Harry landed in the woods behind the Swan's house with a crack and Jasper immediately fell to his knees beside him.
It had been ages since he'd been able to surprise apparate someone, it was something him and George had been doing for years and people had become way too good at dodging them.
The wretching sound Jasper was making did make him feel a little bad though so he patted Jasper lightly on the head until he seemed to be able to focus again.
Jasper glared at him.
"We're here!" Harry announced cheerfully.
Jasper continued to glare at him.
"Blood pop?" Harry had taken to hiding them in all of his pockets, he knew bribery could be his most charming feature. He grinned at Jasper happily.
Jasper was still glaring but it was hard to take the glaring seriously when he was sucking on a lollipop.
Harry dragged him up by his hand and they wandered towards the house which even from 200 metres away they could see was a hive of supernatural activity. The wolf pack were sniffing around the back garden with all the subtlety of herd of Graphorns.
One of the shorter ones had actually bent down to smell the grass. Which was so clearly a thing a human would do.
Harry rolled his eyes when he spotted Emmett awkwardly bent out one of the upstairs windows sniffing the air.
Honestly. He'd seen more subtlety from wizards and he'd once watched Elphias Doge wander around a Tesco in a trench coat and a pair of suspenders. Harry still found it astonishing that he wasn't arrested just for being weird in a supermarket.
It had been one of the reasons he'd pushed for mandatory training for ministry employees in current muggle fashion. And hadn't that been fun to get through the Wizengamot.
He'd had to use so many handouts. Too many wizards refused to accept that bathrobes weren't just wizarding robes for muggles. Explaining that just because you found it for sale in a muggle shopping centre did not mean that it was going to make you blend in with muggles.
Eventually he'd convinced Lavender Brown to put together a side business selling muggle clothing in preprepared outfits to ministry workers. She was running it full time now and yet Harry had still spotted Dedalus Diggle wandering around muggle London in a Merlin costume, complete with a terrible fake beard and a wand with a star on the end.
Jake ran back into the garden at a pace that would have been unrealistic for a world class sprinter, still pulling his shirt back on. Luckily Charlie was too busy watching Quil move a heavy BBQ with one hand.
He'd swapped one group of idiots for another it seemed.
Chief Swan was just stood on his back porch with one eyebrow raised, watching the sheer amount of weirdness happening in his garden with a sort of exasperated exhaustion.
Harry and Jasper slipped around the front of the house and knocked; Harry was not looking for more reasons for Charlie Swan to be suspicious about him. And walking into his backyard from the woods would definitely be suspicious.
A couple of moments later a still confused looking Charlie opened the door before sighing heavily. "Hello?"
Harry smiled in what he hoped was a polite and charming way and waited for Jasper to take the lead.
Charlie was staring at him with narrowed eyes, and he interrupted Jasper before he could even get started. "Hey, aren't you the one that drives that yellow jeep everywhere?"
Harry clearly wasn't doing the best job at looking innocent.
"Eh, yep! Er, I mean, yessir." Harry could feel himself panicking. He was the same age as Charlie, why was he so incapable of talking in sensible sentences. "I drive." Yes Harry, pretty sure he knows that. "My car is very yellow?" Goddammit that wasn't even the thing in question.
Luckily Jasper had the whole looking innocent thing down pat and was happy to talk for both of them.
"Nice to see you Chief Swan, this is Harry." Jasper smiled at him brightly and Harry would bet he could sell water to a whale with that smile. "Harry is new to driving on the right side of the road as he learned to drive in the UK but we're working on it together." Charlie looked reassured in the face of all of nice, good boy energy that was rolling off Jasper but was still eyeing Harry suspiciously.
Maybe he thought Harry was a corrupting influence.
Wouldn't that be fun.
"Well, as long as you're responsible about it." Charlie grumbled, glancing back through to his kitchen where Jake was stuffing an entire slice of pie into his mouth. "I wish Bella had told me she was having friends over."
Jasper blinked down at Charlie politely, "I'm so sorry to intrude, we don't mean to disturb you."
Charlie just grumbled under his breath before he stepped aside to let them in. "Bella's upstairs with the rest of your…" Charlie hesitated for a moment. "Family. The reservation lot seem to be hanging out in the back for some reason." Charlie glanced suspiciously at Jake but if Jasper was an innocence expert, Jake was a master.
He blinked at Charlie like butter wouldn't melt in his mouth.
Charlie just scoffed and moved past him to take up his post looking over the garden.
Jake grinned at him and came to meet Harry at the door. "He's just grumpy because Bella let Edward into her room again. I think he was enjoying the whole yelling at Edward thing Bella had going on for a minute."
That was news to him, Bella didn't seem like the kind of person to yell but if this was part of her journey to become less like an alien Harry was going to support her 100%.
Jasper nodded at Jake as they entered the kitchen but Jake just glared back. Until Harry poked him.
"Oi. I'm allowed to glare at vampires, it's in the treaty and everything."
Harry raised his eyebrow.
"Fine, it may not be in there specifically but it's about the spirit of the thing."
Harry's eyebrow went up further.
"Fine. Jesus." Jake rolled his eyes. "Hi Jasper."
"Hi Jake." Jasper seemed bemused but Harry was happy to see his family being nice to his…whatever Jasper was. Forced politeness was still politeness.
Harry glanced around, apart from the extraordinary number of supernatural teenagers nothing appeared to be disturbed.
But they had to be called here for a reason.
There had better be a good reason otherwise interrupting his date/Buckbeak reunion was an unforgivable offence.
"So what happened?"
Jake was still chewing on pie and Harry cringed when he went to answer anyway.
"From the sounds of it Bella was taking Edward up to her room for a 'private' conversation, or to yell at him some more, when Edward noticed the scent of another vampire in the room. He called you lot and Bella called me."
Harry could barely concentrate on what Jake was saying he was so transfixed on Jake's chewing, it was horrifying. He was definitely doing it on purpose, no one can be that disgusting by accident.
Wait.
Jake was suddenly seeming a lot more chilled out about the whole Bella thing than he had before.
Harry narrowed his eyes at his cousin. This new maturity was surprising and very suspect.
"So you picked up a phone call from Bella?" Harry would grill Jake later but he figured it was best to establish some basics now. Basics like if he was going to have to protect his cousin from a rabidly angry Edward. Because he was totally up for that, just might want some advanced warning.
The bugger was fast, he'd give him that.
"Yeah, well. She's been yelling at Edward all week for what he did to you." Jake finally finished chewing and Harry felt like celebrating. "I figure, if nothing else if she feels safe enough with the guy to yell at him their relationship can't be as bad as it looks from the outside."
Harry shrugged, made sense to him. Jake was many things but now he was over his initial hurt Harry would bet money on him switching over from excessively jealous to excessively protective.
Harry had once watched Jake sprint across gravel barefoot just to stop Seth from accidentally touching a stinging nettle.
Gravel was almost as bad as Lego. The boy was clearly insane.
Jake had spoken at length about how Bella talked about Edward over the summer, it had been mixed in with typical teenaged griping but the red flags were clear anyway.
The way she hovered around Edward at school left Harry feeling similarly uncomfortable. Edward was the centre of her world, she barely spared a glance for anyone else.
"What do you mean?" Jasper was pretending mild interest but even Harry could see his ears twitching.
"Well, she never said anything bad about him. Even when he clearly deserved it. No one is that perfect, especially no one who breaks up and leaves you out of the blue, I figured she was scared to say anything." Jake shrugged oblivious to the way Jasper tensed. "If you can't even bring yourself to complain about someone who abandoned you for 6 months there's something wrong."
Jake finally noticed that Jasper was glaring but Jake waved him away like he was an annoying student rather than a murderous vampire-thingy.
"I'm not saying he threatened her or anything, just that she clearly wasn't comfortable if she couldn't even mention that he might have a flaw. That's unhealthy as fuck."
Harry nodded. Ron and Hermione went through a honeymoon period just after the war but they quickly went back to bickering.
When Harry had been concerned Mrs Weasley had said that for them bickering was just part of how they communicated. They knew each other's flaws and loved each other anyway.
Not complaining about a boyfriend who broke up with you and abandoned you in the woods seemed a bit suspect.
A dick move was a dick move.
You could love someone and still think they were a prick. Malfoy had friends after all, and nobody could ignore how much of an arse that man was.
Jasper looked troubled but he shrugged anyway. "That's not untrue."
Jake tried not to look smug, he failed.
"I'm going to head up and see if my family need any help." Jasper murmured to Harry, smiling gently down at him before heading for the stairs.
"Let me know if you need me for anything." Harry grinned back at him; Jasper's smile was so sweet that Harry was deeply regretting that they were in public. And standing in front of his cousin.
"Pathetic. The both of you." Jake's voice was snide but when Harry looked at him he was grinning at him happily.
Harry smiled back as he protested, "Hey, we've been on one date! We're hardly pathetic yet."
"Very pathetic if you look at each other like that after only one date." Jake mimed wretching and Harry punched him on the arm.
Fuck that hurt. He needed to stop doing that.
Harry shook out his hand as they looked out over the wolves who were now gathered in a group chatting. Harry might have believed they were talking about something serious based on their expressions but he could see Quil gesturing from here and he was definitely talking about Mario Kart. Or demonstrating a really low energy dance move.
"He's good for you." Harry looked over at his cousin sceptically. No way that statement didn't have a scathing follow up. "I mean he's still a blood sucking leech and I hate him."
There it is.
"But you seem happy around him, so I'll only lightly insult him to his face."
Harry snorted. As if Jasper couldn't hear every word said in this house. Jake probably could too the bastard. Harry was going to have to do something to improve his hearing otherwise he was making it was too easy for the others to plan pranks without him noticing.
Jake poked him in the side of the face and Harry slapped at his hand, this time adding enough of a magical push that he at least managed to move the finger a couple of inches.
"You should plan on telling him everything." Harry looked up at Jake who was clearly avoiding eye contact now he'd got all serious. "I know you have a lot of shit bottled up in there." Without even glancing at him Jake managed to poke Harry directly in his ribs.
Ouch.
"We don't mind you keeping it to yourself, but you should talk to someone about it. You haven't got to tell him it all at once but at least plan on letting him in a bit."
Harry nodded. Now they all knew about magic his excuses for keeping a lot of things to himself had run out.
He rubbed his ribs ruefully, Hermione would have said they same thing.
If anyone deserved an honest attempt at openness it was Jasper, Jasper who had told him the most painful things about himself without prompting before they had even decided to try dating.
"You're right."
"Of course."
Harry smiled at Jake who just sniffed at him. "When did my cousin get all wise? Dolling out love advice like an elder." Harry poked Jake in the stomach which, even with a magical push, had upsettingly little impact.
"Pfft, I've always been plenty wise."
Quil walked in at that moment and snorted. "Yeah, sure, you were totally being wise that time you got stuck in that grain silo over by the Clearwaters."
"That was an accident."
Embry popped in behind him. "Or that time you threw the 'empty' gasoline container on that beach bonfire."
Jake just groaned.
"Or that time you got into Leah's room and managed to-"
"SETH SO HELP ME GOD I WILL END YOU."
Harry laughed as Jake chased the increasingly hysterically giggling Seth around the garden for the next ten minutes and even Charlie cracked a smile when Jake eventually caught him only to be tackled by Seth's older sister Leah.
Apparently, she hadn't forgotten Jake stealing her make up for 'war paint' either.
Harry just laughed, sandwiched between Quil and Embry whist they took bets on who would win in a fight between Leah and Jake.
Jake's odds were not good.
A vampire had been here.
A unknown vampire that could be related to the sightings of Victoria. Or the missing people in Seattle. Or the Volturi. Or all of the above.
Jasper was having no more luck than the rest of his family working out if they were going to get any more information from Bella's room.
Bella who had immediately called Jake. Jake who had apparently actually picked up. Jake who had immediately summoned the pack.
The wolves didn't seem to be having any more luck, by the sounds of it they had given up tracking the scent any further, too diluted by the constant rain.
They were now doing something else loud and obnoxious and almost certainly involving Harry.
Jasper watched as Edward slowly disintegrated, if this had happened earlier in the week when Jasper was still apoplectically angry at him Jasper might have even taken some joy in watching him implode.
As it was all he could feel was sympathy.
Bella seemed weirdly calm.
She looked around the room before turning to Jasper. "Is Harry here?"
Jasper just nodded and stared at her, nonplussed.
"Right." Bella nodded firmly and then moved past Emmett who appeared to be trying to pick up on a scent via osmosis. He was pressed to the wall of Bella's bedroom in a way that looked like he wanted to become one with it.
Jasper felt like he would never really understand Emmett.
Bella moved quickly downstairs, quietly avoiding Edward's outreached hand.
Jasper snorted. The two of them had been talking this week and Edward had been confident yesterday that he was making progress. Apparently trying to send her out of town when Alice foresaw Victoria visiting went down about as well as Jasper had been expecting.
Jasper glanced around the room at his family who were all looking tense and unsettled. He sent out a soothing wave of calm that seemed to settle some nerves. At least Emmett decided to stop hugging the wall.
There was nothing he could do for anyone up here, so he decided just to follow Bella down the stairs and join her where she was talking to Harry.
Bella was talking quickly and clearly about what had happened, listing off summaries of the conversations that had happened so far. What they knew about what happened.
Jasper realised she was giving Harry a report. A pretty comprehensive one.
He glanced over quickly to make sure Charlie was still outside and was relieved when one of the younger wolves went over to talk to him.
Sam and Jared were already making their way inside, Jake close on their heels. They gathered around the table, Jasper could feel his family joining behind him. This was turning into an impromptu all hands meeting but Bella was still only focused on Harry.
Harry was just nodding at her seriously, none of the usual mischief on his face.
When Bella finished Jake stepped in to clarify a couple of details from the wolves' investigation. Harry thanked them both and then he just frowned in thought for a couple of moments.
Leaving Jasper's fingers itching to smooth down the line forming between his eyebrows.
Everyone else was quietly waiting.
Harry sighed, glanced around, and nodded to acknowledge the wolves before moving slightly backwards until he could see everyone. Jasper couldn't help but smile at the slight twitch of Harry's fingers that set a shimmering barrier over the door where Seth was entertaining Charlie.
Jake shrugged but everyone else looked unnerved by the casual magic.
Harry cleared his throat to bring everyone's attention back to him. "In summary, Victoria is the mate of a vampire the Cullens killed last year when they were defending Bella. She has been spotted along your borders a couple of times over the last few months and yesterday you collectively chased her off your land." Harry glanced up to nod towards Sam who was staring at him intently.
Hesitantly the wolf nodded back.
"Whilst that was happening another vampire came into this home and appears to have taken an item of clothing with them when they left. Both the wolves and the Cullens have confirmed that this vampire was alone and left shortly before Bella and Edward arrived back in the house. The only person in the house, Charlie, was asleep." Bella nodded fervently. It made sense that that was her main concern. "The scent takes you all on a wild goose chase before ending somewhere north-west where they had a car waiting. That is where the trail ends, no one can follow further because any remaining scent was mostly washed away by the time you arrived."
Harry didn't linger on that, but Edward looked belligerent anyway, it went without saying that if Edward had followed immediately the scent would have still been strong. It was difficult to track cars but possible when it was fresh.
Jasper would have done the same as Edward, leaving Bella alone would not have been an option. Not when he couldn't be sure that there weren't other vampires waiting in the wings.
Harry looked at Edward who was glaring at him, a single raised eyebrow was all it took to stop Edward muttering. Jasper needed to learn that trick.
Edward was projecting his guilt on everyone else, and Harry wasn't going to waste time giving Edward fuel for his strop. His mate was way too clever for that.
"Alice had been watching both the Volturi leadership and Victoria and neither of them made any moves that triggered a vision." Alice nodded; Jasper could still feel her emotions whirling. An accusation of ineptitude from Edward earlier had made her angry and guilty but she was trying to smother it. Jasper reached out lightly, sending calm waves of focus over to her.
She relaxed and gave Jasper a tired smile.
Jasper forcefully reminded himself that Edward was panicking at the moment and didn't mean to lash out. He sent a slightly more aggressive push of calm at Edward. The idiot.
He looked back at Harry who winked at him before concentrating back on Bella. "From this we can be reasonably sure that the Volturi leadership is not involved but it does not mean this wasn't instigated by a different member of the Volturi. Apparently, someone called Jane is a particular concern, but we can at least rule out the full weight of the Volturi." Harry glanced at Jasper again and he nodded. "We should get Carlisle to rule out any Volturi whose scent he is familiar with."
Alice nodded, already sending a message.
"If it isn't Volturi then it could be a passing vampire drawn in by the scent of the Cullens but the timing with Victoria's appearance means that we can't rule out her involvement. Alice, would your gift show you if Victoria ordered someone to come here?"
Alice nodded and Jasper felt a spike in interest from the wolves.
They hadn't hidden their gifts exactly, but they were so used to keeping it close to their chests around anyone that wasn't their own kind that the wolves probably didn't know details.
Harry mulled over that for a moment, his teeth worrying over his lower lip. Jasper had to stop looking at him and unfortunately looking away meant he made eye contact with Jacob who was definitely smirking at him.
"Does Victoria know how your gift works?"
Well shit. Maybe. They didn't share details very often but they didn't exactly keep it secret from other Vampires and after Aro read Edward last year the Volturi would have an intimate understanding of how Alice's gift works. The Volturi would know. Who knows how many other vampires might have picked up enough to make guesses.
Alice looked unsure too. "Maybe."
"So we can't rule out her involvement."
At that the group started muttering amongst themselves, all conscious of the incredible hearing of most of the occupants several conversations were taking place mostly through text.
Jasper sidled closer to Harry, nudging him slightly with a shoulder. Jasper felt Harry's brilliant smile wash over him and was deeply resentful that this had interrupted their date.
This was important sure, but incredibly badly timed.
Shockingly Bella was the one to interrupt the muttered conversations. She was looking at Harry again. "What should we do?"
Bella was looking at Harry like he was going to give her all the answers.
Jasper didn't know when Bella and Harry had reached an understanding, but it felt weird.
Harry wasn't fazed though.
"The way I see it we have 2 priorities." Harry didn't even have to raise his voice, the room fell silent, Jasper was fascinated with his easy authority. Even Carlisle entering at the back was quiet and his family merely parted to let him join the conversation, their eyes still focused on Harry.
The wolves were listening attentively, and Edward hadn't interrupted.
Suddenly Jasper felt like he could see why people followed Harry, even as a teenager he must have been mesmerising.
Harry continued, "Firstly, investigation. We should send out patrols and monitor the edges of both pieces of territory."
Harry glanced at Sam. His gaze was assessing. "Would you be willing to work with the Cullens to cover both pieces of territory together?"
Jared growled but to Jasper's surprise Sam just shrugged. The border had always been a core part of their treaty and something the wolves strongly reinforced. "We would need to take it to the council but potentially. We would need to revisit the treaty." His dark eyes glanced at Carlisle before they settled steadily on Harry. "With other assurances we might be able to make it work."
Jasper felt like growling at the absurdly tall man, how dare he demand anything from Harry. Despite his mate's willingness to be involved this was not Harry's problem and Jasper would resist any attempts by the Quileute to drag concessions from Harry.
He knew Harry had already been discussing things with Billy but that didn't meant the wolves got to make demands.
Some of his immediate tension must have leaked because Harry was looking entirely too amused.
"That can be arranged." Harry nodded at the wolf, "I have few things I might be able to offer you as part of treaty negotiations." Harry glanced at Jake; the young wolf was already bristling on behalf of his cousin.
Harry pressed his lips together and Jasper didn't need to use his gift to know Harry really wanted to laugh at the teen. "As for beyond that, my family is part of your pack so there are a lot of things I was already planning on offering outside of any treaty."
"I would be happy to present any suggestions to the council." Sam looked slightly chastened, but he was also trying not to smile. His eyes dancing as he looked at Jake's ruffled feathers. "As family to the Blacks maybe you could attend to make your suggestions directly."
Jake visibly relaxed.
Harry's cheeky grin made Jasper reflexively smile alongside him. All future Cullen diplomacy would be going through Harry if Jasper had anything to do with it.
He was irresistible. Jasper realised that Harry's adorableness would possibly be less effective on people who weren't in love with him but how could anyone say no to that smile.
Jasper froze.
Jasper was in love with Harry.
What a terrible moment to realise it.
He couldn't even tell him.
For fuck's sake. This was the least convenient family crisis he's ever been part of.
Jasper just had to hope it looked like he was still listening because at the moment all he could think about was asking Harry to teleport them back to his cabin.
He didn't care if it involved repeating one of the worst experiences of Jasper's immortal life and being squeezed back through a tiny tube of vomit inducing misery. All he wanted was Harry alone so he could tell him how much he meant to Jasper.
Harry was still speaking, it was possible that he said something important but Jasper was struggling to focus anywhere but his eyes. Green, so impossibly green.
If he paid attention now maybe he could spot a good moment to whisk Harry away. Or get Harry to whisk them away.
He focused back in on the conversation.
"Second priority is protection." Harry was saying, too slowly and with nowhere near the level of urgency Jasper wanted from him. "I might be able to do something to prevent anything happening in this house, it will take some work so I will need watchers on the house and then someone to distract Charlie when I'm set up."
Jasper could always carry Harry back through the woods. He was struggling to remind himself that this was important.
Harry was looking seriously at Bella and Jasper concentrated on her worried face. Not looking at Harry directly was a good idea.
"In the meantime, I can cast monitoring charms on you and Charlie that will let me respond instantly if either of you are threatened or harmed." Harry glanced at the rest of the group. "We should discuss me casting them over more of you, but we can pick that up tomorrow."
Ah treaty negotiations. So, he was going to have to share Harry tomorrow too.
Sam and Carlisle both nodded when Harry checked with them.
Harry pulled out his wand and Jasper continued to desperately focus on the wall sconce in the kitchen. "Just so we're clear, I don't make a habit of casting on people without their permission, but these are exceptional circumstances."
Jasper heard Jake mutter under his breath. "Unless you imply he's short, and then it's apparently no holds barred."
Jasper couldn't help his grin. He hoped Edward was listening otherwise his brother was going to have an interesting wakeup call when he tried to do his usually looming routine.
Harry muttered something and Jasper watched as Charlie briefly glowed, Seth who was still on distraction duty looked mildly panicked but Charlie didn't seem to notice.
Harry turned back to Bella, "May I?"
Bella just nodded, looking so painfully grateful that Jasper felt incredibly bad that at the moment Jasper wished Harry and him were anywhere else but here.
The same ripple of light settled over Bella and Harry glanced over her quickly before gesturing to the small charm bracelet clasped around her wrist. "Can I borrow that for a moment?"
Bella fumbles with the clasp but soon has it loose, handing it quietly over to Harry.
Harry presses the tip of wand into the silver chain and mutters "Portus."
Jasper finds himself transfixed by the wand now it was in clear sight, it was made of a smooth, well-worn wood but around the handle was still rough with bark. Jasper looked closer; it was made from a Holly branch?
Thinking back, he realised that this was not Harry's only wand, he'd seen another wand by Harry's bedside table. The second one had clusters of what looked like berries running up its length.
Did all wizards carry two? Harry had never said anything explicit but his stories had implied that every wizard had a single wand. That each wand was specific to the wizard who carried it.
"This is a portkey, if you say the trigger word it will instantly transport you and anyone you're touching to my cabin." Harry made strong eye contact Bella. "It is for emergencies only. Try not to use it in front of other muggles if you can but if you need to get out of a situation use it."
Bella nodded, her eyes wide and fervent. "I promise to only use it in emergencies, thank you."
Harry nodded, "The trigger word has to be something you are unlikely to say." Harry blushed and Jasper was immediately very interested in staring at his mate again, he looked so beautiful with colour on his cheeks. "Ah, I'm afraid I just picked the first unlikely word that came to mind, so the trigger phrase is Kerfuffle."
Bella carefully mouthed it, careful not to say it out loud.
The silence was broken by Jake sniggering, a sound that only lasted a short time before he yelped, rubbing a mildly red patch on his arm. Harry's wand slipped back into his sleeve and Jake glared at it. "Not fair, I'm allowed to laugh, you're the weirdo who picked a made-up word."
"It's not a made-up word!" Harry exclaimed, "It's not my fault you're too brainless to know that kerfuffle is a perfectly reasonable trigger word."
"Pfft, perfectly reasonable my ass." Jake stuck his tongue out; Jasper was starting to realise just how similar the two cousins were when Harry stuck out his tongue in response. "What does it even mean?"
An unexpected voice silenced both of them. "It means a commotion or to cause a fuss. It seems fitting to me." Everyone turned to look at Sam with varying levels of shock, Jake's mouth was wide open.
"What?" Sam looked around before rubbing his neck shyly. "I read."
Jake broke the silence by snorting. "You're both nerds."
The fight that broke out then was only stopped when Charlie came back into the Kitchen, staring with a raised eyebrow at Sam who had Jake in a headlock.
Jasper thought that maybe the revenants and the wolves had more in common than he had assumed.
Emmett and Jake were going to get on like a house on fire.
Wasn't that a scary thought.
After smoothing over some ruffled feathers, mostly by thrusting Jake and Jasper at Charlie until their combined nice boy routines had Charlie muttering instead of outright fuming, Harry was ready to leave.
And struggling to decide how he was going to whisk away Jasper without anyone noticing. Even he wasn't mean enough to surprise apparate someone twice in one evening.
Carlisle had slipped upstairs to check what remained of the scent as soon as Charlie moved to come back in. It would have been hard to explain why a fully grown adult had turned up to what Bella had convinced Charlie was a friendly get together she had forgotten to mention to him.
Harry had tried to help sell that lie by pulling out various things from his pocket snack store to make the whole thing look a bit more planned.
'Popping out to the car to grab a couple of things' and coming back with platters of baked goods and a couple of jars of sweets certainly seemed to endear him to Charlie.
After all, Charlie couldn't deny it was planned if he was presented with freshly baked scones with jam and cream to go with.
He had eventually convinced the group that they were, in fact, not biscuits and were meant to be consumed with jam and cream.
Looking around at the remaining crumbs Harry was suddenly very glad he'd got some warning on how the wolf pack approached scones. He wouldn't be able to serve any tomorrow.
Their slapdash approach to topping the scones with cream and jam would definitely have offended the pixies if they were at his cabin. Cornish pixies took their clotted cream etiquette very seriously, and putting jam on top of cream rather than the other way around was a capital offense.
There was a whole section on the 'Devonshire tea riots' in one of Newt Scamander's books. Two months of chaos caused by the first pixies leaving Cornwall and realising that the Cornish approach to scones was not embraced in Devon.
It had only been a hasty treaty between the Devonshire wizards and the pixies that had spared every tea house in Devon from destruction at the cost of still ongoing jam delivery to the main Cornish pixie colony. Apparently, the Devonshire wixen weren't trusted to provide clotted cream or the scones themselves.
Jake was now fixated on his front pocket, waiting for the next plate of cookies with avid eyes. Harry muttered at him, flapping his hand at him urgently just in case Charlie picked up on Jake's new focus. "For the last time, that was the last plate. I'm out, take your bottomless pit elsewhere."
He'd got into the habit of carrying around a veritable feast in his pockets when he was helping to raise Teddy, that boy's werewolf heritage made it difficult to keep up with his metabolism.
He'd kept up the habit for the last decade because he'd gotten used to the convenience of being able to access large quantities of snacks, and with preservation charms, he didn't even have to replenish it that frequently.
It wasn't built for 8 hungry werewolves however, even his pockets had limits, and that limit was drawn directly in front of his newly acquired Jasper-snacks.
Harry wasn't giving up any of Jasper's creations for love nor money, not even if Jake kept looking at him like that.
Harry glared at Jake until he at least stopped openly staring at his pockets, this had turned into a plausible enough gathering.
He was really done with this whole being social thing though.
He had a Buckbeak to pet and coo at. A Crookshanks to pretend to feed whilst making pointed comments about how disappointed he would be if anything happened to the Jobberknolls. He had a Jasper who was giving him increasingly urgent looks that really made him want to be anywhere that wasn't here so he could find out what those looks meant.
Harry edged as close to rudeness as he was capable of being, the wolves had been keeping him here with a series of 'polite enquiries after his health' that were sending him slowly insane. They knew he couldn't completely ignore them and had been making a game out of it, the bastards.
It hadn't helped that he kept producing food. Jake, Quil and Embry had been doing it because it was annoying. The other wolves just seemed to be hungry. Hungry and very willing to poke at the clearly frustrated vampire, especially if it meant the snack dispenser stuck around.
Harry had had enough.
"Right, well. Thank you for inviting us Bella, this has been lovely." Harry slapped his thighs as he got up in a well-worn signal of 'Oh, I'll be off then'. A signal that didn't translate to North America very well judging by the confused faces. "Thank you for letting us invade your home Chief Swan."
"Please, call me Charlie." Charlie paused, "Unless you're in a car, then you should probably stick with Chief Swan."
Harry nodded and tried to look innocent again, he was getting varied levels of success with that expression.
He pretended not to hear Quil insist on knowing how his cat was doing.
Jasper coughed and stood, moving so quickly to Harry's side that Charlie blinked at him suspiciously. "I'll see you home."
Jake's mutter of "You'll see to him alright" was robustly ignored by both of them.
Harry just waved and backed further towards the door, if he had to spend one more minute nodding whilst Quil made another terrible joke, all the while supremely aware of Jasper's eye burning on him. Well. He might explode? Something bad would happen in any case.
"See you all sooooooooon", it came out as more a yell when he had to cover up Seth's attempt to ask him what he thought about the weather.
The bastard was too wily by half and had waited until he was almost finished speaking, Charlie was looking at him like he was insane.
Which clearly he was.
But his hand was on the door, and he was going to hex the next person who asked him a question.
He hummed loudly to help him ignore Embry's attempt to ask him how his flowers were doing.
A quiet stinging hex sent towards Jake, for the second time this evening, gave them enough of a distraction.
And then they were free.
Jasper immediately grabbed his hand. "Do the thing."
Harry just stared at him for a panicked second wondering what the thing was. Was this something couples did? Had he missed a conversation about things?
"The teleporting thing." Jasper gasped, closing his eyes tightly. "Do it."
Harry wrapped his arms around Jasper and the next second they were spinning into place in his living room. Jasper managed to remain upright this time, mostly due to Harry's grip on his shoulders, but he still groaned uncomfortably into Harry's shoulder.
Harry just patted him again. When he was slumped over like this Harry could actually pat his head without climbing him first.
"Harry," Jasper gasped. "Harry, I need to tell you something."
Harry pulled back from what was becoming very comfortable hug to stare into bright gold eyes. Jasper's pupils were large and dark, the thin golden iris winking beautifully in the low light of cabin.
He struggled to keep eye contact, the casual brilliance of Jasper's eyes made him feel almost shy. His gaze slowly meandered down to Jasper's lips.
They had been interrupted earlier.
At the moment he didn't want to think about anything that wasn't directly leading to more kisses.
But something Jasper's tone registered desperation and Harry wasn't about to stop Jasper from telling Harry anything he wanted to.
"Jasper, Jasper, go ahead." Harry couldn't help smiling as he pushed some hair that had fallen into Jasper's eyes back behind his ear, letting his hand linger lightly against the revenant's cheek.
His fake vampire was beautiful.
For a long, aching moment Harry just stared at Jasper. Taking in the rapid but completely unnecessary breaths, the way Jasper's hand crept up to press cautiously into his own face.
Harry nuzzled lightly at the cool palm, pressing closer before looking back up at Jasper.
"Yes?"
"I love you." Jasper's breath left him in a gust, leaving the vampire looking urgent and empty, staring desperately at Harry.
Harry blinked.
What?
Jasper loved him.
Harry choked, his own breath abandoning him. Jasper loved him.
It had been so long. Harry blinked back the tears that were threatening, concentrating on the brilliant, beautiful face in front of him.
Well, that definitely deserved a kiss.
Jasper's lips moved gently against his and Harry felt like his magic was going spark out of him from sheer joy.
And if he whispered a desperate thank you against Jasper's lips than no one else would ever know.
And if he had to channel his still sparking magic into the ward stones for a full hour after Jasper left in order to be able sleep that was something no one needed to know.
