The much better, Dursley's can fuck off, Slytherins are people too AU

by Lindie de Waal

Collection of the The much better, Dursley's can fuck off, Slytherins are people too AU Collections books. Extremely long chapters as complete books are loaded as chapters. MATURE /SLASH Don't read if you don't like it. NOT my stories, credit goes to Alwayslily22 and Des98

2. prisoner of azkaban

The Prisoner of Azkaban and the Incompetence of the Wizarding Judicial System Posted originally on the Archive of Our Own at /works/13884705.

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Archive Warning: Graphic Depictions Of Violence Categories: F/F, F/M, M/M Fandom: Harry Potter - Fandom Relationships: Harry Potter/Draco Malfoy, Remus Lupin/Sirius Black, Narcissa Malfoy/OFC,

Pansy Parkinson/Millicent Bulstrode, Ron Weasley/Hermione Granger Characters: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, Pansy Parkinson, Blaise

Zabini, Ginny Weasley, Fred Weasley, George Weasely, Percy Weasley, Remus Lupin, Sirius Black, Moaning Myrtle, Peeves the Poltergeist, Draco Malfoy, Seamus Finnigan, Neville Longbottom, Severus Snape, Dean Thomas, Minerva McGonagall, Minister Fudge, Dementors - Character, Susan Bones, Hannah Abott, literally everyone

Additional Tags: Flashbacks, Abuse Flashbacks, Dementors, Mentions of past abuse, Minerva is angry as hell with the entire situation, and is probably gonna lose her shit with the dementors, Like, She gon go HAM, Don't Mess with Minnie

Language: English Series: Part 2 of The much better, Dursley's can fuck off, Slytherins are people too AU Collections: Harry Potter Fanfic Must Reads, Astra favs, The Overly Toasted Bagel

Collection, Amazing Epic Stories, If I could marry these fanfics I would, He was rapidly becoming obsessed with Draco Malfoy, For the Giggles, Completed but marked for later

Stats: Published: 2018-03-06 Completed: 2018-03-25 Words: 50,603 Chapters: /collections/Completedficstolookforwardto

The Prisoner of Azkaban and the Incompetence of the Wizarding Judicial System

by Des98

Summary

The next work in the series; Sirius Black has escaped Azkaban and the Golden Clusterfuck is just trying to stay out of trouble- or rather, they're trying to cause only the normal type of teenage mischief, but the wizarding world seems to have it out for them.

Notes

Hey guys! I wanted to start this yesterday, but that stomach bug I've been fighting flared up again. I'm still a little nauseous, but feeling some better. This work is going to be dedicated to BairnSidhe, who literally commented on EVERY chapter in my CoS fic./users/Des98/pseuds/Des98

Chapter 1

On July 29th, 1993, a small black kitten with a lightning bolt scar lay napping at the ankles of Professor Minerva McGonagall as she sat creating her lesson plans at the desk in her office. The tiny kitten, with its sharp feline senses, was aware of the owl that flew through the window to drop a letter on the professor's desk, but paid it no mind, dismissing it as banal. If the letter was for the kitten, the professor would have informed it by now. However, when Minerva began ranting in a long stream of Scots, the kitten looked up, scrunched its little face, and a moment later the small form of one Harry James Potter was crouched on the floor.

"M'na?" he asked his guardian, still half asleep. "Why're you cursing the old gods?" The boy had picked up enough Scots while living with Minerva in the past year to know that whatever was causing the tabby animagus to drop these particular phrases was downright infuriating.

"Oh, Harry darling, you're awake," Minerva startled, the wide look in her eyes much the same as the one Harry had worn the week before when the Minnie had found him with Myrtle planning a prank on Snape. Unlike that instance, however, when Minnie had merely smiled and joined in, Harry doubted this situation would end with Snape wearing red and gold hair and a general state of amusement.

"What's wrong, Min?" Harry asked his guardian, who ran a hand over her face and sighed.

"There's been a mistake with the stupid post," she growled. "I ordered your birthday presents, but I've received notice that they've been misdirected to Privet Drive."

Harry blanched. "That's okay- there's no need to go get them over there. I'll just go without, really…"

Minerva gave him her 'stern professor' look, the one she gave students who were interrupting class. "Nonsense. I will go collect them, and if you need anything while I'm gone, you can ask Severus."

"Ple... Please don't- don't go, Minnie. They can get really violent when something doesn't go their way." He rubbed his shoulder where one of his deeper scars rested, one Minnie was sure was from something even more harmful than a belt. Her heart gave a pang as she was reminded rather abruptly that Harry was still haunted, not only physically, but mentally as well by what the Dursleys had done to him.

Minnie crouched down until she was eye level with her child and gently pulled his hand away from his shoulder, where he'd escalated from rubbing the old scar to anxiously scratching a phantom itch. "Harry," she told him gently but firmly. "You were a young child who either didn't know about magic or was unable to use it. I'm a full-grown witch who is fully able and allowed to give them hell if they don't cooperate." She touched his cheek gently and softly guided his chin up until he was looking her in the eyes and could see the sincerity there. "I promise everything is going to be alright, okay?"

"Okay," he agreed in a shaky whisper, gripping her forearm tightly. "You won't be gone long, will you?" He'd started trembling, and Minerva took off the shawl he'd made her for

Christmas last year and wrapped it around him. "I'm gonna take you to Severus' office first; I don't think you should be alone right now."

Minnie took her little charge by the hand through the floo to the office through the back door of Professor Snape's classroom. Severus looked up, eyes widening slightly in surprise before hardening as Minnie explained the situation to him. He leant down to talk to Harry, and if any of his students saw how gently he reassured him and offered the shaking child a calming draught, they would have fainted in shock. Minerva, however, didn't bat an eye but rather smirked ever-so- slightly. Though her colleague would never admit it, he'd grown fond of Harry since he'd been helping with his Dursley-related health concerns and started to get to know him as a person in lieu of seeing him as the personification of James Potter's worst qualities.

"I will be back in an hour, two at the most, alright Harry?" she asked him.

Harry, whose shaking was gradually slowing down, nodded and hugged her tightly. She returned the embrace before gently tucking an errant curl behind his ear and heading in the general direction of the school gates, from where she would apparate to Surrey.

Severus, hoping to take Harry's mind off of the situation while also avoiding a powerful bout of his emotion-fuelled accidental magic, soon had the adolescent helping him brew simple potions for the hospital wing. Harry saw right through the ruse and while any other child his age might have resented being coddled in such a way, he had never in his memory received a kind word before Hogwarts and so merely accepted the diversion without question, secretly appreciating it.

"You know," Snape told him in a nonchalant voice, "your mother loved brewing the stomach-soother potion. She said it was a simple enough that her mind could wander and relax while she worked."

Harry smiled at him. "I really like it too; it smells so nice and minty. Not like pepper up, which makes you sneeze even when you're brewing it." He went to finish shredding his ginger, but his hands, which were still shaking slightly, slipped and he sliced his thumb. He looked as if he were about to cry out but shut his mouth abruptly out of habit. He went to wandlessly banish the blood and add the ginger anyway; this step was the only part of the potion that had to be timed precisely, but Severus just extinguished the flame and banished the incomplete potion.

"Never mind that, the ingredients are easily expendable. Let me see your thumb."

"It doesn't hurt, really. It just surprised me, is all." Harry pulled his hand back, embarrassed.

"I'll be the judge of that, Mr. Potter," the potions master remarked curtly, looking at the injured hand and frowning. "It's fairly deep, but I think we can evade a trip to Pomphrey." He muttered a spell and waved his wand over the cut until the skin knit itself back together.

"Thanks. Normally I'm really good with prepping ingredients. I guess I just…"

"Am still dealing with the lingering effects of childhood trauma. It is not inconceivable that you would have such a reaction to being abruptly reminded of your old… caretakers," his lips curled in distain as he thought about just what kind of care the Dursleys had been dispensing. "Luckily, as of your last check-up, you have finally gained enough weight that I can safely administer another weak dose of calming draught. Let's have some tea and biscuits as well, hmmm?" The professor called for a house elf and poured a bottle of soft blue potion into a mug of

chamomile tea and thanked the little elf for the freshly baked biscuits before putting a generous amount on a plate for Harry.

"Eat as many as you can, Harry. It helps the potion absorb more efficiently."

"Thank you," Harry said, and although he wasn't at all hungry, he grabbed one and started nibbling at the sugary edges.

Severus had gotten Harry to eat about half of his biscuits and was listening to him recount a funny conversation he had with Du when Minerva came back, her footsteps clicking heavily on the stone floor and her expression one of barely restrained fury as she stepped through the doorway with an armful of packages, which she vanished to her quarters before softening and looking Harry over.

"How'd it go?" he asked her anxiously as she ran a hand through his hair and rubbed his scalp gently to relax him.

"Oh, swimmingly," she answered in a forcibly cheery voice. "I mean, I may have lost control of my magic- accidentally, mind you- and blown up a horrid woman by the name of Aunt Marge, but that's all sorted."

"You didn't?!" Harry clapped a hand over his mouth, torn between amusement and utter surprise. Severus had no such conflict and barked a laugh before looking around as if he couldn't believe the sound of merriment had come from his own body.

"Oh, I assure you I did," Minnie's eyes sparked harshly. "I also may have placed a confundus on the local police so that they believe your uncle had violated the terms of his parole and re-arrested him. That was completely intentional." Snape was having a full-on fit of laughter as Harry hugged Minerva tightly, just glad she had made it back safely.

Chapter 2

Harry was enjoying summer break for the first time in his life, and his birthday was no exception. There had been a party in the Great Hall with all of the staff (although Harry had to persuade McGonagall not to ban Dumbledore out of spite; she was still pretty mad at him, apparently), and Hagrid had cried a little as he exclaimed that he couldn't believe Harry was a teenager already. All of his friends were still off on their summer escapades, but they'd all sent him gifts; Harry's favourite had been the broomstick servicing kit from Hermione, although Pansy's had been a close second- she'd recently taken up knitting, and her gift of matching sweaters (or rather, one sweater and one tube) for him and Du had been highly amusing. If she'd meant it as a joke, it had backfired, as Du adored her cashmere warming device and never took a nap without it now.

Minerva's gifts had been numerous and wonderful; apparently the armful of gifts she'd reclaimed from Privet Drive hadn't been the entirety of them. She'd gotten him some new muggle comics that had just come out, as well as the next work in his favourite series of wizarding graphic novels. Along with that were more new sweaters, pants and shoes. There were many others, but the most wonderful had been a list of detention slips that she'd had in her desk for years; there was a veritable pile with the date, time, and reason for every detention she'd ever assigned James Potter, and she'd given them to him with a smile and a joke about how he'd better not get any ideas. Professor Snape had given him an old potions journal that had belonged to his mother, and Harry was effusive in his show of gratitude for the gift, sure it would have been difficult for the man to part with.

Harry had even been able to persuade all his teachers to play a game of quidditch with him: he, Minerva, Flitwick, and Professor Sinestra on one team with Professor Sprout, Snape, Hagrid, and Dumbledore on the other. They didn't have enough for a full team, so it was single chaser/single beater quidditch, but that didn't make it any less satisfying when Harry's team won, and his cheeks were flushed with laughter and exercise by the time he'd caught the snitch, an hour into the game.

"You purposely put that off, Potter- you probably saw the snitch five minutes into the game but ignored it because you were enjoying this."

"Guilty as charged, Professor," Harry said cheekily, giving a mocking bow. "But then again, I wouldn't have been able to ignore it if you had seen it."

Severus playfully swatted him. "I blame it on your young eyes, you little brat."

"Nope, try a different excuse. I can't see further than three feet in front of me without my glasses."

"It's true," Minerva added as she saw his somewhat disbelieving expression. "The eye healer says that he meets the requisites for being legally blind without his glasses."

"Yeah, and you can see a student messing up a potion from 100 feet away, so maybe complain about how my young joints lost you the game or some other excuse," Harry laughed, ignoring the dark look Severus traded with Minerva- James' vision had never been that bad.

Snape forced his face back into a neutral expression before he looked at Harry again. "You're lucky it's your birthday, brat, or you'd be scrubbing cauldrons."

"You're losing your edge, Professor. That threat wasn't remotely believable," the young teen stuck his tongue at him, and Severus shot a tickling charm his way before Harry put up a wandless Protego. Flitwick complemented his impressive charms prowess as Harry blocked more harmless jinxes from the potions master.

Later that night, Harry studied his electives list critically. "Minnie, what do you think about Divination?" he asked his adoptive parent, who was sitting an armchair over in the empty common room.

"I think it's a load of Hogwash than can occasionally yield a vague prediction at best, but don't let my opinion influence you, dear," she responded blithely.

"Okay, so that's a no, then," he said, scratching it out with his quill, tongue sticking slightly out of the corner of his mouth as he concentrated.

"Do you have any electives you're certain about, luv?" Minnie asked him, looking up from her book.

"I definitely wanna take Care of Magical Creatures. Arithmancy sounds cool, but I'm not very fond of maths. Divination is out, and Muggle Studies wouldn't actually offer much for me. But Ancient Runes sounds really interesting, which is good because it's the only one left…"

"You seem to have a knack with languages darling; I think that you would be good at the class," Minerva agreed. "And two electives are really enough; that's why it's all that is required. Although I'm sure Ms. Granger and Parkinson will want to take more."

"They wrote me a letter about that, actually. Hermione is going to Arithmancy, Care, and Ancient Runes, and Pansy is gonna take Divination and Muggle studies and they'll share notes. They both wanted to take them all, but there's no way that they'd be able to do it- they'd have to apply for time-turners, and the ministry would have to be really stupid to give such a dangerous artefact to teenagers," Harry told her.

"Actually, I do believe that I could garner official dispensation for Hermione to have one, although I was preparing to talk her out of the idea. For Pansy, however, the Ministry would never agree. You know how they are with Slytherins," she added with a sigh.

"That's so stupid, though!" Harry exclaimed, waving his hands. "Half my friends are Slytherins. Narcissa Malfoy, a pureblood from one of the oldest families, is practically married to a muggle woman!"

"I know dear, but unfortunately, some small-minded people, including those running the government, refuse to believe that not all Slytherins are like Voldemort." Harry's steadfast refusal to avoid the name had inspired Minerva to say it as well.

"But that's ridiculous. In 1584, Darrell Derwood was terrorising wizards all over Ireland, and he was a Hufflepuff. But nobody started discriminating against every badger in Hogwarts," he ranted.

"You're preaching to the choir, darling. Gryffindor has had its fair share of evil wizards and witches as well, but ask the average magical citizen and they will still insist that the house of lions is the most noble of all. I mean, they're not wrong, but the reasoning…"

"You know, I was almost in Slytherin," Harry remarked conversationally, trying to divert Minnie before she spent an hour waxing poetic about Gryffindor pride.

"And they would have been lucky to have you, dear," she told him, showing no surprise. She was Harry's guardian; she was well familiar with his Slytherin characteristics. Besides that, nobody would have been able to survive what Harry already had without developing essential Slytherin traits like cunning and the single-minded determination to survive. "But luckily, I got you." She smiled again, ruffling his hair.

Harry smiled back at her before yawning, and Minerva looked at her watch. "Goodness!" she gasped. "It's almost eleven o' clock, you should get to bed."

"I know that as a teenager, I'm supposed to argue with you now, but I am really tired…"

"Goodnight Harry," Minnie rolled her eyes fondly. "I love you."

"Love you too Min," her charge returned, already half-asleep on his feet.

Chapter 3

Harry was buttering his toast the next morning as Minnie piled more eggs on his plate when Snape, picking up his copy of the Daily Prophet after finishing his coffee, suddenly blanched whiter than the bedsheets Petunia had regularly forced Harry to bleach for her.

"Minerva- a word in private, if you would?"

"Of course, Severus, but wha-"

"Now, Minerva!" he hissed urgently, and Harry, who'd been trying to sneak a look at the newspaper, suddenly watched as Professor Snape summoned them all off the table, taking them with him as he dragged Minerva by the elbow into the corridor.

"I'm sure it's nuthin', Harry," Hagrid boomed, patting Harry surprisingly gently on the back with one giant hand. "Jus' eat yer eggs."

Harry picked up his fork to comply, but his stomach churned nervously as he got a sinking feeling that whatever was happening, it had something to do with him.

He was in his room later trying and failing to read ahead in the transfiguration textbook (he'd already finished his summer homework) when there was a knock on his door. He startled, jumping in surprise and just managing to avoid falling off his bed before he squeaked a tight "come in!"

It was, as expected, his guardian, who unusually failed to notice his own anxiety as she came to sit beside him on his perfectly made bed. Harry looked up at her with wide eyes, seeing right away that she seemed distracted and her hands were fidgeting nervously.

"Minnie? Are you okay?" the tabby animagus spooked slightly; she seemed to have forgotten he was there.

"Harry…" she began, swallowing, "I have to tell you something…"

Harry waited patiently, sensing that whatever she was about to say was difficult for her and required time. Du, who had been draped over the headboard relaxing, slithered onto his arm for moral support.

It seemed an eternity before the tabby animagus spoke again. "Harry, as I'm sure you can imagine, your father was a popular man…"

Harry nodded in affirmation, making no motion to rush her. "Well, it stands to reason then, that James had a lot of friends. But there was three that he was absolutely closer to than anyone else." She stopped to swipe at her eyes.

"What were their names?" he prodded her gently.

"Well, there was Remus, to start. He's actually going to be the DADA professor this year." Harry knew that couldn't be the news, as it was a good thing, and Minerva's entire baring spoke of terrible news.

"He was- is, a wonderful man, and he would have loved to raise you as well, but he had a health condition that- well, it's not my secret to tell you… Then there was Peter. He was very shy, quiet, not particularly talented. I suspect he was only part of the group because your father had a tendency to include those that nobody else wanted, but in the end, they were very close; he was a valued member of the group and served as moral support for their grand schemes and the distraction for all their pranks." Her abrupt silence suggested that the story was over, but Harry was distinctly aware that she said three friends.

"And the last one?" he asked quietly, squeezing her hand.

"Ah yes, James' right hand man, Si- Sirius Black," she said, her voice cracking. "He was the only one in their group with a more vocal personality than James. It… he was like a brother to James… he even lived with him, the last few years of Hogwarts, after running away from home. He, his family life was not the best…" she trailed off before continuing. "Not that that justifies… especially after everything James did for him. Never mind, I'm getting ahead of myself. He was like James' brother, and he and Remus were madly in love up until… the poor man's never been the same since." Harry grew more and more concerned, it was unlike his guardian to be so inarticulate.

"What did he… what did he do?" Harry ventured cautiously.

"I'm sorry Harry, you must be terribly impatient with me at the moment. It's just… I'd been hoping not to have to tell you this until you were a little older…"

"It's okay, take your time," Harry said, although he was dying to know the end of the story.

"Sirius Black- he… he was your godfather, Harry."

"And that's going to end up being disappointing news," he surmised astutely.

"Yes, dear, unfortunately it is the worst of news. Your parents, when they found out that You- that Voldemort was coming for them, they went into hiding with the Fidelus charm- which is, well, it's…"

"Like hiding in plain sight," Harry finished, having spent a lot of time talking Flitwick this summer while the Charms professor talked about everything from the goblin culture that formed part of his heritage to his duelling days and his favourite lesser-known charms.

"Yes- very good dear, ten points to Gryffindor," and Harry chewed his lip- it was unheard of for McGonagall to forget that points cannot be awarded in the summer. "Well, Sirius Black, he was…" she bit back a sob.

"He was their secret keeper," Harry realized with a horrible certainty. "He's the reason my parents are dead."

Minerva, crying full now, could only nod as she wrapped her arms around Harry, who was feeling rather numb. Sirius Black, his godfather, was the reason he'd spent over ten miserable years in agonizing suffering at the abusive Dursley household. The room seemed to flicker in and

out for a moment before Harry realized it was the lights- he was having another bout of accidental magic. The bookshelves and furniture started shaking next, and Harry only managed to regain control by breathing deeply and hugging Minnie tighter.

Once the room had come to a complete standstill, it could have been minutes or hours later, neither Harry nor Minerva were calm enough to know, Harry realised that he still didn't know why she was choosing to tell him this now.

"Wha- what was in the newspaper this morning?" he eventually brought himself to ask.

"That night, after he'd- after he'd revealed where you and your parents were hiding, he'd tried to convince Hagrid to let him take you. Hagrid, who was under orders to take you to the headmaster, didn't agree to this, which is a good thing, and Sirius left in a rage. We'd thought it was grief… at the time, before we knew that he'd been the secret keeper. But the real reason must have been that he couldn't… couldn't get his hands on you for whatever terrible thing he had plans. The next time we heard from him, he was in a muggle street, and Peter Pettigrew was there. 'How could you?' he'd asked Sirius. 'Lily and James! Baby Harry!' And then…" Minerva sobbed again for a moment before she regained her voice. "Sirius Black blew up the whole street to keep Peter from apprehending him and handing him to the aurors. Twelve muggles were killed in the process- all that was left of Peter Pettigrew was a finger. By the time the aurors got there, Sirius Black was standing in the ruined street, laughing as they dragged him away. We had to tell the muggles it was an explosion in the sewer system." Harry gasped in dismay, but he still didn't know why all this was relevant now…

"I'm getting to that," Minnie told him, as if reading his mind (although Harry would know if he felt the probing feel of legilimancy, and besides, Minerva would never violate his privacy like that, unlike Dumbledore). "This morning, the paper announced that Sirius… he's escaped, and we have no idea where he is."

"Escaped Azkaban? How?!" Harry exclaimed in horror.

"Nobody knows dear, and they still haven't caught him yet. Which means that I don't want you going anywhere on the grounds without one of the teachers. We think that he must have escaped to…"

"To finish me off," Harry finished, and Minerva mentally railed against the unfairness of the universe, that such a wonderful child as her Harry continued to face more than any adult should ever have to.

Chapter 4

Chapter Notes

So this chapter was an effort to explore more of the character development I'm creating for Snape, and I also feel like he was a good person to include in this particular conversation as I feel he understands better than anyone what Harry is going through at the time with his feelings... well, just read the chapter; I don't wanna give too much away.

The rest of the summer was not nearly as fun as the first part due to the general state of tension and anxiety amongst everyone at Hogwarts. Harry had spent an entire day locked up in his room after he heard the news, trying to come to terms with the fact that his parents had not only been murdered by an evil wizard, they were betrayed by their best friend. Every time he thought about Sirius Black, he felt an intense anger bubble up under his skin, worse than anything he had ever felt before. He had been wronged by many people in his life, but his feelings towards Sirius Black were the closest thing he'd ever felt to hatred. The Dursleys were small-minded bigots, and Voldemort was just plain evil, but knowingly and deliberately betraying someone so close to you? Harry would die before he did that to anyone in his group.

The strength of the animosity towards the convict nonetheless unsettled him: he had always been fairly easy-going and forgiving, and he was unused to the desire to strangle someone on sight. It was a scary thought, that he actually wanted to hurt someone, maybe even wanted him dead. Did this make him a worse person? He'd tried talking to Du about his feelings, but she'd just responded with the comment that she ate everything that annoyed her and went back to her nap, so that didn't lead anywhere. He was stewing in his dark thoughts when there was a knock on his door.

"Not now Minnie- I really just need some time alone, please!" he called out, sighing and putting his head in his hands.

"It's Severus, Harry. Please let me in- it's very red out here," the voice of the potions master called out.

Harry hopped down from the bed and swung open the door dejectedly. "It's redder in here, professor."

"Yes, I can see that… anyway, Minerva was telling me you've been holed up in here and unwilling to talk to anyone," Severus said.

"And she thought sending you would help? Silently brooding is your favourite hobby," Harry muttered.

"Ah yes, there's the teenage angst- I was beginning to worry we'd never have the pleasure of seeing it," Severus snorted. "Although you're not wrong. I figure your feline caretaker thought that seeing how I spend most of my time 'silently brooding,' as you so eloquently put it, I would be the most adept at nudging you out of such a pastime."

"I don't wanna talk about it," Harry grumbled.

"Yes, I'd figured that much."

Harry stuck his tongue out at the professor.

"It's understandable that you're upset, Harry," Snape softened his voice and put his hand on Harry's shoulder. "However, talking about it will help; I would have done well to learn that lesson a long time ago."

Harry looked at him critically for a moment before looking down at his hands again. Then he looked around the room again for a few minutes and chewed his lip while he fidgeted some more. Snape knew that look- it was a guilty look, but he knew that Potter couldn't have possibly committed a serious infraction when he'd merely been sulking in his room, so Severus merely wait patiently for Harry to admit his imagined wrongdoing so that he could tell him that he was being ridiculous.

"I… I hate Sirius Black!" the teen finally blurted out a few minutes later, waving his hands around wildly.

Severus merely raised an eyebrow at him. "As do I," he responded, tonelessly.

"No, but you don't understand!" Harry gesticulated. "I've never hated anyone before- you hate everyone, so it's not as unsettling for you."

Severus looked at him dispassionately again. "I wouldn't say I hate everyone… I like certain of my colleagues, and I don't find you completely distasteful," the professor told him, which for Snape was basically an I love you.

Harry looked up at him with a vulnerable expression in his big green eyes, and Severus' old, shrivelled heart gave a pang as he realised that Lily had never suffered so much as to have such a look in her identical emerald orbs. "I think… I think if he was here, that I might- I might just kill him, professor. Does that- does that make me evil?" his voice was shaking.

"Mr. Potter, look at me please," he told Harry, who was looking down at his feet, ashamed. "There is nothing wrong with feeling that way towards someone who has caused you as much suffering as that man has. It doesn't make you evil, it makes you human."

"But what if, what if he comes for me, and I get mad, and I actually kill him?"

Snape took a moment to curse this odd, long-forgotten sensation of feeling things before he answered. "I believe that's called self-defence, Potter," he teased, quirking an eyebrow in an effort to lighten the situation.

"Be serious!" Harry implored the professor, frustrated.

"I think not Potter, I have no desire to be on the bad side of someone who nearly brought down the Great Hall."

"Did you just- did you just make a pun?" Harry was so surprised that he actually snapped out of his fugue for a moment.

"Do you see the lengths you've brought me to, you little terror?" Severus smirked at him. "But in all legitimacy, the desire to murder someone does not make you evil. Honestly, the fact that you are first experiencing the sensation an entire 13 years into your life speaks to the frankly nauseating extent of your unwavering goodness."

"Um, thanks?"

"Who said that was a compliment?"

"Normal people?"

Snape ignored Harry's last comment. "If I may add one more thing," he said, "I don't think you have it in you to actually kill anyone, no matter how much you'd like to or how much they may deserve it. There have been a lot of people, too many people, who have been… less than ideal to you, me among them, unfortunately. And the fact that all of those people are still alive and unharmed is a testament that there is not an evil bone in your body. Most people have at least three," he quipped, patting Harry on the shoulder.

"How many do you have, then?" Harry asked, lightly swatting him on the arm.

"Seven. But I'm not telling you which ones- closely guarded secret." He ruffled Harry's hair, which was a far more affectionate gesture than he ever saw himself doing with anyone, much less James Potter's son. "Are you done pouting now? Because they're serving meat pies in the great hall and I'm starving."

"Race you!" Harry laughed, and before he could tell him no, you insufferable brat, he found himself chasing after an already-sprinting teenager in an effort not to lose track of him.

Chapter 5

Chapter Summary

Hey, so pretty graphic flashbacks to abuse in this chapter, fair warning.

September 1 eventually arrived yet again, and Harry was taking the floo with Minnie to Platform 9 . It had taken a lot of begging for his guardian to allow him to go- with Sirius at black still at large, she'd rather that he stay in the school where it was safer. Eventually, however, with a liberal dose of Harry's puppy eyes and his pleading that he hadn't seen his friends all summer, she'd eventually relented, but only on the condition that he and his friends find the compartment with Remus Lupin.

"You'll know when you see him- he'll be the only adult on the train besides the trolley witch and the conductor," she told him for the seventh time as she stood with him on the platform.

"I know Min; I promise I'll be safe," he told her, squeezing her hand to reassure her.

"I'm sorry- I probably sound like an old nag, but I just worry about you…"

"It's okay M'na, it's nice," he blushed slightly. "I gotta go, that's the whistle. Love you!"

"I love you too sweetheart!" she exclaimed, smiling brightly. That was the first time that Harry had felt secure enough to say it first. "Oh, and don't forget to eat lunch on the train! And take your potions!" she yelled after his retreating form.

"I will!" he shouted back as he stepped up onto the train and was swept up into a bruising hug by Pansy, who immediately started talking at him. Minerva took a deep breath. It was just a train ride, she reminded herself. What could go wrong?

Harry informed his friends of Minerva's provision, and they'd immediately set off looking for Remus Lupin. Harry, the only one who could do wandless magic, put feather-light charms on all their trunks so they could drag them along easier, since the rest of his friends didn't have the advantage of being able to leave all their stuff at home because- well, they didn't live at Hogwarts, obviously.

They eventually found him in the very last compartment, and Harry cast the expansion charm so they could all file in and then took a long look at the professor. The first thing that hit him was that his magic was strange- there was a hostile presence in it, although it was lying dormant for the moment. It felt a bit like an animagus form… but no, this was a foreign invader instead of a natural subsection of a wizard's magical core. He figured this must be the 'health condition' Minnie had been talking about. He took a good look with his actual eyes and saw that whatever it is, it had certainly taken a toll on the man. He was thin and his clothes were frayed and shabby, although meticulously patched. Although he was a young man, about Snape's age, there

was a disproportionate amount of grey in his hair. He was also very scarred- his face, his arms, his hands, his knuckles- and there was something else on his knuckles. Harry looked a little harder- it really was much easier to see with a proper prescription, one of the many things he adored Minnie for- and noticed that his knuckles were far harrier than the average wizards. He'd read ahead in his textbooks on rainy days when he couldn't go outside to play quidditch or explore the grounds, and he remembered something about that…

The answer hit him quite suddenly- Professor Lupin was a werewolf! No wonder he was so clearly poor, then. If the ministry was so bigoted towards muggleborns and Slytherins, they surely were far worse towards anyone classified as a 'magical creature' even if they only assumed creature status once a month. The professor had been one of his parents' best friends. Poor Remus…

"Harry!" Draco whined. "I've been trying to catch your attention for the past two minutes.

"Oh, sorry- what were you saying?" he asked his friend.

"I was just wondering why you were staring so hard at Professor Lupin?"

"Oh, um… he was a friend of my parents." Harry felt bad about lying to his friends about the reason, but he knew that the professor's being a werewolf wasn't his secret to tell.

"Oh." Draco looked contrite, and Harry reached over and squeezed his hands, missing the other's brilliant blush as he did so.

"Don't feel bad; it's okay," Harry told him, and they all sat down around the tables and persuaded Fred and George to put away the exploding snap decks; the professor clearly needed his sleep.

The trolley witch came around about an hour into the ride and Harry ordered a few sweets while pulling out the sandwiches Minnie had asked the house elves to pack him. There were enough for everyone; Harry only wished he could say the same for his potions. They'd surely stop making fun of his facial expressions if they had to drink the awful stuff.

"Hand me a sweet," he ordered after he knocked back the last phial, and Ron went to offer him some Bertie Botts.

"Not those!" He exclaimed. "I need something that'll definitely taste good to wash away the taste of-" he scrunched his nose at an empty phial, "whatever foul hell-spawn is in those."

"You know, I think you might be overreacting a bit," Blaise remarked as he handed him a pumpkin pasty.

"Smell this and then tell me that," Harry responded, handing him the respiratory potion, the foulest of them all. Blaise did as instructed and coughed.

"I take it back," he rasped. "Merlin, that's horrid. What even is that?"

"A respiratory potion," Harry said. "Apparently my 'lungs are underdeveloped' or something. Personally, I think Madame Pomphrey is just sadistic."

"She is rather scary," Susan, who had spent a week under Pomphrey's tender ministrations iron rule recovering from the diary incident, agreed with him.

"She doesn't even allow homework," Harry continued.

"Literally only you, 'Mione, Pansy, and maybe Draco would ever complain about that, mate," Ron told his friend, mouth full of cauldron cake.

"You spend enough time staring at that blank wall, and even a Charles Dickens novel sounds appealing," Harry said.

"Ooh, Mia made me read one of those this summer. It was awful- how did people consider him entertaining?" Pansy screwed her face into an expression of disgust.

"I thought you'd like Oliver Twist," her friend defended. "It's dark, like your soul."

"Oh, the film was great," Pansy conceded. "But his writing style is so dull- he could have told the story just as well in a third of the length."

"Perhaps that's true, but he got paid by the word," Hermione informed them all.

"In that case, fuck his boring writing, but kudos to his Slytherin methods of taking advantage of the situation."

"You know, Hermione, I don't think I've heard you reprimand Pansy for her foul language since the first day you were friends," Harry remarked conversationally.

"Eh, I eventually realised that language is just a construct and that each word is an objectively equal combination of nonsense symbols that only have meaning because we've assigned it to them, so what's the point? Also, she's really fucking funny."

Ron looked at Pansy in horror. "What have you done?"

Pansy just gave him a rather predatory smile. "The real question you should be asking, darling, is what has Hermione done to me?" Ron gulped and Draco blanched.

"Boys are so easy to scare." Pansy rolled her eyes.

"Have you ever considered, Pans, that maybe part of it is that you're just the slightest bit, well- majorly terrifying?" Harry asked.

Pansy opened her mouth to say something indubitably snarky, but just then, the train stopped.

"We can't be there already…" Seamus stated the obvious.

"Maybe we've broken down; I'll go ask the conductor." Hermione started to get up, but Harry, who had started getting a vague feeling of a malevolent presence around the edges of his mage senses, pulled her back into her seat.

"No, don't leave! Something's wrong. Lo-" Harry started to say lock the door, but just then he was swept away by a horrible and overwhelming feeling of cold. He couldn't even continue the sentence; his teeth immediately started chattering. He'd never felt this cold, not even when the

Dursleys had turned the heat off downstairs at night and taken the blankets out of his cupboard in the middle of winter to punish him for sneaking food. Then the screaming started. "Ha- haf-" he tried to tell his friends that they had to help them, but his mouth wouldn't work.

Then the flashbacks started. He wasn't sure how he could have so many at the same time and how so much misery even fit into a single second. All his worst beatings, his longest periods of starvation, having his hands held to the burners the first time he burned dinner, and every time after that (although with such a harsh learning curve, they were few), working in the garden in the heat when he hadn't been allowed anything to drink for two days, the time he got the chicken pox and had his hands tied behind his back and was thrown into the cupboard to suffer in all his itchy misery without even a bit of calamine lotion while he heard Dudley being fussed and exclaimed over and cared for through the slats of his cupboard while his cousin had the same illness. Coughing up blood after a bad case of the flu and too many kicks to the ribs, certain he was going to die at six years old. Cruel words as well- no one would ever love him, his relatives telling him they treated him with far more kindness than he deserved, he was a freak, he was useless, he was unwanted, his parents had probably gotten killed on purpose just to get away from him.

He wanted to cry, but his tears felt frozen in the sockets, and besides that, he wasn't even sure he remembered how to cry, crying got you hit with the belt, crying got you thrown in the cupboard, crying had Vernon laughing maliciously as he sliced you open with a broken whiskey bottle. And then the screaming in the background. He could barely make out her words. "Please, no!" she was begging "Not-"

And then suddenly there was a closer voice. "Nobody is hiding Sirius Black in their cloaks!" it was saying, and Harry knew that he knew the name Sirius Black, but he couldn't remember why. And then there was a flash of bright light that went by far too fast, and even though it drove the dementor away, Harry wished it had stayed- it felt so warm, so light, so happy.

He gradually came back to full consciousness as he saw his friends' worried faces staring back at him while he wondered when he'd fallen to the floor. But he had more pressing concerns-

"Move!" he yelled at them, and they looked at him confusedly before jumping back abruptly as he retched all over the floor. Shit, the potions all came back up too, Minnie was probably gonna make him take them again…

"Harry!" an unfamiliar voice was saying as the face of the new professor appeared above them. "Are you alright?!"

Harry squinted up at the man as vague memories flit through his mind in which the man didn't seem unfamiliar- someone was tickling the belly of a baby with messy hair and green eyes like his, and he was laughing.

"Moony?" he slurred, voice barely a whisper, and he just had time to register a shocked face before he passed out again.

Chapter 6

Someone was shaking him awake again, and Harry groaned. Couldn't they just let him sleep, just this once? He wasn't exactly sure who they were, and he didn't particularly care. The blackness was calling him so enticingly, and oh, how he wanted to stay a bit longer.

But the shaking only got more insistent, and Harry cracked his eyes open to see Professor Lupin looking down at him with a worried expression. So, he was gonna be one of those professors that woke kids up from their well-earned naps? Bloody hell.

"Harry, what's the last thing you can remember?" he was asking him, and Harry was so not in the mood for a pop quiz at the moment.

"Um… threw up?" he tried, and for some reason the professor looked disappointed. Did he give the wrong answer? He tried to say something, but his mouth had decided it had reached its word limit and stubbornly refused to make coherent sounds.

"Okay, that's good Harry, that's good… you're lucid. Here, have some of this, it will help." The older man pulled him gently back into his seat and proffered a large chunk of Honeyduke's finest chocolate, and Harry gave the man a dubious look. Did he not hear the part where he said he threw up?

"You give side-eye like your mother," the man chuckled a bit, and he seemed barely aware of what he was saying, lost in a memory. "I promise though, it will help. It's a remedy for dementor exposure."

"Dementors? Is that what those things were?" Hermione asked, and she too, looked far paler than normal.

"Yes- they guard Azkaban, and feed on happiness. They seem to be getting a little full of themselves in their search for Sirius Black." His voice snagged on the name, and Harry remembered that Minnie had said that he and Sirius had been in love.

"And chocolate helps how?" Pansy asked, eyeing the candy bar.

"It helps spread the warmth back and combat the negative emotions that come with exposure. Nobody quite knows why, although my personal theory is that it's because chocolate is pure happiness." Remus smiled slightly. "Unfortunately, I only have two bars, and I believe that they need to go to Harry, young Mr. Malfoy, and… Ms. Susan Bones, is it?" Susan, who also looked rather pale and was shaking, shook her head in confirmation. Her auburn hair looked even more vibrant against the chalky shade her skin had gone, in contrast to Draco, who looked like a ghost and was trembling violently. Harry, who hadn't the energy for even a tremor, had to be fed the chocolate bite by bite, a job quickly commandeered by Pansy, who kept a level head in the situation, while Hermione prodded a shell-shocked Draco and Susan to eat the other chocolate bar, which Remus split in half for the two of them. None of them paid any mind to the fact that the train had started moving again.

While the chocolate didn't do anything to offset the queasy feeling in Harry's stomach, it did help bring warmth back into his limbs and he started looking a little less like death warmed over. When they got to the platform at Hogsmeade, Remus, thinking quickly, cast a disillusionment

charm on them all and picked up Harry, who couldn't have protested if he wanted to, for although he could somewhat feel his legs by this point, he didn't think he could use them. Susan and Draco, although still looking quite under the weather, had recovered enough to walk off the train, each supported heavily by a Weasley twin.

Some of the group gave Luna funny looks when she started petting the empty air in front of the carriages that would take them to Hogwarts, although Harry, who could feel a sort of creature presence, had to concede somewhere in the back of his mind that the eccentric Ravenclaw was on to something with this one.

Instead of following the rest of the student body, Remus took them through a door that branched off of the Great Hall, and Harry became slightly more alert when he heard Minnie yelling furiously.

"HOW COULD YOU AUTHORIZE THIS?! DEMENTORS IN THE CASTLE- OF ALL THE- I THOUGHT I MADE IT PERFECTLY CLEAR THAT ALL OF YOUR HARE- BRAINED DECISIONS HAD TO BE APPROVED BY ME FIRST! AND NOW YOU'RE SAYING WE CAN'T GET RID OF THEM BECAUSE YOU'VE ALREADY APPROVED IT?! SOMETIMES, ALBUS DUMBLEDORE, I REALLY WANT TO KILL YOU!"

Harry had never heard Minnie quite so mad, and it didn't bode pleasantly for him either- generally, the madder Minnie was at someone else, the more hovering concern she showed him, so it appeared that he was in for anxious mothering of a lifetime. He was right- the moment Remus removed the disillusionment charm, Minerva rushed over and plucked Harry out of Remus' arms.

"Oh, thank Merlin! My poor baby- oh dear gods what have they done to you?! You feel like an iceberg and you're nearly white! Somebody call Pomphrey RIGHT NOW!" She held him tighter as she fretted.

"M'na…" Harry groaned, put she just brushed his hair off his forehead.

"No buts, young man- oh, wait until I get my hands on those beasts, they'll wished they'd never-"

Remus had never seen Professor McGonagall like this, and he found it highly unsettling. "I'm just going to leave the children in your capable hands and go set up my quarters…" he told his old teacher before making a hasty retreat.

The Mediwitch arrived moments later, and she looked over all the children and gave them chocolate before dismissing everyone but Susan, Draco, and Harry, who were guided to the hospital wing. A few potions and enough chocolate to bake a cake and Draco and Su were permitted to go just in time to catch the sorting ceremony, and Harry crossed his arms over his chest and pouted as he watched his friends' retreating backs enviously.

"Well Mr. Potter," Poppy turned to him with a sigh. "I must ask- are you trying to make a tradition of spending the first night of every school year in the hospital wing?"

"Are you trying to make a tradition of keeping me when you don't need to?" he grumbled, and both women shot him a disbelieving look.

"Not even you, dear child, can argue that it would be anything short of medical malpractice to let you leave tonight," Madame Pomphrey responded.

Harry pouted; he hated it when she was right.

"I'll stay with you tonight, baby," Minnie told him, switching to her animagus form, and Harry put up no argument- he didn't want to be alone at the moment. Except-

"C'n I- Can I please have a dreamless sleep? I think I'd have a lot of nightmares and I don't wanna bother anyone with my screaming…" he ventured shyly, looking at Madame Pomphrey with wide uncertain eyes.

Both women felt their hearts break in half. "Of course you may, Harry," Poppy told him softly, holding herself back from brushing a hand along his cheek. "But for your benefit, not mine- my patients will never be a bother to me, no matter how often they come to visit." She forced a smile onto her face as she offered him the necessary potion, and Harry, who was just grateful this would be the last of the many, many, many horrid brews he'd had to taste today, downed it and dropped off into the blissful embrace of the sandman.

Chapter 7

The dreamless sleep potion was truly the greatest thing ever invented, Minnie thought, as she lay beside a peacefully sleeping Harry, who was curled around her with his hands clutching her fur. His face was peaceful, and without the cares of the waking world, his small form and angelic face made him look far younger than he really was. His long, dark eyelashes brushed his cheeks, which had finally begun to lose their hollow appearance. Minerva knew that breakfast was soon, and Harry would be upset if he missed any of the first day of classes, but he looked so darling and relaxed, she was highly tempted to let him sleep. She debated with herself a bit longer before her child's eyes gradually fluttering open made a decision unnecessary.

"Morning M'na," he slurred, pressing a sleepy kiss to her ear. She purred at him in response. It seemed that even after all the horrible things the dementors had forced him to relive, he was still comfortable being affectionate with her, and she thanked her lucky stars for that, at least. She nudged her nose against his cheek as he gradually came to full awareness, waiting until he stopped holding her so tightly and she could change back and surprise him with the good news that Hagrid was going to be teaching Care of Magical Creatures, hoping it would help start the year off on a better note than yesterday had suggested.

Harry was just pushing himself up to a sitting position when Poppy came in, wand brandished and holding a tray full of potions. The teenager had to bite back a groan- it was too early for this.

"Good morning, Harry," she told him briskly, waving her wand over his head to begin a diagnostic charm. "You seem to be doing better this morning, although not as well as I had hoped," she pursed her lips as she examined the results.

"It seems I'm never doing as well as you'd hoped," he told her.

"Hmmm, I don't disagree, although I suppose you're doing your best," she conceded, debating on whether to keep him another night. Harry knew that face far too well.

"Pleeeeeeasseeee can I go to class. Pretty please!" he begged, turning the puppy eyes on her.

The mediwitch looked at her wand again, then at cat McGonagall. "Oh, I suppose… but you must promise to come back before dinner so I can check you over again."

"Okay, okay, anything you want," he agreed, swinging his legs over the side of the bed before Madame Pomphrey pushed him back to the bed again.

"Not so fast, young man," she chastised. "First you need to eat breakfast and take your potions, and I believe your guardian has some good news she'd like to share."

Minnie, transforming back, smiled at him. "Guess who's teaching your CoMC class this year," she teased, and Harry scrutinized her face.

"Is it… could it be? HAGRID!" He exclaimed, smiling brilliantly. Minerva smiled at him in confirmation, but really, who else on staff could possibly crazy enough to take over the position after Kettleburn decided that one remaining limb was better than no remaining limbs?

"He'll be brilliant at it!" Harry enthused, showing an endearingly childish faith in his first- ever friend.

"I'm sure you're right darling, just- promise you'll be careful, please?" Minnie ran a thumb along the dimple in his right cheek.

"Promise M'na- no sneaking dragons to the astronomy tower at midnight," he told her solemnly, although the effect was somewhat ruined by the giggle that bubbled out of him.

"So, there was a real dragon! I must say I wondered what on earth could have possessed Draco to think such a thing," she said, raising an eyebrow at him.

"Um… oops?" he tried, smiling sheepishly.

"Oops indeed Harry," she smiled fondly, shaking her head. "I only hope your detentions weren't too harsh… after all, you were simply helping a friend."

"Uh, you didn't know they did detentions in the forbidden forest?!"

"What the fuck?!" Minerva swore shamelessly. "That's not… that's not a thing that's okay? Why on earth… only the headmaster could possibly?" Her face suddenly took on a look of thunderous rage.

"I have to go have a word with the headmaster," she said tightly, before injecting a note of soft cheer into her voice. "Have a good day of classes darling; I'll see you in transfiguration," she told Harry, kissing him on the head. Harry cheerfully wished her a good day in return, sparing a sympathetic thought for the arse-whooping Professor Dumbledore was about to receive.

Harry met his friends just as breakfast let out, and they filed happily together towards CoMC, minus Pansy, who couldn't fit it into her schedule. She was dramatically sighing over the tragic separation of her friends, until she realized that Millicent was in her Muggle Studies class, at which point she snapped to attention.

"Initiating plan 3A, phase 1.1," she told them, and they all looked rather confused, except for Hermione, who nodded and gave her a thumbs up.

"That would have been my recommendation," Hermione told her best friend, who squealed.

"We are so connected, Mia, what would I do without you?"

"Ponder it later- you gotta go get the girl!" Hermione shoved her towards the students heading for Charity Burbage's Beginning Muggle Studies class, and Pansy took a deep breath and squared their shoulders.

"How do those two make every interaction seem like a scene from a dramatic chic flick?" Ron asked Harry, who shot a look at Ginny, who had apparently been teaching her brother American pre-teen girl slang.

"By dears, Luna and I are off to Potions!" she ignored her surrogate brother, instead grabbing Luna's hand as they took off towards the dungeons, not wanting to be late, no matter

Snape's somewhat improved mood.

As the rest of the group made their way to Hagrid's hut, they discussed their summer adventures. Draco was telling them how Aralynn had dragged him and his mum to a magical place called Disneyland, and was telling a disbelieving Blaise that "yes, numbskull, I met the real Ariel! What do you think they do, just dress people up to trick people? Please…"

Harry kept his mouth shut. He didn't want to ruin Draco's treasured interaction with his favourite Disney princess. He was glad to hear that Aralynn had sold her flat and formally moved in, though. He was also super excited that they were planning an informal little wedding ceremony for over Christmas break. While they couldn't have their marriage legally recognized, no law could keep them from declaring their love for each other in a ceremony in front of their family and friends, or Narcissa from going to the muggle government office and randomly changing her name to Narcissa Smith, which just so happened to match her lover's surname.

Draco was just telling a sceptical Ron that "of course I didn't see the talking mice with Cinderella, Weasel- they'd be trampled! Is that what you want?!" when they reached the little clearing in front of Hagrid's garden where the lesson was to begin. Hagrid, with a cheery smile on his boulder-sized face, emerged a moment later, a feather in his bush of curly hair.

"'Ello little ones!" he practically shouted. "How ehr yeh? I been up since 5 this mornin' preparin' yer lesson plans, so I do hope yer excited 'n ready te learn," he told them all, and as it was hard not to be fond of Hagrid, if slightly scared of his penchant for death-pets, they all smiled back at him, swallowing their nerves.

"Right then! Follow me," the caretaker professor told them, turning and heading slightly into the forest without waiting to see if they followed; he couldn't seem to fathom that not everyone would be as excited as he was to rush off into a forest full of monsters.

When they got into the clearing where Hagrid was waiting, Harry found himself staring at some very strange looking creatures- not ugly, exactly, just odd. They had the head and forelegs of a very large eagle, except they were coloured like horses- greys, chestnuts, roans, even palominos. They also had the midsection, hindquarters, and tail of a horse, and feathers transitioned smoothly to sleek, shiny fur just beyond the chest area. He couldn't help an exclamation of wonder- they seemed to get more beautiful the longer that he looked at them.

"These here beauties are hippogriffs!" Hagrid boomed, and Harry stepped a little closer so he could catch every word their teacher/friend was saying. "They're half eagle, half horse, and nobody quite knows how they came to be, but they're very smart. They're also very proud, so yeh've got ter bow before yeh try ter pet 'em. So, who wants ter go first?" Everyone, even Ron and Hermione, stepped back, but Harry just leaned forward a bit. Their magic was intoxicating.

"Harry- do yeh wanna give it a try?" the big man asked him. Minnie's warning to be careful rang in his head, and Harry acknowledged it, but he figured it would be all right to do a demonstration- after all, he was with a teacher who would be watching him the whole time, so he nodded his head eagerly in response to Hagrid's question.

"There's a lad," Hagrid praised. "So yehr goin' teh say hello ter Buckbeak," he pointed to the grey one, the largest and most magnificent of the bunch.

Harry walked slowly and carefully up to the hippogriff, his hands up in front of him and an open expression on his face to show that he meant no harm. When he got close enough to the

creature, he bowed low, and Buckbeak immediately sank to his front knees in response. Harry's face wore an expression of glee as he stood up straight again and began giving Buckbeak a good scratch on the head, to which the hippogriff leaned in blissfully.

"Fantastic job, Harry!" Hagrid enthused. "I've never seen him warm ter anyone so fast. He might even let you ride him."

Harry hesitated slightly, looking at Hagrid's cheerful, open face and then back to Buckbeak, who was already kneeling down to allow Harry to mount. Trusting the hippogriff to gauge the safety of such an endeavour more than Hagrid, who tended to have a very high threshold for what was considered 'danger,' he gently grabbed hold of the feathers on the crest of Buckbeak's withers and swung one leg, with a little difficulty, over the animal's muscled back.

As soon as he was seated comfortably, Buckbeak pumped his powerful wings and they were up in the air. It wasn't as smooth as riding his broom, but it was fun in a different way. It was a little hard to keep hold of the slippery feathers, but he felt a friendly mental nudge from the hippogriff's magic that made him feel, inexplicably but instinctively, that he wouldn't object to Harry's holding a little tighter.

They took three turns around the paddock before they started to descend, but Buckbeak, sensing Harry's joy, did a quick loop-de-loop before allowing his claws and hooves to hit the ground.

"That was amazin'!" Hagrid cheered, patting Harry on the back with the force of a small earthquake, forgetting his own strength and his excitement. "Sorry buddy!" he then told the student, who had fallen to the ground with an oomph! "Alright- everyone else c'n come forward!"

The other third-years, emboldened by Harry's success, all hopped over the fence, and Draco headed straight to Harry and Buckbeak, excited to praise his friend for his amazing show of skill. Draco had bowed, somewhat nervously, to Buckbeak, but the animal just looked at Harry, and, seeing his nod, gave a graceful bow in return and nudged Draco gently until his hand was scratching Buckbeak's favourite spot- his forehead.

Suddenly there was a great squawk from the treetops, and Hagrid suddenly paled.

"That's a rainbow-crested eagle-dodo!" he yelled. "They're the hippogriffs' natural enemy. I didn't think we'd see such a rare bird so close to the grounds- everybody BACK!"

The students all hurried to comply, except for Draco, who had been so absorbed in petting Buckbeak (and trying to figure out how the bird had so quickly captured Harry's affection, if he were being honest- he had a secret ambition of doing the same) that he hadn't heard. Buckbeak, however, heard the bird in the next instant, and his instincts kicked in as he reared, claws flashing.

"Draco!" Harry yelled, panicking and reaching forward to pull his friend out of the way. He shoved the blonde behind him but couldn't get out of the way himself in time- he'd managed to turn to the side to make his way to safety, but Buckbeak's razor-sharp claws sliced through his shoulder and upper back. Harry dropped to the ground, bleeding, but did not cry out. He'd been taught to be silent about his pain, and the methods used to teach him ensured that the lesson had been drilled so deeply into his psyche they were difficult to overcome.

Everyone else, however, including Hagrid, cried out in a cacophony of discordant anxiety, rushing towards their smallest class member. Buckbeak, having come out of his instinct-driven

frenzy, looked down with a keen expression of guilt in his large eagle-eyes, nudging the bleeding form ever so gently.

"EVERYBODY NEEDS TER MOVE!" Hagrid boomed, the force of his voice shaking the pumpkins in their patch all the way back at his cabin. "I'VE GOT TER GET HIM TER THE HOSPITAL WING!" He picked up Harry very gently and cradled him to his chest, taking great leaping strides as he sprinted towards the castle.

Chapter 8

"EVERYBODY NEEDS TER MOVE!" Hagrid boomed, the force of his voice shaking the pumpkins in their patch all the way back at his cabin. "I'VE GOT TER GET HIM TER THE HOSPITAL WING!" He picked up Harry very gently and cradled him to his chest, taking great leaping strides as he sprinted towards the castle.

Poppy immediately stopped what she was doing when Hagrid burst noisily into her territory, carrying a bleeding bundle in his arms. She rushed forward and…

Oh no, that bleeding bundle was Harry! "What happened?!" she demanded of Hagrid, face white.

"Hippogriff spook, ma'am. There was a rainbow crested-"

"Stop! I've heard all I need to know; go get Minerva and stay with her class while she's gone. I must get to work. Dear Merlin, it cut all the way through the muscle to the bone…"

Minerva practically flew to the hospital wing, she was sprinting so fast. Harry was just injured yesterday… this was a far faster rate of recidivism than to be expected even of Harry, poor thing. She burst through the doors only to see Pomphrey still bent over her child, still working. This wasn't good- even at her fastest run, the time for Hagrid to reach her and her to get to the hospital wing meant that twenty minutes had passed since she'd first been brought in- far longer than it took to heal a superficial wound.

"I'll be with you in a moment, Minerva," the mediwitch told him tightly. "This is a critical point in the procedure if I wish to save the muscle from irreparable damage."

Minerva said nothing, knowing that the witch would take that as acquiescence and not wanting to distract her further from her complicated task. She merely sat in a chair by the bed closest to the door to wait, trying to be as quiet as possible whilst she nervously fidgeted. It was a further half an hour before Poppy pulled a way, cast a scourgify to clean Harry's blood of her hands and robes before banishing Harry's ruined robes and conjuring a pair of soft silk pyjamas before gently putting them on over Harry's bandaged upper body. Minerva waited until she had him fully clothed before she spoke.

"How bad is it?" she asked the other woman.

Her friend ran a hand over her face and sighed. "Six weeks in a sling and another scar for the collection, but he should regain full use of the muscles." She sighed again. "What is it about this child that attracts so much trouble. It's not like he goes looking for it."

"Sinestra would say he was born under an unlucky star, and while I normally find her astrological flights of fancy a little too close to Trelawney's nonsense, I must say that in this case I'd have to agree with her." Minerva looked down at Harry, who at some point after the surgery had transitioned from unconscious to sleeping and sat down gingerly at the edge of his bed.

"Hagrid told me he was attacked by a hippogriff… I'll have to discuss his over-ambitious lesson plans with him later, not too harshly of course, but did he say what happened beyond that? Harry always follows directions in class, so I can't imagine it was through lack of caution," Minerva said.

"He wasn't able to say much before I sent him off to get you, and as he was a bit of a stuttering mess, I may have poked through his mind a bit for the story- I knew he wouldn't mind, for Harry's sake," Poppy admitted.

"You don't have to defend yourself to me; legilimancy was clearly necessary in this case," the tabby told her. "Go on."

"There was a rare bird- some sort of dodo or something, I can't be arsed to remember, but it was supposedly pretty rare and the natural enemy of the hippogriff. Draco had been petting one of the creatures at the time and Harry was injured pulling him to safety," the nurse informed Minnie tiredly.

"Is young Mr. Malfoy alright and how long does Harry have to stay here?" Professor McGonagall asked, anticipating Harry's first two questions for when he woke up.

"Draco is fine, if a little shaken up, and I'd be willing to let him go Thursday night, provided he doesn't return to classes until Monday," Poppy answered succinctly.

"He's going to be rather bored- best of luck to the both of us," Minnie couldn't help but chuckle slightly; her boy could be a handful- in the best way, of course. She leaned down to place a kiss on his temple and brush his hair out of his eyes before changing into her animagus form and curling up beside Harry; she had no intentions of leaving for a while.

Chapter 9

Harry came slowly to awareness and the first thing he registered is that his shoulder was VERY sore. He groaned, too groggy for his habit of self-enforced silence to kick in. Two concerned, middle-aged women were upon him immediately.

"How are you feeling baby?" Minerva asked him.

"How's-"

"Draco's fine darling- stop deflecting. How are you feeling?" Minnie tried again.

Harry tried to shift his position to something a little more comfortable and pain ripped through his shoulder and back. "Hurts," he whimpered, dropping his brave face.

"I would imagine so, Mr. Potter. The hippogriff claw ripped all the way through the muscle- I could see the bones in your shoulder," Madame Pomphrey told him, handing him a pain- relief potion. Harry tentatively reached out with his good arm and drank it gratefully, barely making a face.

"How long-" Harry began, and Minerva spoke again.

"Hospital wing until Thursday, you can go back to classes on Monday, sling for six weeks," she answered his anticipated questions. Harry sighed, but with the pain he was feeling at the moment, it wasn't unexpected.

"Hagrid's not in trouble, is he?"

"We're going to talk to him about choosing some slightly less dangerous animals, but we will be gentle with him, baby," his guardian promised.

"And Buckbeak?" Harry asked, voice shaking. "Nobody's gonna hurt him, right?"

Minnie sighed and ran a hand through her hair. "I don't know, sweetie… we are required to report all such incidents to the school governors, and while we are allowed to offer our professional opinions, ultimately the decision on whether or not to report the animal to the Department of Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures lies with them."

"Can I talk to them to? Buckbeak didn't mean to hurt me, I'm sure of it. He's really nice," Harry implored.

"They are going to discuss it at their Friday meeting, so if you're feeling up to it, you may give your testimony. I'm sorry luv- that's all I can do. The rest is out of my hands." Personally, Minerva was far more worried about her child than whatever happened to the hippogriff, but she knew that Harry and his good heart would naturally worry more for Buckbeak than for himself. That's why she was there- to worry about him when he was too preoccupied being selfless.

"It's okay Minnie, I know you're just worried about me," he told her.

"You're so good, Harry," she told him, gently brushing his hair away from his forehead. "Do you think you're up for trying some lunch?"

"Okay," he nodded his head in affirmation and Pomphrey brought him a bowl of noodles with some chicken and peas.

"It's okay, I'm ambidextrous," he told Minerva when she picked up the fork to feed him. Despite that little part of Minerva that wanted to feed Harry like she should have been able to when he was a toddler if Dumbledore hadn't been such a blockhead (and that was a mild term for the way she felt about him lately), she acknowledged that even if Harry was unusually affectionate and grateful for a teenage boy, he understandably wanted to be afforded the independence for basic tasks.

She did, however, help him wiggle upward into a sitting position and ensured he was comfortable and the sling wasn't crooked before placing the tray gently on his lap and handing him his fork. He really was quite good with his left hand, and anyone who didn't know him wouldn't be able to tell he was normally a righty.

"Thirsty?" Minnie asked, seized by a fervent need to do something.

"Yes please."

"Water or pumpkin juice?"

"Pumpkin juice, if you wouldn't mind," Harry answered. He really would have rather had some water, but he could tell Minnie was hovering nervously, and as water took only a simple augmenti charm to procure, he figured asking for pumpkin juice would keep her busy for a little longer. Besides, it was better at washing away the taste of his lunchtime potions anyway (and there were more now, go figure).

The next four days went by faster than Harry expected, what with regular visits from his friends and the fact that Minerva had basically bought half a comic book store to keep him entertained. He had to admit, Spiderman and Deadpool make a cute couple.

"I can walk Minnie, it's my shoulder that's hurt, not my leg!" he told his anxious guardian on Thursday night after he was finally released (faster than he expected didn't mean fast enough).

"Alright, alright luv. I'll quit my hovering," she told him, stepping back only about six inches.

"Remember Potter, no classes until Monday, although you may speak to the school governors tomorrow," Poppy said, feeling as if the concession was very magnanimous.

"Can I at least eat my meals in the great hall?"

"Oh, how you push the boundaries of my kindness," the mediwitch teased, but agreed.

It was after dinnertime, so Harry and Minnie headed back to the common room, where most of the house, as well as Harry's friends from other houses, were crowded around the television.

"What are we watching," he asked, sitting down beside Draco and ignoring the way some of the other Gryffindors were staring at the sling on his arm.

"Audrey Hepburn movie marathon," Hermione replied, slapping Ron's hand away from her and Pansy's bag of popcorn. "Get out of there, Ron! You shouldn't have eaten yours so fast!"

"We shouldn't be watching these cheesy romantic movies again," he complained to his best friend.

"You haven't seen Roman Holiday enough until you can quote it," Pansy said, shaking a little pity popcorn into Ron's proffered hand.

"Roman Holiday- isn't that the one where her character makes friends with that writer?" Harry asked, sticking his good arm into Draco's bag of jellybeans.

Ginny looked had him, scandalized. "I'm going to assume that frankly appalling confusion of Princess Ann with Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany's is due to your pain potions."

"You know, I'm the one who introduced you all to muggle entertainment," he told his surrogate sister, who stuck her tongue out at him.

"'Is that the one where she makes friends with the writer?' Honestly, Potter," Blaise scoffed. "No, no!" he suddenly yelled, throwing popcorn at the screen. "Don't leave her, you fool! Go back to her Joe- you can make it work!"

"Blaise, Blaise honey," Hannah said, putting a hand on Blaise's shoulder as the credits rolled. "I think you're getting too involved- it's not gonna end differently even if you watch it fifty times."

"They were in love…" the normally collected Slytherin trailed off, swiping at his eyes with the sleeve of his robes.

"Yeah, but she was a princess and he was an American reporter. It was impossible; that's like- like a death eater falling in love with Dumbledore," Pansy put forth, ever practical (and somewhat disturbed- in the best way, of course).

"Thanks for that disturbing visual, by the way," Dean snorted at her.

"Speaking of disturbing, my crazy Aunt Bella was in love with You-Know-Who," Draco informed them cheerfully.

"Eeeewww! Gross gross gross whywouldyoutellusthat?!" Ginny wailed, covering her ears.

"What?! It's not like they-"

"One more word, Malfoy, and I will beat you so hard you'll never be able to," Hermione warned, shooting him a glare.

"Hannah, Susan, I think you two need to do a seminar on how we make friends for 'Mione and Pans," Harry said, and the girls both shot him eerily similar glares that said something along the lines of if you weren't injured…

"Watch it Harry, or I will take you straight to Oliver so he can give you that lecture he's no doubt been planning on 'preserving your health for the good of quidditch,'" Hermione said.

"I think Oliver's actually kind of busy at the moment," Pansy scooted closer to Hermione, even though she was already practically sitting in her lap. "Word in the dungeons is that he and Flint have been… what's that the muggles say- 'hate fucking,'" she told her with a conspiratorial grin on her face.

"Ohmygod why didn't you tell me this earlier?!"

"I meant to but I forgot because we were so busy trying to figure out what it meant that Millicent asked to borrow my quill."

"Fair point. I still think we should move on to phase 1.3…" Hermione tried.

"I still think it's just a little too early… it'd probably be okay, but I'd rather play it safe."

Harry looked at the rest of his friends. "Does anyone else ever worry those two are gonna take over the world."

"All the time- but we'll be so proud when they do," Fred and George nodded their heads in unison.

Chapter 10

Harry paced in front of the mirror in the dorm the next morning, mentally going over what he planned to say to the school governors.

"The meetings not 'till 11, Harry, you can go back to sleep, unlike the rest of us," Ron grumbled as he pulled on his robes.

"Nah- I can't sleep past sunrise anyway," he responded.

Neville, a light sleeper with a bed next to Harry's, groaned. "We know."

"They just- they can't hurt Buckbeak," Harry ranted, ignoring Neville's comment.

"Relax Harry," Seamus told him, unconcerned. "You're the Boy-Who-Lived; if you asked them to, they'd all do naked pagan rituals by the light of the full moon."

"You vastly overestimate my influence, you twisted, twisted pyromaniac."

Seamus just winked at him before turning to Dean. "D'you think Professor Lupin's lesson today will be as awesome as the one with the boggart?"

Harry sighed; he was so envious that he'd missed the first interesting defence lesson they'd ever had. Maybe the professor would let him face a boggart if he saw him in his office hours…

"Are you going to Hogsmeade this weekend?" Ron asked his best friend.

"No," Harry sighed. "Madame Pomphrey says I'm not well enough, and Minnie is really worried about the dementors and the whole Sirius Black thing. She said I could go to the next one, though, if Snape came as a chaperone."

"Why Snape?" Ron made a face.

"Isn't it obvious? He's terrifying- plus, Minnie said he and Black hated each other in school, so she trusts that he wouldn't hold back."

"Like duelling club on steroids!" Seamus' face lit up at the thought of the dour potions master whopping some more arse.

"Can we not look so excited about the fact that a mass-murderer might track me down and try to kill me?"

"Aww c'mon Har, where's your sense of adventure?" Dean teased gently.

"I think I misplaced it somewhere in the last two or three murder attempts," he retorted cheekily. "Now you guys better get going or it'll be your arse Severus is kicking."

They did, but they all gave him a look first that said they'd later be discussing Harry's casual use of the dungeon bat's first name (Snape had given him permission over the summer to use it outside of class and away from the students, and Harry realised he'd have to request threaten that his friends keep silent on the matter).

Harry's speech on how tame and sweet Buckbeak was and how his injury was an unfortunate accident was very eloquent and seemed to go over well with the school governors, as they were sharing pensive looks and nodding their heads slightly as if conceding that he made some good points, but then Madame Pomphrey was required to give her testimony on his injuries.

"The patient was bleeding profusely and had a deep laceration from his shoulder to his lower back and I had to use quod ipsorum confringatur to repair the severed muscles and torn skin. Two blood replenishing potions were used in the procedure and the patient will remain bandaged and the injury supported with the aid of a sling for the next six weeks. In addition, I have prescribed a potions regime of 350 mL of pain relieving draught, to be consumed twice daily." She said all of this as neutrally as she could, even replacing Harry with the patient, as she knew that for whatever reason, Harry was ridiculously fond of the hippogriff, but it didn't seem to do much good.

The governors traded concerned looks. Quod ipsorum confringatur was a complicated and difficult spell that would not have been used unless absolutely necessary to avoid permanent damage, and 350 mL of pain reliever twice daily was essentially an industrial strength dose for such a small child. They dismissed everyone to discuss their decision, but it was only five minutes later that they called them back into the unused classroom.

"Due to the severity of the injuries and the unpredictability of the hippogriff in question, we have decided to hand the case over to the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, that they might hold an appeal to determine if the threat the animal prevents is significant enough that euthanasia is required," the head governor, a tall, plump witch with grey hair, read from a parchment.

Chapter 11

"What? No! You can't do this- he's not dangerous!" Harry told the witch, who looked sympathetically at him.

"I'm sorry dear, but we feel the matter needs further investigation by a specialist. It's not a death sentence- merely an appeal," she told him kindly.

"But, but- that's not, he doesn't, what if?" Harry stuttered, looking lost. McGonagall put an arm around him.

"Come on sweetheart, why don't we talk about it in our quarters?" Harry followed her forlornly.

"I can't believe it; I tried so hard with my speech," he told her eventually when they were alone, swiping at his eyes.

"Oh baby, it wasn't your fault," Minnie told him, squeezing his good hand. "It was an unfortunate accident, and don't worry- I'm sure you and your friends can prepare an excellent defence for Buckbeak; Hermione and Pansy are the best legal team a hippogriff could ask for."

"But what if they try to kill him anyway?" Harry's lip quivered a little, and Minnie put a hand on his shoulder.

"Then he'll 'escape'," she told him impulsively, but she knew she meant it.

"You would do that for me?" he looked up at her with wide eyes.

"I would do anything for you Harry, anything," she said honestly.

"Even change your mind and let me go to Hogsmeade this weekend?" he tried with a mischievous smile.

Minnie rolled her eyes and ruffle his hair. "Come on you little imp, let's have some lunch."

Harry saw his friends sulkily off to the village the next morning before wandering off down the corridors towards where he knew Professor Lupin's office was. Maybe he'd let him try the boggart…

That was a bust, unfortunately.

"Sorry cub, I don't want you to be pushing yourself that much so soon after getting out of the hospital wing. Minnie would have my hide," the teacher told him. "But you're welcome to stay for some tea, if you'd like…" he added hopefully.

"Okay, tea sounds nice," Harry agreed. "Can I ask you a question?" he added as the professor put the kettle on.

"Of course, Harry."

"Just now, why did you call me cub?"

Remus turned red. "Oh, that… I suppose I did that without thinking, really. You see, I was close with your parents… I used to call you that when you were a baby."

"Oh, that makes sense," Harry nodded. "Minnie told me you knew my parents."

Remus nodded before steepling his fingers. "If I might ask you something now, Harry," he ventured, and Harry nodded. "You seem… very close, with Professor McGonagall. I understand she has guardianship of you, but the last I heard, Professor Dumbledore told me you were happily living with some relatives of Lily's…"

It was Harry's turn to blush and look uncomfortable. "I… I was, but I wouldn't say happily… it didn't work out."

Remus nodded in understanding, seemingly lost in a memory. "Yes, that happens sometimes. But you are happy now?"

Harry smiled brilliantly. "Ecstatic. Minnie is the greatest! A little overprotective though…"

Remus chuckled. "Ah yes, that woman always was such a mama lion; I can only imagine that those instincts would increase with her own child. Your mother was similar when you were a baby. I can't tell you how many smacks we all got if we didn't change your diaper or mix your baby food to her exacting standards."

Harry giggled. "That sounds like her, from what Severus has told me, at least."

Remus almost dropped his tea. "You call Sniv- Professor Snape Severus?!" he asked, banishing the liquid that had sloshed over the sides of his mug and onto his desk.

Harry nodded. "Yeah, when we're in private. We didn't get off on the right foot, but we reached an understanding. I stay at Hogwarts over the summer, so I got to know him a little better. And he's not so bad once you're used to his sense of humour."

Remus looked at him slightly oddly for a moment before he spoke again. "You really are an amazing kid, Harry- making friends with Snape. Your father would never have imagined it."

"I don't know… he's been a lot nicer to everyone lately. I mean, he's not like, friendly in class or anything, but he's fairer," Harry defended.

"As no one had Professor Snape for a boggart, I must say I have to agree with you. The Severus I knew would have frightened at least one student out of their wits," Remus agreed.

"He couldn't have always been so bitter though, right? Or my mum would never have been friends with him. Maybe he just went back to what he was before?" Harry prodded the professor, seeking more information about his mother's past.

"Time is a cruel mistress, Harry," Lupin agreed. "Although Professor Snape was never what one could call cuddly. But then again, your mother wasn't exactly the Madonna the papers tended to paint her as, after… well, you know. She was a fierce, snarky little thing, and she could- and did, many a time- throw a mean hex."

"Do you think, you think that she- that she fought? That night…" Harry asked, voice breaking.

Remus looked at the child, who was, or at least had once been, the closest thing to a son he'd ever have. "Oh Harry… I'm sure she did everything she could to stay alive for you. If she didn't fight, it was only because she didn't want you to get caught in the crossfire. I think… I think that if she was in a position where she could have gone head to head with Voldemort on equal grounds, the whole street could have been blown to pieces. She was powerful… the most powerful witch I've ever met, actually." Remus politely ignored Harry's sniffling- he too had to wipe his eyes right at the moment.

They sat in a not-uncomfortable silence for a few moments before Harry's head suddenly shot up.

"You- you called him Voldemort…"

"Good observation, cub. Fear of the name only increases fear of the thing itself, and all that."

"Can I ask you one more thing, Professor?"

"Anything you like, Harry."

"What… what do you do on the full moon?" Harry asked softly, and Remus suddenly choked on his tea.

"What- you, you know?! How?" he wheezed between sputtering coughs.

"I have mage senses," Harry answered, and Remus couldn't even overcome the shock of having his secret known by an 13-year-old to register that Harry had mage senses. Senses. As in, multiple.

"It's okay Professor," Harry soothed. "I don't care, and I haven't told anyone- your secret is safe with me. I'm just wondering how you cope with that- I heard it's really painful…"

Remus gathered himself, touched by Harry's concern. "I… I handle it alright, cub. Professor Snape has been kind enough to brew me wolfsbane potion, so it should be much easier than it has been on my own. I'll just curl up on the floor of my office and nap the night away. That said, if you ever come upon me during the full moon, I want you to incapacitate me any way you can, drugged or not."

"That seems unnecessary. I'd just switch to my animagus form; werewolves can't turn animagi," Harry remarked casually, and Remus nearly choked again.

"Wha-" he began, but just then, Snape knocked on the door and entered the office with a steaming goblet of what Harry knew to be wolfsbane. If he was surprised to see Harry in Lupin's office, he didn't show it.

"Your potion, Lupin."

"Thank you, Severus." Snape merely gave a curt nod, turning to Harry.

"I haven't seen you since the accident, Harry. Are you feeling alright?"

"Buckbeak's gotta have a trial, Sev'rus," his student informed him gloomily.

"I am more concerned about you, brat, than the eagle-horse at the moment."

"Professor!"

"Fine, fine, I'll humour you. Oh no, the feathery death horse could be dangerous. Whatever shall we do?" he put forth, deadpan.

"Severus! This is serious!" Harry groaned, moving his hands to cradle his head before wincing as he remembered he shouldn't be moving his right arm. At all.

"No, that is Remus," Severus quipped, trying to hide his anxiety as he dropped to his knees to look at Harry's shoulder. "Stay still for a moment, would you."

Remus merely stood, stock-still in his shock. Harry knew he was a werewolf. Harry had mage senses. Harry was an animagus. Harry was being raised by Minerva McGonagall. Harry was friends with Severus Snape. Severus Snape had just made a joke. Severus Snape was kneeling on the floor, crouching worriedly over Harry, who was merely suffering the hovering examination as if this wasn't the first time it had happened. Had the train taken him to a Hogwarts in a parallel universe? He wondered how unprofessional it would be to slip a bit of firewhiskey into his tea…

Chapter 12

After Severus had made sure Harry was okay and then Harry explained the tale of how he accidentally became an animagus to a shocked and impressed Remus, it was getting close to time for dinner, so the two men escorted him to the Great Hall. Harry skipped over to the Ravenclaw table, where the group was eating today, and slipped his arm across Draco's eyes from behind.

"Guess who?" he teased.

"Considering there's only one hand over my eyes and it's your voice speaking, Harry, I'm gonna guess it's you," the blonde retorted.

"Spoilsport."

"Come sit down, dork, we got you stuff in Hogsmeade."

"Ooh, presents. I like those," Harry said, sitting down and reaching for the mashed potatoes. Draco gently pushed Harry's hand down and ladled them for him.

"I still have one good hand, you know," he told his friend.

"Oh, just let me take care of you," Draco ordered, having moved on to serving Harry chicken and carrots. Harry knew that Draco felt really guilty about the accident, although he was trying not to show it for his sake, so Harry just sighed and let Draco pour his pumpkin juice and line up his potions according to their position on the colour spectrum.

"Look, we got you lots of candy," Ron exclaimed, hefting some Honeyduke's bags from under the table.

Draco pulled his own bags out. "Oh, and look at this- you're gonna love the scarf I found for you. And this jumper with a cobra on it- and look at this quill: it's green, like your eyes!"

"Wow, Dray, I was really excited to see the village, but I think you might have bought it for me," Harry quipped, and Draco turned red.

"I just saw a lot of things that reminded me of you…"

"I'm just kidding; I love them. Thank you, Draco," Harry told him sincerely, putting his left arm around Draco and resting his head in the crook of the taller boy's shoulder. Draco blushed even more brilliantly, and Hermione and Pansy shared a look.

"Plan SGHD 3, phase one self-initiated," the darker girl told her best friend in BSL, their secret plotting language.

"About damn time," Pansy signed back. "If those two were any thicker, we'd have to water them down."

It wasn't until after dinner that they discovered Hermione's prized purchase from the village: a large, ginger, bowlegged cat that grumpily swatted at anyone besides Pansy who got too

close to his new owner. Harry silently resolved never to transform into his animagus form anywhere near this creature; it looked quite capable of eating him.

"Um, so, should we start talking about Buckbeak's appeal?" he asked tentatively, trying to continue the conversation they'd been having when dinner ended and ignore the tiny tiger purring on Hermione's lap.

"Yeah, sure, come a little closer so I don't have to shout at you," she told him.

"I'd rather not; your familiar somehow makes you even more of a terrifying badass," Harrys said, still eyeing the cat warily.

"Crookshanks is my familiar?" she asked him, her hands stopping abruptly from where they'd been scratching the cat's ginger ears.

"Oh right, I forgot nobody else can see the bond. Yes, Crookshanks- and seriously, Crookshanks- is your new familiar."

"Did you hear that, Shanky? We're familiars!" Hermione cooed at the orange monstrosity.

"I think he already knows- he's a very smart, if scary, kneazle. He chose you," Harry informed her.

"Come closer, Harry, I think he likes you," Mia prodded her best friend again.

"I'm really much fonder than usual of my left hand at the moment…"

"Pet the cat, Harry." And because literally everyone complied with Hermione when she used that tone, Harry inched forward and gingerly ran his hand along Crookshanks back. Crookshanks purred.

"See? I told you he'd like you, and he's my familiar, so I'd know."

"Yes," Pansy agreed. "Shanky likes Mia, you, and I, Harry, so he obviously has good taste." Just then, the bowlegged kneazle jumped of Hermione's lap and streaked towards Ron, who'd just descended from the boys' dorm with Scabbers in his pocket.

"Ron, your rat!" Pansy yelled as Crookshanks leapt up onto the redhead's shoulder and swiped at his shirt pocket.

"Scabbers!" Ron fretted as the rat leapt from his pocket and ran under the wardrobe, Crookshanks in hot pursuit.

"Hermione- your scary monster-cat is trying to kill my rat; and he's already sick!"

"He's a rat, Ronald, what do you expect? Crookshanks has instincts!" she told him as she pulled her hissing pet away from the wardrobe so Ron could get Scabbers to the safety of the dorms.

"Look at that- he's got another bald spot now!" Ron said as he took the rat upstairs.

Uh oh, Harry thought. Another Ron and Hermione fight is coming.

"Honestly, being upset about a cat chasing a rat," Hermione ranted, as Harry edged carefully backwards; he was not about to get in the middle of this.

"Don't worry Harry," Pansy told him. "The rest of the group has a firm policy of neutrality when they get like this. We shall call it pulling a Switzerland."

"Yes, nobody else need pick sides, even though I'm right," Hermione sort-of agreed. "He'll see sense eventually."

"Yeah, I'm still gonna go read comics in the dorm… Draco, wanna come with?" The blonde nodded, although he'd frankly agree even if Harry suggested they try Grindlylow wrestling.

"Oi, chosen one!" Ginny called after him. "Toss down the next Wonder Woman graphic novel while you're at it, would ya?"

Chapter 13

Having missed the entire first week of classes, Harry was a little bit behind in most of his classes, so Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday were spent buried in a fairly heavy homework load- especially in ancient Runes, where Harry had less time than everyone else to prepare for the Druidic alphabet quiz. By Thursday, however, things were back to normal and he was playing exploding snap with the Weasley twins.

"I win again!" Fred exclaimed gleefully as he pulled the candy in the middle of the table towards himself. Harry, who'd only bet a bag that he'd filled with all the gross Bertie Botts, wasn't too bothered. He'd figured out that last week that the jelly beans were flavoured using special flavouring magic, which he could then feel out with his mage senses. He hadn't had a bad bean since.

It was quieter since Ron and Hermione had reached a tense truce regarding their pets- Scabbers stayed up in the boys' dorm most of the time anyway, since he hadn't been feeling well. Harry was wondering how long it would last.

"Harry, what are we brewing tomorrow?" Ron suddenly asked him.

"Check the syllabus. It's in my bag," he told him distractedly, trying to keep his hand of cards from blowing up again.

"Potions, potions, more potions, geez Harry, where do you keep your school supplies in this med kit?"

"Expanded pocket, top right corner. Oh, and don't fall in," he warned just a bit too late.

"Where'd he even go?" Draco asked, looking at the spot on the floor where Ron had once been.

"I have a little storage room/nuclear bunker in there," Harry said, and everyone stared at him.

"I get really bored in the hospital wing, okay?" he defended. When nobody said anything, he sighed and walked over to the school bag.

"Ron!" he yelled down, "push the red button and climb the rope ladder that pops down."

A moment later, a very disgruntled Ron emerged, sans syllabus. "Bloody hell mate, when did you learn to make pocket dimensions?"

"Over the summer- we had a bonfire for the summer solstice, Flitwick got a little drunk, started talking about archaic magic, you know how it goes…"

"And you didn't take notes?!" Pansy and Hermione screeched in unison.

Harry tiredly pulled some parchment out of his bag and handed it to them. "Did you really think I'd risk getting on your bad side?"

"Next time, give it to us earlier," Pansy told him.

"I may not be actively inhibiting your world domination ambitions, but forgive me for not wanting to be an accessory."

"Ugh, no more Law and Order in the evenings, they're getting self-aware," Pansy signed to Hermione, who nodded sagely.

"Draco, could you please skin my shrivelfig?" Harry asked his friend the next day in potions class.

"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" Seamus snorted from his and Dean's station behind them. Draco turned around and smacked him.

"Stop being such a perv!" the blonde said, thumping him again.

"Malfoy, if you could kindly refrain from beating up your friends until after my class, I'd greatly appreciate it," Snape susurrated from the front of the room.

"Yes sir."

"Draco. The shrivelfig- this is kind of an important step."

"So needy," Draco teased.

"I think our grade is the needy one, Dray, and it needs me to put the shrivelfig in the cauldron in 3…2…1," he finished as Draco handed him the ingredient and he dropped it in softly before stirring clockwise.

"Tentacula spines, please," he said a moment later.

"Hmmm?" Draco murmured, busy staring at the way that one stubborn curl kept falling into Harry's eyes as he stirred, his tongue between his teeth as he counted seconds.

"The next ingredient." Harry's voice was slightly more impatient this time.

"Oh!" Draco exclaimed, reaching for the tentacles and pricking himself. It was a good thing they'd already removed the venom sack… He really had to do something about how distracted he'd been lately.

When they got out of class half an hour later, they were almost hit by a flying Ginny. "Guys guys guys guess what?!" She yelled, Luna smiling sedately behind her.

"I don't know… what?" Neville asked the hyperactive redhead.

"Wood saw me flying during morning break and he wants me to sub in for Harry in the next quidditch game!"

"That's great Gin!" Harry said, relieving her worries that he'd be upset.

"He's really kind of a nervous wreck at the moment- he really wants to win the cup this year," Ginny informed them.

"Yeah, and hags eat kids; tell me something I don't know," Draco snorted.

"Aww, someone getting sarcastic because his team's gonna lose?" Ginny teased.

"Haha, Weaslette, you're going down!" Quidditch trials for Slytherin had been the night before, and Draco had eagerly told them all that Flint had picked him- had gone on about it for forty-five minutes, in fact.

"If you can catch me first- oh, by the way Harry, can I borrow your Nimbus?"

"Sure, just be careful with it."

"Have you seen my room? I'm careful with everything." It was true that Ginny had the only bedroom in the burrow that didn't look like a hurricane hit it.

"There's only two weeks left before the game. Is that even gonna be enough time to learn?" Ron asked his sister, who gave him the middle finger.

"Why do boys always insist on underestimating us? Harry will only have three days between getting his sling removed and playing against Hufflepuff, but no one's questioning if he can do it," Ginny grumbled.

"Hey," Harry put his hand up. "I didn't say anything."

"I didn't say anything either. I'm a good little feminist," Draco said. Seamus, Dean, and Neville all nodded.

"It's not because you're a girl Gin, it's because you're my little sister, Gin, I worry about you… that's all," Ron said.

"Well stop it. I can take care of myself. Better than you can, at least," she stuck her tongue out at him.

"Hey, I survived a few near-death experiences."

"That's nothing. I've survived more than a few just by using the bathroom after you were done with it."

"Ginny! I thought we weren't gonna talk about those," Ron gasped, turning red.

"Quit underestimating your little sister, then, bro, and start fearing me," she waggled her fingers before turning around. "Gotta go, the twins and I have practice. You and Percy can come watch your cool siblings if you want."

"Merlin," Neville turned to Ron as Ginny walked away. "Your sister is so mean sometimes."

"Yeah," agreed Ron. "When we were kids she made me cry a lot."

"I think she's amazing," Luna commented lightly before skipping after her friend.

Chapter 14

"I've never seen someone get quite so violent with a grindlylow," Lupin said in class the next week.

"Yeah, I've got some unresolved anger issues…" Pansy told the teacher, pulling another dismembered grindlylow finger off of her robes. "And the damn thing tried to grab me by the skirt Harry got me for Christmas!"

"Yes, well in the future you'll have to remind me that you and Ms. Granger will have to go last in our lessons- a Grindlylow with one arm is still somewhat useful for a practical demonstration, as I told Hermione, but you've essentially rendered it obsolete for our purposes…" Remus was looking at Harry's two female friends somewhat nervously.

"I really am sorry, Professor," Hermione exclaimed again. "I didn't realise quite how fragile they were, I didn't intend to pull its arm off..."

"I did," Pansy snorted, unapologetic.

"Is it going to be alright, Professor?" Harry asked.

"Oh, it will eventually regrow the arms, much like a lizard when its tail is cut, but I really wouldn't be too concerned Harry. They enjoy eating children, so one fewer in the Black Lake is not a great loss."

"And yet it's considered rude when I say the same thing about Pansy," Blaise quipped, and Pansy smacked him.

"Our mothers put us in a crib together one time, and I was teething, Zabini- when are you going to just let it go?!"

"Considering she made one of her first friends by biting him, is it really so strange that her socialising techniques are so unconventional?" Ron asked.

Lupin eventually called for silence. "This was supposed to take the rest of the class period, but I obviously didn't plan for this group. So, for the remainder of the period, please pair up and turn your books to the chapter on poltergeists- five points to the group with the best idea for a prank on Peeves." There was a chorus of cheers from the assembled students, and Ron, Harry, and Draco became a group of three due to the odd number of students in the class.

"Would it be cheating if we tried to use Myrtle?" Ron asked.

"We can't- even if she was at our beck and call, which she isn't because she has her own life- er, afterlife, Fridays at 11 are when she does counselling sessions in the bathroom," Harry said.

"Myrt is doing counselling sessions now?" Draco asked.

"Yeah, for kids who are having trouble adjusting. She's trying to keep busy these days."

"That's so great for her!" Draco enthused.

"Guys?" Ron reminded them, "we've kinda got an assignment…

"Oh, right," Harry and Draco said at the same time, and then blushed brilliantly as they realised they'd spoken in unison.

They did end up winning with their suggestion to conjure a muggle vacuum cleaner and suck Peeves into it. Pansy and Hermione had a list of ideas that were admittedly much more creative than theirs, but they were all deemed "too violent," or "dear Merlin, girls, this is a schoolyard prank, not a full-scale tactical assault." Those two really brought out… something in each other. Harry was pretty sure they were illegally brewing Polyjuice potion in the girls' bathroom, just for fun. Although, Harry supposed he really shouldn't blame Pansy for Hermione's behaviour- she had set Snape on fire their first year, after all.

"The first quidditch match is tomorrow; are you bummed you're not going to be able to play?" Seamus asked Harry as they walked to lunch. Dean knocked him upside the head.

"What? It's not like he doesn't know he's side-lined," the Irish boy defended himself. Neville sighed- they'd need to give Seamus another manners seminar in the dorm soon. Pity, they'd just had a things we don't light on fire seminar last week…

"I mean, kinda, I really miss flying, but I've only got four more weeks before the sling comes off, and besides- I'm really happy for Ginny. She's a great seeker."

"Yeah, she's bloody aggressive, too," Ron added. "Draco, be careful about trying anything too Slytherin- she has no qualms about hexing people mid-air."

"I seem to remember you learned that the hard way the summer after our first year…" Harry had been in the hospital wing at the time, but Draco and the Weasleys would never forget how Ron tried to pull a sneaky feint right as Ginny was about to score and got a bat-bogey hex instead: Ginny had been taking full advantage of the fact that she had a wand but couldn't be penalized for using it that summer, as she wasn't technically a Hogwarts student at the time.

"I was sneezing bats for two days!" Ron complained. "Muggles say redheads have no soul, but it's just her, I'm telling you."

Harry thought that being conscious but knowing that someone else was about to play in a quidditch match for the glory of their house was a distinctly different but no less valid type of anxiety, and it took several dirty looks from Madame Pomphrey at the head table before he could muster up the appetite to finish his breakfast.

Across the table, Ginny was having the opposite problem as Oliver kept flitting around and trying to give her last-minute tips while she ate. He eventually stopped when she lobbed a spoonful of oatmeal that hit him square in the nose.

About ten minutes after the team left, the rest of the group made their way down to the stands, Harry wearing the scarf and jumper that Draco had gotten him in Hogsmeade. The entire pitch was packed, as Slytherin-Gryffindor matches always drew a crowd, and they'd had to climb

nearly to the top before they found good seats after vetoing Pansy's idea to kick first and second years out of some of the closer seats.

"Captains shake hands!" Hooch's shrill voice called out, and it was hard to ignore the sexual tension between Oliver and Flinch as they held on far longer than strictly necessary.

"And they're off!" Lee Jordan yelled from the commentary box. "Slytherin lobs the quaffle, nice block by Gryffindor, oh, Slytherin keeper seems to be employing a more conservative strategy. Not much really going on there at the moment; let's take a quick look at our seekers, Ginny and Draco, who are currently at opposite ends of the pitch, circling each other like two prowling tigers, or that awful cat Hermione's got that's always terrorizing the common room-"

"Mr. Jordan!" McGonagall chastised, although whether it was because he was straying off topic or offended at the insult to her feline kin, she wasn't entirely sure.

Another twenty minutes went by smoothly; the score was 30-20 with Slytherin in the lead, which had Pansy looking very smug.

"Oh, it looks like Ginny's spotted the snitch, she's going into a dive, matched stride for stride by Draco, come on- faster Ginny, and oh- lost again," Lee facepalmed as Minerva reminded him he was supposed to be a neutral commentator. Both seekers stopped in mid-air, breathing heavily, and the game went on for another fifteen minutes, uninterrupted, with the score still even.

Draco was getting a little bored- watching Harry play quidditch always made it look more action-packed than his first game was turning out. Speaking of Harry…

His tan skin was flushed with excitement as he watched the game, cheering for Weaslette, naturally. Draco supposed he couldn't fault him that, but why did he have to look so cute doing it? His hair was an absolute mess in the wind, and Luna was idly playing with a curl by his ear, pulling it and letting go so she could watch it boing back into place. His green eyes were sparkling, prettier than all his mother's prized emerald's…

Draco suddenly felt a rush of air by his ear and almost fell off his broom when he saw Ginny stopped right in front of him, holding the snitch with a cheeky grin. He'd lost his first game- because he was staring at Harry… oh Merlin, this was a problem.

They landed their brooms and Marcus was just launching into his lecture ("THE SNITCH WAS RIGHT THERE, MALFOY! HOW DID YOU NOT SEE THAT?") when he felt a sweeping cold and was flooded with memories of his father. He was trying to push away the little voice in his head that was saying he could escape. Sirius did, what's to stop Lucius? He could come back, he could hurt you again; he was trying to look at Harry. The dementors were even worse for his best friend- was he okay?

If Draco had been able to look Harry's direction, he would have seen that his friend had gone pale, and all the students were screaming as one of the horrid creatures headed right for him, reaching out a scaly, scabbed, rotting hand when-

Slash! Pansy had pulled a dagger out of her boot and, although she was pale and shaking, had lopped the appendage off the dementor with unflinching accuracy.

"Bite me, you bastard!" she yelled, her voice a lot stronger than she felt. The hand grew back in the time it took to blink, but she didn't stop. She had stepped all the way in front of Harry,

who Hermione was helping stand to evacuate, as per their plan, but Merlin, there were dozens of them.

She stabbed again, aiming straight for the midsection. The knife sliced through robes and putrid flesh and she was squirted with a black liquid that she assumed substituted for blood in whatever horrid hell-verse these monsters came from. She was vaguely aware of the teachers sending out some silvery shapes that were gradually driving them away, but by some cruel misfortune, they were rather far away from any of them. Pansy felt the cold and the numb feeling of depression, but she used them as fuel for her burning anger- she was like a warrior who, in the haze of battle, could feel no pain, not even the black blood covering her hands and arms and sizzling against her flesh.

"Die! Die! DIIIIEEEE!" she screamed, infuriated. Harry was one of hers- her friend, who'd saved Draco from the emotional hell that his father had put him through. No one hurt her own. Pansy had always had a hot temper, and her parents had handled it by putting her in all sorts of martial arts and fighting lessons. She was still stabbing the demonic creature in a frenzy of fury, using it as a substitute for all the people she'd never been allowed to punch in the face, when a silver doe finally knocked into the creature, and Pansy fell back against the seat where Harry had been. Luckily, he was no longer there; Hermione had the unconscious boy against her chest a few yards away, brandishing her own wand, her afro having worked its way out of the elastic to fall loose about her face like the halo of an avenging goddess. She did a quick recon- everyone else was safe, Draco sitting forlorn but alive down on the field, Seamus and Dean hugging each other and shaking but still lucid; Luna's normally dreamy silver eyes were glassy and haunted, and Ginny was climbing shakily but determinedly through the stands to reach her. Neville looked shell- shocked but unharmed; the Weasley twins likewise. Everyone was okay; it was only then that she allowed herself an awareness of her own body and the intense, blistering burns on her hands and forearms.

So that's why nobody stabs dementors was her last thought before she, like Harry, succumbed to the blackness.

Chapter 15

Harry hovered nervously around Pansy's bed as Madame Pomphrey bandaged her arms.

"Mr. Potter, I will tell you one more time- back to your bed. You've only just woken up."

"But Pansy-"

"Will be okay. She'll just be your bandage buddy for a couple weeks."

"This is all my fault," he moaned, and Minerva, who had been in the room the entire time, eventually picked Harry gently up, bridal-style, and carried him back to bed.

"Kitten, be reasonable," she told him gently but firmly. "You are not responsible for Ms. Parkinson's being brave- or insane- enough to attack a dementor with a muggle dagger, and you are not responsible for her actions. As for being the type of person that people care for enough to defend- I would not let Draco blame himself for the hippogriff incident and I certainly won't tolerate such nonsense from my son!" She had been ranting so hard she hadn't realised that she'd proclaimed Harry as her son out loud, but when she heard it, she clapped a hand over her mouth. Merlin forbid Harry thought she was trying to take Lily's place…

Harry, seeing the inner battle in her eyes, didn't comment directly but instead squeezed her hand in his. "Okay," he said, agreeing with her order not to be so hard on himself. He sat quietly on the bed while Poppy finished with Pansy, who came to awareness almost immediately as soon as the last bandage was tied.

"Die!" she yelled, taking a swing at the medi-witch, who backed up.

"Ms. Parkinson, you're in the hospital wing. Kindly rein in your battle instincts."

"Sorry ma'am," she said, dropping her bandaged hands from where they were in a standard fighting position in front of her face. "What was that shite?" she asked, referring to the dementor blood.

"Language, young lady," Poppy chastised. "But in answer to your question, dementor blood is a highly corrosive acid. You're lucky you have a strong constitution; by some miracle you will regain full use of your hands, and in only two weeks at that- I've never seen anything like it. You will, however, be permanently scarred, and I'm afraid it will be rather unsightly."

"Fuck being pretty," she said, completely ignoring Madame Pomphrey's warning to watch her mouth. "I'm a badass and I'm gonna cut all the sleeves off my robes to show it."

"Normally I'd tell you that that violates school dress code, Ms. Parkinson, but as you saved Harry, you're more than welcome to gallivant around the school in a bathing suit if you wish," Minerva told the young Slytherin.

"Don't tell her that, Mins, or she will do it," Harry groaned.

"Damn right I will, golden boy. Now eat your chocolate and don't you dare feel bad about this, or my awesomely scarred hands will slap you into next week." Harry hurried to comply.

"When can we get out of here?" she then asked, turning to Madame Pomphrey.

"I will keep you both overnight and you can be back in classes by Monday, although you will find yourself unable to hold anything for the next two weeks, I'm afraid. However, anyone who's first instinct upon seeing a dementor is to attack it with a knife is surely able to come up with a creative solution to the problem."

"How come she only has to stay one night?" Harry whinged, looking at Poppy with an expression of betrayal.

"She is an amazingly fast healer, Mr. Potter, and frankly, I'm afraid of what she will do to my hospital wing if I keep her longer than absolutely necessary." Pansy smiled like the cat that got the canary and smiled wider when Poppy said their friends could come in for a few minutes.

Harry knocked nervously on Lupin's door the next day after lunch.

"Come in!" the man called.

Harry steeled himself, squaring his uninjured shoulder and forcing his voice to sound more confident than he felt. "I know that last night was the full moon, Professor, so I won't keep you for long because I'm sure you're tired, but I need to ask you something."

"Ask away, cub," Remus smiled at him kindly, and this set Harry a little more at ease.

"I need- one of my friends was hurt because I can't handle myself around the dementors. Those silver animals; I looked them up- I know it's hard, but I need to learn how to make one."

Remus inhaled; Harry was trying to take on something far above his age, and he wanted to warn him that this might just be too much, but Harry didn't let him finish.

"I won't take no for an answer, sir." He drew himself up to his full height, diminutive as it was, and the look in his eyes made Remus think that not since Lily died had anyone reminded him of her so strongly. "Teach me the Patronus Charm."

Chapter 16

Lupin pulled Minerva aside after dinner that night to inform her of Harry's request (and his subsequent acquiesce) that he teach him the Patronus charm.

"I know," she said. "He told me. I must admit I find myself a bit concerned that he is so determined to take on such a difficult task, but it does seem a good thing for him to learn, if he is able to do it…" she trailed off. "I do hope you won't be using actual dementors," she finished, sharply.

"I would never," Lupin promised his old professor solemnly. "Based on his reaction to the dementors, I'd say it's a safe bet to assume his boggart would assume the form of one. Even if not, I could at least have him learn the spell and be able to cast it in general, and hopefully he will eventually gain the proficiency to cast it under pressure."

"Very well," Minerva agreed. "But you have to promise me you won't let him push himself too hard; he will never ask to stop of his own volition. He has the tendency to push himself until he drops."

"I promise I will take it slow with him," Remus said. "But Minerva, I need to know… what happened to him? Albus was so adamant that he live with the muggles- how did you ever convince him otherwise?"

Minerva's eyes sparked dangerously. "I'm telling you this in confidence, Remus, because Harry is very sensitive about it, so I trust you won't bring it up." She waited for Remus' nod before continuing. "He was abused, Remus. Poppy said it was… it was, the worst case she'd ever seen." The professor's voice broke and she had to wipe her eyes with a hankie. "And that was just from the physical evidence. I still don't know very much of what… what went on in that house. He doesn't like to talk about it, and I- I am not at a stage in which I have the emotional strength to hear it all."

Remus growled, sounding feral, and his eyes were very lupine despite it being twenty-nine days until the next full moon. "Albus promised me he was happy- I asked as often as I could afford the postage, and the answer never changed."

"Albus didn't check- he assumed that as long as the blood wards were working, everything was alright," Minnie harrumphed. "He came to Hogwarts scrawny, in oversized clothes, and so short he looked two to three years younger than he was. He asked to stay at Hogwarts for the summer. When I talked to Albus about it, he promised me that although there was no love lost between them, Harry's family provided well for all his physical needs. For a man so in love with his elaborate plans, fact-checking was clearly not his priority in Harry's case." The wind began to pick up in the abandoned classroom they'd chosen for their discussion, and Minnie had to take a deep breath before she could say her next bit. Lupin felt a sense of foreboding due to the mere fact that there was clearly more.

"I… some of his birthday gifts were misdirected to Privet Drive. I found them in the cupboard under the stairs, but the most concerning thing was that there was an old dirty cot, and some childish drawings. I pressed Petunia until she admitted that the cupboard under the stairs had been Harry's bedroom until the first Hogwarts letter came, despite the fact that there were not one,

but two spare rooms they could have put him in." Remus growled again, and Minerva held up her hand for silence.

"Then Petunia's awful sister-in-law, who was visiting, started saying all these awful things about my child, who is really the most wonderful, darling little thing I've ever had the pleasure of teaching, and about James and Lily, like how they were useless, unemployed drunks, and I lost it. I blew the woman up like a helium balloon."

"James and Lily are no doubt very proud of you, from wherever they're watching," was all Remus was able to say, trying to avoid the more painful topic.

"I'm telling you this, Remus, because he's got a lot of horrible memories- far more than pleasant ones, and I need you to be mindful of that."

"I will Minerva, I swear it." This was the first time Remus had ever used the professor's first name, but the solemn intimacy of the agreement seemed to demand it.

Up in the Gryffindor tower, the children were having far more pleasant conversations as they finished up their homework and studying and clicked on the telly set.

"No, not the muggle shopping channel again. We don't need any more miracle coffee- the twins were practically vibrating for a week," Pansy scolded.

"And we will have you know that it was a useful experiment- we are going to be putting them in our new Bouncing Biscuits," Fred said, indignant.

"What's the actual purpose of that?" Ron asked.

"HUMAN POGO STICKS!" Ginny cried out.

"I will never forgive you for getting her one of those for her birthday, by the way," Ron told Harry and Hermione. "She nearly crushed my foot on a daily basis."

"Your foot would be lucky to be graced by my magnificent mass," his little sister retorted, unapologetic.

"You'll love having a younger sibling, Ronnikins; you can teach them things and they'll look up to you," Ron said in a poor Mrs. Weasley impression.

"Ooh, stop here!" Pansy cut in suddenly. "That's so Raven!"

"I love that show," Luna agreed, showing slightly more excitement than usual.

"I wish Raven Samone was our Divination instructor," Pansy sighed. "She can actually make decent predictions."

"I'm telling you babe," Hermione told her, "just drop the class and take Arithmancy with me. Neither one of us are benefitting from you sitting through Trelawney's snore-fests."

"You know, I just might. I should do it now, while it's still early enough and also while I've got some sympathy points with the professors," she agreed, holding up her bandaged hands.

"Damn it Pans, when you're injured you have everyone wrapped around your little finger, but I so much as sneeze and suddenly everyone's trying to tie me to my bed," Harry complained.

"Well my darling golden boy, that's because you're adorable and your tiny little face says 'vulnerable puppy,' whereas I'm a badass who can frighten with a look," she informed him, popping some of the muggle chewing gum she and Hermione had stocked up on over the summer.

"I do not look like a vulnerable puppy! You know I can do wandless magic…"

"I didn't say you couldn't fight, baby darling, just that you looked like you couldn't. I have a certain… je ne sais quoi when it comes to promoting an image."

"Well then, make me seem scarier," Harry demanded.

"Oh darling, even I'm not capable of doing the impossible. Besides, why would I do that when for 12 years, I was never allowed to have a kitten? You and your tiny little paws have achieved my life-long dream," she drawled.

"One day I'm gonna cough a fur-ball all over your pillow."

"You still have the sling for four weeks, and by then I can have an anti-Harry warding system clinging to my bed like a canopy."

"You can't hold a wand for another two weeks, and the one thing I have on you, Pans, is the ability to work without one," Harry quipped. "Besides, I could totally see your wards."

"Even if you see them, they can still get you," Pansy sing-songed.

"That's what people say about us!" Fred and George exclaimed. Everyone simultaneously rolled their eyes.

"Oh, by the way Harry, you have to take notes for us in your Patronus lessons," Hermione ordered during the next commercial break.

"How did you guys know about that? I haven't even said anything!"

"We know everything," Pansy whisper-shouted dramatically.

Neville rolled his eyes at the two- honestly, how much of their plotting time was devoted to theatrics? (The answer, by the way, is 32.6 %, but that is classified information). "Really Harry, you're highly predictable. The dementors try to come at you again, Pansy gets hurt trying to defend you- which, by the way, is absolutely not your fault; that girl has been wanting to stab something for way too long- so you decide that you have to be able to do everything yourself because you are afraid to ask for help. A flobberworm could have figured it out."

The others looked at him, mouths open. "When did you get so sassy, Nev?" Dean asked him.

"Between Harry, Pansy, Ginny, and Draco, and Hermione, I'm convinced it's contagious," the formerly-quiet boy snorted. The others shared a look- he had a point.

Chapter 17

Harry's first dementor lesson was on Tuesday, and he took a deep breath before he knocked on Lupin's door. He was… nervous, to say the least, about these lessons. He wanted to get to know the professor better, and he desperately needed to be able to conjure a Patronus, but he was nervous about the sort of things that might come up when dealing with a charm that relies primarily on memories. He had been on the cusp, a few times since the quidditch game, of running to Severus' office and asking him if he could cast a Patronus, and if so, could he teach him instead, because the potions professor already knew as much about his life at the Dursleys as he'd ever said out loud, and it didn't make him cry like it did Minnie. Additionally, he and Severus already had a repertoire, and their relationship was familiar. But he'd asked Remus because he wanted to get to know him, and he wasn't going to back a way. He knocked on the door.

"Come in," Remus called.

"Hullo sir," Harry greeted shyly.

"Good afternoon Harry. While we are outside of class, you are more than welcome to call me Remus," the professor told him kindly.

"Okay…Remus," Harry tested the familiarity on his tongue, and it was slightly awkward, but easier than it had been with Minnie and Severus, who he'd known as professors for a year before he got to know them as people.

"We are just going to be practicing the charm without the addition of anything resembling a dementor, but first I'd like to ask you a question."

"Go ahead," Harry agreed, looking warily at Remus.

"If you had gotten to face the boggart, what form do you think it would have taken?"

Harry was slightly surprised by the question, as it didn't seem relevant, but he thought about it nonetheless. What would it be… Vernon, maybe, or Voldemort. He was comparing the fear factor of the two biggest monsters in his life when suddenly the image of a scabby hand reaching forth from a black cloak overtook the image of both of them.

"A dementor!" he gasped as he realised. "That was really clever, professor," he complimented, and Remus' scarred face stretched into a smile.

"Thank you, Harry. As morbid as it may sound out of context, I was hoping that would be your answer, as a boggart is easy to procure and will make our later lessons far more realistic. But let's just start with the incantation- Expecto Patronum."

"I need a guardian," Harry translated. "Fairly simple."

Remus looked surprised for a moment. "You speak Latin, Harry?" He was surprised he still remembered, it was so long ago…

"Yeah, but I don't know how I learned it- unless you'd have any idea, professor?" he asked, seeing something in his face.

"I'm afraid I can't help you there, Harry." He lied by omission. If Professor McGonagall hadn't told him, it certainly wasn't his place…

"Oh," the student's face fell a bit before he gathered his wand. "Expecto Patronum, alright. What's next?"

"The wand motion works like this," Remus said, making a motion as if his wand was a sword that he was using to block an offending attack. "Although that is not as important in this spell, and I understand that you have an unusual prowess without one, anyway, so the most important thing is to find a happy memory, the happiest memory you can think of."

The happiest memory Harry could think of… he certainly had more now than he had a year before, but still, there was nothing that immediately came to mind as the glowing moment of his young life. He also didn't want to choose something too personal, in case Remus asked him what it was. Maybe- the night he found out he was a wizard. That was a good, safe choice. He pulled it to the forefront of his mind and tried the spell.

"Expecto Patronum!" he bellowed, pulling his wand in front of his chest in a defensive stance before pointing it straight ahead. A weak silver mist emerged from the tip.

"That's wonderful, Harry! An incorporeal Patronus on your first try- I must admit myself impressed," Lupin praised.

"A bit of mist won't do much against a dementor," Harry grit his teeth. "Let me try again."

The next hour produced a lot more silver mist as Harry cycled through various pleasant but impersonal day-to-day memories, and he kept chanting the spell until Remus called a stop for the day.

"That's some wonderful progress you made, Harry, and I'm very proud of you cub. Same time next Tuesday?" Harry nodded, slightly disappointed in himself despite Remus' effusive (and genuine) praise and encouragement.

Minnie knew the lesson hadn't gone the way Harry hoped when he trudged into his room that night instead of going to the dorm.

"You're not sleeping with your friends tonight, kitten?" she asked in a neutral tone, making sure not to sound pushy or accusatory.

"No- I told them I just wanted some time alone tonight to think, and they understood. I have great friends." He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. Minnie sensed that was all he wanted to say, and she was just relieved he wanted to share anything with her at all, so she kissed him goodnight and tucked the blankets around him before she went to her office to finish grading her O.W.L students' essays.

Harry waited until Minnie had been gone for five minutes before he took out his wand again. He wasn't going to be able to relax until he made some more progress. He thought very carefully for a few moments. Minnie made him happier than he'd ever been, and now that he wasn't being watched, there had to be something…

His mind snagged on Saturday, in the hospital wing. With everything that had been going on that day, and his worry and guilt over Pansy's injury, it almost slipped his mind, but Minnie had called him her son. Minnie thought of him not just as a ward or someone to take care of, but her own kin, someone so important to her that he might as well share her blood. It was momentous, and there had been so much going on that he'd pushed it aside to think about later. But now it was later.

He pondered the implications of well and truly having someone, of having a family. They weren't just playing at it, they were mother and son. Of course, he still missed his parents, but they weren't coming back, and didn't Minnie tell him he deserved to be happy, even if he didn't really believe it fully himself yet? Hadn't others told him as well, like Hermione, the smartest person he knew, and even Severus Snape, who so rarely wished happiness for anyone?

He had a mother now- Minnie wasn't just keeping him because no one else was, she was keeping him because she truly wanted him, wanted him forever. The sensation of truly feeling like he belonged, and of the firm and final knowledge that the niggling feeling he'd had of insecurity in this new dynamic being just that- a senseless worry- was overwhelming, but in the best way. For the first time in years, tears were streaming freely down his face, but they were happy tears. He bottled that feeling, shoved it deep in his heart and his mind to keep there forever, the same way he'd compartmentalized the Dursleys 'lessons' so deeply they'd become part of his psyche, then he lifted his wand.

"Expecto Patronum," he whispered, as a shape emerged, dazzlingly brilliant, from his wand.

Minerva hadn't been able to focus on anything but her worry over Harry, and it was after she realised that she'd marked the same essay three times- with different grades- that she'd tiptoed to the door of his room. She cracked it open very softly, hoping to reassure herself with his angelic sleeping face, when she saw him sitting up in bed. She was about to burst in, afraid his injury was bothering him, when she realised he was holding his wand and whispering a spell. Her feline ears picked up the incantation a split second before a brilliant stag burst out of his wand and galloped around the room for a moment before disappearing. Harry must have been so absorbed in his concentration and subsequent success that he didn't even have his mage senses extended, because he didn't look towards the door or give any other sign he was aware of her presence before he collapsed back against the pillows, a smile on his face.

The tabby animagus shut the door gently and quietly crept away, her cheeks wet. For though it hadn't been as long for her as it had for Harry, she too cried happy tears that night.

Chapter 18

Chapter Summary

Just some fluffy fun and also some more badass Pansy because she's demanding more screen time (I've lost control of her- oh dear...)

Harry's next lesson with Lupin went very well; he was able to summon a Patronus every single time. Remus hadn't asked about his memory, but he had teared up when he saw Harry's Patronus and told him with a lump in his throat that his father had the same one. To ease the emotion, he'd said that during the next lesson they could start with the boggart. That was pretty much the most exciting thing that happened that week until Saturday, when Pansy came downstairs (she must have spent the night in the Gryffindor dorm with Hermione) with her hands unbandaged and, as Pomphrey said, very noticeably scarred.

"Ahhh, such a relief to be able to put on my own eyeliner again: wings so sharp they can kill a man," she sighed pleasantly, brushing her hair out of her face.

"You know, some of your expressions are rather frightening," Ron told her.

"That's the intention, Weasel," she smirked.

"Why do you all insist on calling me Weasel?"

"Term of endearment."

While Ron and Pansy had another of their friendly spats, Harry looked enviously at her unbandaged hands. He still had two weeks in the sling, but the wound had reached his least favourite stage of the healing process: when it was just beginning to scar and it itched… so badly. He backed up slightly until his back was against the rough stone wall. And just scooch a little this way, down, to the side, rub a little, increase the friction and…. Ahhh, that's better. A little faster, up, down, press a little harder and oh, sweet relief. He technically knew this wasn't a good idea, but just a few more minutes….

Smack! One of Pansy's newly freed hands came down with a vengeance on his good arm. "Harry James Potter!" she scolded, fists on her hips. "Stop that; you're going to open the wound again."

Harry reluctantly pulled away from the wall and looked up at Pansy. "But…"

"Don't you dare finish that sentence. Go ask Snape for a potion or something."

"But that's all the way down there, and the wall is right there…" Pansy shot him another look.

"Alright, alright, I'm going. Draco, come with?" He could get his friend to scratch his back on the way down.

"I know your games, golden boy. I'm taking you down. You have that blonde pixie wrapped around your finger," Pansy told him, grabbing him by the hand and taking him towards the portrait, ignoring Draco's indignant screeching.

"Pansy, you really don't have to-" Harry began, but Pansy silenced him with a scarred finger against his lips.

"I'm the mom friend; it's what I do."

"Your idea of a good time is throwing daggers at things."

"So what- I can't be the mom friend and the murder friend at the same time?" she asked- far too nonchalantly, in Harry's opinion. She slapped him again. Had she read his mind?

"Get your nails away from those bandages, mister!" Oh, he'd been scratching again. Thank Merlin… a Pansy who could do legilimancy is a Pansy that would be one step closer to taking over the world- and the path was already too clear for her. He was also certain that if anyone could do legilimancy without him feeling the magic probing at him, it would be her. He shuddered.

"You cold?" she asked him, stripping off her robe and putting it around him, revealing a tank top and shorts that showed off her muscular limbs.

"No, I was thinking about you taking over the world again," he told her honestly.

"Shhh," she patted his head. "You'll be my beloved pet; no harm will befall you."

"That… doesn't make me feel any better."

"Oh look!" she said, ignoring Harry's last comment. "We've reached the dungeons."

Harry reached his hand up to knock on the door, but Pansy burst right in. "Sevvy, it's your two faves!"

Harry looked at her in horror. He had just gotten comfortable calling the professor by his first name and Pansy just busts in unannounced and calls him Sevvy?! The potions professor looked similarly disenchanted, although not surprised.

"Ahhh, Pansy. What a… pleasure. Harry, nod twice if you're being held against your will," he drawled.

"I… I'm not even sure at this point, professor," Harry told him honestly.

"The doofus is scratching at his shoulder like the insubordinate kitten he is. Don't you have like, some goop or something for that?"

"Some goop or something… god help us… Harry, sit down and have Pansy help you take off the sling. I'll go get the anti-itching salve."

Pansy put him in a desk and pulled the sling off gently by the time Severus made it out of the storeroom with a jar of lavender-coloured salve. "Alright Ms. Parkinson, you're welcome to leave now."

"Harry's my friend. I'll stay with him," she said determinedly, crossing her arms, and by Merlin… the scars did make her look more intimidating- it hadn't seemed possible.

Harry looked at Severus- Pansy had never seen him without his robes, and he really didn't like people seeing all his scars. Severus looked back at Harry.

"It's your decision Harry, but someone who sees you frequently is going to have to help you apply this three times a day, and Pansy would probably cry less than Minerva," the teacher told him in broken Latin (he would never admit it, but yes, he had begun studying Latin so that he could have a private conversation with Harry if need be; if anyone ever found out, he resolved to kill them immediately after). Pansy added learn Latin to her and Mia's to-do list.

"Alright Pans, you can stay," he told her reluctantly as Professor Snape helped him remove his bandages. When she saw his tremendously scarred back, the Hippogriff wound standing out in stark relief as the newest (and reddest), she bit back her surprise, as well as her anger at the Dursleys.

"Your scars are cooler than mine, no fair! Fuck you Potter," she exclaimed, and it said a lot about her friendship with Harry that she made fuck you seem like the most comforting phrase he could ever hear.

"Thank Pans," he told her, relieved. "And just, don't tell anyone about this, yeah? None of my other friends have seen them."

"Got it: if anyone finds out, I kill them."

"Pansy no!" Harry and Severus yelled out at the same time.

Chapter 19

"How'd your Patronus lesson go today? With the boggart and all that?" Pansy asked him Tuesday night as she rubbed the lavender ointment into his shoulder and back.

"It was… okay, I guess. I managed to conjure a corporeal Patronus with the dementor- boggart once, towards the end, but it's still inconsistent. I need to be better, especially with all the dementors guarding the school. The Hufflepuff-Gryffindor match is in less than two weeks- what if the dementors come again?" Harry unloaded his worries as Pansy's deft hands rebandaged his wound.

"I'm gonna be honest with you Harry- the dementors don't seem very responsive to Dumbledore's authority, so I think there is a good chance that they might try to come at you again," Pansy told him. Harry appreciated her refusal to offer empty platitudes just to make him feel better.

"Well I know you wouldn't expect the worst and not have a plan, so what do we do about it?" he asked her.

"We find another boggart- one that's not in a locked staff room. And we practice until you can conjure it consistently. In the meantime, Hermione and I work on our own Patronuses, because I'd really rather not stab another one of those- too acidic. When it's time, we'll be ready," she said, fastening his sling and tightening the strap until everything was in place.

"Is it a bad idea to be alone with a boggart- without an adult there?"

"Nah, it'll be fine. Hermione and I can do the riddikulus charm, no problem," she waved a discoloured hand dismissively.

"So, where do we find a boggart- and how?" Harry wondered aloud.

"Who knows the castle better than anyone?" Pansy prodded.

"Uh, Dumbledore? The twins? Filch, before he got fired?" Harry tried, completely at a loss.

"No, Harry. The ones who know it best are the ones we never see, unless we need them, of course…" Pansy tried again, patiently. She found that boys often needed to have their hands held through processes involving anything above simple cognizance.

"The house elves!" There it is, Pansy mentally congratulated herself.

"Yep- if there's a boggart that a student can get access to without risking too much trouble, they'll know," she said.

"Hey Plonky!" Harry called suddenly, and Minerva's elf popped into the room.

"Yes, little master Harry?" the creature asked deferentially.

"We're looking for a good place to practice a Patronus. Do you know where we could find a boggart without breaking any school rules?" Contrary to popular belief, Harry would rather not

break rules or risk getting into trouble unless there was no other way.

"Yes, little Master. On the seventh floor, past this painting of the trolls dancing the ballet, there is being a wall where if you's be walking past it three times, it be giving you whatever you's be needing. The elves be calling it the come-and-go-room."

"Thanks so much, Plonky!" Harry was relieved he could get some extra practice without risking doing something that could get him in trouble and thus disappoint Minnie.

"We start tomorrow during study break; I'll let Hermione know," Pansy ordered before kissing him on the cheek. "G'night golden boy, don't do anything stupid without me there to watch you."

The next day, Harry was on the seventh floor by the painting Plonky mentioned waiting for Pans and Mione when they came, surprising him by dragging Draco in tow.

"Hey Dray," Harry said, and the nickname had a blush creeping up Draco's neck and into his cheeks. "I didn't think you were interested in such a hard spell." Everyone knew he was taking Patronus lessons, but Hermione and Pansy had been the only ones who asked for his notes…

"When he heard we were gonna be doing a training session with you, he was all for coming along. I told him he can just watch us today, since we only have an hour and a half to train until lunch," Hermione informed him.

"Okay," Harry agreed, smiling at the other boy, who blushed again. Harry wondered why he was being so quiet but didn't think now was the time to ask. "So, I think we just walk up and down the hallway three times…"

They did so, thinking about a room with a boggart and space to cast the spell, and a chair for Draco to watch. Sure enough, as soon as the turned and walked back towards the painting a third time, a wooden door appeared in what had before been a solid stone wall. Pushing it open cautiously, Harry saw a rattling wardrobe just like the one he used with Remus. He extended his mage senses and felt inside of the wardrobe, and it felt the same as the boggart he'd faced on Tuesday- a vague, indistinct sense of dread inside of its hiding place. When it came out, he knew it would feel, while not exactly a dementor, close enough to one that he didn't really have the mental distance from the situation to dwell on the difference.

"Are you ready?" Hermione asked him, after he took his stance in the centre of the room. On his nod, Pansy shot a spell at the wardrobe, and it burst open.

Hoping to start on a good note, Harry had pulled the happy feeling associated with his memory to the front of his mind. Living in an abusive household, he had learned to compartmentalize his feelings and separate them from his actions when need be. It was coming in useful for this spell- having to be able to hide emotions at the drop of a hat also made it easier to find them as well. He'd tried to explain his process to Pansy and Hermione the other night, when they were asking him for tips, but he didn't think he'd been able to describe it properly; he wasn't quite sure how to put it into words himself.

The point was, he'd produced his Patronus with relative ease the first time, and roughly every third time after that- the girls had brought plenty of chocolate. It was better than it had been yesterday when he'd started with the Boggart, but it still wasn't where he wanted. He was so

caught up in his concentration that he didn't even notice Draco and even Pansy and Hermione giving his glowing stag awed looks.

Although the girls couldn't use the Boggart because theirs wouldn't be a dementor, they were still having trouble and had yet to produce more than mist. While Harry was used to hiding his emotions, it didn't mean he didn't have them or wasn't in touch with them; he was very sensitive and empathetic. The same could not be said for his two friends: Hermione was very logic-driven. Anything unquantifiable was bound to give her more trouble. Hermione put spells together like a formula: a perfectly pronounced incantation combined with a wand movement so precisely memorized it was almost mechanical and just the right amount of power. There was no formula for happiness and trying to truly let herself fall into a memory and put her academic inclinations in the background was a stumbling block.

Pansy was used to fuelling her magic with determination and anger and a desire to prove everyone who had ever underestimated her was a fuel. To find a memory of pure happiness, one that her cynical mind could not pick apart and one whose joy did not come from a place of spiteful satisfaction was proving to be more difficult than she had thought. She was a true Slytherin- everything she did could be weighed and categorized by value- even personal value. The first time she shot an arrow at the target and hit a bullseye, her first kiss at eleven with a muggle girl from the village nearby, the first time she held her wand and realised that the power inside her was hers to control now- they were all ranked by how much value they had in comparison to another, and the emotions resulting were felt through the filter of her ambition. To be happy simply because she was happy, and not because that happy memory had represented a step forward for her or otherwise benefitted her- that was something new, and although she would never admit it, somewhat frightening. If she allowed herself to melt into an emotion simply because she wanted to feel it and not because it offered something- would that lead her off track?

Pansy looked at Harry, who had, for the first time, cast two successful Patronuses in a row at the boggart. What was it that drew her to him? While she did have a desire to protect him, that wasn't why she cared for him so much- he was more than capable of protecting himself. Yes, he'd saved Draco, but she hadn't just thanked him, she'd grown closer and closer to him, become part of his group, had grown to feel such platonic love for him that she would face down a hellish demon for him. What was making this spell so much easier for him? While he was obviously unusually powerful- more powerful than her, she was forced to admit, although she could definitely hold her own just as well- that wasn't a factor. All the power in the world was of no use if the possessor couldn't control it.

Harry… Harry was kind, with an innocence and a capacity to love that was nearly frightening in its intensity. He could forgive and connect with and understand others on a level that made it nearly impossible not to care for and love him in return. Pansy had a loving family and a stable home life, but she didn't have half the easy innocence and faith and belief in goodness that he showed effortlessly. Who knew why Voldemort couldn't kill him? It could have been his mother's sacrifice, it could have been his startling power; it could have been a combination of both or it could have been neither. But although Pansy had never before believed in fate, she felt deep within her, in a sense that words couldn't describe and that she wasn't even fully aware of, that the main reason Harry had been spared is because he was more; he had something that couldn't be learned- a soul like his was special, a unique force in the universe. Harry was meant to do great things not because of what he had because of who he was, and the foils of a one dark lord were pale in comparison.

Chapter 20

Chapter Summary

Quick note for later on in the chapter- red is the colour of determination and also protective instincts.

They practiced all of the next two weeks- by the end, Harry had been able to produce a Patronus every single time. His next lesson with Lupin had helped immensely as well- the man had told him a plethora of stories about his parents that the small teen used to increase the strength of his Patronus. Draco had joined their lessons after looking over the notes in his spare time, and he had only just reached the stage of producing a weak mist- his father had never appreciated emotion in his son and heir, but unlike Harry, who had compartmentalized, Draco coped by repressing. It had been a problem since he was a child- his accidental magical outbursts were much more subdued and less frequent than those of a normal child, which of course only displeased his father more. It frustrated him that even though Harry came from a worse situation, he was making more progress; it made him feel inferior. It was only that he forgot himself all together and let his mind wander on about Harry that he was able to produce anything at all. He'd been daydreaming about the way Harry smiled when he was reading comic books when the first spurt of silver mist came out of his wand, surprising him, because he hadn't been trying at all.

Hermione and Pansy had likewise been unable to produce a corporeal Patronus as of yet, and their frustrated conversations in BSL had their hands talking so fast that trying to follow the movements at all left the viewer with a headache. But Harry could do it, and that was all that truly mattered for the moment.

Pansy and Hermione, to take their minds off their own frustrations, had spent the last few days before Harry got his sling removed making him cast his Patronus at the Boggart while navigating an obstacle course the room had sent, then with a second Boggart, then with a second Boggart and an obstacle course. If one were to ask him whose lessons tired him more- his teachers' or his friends'- Harry would have said that Pansy's and Hermione's were ruthless, without hesitation.

Once they were satisfied with his ability to call up a Patronus nearly automatically, they put that training to rest and recruited the rest of their friends to the room, on the Thursday Harry got his sling removed.

"Alright, now everyone's got two arms," Pansy said. "and we're gonna use them." "Wands down!" she ordered the twins, who had been shooting mild jinxes at each other. It was a true testament to how frightening the Slytherin could be that they immediately complied.

"Right," she continued, pacing like a drill sergeant, intimidating battle-scared arms at her side, "with the exception of Harry, almost every single one of you is helpless without your wand. As you may have heard, Sirius Black was potentially spotted near Dublin yesterday. With someone out in the open with a potential intent to kill our Harry, that is not acceptable. So, we're going to learn to fight like goddesses- no, not gods, goddesses- because goddesses get shit done. And until

every single one of you can disable a moving target with a dagger and incapacitate an enemy with only your fists, you can say goodbye to your free time." There were some half-hearted groans, but no one dared argue with Pansy when she was like this.

"Alright, first things first. Ron, come here." Said boy walked forward cautiously, and she lightly put a finger a few centimetres to the left of his Adam's Apple. "This spot right here," she said, pressing it very gently, bringing Ron halfway to his knees before she hoisted him back up, "is a crucial pressure point. If I pressed a little harder, I could knock Ron out. Just a little more at just the right angle, and I could kill him." Ron paled and stepped to the side. "I'm not gonna Weasel, calm down," she smacked him lightly in the back of the head. She signed something to Hermione.

"Room, if we could have some practice dummies, please?" her friend requested, and a number of limbless mannequins came into the room. They were made of a silicone-like material, and were the colour of a whitewashed wall except for the spot that Pansy had pointed out on Ron, which was bright red.

"Press the red spot and dig in just right until the dummy crumbles," she ordered. "If you're having trouble, I have some newspaper cut-outs of our target's face. By 'target,' she meant Sirius Black.

Pansy was a ruthless general, and Hermione her just-as-tough lieutenant. In addition, the two had somehow convinced the room to only respond to them, and they now controlled everything from snack breaks to the existence of a door. Hermione had snuck to the muggle village nearby Hogsmeade (so much for good girl Granger) and gotten them both matching combat boots and whistles. Minerva seemed somehow simultaneously concerned and relieved that Pansy was creating an army, but she did extend their curfew an extra hour so they could have more time to train; the Black sighting in Dublin had terrified her, and although she had no intention of letting the man get near her child or any child in the school, she had to admit it was best to be prepared for the unforeseen circumstances that seemed to cling to Harry like lint on a robe.

Thusly, by the time the quidditch match rolled around on Saturday afternoon, Harry and every single one of his friends could find and utilize the pressure point near the throat, throw a dagger and hit at least the edge of the target, and run a mile- well, Pansy and Hermione wouldn't let Harry do the running, citing again his 'underdeveloped lungs.' The girls were almost as bad as Madame Pomphrey with their hovering, and if Harry hadn't been so intimidated by his two-female year-mates, he would have seriously considered pressing one of their pressure points to get a break from listening to "How's your shoulder, Harry?" "Do you need a break, Harry?" and "Minerva said to make sure you got extra snack breaks, Harry." He was beginning to regret expanding his friend group…

He'd never been so relieved to get on his broom, and that was saying something. Oliver and the Hufflepuff captain shook hands (although a sharp-eyed observer could have followed Wood's eyes to where Marcus was sitting with some friends), and then they were up in the air. The match proceeded fairly smoothly for just over an hour with no sight of the snitch. Harry had scanned and flown through every inch of the stands twice with no sign of the snitch, and also spent some time sizing up Cedric Diggory, the Hufflepuff seeker. He was a well-built sixth year with magic as yellow as his quidditch robes that felt like a summer breeze and sounded like soft jazz music. It smelled like cream puffs, Harry noticed. If this was a rather boring game as far as snitch- hunting went, at least the view was nice…

He eventually did spot the snitch, luckily before Cedric did, as the other seeker was closer. He was halfway to it and Cedric had finally spotted the snitch when Harry suddenly felt a sweeping feeling of cold. It had been so peaceful so far Harry was beginning to think that they wouldn't show up- it hadn't even been raining like the muggle forecast called for.

Yet, here they were, and Harry noticed quickly with a sinking feeling in his stomach that whereas there had been less than a dozen last time, there were almost a hundred now. Patronus… Patronus… so cold… Vernon… belt, oh god, Marge was there, she'd just offered him her dog chain, she was laughing. Harry felt himself beginning to fall, a sudden wind blowing his now un- captained broom to the other side of the field, him as a disassociated passenger.

Harry came slightly to awareness again when he slipped slightly to the side and noticed that his broom had gotten much further towards the ground and was gradually sinking more. NO! If he could still get up and do his chores when he could barely move from the pain of a beating, he could cast a damn spell when he had a parent who loved him and friends who cared about him so much they started a de facto army just to keep him safe. He was overwhelmed, with the feeling of love that he'd stored away bubbling to the surface so strongly that he hadn't even lifted his wand from his sleeve before the glowing silver stag seemed to spring to life of its own accord. It snorted and pawed as the dementors shrank away from it, looking not only repelled but genuinely scared, if such a thing were possible. He regained control of his broom and landed just in time to avoid blowing backwards into the Whomping Willow. As the dementors were driven away from all sides by his and the faculty members' Patronuses, Harry noticed his stag running alongside a form he hadn't seen before: a prowling tiger. With all the other forms around it, this one stood out- it was a brilliant red.

When the dementors had come, Pansy tried again to cast a Patronus, but not even a bit of mist came out. She felt cold, and numb, and she remembered the day that her mother had told her that they'd miscarried, that she wasn't getting a younger sibling to teach and protect. The day that she'd come back from the doctor crying because they'd been trying again for a year but nothing happened, nothing ever would, Pansy would always be alone, her dreams of being a beloved big sister crushed to dust. And then, she saw Harry. He was falling, being driven back by the foul creatures closer and closer to the Whomping Willow. She may not have a sibling, but she did have people to love, people to protect- Harry and Draco especially, who were broken, mistreated boys who needed the guidance and confidence she was only too happy to give them. The same instant Harry produced his silver stag, Pansy screamed a battle cry as a tiger burst from her wand and drove the dementors away from her and her friends before heading down to join Harry's stag. It was only she checked Draco over- and seen that he was pale and clammy but conscious and lucid- that she looked again and saw that her tiger was a brilliantly deep red colour. Whatever she'd produced, it wasn't a traditional Patronus.

Chapter 21

The dementors had fled quickly from the combined force of all the Patronuses- and whatever Pansy had produced- and by the time the chaos had died down a little and Harry had reunited with all his friends, it had been nearly half an hour. The group made their way over to where the faculty had gathered in a corner of the field so that Harry could locate Minnie and assure her he was okay, and they found her hysterical and livid, yelling at the headmaster.

"I'M TELLING YOU ALBUS, THIS IS THE THIRD TIME THIS HAS HAPPENED! DID YOU SEE HOW CLOSE MY SON WAS TO THAT ATROCIOUS TREE, HOW MANY OF THOSE DEMONS WERE AROUND THEM?! YOU GET RID OF THEM, OR I SWEAR TO MERLIN I WILL GO TO THE GOVERNORS!"

Dumbledore, looking frightened, backed away, hands outstretched as he tried to placate her. "Minerva, I have no control over the situation; once I agreed the ministry could keep them here, they took over total responsibility. I have no authority, that rests with Cornelius."

"I will be sending him a howler tonight, to be sure," she harrumphed, but she was no longer screaming at the top of her lungs. "Although, may I remind you that if you had consulted me about this decision as you were supposed to, we wouldn't be having this problem."

"Minnie…" Harry put a hand on her elbow, tentatively.

"Harry, oh thank Merlin! That was quite some Patronus, by the way, I am incredibly proud of you," she said, wiping her eyes as she teared up a bit.

"Thanks Min," he responded as he looked down at his feet, embarrassed at such a public display of praise but at the same time very pleased.

"And Pansy- what on earth? I've never seen anything like that tiger you produced. That certainly wasn't a Patronus- what spell did you use?" Minerva asked the Slytherin.

"I… I honestly don't know, Professor- I couldn't think of a happy enough memory, and I was having trouble with the spell, but then I saw how much danger Harry was in and, and it just sort of… happened…" Pansy responded, uncharacteristically shaken.

"I believe I may be able to shed some light on the situation… just a theory, mind you," Professor Flitwick said, making himself visible by stepping in front of Snape, whose height had hidden the diminutive professor from the view of Harry and his friends. "You are correct, Minerva, when you say that what Ms. Parkinson has created is certainly not a Patronus, but I believe that it is a related conjuration. It is certainly not a spell that has ever been done before, although that can definitely be considered an achievement, and I would certainly appreciate it, dear, if you wouldn't mind having a more in-depth discussion about it with me after class one day," he said, looking at Pansy. "Magic, like emotions, have colours, and while red is traditionally viewed as the colour of anger and aggression, it is also the colour of determination and protective instincts, and these things often go hand in hand."

"Pansy's magic is red too!" Harry interjected.

"Thank you, Harry," Flitwick told his other student, before addressing the group at large. "What I believe Pansy has created is a cousin to the Patronus, one that drives of negative energy with an incarnation of protectiveness and strength. It is certainly something that deserves more research, as if it could be recreated and a standard spell mechanism created, it could do a world of good in the field of magical law enforcement and elsewhere. However, I would definitely recommend, Ms. Parkinson," he said, looking exclusively at Pansy again, "that you keep practicing until you can do a standard Patronus as well, especially as you need to be able to protect yourself as well."

Pansy nodded and chewed her lip; besides coming up with a new spell, it seemed to her that she was right back where she started. "Would my regular Patronus be a tiger as well?" she asked the charms professor, hoping to at least have gained some useful advice for her efforts.

"I have no reason to think otherwise," Filius agreed.

"Well, that was certainly a useful information session," Minerva interrupted, "I would rather like to have the nurse look over the children, just to ensure there is nothing warranting medical attention- especially for Harry and Pansy, who have just cast very demanding and complicated spells." They all groaned in unison, although Susan, Luna, and Draco looked like they could use a heaping helping of chocolate.

Madame Pomphrey did not look at all surprised to see them, and indeed she was distributing chocolate to a number of other children. She had a bar of chocolate the size of the desk it was laid out on, and a large hammer that she was using to break it into pieces with.

"Leave the hammer alone, Parkinson," Severus ordered, seeing a familiar gleam in his student's coffee eyes. She reluctantly stepped back, and Poppy promptly waved her, Draco, Susan, Harry, and Luna over to the beds for a more in-depth examination.

"Mmm, just as I suspected- slightly lowered body temperatures, emotional exhaustion, and just a touch of magical fatigue- although," she continued, looking at Harry, "the strain on Pansy's core seems to be somewhat less than yours, Mr. Potter. It doesn't quite make sense for the spells used, unless…" she broke of before looking at Harry somewhat uncertainly, "Potter, did you… conjure your Patronus wandlessly?"

Harry nodded shyly. "I didn't really have time to gather my wand before the spell just," he made a snapping motion with his fingers, "happened."

"You continue to surprise me," the medi-witch shook her head incredulously. "In other unheard-of news, neither you nor any of your friends need stay the night, although I would recommend that you all do something relaxing and therapeutic to combat the depressing effects of the dementors. You may go," she waved them off, picking up her quill and scribbling notes in their charts.

Neville wanted to go down to the greenhouse to do a bit of gardening, but the teachers had announced to the entire student body that the grounds were off limits for the rest of the day until they ensured the dementors were staying in their places at the gates. Everything on the telly was at this time of day was either an old action film or something completely uninteresting to all of them. Ginny suggested makeovers, which none of the boys were exactly enthusiastic about, so Hermione

suggested yoga, which had the rest of them grumbling that they got enough exercise in her and Pansy's boot camp training sessions.

"Knitting circle?" Harry suggested, thinking something to do with his hands would relax his mind sufficiently that the lingering unpleasant memories would fade back into his subconscious where they could be dealt with when they weren't so raw.

"I like making pretty things," Luna agreed, so those that could knit settled down to do it, and those that couldn't received instruction from Harry, who had the requisite amount of patience for such a complicated endeavour. By the end of the night, all the new knitters had the beginnings of a scarf, Pansy and Hermione had new wrist warmers (they used magic to speed up the project), Harry had the first two patches for a quilt he decided to make, and Luna had an… indiscriminate shape of various colours and lacework. They all fell asleep easily that night, and even Harry and Draco only had mildly uncomfortable dreams and didn't wake up screaming.

Fanart for the series that I just had to put in

Chapter Summary

Hey, so this isn't a written chapter- although I hope I will have some more energy to write later, but my best friend JessicAuburn drew this awesome fanart of Pansy with her scarred hands, and I absolutely had to put it int the work, so here you go my loves.

Chapter 23

Wood had been rather upset that Hufflepuff had won the game (Cedric had tried to ask for a rematch when he realised that Harry had been caught up with the dementors, but the rules of the game stated that he'd won fair and square, no matter the circumstances), so he'd been pushing the team harder than ever, even holding practices before sunrise on weekends. Between quidditch and Pansy and Hermione's combat training, Harry was exhausted. Minnie noticed and banned Oliver from holding quidditch practice before nine and after sunset (and received an enthusiastic hug of gratitude from every other member of the team), but Harry was still feeling pretty overwhelmed and was relieved when the next Hogsmeade weekend arrived. It was on the day of Halloween, which was good, as it distracted Harry from the fact that his parents had died that day twelve years before. With Snape hovering in the back as a dour chaperone, Harry's little group headed out the castle doors and down the grounds.

"And you just have to see Zonko's- it's amazing!" Fred and George were telling Harry.

"Maybe we can use something there to get revenge on Rita Skeeter," Draco grumbled. "Did you read her last article about my mum and Aralynn? I don't even know how she found out about the wedding!"

"I know, right? She's such a bitch!" Pansy growled, and Snape very conspicuously did not scold her for her language. "What does she even have against lesbians?"

"Good luck getting a shot at her," Harry whispered to Draco. "You'll have to pull Pansy away from whatever's left of her first."

"I'm personally more concerned with the look on Hermione's face," Neville, who was walking next to the pair, remarked. Looking at Mia, the boys acknowledged that she did indeed have her plotting expression on her face.

"I mean, how does she even find out about all this stuff?" Seamus asked. "I mean, how does nobody notice her? It's not like we're all stupid like Lockhart."

"Lockhart!" Hermione gasped, and everyone turned to look at her, confused.

"I'd rather hoped to never hear that name again," Severus remarked sourly, the first words he'd said so far.

"Oh, come on guys, catch up!" the girl ordered them impatiently, signing rapidly to Pansy as she did so, and soon a look of comprehension dawned on the Slytherin's face.

"Of course! Mia, you're a fucking genius!" she exclaimed.

"Um… I'm still lost," Harry admitted what they were all thinking.

"Oh Harry," Pansy patted his head, and Harry resolved that he absolutely must at least get taller than her so she couldn't do that anymore. "Poor lost little kitten- how did we get Lockhart's secrets last year?"

"I used my animagus form. But how does that help us?"

"Merlin- Skeeter's an unregistered animagus!" Neville suddenly exclaimed, and Hermione pointed at him.

"Exactly, Neville, good job," she told him.

"Finally, some decent deductive reasoning. It's a shame you're stuck with all those slow little plebeians," Pansy said.

"I regret getting you the Sherlock Holmes novels for your birthday," Harry grumbled at her. Honestly, what thirteen-year-old girl called her friends plebeians anyway?

"Oh look, Honeyduke's- how about an ice lolly for your bruised ego?" was her response, and Harry was soon distracted by the marvellous candy store. The others, who had seen it before, simply went straight for their favourite sections (Pansy took a roundabout route, because, in her own words, she never did anything straight).

"Are you going to buy anything, or can you taste through your eyes now?" Snape snarked after twenty minutes of following Harry around the aisles.

"I'm just trying to find what I really want, since I can't eat too much or I'll get sick."

"Finally, a smart one," the professor quipped, trying to take his mind off the fact that the Gryffindor's weak stomach was mostly due to the lingering effects of malnutrition that all his carefully brewed nutrient potions couldn't seem to correct.

Harry had moved on to staring intently at the chocolate frog display, and Severus asked what in the nine hells he was trying to do.

"I'm looking for Agrippa- they use magic to enchant the cards, and I looked up a photo of her so I could match that one to the one on the card. Ron's been hunting for her card forever."

"How very noble," Severus said sardonically. "And I must admit, creative- five points to Gryffindor. Ugh, how bitter those words taste."

Harry ignored the last comment however, as he had a hopeful look on his face.

"Found anything?" the potions professor asked, interested despite himself.

"Maybe… nope, just Morgana," he sighed. "The two were cousins, you know, so their portraits look very similar, especially when I'm trying to spot the magic through the wrappers."

"I found an Agrippa card once, you know," Snape said casually. Harry looked at him- even the fact that he had come to see the professor as a human being and not a big scary dungeon bat could not prepare him for the image of a young Snape collecting chocolate frog cards.

"Really?! Did you keep it?"

"No," Severus sighed and ran his hand through his greasy hair. "Unfortunately, my father made me sell it for whisky money one summer." He didn't talk to many people about his less than- ideal childhood, but his newly-awakened conscious told him that since Harry's secrets had been of necessity laid bare to him during the course of his treatment, it was only fair that he let him know he wasn't alone. Oh, how he cursed these feelings. How did normal people have these all the time?

Agrippa or no Agrippa, Harry did buy a box of frogs, because as Remus would say, chocolate was awesome (well, maybe he'd say it a little differently, but still). He also felt for the box of Bertie Botts that had the fewest gross ones and bought that as well, and then the group moved out into the chill air again. Harry wrapped his scarf tighter and pulled his mittened hands into the warmth of the his Weasley sweater.

"Oh, wouldn't that look so cute on Harry?!" Pansy squealed, pointing to a set of emerald robes in the window of Gladrags. Harry grabbed Draco's hand and ran to Zonko's before she could get any ideas.

"Got anything that can keep your crazy best friend from forcing you to try on clothes?" he asked the shop clerk, who began to point disinterestedly towards the Invisibility section before catching sight of his scar.

"Oh my god, you're Harry Potter!" she squeaked. "I was hoping you'd come in last Hogsmeade weekend, but I'm glad you're here today."

Harry groaned. "Please don't thank me for saving the wizarding world- I don't know how I did it."

The witch caught her breath and smiled at him. "While I must admit I'm slightly star- struck, that's not why I was hoping to see you. My da owns Zonko's, and I used to watch James Potter and his friends come in here all the time- his pranks were inspiring!"

"You knew my dad?" Harry asked, immediately warming up to her.

"Well, not so much knew him as idolized him," she admitted. "I didn't start Hogwarts until he was in his last year, and by then so many of his pranks had leaked into the village by word-of- mouth that the one time he said hello I could only squeak at him. He was so ruggedly handsome," here she stopped to sigh. "So I didn't expect you to be so adorable." Harry crossed his arms and wished she'd stopped after the sigh.

"Why? Why does everyone have to say that? I'm a teenager, I'm not adorable," he pouted, adorably.

"Don't worry, you'll grow. Probably," the clerk said. His father had been much taller at thirteen, so she didn't want to make any promises.

"It's okay, Harry; I think you're ruggedly handsome," Draco said, before turning red and wishing he could curl up in a hole and die.

"Thanks Draco," Harry responded, not seeing anything in the statement but friendly reassurance. He then wandered off to look at filibuster fireworks, followed by Snape, who had followed them in as part of his Minerva-mandated duty to keep an eye on Harry and was very glad that the conversation was no longer about James Potter.

"Don't worry lad," the clerk winked conspiratorially at him. "I met my partner when I was your age, and she was dense as a cauldron cake too. You'll get 'im eventually. He just doesn't realise his feelings yet." Draco turned red and ran out of the store. Even clothes shopping with the girls would be less torturous than this.

Chapter 24

Harry's friends had convinced him to go to the Halloween feast in lieu of attending another of Nick's Death Day parties. While Harry felt kind of guilty laughing and celebrating with his friends on the day that his parents died, he had to admit the dancing skeletons were pretty cool.

"How's the lessons with Flitwick going?" Harry asked Pansy. Once the diminutive professor had talked to her after their first class after the Hufflepuff game, he'd been impressed by her charms prowess and had cleared away an hour for her three times a week, in which he taught her advanced charms in addition to trying to recreate her red tiger.

"He borrowed the boggart and I've managed to recreate it once, but he wants to standardize the spell, and apparently a feral scream doesn't count as an appropriate incantation," she told them in a frustrated tone, scarred hands slapping Ron away from the last treacle tart and nabbing it for herself.

"Once is still good though," Harry encouraged, ignoring the 'feral scream' bit for now. "I mean, the spell is based on protective instincts, right? So it's probably a little more difficult to get a boggart to work for that than for a standard Patronus."

"Mmm," Pansy agreed noncommittally. She wasn't about to admit that her boggart was a dementor going after Harry and Draco- they needn't know she cared that much.

"Flitwick let slip that it took you an entire session to stop automatically trying to stab the boggart," Luna said.

"You know, for a Ravenclaw, it took an embarrassingly long amount of time for him to think of summoning all my knives," the Slytherin said nonchalantly, pulling one of the aforementioned from seemingly out of nowhere and cleaning her nails with it.

"I'm really glad I don't go to a muggle school anymore," Hermione added. "I'd be expelled quickly with the amount of weaponry I'm packing."

"How has somebody not banned them yet anyway?" Dean asked, amazed yet again by the lax security and alarming lack of safety procedures in the wizarding world.

"Our main school supply is a stick that can kill people with a word," Pansy answered. "When you put it in perspective, there seems to be no reason to object to the poison darts in my shoe."

"Where'd you get poison darts?" Neville asked, paling.

"The darts are from my trunk. The poison was given to me by a confidential source, after I proved that my aim is such that I could easily hit Sirius Black from across the room." Pansy loved being a Slytherin; as long as one proved themselves trustworthy, their head of house was adept at supplying all their needs, from tampons to dubiously legal poison for assassinating escaped convicts. As long as you didn't need a hug or any sign of human affection, he was really the man to go to.

"You know, I think that maybe the reason you haven't had any luck with wooing Millicent is that you're really terrifying." This came from Ginny, so it was more of a compliment than anything. "Also, I will give you ten galleons for a handful of your poison darts."

"Where'd you get ten galleons?!" Ron asked his little sister in shock.

"I bought some muggle pens and sell them to purebloods at a huge mark-up."

"Hey!" Draco looked at the youngest Weasley, offended. "You told me I was getting a great deal!"

"Yeah well, I lied, and quills are annoying, so you're still gonna buy more, so I really don't feel that bad about it, either."

"This is why I said we had too many girls- girls are dangerous!" Ron said. "You all accuse me of being a bad feminist, but really I just have a healthy dose of fear."

"Luna's not dangerous," Neville protested.

"C'mon Longbottom, have you even seen her on taco night- that girl's an animal!" Draco said. Luna smiled- she did love tacos.

"Seamus sets practically everything he touches on fire and Harry has the magical potential to do more damage than Pansy and Hermione combined if he really wanted to, but girls have the motive to really fuck you up, and that's what does it," Fred told them. Vulgarity had been casually spreading through the group- another gift from Pansy Parkinson.

"Centuries of patriarchal oppression will do that to a person," George agreed.

"We've trained them well," Hermione signed to her partner-in-crime as they headed out of the hall.

Harry was actually having a lovely dream about doing the grocery shopping with Minnie when he was startled awake by Ron's scream.

"Sirius Black!" he yelled, shaking from head to foot, face pale and making him look like a blanched carrot cake. "He was standing over me with a knife."

"We gotta get Minnie," Harry said calmly, years of training in keeping himself safe in dangerous situations (i.e. every day at the Dursley house) kicking in. "Everybody get behind me; I'm the only one who can feel for unfamiliar magical signatures, and I'm not feeling any in our room or down the stairs. Wands out. Guys, remember your pressure points?

The others, reassured slightly by Harry's steadfast demeanour, formed a line and followed their shortest roommate as they tiptoed down the stairs.

"I don't feel anyone besides other Gryffindors in the common room either. Guys, I need you to be on watch for a minute, I have to narrow my senses so I can send my Patronus to Minnie." His friends formed a circle around him and waited with baited breath for the two minutes it took Harry to summon his stag and send it to Minerva's office with a message. Moments later, she burst downstairs, grey-streaked brown hair loose and falling to her waist as her wand let off a

screeching alarm. She sent three tabby-shaped Patronuses off to the other heads of houses and then another to Dumbledore.

"Is everyone alright?" She asked anxiously, pushing past the students already filling the common room to get to Harry.

"Yeah, we're fine," Harry said, before tapping Ron on the shoulder and signalling him to tell his story.

McGonagall's face betrayed more and more alarm as Ron told her about the gaunt man with the elbow-length hair standing over him with a knife, out of his mind, whispering something about a rat.

"He called my son a rat? That doesn't make any sense…" Minerva said, a perplexed and offended expression mixing with her alarm.

"It… he never mentioned Harry by name, and he was frantic. It was so strange; I was scared- he was absolutely mental."

"Dementor exposure will do that to a man, and he couldn't have been the most stable to begin with, to do what he did," their head of house told Ron, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. "I'm just glad he had the wrong bed, and that you woke up in time to scare him off. Well done raising the alarm, Ronald. Ten points to Gryffindor." Then she sighed in relief as the counting spell she'd silently cast reported all students present and accounted for.

The other teachers burst into the common room, each looking frantic, although Snape had a large amount of anger in his expression as well.

"Have you seen what happened to Violet?" Pomona Sprout asked her colleague.

"No, I haven't left the common room- I've been checking on my students," she said, her expression growing even darker.

"Her portrait's been torn to shreds," Snape said shortly, as the students realised that Violet must be the fat lady.

"Is she alright?" Harry asked.

"She's fine, Mr. Potter," Professor Flitwick informed him. "Professor Sinestra sent us a message that she'd found her with a friend on the seventh floor."

"Can you leave your prefects to watch the Gryffindors? We need to join the search," Snape said, and Minerva reluctantly left Percy and his partner, a quiet fifth-year girl named Anna, to watch the children.

"Don't worry," Percy told them, "we'll protect you from Sirius Black." Even the first years rolled their eyes- like Sirius Black was gonna back down because the snooty redhead told him he was 'breaking the rules.' They felt slightly better when Fred and George told them they had their filibuster fireworks- a distraction would be better than nothing if he came back.

They waited a tense hour before the teachers informed them that Sirius hadn't been found and they were all taken to the great hall for the night so the staff could better keep an eye on them

all. Dumbledore summoned a bunch of squashy sleeping bags in an obnoxious shade of purple, and for a moment the hall was all a dizzying array of changing colours as all the students that knew how to do a colour-changing charm spelled theirs into something more visibly pleasing.

The friends all found a cluster of bags in the same corner and talked as they changed the colours and settled down. Ron told the girls and the boys from other houses the full story.

"Where'd he even get the knife?" Hannah wondered, and everyone looked at Pansy and Hermione.

"Don't look at us- we do inventory every night, and nothing was amiss, right Mia?"

The other girl nodded.

"It's really easy to find one in the muggle world, even if you are a wanted convict," Harry said. "Plus, the muggle community is a lot larger, so there's more anonymity. I imagine he stocked up on muggle weapons since he doesn't have a wand." The others shuddered- an unarmed Sirius Black scared them badly enough, even with the rigorous combat training they were being subjected to.

"You know what's strange?" Susan asked. Hermione looked at her immediately. "What are you thinking, Su?" the situation seemed off to her as well, but she had been too nervous to properly think about it.

"Why did he go to Ron's bed? I mean, even if he realised he had the wrong one, why didn't he just kill him to keep him quiet and move on to Harry?" Susan never would have thought of it before last year, but having spent an entire semester being possessed by a madman clued her in to the way they thought- and if Sirius was as horrid as Tom, he definitely would have disposed of Ron before he'd had the chance to scream.

Hermione and Pansy looked at her and then at each other. She had a point…

The prefects went around calling for silence as the lights went out, but the friends stayed awake for a long time, each lost in their respective disturbing thoughts. Harry thankfully remembered to cast a silencing charm before he finally did fell asleep, as nightmares of a screaming woman and a flash of green light fought for supremacy with haunting memories of his life at the Dursleys, and it hadn't been two hours before he woke up, screaming his throat raw.

Chapter 25

Chapter Notes

Sorry guys- it's been a crazy week. I dropped a class I was having trouble with, so hopefully I will have a bit more time now.

Minnie and Severus were standing guard around the Great Hall when a movement in Harry's group's corner caught their eyes. Looking closer, they saw that it was Harry, thrashing around in his sleeping bag, his mouth open but no sound coming out. He suddenly shot up, still silently screaming, before his eyes opened, he took a few deep breaths, and flopped back against his pillow. They traded concerned looks.

"He was having nightmares," the tabby animagus whispered to her colleague, concerned.

"That much is obvious," Severus snorted derisively. "The more pressing concern is that he has them enough that he put up a pre-emptive silencing charm."

"He asked for dreamless sleep the first night of term, but he hasn't since- I guess I just supposed his nightmares were improving, or else that he would come to me if they were getting worse…" Minnie trailed off, wondering if she should have been more attentive.

"Dreamless sleep is a very heavy drug, especially for someone so young and small, and regular doses wouldn't be safe or healthy- he is good in my class and I expect he knows that and didn't want to concern you," Snape told her. "As for not coming to you, he would have known there was little you could do. Most abused children have trouble coming to adults, even years after the fact."

"I know that, Severus, I just… it's not that I blame him for it, obviously. He just seemed very happy lately, despite everything that's been going on, so I suppose I just thought…"

"That he was getting better," Snape finished. "Harry is… a difficult case to decipher. His personality is much more open and caring than is the norm amongst children with his background, and his conditioned reactions are very easy to miss if you're not looking for them. I of all people should have noticed something, but in addition to my… misconceptions, he is much more open than the cases that I often see coming through my house. They are usually far more closed off and disillusioned."

"Like you were," Minerva cast him a sad look, and the potions master responded with a glare.

"Don't you start with that again, woman," he muttered darkly, and Minerva thankfully dropped the subject as they veered back towards discussing her son.

"I'm not presuming that I have any pertinent advice on parenting, but it is perhaps time to consider talking things out with him, or taking him to a mind healer," Snape said.

"I was hoping to wait until he was a little healthier physically…"

Severus cast her a dubious look. "It's been a year, Minerva. While he clearly has a long way to go, recovery-wise, he is never going to be as physically strong as he could have been if he grew up in a healthy environment. You just don't want to admit to yourself that you don't want to make him face it yet."

"Well spoken for a man who avoids facing his own issues with an almost religious effort," Minnie remarked, pursing her lips. "Although you perhaps have a point. But," she broke off, not looking at her colleague, "even if putting him through therapy right now when there is so much else going on were a good idea, the fact that he's Harry Potter makes finding a mind healer I can trust far more difficult."

"I hear America has a rather good magical mental health system, perhaps that is something to consider for the summer," Snape said.

"Severus Snape, do you actually care about Harry?"

The man in question curled his lip with a sour expression on his face. "You're not going to make me admit it again, Minerva, especially as I am stone-cold sober at the moment, however much I wish I weren't."

Despite the situation, the tabby animagus smiled slightly. "I never pegged you as a man who couldn't handle his scotch."

"That was basically pure alcohol and you know it."

"It's the staple drink of my hometown, you cranky bat, and I handle it just fine. As long as we can't leave until morning, you might as well just save yourself the argument and admit you're a lightweight."

Snape snorted again. "You could get a cow drunk on that swill, woman, and the fact that you can hold your liquor better than Hagrid changes nothing."

"I swear to Merlin, Severus, if you weren't making my child's medications, I would hex you to Aberdeen for insulting my home-brewed scotch, don't think that I wouldn't," Minerva scolded, while Snape merely harrumphed.

A very sleep-deprived Harry was rubbing his eyes in History of Magic the next day when Pansy looked exasperatedly at him. "Just go to sleep, golden boy. Binns doesn't care," she said, tossing a sparkling light from her wand through the ghost's body to demonstrate. The dull professor didn't even seem to realise his chest continued to glitter slightly with the after-effects.

"I gotta take notes," Harry yawned. "It's my turn, and Hermione's working on stuff for runes, so if I don't do it, nobody will."

"I'll do it, you idiot, just go to sleep," Pansy said again, putting down her novel with a sigh. Harry pushed his parchment her way with a grateful smile and immediately fell asleep with his head on the table.

Pansy noticed Draco, on Harry's other side, staring not-so-subtly at his slumbering form. She breathed a sigh of relief. At least one of her idiots finally realised they were infatuated with each other. She very gently picked Harry's head off the table and positioned it against the blonde's shoulder, and Draco started almost violently.

"What the hell are you doing?!" he whisper-shouted, nonetheless adjusting Harry so he could rest more comfortably against his chest.

"I don't want him to get a cramp in his neck, and I'm busy taking notes."

"Pansy, whatever you're planning- stop!"

"What would I be planning?" She batted her eyelashes at him, faux-innocently.

"I know that you know, if I know," Draco said.

"Well, if there were something that we both knew, at least I'd be doing something about it while you pined away morosely."

Draco glared at her. "I do not pine, I bide my time strategically."

Pansy shot him a look. "Quit lying to yourself, you big Hufflepuff, and snuggle with your crush. You're lucky Hermione and I are here to help you, or your gay ass would probably end up married to a woman you don't love while making goo-goo eyes at Harry until the day you die."

"What… how…"

"Oh Draco, if you were ever even in the closet, it was an invisible one. At least you're not as obtuse as Harry though, I'm probably going to have to come out for him."

"I regret the day our mothers became friends."

"Love you too, you big gay prat," his best friend said, waggling her scarred fingers at him and blowing him a kiss while Harry let out a very snuffly snore.

"Oh dear, I do hope he's not getting sick again…" she sighed.

Chapter 26

Harry was indeed coming down with something, so all the girls, including Luna, practically pushed him towards the dungeon during their free period with an order to get a pepper-up potion.

Severus opened the door to see a bleary-eyed little Potter staring up at him. "Sorry to bother you Seb'rus," he said, sounding clearly congested. "The girls sent me for a Pepper-Up."

"I can't imagine why," the professor drawled, trying to bite back a smile as Harry sneezed and accidentally transformed into a little kitten. "My, my," he said, picking Harry up and unable to keep himself from petting his head a bit, "that was a rather violent one. I believe you're supposed to drink lemsip for a sore throat, not catnip."

Harry transformed back, forcing Severus to scramble back as the tiny kitten he was holding grew into a slightly-less-tiny third year. "Ha-ha," he glared, its potency broken slightly by the fact he had to swipe a hanky across his drippy nose (and the fact he was adorable in general). "I'b not eben allowed to touch Minnie's catnip 'till I turn fourbteen."

Severus pondered the idea of Minnie and Harry running around the castle in cat form, each high as kites, and decided he absolutely had to clear his schedule for the next July 31. In the meantime, he stepped into his storeroom, grabbing a grey potion and turning to hand it to Harry, who was looking at brightly-coloured cardboard boxes along a second shelf, sharing space with chocolate and various pain-relief potions.

"Wha's tha'?" he asked, pointing to a pink box emblazoned with cursive lettering spelling Always, before he suddenly realised on his own and turned bright red.

Severus chuckled. "As you seem to have just figured out, I keep a stash of supplies for my female students. If you keep them happy and as comfortable as possible, they're less likely to revolt."

"Pansy's gonna rebolt anyway," Harry muttered, trying to overcome his embarrassment. Then he sneezed again.

"Alright brat, just take your potion. Then go to Madame Pomphrey, because I think we're past the point when just a dose of Pepper-Up would be enough."

"No…." Harry groaned, taking his potion and sneezing again before Snape shooed him towards the floo, apparently not trusting his student to actually follow the direction unless he was supervised.

The next afternoon, Harry was still in the hospital wing, so the rest of his friends wandered the grounds aimlessly after being kicked out by Pomphrey.

"I'm bored," George said, after the giant squid had tired of having its tentacles tickled and withdrew back into the lake.

"We could train some more," Hermione suggested.

The rest of the group groaned collectively. "I'm still sore from yesterday," Seamus complained.

"We could sneak down to the muggle village and see a film," Ginny suggested.

"No, we wouldn't have enough time to make it back before dinner, and we'd get caught," Pansy said, knowing from personal experience that it took an hour and seven minutes each way to get there.

"We could make daisy chains," Hannah suggested, and Neville and Dean both added that that sounded fun.

"We can't go to the daisies today," Luna informed them. "It's rabknocker breeding season." The others had no idea what she was talking about, but they respected her flights of fancy, so that was out.

They were arguing the benefits of exploding snap versus cards against humanity when they heard a low keening whine. A very large, very thin black dog with mangy, knotted fur had emerged from the woods, dragging a back paw.

"Oh, look at the puppy!" Susan squealed, moving towards it. "Aw, e's' got a big cut on his wee paw."

"In what world is that a puppy? Well, at least I don't have Scabbers today; the last thing he needs is another animal chasing him." Ron muttered as he shot a slightly peeved look at Hermione, but nobody was listening as Pansy and Hermione reached into their expanded school bags for medical supplies and snacks. While Luna and Susan, the gentlest of the group, bandaged the big dog, Hannah fed him, and he gobbled the proffered goodies and basked in all the petting he was receiving.

"Aw, it's too bad Harry isn't here; he loves dogs," Hermione said, and could have sworn the dog's ears perked up at the word Harry.

They spent the rest of the afternoon at the edge of the forest playing with the dog, until Hedwig swooped in with a note.

"It's Harry!" Draco exclaimed as he read the letter, as if the use of his familiar hadn't already told them all that. "He says he's out of the hospital wing and that he's coming out to the lake to meet us."

"Do you wanna meet Harry?!" Susan asked the dog in the voice one would use with a small child, and the large hound's tail wagged excitedly as he barked what seemed like an affirmative. "He's amazing. He's sweet and nice and super talented. I don't think you really care- you're a dog- but he really is the best wizard. He even has ALL the mage senses- have you ever heard of such a thing?! Well I suppose not; you're a dog."

But the dog had stopped listening enthusiastically. It was strange; as soon as he heard the word mage senses, he took off running into the forest, and no amount of "here, puppy puppy puppy!" could persuade him to stop his headlong streak away from the group. By the time Harry joined them a few moments later, the dog was long gone.

Chapter 27

The remaining weeks of term were fairly quiet, minus Hermione and Pansy's insane training and studying style. They were wonderfully relieved when finals finished and all of their stuff was packed and ready for their now-yearly tradition of Christmas at Narcissa and Aralynn's house. The others all boarded the train, but no matter how much Harry begged, Minerva was unyielding on her position not to let him on the train after what happened with the dementors on the ride to school. He waved forlornly to all his friends until Ginny whacked him on the arm and told him that they'd see him in a couple hours and that he needed to stop moping. Harry changed into his animagus form and spent a couple of hours chasing spiders and mice around the castle while Minnie finished grading her finals. With Crookshanks gone, he was also able to take a nap on his favourite chair in the common room without being too afraid to turn into a cat. He was just stretching languidly and licking his paws in front of the fire when his guardian came down from their quarters to fetch him. He was about to change back when she picked him up. "Stay like that luv; it's easier to keep track of you in the floo this way," she told him as she scratched his ears, and Harry wondered when he'd be allowed to try going through on his own again. With all his overprotective friends and the adults in his life, he somehow doubted it would be soon. "Harry!" Draco blurted once they'd reach the Malfoy living room. Narcissa almost squealed- well, she sort of did, except for the fact that she insisted a lady never squeals; she only exhales excitedly. "What a cute little kitten you are!" she exclaimed as she took him from Minnie. Soon both she and her fiancée were lavishing him with attention. Harry really wanted to be irritated with the continued insistence of adults to call him adorable, but his feline side was really enjoying all the petting, and he purred despite himself. "Meeeeeooow," he implored, which roughly translated to "scratch my belly. No, not there, okay, little to the left- yes, right there! But only three times exactly." "If you scratch him right here," Pansy motioned to a spot just in front of his tail, "he shakes his little head and kicks his back leg. It's precious." Aralynn applied her ministrations to the appointed area and the odd reflex was activated. "Alright Harry," George suddenly broke in. "Hermione is about to come back downstairs with Crookshanks, and I know you're scared by the big mean kitty," he mocked gently. Harry whined to be put down and then glared at the twin, newly human. "You'd be scared too if Crookshanks was twice your size," he said. "Aww, don't be cranky, wittle Harrykins," he teased. "Let me scratch behind your ears to calm you down." "That only works as a cat," Harry grumbled as he batted George's hand away from his messy curls. Fred opened his mouth as if he was about to join in on the fun, but just then Dobby came into the living room, carrying a tea tray and dressed in a very odd ensemble. He wore two different socks, one a neon pink with twinkly Christmas lights sewn in, the other a truly atrocious knitted green fur. There was a muggle costume unicorn horn positioned between his bat like ears, and he looked to be trying a very becoming shade of metallic blue eyeliner. He had a tutu a completely different shade of green from his left sock and an Ariel t-shirt from Disneyland Paris topped with a sparkly orange leather jacket. "Little Master Harry be coming again to see Dobby!" the elf squeaked, while everyone stared at his outfit. Well, everyone except for Narcissa and Aralynn, who merely smiled fondly. Even Draco, who was used to Dobby's flights of fashion fancy, seemed rather shocked by this particular choice. "I especially like today's ensemble, Dobby," the muggle told him. "Dobby be thanking Mistress Aralynn!" the little creature beamed.

"Where did you get that outfit, Dobby?" Susan asked, earmarking the jacket as a possible gift for Luna. "Mistresses like to take Dobby shopping on weekends when they's be having the time," Dobby answered, doing a twirl for her. "He also has a lovely pair of fur-print boots, but he prefers to show off his socks inside the house," Narcissa informed them. "So, um, how's the wedding preparation going?" Harry asked as they all took tea from the tray. "There are just a few more alterations on my dress," Aralynn said, looking at her fiancée. "One of us thought the hemline ought to come down a few inches." Narcissa merely raised an eyebrow at her. "If you insist on wearing those tacky muggle converse on your wedding day, darling, I don't want to look at them." "You just want everyone to be paying attention to your legs in that layered tiered mermaid skirt," the muggle told her, unimpressed. "I thought it was bad luck to see the bride before the wedding," Hermione's father chimed in, pulling natural sweetener out of his wife's bag and stirring it into their tea. "That rule doesn't apply to lesbians," Pansy spoke up, reaching for another scone. Hermione's mother cast a fond look at the girl. "I must say, I have missed your witty banter dear." Then she slapped her husband's arm. "Stop staring at her hands, Dan. It's rude." "I'm not looking at the scars dear, it's more the third éclair. So bad for the teeth," he clucked, shaking his head. Seamus' father clapped him on the shoulder. "Come on, mate, it's Christmas," he cheered, already a little tipsy on Dobby's excellent spiced wine. "Besides, I'm sure they've got more advanced methods of dentistry than me mere muggles." "You know, I'm not sure about that," Dan Granger said. "Hermione might have told us, except I do believe we've turned her off to any kind of dentistry over the years. Perhaps Harry would be able to tell us with more enthusiasm." The aforementioned boy had been compulsively straightening the tea things out of habit when he jumped at the mention of his name. "I'm sorry, what?" he asked, turning to Hermione's father. "I didn't catch that." "Not to worry lad," Dan told him, slipping into a bit of his original Yorkshire accent. "I was just curious as to your opinions on muggle versus wizard dentistry." "I don't know," Harry said, turning red. "I… the Dursley's never took me to the dentist," he admitted. As an awkward silence descended, he tried to salvage the situation. "But wizards just use a couple of spells and potions and stuff, if that helps." "Yes, thank you dear. We'll make a note of it," Mrs. Granger said, smiling a bit too brightly. While she didn't know any details, Harry's small stature, tendency to startle easily, and her daughter's studious avoidance of any questions she asked about Harry's childhood, she could fill in the blanks. They all could. "So, mummy, what do you think of Crookshanks?" Hermione asked, and the older woman, with Hermione's kind brown eyes and bushy hair, smiled genuinely at her daughter. "I absolutely love him. What a poufy little darling." "Little?!" Seamus exclaimed. He was still sporting angry scratches on his torso from the other day, when he forgot to check the couch before sitting down. "Darling?!" Ron spat, still slightly cranky about the fact that he could no longer carry Scabbers with him all the time. "I see where she gets it," Harry whispered to Minnie, who snorted and then hid her nose in her tea. Like mother, like daughter. Even she must admit that that cat was undeniably fierce, just like his owner. She didn't even take her animagus form around Hermione's familiar- not because she was afraid, of course. She was merely a busy, respectable adult with no time for picking fights with other cats in her neighbourhood.

"Ah Minerva, I see that Severus has turned down our invitation again," Draco's mother turned towards the teacher, pursing her lips slightly. "He has indeed," the professor said sagely. Harry, who had been receiving his morning medicines from the potions master when the owl arrived, sputtered a laugh. "I believe his exact words were…" he began, taking a moment to adopt a disdainful facial expression and imitate Snape's condescending sniff, "Ew, people." Everyone laughed. Harry's Snape impression was on par with Pansy's and Draco's. "That does sound like that sour old cad," Seamus' mother, who had been a Slytherin in Severus' year, agreed. Everyone laughed again. * The wedding was set for the early morning of Christmas Eve, and the night before, Harry tossed and turned anxiously, unable to sleep after waking up from another nightmare. He was still reluctant to worry Minnie, unaware that she had witnessed his thrashing in the Great Hall that early November morning and was just waiting for the right moment to bring it up (she was procrastinating, if she were honest with herself… but it wasn't like they were even going to be able to go to therapy until summer, she reasoned, justifying her decision. Dumbledore asked her the other day when she was going to stop being so frigid with him. She'd glowered at him and told him that he wasn't going to be back in her good books until Harry stopped hurting, which was unlikely to happen for a while with all the damage those horrid Dursleys had done). Harry's guest room was next to Draco's, and when he had stopped fidgeting for a moment he heard a faint creaking. Reaching for Draco's unmistakable magical signature, he saw that his friend was undeniably awake and active. Impulsively, he threw off his own covers, making the bed carefully before tiptoe-ing to Draco's room and knocking softly on the door. Some of the other boys in his dorm had started... treating themselves when they thought nobody else was awake, and he certainly didn't want to catch Draco unawares. Just the thought of it made his cheeks glow even redder than when he walked in on Ron that time last month. He didn't know why the idea of catching his blonde best friend doing it with himself brought on more embarrassment than actually catching his surrogate brother with his hand halfway out his trousers. But Draco called a soft "come in" with no sounds of one who is hurriedly caught in the act, and Harry softly pushed the door all the way open and padded softly across the carpet, the hem of the dressing gown Aralynn sent him for his birthday dragging slightly behind him. "You can't sleep either?" he asked, and Draco nodded slightly. "Nightmares?" he continued, and the blond nod was nearly imperceptive. "Me too," Harry admitted. He chewed his lip for a moment as he wondered if he was brave enough to ask his next question. Reminding himself he was a Gryffindor, he took a deep breath. "Do you… d'yawannacuddle?" he blurted out, and Draco's eyes widened enormously before he could squeeze out a "yeah." Harry scrambled up into the four-poster and curled up under the covers. He cautiously pushed himself further into the middle until he was curled around his friend. "Your toes are freezing," Draco gasped, hyperaware and trying to distract himself from how close his not-so-secret crush was. "Sorry," Harry said, beginning to withdraw before Draco reached out and pulled him back. "Stop," he ordered. "Gotta warm them up somehow." Harry felt drowsy and comfortable, the way he did when he took naps in the summer sun as a cat, curled up into Minnie's side as she read Transfiguration Today. He was nearly asleep when he heard Draco's timid whisper of "this is nice." "Yeah," he agreed. "It is." The next morning was the first time Harry had ever slept past dawn when he wasn't in a medically- induced slumber, and Narcissa took full advantage of this, when, tiptoeing into her son's room to wake him up so he could get dressed for the wedding, she found little Harry Potter clinging to her

Draco like a koala bear. She had just enough time to rush back to her and Ara's room, grab her camera, take a few pictures, and slip back out before Harry woke up and was surprised to realise that the sun had already been up for an hour.

Chapter 28

The wedding was beautiful, and Narcissa's silver, off-the-shoulder, ruffled, open-front-skirt was all Pansy would talk about until dinner. Luna also adored that dress, and Narcissa watched, amused, as she let the girl reverently run her hands over the fabric after the ceremony. Hannah, Susan, and Hermione liked Aralynn's traditional white A-line dress with a sweetheart neckline, and Ginny, in her own words, "couldn't be arsed either way." Draco couldn't help but smile as he elegantly bore the rings, a stark contrast to Dobby's enthusiastic flower-scattering (and his lovely flower-elf dress, with matching white roses to the one's he threw being sewn throughout the skirt). He excused himself after the ceremony to change into a little suit for the reception, proudly bearing champagne with a straight back while the other elves cast him dubious looks from the familiarity of their clean white pillowcases. Christmas dinner finally saw Pansy and Luna talking of something besides the brides' dresses as they all exchanged Christmas Eve pyjamas. Harry couldn't help but wipe a tear as he saw the animated stags prancing across his, and Minnie was discreetly passing him a handkerchief when the floo flared to life. "Remus!" Harry exclaimed gleefully as the professor brushed ash off his robes. "Hi cub; hi all. Sorry I'm late; I had a commitment that couldn't be avoided." Harry sipped his tea inconspicuously- last night had been the full moon, and Pansy and Hermione were looking at him like they knew he knew something. "That's quite all right professor; we're delighted to have you here," Hannah answered cheerfully as Narcissa took her hands from Aralynn's long enough to fill a plate for the man. "You ought to eat something Remus, you look positively haggard," the Malfoy matriarch told him as she poured more gravy on his potatoes. "Oh Narcissa, you always were so complimentary," he chuckled dryly as he accepted the large portion. "That is what the ladies tell me," she remarked as Aralynn winked at her roguishly. "Brandy, Remus?" Minerva asked, already filling a cup for him. "Why Professor, is your goal to get all the teachers drunk enough to tell you embarrassing secrets?" the werewolf teased, accepting the glass nonetheless. The children had laughed and begun pestering their teacher to tell them Snape's embarrassing secrets when Narcissa peeked at Aralynn's wristwatch and told them it was time for bed. * Harry and Draco cuddled in the blonde's bed again, shyly telling each other it was to "pre- emptively prevent the nightmares," and despite the excitement of Christmas morning being so near (especially for Harry, for whom this was only his second real one) they were soon slumbering soundly. The morning came in a haze of excited teenagers tumbling gleefully down the stairs to the large pile of gifts. Susan had indeed gotten Luna the leather jacket, although in a powder-blue instead of orange. This year, Harry had knit Minnie a cashmere sweater with a cable-knit pattern, which she loved, and a leather-bound journal for her notes. Snape, while he hadn't attended, had sent Harry another set of rare ingredients, and Harry was glad he had thought to translate more of the journals from Salazar's library and owled them to Severus. He received another plethora of gifts from Minnie, and he had finally finished those and moved onto unwrapping the gifts from his friends and the other parents when he realised that all the others were watching him. "What?" he asked, bemused. Pansy sighed and tossed her hair. "You unwrap so slowly," she said, fondly exasperated. Harry's cheeks turned red. "I like to be careful with the paper," he mumbled.

"Aww, that's just the cutest," Mrs. Finnigan exclaimed. "Little Seamus used to rip into everything and then invariably lit the paper on fire to dispose of it." "What's that one?" Ginny suddenly broke in, pointing to a long skinny package with Harry's name printed in nondescript lettering. "Dunno," Harry answered, carefully laying aside the comics set he'd been meticulously unwrapping and reaching for the gift. Ginny eventually got tired of him carefully peeling the tape off the plain brown paper and snatched it, shredding the wrapping to reveal a sleek new broom. "A firebolt!" she exclaimed, and every quidditch fan's head turned to Harry's new broom. "Why would I be getting a firebolt? My nimbus is great," Harry scratched his head as he looked for a tag. "There's no name on it. That's weird…" The broom suddenly went flying out of his hands and into Minerva's, who'd used a summoning charm. "This isn't safe! What if it's from Sirius Black?" "Why would Sirius Black send Harry a broom?" Ron exclaimed, casting a longing look at the firebolt. "It didn't feel cursed…" Harry trailed off but made no move to ask for the broom back. "Nonetheless, I'd rather have Filius take a careful look at it before you get on it. Assuming it's safe, you can have it back, alright luv? I know it seems a bit severe, but one cannot be too careful right now." "That- that's like a crime, to do invasive testing on a broom like that!" Ginny blurted. Fred and George seemed torn. On one hand, Ginny had a point, but on the other, this was Harry's safety they were talking about…. Harry stayed silent as the room broke out in noise. He didn't like conflict, and this felt uncomfortable for him. He could see both sides, but he really just wanted the clamour to stop. "I'm just gonna… go get a pastry," he said, stepping out. Minerva handed the broom to Narcissa and followed him. "I know it's tough, darling, but you will have the broom back as long as it's safe." "It's not that," he told his guardian. "I'm fine with riding my nimbus until then; it's really a great broom, and you got it for me. It's just really… loud in there." "Ahhh," Minerva realised, pursing her lips discontentedly. She really was going to have to start searching for an American mind-healer for the summer, as much as she hated to put Harry through that. It was necessary for him to heal. And if another Dursley got blown up this summer, well, nobody had to know. "Want me to make that hot chocolate you love?" she asked her son, smiling when he nodded eagerly. He might have things to work through, but he wasn't broken.

Chapter 29

"No, Du! The koi pond is not for snacking!" Harry hissed at his snake the next day as they all sprawled, well-wrapped in warm clothing, in the extensive Malfoy garden.

"Then what, exactly, issssss the point of it?" the adder asked him, still eyeing the brightly- coloured fish.

"Decoration." Harry explained to his pet.

"Sssstupid, wasssste of good food," she grumbled. "Take my sssssweater off; I'm going to go catch ssssomething I can eat," she told him crossly as Harry took off her favourite of the many tubes of cashmere fabric Pansy had knitted her lately.

"What's got her tail all in a twist?" Pansy asked as Du slithered away.

"She wanted to eat the koi fish. Do you need any help with Buckbeak's appeal?" Harry asked.

"Don't worry Harry, we've got this," Hermione said. "No offence, but I don't think you're suited to the legal profession." "So I fell asleep during one Law and Order Marathon," Harry grumbled, exasperated, before stopping suddenly, standing stock still with his head leaning slightly to the side, looking very much like he was channelling his kitten side. "There's an animagus here," he said in Latin, hoping that Mia and Pans had learned enough to understand him.

Luckily, those two never did anything by half. "Where?" Hermione asked, and although her accent was a little anglicised, she was understandable.

"Small, on that tree over there," Harry replied, pointing inconspicuously, trying to keep his tone light, as if they were merely having an impromptu Latin practice.

"I'll get it," Pansy said. "If it's a threat, we don't want to expose your animagus form." Then, quick as a flash, she'd summoned a jar and pounced on the tree like her red tiger charm, coming back with an acid-green beetle wearing a very peeved expression.

"Let's take this to the adults," Hermione said. "There's a spell that can force an animagus back into their human form, but I haven't tried it yet, so there'd be a good possibility of disfigurement." She eyed the beetle in the jar, and her words made it clear that it wasn't merely a statement but a threat, and that she was perfectly capable of 'messing up' the spell should the need arise.

The children took their jar inside and were surprised to see Severus standing by the floo talking to Minerva. "Professor?" Hermione ventured, surprised.

"Ah, hello Ms. Granger. I was just talking to Minerva about something for a moment. Don't you children have better things to do than go bug catching? Perhaps I should have assigned holiday work." The others cast him distrustful looks, but Harry had to hide a laugh behind his hand. He knew better than anyone by now that the professor was full of hot air. Severus witnessed his poor attempt at hiding his amusement and cast him a mock glare. Harry only giggled harder.

"Harry says it's an animagus," Pansy explained, casting her friend a strange look as he shoved his scarf in his mouth to keep from laughing out loud.

"Oh, well in that case, one of you- no, not you Finnigan, it needs to be unburned for this to work- cast a stunning charm and lay it on the ground," the professor ordered. Hermione, clutching the jar carefully, did as instructed and soon there was a puff of light and a blonde woman with short, coiffed curls and ruby coloured, fake-diamond-studded glasses stood in the living room.

Most of the children didn't seem to know her on sight, but the dour potion master's face lit up in predatory excitement as he very nearly licked his lips. He rubbed his hands like a cartoon villain.

"Well, well, well, Rita Skeeter," he murmured in an undertone as he circled his prey like a great black panther. "So pleasant to see you again. I must say, I've been meaning to… compliment… some of your recent work."

Harry was torn between letting his anger loose on the woman and watching the dance of the angry Slytherin, but Pansy seemed to have no such restrictions. Hermione, although she had a fire in her eyes, took a step back graciously as she waved Pansy forward. This was her kill.

"You absolute bitch!" she growled, pushing Rita to a sitting position so she could look her in the eye.

"Ms. Parkinson, I believe I was in the middle of something," Severus intoned.

"Oh, we've all seen the lion king Sevvy, we know how this ends. Let me at her!"

"Detention for a week, Parkinson," and Harry knew it would have been longer if she wasn't one of his favourites.

"Yeah, yeah," she told Snape, the Americanism picked up from Jennifer Aniston's excellent portrayal of Rachel Green. "So," she turned to Rita, "what do you have against lesbians? Is it because we can actually do makeup?" she sniffed, looking disdainfully at Rita's thick swipe of eyeliner.

"Who are you?" the stunned looking reporter asked Pansy.

"Huh, funny your 'excellent contacts' didn't tell you that," she drawled, all Snape's lessons in posturing and dramatics being demonstrated to perfection. "Do you see these scars?" she continued, ghosting Skeeter's cheek with a red painted nail and offering her a good long look at her irreparably burnt hands. "These," she whispered, drawing out the silence for effect, "are from going at a dementor with nothing but a very tastefully elegant dagger. With you, all I'll need is my bare hands."

Anyone who didn't know Pansy wouldn't think it was possible for an adult witch to look so frightened by a four-foot-nine schoolgirl barely out of training bras.

"Well, we'll leave you kids to it," Narcissa said, as if they were merely playing a game of exploding snap. "Nothing illegal please," she said in a blasé tone, before grabbing Severus by the collar as he tried to escape through the floo. "Now, now, Sev, you must stay for tea. Dobby makes the most divine eclairs," she said, and swept all of the adults out of the room.

"So, whatever shall we do with her?" Pansy asked sardonically before turning to Harry. "Kitten, would you like the first go before I start. It was your mother she insulted, after all."

Harry was about to politely deny and just enjoy watching Pansy have a go at the muckraking monster when his sweet, conflict-avoiding nature took a back seat for a moment and he silently waved his wand at Rita. Nothing physically changed, but he looked very pleased with himself.

"What was that? Harry Potter, friends with Slytherins and unable to cast a simple hex," she cried gleefully, momentarily forgetting her situation. But no sooner had the words left her mouth than a horrid belching noise emerged from her mouth and she gagged until a toad slimily squelched to the ground.

"As you can see, I am perfectly capable of casting more than simple hexes. This is a little creation of my own. I got the idea from a muggle fairy tale. You print trash, you burp toads," he told her, before looking at Pansy. "That one's long term and irreversible, but she's all yours for a little more immediate revenge," he said, and he had never, not even when utilising every ounce of cunning at his disposal to survive the Dursleys, seemed more Slytherin than he did in that moment. Draco was entranced.

"Come on Draco, Ron," he said to two of his closest guy friends. "Let's go grab an éclair while the others enjoy the show."

Fifteen minutes later, Harry was having chocolate wiped out of his dimple by a hovering Minnie when a very odd creature with the body of a very large green beetle and the head of a bald Rita Skeeter scurried past the window. Harry was laughing so hard he had to hold his ribs and descended into a coughing fit, sending Minnie into mini-frenzy. Draco choked on his éclair, and Ron shot chocolate out of his nose as he snorted.

Chapter 30

They were due back at Hogwarts the next day, and Harry and Draco had done their packing ahead of time, unlike most of their friends, so they wandered the grounds aimlessly, talking of anything and everything except their childhoods. Du was draped casually around Harry's neck, full of nice fat field mice she'd found at the edge of the property, and Draco and Harry's hands were fighting for dominance in a large bag of caramel popcorn.

"You've had like, half the bag, Dray; let me have some!"

"You eat so slowly, though, and it's really good!" the blonde whined back, fingers reaching for a particularly sticky piece when they both heard a rustling a way ahead.

"Who could that be?" Draco whispered. "I thought everyone was inside."

"Dunno," Harry responded back just as quietly. "But if we're quiet, maybe we can see what they're doing." The two tiptoed quietly forward until they saw an unmistakeable head of bushy hair through a gap in the bushes. Then they heard Pansy's voice.

"How was that one?" the Slytherin asked her friend, and Harry pulled Draco down into a squat so they could better spy on the two.

"Better," Hermione responded. "I think she'd like that one. You're really good with your tongue. But you need to use your hands more, be gentle with them to contrast the heat behind it."

Harry looked at Draco- what in the world were they talking about? They had their answer a moment later, when Hermione pulled one scarred hand to the side of her face, just brushing the front-most curls there, and the other to her waist, gripping slightly. "Now try," she told her, and soon Pansy was… was attacking Hermione's face… with her mouth.

The two boys stood slack jawed for about twenty seconds until the two girls broke apart, both panting slightly.

"That… that was really good," Hermione complimented.

"Well fuck, now I'm just confused," Pansy swore.

"Join the club," Mia agreed.

"Wanna try some more?" Pansy asked, and that was when they boys ran.

[I'm revamping my line breaks. Please enjoy this visual of kitten Harry sneezing while Pansy tickles his nose with a feather]

Like fight club, the first rule of finding two of your friends kissing in the garden "as an experiment" was that you didn't talk about it. When Narcissa had asked them if they knew where the girls were that morning, they'd just squeaked and run off and hadn't said a word about it since. It was easier to put out of their minds with the school year resuming again, but they hadn't been able to meet the two girls' eyes for a full day until Pansy had smacked each of them and told them

to "stop being weird." Whether or not she knew they'd been spying on her and 'Mione, neither had the courage to ask.

Harry smiled as he dragged his trunk to the foot of his bed in the dorm room. Even though coming to Hogwarts no longer meant leaving behind a hellish summer with the Dursleys, it still gave him the warm feeling of coming home to a safe place when he got everything situated in his little corner of the dorm he shared with his friends. He let Du slither along his headboard until she found a comfortable spot to take a nap before he pulled out his Transfiguration book to read ahead for class the next day. He'd charmed a muggle pen to take notes while he thumbed through the chapter and was comfortably settled on the end of his bed when Ginny burst in.

"Ginny?! What are you doing here, and why are you on the boys' side?" Ron cried as he quickly buttoned the shirt he'd been changing into.

"You'll never believe what I just saw!" she told the room at large, ignoring her brother.

"What? What is it?" Dean and Seamus clamoured at the same time.

"Oliver and Flint snogging in the broom shed!" the little redhead crowed, crossing her arms triumphantly.

"We already knew that, Gin," Neville said. Flint and Wood had been hate-fucking half the schoolyear by now.

"No, not like that! I mean like snogging, like they were in looooove," Ginny sang. "Like Flint was cupping Ollie's cheek and everything. And it was slow, and tender, and they weren't just rushing to rip each other's clothes off!"

"You could tell all that from just a kiss?" Ron asked, looking at his little sister like she was a different species.

"It's an art form," she said, flicking her hair back. "I bet they're still at it- wanna come look?"

"Ew, no!" was the response from most of the boys, but Neville followed the youngest Weasley. "I've got nothing better to do," he shrugged, as Harry wondered when everyone turned into raging piles of hormones and buried his nose back in his book.

[Imagine, if you will, Marcus kissing Oliver good luck before a match (one where they're not against each other, of course)]

"Ugh, Harry, you've got a tonne of Potions," Pansy informed him the next evening, stepping into the Gryffindor common room as if she owned the place. "Snape made me help him brew them all in detentions. Also, Sir Cadogan can go fuck himself." They were all very frustrated with the new portrait, a wanna-be knight and the fat grey pony who seemed to object to the knight trying to ride him.

"I know," Fred said. "Too bad the map doesn't show an alternate route into the common room."

"The map," Hermione asked, pulling her head up from her Arithmancy homework. "What map?"

Fred and George both cast a glance along the common room to make sure it was just their group. "Wait right here," George said, disappearing upstairs. When he returned, he was carrying an old, blank piece of parchment. The others looked at the twins like they'd finally gone 'round the twist, unimpressed by a wrinkled old paper, but Harry gasped as soon as he saw it.

"That has Remus' magic in it!" he gasped.

"Professor Lupin was one of the Marauders?!" Fred and George looked like it was Christmas again. "You mean he was part of the greatest pranking team in history. He was a quarter of the marvellous Messrs. Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs?"

"What the hell are you on about?" Ron asked his brothers, but Harry practically fell into a chair as he was inundated by a wave of long-forgotten memories. He was barely a year old, having a crawling race on all fours with Remus. Remus was feeding him sweets behind his mum's back. He was bouncing and laughing atop Remus' back as the professor crouched down on all fours.

"I have to go!" he cried, and the others were starting to ask him what was wrong, but he was already in kitten form, rushing headlong out the portrait. He ran full speed all the way to the professor's office, transitioning smoothly to human form and shoving open the door without even slowing down.

"Harry?" Remus looked up in surprise. "What's wrong?"

Harry had tears streaming down his face as he practically tackled the professor in a hug. "Uncle Moony!" he cried hoarsely, picking up his legs and wrapping them around Lupin's torso.

Remus could hardly believe it. "Cub?"

Harry cried harder. "I remember," he gasped, burying his head in his uncle's chest. "I missed you!"

POLL- WHEN SHOULD DRARRY KISS???

Hello darlings,

I'm about to work more on the fic, but I need an opinion before I eat my dinner and get to work on the second part of the year.

I know people are super excited for drarry to get together, I am too. But I had two ideas for when their first kiss would be- I was thinking either the end of this third year or at the yule ball their fourth year. Both have their merits and I can write the story either way, because I'm fairly flexible as a writer. So whichever gets more votes, that's what it'll be. If you prefer a third option, you're welcome to put that in the comments as well.

Love you all,

Des

Chapter 32

"Not that I care," Snape told Minerva as they were both taking coffee in the staff room a few days later. "But what has Harry been up to this week? He normally comes by once or twice to talk to my ice cobra and have some biscuits, but I haven't seen him. And it's the Slytherin/Ravenclaw match this weekend, so it can't have been quidditch."

"Oh, it's the sweetest story," the tabby animagus told her colleague. "He found an old school thing of Remus' and it triggered his memory, so he's been getting reacquainted with his 'Uncle Moony,'" she said, smiling.

"So, he's been spending time with the wolf then," Snape sniffed.

"Severus Snape, are you jealous?" Minnie cried, looking very pleased with this turn of events.

"What?! No, of course not!" Severus spat, looking affronted by the very suggestion. "I'm merely frustrated as a professional. How is the boy supposed to receive all of the copious amounts of potions on his medication regimen if I never even see him outside of classes?"

"Aww, somebody's feeling neglected now that there's a new favourite uncle," Professor McGonagall cooed.

"The fact that you think I hold nearly that level of regard for the child shows how mistaken that statement is, woman," he griped, topping off his coffee mug. "But just for the record, if I were trying, I'd be the favourite uncle."

"You keep telling yourself that, dear," Minnie told him in a voice she hadn't used since he was a student. "But you know he'd be happy to have tea with you if you only asked him."

Severus flounced his robes dramatically and stalked away without responding.

[Snape is brooding in his office now- oh, dear]

"And then we realised we'd left the invisibility cloak on the astronomy tower," Harry finished his story, waving his hands excitedly. "Can you believe that? We get Norbert safely away and then forget the cloak."

"That's funny, cub," Remus told him with a smile, adding milk to their third cups of tea. "Two sugars?" he broke in quickly, and Harry nodded with a wide smile. "A similar thing happened with your father when he was head boy. It was my night off as a prefect, but it was also your mother's night off- she was head girl, you know- so I agreed to take over for James so they could spend some time together. He took the invisibility cloak and went to meet her, but it had been tossed aside and forgotten at some point. James liked to tell me that if McGonagall hadn't caught them, you might have gotten an older sibling that night."

Harry scrunched his nose up in disgust, the movement stretching the prominent scar across his forehead. "Uncle Moony, TMI! That is so gross!"

"Oh Harry, your mother would have embarrassed you so much- she believed in being very open about these things, you know," Lupin told him, chuckling.

"I know how it works, Moons, I caught my primary teacher doing it with the janitor on her desk when I was nine- I got detention for a week, by the way, and all I wanted was a book- but I don't need to hear about mum and dad doing it," Harry cried out, turning red.

"Silly cub, you would have been in for such a rude awakening. Your parents were so in love, you know, and they'd be ready at the drop of a hat, all hours of the day, forgetting to lock the door. You probably would have accidentally walked in on them so many times it would cease to be embarrassing by now."

Harry scrunched his nose again, and Remus couldn't help but smile at the thought that he'd done the same thing as a baby whenever anyone tried to give him sweet potatoes. "At least I don't have to worry about that with Minnie. The worst thing I've ever seen her doing is licking herself clean in cat form, but that's not a big deal because she does the same thing to me. I can't believe my parents used to have sex!"

Remus laughed so loudly he snorted a bit. "How do you think you got here, cub?"

"Stop, stop, stop!" Harry cried, cupping his hands over his ears. "I was made with cuddles and magic wishes and that's the end of it!"

"Alright cub, you were made with cuddles and magic wishes. And your mother never once hexed your father for annoying her. And I'm straight," Remus teased.

"I can't believe everyone thinks you're the strict professor type," Harry grumbled, shooting his uncle a mock glare and sipping his tea.

"Honestly, I can't either. I was a Marauder and the mastermind behind most of our pranks. The rest of them barely had half a brain between them on a good day," the professor chuckled fondly.

"And you're sure the map is safe?" Harry asked, picking up a previous conversation. "Even though…"

"Yes Harry, you and your friends are perfectly safe using the map. Sirius helped make it, but that was long before…" he swallowed, casting his eyes down. "Long before everything went wrong," he finished around the lump in his throat.

"Can't you try dating again, Uncle Moony? Find somebody else? I want you to be happy," Harry told him, big green eyes looking earnestly at Remus from their dark little face.

"Even if I wanted to cub, I couldn't. Werewolves mate for life. Sirius was it for me," Remus sighed.

"Oh," Harry swung his legs back and forth, too short to reach the ground from his chair.

"But don't worry about me cub. I am happy; I have you." He reached across the desk to ruffle Harry's hair as the teen shot a small smile at him. "Now come on; it's nearly time for dinner.

They'd just gotten up to walk to dinner when Severus Snape waltzed in. "Remus." He nodded curtly at the other man. "I've brought you your potion."

"Severus, it's two weeks until the next full moon."

"Oh, is it? Must've slipped my mind," Snape said, looking not-at-all put out. "Well, as long as you're here, Harry, you might as well come down to take yours in my office. It's so easy to miss a phial in the hustle and bustle of the great hall, and your serpent friend's been missing you. I also happen to have a batch of those biscuits that you like."

"Mm'kay," the teen agreed genially. "I'll see you at dinner, Uncle Moony," he said, hugging the man before turning to follow Snape to the dungeons.

Lupin rolled his eyes. Somewhere, from wherever she was watching, Lily was rolling her eyes at her old friend's theatrics.

Chapter 33

Harry was coming back from having tea with Lupin the next day when, after finally getting Sir Cadogan to open up the portrait hole, he ran into a distraught Ron, lifting all the cushions off the sofas and armchairs in the common room.

"I can't find Scabbers!" he wailed, before Harry could even open his mouth to ask him what was wrong. "I think that awful cat ate him!"

Hermione, who was searching the room as well with Pansy, albeit more calmly, ran her hand through her hair. "Ron, we have no proof that Crookshanks ate Scabbers. He's been up in my dorm all day!"

"Well, he must have come down, then, because Scabbers is gone!"

"Um, Ron, I hate to get in the middle of this, but couldn't Scabbers have just wandered off?" Harry ventured cautiously.

"Where, Harry? Where?! He's sick- he doesn't have the energy to go anywhere!" Ron shouted, and Harry backed up a bit.

"You know, we're just trying to help you!" Hermione shouted, finally losing her patience. "But if you're just going to accuse me, I think I'll go work on Buckbeak's appeal in my dorm instead!" She cried. "Come on Pansy, let's go," she ordered, dragging her friend by the hand.

"Ugh, I can't believe her sometimes!" Ron ranted to a silent Harry, who really just wanted to escape to the sanctity of the dorm. "You'll help me look, mate, won't you?" he asked, looking up.

"Uh, sure, of course Ron," Harry agreed, hiding his reluctance. At least the girls had left the room, so there would be no more shouting.

[Please enjoy this visual of Hedwig and Harry snuggling after morning mail is delivered]

Scabbers still had not been found by Saturday morning, and Ron and Hermione maintained an icy sort of silence, Ron from chair in front of the chess set, and Hermione from where she sat on Pansy's lap as the other girl pulled her afro back into a French braid.

"Alright, that's enough!" Pansy cried, fastening Hermione's hair back with an elastic. "I don't care how mad at each other you are, or which of you is right. It's Draco's second game ever and he's really nervous, and I love you both, but you're being ridiculous and you're going to have to put this fight on hold for the morning and you can go back to freezing each other out this afternoon- I don't care- but we need to put up a united front to support our friend! Is that clear?"

"Yes Pansy," Ron mumbled, looking down.

"Yes Pansy," Hermione sighed, knowing she was right.

"Good!" The Slytherin beamed, patting Hermione on the shoulder. "Now, let's go down to breakfast, and remember, act like you love each other."

Pansy made sure everyone ate a good breakfast (and in Harry's case, drank their potions) in time enough to get to the stands and get good seats before everyone else filed in. They were on the Slytherin side, of course, even Luna, in support of Draco, and Harry wore a green scarf and silver gloves Narcissa had gotten him for Christmas over the jumper Draco had bought him that first Hogsmeade weekend. Dean had owl-ordered some green face paint and made little snakes on each of their cheeks. He'd also painted a big sign that said "Get Raven-clobbered!" If you'd asked anyone who graduated before Harry's second year, they would have laughed in your faces at the thought of so many kids from other houses ready to cheer on Slytherin in a quidditch match, but here they were. Harry was just pulling some knitting out of his bag to wait for the start of the match when Remus, wearing nondescript black robes, walked towards their direction.

"Hey Uncle Moony," Harry greeted, tongue between his teeth as he finished a particularly difficult cable pattern.

"Hi cub, hi all. Would you mind if I joined you?" the professor asked, and a bunch of students eagerly bade him sit. The twins were just offering their hero a very suspicious-seeming cauldron cake when Professor Snape also joined them, wearing a large green top hat.

"Ah, Lupin, so nice to see you in my section," he drawled.

"Um, professor?" Blaise ventured cautiously.

"I lost a bet with Draco's mother, and say no more about it if you wish to keep the rest of your weekend free," he snapped at the stands in general, and Harry wasn't the only one who had to cast his eyes down to keep from laughing.

"Harry, cast your senses around, see if you can find Ollie; I bet he's kissing Flint good luck," Pansy ordered, and Harry turned red. "I'm not gonna do that! That's such a violation of privacy," he protested, turning to Moony for backup. But Remus, apparently remembering the decapitated Kappa in his classroom, courtesy of Pansy, looked away, whistling conspicuously.

Severus, who was just doing his job as a teacher and absolutely was not using this opportunity to get one up on the wolf, looked at his student. "You just finished a week of detentions with me, Ms. Parkinson- would you like to add another?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at her. Pansy rolled her eyes at him but dropped the subject, and soon Hooch announced the game to be starting anyway.

The Ravenclaw seeker was a lithe Asian fourth year named Cho Chang, and Harry noticed both Hermione and Pansy eyeing her appreciatively. Oh Merlin, it was spreading…

For his part, he mostly watched Draco, who, although an excellent flier, was very clearly nervous. Harry, who although he wouldn't admit it, had tuned in to Draco's aura, could feel his anxiety like a wave. Deepening the connection ever-so-slightly, he pushed a friendly little nudge from his core along the invisible string connecting him to Draco's. The blonde looked at him in surprise, and Harry smiled at him and gave him two thumbs up. He seemed to calm down somewhat after that.

The match itself was pretty exciting. The score went back and forth, and there were several chases for the snitch that ended in frustration for both teams. Ravenclaw was in the lead by thirty points when Draco spotted the snitch at his end of the field. Free of Cho, who had spent a good portion of the match tailing him, he shot off towards it, and although the other seeker noticed and gave chase, the hundred-foot head start Draco had was enough to ensure he reached it a good

second and a half before Cho got to the place the snitch had been. The other houses were by-and- large uncomplimentary as they groaned and booed, but the Slytherin house, along with their supporters in Harry and his friends, made more than enough noise to compensate. Harry dropped his knitting in the middle of the row and ran down to the field as soon as the teams had dismounted.

"That was great!" he enthused as he threw his arms around Draco, not seeming to realise that none of his friends had followed him down. "I knew you could do it," he told his friend, exaltedly, burying his head in the blonde's shoulder.

"Th… thanks," Draco stuttered, belatedly and dazedly wrapping his arms around Harry in return.

"Let's go have a party to celebrate!" the shorter exclaimed, for once in his life unaware of all the eyes on him. "We can ask the elves for snacks and send the twins to the village for butterbeer! I'm sure Sev won't mind if we do it in your common room."

"Calm down, golden boy," laughed Pansy, who had taken her time catching up to them. "I don't even think Sevvy's in a very good mood today."

"Oh, can we? Can we please, professor?" Harry asked, looking up at Snape, who felt a strange pang that the teen was using the honorific in public while Remus was called 'Uncle Moony.'

"Well, if McGonagall lets her lions do it, I certainly won't deprive my snakes," he agreed, taking the top hat off and looking relieved that he'd apparently completed the terms of whatever bet he had lost to Narcissa.

"Whoo!" Harry cheered, joined by Ginny and the twins, who were always down with any excuse to party. An excited tumble of green and silver soon drowned out any of the other colours they were wearing as the excited gaggle of children headed for the dungeons.

Chapter 34

The party lasted late into the night, far longer than Harry was capable of staying awake, and he woke up the next morning on a couch in the Slytherin common room, a blanket that hadn't been there the night before tucked carefully around him. He was, as usual, awake far earlier than everybody else, and the common room was empty. Harry cast his eyes around, vision snagging on the glass window looking into the lake, fish and merpeople swimming lazily by. He got down off of the couch, padding forward to press his nose against the glass. He was trading funny faces back and forth with a little merchild while her mother watched them fondly when he felt his bare feet covered by a pair of warm fuzzy socks. His mage senses told him before he even turned around that it had been Professor Snape.

"Mornin' Sev," he greeted, sticking his tongue out at the little mergirl.

"Good morning, brat. You really shouldn't be gallivanting around barefoot on these cold stone floors; your immune system is bad enough as it is."

"You ought to be careful, Pr'fess'r, or people are going to start to think you're a decent person," Harry commented off-handed, wiggling his toes around in the fluffy conjured footwear.

"No one would believe you if you tried to tell them," Snape said. "Therefore, my secret is safe."

"Is it, though? You gave Neville points for a good potion on Thursday," Harry reminded him.

"Damn, I did, didn't I? Must have been the fumes," the man defended. Harry rolled his eyes.

"Suuuure," he quipped. "Even Minnie thinks you're going soft, you know."

"Yes, well, what does that old cat know?" Severus grumbled. "She still thinks she's raising a darling little angel and not a holy terror."

"Thank you!" Harry exclaimed, not at all offended by the description. "Somebody realises I'm not adorable!"

"Oh, no, you're still adorable," Snape said. "If your mother was here, she'd be telling me to pinch your cheeks."

"My one ally!" Harry cried, clutching his heart as if mortally wounded. "The one person who I could count on to tell others that I'm not adorable, and you've betrayed me!"

"Dramatics are unbecoming on you," Severus hummed, unaffected.

"Well yeah, but that doesn't stop you," Harry retorted.

"Why, you cheeky little…" Harry, squealing, dodged a tickling charm as he booked it out of the dungeons.

[Pansy and Hermione are "practicing" behind the herbology greenhouses]

"MAMA!!!!!!" a little black kitten mewed, rushing headlong into a nearly empty Great Hall, tripping over its own feet and rolling over twice before landing at the feet of one Minerva McGonagall. "I'm being chased!" he meowed dramatically as the professor picked him up. Minerva, quite capable of understanding Harry even when she herself wasn't in her animagus form, was looking around for a culprit when a panting Severus Snape burst around the corner, lank hair dishevelled as he clutched his ribs.

"Your son," he panted, "is an absolute nightmare."

"What did he do this time?" Filius, another fan of early Saturday breakfasts, squeaked a laugh as he buttered his toast. "Insult your dramatic flair again?"

Snape harrumphed, and the assembled staff knew that to be a yes.

"Oh, Harry," the charms professor continued. "Your broom passed all the tests. I don't know who got it for you, but it's perfectly safe. I've had it delivered to your bedroom."

"AWESOME!" Harry cheered, turning around to run to his and Minnie's quarters, only to be stopped by the simultaneous cry of "Eat first!" and "Take your potions!" from the adults. He sighed- sometimes this 'caring adults' thing was really a pain. Of course, he wouldn't trade it for anything.

[Snape is brooding again- why does nobody fear him?]

Harry was rushing out, broom in hand and the Weasley siblings, minus Percy, who were the only ones awake in the common room, following him, ready to see a firebolt in action. They briefly stopped to talk to Hagrid, who had just received Hermione and Pansy's completed defence for Buckbeak and was feeling very optimistic about the appeal the next week, before they were on the field, the grass still wet with morning dew.

Harry mounted the broom and was surprised when it shot up one hundred feet higher twice as fast than his Nimbus with the same force behind the take-off. "THIS IS AMAZING!!!" he yelled down to the Weasleys, zooming so fast he was just a dark-skinned blur. "WOOD'S GONNA FREAK!" He shot high above the quidditch hoops before zooming downward into a dive that would have intimidated even Charlie Weasley, pulling up barely an inch before he hit the ground.

"You guys absolutely HAVE to try this!" he squealed, the thought not even occurring to him that most thirteen-year-olds who received such an extravagant gift would be reluctant to immediately share it with their friends. "Here, Ron- you go first!" he told his friend, knowing he was downcast from still being unable to find Scabbers.

The youngest Weasley brother brightened and gripped the broom reverently.

"Y'know," Harry said. "I won't be using my Nimbus very much since I have the Firebolt now. You guys could take it- you can share!"

Four Weasley jaws dropped in shock. "Harry!" Ginny, the first to be able to form words, gasped. "Are you sure?"

"Of course, I'm sure! You guys have done so much for me," he smiled brilliantly at them. "You deserve this. Besides, three of you are on the quidditch team as beaters and reserve seekers. A faster broom can only help us as a team," he said, as if this was the simplest logic in the world and not a grandly generous gift. He was soon engulfed in a group hug, unable to be seen through the pile of redheads embracing him joyfully.

Chapter 35

Hagrid burst into the Transfiguration classroom a little week later clutching a sheath of parchment. "WE WON!" he shouted, his excited voice making the desks shake. "BEAKY IS FREE!"

"Um, Hagrid…" Dean said, reminding their teacher that they were in another lecture.

"Oh, right," the large man's face turned red. "I'm sorry, Pr'fess'r McGonagall."

The tabby animagus' eyes sparkled in amusement. "Oh, that's quite all right Hagrid," she forgave, trying not to smile too widely. "We are all very happy for you and Buckbeak, but I do have a class to teach now, if you would…" she made a shooing motion with her hands, and Hagrid, smiling widely, stepped out of the classroom.

Harry was ecstatic that his hippogriff friend wouldn't have to be dead or on the run, and the rest of the period he spent charming smiley faces onto his newly transfigured teacups. He was so happy; he had a firebolt, Gryffindor had defeated Ravenclaw in the quidditch match the preceding Saturday, they were in for the cup the coming weekend, Buckbeak was safe. Things were looking up.

The rest of the week seemed to fly by. Harry and Draco had talked, and both had agreed that no matter who won the quidditch cup, they wouldn't let it affect their friendship. They sealed it with a friendly chess match, which Harry good-naturedly lost, before doing their ancient runes homework together.

The day of the match dawned bright and clear, and everyone ate breakfast at the Hufflepuff table, as it was neutral territory. Harry felt the usual pre-match anxiety churning in his belly.

"C'mon, eat your breakfast," Draco nudged Harry with his elbow. "I can't be happy about winning today if you're not at full strength when I beat you."

"You're one to talk," Harry grumbled, stomach gurgling. "Are you going to eat your oatmeal or just play with it?" Draco sighed and shoved his spoon in his mouth with a significant look at Harry, who reluctantly bit into a rasher of bacon.

"Those two absolutely bring out the best in each other," Pansy signed to 'Mione. "Isn't it sweet?"

"They're made for each other," Hermione agreed. "If only poor Harry could get it through his thick head that he's got a crush on him."

[Draco desperately wants to grab Harry's face and kiss him before the match, poor bean]

"Alright guys," Wood said, pacing in front of them like a drill sergeant. "This is it: the final match. This is what we've been waiting for. Twins, be aggressive. Katie, Angelina, remember our plays. And Harry-"

"Don't catch the snitch until we're at least fifty points ahead, he knows!" Katie groaned. "Leave the poor boy alone."

"I just want us to be prepared!" Wood gesticulated, waving his hands around wildly. "This is our-"

"Last chance to win the house cup," the twins finished in unison. "We know; we're as ready as we'll ever be, just relax a little, would ya? Oh, and cap?" they added when Oliver shot them an annoyed look.

"What?" he gritted his teeth.

"Your fly's down," Fred said, flashing him a grin. "At least have the subtlety of Katie and Angelina and do all your buttons up properly." Their captain reddened immediately and turned around to zip his trousers.

Harry barely registered anything for the next twenty minutes. Fred and George had to pull him into a corner of the locker room because he almost forgot all about his scars and changed in plain sight of the girls, and he felt the extensive pressure of all of Wood's expectations as he pulled on his seekers' robes and trudged out to the pitch with his broom. He and Draco shot each other shaky smiles as Hooch blew the whistle, and then they were airborne.

It was a rough match, but not a dirty one as each team pulled all the stops and gave everything they had. Harry focused intently, trying to hear Jordan's commentary above the roar of the wind so he knew when to go after the snitch. Draco almost managed to catch it once, but Harry managed to drive him away at the last minute as his best friend flipped him the bird, the smile in his grey eyes making it clear he didn't really mean it. Gryffindor had secured a sixty-point lead by the time Harry spotted the snitch, and he and Draco were both after it, the Slytherin having a fifty- foot head start that Harry quickly overcame with his faster broom.

Neck and neck, they raced towards the snitch, close enough to reach out and grab the other's hand. At the last moment, the snitch shot into a narrow branch of the stands, and Harry's gloved hand just managed to clasp it before both he and Draco realised he was very, very close to collapsing into the stands with no chance of slowing down. Draco, thinking quickly, grabbed the back end of Harry's broom and shot backwards with all his might. The Gryffindor's arm received a long, bloody scratch as it scraped against a sharp wooden corner, but that was the extend of it as the both collapsed on top of each other, the point at which the snitch was caught being very close to the ground.

"Nice job catching the snitch," Draco said, panting in exhaustion and relief that they were both okay.

"Nice job saving my arse," Harry returned, squeezing the other's hand. "But do me one more favour?" he pleaded the blonde, who looked at him quizzically. "Wrap your scarf around my arm? I'll have Minnie heal it, but if Pomphrey sees she'll lock me away and I'll miss the party." Draco laughed as he wrapped one of his favourite scarves around Harry's bloody arm without a word of complaint.

[Myrtle's just received her invitation to the victory party and is dancing in her toilet with glee]

Minnie healed Harry's arm but almost called Pomphrey just to look at it anyway, but luckily Harry's puppy eyes (or kitty eyes, to be more precise) saved him from the clutches of the medi- witch. They invited the whole school, even the Slytherins, and Myrtle, who had floated through the wall, watched gleefully as all the living beings complained about Sir Cadogan the annoying

portrait. It was a wicked fun time though, and even Flint wasn't too upset about losing, if the sounds from the seventh-year dorm were anything to go by.

"Next time try a silencing charm, would ya?" someone complained when Ollie and Flint came downstairs, both looking distinctly mussed and pleasantly dazed.

"Yeah, sure," Oliver agreed, looking as if he hadn't even heard the words, or was even aware of anything happening around him at all. He'd just won the quidditch cup and received a very thorough fucking; this was as happy as he'd ever been in his life and as happy as he'd be until he and Marcus got married and had a whole team's worth of babies.

"He won't be with us for a very long time yet," Katie laughed, a butterbeer in one hand and the other arm around Angelina.

"Congratulations cub," Remus told him, ruffling his hair. "Your father would be very proud of you."

"It was a good game," Snape agreed reluctantly. "Although I'm sure your mother would insist you have your eyes checked again; that was a bit of a close shave."

"Yeah, I could have planned that a little better," Harry mumbled, blushing. "Luckily Draco was there for me." The blonde flushed even redder than Harry.

[Someone snuck in firewhiskey; Flitwick's very tipsy]

Harry woke up in hid bedroom the next morning, having fallen asleep on the common room couch again.

"Geez bro, what do we have to do for you to make it past 11:30, win the World cup?" Ginny asked him when he emerged downstairs, having slept past his friends, an almost unheard-of event.

"Shut up," he muttered, stifling a yawn. The two pseudo-siblings were basking in the glory of the morning with Pansy and Draco, who had also slept in the tower, when Ron stomped down the stairs shouting. Hermione had come down a few moments later, Crookshanks in her arms, and they were all chatting softly when Ron came down.

"LOOK AT THIS!" he shouted angrily, holding a sheet with a bloody stain on it. "LOOK AT IT! SCABBER'S MUST HAVE COME BACK, BUT THEN THAT THING," he stabbed a finger angrily at Hermione's familiar, "KILLED HIM! HE JUST KILLED HIM!"

"Ron, you don't know that…" Harry tried, but Hermione had had enough.

"YOU KNOW WHAT, RONALD?! I'M SICK OF THESE ACCUSATIONS! YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW IF CROOKSHANKS DID IT- MAYBE SCABBERS JUST DIED! HE WAS AN OLD RAT, FOR MERLIN'S SAKE!" She shouted back at him, filling the common room with noise.

"IT MUST HAVE BEEN CROOKSHANKS! ASK SEAMUS AND DEAN- TRELAWNEY MADE A PROPHECY THE OTHER DAY THAT I WOULD BE BETRAYED- IT HAD TO HAVE BEEN YOUR STUPID FAMILIAR!" "TRELAWNEY WOULDN'T KNOW A REAL PREDICTION IF IT SHOT UP HER ARSE IN A CRYSTAL BALL!" Hermione screamed.

"THIS ONE WAS REAL! HER EYES WENT ALL WONKY!"

"HER EYES ARE ALWAYS WONKY, RONALD!"

Harry had started shaking. They aren't yelling at you, they aren't yelling at you, he repeated to himself, trying not to hyperventilate. But the room was fading in and out, and he was having trouble staying connected to the couch under him. The pain in your back isn't real, the pain in your back isn't real, noneofit'srealnoneofit'srealjustcalmdown, he shouted inside his head, but he could almost feel blood streaming out of fresh lashes and hear Vernon laughing.

"Stop it, you two!" Pansy ordered, not shouting, but somehow managing to quietly cut through all the noise the same way Professor Snape did in the classroom. "You're fighting about a stupid rat, but can't you see what it's doing to Harry?! You know what he grew up with, can't you be a little mindful about what he's going through?" She scolded them before turning to Harry.

"You're at Hogwarts, kitten. You're just fine."

"It hurts ithurtsithurts!" Harry cried, gripping Pansy's scarred hand for all he was worth. "Please stop! I'll be good, I promise. I'm sorry I stole food; I was just hungry butIwon'tdoitagainIpromise!" Hermione and Ron shared a horrified look; they hadn't known it was this bad.

"Feel guilty later you two and go get Minnie," Pansy ordered them. "Draco, grab Harry's other hand and just stroke it." She put a hand on Harry's sweaty forehead and stroked his hair gently out of the way. "Harry; listen to me. You're not with those monsters anymore. You're at Hogwarts with lots of people who love you and nobody will ever be able to hurt you again. If they even try, every teacher in this school will hex them to within an inch of their life, even Professor Snape. Just match my breathing. In, out, in, out," she demonstrated, and Harry started to synch his breathing to hers automatically.

"That's great Harry; you're doing great. Focus on my face. That's it. Can you tell me where you are?"

"Pans?" he muttered blearily.

"It's me Harry, you're safe, it's okay," she promised him.

"I'm sorry," he muttered.

"Shhh, don't be," she put a soft finger to his lips. "You've been through a lot- you were long overdue for a panic attack. Just rest," she soothed, softly singing an old Irish lullaby until his eyes fluttered closed, just as Hermione and Ron came through the portrait hole with Minerva.

"Weasley and Granger told me what happened," she said, feeling his clammy forehead, and Ron and Hermione knew she was disappointed in them by the use of their surnames. "He's worked himself into a fever; I'm going to take him to Poppy." She picked him up gently and exited again.

The kids all looked at each other for a moment before Pansy turned to Draco.

"Are you alright?" she asked her oldest friend. "I know that can't have been easy for you either."

"I'm okay," Draco nodded shakily, gripping Pansy's hand. "Thanks. You were really good."

"I never told you this, but I used to have panic attacks after my mom miscarried. The mind healer would go through that whole routine to calm me down."

Hermione looked at Ron. Ron looked at Hermione.

"I guess I don't know for sure that it was Crookshanks…" the redhead started.

"I guess I don't know for sure that it wasn't…" Hermione continued.

"I doubt we ever will," Ron said, scuffing the ground with the toe of his shoe.

"Maybe that wasn't even Scabbers," Hermione put forth optimistically.

"It's okay, Mione," Ron told her. "He was a really old rat, and he was sick anyway. And I should be happy that you have a familiar; that's a great thing for a wizard."

"I'm sorry I got so mad at you," Hermione said. "I probably should have put my pride aside and tried to work it out with you."

"I should have made it easier for you; I was kind of being a right prat."

"So," the black girl hesitated. "Are we okay again?"

Ron put an arm around her. "We were never not okay," he said. "You're way more important to me than a rat. Next time I just hope we realise before it hurts Harry."

Hermione shot him a shaky smile. "Me too, Ron. Me too."

Chapter 36

Harry was released from the hospital wing the next evening, and he was enjoying the fresh air whilst taking a roundabout route back towards Gryffindor tower with Severus, who just happened to be hanging around near the hospital wing (not so he would run into Harry. What? Why would anyone say that?) when they were greeted with a very odd sight. Ron and Hermione, chasing a rat, followed by Pansy and Draco, then, for some reason, Remus Lupin, who was shouting "Catch him, catch him! The old bastard!"

"Wha?" Harry looked at Severus.

"Just keep walking," Snape ordered, putting a hand gently on Harry's back. "You need rest, not whatever freak circus this is." Harry would have liked to argue and remind Severus that this "freak circus" was a group of his nearest and dearest friends, but he really couldn't disagree with the analysis. And that might have been the end of it, if it hadn't been for the great black dog that knocked into Ron, who had just gathered up Scabbers and put him in his pocket.

"I suppose I must clear up this mess now," Snape sighed, but then he caught a look at Harry, who had a very odd expression on his face.

"I'm coming with you," he said through gritted teeth.

"Harry, what? Go rest- this might be odd, but it's fairly tame by the standards of the messes your friends get into."

"I'm going; that dog is Sirius Black- I recognize his signature from the map."

"What map? - you know what? Never mind. Absolutely not. It's too dangerous."

"Severus, please; I have to go. Those are my best friends in there. And don't you think I deserve to look into the eyes of the man who destroyed my childhood and ask him why?" Harry's bright green eyes, so like his mother's, were full of pain and determination.

"Harry…" Snape ran a hand over his face, suddenly exhausted.

"I'm gonna go whether you take me or not; I need to do this. Wouldn't you rather I stayed safe with you?"

The professor's face twisted into a very odd mixture of pain and resignation. "Your mother is going to kill me and your other mother is going to build me a living hell in the afterlife, but very well," he sighed, defeated. "Do you have your felix felicitus?"

Harry pulled the little bottle of golden potion that Snape had given him the year before out of the pocket of his robes, where he always carried it. Severus nodded at him.

"Take it now and stay behind me. There's enough for three hours in there. The moment it runs out, I'm sending you back, with or without the rest of us." Harry nodded, agreeing to the terms. Then they both headed off, even the professor flinching as the great black dog, Ron's robes between his teeth, dragged him into the Whomping Willow. The redhead's leg was caught by a branch, and there was an audible CRACK as a bone was clearly broken.

"How do we get through the tree without getting clobbered?" Harry asked the professor, who told him about the knot at the roots.

"I'll get it," Harry said, preparing to change into his animagus form.

"No," the professor held up a hand. I will. Harry was about to ask more, but there was suddenly no Severus Snape, just a little black fruit bat. Harry would have laughed if the situation weren't so serious. The so-called 'dungeon bat' had a bat animagus. This had to be the felix felicitus already doing its work.

The little bat fluttered through the branches and pressed the knot in the roots with its nose. The branches stopped instantly, and Harry ran through, following an already human-again Sev into the tunnel.

Snape sighed. "I suppose it would be too much to ask you not to mention my animagus form to your friends."

Harry couldn't help the wide smile that stretched along his face, bringing his dimples into stark relief. "Uh, yeah," he giggled. "It's just too perfect."

"And the gradual disintegration of my reputation continues," the potions master lamented, before holding up his hand as he came to a stop at the end of the tunnel.

They were in a doorway to a dusty old bedroom, and Severus pulled Harry so that he would be hidden behind him.

"Just give me the rat," an unfamiliar voice, one that Harry assumed to be that of Sirius Black, growled at Ron, who lay on the bed, holding a desperately wriggling Scabbers tightly in both hands.

"Sirius, you're scaring him. You're going to have to explain a little more before you ask the terrified child to hand over his beloved pet to you. No offence, but you don't exactly look sane and charming at the moment," the calm voice of Remus Lupin was saying.

Harry tried to puzzle out what on earth was going on in there from where he was safely ensconced behind the professor's robes, but Snape had no such calm as he practically burst through the doorway.

"How dare you, wolf! Harry trusted you, and then I come down here to find you in cahoots with the enemy!" Remus may have been the werewolf, but Severus was the one growling at the moment.

"Snivellus?! What the hell is going on here?!" Sirius cried, wondering why this greaseball was calling his godson by his first name.

"Oh right," Remus sighed. "You're rather behind the times, Pads. Snape has come around to be a decent person and we're currently fighting over the position of Harry's favourite uncle."

"Um… what's going on here?" Harry finally stepped into the room.

"Oh, Harry," Remus exclaimed. "Good to see you. I'm rather surprised the mother bat let you come. Anyway, your father and his friends all became illegal animagi to keep me company on

the full moon, because as Severus so nicely just let slip, I'm a werewolf, Sirius is innocent, and that rat is Peter Pettigrew."

"You're insane," Severus snarled. "Harry would have felt if his best friend's pet was an animagus."

"Not if he hadn't left his form or used magic in twelve years," Remus argued as Snape raised his wand to do something indubitably illegal. "Go on Harry, feel the rat."

"I'm just gonna ignore how wrong that sounded," Harry muttered as, with the help of the luck potion, he tuned deeply into Scabbers. And Remus was right. Under twelve years of Weasley magic, there was a weak aura of human…

"Oh my god, he's right," Harry muttered, and Ron, who had been on the bed with Draco, Pansy, and Hermione, almost threw the rat away from him.

"I slept with that!" He cried, as everyone else screamed not to let him escape. In a flash, Harry was in his animagus form and clutching Scabbers between his teeth. With his feline instincts in the foreground, it was very difficult not to eat him. But he dropped the rat at Severus' feet, who briefly took his wand off Sirius and Lupin to stun him.

"Ms. Granger, if you would kindly keep the wand trained on Black and Lupin while I try the spell to turn this creature human. I don't trust either of them yet." Hermione did as instructed, as did Pansy, who gave Sirius a feral smile.

"I've still got poison darts in my shoe, you know," she told the convict, who paled. "Stay where you are or one might just slip."

"Well, can I at least scratch my nose? Now that you're telling me not to move, it really itches," Sirius whined, and Harry began to see him less and less like a hardened criminal.

Suddenly there was a great flash of light and a very dirty, rat-like man sat crouched in the centre of the room, grey-blonde hair in uneven tufts across his head. Just like Scabbers the rat, he was missing a finger.

"Oh my god, he's right," Snape muttered, in shock. "Which means… fuck! I've been making puns with Black's name all year, and now you're telling me he's innocent? Dammit!"

"Uh, Sev?" Harry tugged on his sleeve. "Not our biggest priority."

"Right," Snape shook his head. "Well," he continued. "Now there's just the problem of who gets to kill him. If I was fair I'd say we draw straws, but this is really cutting into my evening, so I say I get to be the one who tortures him slowly to death. Kids," he made a shooing motion with his hands. "Off you go. Remus will take Ronald to the hospital wing. Black, since you did just spend twelve years in prison for a crime you didn't commit, I might let you gnaw on his bones when I'm done with him." He raised his wand at the man cowering on the floor, simpering but too scared even to beg for mercy.

"Now hang on just a minute here," Sirius grumbled. "I want to be the one who gets to commit the murder I was actually imprisoned for."

"Stop it!" Harry cried. "Nobody kills him!"

The others looked at him like he was insane, and Pansy, seemingly prepared to ignore Harry completely, pulled out a dagger from god-knows-where and started sharpening it.

"Pansy, put down the knife," Harry ordered, sounding more authoritative than he ever had. "Now look, I hate him too. But how are we supposed to prove that you all switched secret keepers at the last moment- I'm assuming that's what happened," he stopped, waited for Sirius' nod, continued. "If we don't have a live witness to testify. Do you really want to live the rest of your life on the run just so you can kill someone who's barely worth the effort to raise your wand?" Both Sirius and Remus nodded, but Snape was still eyeing the rat appreciatively.

"I still want to kill him," he grumbled. But seeing Harry's stern face, he relented. "But I won't."

"So noble, so good, so like your mother, thank you," Peter snivelled, the first coherent statement he'd made all night, or in twelve years for that matter.

"This doesn't mean I don't think you don't deserve to be punished; I just think you're more useful alive at the moment," Harry told Pettigrew, impulsively giving him a good kick in the ribs. One wouldn't think such small feet could pack so much force. Peter whined. Harry looked down at him, unimpressed.

"Quit your grumbling," he said, anger starting to assert itself. "You're lucky it was just my foot and not a belt; that's what the Dursley's did to me." He was so frustrated, he forgot that most of the people in the room didn't know too many details about his life before Hogwarts, and his friends and Sirius traded horrified looks.

"Alright, now I don't want there to be any chance this little bastard escapes, so someone needs to put the spell that keeps him from changing into his animagus form, and then we all stun him at once," Harry said. Pansy wiped a tear from her eye; all her lessons were paying off.

They had no sooner done that than they all took off out of the tunnel and into the moonlight, eager to expose the truth to the world. But then the clouds moved away from the moon: the full moon. Remus started convulsing and doubling over, and Snape was about to curse him for forgetting to take his potion when he realised that he himself had been so distracted worrying over Harry today that he'd forgotten to make his potion. He could have cursed himself then, but instead he handed the magical ropes holding a stunned Peter to Pansy Parkinson.

"Take Pettigrew and run!" he screamed at the children as Draco and Hermione each put an arm under Ron to support him. Then he changed into his animagus form right as a great black dog charged into a snarling werewolf, transformation now complete. He was about to dive into the fray when he realised that a little black kitten was also staying in the open space instead of following the others. Oh Merlin, Harry Potter was going to be the death of him.

[Oliver and Marcus are having sex; completely oblivious to the happenings on the grounds]

Pansy panted as she ran harder than she'd ever run in her life, which was saying something. But Peter Pettigrew was slowing her down, and she'd lost the others somewhere along the way. At least there didn't seem to be a werewolf following them. But this thought came too early as she was suddenly overcome with a sweeping feeling of cold; there were dementors here, more than she'd ever seen, as they swept over the fog of the moonlit lake, drawn to Peter and his overwhelming stench of fear (or just overwhelming stench in general; the man hadn't bathed in twelve years, after all). Pansy cursed under her breath as her aching, freezing hands struggled to

stay connected to Peter's bindings and she saw her breath coming in crystals. Then there was a dementor she recognized, sporting a scarred chest and torn robes and lifting a regrown hand as if to say "so, we meet again." Pansy tried not to gag at the sight of scabby hands reaching towards her as she scrambled back. She had no one to protect here; her red tiger was useless. Happy memory… happy memory, she chanted to herself as she felt blackness edging into her vision. But she couldn't think of anything.

NO! screamed her inner voice. Without her, how was Hermione supposed to keep the group from getting themselves into trouble all by herself? Hermione… the way her hair fell in her face and the way her nose crinkled as she translated rune patterns. The way she kissed Pansy back behind the greenhouses, in the dorms, in abandoned classrooms when they "practiced." The way they wondered if maybe it wasn't supposed to be just Pansy and Millicent, but Pansy and Millicent and 'Mione, because they'd fit so perfectly together since the first day of second year when they beat the hell out of Cornish pixies together. She had to stay alive.

"EXPECTO PATRONUM!" she screamed, and for the first time, a brilliant tiger in not red but silver sprang from the tip of her wand, frightening the dementors away. This was the first time in her life that Pansy had exuded such a strong whirlwind of not terrifying anger but overwhelming happiness, here alone by the lake with nothing but an old-rat man, hundreds of thousands of dementors, and the memories of her friends. She smiled- she was never one to do things by halves.

[Minerva grades papers in her office, thinking that Severus is merely using the full moon to try to one-up Remus as Harry's favourite]

Hermione and Draco held an unconscious Ron; they were almost to the castle. They'd lost Pansy somewhere along the way, but they weren't worried; she could take care of herself. They were just reaching the castle's grand back door when two lone dementors came gliding towards them. Shit. Shit shit shitshitshit.

"Now would be a great time to make a Patronus," Hermione told Draco as she grappled for her own happy memories.

"Don't you think I'm trying?!" Draco snapped through gritted teeth, sweat pouring down his pale face.

Hermione was still feeling rather down about causing Harry to have a panic attack by her fight with Ron, and the dementors were only bringing that feeling into the forefront. As much as she hated to admit it, Draco was their best hope in this situation.

"HARRY LOVES YOU, YOU GREAT FOOL!" she yelled at him, knowing it was true. "HE DOESN'T KNOW IT YET, BUT HE DOES! I'M ONE OF THE SMARTEST PEOPLE IN YOUR YEAR, AND I'M TELLING YOU IT'S TRUE! NOW WOULD YOU PLEASE MAKE A DAMN PATRONUS?!"

Until that night, there had never been a case of someone being yelled into producing a memory of pure happiness, so Draco's gleaming silver ferret had the honour of being the first as it drove the two dementors away before disappearing as he and Hermione nearly collapsed through the doors with an unconscious Ron, where a prefect found them a few moments later, all collapsed in a pile, exhausted.

[Madame Pomphrey is dispensing chocolate to all our sweet children and wondering where the hell Harry is, because there is no way he's not involved in this]

As the others dealt with their dementors and made it safely to the hospital wing (and wasn't it a surprise to see Peter; Poppy called Dumbledore, who called Fudge, who is now in shock as he has no other option but to admit he was wrong about Black, wherever the man happens to be at the moment), Dumbledore made the very stupid decision not to alert Minerva until they knew for certain where Harry was, which was frankly a dumb decision, but one that Poppy hadn't the time to argue at the moment as she bustled about, caring for her patients.

Meanwhile, down at the open field, a great black dog fought a werewolf as a fruit bat tried to drive a kitten with a lightning-bolt scar back towards the castle, but he would not go. He batted the little mammal gently aside as he anxiously watched his godfather fight the wolf, both of them rolling around, each trying to gain the upper hand. Bat-Snape anxiously tried to grab Harry in his little claws, but the kitten was too heavy for him. He was about to change back into his human form, grab Harry, and run for it when Lupin broke free of Sirius and rushed in their direction.

Harry knew Snape wanted to get him to safety, but even in kitten form he could feel Lupin's internal struggle with the werewolf dominating his core. He couldn't leave him like this; he just couldn't. Remus was in there, in so much pain as he fought with the magical beast in an effort to defeat it; he just needed a little help. With the felix felicitus still coursing through his system, he knew he had the perfect opportunity. When the werewolf broke away from Sirius and rushed towards him, Harry stood his ground, batting aside a hovering Snape, who luckily was frozen in uncertainty over what to do. Harry waited until Remus was almost on top of him; Uncle Moony couldn't turn him while he was a kitten, the worst he could do was eat him. But Harry was too fast for that as he lithely sidestepped the raging beast's claws, jumping onto a rock and from there to the werewolf's back. He dug his paws and his teeth into fur and held on. He had moments before the potion wore off; he needed to do this now.

Harry tuned in, deep inside Remus' magical core, feeling the angry grey mass that dominated the magic there. And he grabbed on with his own magic, grabbed on with all he was worth. And he pulled; he latched on and started the most difficult battle of his young life so far. Inch by inch, he tugged the snarling virus away from Remus' magical core, he refused to let it bounce back as it so desperately wanted to; he tugged and he tugged and he tugged- held on with even more effort than he'd held onto Quirrell first year. The mass growled; he growled back; the mass pulled, he pulled back. The mass fought; he fought back, until finally he felt his magic return to his own body and the wolf that once held Remus captive dispersed into the air in a great pile of grey fur, and then he was on top of a human Remus Lupin. The last thing he had the energy to do was retract his claws and pull his teeth out of what was now human skin, and then he passed out, too tired even to return to human form.

Chapter 37

Chapter Summary

Well well well my friends, we've reached the end of another book, and I'm so happy to take this journey with you. I hope you have continued to enjoy this AU, and I can't wait to start the next book in the series with my wonderful readers. Love, Des

"His rate of recidivism increases every year," Madame Pomphrey cried as Snape carried an unconscious kitten into her hospital wing, followed by a great black dog. Poppy looked at the dog and sighed.

"You may change back now Sirius; your innocence has already been proven." A very dishevelled Lord Black, covered in dirt and hair down to his elbows, appeared where the dog had been standing.

"Fantastic, because I really need a shower. Come in with me, Remy?" Lupin wrinkled his nose.

"Not until your second shower, babe," he told his boyfriend, who shrugged.

"Suit yourself. Come get me when Harry wakes up, yeah?"

"Of course," Remus nodded, and that's when Madame Pomphrey turned to look at him, looked outside at the moon, and dropped the tray of potions she'd been carrying.

"Remus, you're supposed to be… how… what on earth?"

"Harry," Remus said, and that one word served as a coherent enough explanation on its own as realisation dawned on Poppy's face, but he kept going. "He… he pulled it out of me somehow. I've never seen anything like it…"

"Yes, he continues to surprise us all," Snape said. "Now would someone please look at the poor child and make sure he didn't do any permanent damage to himself?" The medi-witch shot him a look for being so rude, but she waved her wand over Harry without commenting.

"No permanent damage," she breathed a sigh of relief. "Just magical exhaustion. I'm just going to charm him back into human form, and with a few days of rest and his usual depletion of my potion stores and he'll be back to his usual antics. I must say, this child continues to surprise me."

"Well," Severus said, "judging by the lack of hoovering tabby cats, I'd say the esteemed headmaster hasn't seen fit to inform Minerva of what has happened tonight. Remus, now that you're human and not a slavering monster, why don't you tell her?"

"Why yes, Severus," Lupin said with a mischievous smile, "I would be happy to go tell Professor McGonagall that you allowed her beloved only child to embark on a dangerous adventure after an escaped convict and a werewolf. I'm sure she'll be delighted to hear it."

The potions master scowled. "Never mind, I'll tell her myself if you're just going to twist the story around," he grumbled stalking off towards Gryffindor tower as Remus, looking very pleased with his victory, took the chair beside Harry's bed.

[Minerva wasn't pleased; oh dear. Well, at least Snape still has all his limbs. Dumbledore's nose has been broken again.]

Harry groaned as he came to awareness two days later; he had a bitch of a headache. A roomful of eyes immediately turned his way at the sound, including those of a newly clean and well-groomed Sirius Black, hair down only to his shoulders.

"Just what am I going to do with you, young man?" Minerva sighed, laying a hand across his forehead to feel for a temperature.

"Love me and trust that I knew what I was doing?" he smiled sheepishly at his guardian.

"Nice try," she waggled a finger at him. "Well, I suppose it was too much to ask the teenage son of James Potter not to take off after a dangerous escaped convict dragging his best friend into a tree," she sighed, pushing his hair back and apparently lacking the ire to truly scold her son. "Severus, however," she cast a dour look at the man sitting in an adjacent chair.

"He made me do it; it was all very Slytherin." Minerva's f ace said that she was not impressed with the excuse.

"Who's the adult here?" she asked him.

"Yeah, Snivellus," Sirius stuck his tongue out at the man.

"Watch it, mutt. I still don't like you," the potions master pouted.

"You're just mad because everyone knows you're a big old softie who worries incessantly about my godson," the dog animagus laughed.

"Maybe your godson would like to know what I walked in on yesterday between you and a certain defence professor…" Snape threatened.

"He most certainly does NOT want to know!" Said godson cried, before groaning and clutching his head.

Madame Pomphrey immediately bustled over with a pain relief potion. "Easy there, Mr. Potter," she told him sternly. "You did just wrestle lycanthropy out of a man less than 48 hours ago."

"It really worked, then?!" Harry exclaimed eagerly as he reached for the potion.

"Yes, Harry, it really worked," Remus told him, squeezing his hand. "And I cannot tell you how grateful I am, although I wouldn't recommend you make a habit of it. You really scared us there, when you collapsed. It's the longest I've seen Sirius and Severus ever go without screaming at each other."

"Perhaps even more concerning," Madame Pomphrey said, unable to keep from cracking a smile. "Now, you've all seen that he's okay, so everybody out. Let my patient rest!" she ordered, shooing them all away, except for Minnie, who did her usual routine of changing into a tabby cat and curling up against Harry's side.

[Moony and Padfoot sittin' in a tree. F-U-C-K-I-N-G!]

There were only a couple months left before the end of term, and they seemed to fly by as Harry got to know his godfather, played quidditch with his friends without the pressure of Wood telling them all how they absolutely must win every game, and studied for finals, which went well, as usual, thanks to Pansy and Hermione's study schedules. Minerva had finally exclaimed that she and Severus had witnessed his nightmares the night Sirius broke into the castle and explained that she would really like him to see a mind healer in America over the summer. Harry, who wasn't keen on having any more panic attacks any time soon, had to agree that it sounded like something necessary, if unpleasant. Besides, Minnie said that it would be for only a few weeks, they'd be back by his birthday, and that they could go sightseeing in between sessions. Severus would also be joining them, something about 'looking for potions ingredients native to the area,' but they both knew he'd gotten used to Harry's presence in the summer and had reluctantly come to worry about his old friend's son.

In a surprising but satisfying conclusion to the Latin question, Sirius, who had heard him translating a difficult passage for Hermione and Pansy, barked a laugh and explained to his godson that for months on end, he had spoken to Harry only in Latin as a baby after James had made an offhand comment about how Padfoot 'didn't seem sophisticated enough to speak Latin,' even though all the Black children were forced to learn it, just to drive his best friend mental. He had been surprised Harry remembered it, but then, Lily had always had a knack for picking up languages quickly.

Perhaps the only truly disappointing thing to happen to Harry for the remainder of the term was when Remus announced that he would not be teaching DADA the next year. Harry had burst into his office after dinner, distraught.

"I took the werewolf out of you!" he'd cried. "Why can't you stay?!" The professor let him rant a little longer before he could get a word in.

"Don't worry, cub. I'll be back after next year," he told him. "I just want to take a leave of absence to spend some time with Padfoot. Besides," he lowered his voice to a whisper and leaned in conspiratorially, "we have a bad habit of being too much for the silence charms to handle."

"EW!" Harry turned a brilliant shade of red. "Don't say any more, please- I love you and I'll see you next year!"

"Harry, you're coming over to dinner at our place tomorrow night after the train stops in Diagon Ally," his uncle reminded him.

"I'm never eating dinner ever again!" Harry cried dramatically, making gagging noises as he turned and booked it out of the room.

"See how well that goes over with Minerva," Remus called after him as he left, shaking his head fondly.

[Remus is right; the silence charms have fallen again. Oh dear- Padfoot, you kinky bastard!]

It was a fairly relaxing train ride to Diagon Alley; Minnie was happy to let him join his friends now that the dementors were gone, and Seamus only started one small fire in their expanded compartment. Harry was excited to see Grimmauld Place, where Uncles Padfoot and Moony lived; apparently, they had fixed it up from an old dour manor where Sirius passed a miserable childhood into a bright new home over the past couple of months, and Harry was hopeful that a mind healer could help him similarly recover his sense of self over the summer. But for now, Harry had his friends, he had a bag full of snacks from Minnie, and he had a dinner with his godfathers to look forward too, and that was more than enough for his easy-going nature to find all the happiness in the world, something that three years ago, he didn't believe was possible.

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Preface

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Fanart for the series that I just had to put in

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Chapter 30

POLL- WHEN SHOULD DRARRY KISS???

Chapter 32

Chapter 33

Chapter 34

Chapter 35

Chapter 36

Chapter 37

Afterword