Authors Note: Thanks for the support.
Lost in time
Chapter 11
A week later Rabastan is also free again and healed from the constant pain he was in and incredibly grateful to Harry. Rodolphus also is very happy to have his wife healed again since he truly cares about her and is hoping to slowly get her out of the depression her guild threw her in. Both are offering to help him whenever he should need anything.
Frank and Alice Longbottom make the same offer after both of them are healed and Alice can already leave while Frank only stays in the hospital for supervision until the last potion has left his system.
As soon as the last potion is given, Harry agrees to meet with Sirius and see the home his father grew up in but the day before he goes there he goes to Gringotts to get the book his mother left to his cousin, which he copies after seeing what kind of book it is. He also gets the gold Dudley is to get and already exchanges it into English pounds knowing that Dudley wouldn't be able to use it otherwise. Once that is done he apparates to Private drive in muggle clothes and wonders what his family had been told about him not returning. He hadn't even thought about asking Dumbledore before he left the school.
He rings the doorbell of number four and tries not to show any fear but actually is scared a little and keeps telling himself that he can use magic and that he can defend himself and is not a little kid anymore. petunia is the one opening the door and looks at him questioningly. "We're not buying anything." She says after a moment of silence.
"And I'm not selling anything." Harry replies before she can close the door. "I'm here because of your sisters will has finally been read and want to bring what was left to Dudley Dursley."
"I take it you're one of them?" She grumbles. "We don't need anything from people like her."
Once again she tries to close the door and Harry just puts his food into the door and says, "I don't care what you say Miss Dursley since she didn't leave you anything. I'm not leaving until I spoke to your son and been able to give him what was left for him. It will be up to him to accept or not."
He forces his way into the house and just walks up the stairs assuming that if he's in, he's probably in his room playing some game. Petunia is screeching the whole time and Harry has to lock the door magically after himself one he's in Dudley's room. The boy looks at him scared and Harry puts some charms onto the door to silence Petunia's screeching. "What did you do to my mum?" Dudley asks shaking in fear.
"Nothing." Harry replies. "I locked the door and put a charm on it that won't let any sound get through in either direction keeping the noise out. How are you doing Big D?"
Dudley looks surprised and then asks, "How do you know that nick name?"
"Time is a funny thing." Harry replies and moves his fringe out of the way for a moment to show him his scare. "I've been in another time for ten years before coming back to this. Which is why I didn't come back this summer. Don't know what you guys have been told."
"Dad only mentioned that they got a letter that they don't get anymore money for raising you because you wouldn't come back. Nothing else." Dudley replies less scared now that he knows that it's only his scrawny cousin. "Why did you come after all?"
"Since I'm older now I could get my parents will read to me and found out that they left something to you. The Goblins, that work in the bank and would have to get it to you, can't give it to a muggle."
"Muggle?" Dudley asks.
"Non magical people." Harry explains.
"So, your parents left me something?" Dudley asks skeptically.
"My mom did." Harry says with a smile, "And from what little I heard about them by now, they would have been much nicer to you if your parents had died then yours were to me, but that is in the past and doesn't matter anymore."
"Why are you giving it to me?" Dudley questions, "You could just keep it couldn't you?"
"Sure." Harry replies, "But it was my mothers last will and to be honest, I don't think you're all that bad. Your parents might not have been the only ones to hurt me, but you were a child yourself and with the way they treated us, I'm just hoping you won't end up in prison."
"You're the delinquent in the family not me." Dudley insists.
"You steal money from kids, you broke my bones, you threw a tantrum because of one present less then the year before when you were already 11 years old." Harry points out. "How on earth do you think that will get over when you're grown up and legal? Never mind how a girl would find such a tantrum?"
"I'm good boy, everyone says then." Dudley insists.
"You mean the parents that starved a child? Or the teachers that never knew that it was you that did everything I was punished for? After all they called me a delinquent because they thought I had done what you did!" Harry questions but then sighs, "Just try and remember this when you're older. Maybe you'll learn then. For now, this is yours." Harry takes out a small bag from his pocked and after opening it he grabs inside and Dudley's eyes nearly bulge out of their sockets the way he stares when Harry's whole arm is in that small bag. "There it is." Harry mumbles and take out the book and hands it over. Dudley looks at it skeptically while Harry once again lets his arm disappear in the bag and this time it comes back up with a bigger bag then the one the bigger bag was in. Harry turns the bigger bag upside down over Dudley's bed and out comes lots of cash. "I took the liberty to exchange the gold you were supposed to get for muggle money since I doubt you could use the wizarding money."
"Gold?" Dudley questions sounding interested.
"That's what Galleons are made of." Harry explains, "Shickles are silver and Knuts bronze." He takes out some coins and shows them to Dudley who actually looks curious. "You should look at the book. It's full of pictures of both of our mothers and their parents during their childhood. I really don't get why Aunt Petunia seemed so jealous. There are so many pictures of our grandma hugging her. More then hugging my mum but then again, it might just have been the pictures."
Dudley looks skeptically but then slowly goes through the pictures of their moms mostly playing outside. "Do you know who that is?" He asks after seeing a picture of both girls and a boy standing next to Lily and Petunia glaring at them.
"That's Severus Snape." Harry replies, "His mother is a witch and he's a wizard. He's actually a teacher at Hogwarts now and teachers Potions. He's usually grumpy but not too bad."
"Mom looks jealous." Dudley mumbles. "Dad once mentioned that mum used to have a crush on a friend of her sister but that she saw how inferior he was after meeting him. Maybe that was this boy."
"Petunia? And Professor Snape?" Harry asks and then shudders. "I rather not imagine them together. I mean Professor Snape can be nice but no, I actually find it hard to picture him with anyone."
Dudley grins a little and then says, "But it would explain it wouldn't it. Why she was jealous of your mom."
"I guess." Harry replies, "And why she was jealous that she was a witch. Maybe she thought she would have had a chance if she had been one too."
"The pictures are nice." Dudley replies and at the last page sees one of himself with his parents when he was a baby and under that one of Lily and her family including Harry as a baby. The later one actually moved and Dudley stares at it. "They move."
"Magic Dudley." Harry states, "It makes a lot of things possible. Not everything but a lot. Which reminds me, I made something for you while I was in the past and talking to some people about how you acted in this time and how your parents treated you like a little prince no matter how much trouble you caused." Harry takes out another bag from his other pant pocked and once more digs his hand into it. Again his whole arm disappears until he grumbles, "Where the hell is it." Harry then pushes his Head into the opening that normally wouldn't be big enough to even let it in. Next goes the arm and Dudley only sees the bag stretch over it all until he hears a "There it is." Next Harry comes out of his small bag that once again looks like a little bag. The kind of things girls have in very old movies with a strap around their wrists, just a little smaller to fit in a pants pocket. In Harry's hand is a hand hold mirror that looks from the make like it's at least from the same time if not older then that bag but it does also appear to either be well restored or newly made. The only thing Dudley likes about it is the color. It's black with a greenish tint to it. The mirror itself just like the surrounding metal or whatever it is. it doesn't really feel like metal and more like glass.
"A mirror?" Dudley grumbles when Harry hands a boring and old looking mirror to him after being half way in his stupid magical bag.
"Not just any." Harry replies "I have another one made of the same material and it will glow when you say my name until I pick it up. And once I do you'll be able to see me through it and even talk to me. That way you can contact me should you ever be in need of some form of magical aid. Like I said, magic can't fix everything, like I can't bring back the dead as much as I sometimes might wish to but I can cure some diseases that muggles can't, or even fix a broken glass even though I'd thank you not to bother me for just any spill." Harry smiles at him, "We might not have gotten along all that well but you are family. You and your parents are the only family I have left, well not counting the great great great great I have no idea how many great grand son from my son that I had to leave in the past when I came back to this time but I hardly know him and there are so many generations in between that I doubt he considers me family. Anyway, I want to at least give you the means to contact me should you ever truly need me. If you use it or not, will be up to you."
Dudley looks at Harry for a moment and then grumbles, "It still looks stupid. And why should I want to contact you anyway."
"Who knows what time will bring." Harry just muses and then rises. "I should probably go, who knows what your mother thinks I'm doing with you."
"Probably kill me or torture me." Dudley shudders, "That's what she said you're learning in that school."
"That's just ridiculous," Harry chuckles, "Children learn to brew potions to calm someone that is distressed or to cure a rash. We learn to move or clean objects or turn a chair into a comforter. We learn to defend ourselves from wizards that do kill or torture because just like there are muggles that kill with guns, there are wizards that do the same with spells. We learn about Dragons which by the way really exist, they are just hidden by us so muggles don't see them."
"Did you ever see one?" Dudley asks excitedly.
"Pictures of them only." Harry replies, "They are very rare and nearly extinct because poachers want their blood or hearts or scales."
"Why?" Dudley asks."I get the scales they're probably cool but a dragons heart and blood? That's gross"
"The heart can be used for potions as well as a wand core and the blood also has a it's uses in potions and I think in Alchemy too." Harry replies, "Professor Dumbledore once wrote about the 12 uses of Dragon blood. I think a nice red inc was one of them."
"But I really should get going." Harry replies, "I still need to tend my garden which is by the way another thing a young wizard or witch can learn at Hogwarts, the care of magical plants."
"So you're like a gardener now?" Dudley grins slightly evil, "Guess the gardening here payed of."
Harry grins back not letting the boy get to him. "Probably did. But I'm not just a gardener. I grow my own potions ingredients to make healing potions or, as Professor Snape put it in my first year, I learned how to bottle fame, brew glory, and even put a stopper in death." Dudley stares at Harry slightly awed against his own wishes. "But that is still not my main work, I'm going to teach magical defense next term at Hogwarts because in the past I've been trained to be a defense master under Merlin himself."
"The Merlin?" Dudley asks, "The one from the King Author movies?"
"Yes, the Merlin." Harry replies, "He's also my father-in-law and his beard is thanks to my son who pranked him. But enough for now. You know how to contact me should you want to see me again for more stories of the magical world."
With that Harry ends the charms on the door without drawing his wand and just a simple movement of his hand. "I thought you need a wand for things like that?" Dudley asks while his mother falls into the room.
"I'm a defense master trained under Merlin." Harry replies, "I'm well able to do quiet a bit wandlessly. Good bye Dudley, Good bye Aunt Petunia." And with that he disapparates right out of Dudley's room back to the gates of Hogwarts and walks into the castle with a grin.
The next day he goes with Sirius to the house his father grew up in. Once there he isn't sure if house is the right word for it. It looks very luxurious with a sea on the grounds and Sirius even points out that there is a whole quidditch pitch in the back. Once inside it still looks rather luxurious even if a little empty but clean. "I take it they have house elves still living here?"
"Sure." Sirius replies.
Harry just sighs for a moment and then says, "Would one of the elves please come and meet me." A nearly soundless crack later a little elf is in front of Harry and bows. "I would like you to make sure that there are plenty of elf sized clothes with the Potter crest on it and that you all can borrow." Harry orders, "I want my elves to look appropriate for a Potter elf even if I did change my name which by the way is Slytherin."
"Master will give us clothing?" The elf questions confused.
"No," Harry clarifies, "I'll borrow you clothing. It will still be mine but I want you to use it so you won't embarrasses me."
"We thank you for the honor." The little elf squeaks and bows even deeper, "What else can we do for master?"
"Keep the house as well as you did so far. I'm currently living at Hogwarts since I teach there but let me know if you need anything to keep the house." Harry orders. "And if you can prepare some snacks and drinks for us in about an hour in the garden."
After that Sirius shows him around and all the rooms including James' room and his own since he lived there for some years after running from his parents. Harry likes the place and the stories Sirius tells him about what he and James used to do while here and all the pranks they played on Harry's Grandparents.
The walk through a hallway on their way to the garden when a voice from the wall asks "Don't tell me you finally have a steady lover?" Harry looks towards the man in the portrait looked a bit like James Potter, Harry's father but not close enough to actually make Harry mistake the man for his father.
"No sir." Sirius grins, "He is actually my godson who has a very interesting life story so far considering that he spent ten years in the past."
"I didn't know you had a god son that is so old already." The man wonders and eyes him a little suspicious before asking, "How much time did go by here while he was in the past."
"None sir." Harry replies, "On the contrary I clearly remember hearing me before I left and seeing my younger self after returning."
"You're..." The man's eyes widen. "You're not by chance Harry James Potter are you?"
"I am. But I married in the past and I'm called Harry James Slytherin now." Harry replies already assuming that the man is a paternal ancestor.
"Slytherin?" The man questions worriedly.
"It's more then okay." Sirius replies, "Harry is cool and so is Salazar even though I only know him from a portrait Harry managed to find. He's nothing like we thought. None of the founders are."
"If you say so." The man replies, "Hadn't assumed anything else from my gorgeous grandson then to be cool as you put it Sirius."
Harry smiles a little and then sighs, "I take it your my fathers father then?"
"Correct." The man replies, "I'm glad to see you so well and James will be too he was worried about you."
Harry stares at the man for a moment before realizing what he must mean. "There is a portrait of his around?"
"Him and his wife Lily." The man in the portrait replies, "How about I gather the lot and we meet in the tee room to talk a little and you can tell us everything about your life and how on earth you became a Slytherin. I thought the line died out long before my time."
"Oh that will be a long confusing talk." Harry replies before summoning a house elf and rearrange the drinks and snacks to the tee room.
A few hours latter Harry is glad to have gone on this trip and found out that Sirius hadn't known about the portraits being made just in case something would happen to them and Harry would be fine. They wanted to have some way to be a part of his life. It still takes about ten years before a portrait starts to talk after the person dies but since that time has already past Harry can talk to them now and tell them everything. He leaves out most about his childhood apart from being raised by Petunia and Vernon which causes both of his parents some worry but he promised that it was okay and never goes into any details. Lily is still mad with Sirius that revenge was more important to him then protecting Harry but Harry insistently tells her that he is fine and just glad that Wormtail got his dues.
The part with Voldemort being their own descendant caused some confusion but in the end they are all just glad that the man is healed and doesn't cause any further mayhem. And they all seem very proud of Harry's accomplishments and Harry and his grandfather Fleamont talk about potions for a while after finding out that the man had invented Sleekeazy's Hair Potion. James seems more interested about the defense abilities and the fact that he got a sword from Merlin himself and is his son-in-law. Lily though likes the talk about potions while Euphemia liked to take are of plants and supported husband by growing his ingredients at least those that are plants. Thus Harry had plenty to talk to all of them even after he was done with his own rather confusing past. They did talk about him wearing a sword and he also mentioned about the lessons he had but never once drew it or told them why he cherished it so much apart from it having some useful little features.
Harry stayed all day and promised to visit on occasion and possibly move their portraits to Hogwarts or latest to wherever he decided to live in the future should he ever leave the castle.
For the rest of the summer break Harry also could relax a little more now that the Longbottoms are healed and the Lestranges are as well. He had taught some more medi wizards and mind healers about the testing he did and they can now check the other prisoners to make sure no other one suffers any long term damage from Slughorn's experiments with mind enhancing potions.
Harry even manages to pick out the books he wants to use for his classes on time for Dumbledore to send the list out two weeks before the summer ends and Harry goes to the Weasleys to join them as planned. He truly enjoys his time with Ron and Hermione who is there as well and meets Charlie for the first time who is only a little younger then him now and they get along very well too and Harry is glad about it since occasionally he does find Ron acting rather childish and has a hard time not to show it too much since he remembers being the same at the age and doesn't want to lose his first friend just due to the age difference. Hermione is more mature and Harry does find it easier to still get along well with her and is glad about it but she too is still young. Much younger the him since there are ten years between them now.
It still is very nice to be with them all and is tempted to accept when Molly once again offers for Harry to stay but decides to leave because he intends to prepare for his classes and finish planting his green house and also wants to talk with Rolanda about the new brooms for the school and get at least some for her.
The last week of summer passes quickly and Harry is nervous when the students return and for the first time in this time he sits at the head table in the great hall. The amount of students is much bigger then it was in the past and he is more nervous then he was the first time around in the past. He assumes that it is partly because he'll have to teach his former class mates among others. It will be weird to teach Ron, Hermione, Dean, Seamus and Neville but even to teach Ginny, who used to be just a year younger and whom he knows rather well privately, now too will be more then a little strange. He does hope that being a friend will save him from the worst of the Weasley twin's pranks though.
Authors Note: Harry finally managed to talk to his cousin and it seems like Dudley is more interested in the magical world but will that be enough to change him? And what will happen when he starts to teach?