Nothing is mine.

Katie finally meets her godmothers...

You're quite right Menaphite, I meant to write few, not handful. There are only two more left after this one.

Five Minutes Peace

The tall elms bent in the wind, swaying back and forth, and the little white clouds raced through the bright blue sky above. Harry clung to the branch as it bowed; around him, the other ravens scattered into the sky, circling overhead in a cacophony of cawing, and settled back down in the branches again.

It's nearly mid-morning. When are they coming? Katie said morning.

He hopped along the branch and up one higher, prowling along it as the wind tore through the treetops, tearing leaves and little branches free and scattering them down over the long grass below his toes.

The glasshouse shone in the sun, the crimson roses gleaming like beads of blood within its shining walls, and the cherry trees shed clouds of swirling pale pink petals across the garden in a blizzard of soft blossom. Through it, Harry peered at the neat lawn and the ornate black steel rose vines of the gate.

Fleur enchanted the gate. He cast one beady eye across the garden, taking in the myriad of small sculptures, water fountains, features, floating flower gardens, ponds, and trellises. All these amazing enchanted things; just you, and our baby bird, and all these things you've made to fill the time.

A loud crack tore through his thoughts.

His three blue-and-gold-robed sisters stood before the gate, squabbling amongst themselves and passing a huge present wrapped in bright, striped, colour-shifting paper back and forth between them around a game of rock, paper, and scissors.

A soft croak of amusement slipped from Harry's beak. They never change.

One of them opened the gate and their cheerful quarrelling continued down the path across the lawn toward the backdoor.

Anxiety coiled in the pit of Harry's stomach as they neared it. Don't tell her anything. S'il vous plaît, mes sœurs. He clenched his toes around the branch. You said I'm the one who has to do it. Don't change your mind.

Katie tugged the door open, a nervous, shy smile on her face, and gave them a small wave, one hand fisted in the skirt of her blue dress. The Duforts squealed, snatching her up into a group hug and plastering her with kisses. His daughter turned bright pink and squirmed beneath the huge present they pushed into her arms.

Harry's heart melted, trickling away into a small warm puddle beneath his ribs. I told you they'd love you, little chick. How could anyone not?

The door swung shut.

A fierce gust of wind ripped through the treetops, bending the branch away beneath his toes, and his weight dragged him forward over the edge. Harry spread his wings and pushed off the branch, swooping out of the trees and drifting down against the wind to the riverbank among the fallen, wilted daffodils.

A happy little chick finally gets to meet her godmothers, get a wand, go to school, and learn what happened to her papa.

The wind buffeted through the grass, tugging at his feather's and pushing him into the pile of daffodils. He ducked underneath them, running his beak through his wings to straighten all his feathers as the breeze burst through the gaps in the daffodil stalks, ruffling the top of his head.

More than perfect enough. The last thing it needs is me ruining it.

Anxiety twisted Harry's stomach into a tight, taut little knot and he peeked through a gap in the stalks, peering upriver at the parts of the chateau unshrouded by clouds of cherry blossom and streaming swirls of pale pink petals.

Nothing stirred; the chateau sat still at stone, and beyond the gleaming glass windows, only steady shadows hung in silence.

They won't say anything. If they didn't write the letter and said it has to be you, they won't say anything. They'll just be a bit disappointed I haven't done it yet.

He pecked at the smooth green daffodil stalk in front of him, polishing the sides of his beak on it over and over as the minutes trickled by.

The back door slammed and Harry's head snapped up.

Katie skipped out from under the cherry blossom, hand in hand with Celine and Colette as she led them along the riverbank.

'Sisters! I get the way back.' Isobel trailed them wearing a crestfallen expression. 'That's fair.'

'You lost,' Celine said. 'Best of three—'

'And we won.'

'But this way we each get one journey,' Isobel retorted. 'It's my turn.'

Katie giggled.

'Don't you worry about our sister, petite filleule,' Colette said. 'We agreed to rock, paper, scissors for it and she lost.'

'This is your favourite spot, Katie?' Celine asked.

'It's my tree!' she chirped. 'Maman said it was for me; I come and water it so it's happy.'

'It's a very pretty tree.' Isobel's grey eyes were soft as summer mist. 'It suits my very pretty little goddaughter.'

Katie beamed, the tips of her ears turning pink. 'Do I look like my papa? Maman says I do.'

'You have his eyes,' Colette murmured. 'And his ears. But you take a lot after our pretty sister, your maman.'

'Bonne.' Katie glanced back up toward the cherry blossom and the chateau. 'You're my aunties, aren't you? My papa's sisters. You have the same name as he does.'

The Duforts exchanged a swift, sharp look. 'Yes,' they chorused.

'Your papa is our little brother,' Celine said.

'Will you tell me about him?' Katie asked.

'Ah—' Colette laughed '—you brought us to see your tree so you could ask us questions away from your maman.'

Pink climbed Katie's cheeks and she squirmed on the spot. 'I just want to know.'

Harry's sisters glanced at each other.

'We're not the ones who should be telling you about him,' Isobel said. 'But if you still don't know by the time you're leaving for Beauxbatons, we'll tell you.'

Katie bobbed her head. 'Merci,' she whispered.

'Your maman said we shouldn't be too long down here.' Celine pointed back up the hill. 'She's probably got all the cake out by now.'

'Is there anything else you wanted to show us while we're out here, Katie?' Colette asked.

A huge bright smile spread across Katie's face. 'It's just my tree. It's my spot! With my tree and the river and all the white stones—' she waved a hand toward Harry's clump of daffodils '—and the flowers and those big trees where the ravens are.'

Isobel's grey eyes sharpened. 'We should go back—' her gaze drifted to the distant scatter of ravens among the tall elms '—you all go, I'll catch up in a moment.'

Harry's blood ran cold. It's fine. She can't catch every raven. And I'm not even over there.

Celine and Colette took Katie's hands and led her back up the riverbank toward the chateau.

Isobel watched them disappear behind the cloud of pale pink cherry petals and drew her wand. 'Accio, petit frère,' she murmured, flicking her wand.

Her spell yanked Harry from under the daffodils, sweeping him across the river and into her hands.

'Got you—' she held him up, her grey eyes soft and dark as rainclouds '—why are you still doing this?'

Merde. He croaked at her.

'I know it's you.' Isobel gave him a gentle shake and set him down on the white pebbles. 'Come on, change back. Nobody can see here.'

Harry shifted out of the form of the raven with a long sigh. 'Bonjour, ma sœur.'

'Bonjour.' Her eyes swept over him from head to toe. 'You're still too thin, little brother. Much thinner than you used to be.'

'It was winter,' he replied. 'Winter's a hungry few months, even for a raven.'

Her slim eyebrows drew down into a frown. 'Why are you still out here? You are supposed to be listening to your sisters like a good boy.'

'I—' Harry swallowed the sharp heat of the stirring storm '—I can't.'

'You can,' Isobel murmured. 'You are just scared. Scared you will go back and they will not want you.'

'Katie knows about me. She comes down here to talk to me and I teach her magic.'

A faint smile flashed across her face. 'That's a start, little brother. Things are clearly better if your pretty wife has invited us here and is letting your daughter get her wand and go to Beauxbatons.'

'Because I haven't come back,' Harry said. 'Fleur's letting Katie go because she's sure that she will be safe and happy. If I come back, she won't be sure anymore; I'll only make things worse.'

'You are being stupid,' Isobel chided. 'But you heard what we told your pretty little daughter. You have until she goes to Beauxbatons.'

Unease coiled cold itself about Harry's heart. 'But—'

'No buts. Everything else is ready.' She tucked her wand away. 'We spoke to Zoë de Medici and she said she owes you a favour. She will lie for you; she swore she would. She will tell anyone who asks that Violette, Henri Dufort, finally escaped the secret cells beneath Nurmengard in Burgundia less than a year ago and fled to North Italy, where she smuggled him into her private manse and helped him recover.'

'I just… come back?' he asked. 'Desrosiers won't be suspicious?'

'The only one who will be suspicious is that cochon, Monsieur Longbottom,' Isobel murmured, 'but he already thinks you've come back.'

Harry swallowed a stab of dread. 'He does?'

'Oh, there is nothing to fear,' she said. 'After your… execution, the ICW did whatever it could to stop everything collapsing into chaos. Every effort was expended on monitoring muggle births and checking for muggleborns: infiltrating muggle governments and services to use their records, embedding secret departments for paranormal incidents in muggle governments to obscure our actions and provide support for muggle parents of magical children, expert obliviation squads, the bureaus, auror squads in case the Statute does break and we need to take drastic action.' Isobel shot him a sharp look, her grey eyes hard as steel. 'The Statute nearly broke a thousand times in the first year alone; your sisters have been all over China and India and America obliviating witnesses to accidental magic. Desrosiers begged us to try and convince our sister-in-law, your pretty wife, to take over Les Inconnus and help there, but she refused.'

'But it worked?' Harry whispered. 'It wasn't all for nothing?'

'It is working; it is chaos, but just about still under our control.'

'Then it doesn't matter if they hate Mithras. I don't mind.'

'Oh they don't hate your monster, little brother,' Isobel murmured. 'You gave all these new muggleborns magic; they love you for it. And then there are the purebloods who knew the prophecy of Mithras and have hoped for this for centuries, and all those countries on the ICW who leapt to do whatever it took for the magical world to triumph, even though, no doubt, their leaders were expecting a very different necessary evil to the one you delivered.'

'Grindelwald put them all there,' Harry said. 'I just found a better way than his.' A small hot lump swelled in his throat. 'They really love Mithras?'

Isobel patted him on the cheek. 'Little brother, that Incan girl who fought for Grindelwald, Chasca, restarted a Cult of Mithras in the Incan cities and it has spread all across the world; they worship what you did. They call you a demi-god, brought forth by magic to fulfil the wishes of a world and unable to die until you had.' She frowned. 'Monsieur Longbottom didn't like that at all.'

A snort of laughter escaped Harry. 'I bet he didn't. He doesn't like how easy it is to confuse a hero with a monster.'

'He tried to campaign in Britain to begin a motion to outlaw the Cult of Mithras there, but failed, and then he tried to secretly investigate it with his little group. He thinks you are leading it from the shadows to take over the ICW.' Isobel rolled her eyes. 'He was very tiresome for a couple of years until Minister Bones demoted him back down to the very bottom and left him there. It turned out he was trying to get inside the Cult of Mithras to get to you, and had been trying to work on a way to undo your dawn.'

'It can't be undone,' he murmured. 'Neville can't change the world alone. Nobody can.'

'He refused to accept it.' Isobel frowned. 'The ICW nearly snapped his wand for trying, I heard.'

'He didn't want things to change,' Harry replied. 'He wanted everything to stay the same, because he wasn't the one suffering when it was that way and he was afraid changing things might make it worse. And he thought I was supposed to pay the price to keep it that way; like I wasn't allowed to have any wishes of my own, just die for his dreams instead.'

'He's despised,' she said. 'His wife divorced him. The ICW and other British aurors refuse to work with him on anything serious because they don't trust him to do his job. The public… they loathe him most of all. Their world was saved and he tried to undo it, or they were given magic and he tried to take it away from them.'

Harry glanced up the hill toward the chateau. 'He can't get to Fleur? Or to Katie?'

'He's barred from international travel after invading the Cult of Mithras here in France. He is still an auror, so he may have found out we are visiting tomorrow, but when we are in Britain, we'll make sure he keeps his distance.' Isobel reached out and tugged his robes tight around his chest. 'You really need to eat more, little brother. You are all bones.'

'I would, but I'm pretty sick of fish.'

'Where do you sleep?'

Harry glanced at the elm trees. 'Somewhere with a very good view.'

She tutted. 'No more of this. You will apparate to our house and eat something, bathe, and sleep in a real bed.'

Anxiety stabbed at him. 'No—'

'If you are going to be stubborn about staying here while your daughter is here, then you can do it tomorrow, when we are all in Britain and you cannot be; you have nothing else to do then anyway.'

'Alright,' Harry whispered. 'Just keep them safe for me, s'il te plaît.'

Isobel stepped forward and dragged him into a close warm hug. 'If you were not so set on being stupid, you could do it yourself,' she murmured in his ear. 'But until you are feeling brave enough to go back, we will keep your little daughter safe for you.'

'Merci—' the words snagged on the hot lump stuck at the back of his throat '—je vous aime, mes soeurs.'

'You had better,' Isobel retorted. 'Now, I have to go back; I've been here too long and my sisters will be taking all my time with our beautiful little goddaughter.'

Harry shifted into the form of the raven, shrinking down onto the white pebbles as she strode through the long grass toward the chateau.

I have until Katie goes to Beauxbatons then. He took wing, flapping up into the wind and letting it sweep him across the fields into branches of the elm trees. Maybe there's a way out. I can come back as Violette; Fleur will never know now she no longer works for Les Iconnus, and I won't be able to see Katie as much when she's at Beauxbatons anyway, but I can still visit her there as a raven. Harry settled upon a thick branch near the trunk and fluffed his feathers up against the wind. I just have to find a way to keep my sisters from realising I haven't really gone home, then nothing will be ruined by me again.

AN: Follow the linktree, it will take you to Discord for update notifications that always work, all my other stuff, my original stuff, all those fun things. Actually, my new story is about twenty chapters deep for those who have the early access to rough drafts, something very different to this story, I (and I think everyone else by this point) are in the mood for something a lot lighter!

linktr . ee / mjbradley