusions about who was in control of Hogwarts now. It was no longer a safe haven in the Wizarding world.
The group of five fourth-years took the compartment at the rear of the train and waited until the train was on the move and out of London before they made their move. The train was made up of half a dozen cars, plus the engine. They moved quickly through each car, locking all of the compartment doors and forcing students in the halls to return to their seats. Then each of them took a car and went from door to door, throwing down a vial of the potion and stunning anyone who either bore the Dark Mark or answered "yes" to the question, "Do you serve the Dark Lord willingly?"
To each of the students deemed trustworthy, a portkey was given that took them and their luggage directly to the foyer of Black Academy.
Within thirty minutes, they had emptied the train of all but a few students who were faithful to the Dark Lord. The twins, Ron, Hermione, and Draco then activated their own portkeys and returned to the Academy to await the news that the train arrived in Hogsmeade nearly empty of students.
Professor McGonagall was presiding over the students who had been ushered into what had previously been a ballroom but now served as the school's Great Hall. Once she saw the five of them enter, she relaxed and shot sparks from her wand to silence the terrified whispers of the students.
"Silence!" she cried. The whispers died to nothing as the students looked up at her hopefully. "As you can see, Hogwarts has been relocated. Due to the threat of the Dark Lord, we felt it would be safer to secret you all away where you will be safe. Each of you will be allowed to write one letter, which we will deliver to your families ourselves. This location is hidden from You-Know-Who and his followers, and I'm afraid we will have to restrict your contact with the outside world to keep you safe. You will have your classes here just as you would have had at Hogwarts. First, let's see to the sorting of our new students and then I will introduce you to the new professors and we can serve lunch before showing you your new dormitories."
Professor Sprout set up a stool at the front of the room, below the new head table, and set the familiar shape of the Sorting Hat upon it. A rip near the brim opened, and that year's song echoed forth.
The hat sang of strength through hard times and encouraged them to band together to make it through the year. There were several tears surreptitiously wiped away by staff and student alike when it finished.
The sorting seemed to take no time at all. There were no fewer first years than any other year, since they had secreted away all the Muggleborns safely and procured every last first year from the train. Harry and the others were sitting at the Slytherin table and were pleased to see that despite the terrible events going on in the outside world, a good number of students were still sorted into the house of snakes.
Once every student was sorted, McGonagall announced Sirius as the new Transfiguration professor, Grubbly-Plank for Care of Magical Creatures, and Proudfoot for Charms. For the first time in their memory, she also introduced the other professors for the benefit of the first years.
"And now, lunch!" she said cheerfully when she was finished. The plates and cups on the tables before them filled at once, the food magically transported from the kitchens where the Hogwarts elves were cheerfully taking over.
"So that's it," Hermione sighed as she took a tong-full of salad onto her plate. "Now we just wait for Snape and hope the rest sorts itself out."
"Hopefully it won't take too long," Ron agreed, already halfway through the mountain of food on his own plate.
Harry glanced aside at Henry, who was fitfully stirring his food in tiny concentric circles. He couldn't bring himself to agree with Ron. To him, every second until the end was a precious gem. Because when the end came, he had a feeling he and Henry would be going with it.
-o-0-o-
A/N: I went back and added a scene to Chapter 33 due to a bit of a plot hole I didn't notice. The twins did know how to destroy a horcrux, so if you are interested in seeing them destroy the locket, go take a look. Special thanks to HikariKurayami88 for pointing this out to me!