"Keep your eyes on the road. Both of them".
Ignoring Moody's low growl, Harry tightened his grip on the strap across his chest, pulling 'sling' backpack that Madam Bones had given him tighter against his back as Tonks threw his broom over her shoulder with her own and cancelled her disillusionment charm with a gentle tap on the shoulder.
He could feel the ex-auror's eyes burning into his back as he followed Lupin out of the grassy park they'd landed in, imagining he could hear the hissing of the steam bursting from the scarred man's ears. He couldn't believe that Moody actually expected him to allow him to search through his things before going to 'HQ', and while it was a good thing to know that Madam Bones' gift was immune to Moody's magical eye, it still pissed him off that Moody had the guts to demand he hand it over.
It didn't matter how paranoid the man was, Harry's secrets were Harry's secrets, and he wouldn't hesitate to incinerate anyone who tried to force him to share them.
And on the topic of secrets, Harry was rather disappointed in the Order of the Phoenix's secret. The street looked like somewhere he imagined Dudley living in once his cousin left his parent's home, there were broken windows and bottles littering the sidewalk, the paint on the townhouses was chipped and peeling and the gardens were miniature jungles just waiting for the unsuspecting traveller to pass through them.
"Where are we?" he asked slowly, silently hoping that this was just another of paranoid Moody's 'stop and walk three blocks before taking off to avoid being followed' tactics.
"Quiet," Moody snapped from behind him, the pegged man shoving past Harry in a way that made him instinctively pat down his pockets. (Dudley may have been a fat graceless lump, but he could pickpocket like the best of them). "Follow us, Potter".
Resisting the petty – and frankly childish – urge to argue with Moody for the sake of it, Harry stuck close to Tonks and Lupin as they headed down the street, his hand slipping up behind his back to touch his bag reassuringly. The silence on the street (other than the sounds of Moody's peg leg) allowed Harry to remember the dilemma he'd realised on the flight over.
What was he going to do when put face to face with Ron and Hermione?
The fire in his chest raged at the thought of meeting them so soon, so he knew that he wasn't ready to just forget and forgive, not that he believed he'd be capable of such a thing in the first place. Ron was already on his second chance so the red-head would be lucky if Harry didn't punch him out, but what about Hermione? The only real problems he had with her were his Firebolt in third year – which she had explained and he'd understood, leaving him to realise she was right – and the way she constantly looked down on his smarts.
He wasn't her, he knew he'd never be as intelligent as she was. But he wasn't an idiot, and he didn't appreciate her treating him like one. Merlin, Harry was sure even Dudley of all people would understand that a colour changing charm changed colours. It wasn't rocket science, so why did Hermione find the need to try explain that to both him and Ron?
But that didn't matter right now. What mattered was he didn't know how he'd react when they were finally 'reunited'. As far as he knew he could lose control and burn the safe house down, and for obvious reasons he didn't want that. And he couldn't just avoid them, neither of them would allow him to, they'd hound him until he gave up and told them what was wrong like they always did.
Which meant he would have to confront them. He could do that.
(He couldn't do that).
"Here," Moody snapped, turning a glare on Harry as he stopped randomly in the middle of the street. "Read this quickly and memorise," the man growled, pulling a piece of parchment from his pocket and shoving it at Harry, yanking his hand away immediately like he couldn't bear touching him.
He recognised the handwriting as Dumbledore's immediately, the cursive letters filling him with an irrational anger as he read "The Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix may be found at number twelve, Grimmauld Place, London".
"Wait till we're inside before you start blurting out our secrets, boy," snarled Moody seconds later, snatching the parchment from his grasp and incinerating it with a scowl. Just when Harry didn't think he could dislike Moody anymore, the ex-auror had to go prove him wrong and start calling him 'boy' like his relatives did.
Reminding himself that he'd promised to play nice for now, Harry turned away from Moody and started looking around, faltering as he watched a cleaner more unbroken house appear between ten and eleven in a shimmer.
This was the Order's safe house? Harry could practically feel the dark magic radiating from the building. Okay, maybe it was just the air of morbidity and cruelty he could feel, but he imagined that's what dark magic felt like. It's what the graveyard had felt like last year, after all, or he was feeling the hostility between him and Moody simmering. Either way he didn't like it, Harry felt like Privet Drive was safer than this place, especially with the suspicious looks that Moody kept sending him.
Harry wasn't letting his bag out of his sight.
"Come on," Lupin urged, his fingers curling around Harry's arm and starting to lead him towards the building, the silver snake doorknocker shining like it was moving with every step they took. He could probably speak parseltongue to it, if he squinted just right, it looked lifelike enough. With a tap of his wand on the door, Lupin unlocked it and pushed Harry forward with a whispered "In quick. Don't go too far in though, and don't touch anything".
Stepping into the dark entry hall, he scrunched his nose up against the rotting smell permeating the air, glancing around the derelict looking room in disgust. Ignoring the sounds of the others filing in after him, Harry continued moving into the house, pretending not to hear the sound of an animal skittering through the walls as he reached out to brush his fingers across the dust covering a snake-shaped rickety table.
Part of him wanted to conjure a fireball to light up the room around him, but it would be difficult for him to explain why he could use the Incindio charm wandlessly but not Lumos. Besides, it was for the best that he didn't offer the Order the opportunity to ask him questions about his new 'skill' that he couldn't answer, he wanted them to forget about his little surprise until he was ready to remind them.
"Harry!"
Annoyance flaring through him as he turned to see Mrs Weasley rushing through a door at the far end of the hallway, Harry clenched his jaw and curled his hands into fists.
"It's so lovely to see you!" Mrs Weasley whispered loudly, hurrying towards him and reaching out, only to close her arms around empty air as he ducked beneath her outstretched arm as easily as he dodged a bludger on his broom.
"Don't touch me".
"Harry!" she scolded as she whipped around to scowl at him, "There is no need for that! I'm just trying to say 'Hello'!"
"I know," he admitted, stepping back as she moved forwards.
"It's okay Molly," Lupin interrupted soothingly as Mrs Weasley turned to blink at them, "Harry's… not in the best of moods right now. He feels betrayed by us, that we didn't do anything to bring him here sooner, and I guess from his point of view he's correct".
"Oh Harry," Mrs Weasley exhaled sadly, turning a sympathetic look on him as Harry's eye twitched behind his glasses. "It's okay, you're allowed to be angry with us," she assured him like he needed her permission, "But I dare say, you look rather peaky, you need a good feeding up".
"My relatives try to starve me," Harry deadpanned bluntly, making everyone in the hallway freeze immediately.
"Right th- well," Mrs Weasley stuttered out as he crossed his arms, "You'll need to wait for dinner, I'm afraid," she apologised awkwardly. "Albus has just arrived, the meeting's started," she added, turning away from him quickly and turning to the rest of the Order.
As the Order made noises of interest and started filing past them, Harry hid his smirk when he noticed the way none of them (except Moody who was glaring) were meeting his eyes as they hurried to get away from him.
"Oh no!" Mrs Weasley blurted as he turned to follow them, reaching out to stop him but faltering mid-gesture. "No, Harry, the meeting's only for members of the Order. Ron and Hermione are upstairs, you can wait with them until the meeting's over," she explained in a rush.
"No".
Ignoring her shocked spluttering Harry side-stepped her hand and started down the hallway, raising a challenging eyebrow at Tonks as she stood in the doorway, the shapeshifter ('Metamorphmagus', she had said before) merely looking amused as she stepped further into the room and let him in.
"Harry!"
What was it with people and shouting his name like that today?
Struggling to stop his face from breaking into a smile at the sight of Sirius, Harry made a beeline towards him and allowed himself to be pulled into a tight hug, the escaped prisoner holding him so tightly he feared his ribs might crack under the pressure.
"If this sickening display of sentimentality is done," a familiar voice drawled slowly, "Then perhaps you should go upstairs to join your fellow Gryffindors".
"Bite me, Snivellus," Sirius snapped, withdrawing only one arm from Harry that he used to flip off the Potions Professor.
"I'm sure such behaviour is more to be expected from you, Black, considering your flea-ridden state," Snape snarled back, for a moment looking just as feral as he had back in the Shrieking Shack in third year.
"Gentlemen," another voice interrupted, Harry stiffening as the Headmaster continued, "Perhaps this argument is one better shelved until you are ready to forgive each other? I do believe Harry should be joining his friends upstairs, after all".
"No thanks," Harry denied, finally pulling away from Sirius and promptly stealing the man's chair. "I think I'm good here".
Dumbledore didn't look at him, his eyes drifting over the entering members of the Order instead. "Now now, my boy, this meeting will be dreadfully boring I'm afraid, nothing to worry yourself about".
"Oh?" Sirius asked, perking up behind Harry as he reached out to rest his hand on the young wizard's shoulder, "So it's nothing to do with the whole 'Don't tell Harry more than he needs to know' rubbish you've been spouting?"
Dumbledore, curse him, didn't even flinch at Sirius' accusation even as Harry's fists clenched and tingled. "This is a serious matter, Sirius, you know that. One better suited for adults than for children".
"If that's the case," Snape sneered out, almost blending into the dark corner behind him with his equally as dark robes, "Then Black should join the boy upstairs".
"Hands up if you've fought Voldemort and won?" Harry cut in as he felt Sirius breathing in to continue his earlier argument. "Anyone?" he asked as he raised his own hand, looking around the room at the awkwardly shifting Order members until his eyes had returned to staring at Dumbledore who was finally looking at him with a sad expression, "That's what I thought".
"Harry," Dumbledore began slowly (and what right did he have to sound so disappointed?), "You're just a child, you need to enjoy your childhood, not waste it fighting a war you have no part in".
"If you wanted me to enjoy my childhood, Sir, then perhaps you should have placed me with a family that wouldn't verbally, emotionally and physically abuse me," argued Harry without hesitation, "Only the other day my Uncle admitted that he'd wanted to drown me when you left me on the doorstep in the middle of the night".
"I'm sure he didn't mean that," Dumbledore dismissed, "Sometimes people say things they do not mean when they are angry".
"He put bars on my window".
"I'm sure it didn't mean what you believe it did," Dumbledore claimed, waving a hand as if to clear the air.
"He put bars on my window," Harry repeated slowly, unable to prevent the growl to his voice as he stood up and rested his hands on the table as the faint smell of smoke reached his nose. "He put locks on the outside of my door, and fed me through a cat flap. Do you really think I misinterpreted that?"
A wave of mumbles rolled throughout the room, Dumbledore suddenly seeming extremely interested in the grains of wood in the table they were all gathered around.
"Now. I'm offering to help the Order," Harry continued, not wanting to hear whatever pathetic excuse Dumbledore had up his sleeve, "But I expect that to be a two-way street. No more spying of me, no more treating me like some kid-"
Snape's loud scoff cut Harry off, the man pushing roughly past a bird-like woman to sneer at him from across the table. "I don't know why you think you deserve to be involved, Potter," he drawled, practically spitting out his name, "The Order has no need for arrogant braggarts with delusions of grandeur".
Harry paused, blinking. "What are you still doing here then?" he asked before he could stop himself.
"Professor Snape is here as a spy for the Order, at great risk to himself," Dumbledore jumped in, defending Snape where he wouldn't Harry. "I ask you show him a patience you normally would not".
"Oh I'm patient," Harry corrected, meeting Snape's glare head-on with his own, "I've never once complained about the way I'm being bullied and harassed by a 'Professor', I've never once acted the way he claims I do, and I've never once spoken out against getting detention for a week for breathing too loudly".
"Now I'm sure-" "Is that true Severus?"
Jumping as Professor McGonagall's sharp voice interrupted Dumbledore's mindless defence, Harry turned to see his Head of House leaning forward and fixing Snape with a look that reminded Harry of Crookshanks when the cat was hunting a toy. "You assured me that each punishment was one hundred percent justified".
"They are," Snape lied without hesitation, "Potter is merely lying for sympathy".
"Prove it," Harry countered smugly as he smirked, "I'm willing to provide memories if you are".
Snape's glare darkened tenfold, making Harry's smirk grow by the same.
"Enough!" Dumbledore exclaimed loudly, "This is neither the time nor the place for fighting between ourselves! The real enemy here is Voldemort and his Death Eaters, not each other".
"Snape is a Death Eater," Sirius interrupted.
"We can discuss Harry's accusations at a later date when it is more appropriate," Dumbledore continued, pretending not to have heard Sirius' comment.
"From now on, Severus, I'll be watching you very closely," McGonagall threatened bluntly, settling back into her chair with a more than dangerous glare of her own.
"Does the Order of the Phoenix fight Voldemort?" Harry asked before Dumbledore could take back control. When people around the room nodded and mumbled agreements he nodded back to them, "So why can't I join? I have more experience fighting him than any of you, I've killed him twice, and he's after me because of it".
"Harry? Do you trust me to protect you?" Dumbledore asked simply, his tone of voice as he cleaned his glasses confident in what he seemed sure the answer would be.
"How can you ask me that?" Harry countered, "Of course not!"
Watching as the old man jolted and stared up at him in shock, Harry shook his head. "You lied to me and spied on me and had me followed. You kept secrets from me and left me in a house filled with people who hate me while you brought my friends here. You've done nothing to prove that Voldemort has returned, and you're actively preventing people from finding out the truth by telling them to stay away from me!" he shouted, hesitating for a moment as he realised that sometime during his answer he'd jumped to his feet and began yelling. "You forced me to compete in a Tournament that I almost died in, promising me that you were 'doing all you could' to get me out without even realising that the man you trusted so much wasn't really him! You're making excuses for Snape's behaviour and defending him because you 'trust him', and you're telling me that my relatives love me and that the past fourteen years of abuse have been nothing but a figment of my imagination! Oh! And you stole my owl!"
"Right now I trust Voldemort more than you," he confessed bluntly, ignoring the gasps of shock from around the room, "At least I know he wants me dead. I can trust his motives, not yours".
"Harry…"
Dumbledore cut himself off, still staring at Harry in a mixture of shock and hurt as if he was surprised by Harry's reasoning. "Surely… surely you don't mean…"
"That I'm giving you one last chance to earn my forgiveness?" Harry finished for him, "Yeah, I do. You let me into the Order, or I'll never be able to trust you again".
Dumbledore didn't answer, sky blue eyes merely dropping to the table before him.
His breath escaping his lungs slowly, Harry's shoulders dropped slightly and he turned away from the table. "Where's my room, Sirius?" he asked his godfather quietly, pretending not to see the look in the dog animagus' eyes.
"You're rooming with Ron upstairs, Harry," Mrs Weasley piped up coldly.
Sirius just smiled at him gently, reaching out to throw his arm over his shoulders and pulling him close. "I cleaned out the room next to mine for you weeks ago, it's been waiting for you," he offered Harry simply.
"That's not necessary, Sirius," Mrs Weasley argued, "He's sleeping with his best friend".
"Yeah I am, the moment I find out where you locked Hedwig up," Harry confirmed, turning a glare on the red-headed woman who was glaring building up to an explosion.
"Come on, kiddo," Sirius suggested, "Let's go get her, we'll have dinner in your room and catch up".
Letting Sirius lead him towards the door, the tension in the room so thick it could have been cut with a blunt spoon, Harry realised something and stopped in the doorway. Looking back at Dumbledore, who had been watching his retreating back, he met his eyes so the Headmaster would know he was being deathly serious.
"If I'm not part of the Order, then I'm not part of the War".
IGNITION
I'll say it now, I believe Snape is a Good man in that he is on the side of Good, not that he is in anyway a Good man as in is actually Good. He's abusive, cruel, a murderer on more than one occasion, and will be a very lucky man if he survives this story. In addition, I'm trying to avoid the cliché Dumbledore is evil trope.
I admit it, this chapter is barely three thousand words, but I didn't want to stretch it on any further and include his confrontation with Ron and Hermione because I don't think I'll be able to keep that to less than a thousand words.
Thank you to everyone who reviewed and enjoyed Christmas! Remember that I don't own Harry Potter.
IGNITION