There was a loud crash; Ginny had dropped the teapot into the bottom of the sink. She was the only one that didn't seem to notice; she stared over her shoulder at Ron, eyes whizzing between him and Harry.

'Ted,' she said lightly, 'please help Lily de-gnome the garden.'

Teddy frowned. Harry knew it wasn't because he was work-shy, but rather because he, too, could feel the atmosphere drop several degrees. 'Um … it's quite late? And Lily was moaning about how she had to do it last week …'

'I think they've made a burrow. Behind the shed.' Ginny didn't glance at him and instead stared at Ron who was fidgeting by squeezing a corner of the Map neurotically.

Teddy looked around the room at the adults, who were, all staring either at each other or him. 'Right,' he said, 'I'll—uh—find her then?'

'She's by the trees,' Ron said unnecessarily as Teddy walked slowly out of the room towards the kitchen door. Ginny sent Ron a sharp look which was not lost on Teddy; he looked at Harry for answers and it took most of Harry's energy to smile back. It felt tight and wafer-thin.

All three of them watched Teddy's progress to the bottom of the garden. Then Ginny turned, blocking half of the dusky window-light.

'Sirius? Dumbledore?'

'The Map!' Exploded Ron. 'The Map showed Dumbledore—didn't it! Harry?' He nodded.

'You're basing this off the Map? A—what—fifty-odd year old teenagers' map?' Ginny asked archly, 'thank Merlin I got Teddy to leave, imagine if he heard where you're going with this!'

Ron mumbled something about how he hadn't thought she could hear their earlier conversation, much less pick up on the subtext. She snapped back at him waspishly: 'Don't be an idiot, Ron, you're as subtle as a House-elf.'

'Ginny,' Harry said lowly, 'I spoke to Dumbledore.'

'You spoke to Dumbledore.'

'With McGonagall.'

'McGonagall?'

'Are you just going to repeat everything?' Ron asked, bruised. Ginny rolled her eyes and sat back down. Harry continued.

'The Map's never lied before, Ginny. And he told me Snape's Patronus.'

Both brother and sister turned to stare at him with identical expressions of shock. Harry thought a shadow briefly passed over Ron's face.

'Blimey,' Ron breathed. 'It's real … you don't think—'

Harry knew exactly what Ron was thinking, about Teddy's parents and Fred and all the rest.

'Ron,' Ginny cut him off. 'Just don't.'

Harry looked at her properly. She was far away, eyes looking into the middle distance of the kitchen table.

'Where's Hermione?' Ron asked suddenly, looking about him as if his wife was about to emerge from under the sink or climb out from a cupboard.

'She's looking into a way to know for sure,' Harry said, and Ron looked aghast.

'She knows!'

'I only told her this morning—'

'Does Hugo know?'

'No Ron, Harry did not tell his ten year old nephew about Albus Dumbledore coming back from the dead.' Ginny snapped. 'Do you always have to be this thick?'

'Lay off it Ginny, I—'

The only person Ron bickered with more than Hermione was Ginny. They knew exactly which way to annoy the other best, and typically enjoyed nothing more than proving they were better at something than the other. Harry supposed it was something to do with being the babies of the family. He had been trying hard to stop Lily continuing the tradition by assaulting James and Al whenever they irritated her, mostly because she would likely knock them unconscious before they knew what was happening. Whenever he saw Ginny reading the paper and ignoring them as they swatted at each other, she simply explained that he didn't understand siblings, and they simply had to get it out of their systems.

'What if Voldemort comes back?' Harry said suddenly. In unison they looked out of the window to check Teddy and Lily weren't within earshot.

Ron looked the most uneasy. 'I don't think he could … I don't think he's human enough. Was human enough.'

'But he did it once,' Harry said, feeling desperation pool within him.

'Harry,' Ginny said, reaching for his hand gently. 'That's because he latched onto you. Besides, you got rid of—all of them.'

'What if there was more?'

'Don't be stupid,' Ron said firmly. 'If Dumbledore said that was all of them, then that was all of them. And your scar hasn't hurt in years.'

Harry thought about meeting with Dumbledore earlier on, about the serenity around him. His confidence in his guessing. He thought, for once, that the worst-case scenario might be impossible.

'Still.' Harry said, clawing at everything that could go wrong, trying to ignore how tired he was, 'there's the Death Eaters.'

Ron and Ginny exchanged a look. 'If you're talking about the likes of the Carrows, I reckon if anybody could handle them it's the Head Auror.' Ginny said. 'They're nothing without Voldemort, Harry. And they were around when we were kids and barely affected us at all, when everyone thought he was dead then.'

'I don't think they'll come back,' Ron said. 'That lot are a bunch of pillocks, they'd never manage it. They'd get lost on the way.'

They all laughed and Ron grinned, satisfied. Harry rubbed the hand Ginny had been holding through his hair – he felt his wedding ring, cool against his scar.

'Before they come back,' Ginny said, gesturing to the door, 'Do you think there might be others?'

The mood dropped into solemnity. 'Well, at the rate they're coming …' Ron said ominously.

'We have to prove they're real,' Harry said. 'No point talking about them like they're … them, if everyone will think we've gone mad if we try to tell them.'

They all paused. 'Hermione best hurry up, don't like the idea of Goyle senior up and strutting about.' He shrugged and shook his head. Ginny looked over at him in disbelief, as did Harry.

'Better not let Hermione hear you say that,' said Harry, looking at Ron in amazement. He turned to Ginny. 'How many years have they been together? And he still questions silly things like Hermione knowing her way round an archive.'

'I wonder who you'll live with after the divorce,' Ginny said, looking thoughtful. 'Better food at Hermione's, but you'd get away with a lot more at his.'

'I think I'd like to be shipped off to the grandparents', actually,' Harry replied idly. Ron scowled.

'You're both hilarious, you know that?' He said. Ginny picked up the tea pot and began the process of refilling it at the sink.

'Teddy and Lily are coming back now,' she told them both, looking over the sink into the garden. 'Good thing, it's getting quite dark out. Ron—don't mention a thing.'

'Why're you looking at me!' Ron demanded. 'Harry's the one that's telling everyone about it in the first place!'

'What's dad telling everyone?' Lily asked, stepping through the threshold. She and Teddy had red faces and even redder noses; the wind must have risen in the meantime. Harry saw Teddy's eyes narrow as he looked between them all.

'He won't shut up about his Horntail tattoo,' said Ron promptly.

'Staying for dinner, Ted?' Harry asked as Lily wrinkled her nose in disgust and Teddy shrugged off his jacket in the new heat of the kitchen. Looking contemplative, he folded it slowly and pressed it into the back of a dining chair.

'Depends on what it is,' he said solemnly with a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. Lily was already arguing with her uncle about the existence of her father's tattoos.

Before Harry could think of any ideas, Ginny cut in. 'Mum dropped round a pork loin,'

'I'll have a bit of that, yeah,' Teddy said eagerly. Harry grinned, anxieties forgotten as he turned to look at Ron who had gotten up as they were speaking and was looking hungrily at the brown paper bag on the countertop.

'Wonder when Hermione'll be home,' Harry said for the sole purpose of seeing Ron's face drop as he remembered he couldn't stay for dinner.

'When can Hugo come over?' Lily asked Ron, distracting him. 'I've got to show him my new Chocolate Frog cards.'

'He's ill at the moment,' Ron said. 'But probably day after next, definitely at your nan's for Sunday lunch.'

'Yes, very ill,' said Harry drily. Ron shot him a look.

'You have no idea what George pulled today, honestly—'

And they descended into the quiet chaos of family dinner, even if it was without some of the family. Ron absconded into the green flames of the floo before long, and clutched Harry's arm tight before he left. He was sombre and stared so intensely that Harry had to look away.

'It'll be all right mate, really. I'll clue Hermione in, don't worry about that. Don't think about all the bad bits, think about what's happening now for once. Sirius and Dumbledore!' He laughed in disbelief. 'Everything will sort itself out, it always does. Just go and talk to your Godfather. Tell Teddy soon, too, I reckon Sirius will have some good stories about Remus and Tonks. Just enjoy it, you deserve some good weird stuff for once.'

'Thanks,' was all Harry could say, choked and thankful, guilty that he had been keeping Sirius to himself when the man was a veritable bank of information for Teddy, too.

Ron patted him on the shoulder, drew him into a one-armed hug, and left. Harry didn't mention anything to Teddy and instead debated it all with a thoughtful Ginny well into the night.

Harry woke very early in the morning, on purpose. He wanted a quiet few hours at work before everyone from his department and others came in. Ginny woke with him; she made the tea and toast while Harry completed last night's washing up with his anxious, restless hands.

The clock ticked into the silence as they both picked at their bread. 'You'll let me know how it goes, won't you?' Ginny asked, tapping her wedding ring against the porcelain mug. Harry nodded. 'I wish I could be there.'

'I know,' Harry said, 'I wish you could see them both. All of them. But—'

'Don't worry, I know why.' She sighed and looked down. Her hair was knotted and she had bags under her eyes; Harry knew she was almost as affected as he was. And she couldn't even do anything in the way he could. He reached out and took her hand.

'It'll be all right.'

'I know,' she said, smiling. 'It always is, in the end.'

Harry arrived at the Ministry with little sleep but a fair amount of determination. His wand was still too long and had grown even more, this time—he vowed to ask Dumbledore about it when everything had calmed down a little—and as he stared at his reflection in the polished walls of the lift he steeled himself.

It was Amber Fogs and Roan Williamson on the night shift, just at the tail end of it and looking rather worse for wear. Amber didn't insist on staying for the remainder for even a moment and looked very relieved—Roan, meanwhile, narrowed his eyes suspiciously at the charity.

'Why are you in so early?' He asked, though he was gathering his belongings as he spoke. Harry shrugged and tried to look nonchalant, which was hard when he was still half-asleep and also incredibly stressed about most everything. 'Lots of paperwork for the fakes, you know' he murmured. They simultaneously glanced at the time, and Harry knew Williamson didn't buy it for a second.

Nevertheless, he seemed to decide it was not worth the fuss. He had more than three hours knocked off his shift after all, though he did insist Harry call him back in if there was any trouble and not to be 'so proud you end up handling it yourself and get maimed for life'.

Faced with the small corridor that led off, one by one, to the cells that kept their occupants locked up, Harry panicked. Instead of going into Sirius', his feet took him to Dumbledore's with barely a second thought.

Somehow, the old man was wide awake and happily writing on a piece of parchment. He glanced up immediately when Harry entered, and seemed quite overjoyed.

'Harry! Lovely.' The parchment was full of runes, cluttered and miniscule but neat, with what looked to Harry like random lines between paragraphs that spiralled around the page.

Conjuring a chair (not even close to the brilliantly comfortable armchairs Dumbledore managed, but merely a small step up from a rather pathetic three-legged stool) Harry sat down opposite him. 'Everything been all right, Professor? Treating you well?'

'I have not been your Professor for a number of years, Harry,' Dumbledore said, amused. 'But yes, the Aurors have been nothing but courteous. A credit to you, I am sure; I certainly would not expect the same treatment in Alastor's days here.'

'He was something of a renegade, wasn't he?' Harry grinned back. Dumbledore chuckled and agreed.

'May I ask what brings you here, Harry?' He enquired once their smiles died.

'I—' Harry's throat closed up. The old headmaster simply waited carefully, looking generously around the room which would have fooled anyone had the walls not been utterly plain and uninspiring. 'It's Sirius … I've got to see him. I'm going to see him now.'

'Ah,' he nodded. 'A difficult conversation, for sure.'

'What could I say to him?' Harry pleaded, 'how do I explain something like this to him?'

Dumbledore looked thoughtful. He stroked the end of his beard with soft, rhythmic strokes that were somehow in time with Harry's heartbeat. 'Sirius Black is a very intelligent man,' he began, 'and he has already seen you as you are now. You might have aged, Harry, but you look remarkably unchanged, too. I have no doubt he recognised you almost immediately. He has had nothing to do but think and dwell for many hours now … I would be surprised if he has not thought of an explanation very close to the truth already. If amongst other theories, of course.'

'That he died and came back?' Harry asked sceptically. Dumbledore shook his head.

'I would hazard he believes he has accidentally travelled through time, or something similar. The Veil of Death is largely unresearched. It seems a valid conclusion to come to. I assume he was found near there?'

'Percy and Kingsley found him wandering around the Ministry.' Harry said. 'So I think so.'

'On that matter, Harry,' Dumbledore twirled his thumbs around each other, 'may I ask who else…?'

'One of the Prewett brothers, Fabian … Marlene McKinnon, Sirius, Scrimgeour …'

'Scrimgeour!' He repeated. 'I had hoped he would survive. You shall have to fill me in, as they say, on the events after my death. How interesting, that Miss McKinnon and Mr Prewett have also returned …'

'About that,' Harry hurried, 'why? You acted as if you thought this might happen, by your, uh, grave.'

'I would rather not burden you with this now, before you reunite with Sirius,' Dumbledore said quietly. Harry felt a surge of annoyance which the other man appeared to sense. 'I do not think it is anything bad, Harry. Certainly, I doubt very much that even Lord Voldemort will reappear. Let that reassure you. What is happening is new and unprecedented, but I do not think you should fear too much for the present. It is merely a great personal load and perhaps requires a long conversation with time you can little afford at this moment. And I would rather like some more time to organise my thoughts on the matter, I must say.'

'You said something about the Hallows. About the Master of Death.'

'Yes.'

'You think they have something to do with it. And it all has something to do with me.'

'Yes.'

Frustrated, Harry stood. He bemoaned the vagueness, hated the uncertainty. He felt bitter that it was, again, him. But Sirius was in the next room, who was one of the very few people in his childhood that didn't care about everything surrounding Harry so much as he cared about Harry himself. And, in his adulthood, after years of living without the shadow of Voldemort and general immortality, Harry was not going to push aside those in his life like Sirius to their complete detriment in order to pursue vague concepts. Harry let the Hallows go—for the moment, while he still could.

'I'm going to talk to Sirius,' he told Dumbledore unnecessarily. He nodded.

'Good luck. Though I doubt you will need it.'

'Thanks,' Harry said weakly.

Sirius and Dumbledore shared a cell wall. Harry needed to take only a few steps to be outside the door he wanted. He couldn't help himself—he stared at it until his eyes started to blur, and then he blinked repeatedly when he saw colours swirling in and out of focus. He shook his head, and raised a trembling hand to the door-handle.

When he entered, Sirius jumped. He had been lounging on the cot in the dim light of the wall-light. Harry was unsure if he had been sleeping, but Sirius was certainly awake now he had walked in. The lights flared when they sensed someone crossing the threshold, and both faces were thrown into sharp relief.

Sirius was pale and tired. His borrowed robes hung off him. Harry was quite shocked at how thin he was … it could not have been from his time in this cell, but from his captivity in Grimmauld Place. Harry had never realised, before. Never noticed.

Too tense to sit and therefore not bothering to conjure another chair like the one he had abandoned in Dumbledore's cell, Harry leaned against the wall and crossed his arms against his chest for something to do. Sirius eyed him warily, pressing himself into the corner. Harry's throat closed up.

Neither said a thing for a minute or so. They stared at each other; Harry in disbelief and Sirius inscrutably back.

'Sirius,' Harry croaked. His Godfather's eyes widened. 'It's me.'

'Harry?' He asked, hands kneading at the mattress he sat on. 'It can't be … you're fifteen. He's fifteen.'

Sirius looked impossibly lost. Harry had never seen him so uncomposed and it felt too wrong, too unsettling. He wanted arrogance and ease and even that too-familiar bitterness he had let take him over so often before.

'You died,' Harry's eyes stung in the corners and his voice was smaller than it had been in years. 'You fell through the Veil, and you died.'

'The Veil …' Sirius was staring hard at him. Harry looked away. 'Where did they go? Malfoy and Bellatrix? The rest?'

'The Prophecy smashed. Voldemort came. Everyone saw.'

'They know? They believe he's back? But you're—is he still—?' Fear and worry passed over Sirius' face like a cloud. Harry saw, easily, that he was gripped with the relief of the truth finally being shown together with the fear of the open warfare it entailed.

'No. He's gone. Properly, this time.' More than he cared to admit, Harry struggled with the overwhelmed look of confused jubilation that crossed through Sirius's eyes. He was somewhat bewildered at the trust Sirius was showing in him.

'Harry—' Sirius believed him, must believe him and what he was saying, as he was saying his name too and Harry got the privilege of hearing it spoken from his Godfather for the first time in years and years, '—I—I always knew, well done, I can't tell you—' he pressed his hands to his face and breathed deeply. Harry watched on.

Sirius spoke through his hands, voice muffled and weak. 'How long has it been, since … whatever it was happened to me—died!—you look—you're—'

Harry took a long, deep breath to compose himself. 'Twenty years,' his voice was embarrassingly an octave higher, but he couldn't make himself care.

He looked at Harry in disbelief, hands falling to his sides. 'Morgana,' he breathed, 'you must be my age!'

Harry nodded and they both stared at the other. Two men, of an age, but still somehow only Godfather and teenager when they looked at each other. Against all odds, the ridiculousness of the scene burst through Harry's thoughts. Startlingly, he grinned, and Sirius smiled weakly in return; Harry's hands dropped to his sides too.

Sirius shook his head in disbelief, eyes fixed on Harry's face, a glassiness developing in them that Harry couldn't look away from. With a jolt he hadn't been expecting, Sirius laughed, struck by their situation too. It was the bark Harry had not heard for so many years, that he had not heard nearly enough in the holidays he had spent in Grimmauld Place or in the cold Hogsmeade visits to the cave.

'Sirius,' he said, but couldn't say more. He stepped over towards the cot Sirius was still seated on at the same time his Godfather swiftly rose to meet him. They were now, bizarrely, of a similar height as well as age, and when Sirius clasped Harry's shoulders as he had done so many years before, he no longer needed to hunch his shoulders to be eye-to-eye.

'You did it,' Sirius said quietly, 'everything that happened, and you still did it,' he raised his eyes to look at the ceiling for a moment. Harry had never stood so still in his life. 'Harry, I—' he seemed overcome with some emotion— 'your dad would—I am—I'm so proud.'

Harry felt an involuntary, watery smile rise on his lips. He didn't trust himself to speak, and instead drew Sirius into a hug. Both heads rested on the others' shoulder.

AN: I hope the reunion lived up to your expectations:)