Headmaster's Office I Hogwarts
"So he only heard . . . ?"
"He heard only the first part, the part foretelling the birth of a boy in July to parents who had thrice defied Voldemort. Consequently, he could not warn his master that to attack you would be to risk transferring power to you — again marking you as his equal. So Voldemort never knew that there might be danger in attacking you, that it might be wise to wait or to learn more. He did not know that you would have 'power the Dark Lord knows not' —"
"But I don't!" said Harry in a strangled voice. "I haven't any powers he hasn't got, I couldn't fight the way he did tonight, I can't possess people or — or kill them —"
"There is a room in the Department of Mysteries," interrupted Dumbledore, "that is kept locked at all times. It contains a force that is at once more wonderful and more terrible than death, than human intelligence, than forces of nature. It is also, perhaps, the most mysterious of the many subjects for study that reside there. It is the power held within that room that you possess in such quantities and which Voldemort has not at all. That power took you to save Sirius tonight.
"That power also saved you from possession by Voldemort, because he could not bear to reside in a body so full of the force he detests. In the end, it mattered not that you could not close your mind. It was your heart that saved you—"
Dumbledore abruptly stopped speaking and his head suddenly jerked to the window behind him as if something had called him. But a confused Harry could see nothing out there except for the quidditch grounds—but, out of nowhere, something large and silver appeared in the distance closing in towards them, and before Harry could even blink, the silver Lynx landed in the middle of the room.
"Wha—" Harry began to ask but Dumbledore silenced him with a raised hand, his blue eyes staring intently at the silvery patronus, which immediately began to speak in the deep, low voice of Kingsley Shacklebolt.
"Dumbledore! Sirius is alive! I can't explain how, but we are at the Tonk's house and you need to come quickly! Oh! And Sirius wants Harry!"
With its message delivered, the patronus burst into a shower of silvery lights, leaving the occupants of the room stunned for a few moments.
"Wha—Who—How is he—" Harry felt as if the Hogwarts Express had slammed into him, his brain felt as if it was malfunctioning, he was having trouble breathing, and while his stomach was still stuck in the depths of despair it had been in since Sirius had died, his heart had now begun to beat furiously with rising hope... hope that Sirius was... "W-What did that message mean?"
"I... don't know," Dumbledore replied in a rare stunned voice. It was probably the first time in many many years that the Headmaster had felt this off guard and genuinely surprised about any piece of information.
After his short talk with the Minister, Dumbledore had only made two brief stops before coming here for his talk with Harry, one was at St. Mungos to check on Mad-Eye, and Nymphadora and the other one was at the Hospital Wing, where Madam Pomfrey had all the students in a potion induced sleep.
While he had been a bit surprised by Kinglsey and Remus's absence at that time, he hadn't thought much of it, just assuming that they were tired and had gone home to sleep, but now... it seems something monumental had happened during those few minutes... something that he had been kept out of the loop for, which was quite jarring for the old man, who was usually the most informed in any room.
"Could it be true? Is S-Sirius really alive?" Harry asked in a broken whisper, his voice filled with so much hope that it hurt. He knew that it would only break him more if he got his expectations too high, he also knew that he had seen for himself that Sirius hadn't been breathing before... But no matter how he tried to explain to himself, his heart just refused to stop hammering with hope.
"I don't know," Dumbledore repeated before he gathered himself and said, "but we can find that out at the Tonk's house," He abruptly stood and walked around the table towards Harry, "Are you coming?" he asked even though he knew the answer.
"Y-Yes." Harry replied immediately while standing up, his legs still felt like jelly but he thankfully managed to stay on his feet without falling, "How are we leaving? Are we taking Fawkes-Ah!" midway through his eyes caught sight of the little featherless Fawkes sitting in the ashes under her perch and remembered that she'd recently taken the Killing curse for Dumbledore couldn't teleport them.
"No, we are going to take the normal way," the Headmaster replied and for a moment Harry wondered if he was talking about brooms before he noticed him approaching the fireplace and realised what he meant by normal.
"Take this," Dumbledore handed Harry a pinch of floo powder from the nearby flower pot, "The place is called Tonks' Cottage..." he said before waving him into the fireplace, "Go on, you can go first."
Harry nodded his head and after taking a deep breath to somewhat calm his frayed nerves, he stepped into the fireplace. Throwing the floo powder towards the floor he shouted clearly, "Tonks' Cottage!"
Almost immediately an emerald fire sprang up and covered him making him disappear in a swirl of fiery colours.
It wasn't the first time Harry had used the floo, but the dizziness and the nausea were as worse as the first time. He felt as if he was being propelled through a very narrow tube, many random fireplaces were blurring past him and he even heard some indistinct voices, before the pressure around him abruptly disappeared and he was expelled through the fire.
And it was only as he was being thrown out that Harry remembered that he needed to land on his feet but it was too late by then, and fumbling so late only made his balance worse and he fell straight onto the floor face first, "Ugh!"
"Harry!" shouted several voices simultaneously, but Harry was far too dizzy and disoriented to look up and see who they were.
"No! Stay down, Sirius, you need to stop moving so much—" snapped an unfamiliar adult female voice irritatedly.
"But I feel completely fine, Andy, you just worry too much..." The moment the familiar voice entered Harry's ears, it cleared all the fog in his head and jolted him awake immediately.
"Harry?" Remus's concerned voice sounded somewhere beside his head but he wasn't listening, no all his focus had gone towards that voice, Harry woodenly looked up from the floor to see his Godfather lying on a sofa in the middle of the living room, looking at him with that handsome grin of his, alive and breathing.
"S-Sirius?" Harry whispered in a scared voice.
"Hey, there, Harry, you've grown up quite a lot since—"
"Sirius!" he cried and stumbled and ran straight for him ignoring everything and everyone else in the room and dived straight into his godfather's arms, "Sirius!" he cried again while hugging his godfather tightly.
"Hey! Hey! Hey! it's alright! it's alright! you're fine," Sirius said in a soothing tone while rubbing Harry's back up and down as he bawled his eyes out, "Look I'm fine, aren't I? Come on, now, don't cry, It's alright, Shh..." Sirius said as he tried to console his godson as best as he could.
A few minutes passed as the silent sobs racked through Harry's body, before finally someone interrupted them, "That's enough, lad. Get up from there, he's still a patient, and you shouldn't jump on him like that—"
"Oh! Shove it, Andy,"
"Um..." Harry coughed and slowly raised himself away from Sirius while wiping his eyes as his embarrassment finally caught up to him. His face immediately flushed as he realised that he had been crying like a child in front of a stranger. He took a deep breath before turning his head towards the voice that had reprimanded him, "I'm sorry about—Y-YOU!"
"Oh, no, no," Sirius hurriedly said as he stopped an angry Harry's hand from moving towards his wand, "She's not—I mean, Harry I'd like you to meet my most favourite cousin, Andromeda Tonks,"
"I-I-She is-What?!" Harry was too bewildered to articulate himself as the face of the person he hated the most was just a few feet away from him, standing nonchalantly.
But it was only when he looked closely a few moments later that Harry realised that while she resembled Bellatrix quite a lot, there was some distinct difference between their features, most prominent among them was that her eyes didn't scream insane, "Tonks?" he questioned turning to Sirius.
"Yeah, she's Tonks'—I mean, Nymphadora's mother," Sirius replied nodding his head, "I know what you mean—Even I was shocked that Dora turned out to be such a blast with her as her mother..." he then lowered his head to whisper, "You know, I like to think that it may just have been my influence on her that saved her..." he finished with a wink at Harry.
"Nymphadora was only six the last time you saw her, Sirius." Andromeda's witty reply came equally quickly, "You know before you decided to dive headfirst into Azkaban,"
"Aw! How can you hurt my—"
"Um, Sirius," Harry knew that he was interrupting and that it was rude, but it had been a very long and exhausting night so he just couldn't keep his emotions and questions bottled up anymore, "How did you—Why are you—I mean, how are you..."
"I would like to know the same," came the quiet voice of the Headmaster from behind him.
Dumbledore had arrived silently into the room immediately after Harry, but he didn't want to interrupt Harry's moment so he just quietly stood in the corner while watching the reunion with a merry twinkle in his eyes.
"Dumbledore!" Sirius greeted with a serious expression on his face while trying to sit up.
"I swear, Sirius, I will not hesitate to stun you into oblivion if you try to get up one more time," Andromeda warned with her wand raised dangerously.
"Fine, fine, Jeez," Sirius said as he raised his hands in surrender and lay back down before turning back to Dumbledore, and Harry to answer their questions, "Um, you see I was a bit busy being dead at the moment when I was saved so I don't think I can answer you properly... but you can ask them," he pointed towards Remus and Kingsley standing quietly in front of the kitchen.
All eyes curiously turned to the two of them, and after exchanging a glance with Kinglsey, Remus began speaking, "It's a bit hard to explain but the short answer is... Ron did it." he said with a shrug, "He was the one who saved Sirius..."
"What?!" Harry exclaimed with a bewildered look on his face, and Dumbledore too had a puzzled expression on his face, "How? How did Ron save Sirius?"
"It happened when I asked Remus about the spell Bellatrix had used on Sirius," Kingsley intervened in his deep voice when Remus was having difficulty coming up with a way to explain what had happened, "And when he heard that it was the Heart-Stopping Spell, Ron seemed to remember a possible cure for it and went to work on him immediately..."
"What? I didn't hear about that part before?" Andromeda suddenly exclaimed with an interested expression on his face, "I never knew there was a method to revive someone after their heart had stopped... What method did he use? Was it an ancient spell? Or did he use a potion?"
"That's the interesting thing... It wasn't a magic spell," Remus replied with a bemused expression on his face.
"What?! How can someone revive a person without using magic?"
"It's true," Kingsley nodded his head calmly, "Even though I thought in the beginning that it was some kind of a dark ritual..."
"You did?" Remus asked with a strange expression.
"Yes, but what else was I supposed to think when the boy suddenly started jumping up and down on Sirius's body while chanting, 'Staying Alive!' 'Staying Alive!'..." Kingsley replied with a shrug, "Anyway, apparently it's supposed to be a famous muggle procedure called CeePee—something..."
"I think it's called CPR..." Remus added helpfully.
"Wait! CPR?!" Harry exclaimed in a disbelieving tone.
"Yes. Do you know about it too?"
"Y-Yes! I mean—I've never performed it myself but I know how it is done... I think everyone in the muggle world knows about it," Harry replied reflexively, as his mind was still reeling from the fact that such a simple thing had helped save Sirius... and to think if he hadn't chased after Bellatrix in rage, then maybe he could've helped too and wouldn't have almost lost Sirius... Thankfully Ron had been there and had managed to save him, otherwise...
'Wait! But how did... where did Ron learn CPR...' Harry mused with a confused expression on his face.
"Fascinating..." Dumbledore murmured with an impressed expression on his face while caressing his long white beard in excitement.
"I agree..." Andromeda breathed out with a pondering expression on her face, "To think we healers simply discarded all the muggle healing methods simply because their machines couldn't work near us... and now somehow such a simple commonly known method of theirs has managed to cure a Dark Spell, that would leave even us stumped..."
While Dumbledore and the healer cousin were captivated by the novelty of muggle healing, Harry didn't think much about it and turned back to his godfather and asked, "Umm, where are you going next, Sirius? Are you going to stay here or are you going back to Grimmauld Place?"
"I guess back to the Grimmauld..." Sirius answered with a sigh before he forced a peppy expression on his face to not worry his Godson, "But don't worry kid, I've redecorated that place so much that it almost resembles the Weasley house now, Haha—"
But Harry wasn't fooled by his fake excitement, while there had been a multitude of factors that had led to his death... Harry knew that staying inside that house as a prisoner had been chief among them, and now for him to be forced to go back and live there...
"Maybe... you don't have to, Sirius," Dumbledore suddenly intervened with a ruminating expression on his face.
"W-What do you mean?" Sirius asked with disbelief on his face. After all, Dumbledore was the one who was most adamant about him not leaving that house, (he knew that it was for his own sake but still...).
Instead of answering Sirius, Dumbledore turned to the other Marauder in the room, "Tell me, Remus, am I right to assume that no one from the opposite side knows about Sirius' continued survival..."
"Yes." Remus nodded immediately, "Except for the people in this room, only Ron and Neville know about Sirius..."
"Excellent," Dumbledore responded with a triumphant gleam in his eyes.
"But how does that help Sirius, Professor?"
"Because If we play our card right, then maybe... we could get Sirius his freedom back without too much of a hassle..."
"How?!" Sirius immediately asked with a hungry expression on his face. Only he knew how suffocating it was for a man like him to stay hidden in that home all alone while others were out there fighting with their lives on the line.
"Well, it all depends on whether you can agree to remain "dead"," Dumbledore explained in a conversational tone, "Because if you do, then it shouldn't be too much of a problem to get your name cleared posthumously... After all, if I am right in my assumption then even the pureblood members of Wizengamont who Voldemort is secretly funding wouldn't waste their time opposing something they consider as foolish as honouring a dead man..."
Unknown to Dumbledore, this was what would have happened in the cannon, if Ron hadn't saved Sirius and changed the course of future... The ministry wanting to get closer to Harry had pardoned Sirius after the battle, as with him being dead there had been no chance of an embarrassing and long public trial to make them look stupid.
But the Headmaster didn't know that, in this instant, he was just an old man who hadn't expected to get a second chance... a chance to rectify his mistake. And now that he got that chance, he just wanted to make amends to a man he had wronged so much.
"If your name officially gets cleared, then it should be quite easy to remove your magical signature from the main ward, Sirius," Kingsley added with a serious expression, "This means that you wouldn't have any restrictions and could freely wander anywhere without fearing an Auror ambush..."
Not many people knew, but there laid a massive ward over the whole of Great Britain. It came under the purview of the Minister of Magic, and while it didn't have many defensive functions considering how big it was, there were some miscellaneous functions that it could perform very well, one of which was that it could routinely scan for magical signatures of people that the Ministery considers wanted fugitives.
This ward was also the main reason that Sirius either had to remain on the run or hide under the heavy wards of Gimmauld place, because if he remained in the open for too long then the ward could pick up his signature and alert the Aurors even without him performing any magic.
"So, what do you think, Sirius? Will you be fine with everyone in the wizarding world assuming you are dead?"
"I was already dead for most of them when I went to Azkaban, so I don't really care what they think," Sirius said with an uncaring shrug, "As long as the people I love know that I am alive it's enough for me," he finished with a quick glance at Harry.
"Does this mean he could go anywhere he wants and wouldn't have to stay confined anymore?" Harry asked with a hopeful look in his eyes.
"Of course, he will still have to take some measures of stealth, such as using the polyjuice or transfiguring his face, but other than that, I don't see any reason why he has to stay indoors any longer..."
"T-This is great, Sirius," Harry said with a genuinely happy expression on his face, he couldn't help but imagine how great his summer holidays would be if Sirius could come and meet him whenever he wanted to.
"Alright! I think this is enough reunion for the day," Andromeda suddenly interjected with a glance at the clock, "Now, I will have to ask all of you to leave so that Sirius here can get the rest he needs..."
"But Andy—"
"No, buts, Sirius." Andromeda shook her head firmly, "While you may look fine from the outside, you are really not. That spell did not just stop your heart harmlessly, after all, it was a dark spell and they always leave their marks. So unless you want to die of heart attack, the next time you see a girl's skirt flip down the street, I suggest you take your potions and go to sleep..."
"T-That is indeed quite serious..." Sirius nodded with a scared expression.
"Andromeda is quite right, Harry" Dumbledore said nodding his head at Harry, "I think it is time for us to get back to Hogwarts too,"
Harry nodded his head before he turned and looked towards Sirius with a reluctant gaze. He was quite scared that it was all a dream and that if he left, his godfather would disappear.
"Don't worry, Harry. I am not going anywhere," Sirius said squeezing his shoulder comfortingly, "And besides you can always use your Christmas present to contact me at any time..."
"I-I didn't open it yet..." Harry said in a somewhat embarrassed tone.
"Oh... Well, then you should when you go back. I am sure you'll be pleasantly surprised..."
"I will," Harry nodded his head vigorously before he finally stood up and moved towards the fireplace. He took a pinch of floo powder from the pot and after taking one last look at Sirius he threw the powder into the fire and stepped in.
"And don't forget to thank Ron for me—" Harry heard Sirius's shout as he disappeared in the emerald flames.
/
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