Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Author's Note: An enormous thank you to everyone for all the reviews, follows, and favorites. I am so incredibly grateful to everyone, and am so happy at how well this story has been received so far. I hope it continues to live up to your expectations.

I wanted to dedicate this entire thing to my amazing boyfriend, Ryan, who inspired me to begin writing again. I have been on hiatus for a long time, but his motivation has spurred me onward. He isn't even a Harry Potter fan, but I have told him enough about the series that he and I actually wrote our own fanfic, which was a coordinated effort between us. It is on my profile page, and it's called Harry potter and the Disco Wizards. It is a humor fic, and not my usual style at all, but I had an absolute blast writing it. Please feel free to check it out.

Anyway, on to chapter 2 of this story.

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Harry came awake suddenly, his entire body jerking violently as a gasp of terror escaped his lips. The horrific images that had swirled around him all night, tormenting him, came to an abrupt halt as his emerald eyes flew open, and they darted frantically around the room as his breaths came hard and fast.

As he tried to come to grips with his surroundings, he felt someone gently place his round-rimmed glasses on his face, and the room came into focus. He was lying on a familiar bed in the Hogwarts hospital wing. He felt the hand that had touched his face rub his shoulder gently, and he looked around, coming face to face with a haggered, exhausted-looking Sirius Black.

The two stared at each other for an indefinable moment, and then, it was as if a huge wave broke over Harry, containing an overwhelming current of memories within its depths. The third task ... he and Cedric deciding they'd take the cup together ... Peter Pettigrew, carrying the deformed, grotesque Voldemort in his arms ... the shouted Killing Curse .. Cedric, eyes wide open but lifeless, a look of shock and fear forever imprinted upon his handsome face ... pain exploding as Harry's arm was cut open ... Voldemort, slithering out of a massive cauldron ... pain, humiliation, torture ... the bowing and scraping of the Death Eaters ... being on the edge of death ... the ghostly figures of Cedric, Bertha Jorkins, the old Muggle man, and ... Merlin ... his parents, their gentle pleading for him to hold on, to be strong ... sshrieks of grief and howls of sorrow as the students and staff learned what had happened, while Harry held the lifeless body in his arms, never wanting to let go.

"Harry. Harry!"

The boy's body jerked again, and he suddenly realized that Sirius was speaking to him urgently as he rubbed comforting circles on his back. "Harry, kiddo, it's okay now. It's all right."

Harry looked into his godfather's worn face, and his eyes prickled with tears. He furiously blinked them back; he simply would not cry. Through all his years, there had been one lesson which had been pounded into his mind, and it had stuck, no matter how the world had tried to break him. He remembered back to a time when it had been shouted at him in his aunt's shrill voice as he was dragged into his spider-infested cupboard: "No tears, you stupid boy. They mean nothing to me, and won't get you what you want. Your tantrums won't move me, nor will they anyone else." And to this day, he lived by those words. No tears would make any situation better ... especially not this one. As visions of Cedric's terrified face swam before him, he knew no amount of weeping could ever fix this.

He then felt arms tenderly coming around him, folding him into an embrace filled with something that felt extremely soothing to him. The closest he'd ever come to feeling something like this was when he'd been hugged by Hermione and Mrs. Weasley, the latter of whom had done so last night. Harry was ashamed to admit that he'd felt those traitorous tears pressing at his eyes again when Molly had enfolded him in her arms, like he'd often seen mothers doing to their own children. But to his credit, not one of those tears had fallen.

No, he hadn't broken then. But now, in the arms of his godfather ... the man who he had heard defy Albus Dumbledore himself ... it weakened every defense Harry had built around the stone structure that was his emotions, and he felt his walls come close to crumbling down, though he tried to rebuild them with every breath he took. But for the first time in years, he failed as the tears came streaming down his face. And after they started, it seemed as though they'd never stop. Harry's whole body shook with sobs he could not suppress, and as they clawed their way through his body, the warm arms never once let go of him. There was something so familiar about this embrace; it spoke of home, love, and security, and it awoke in him something inexplicable, something long buried. If he had recognized it for what it was, he would have known that his mind remembered knowing Sirius from when he was just months old. But the truth was, he consciously didn't remember; all he knew was that he could trust Sirius, without knowing how.

For how long Harry wept, he did not know, but when the flood of tears had eventually ebbed, Sirius finally let him go. Softly, he said, "Here, kiddo," and he handed Harry back his glasses, which he shakily placed back on his face. He hadn't even realized that Sirius had removed them during his breakdown. Then, Harry looked down to the ground, far too ashamed of the fact he had given in to his weakness to even look at Sirius. As cowardly as it sounded, he couldn't bring himself to actually see the disgusted expression on the man's face. If he'd had the clarity of mind to think at the moment, however, he would have wondered why Sirius had been so gentle, if he was ashamed of him.

But it seemed as though the man knew exactly what Harry was trying to do, because he gently put his hand on his chin, lifting it up so he could look into the bloodshot emerald eyes. "Harry," he said softly, "I know what you're thinking, and by Merlin, please don't. You have nothing to be ashamed of. Look at me," he urged as Harry attempted to look down to the ground again. "Harry, I am here for you. I know I haven't been in the past, but everything's going to change now. From here on out, I am here for you. I know things seem really, really bad right now, and words can't even describe what you've been through. But I promise you now ... I'm never leaving you alone again. We'll get through this together." He tenderly put his arms around his godson again, and Harry, somehow going against everything he'd been taught about affection, accepted it willingly. As he sank into the coccoon of security and protectiveness Sirius provided, a wave of exhaustion hit him, and he knew, without knowing how, that the sleep he would fall into now would be one without nightmares.

But before he succumbed to the sweet release of unconsciousness, free from the guilt and grief that overwhelmed him, he had the energy to mumble softly, "Why did you say no to Professor Dumbledore when he asked you to run those errands for him?"

And Sirius's answer came just as quietly as he cradled the child in his arms. "The answer to that is simple, kiddo. I told you before, I'm never leaving you alone again."

And with that, Harry let his eyes fall closed, and he let the familiar, rhythmic sound of Sirius's breathing lull him all the way to sleep.

Xxx

Sirius's heart ached as he continued to hold Harry close to him. The boy's breathing was now deep and even, and Sirius knew he had fallen asleep. He lifted up one hand and soothingly ran it through Harry's hair, hoping that the gesture would keep the terrifying nightmares away from his mind. He'd known instinctively that the Dreamless Sleep potion, which was supposed to have kept Harry asleep nightmare-free, had not had the desired effect. It was only three o'clock in the morning, and it was plain to see that Harry had suffered all night. He had realized, after looking into Harry's eyes the moment after he awoke, that instead of giving him a night without dreams, it had trapped him in his nightmares for a long time without him being able to wake up. It was obvious that even though the dose had been strong enough, Harry's mind had been too riddled with nightmares for the potion to truly do its job, and it had ended up having entirely the opposite effect on him.

And Sirius knew all about that. Since Dumbledore had found out the truth of his innocence, he had discreetly sent Sirius some Dreamless Sleep potion, and it had the same result for him as it had for Harry. He had only used the potion once, and after cycling through seeing the lifeless bodies of Lily and James over and over again, followed by hearing the horrific screaming and violent, wretched cackling of prisoners from his memories of Azkaban, he'd never taken the potion again. If he was going to have nightmares, he surmised, he'd rather wake himself up naturally than be trapped in them for hours without end. He felt sick to his stomach to know that his young, innocent godson had to suffer that fate as well. He hadn't even asked Harry what the potion had done to him; the answer was written all over his face, and he knew that all the boy needed at that moment was to be comforted. Talking about the nightmares would come later. After Harry had fallen asleep again, he knew his decision had been the right one. Harry had already been thinking himself weak for sobbing; he couldn't stand the thought of his reaction if he asked about his nightmares.

A new bout of fury flooded his veins as he remembered the shame in Harry's eyes after he'd sobbed his heart out. Growing up in the Black family, he was all too familiar with the mindset of how tears were a weakness. After all, Walburga had screeched it in his ear often enough, and Orion had drawled it in a bored, uncaring voice as he locked him in his room, telling him to think about how he was besmirching the Black family name. It was only when he had been exposed to the people who would become his best friends that he realized those words were a falsehood, and even then, it had taken him a long time to accept it. Looking at Harry, who was now peacefully sleeping, he knew those Dursleys had been just as foul as he'd always assumed they'd be. Guilt choked him in its stranglehold again; it was all his fault that Harry had had to grow up with them. He vowed that he'd get to the bottom of the damage those beasts had done to that child. Nausea gripped him as he hoped, with everything he had in him, that it was not worse than what it seemed on the surface ... and what was on the surface was bad enough.

As the minutes ticked by, Sirius reaffirmed the vow he'd made to Harry. He knew that he hadn't even begun to scratch the surface of the boy's guilt. He knew that simply saying, "None of this was your fault, Harry. Cedric's death and Voldemort's return weren't your fault," would not help in the slightest. Merlin knew, he would always wrestle with that particular demon himself when it came to Lily and James. And oh, God, Lily and James ... Harry had seen them as mere echoes coming out of Voldemort's wand. Even in death, they had been there for their son. He knew that for Harry, this would be one of the hardest things to process, and Sirius told himself firmly that he would never, ever let Harry see the pure, unadulterated jealousy that had flared up in him when he had found out that for a very short time, Harry had seen their faces, had gotten to talk to them. Sirius would have given anything, anything, for that chance ... the chance to look at them once more, to hear their voices again, to apologize to them for being such a fool, to promise them that he'd take care of their son ...

Viciously, Sirius forced those thoughts out of his head. His feelings on the matter were irrelevant; he needed to help Harry process all of this rather than focus on his own selfish wants and desires. Lily and James were counting on him, and he knew that feeling jealous of Harry, even for just a split second, was despicable. The boy had been through enough to last a thousand lifetimes, and Sirius would see him through the healing process every step of the way.

And as Sirius continued to stroke Harry's hair, he felt sleep closing in on him as well, and knowing that the boy was safe for now, he let it take him into its hold.