The Ravenclaws had been as attentive as Harry could hope for; they listened and accepted and asked the kind of questions that made sense. Professor Jigger was obviously very pleased, even if the man struggled to tear his eyes away from Harry for more than a few seconds. Jigger was something of a cross between Dobby and human in Harry's eyes; mostly it was because he had protruding eyes that held the gleam of faint, admiring insanity. It was disconcerting, as the man was at least thirty or forty years older than Harry. McGonagall frequently apologised to Harry via the medium of disgruntled glances.

Jigger was not eager to peel himself away from Harry and McGonagall as they walked to Gryffindor tower. He kept asking questions about obscure Defence Against the Dark Arts that Harry hadn't the slightest clue about and seemed to work in hypotheticals the way most academics did. Endless shrugging on Harry's part did nothing to dissuade him, and he insisted in accompanying them both to Gryffindor because their Head of House, Professor Sinistra, was away caring for her sister with Spattergroit.

Before long, the Fat Lady loomed into view. She was examining a sliver goblet and muttering to herself before noticing them all and straightening up to attention like a soldier.

'Headmistress! And – my, Mr Potter! Why, I allowed your boy in not thirty minutes ago! With his horrible little blonde cousin—'

'Ah, Louis,' Harry said, 'you're still not over the Walking Whiz-bangs, then?'

'I should hope not!' McGonagall cut in sharply, glaring at Harry's smirk. 'Mr Weasley could have seriously damaged and ancient piece of school property!'

Feeling chastened, Harry turned away and looked aimlessly at the surrounding portraits while McGonagall assuaged the portrait who was hissing 'Property?!'

'Mr Potter – if you could – what is your opinion on the use of non-offensive spells in duelling scenarios? Do you incorporate it into the Auror programme at all? I have been advising my NEWT level students that—'

'If I may answer your question on Mr Potter's behalf, Professor, he does indeed have experience on that front.' McGonagall said stiffly. Both she and Harry were thinking about the troll. 'Now. Please, Theseus, I must ask that you save your questions for later on – perhaps a letter?'

Harry glanced between them both, one with eager eyes and one with a smirk. 'That would be fine, yeah,' he said weakly. Jigger almost vibrated with happiness.

McGonagall turned and gave the password – Pygmalion – to the Fat Lady, who was grumpily organising the trellis that projected over her head. All three murmured awkward thank you's as one by one they clambered through the portrait hole.

If Harry had entered the common room as it usually was, he might have paused and allowed the memories to wash over him. He might have drowned in them; Ron and Hermione, the twins, late night conversations with Ginny by the fire and even the heaviness of after the Battle where it was the only place that felt safe. But he did not enter it at it's usual. Every Gryffindor was crammed into the space to form a jostling mass, as if they had just won the Quidditch Cup. The noise of too many teenagers easily reached a crescendo and stayed there, being maintained by shouting, laughing, screaming and intermittent bangs. Harry felt completely, entirely at home.

'Dad!' Came a small voice from his left. It was Albus. He looked like he wanted to lunge at Harry, but clearly thought better of it by the way he glanced over his shoulder and saw a few of his friends staring. They were so focused on Harry's forehead he doubted they would notice Al hugging his own father, but Harry restrained himself too and allowed his son to keep whatever odd sense of propriety he held.

'How are you?' Harry asked warmly, resting his hand on Al's shoulder. Al grinned and glanced back at his friends again.

'Simon's bought this amazing Muggle trick from home, and he said he'd trade with me for a couple of fake wands—'

'Uncle Harry!' This was Rose. She had no qualms about bundling into Harry's middle, though Harry found it a little hard to breathe and decided she was spending too much time with her Grandmother. Far over her head were more of her cousins smiling easily, Fred and Molly, two of the most laid back people Harry had ever met which he thought was a particularly fortunate trait in both of them. It helped them become their own people, for one, and meant they didn't mind whether people occasionally got a little misty-eyed around them either.

Casting his eyes around, Harry spotted more Weasleys; there was Victoire, lounging by the fire with some girls, trying to look cooler by pretending to ignore him; Dominique with her, giving Harry a little wave; Roxanne wrestling with a chocolate frog in the corner; Lucy giggling with two boys and a girl over a magazine they had spread between them; Louis getting very close with a girl with long, sleek black hair by the record player. James, however, was nowhere to be seen.

'Rose, Al – where's James? Have you seen him?' They both looked confused.

'I just saw him come down from the dormitories as you came in,' said Molly as she shrugged. 'He's in here somewhere.'

'Right,' Harry said, feeling on edge. He kept looking in and amongst the crowd, trying to find a head of black hair. He thought he saw a flash of it, but then a Fanged Frisbee whistled past the spot it had been in, and it vanished.

McGonagall, who had been giving a young girl a severe telling-off about the state of her school-tie, straightened up with an angry glint in her eye and pressed her wand to her throat.

'THIS IS HOW YOU WOULD REPRESENT YOUR HOUSE?' Came the bellow; silence seeming to press louder than even her shout after it. McGonagall let her wand arm drop as she surveyed the children coolly. Even Louis was staring at her in shock, the girl next to him turning dark red.

'I was not aware how difficult you would find it, to be locked in your own common room together for less than an hour,' she carried on at normal volume, 'but if you continue representing this school as such I will ensure no Gryffindors are allowed out of the Tower until I see fit.'

'You can't – but – what about lessons?' Said a brave boy with sandy hair. By the look on his face he immediately regretted it.

'Let us not think of what will surely not happen, Mr Finch-Fletchley.' McGonagall said sternly. The boy took an involuntary step backwards, and was patted comfortingly on the back by his mortified looking friend.

Withering and abashed, the children's eyes flickered back and forth between their headmistress and Harry. He could see some of them surreptitiously nudging friends and gesturing with their eyes and nodding their to him. Further still, some looked between Harry and Albus with realisation creeping across their faces.

'We have an Auror here, Mr Potter, to inform you of the safety precautions you will all have to adhere to for the time being. I trust you will listen to him very carefully, and do everything he asks of you.' It sounded more like a warning than McGonagall putting actual faith in the students before her, though Harry doubted they needed any warning at all with her as headmistress.

McGonagall looked at Harry and stepped backwards when he stepped forwards, away from Albus and his small collection of cousins.

'Thank you for gathering here on such short notice,' Harry began, looking for James still as he repeated what he'd said to the Ravenclaws. 'The Department have had a series of small incidents recently relating to the war. I'm sure I don't need to go into how that involves the castle for you all.

'I am here today to make sure every one of you is vigilant when you go to and from your lessons. You must stay in groups of three or more at all times, and if you see any person who is not in uniform that you don't know, you and your friends must find a teacher and let them know immediately. Even if you're not certain, and they seem nice-looking enough, tell the nearest professor straight away. It's far better to be safe than sorry.'

He felt responsible, and guilty, for their scared faces. Not one of them had known anything like war, and to them it might just as well have been a ghost story like the Tale of the Three Brothers. He hated to bring the war into their lives when they were so young: Victoire and the seventh years, the same age as he had been when walking to his death. Molly, Fred – his age when Lord Voldemort had returned to flesh. But, Harry carried on anyway, as all adults must.

'Even worse than someone you don't know, you might think you recognise them. They might look like someone you knew, or your parents knew. I will make it very clear, now, that they are not who you think they are.

'Most important of all, don't point your wand at them. They'll only think you're trying to duel. Keep ready in case you have to defend yourself, but your first option is always to get away as fast as you can. They might try to talk to you, and they might seem normal and a little confused. Ignore them. Run, and find a teacher.'

Harry felt the pressing eyes from all angles, and felt exhausted by it in a way he so rarely did anymore.

'Hogwarts has remained a fortress for many years, and will continue to be so long after we are all gone,' McGonagall said slowly, 'but your safety is the school's priority, and as such, we must keep you, as they say, in the know. Now. Questions?'

Nothing, and then – 'When do we have to be back here in evenings, please, Professor?'

McGonagall smiled at the girl. 'Six o'clock every evening, Miss Cattermole – weekends included.'

The magic of silence was broken before she had even finished speaking. Loud groans filled the room, and angry complaints to classmates began to swell to a frenzy. Jigger, Harry saw, shook his head good-naturedly while McGonagall rolled her eyes. Albus ignored his father in favour of turning to shout about Quidditch to Rose and his friends. Louis stood abruptly, abandoning the put-out girl behind him, and was making his way towards Harry to take it up with him personally; he remembered that Louis was a Chaser on the team and James had gushed in his recent letter about an upcoming match against Slytherin.

Speaking of … as McGonagall fielded more questions from unhappy students, and Jigger shrugged at more of them directed at him, Harry looked more closely for James, hoping to spot him in the fray. The children became more and more rowdy, the party atmosphere returning somewhat as some of the braver upper years edged their way towards Harry to ask some questions, or perhaps ask him for an autograph …

There, above Victorie's head, was a disembodied hand thrown into relief by the fire behind it. Harry immediately knew where James had been – right in the same room the entire time.

'JAMES!' He shouted, with no luck – the powder he had been pinching between his thumb and forefinger fell directly onto Victoire's scalp, and the second later she jumped up, screaming – her hair was a bright canary yellow she was ripping endless feathers out of her hair.

James looked incredibly proud of himself as the Cloak pooled to the floor around him. He grinned from ear to ear, shouting over Victoire's shrieks – 'Now whose hair looks like a bird's nest!'

Albus looked horrified next to Harry, him too shouting over the noise: 'I didn't give it to him dad, the Cloak – I didn't, it was under my bed!' while Roxanne marched over to James and grabbed the packet the powder had been in.

Mortified, Harry could barely look at McGonagall. He began clambering over outstretched legs and armchairs to get to James, making sure he scowled appropriately when his son saw him coming. Harry felt very satisfied indeed when the smile slid from James' face.

'Of all the times—' Harry hissed, snatching the Cloak from the floor and shoving it backwards where Al had trotted over to see the universal entertainment of a sibling get told off in front of a room of peers.

'She wouldn't stop going on about my hair!' James protested, pointing to his cousin. One of her friends was trying to help remove the feathers coming out of her ears, but it only seemed to encourage the enchantment further.

'Finite,' Harry tapped his wand atop Victoire's head – this made the feathers flash different colours of the rainbow, and double in size. 'Does it hurt?' He asked her quickly. She shook her head and then tried to lunge at and hit James through teary eyes, missing when he dodged artfully away.

'Right, okay, Roxanne, find the antidote – James, Merlin, I can't believe you—' Harry had grabbed his upper arm and was beginning to cart him over to Professor McGonagall and Professor Jigger. He became distracted, however, when a crumpled piece of old parchment fell between them; James had clearly stashed it hurriedly under his cloak by his armpit.

Harry reached down and picked up the Marauder's Map. It was still activated. He saw the cluster of dots in the Gryffindor common room that James must have been using to navigate and found himself there, too.

A sudden, paralysing thought rushed through him. The Map never lies. Remus Lupin's voice echoed through his head even though Harry wasn't quite sure he remembered what the man sounded like. Even in rat form, Pettigrew had been there. It had shown Sirius as Padfoot, and it had shown through Polyjuice Potion before. Harry couldn't recall a time the Map had been wrong. He was appalled he had forgotten all about it. He wished for a Map of the Ministry then, wished he had bothered to ask Sirius or Remus just how they had created it. He would have no need for investigation if he had a Map like this of Britain, surely …

And then he thought of why he was in Hogwarts, and what he was warning the students about. He remembered at least he had this, and it was more than he could ask for really, more than he had thought of so far – there was no room on any of the tables within Harry's eyeline, barely any legroom either. So, he got James to turn around and rested the Map on his back, ignoring his complaints, and began unfolding it and scouring it.

Rosier, Rookwood, Lestrange, Carrow, Dolohov … Harry's head was full of any Death Eater name he could think of, mixed in with the names of people he might have wronged in the last decade, which was more than a few. He saw Winnie and Rupert making their way to the Tower first, then he looked in the forgotten halls, up by Trelawney, down by the Potions rooms, where Sir Cadogan's portrait was … the greenhouses were empty, and he could see Madam Rafflesia making her way towards them, taking a small footpath Harry had never used himself that overlooked the Black Lake …

And there, nestled comfortably against the Lake's border, was a small pinprick of writing that ignored the importance of what it spelt. It was a tiny Albus Dumbledore.

Harry looked up immediately, finding the eyes of McGonagall. She knew what the Map was, by now, but had never seen it. Harry knew she was aware one of his sons had it even if he nor Ginny had expressly said, but also knew she would never take it away from them unless they were stupid enough to get caught red-handed.

Harry stumbled back over to her and shoved the Map into her hands. She looked down, and gasped, 'Potter – surely not,' without a hint of conviction. There was a strained pause.

'Ten points from Gryffindor, Mr Potter. And, Theseus,' she said absently, 'please stay and answer any questions the students might have.'

Jigger looked horrified. 'But – I don't—'

'My Aurors will be here to help soon, just let them in,' Harry said hurriedly, following McGonagall out of the portrait hole.

'You can't think – Dumbledore—' she gasped as they took a steep passage behind a tapestry to avoid the delay of explaining to Winnie and Rupert who were rounding a corner nearby.

'Professor!' Harry exclaimed, forgetting he was in his thirties, 'The Map never lies!'

'But Albus Dumbledore—' she repeated, and kept doing so in varying levels of disbelief until they reached the shores of the Black Lake.

Harry was vaguely aware of McGonagall standing behind him, panting like he was, but as he stared at the marble tomb his mind cleared and he thought of nothing else. The rock glowed bright as it always did from afar, and it was no less blinding up close.

Unsure how to open it, Harry thought back to the table it had once been at the funeral so many years before. He thought of the glowing light that encased Dumbledore's corpse, and as he did, saw a line that looked like an ordinary vein in the marble draw its way vertically so that it split the tomb in half. It was barely noticeable amongst its brothers and sisters, but Harry knew better. He wondered if any amount of spell-work would open the tomb after it had been so desecrated by Lord Voldemort years before.

As if to answer, McGonagall patted Harry on the shoulder as she moved past him, staring at the tomb with glassy eyes.

'I laid these protections myself,' she said quietly, 'I will remove them.'

Harry remained as she moved further forward, robes rustling in the wind from the lake and toes planting against the base of the grave where it met the grass. There was reverence in the silence as those gathered strained to hear the muttered incantations. McGonagall's wand-tip was feather-light where it touched the cold stone.

Slowly, a blue mist rose from the grave and drifted into the air as if caught in an upward draught. It was the reverse of what had occurred at the funeral; the marble seemed to disintegrate before Harry's eyes with soft grace.

Before long, the silhouette of a body could be seen – feet, nose, clasped hands. Harry's body stiffened and he tried to prepare himself for what he would see. He was sure, to an extent, that they would not be faced with bones and rot, but a small part of him did not trust wizarding logic to remember this detail. Still, even a sleeping Dumbledore was more than he had seen of the man in years, and it would be abstract to have his vague memories made solid.

The colour of the robes came next, purple and starred to match the shroud Hagrid had carried him to this place in. Harry could barely stand to look, and yet could hardly glance away. The Map dropped uselessly to the floor next to him. McGonagall sniffed as she finished chanting, and then stepped back to stand at Harry's left. Her hand clasped his elbow tightly as the body of Albus Dumbledore was finally displayed.

Stillness settled and breath was caught in Harry's throat as he was suspended, helplessly, to watch from somewhere outside himself. His throat closed up all at once, and the silhouette, which had looked as immovable as the marble it lay on, was interrupted. The crooked nose turned away from profile, and the blue eyes looked over half-moon spectacles at Harry's.

'Excellent,' Dumbledore said, arms moving to his side. 'Truly excellent, my boy. You have outdone yourself.'

Dumbledore rose to a seated position and turned to face the eyes that stared at him. 'Minerva,' he said softly, a smile playing about his mouth. 'It is good to see you looking so well.'

McGonagall's breaths were heavy and short, her grip on Harry's elbow fierce but twitching. Harry stared at Dumbledore too, dumbfounded that reality seemed to be warping itself to fit his deepest desires.

A cry of song carried on the wind that Harry had not heard for nearly three decades. Tears welled in Dumbledore's eyes as he looked up to the heavens beyond Harry and McGonagall's heads.

'Fawkes,' he whispered, 'such a clever, dear bird. How fitting.'

AN: I felt bad for leaving you in the lurch yesterday. I hope you like this one - I'm nervous!

A note on all the Gryffindor Weasleys: I know, really, they wouldn't all be in the same house. The chances are too slim for that. But I also have hilarious visions of the Gryffindor Quidditch Team being made up entirely of Weasleys, and of things in a similar vein, so I went with my heart. (Not that the team is made up of only Weasleys here. But, you get my point.)

I also choose to ignore Cursed Child with every fibre of my being, so there's that, too. Nothing at all against Slytherins, though.