Nothing is mine.

Harry has a happy dream again. And he gets ice cream (no smooth mint and no pistachio surprises, not this time)!

A Play of Hopes and Fears

Above the slender silhouettes of pines and the long, looming shadow of the mountainside, the moon glowed, half full, but high in the night sky, and still bright and pale and cold as a coin of ice soaring before the shreds of cloud. The stars shone beside it, a veil of small silver lights hanging among the heavens in heartfelt defiance of that deep dark beyond.

A ring of witches and wizards in rough, ragged clothing stood about the ashes of the great fire pit sprawling between the smooth, dark water of the lake and the ramshackle huts tucked up against the rocks of the ridge rising up to the peak above. Harry stood aloft, above them upon the summit of the heap of tumbled stones at the lake's edge, his bare toes curled over the edge of the cool rock, listening to the whisper of the small waves lapping against the pebbled shore as the huddle stared up at him in rapt silence.

'You bereft banished beasts.' Voldemort's smooth high voice left Harry's lips. 'Cast from your ancestral homes by Pendragon and forced to flee to claw a living from the bare rock of these small windswept, sea-savaged islands sticking from the Atlantic. Fear not, Lord Voldemort comes to change your fortunes forever.'

A broad tall figure shouldered his way through the ring. 'We've heard the rumours. We've seen the signs. Many of us wish to fight. But not just to throw our lives away as we did in the past. We are sick of fighting and dying; we want to win.'

'Aye, we manage to get by living here!' A voice called. 'Fenrir's done us good. Why lose all this just to lose again?!'

'You survive,' Voldemort said, drawing his long, pale wand from within his robes. 'You cling to this handful of rocks sticking from the ocean and scratch enough to survive, half-starved and suffering, from them. You do not live.'

'We are alive.' The tall leader folded his arms across a bare chest matted thick with grey and dark hair. 'Few of our kind can say that they at least live free. Here, we can call to the moon and the coming Winter without fear.'

'You are Fenrir Greyback, greatest of those gifted with the bite of the beast. Is hiding so far from the concern of greater powers that you need not fear them the limit of your ambition?' Voldemort's cold grin curved Harry's lips. 'Once… you spent your every endeavour spreading terror among those who sought to cage your kind. Is this beaten old dog all that remains of that fierce beast?'

Fenrir growled. 'And my beast-kin paid for my blood-lust. Maerdrid hunted them when he was barely more than a boy, one by one, all across Britain, and hung the branded skin of each flayed brother and sister I lost from the walls of Ynys y Cedairn.' His huge hands curled into fists. 'My blood burns with desire for vengeance, to rip that man's throat out with my bare teeth, to feel his bones break beneath my fists, to watch him scream as I strip the skin from his back and wear it as a cloak!'

'And yet the leader of the Grymgwenvydg, those bite-blessed, huddles here in the furthest forgotten corner of Pendragon's domain, scraping limpets from the rocks for a supper he has not even the firewood to cook.' Voldemort lit the great fire pit with a flick of his wand. 'But despair not, Grymgwenvydg, Lord Voldemort has returned, aileni yn marvoleth, as none who have gone before him achieved. The signs do not lie. The sacrifices of Autumn come at last to a close.'

In the flickering green flames, the scars biting deep through Fenrir Greyback's thick features held dark shadows, but none so dark as those rising in his green eyes. 'We wish to fight,' he declared, spreading his arms and turning around. 'To bring Winter with vengeful fang and claw.'

Countless white scars sliced across his back, some so deep that bits of his spine seemed to stick bare from his skin; they gleamed in the bright moonlight like a swathe of spider's webbing caught in the morning sun.

A low murmur of agreement passed through the others standing about the emerald fire.

'I know the cruelty that Emyr Pendragon is capable of. As a boy, only just blessed with the bite, they kept me in a cage and flogged the wolf each time it burst from within me until one day I broke the bars and ripped the throats from my captors.' Fenrir bared all his yellow, jagged, chipped teeth. 'But we are not dogs for you to flush out your prey. We come to fight, not to die. We come to win. When Avalon burns and the Graal-Kynak's bodies cover the ground like Autumn leaves, we want our homes and rights returned. And I… I want Maerdrid Pendragon's flayed skin to wear and his raw heart to feast upon.'

'A fair bargain,' Voldemort replied. 'All you ask… I will gift, and more.' He ran the tip of his finger along his crooked yew wand. 'What say you to Lord Voldemort, Fenrir?'

Fenrir's fierce grin showed off all his jagged, yellow teeth; he thrust one huge fist into the air. 'Yr gwyan, y Goanv!'

The Grymgwenvydg took up the cry, howling it to the moon, and Harry felt Voldemort's thin smile spread across lips.

He turned.

Bellatrix stood in his shadow, her dark curls veiled in the magic of her mask and her eyes pools of shadow behind the glowing blue runes etched across the pale ivory. 'My lord?' she whispered.

'See them brought to one of our strongholds. Feed them. Give them a taste of blood, Bella, but only a taste. I want the Grymgwenvydg hungry when the time comes.'

'My lord.' Bellatrix disapparated with a loud crack.

'More people for red crayon time, I see,' Harry remarked. 'That Fenrir guy looks like his back is about to sort of come apart like all the stuffing spilling out of bad stitching.' He laughed to himself. 'That would probably be very red crayonish. You'd like that.'

'Lord Voldemort will be recognised by all Y Syd a Hunvreal yn Angau, Those Who Dream in Death,' Voldemort murmured. 'Few of the Grymgwenvydg escaped Maerdrid's purge, but when possessed by the blessing of the bite, they are a worthy foe even to the Graal-Kynak. I will have them all, Harry, all those the Lords Pendragon have hunted and persecuted, every soul who longs to see this long Autumn brought to Winter and turn to Spring. And when our full strength is mustered, we will tear them from Avalon. Fenrir will wear Maerdrid's skin and eat his heart, but it will be Lord Voldemort's hand that he dies at. The fear and the power will all be mine.'

'You know you probably shouldn't tell me these things, right?'

Voldemort laughed a quiet cold chuckle. 'Who will you tell, Harry? Dumbledore? An old fool he might be, but he is a devious wizard. He has long known my goals, long known there are many who have suffered at the hands of the ICW who long for vengeance and freedom, long known that even the Wizengamot has many among their number who would welcome Lord Voldemort's victory. He will work against me as he ever has, for he underestimates Lord Voldemort, and how much Pendragon and his retainers must fear the loss of power and retribution for more than a millennia of inflicted suffering.'

'I guess it doesn't really matter when you put it like that.'

'You have a seat on that Wizengamot waiting for you, Harry. I hope to see you there one day, allowed the freedom you and all Wychfolke deserve at my hand.'

A deafening crack rang through Harry's ears and his eyes snapped open. For a moment, he gazed up at the ceiling, smiling at the thought of himself wrapped up in fancy silk robes and sat upon some ornate chair, half the plain stone seat piled with crimson cushions from Daphne's garden and half a gilt golden throne.

'How silly I'd feel.' He laughed to himself as he rolled out of bed and dressed. 'I suppose I could at least act all pompous, that might be a lot of fun.'

A light summer drizzle descended upon Privet Drive from a dreary grey sky; its haze veiled everything beyond the line of the woods where the roofs and gardens gave way to patches of green, veiling the morning sun.

Harry dug the enchanted mirror out from the bottom of his underwear drawer. 'Daphne,' he whispered, his breath misting the silver surface.

Seconds trickled by.

The surface of the mirror shimmered. Daphne appeared, her blonde braids in slight disarray, and the corner of her mouth crooking into a faint smile as her ice-blue eyes found him.

All the butterflies stirred, their wings trembling like fresh Spring leaves in the breeze. 'Hi,' Harry said. 'How are you?'

'I am well,' she murmured. 'But I have to go, Harry. I need to get up and get ready. I am having lunch with my parents and my little sister today.'

'Oh.' A couple of those butterflies went down, drifting back down like fading fireworks after the bright burst of their colours. 'Well, I'll see you in a few days when I come and visit. Remember not to mention you have a boyfriend.'

Daphne's lips twitched. 'I will not forget. They would be… upset to hear I was going out with you. It must stay our secret for now.'

'Bye.' He gave her a little wave as she faded from the mirror and stuck it back at the bottom of his underwear drawer, swallowing the last few butterflies. 'See you soon, I hope.'

Harry wandered down the stairs above his old cupboard, chuckling as he imagined the dust and spiders showering down upon his younger self. 'I'm going out,' he announced, pulling on his trainers.

Silence hung in the house.

'Oh, right, they left early to go watch really small men in lycra race really not small horses over hedges.' Harry contemplated getting the spare key from the top drawer of Uncle Vernon's desk, then patted the sheathed wand across his spine with a little grin and skipped out.

Tonks sat upon the sign, bobbing her head to the music emanating from her bright pink headphones and bouncing her feet off the box hedge beneath the sign. She had the pink cable of her headphone wound around her finger, tapping it to the beat where the hem of her dark purple shorts ended midway down her thigh.

Harry strolled across the road and tugged the sleeve of her white t-shirt. 'Nymphadooooooora,' he sang.

Tonks pulled her headphones down. 'I can lip read, baby cuz.'

'I'm happy for you,' he replied. 'Does it ever come in handy?'

'Actually, all the time,' she said. 'Particularly when my brat of a little cousin thinks it's funny to say my awful full name because he thinks I won't know.'

'I mean, it wouldn't be funny if you didn't know.' Harry gave her a huge grin. 'The whole point is that you know.'

Tonks tugged her finger free of the pink cable and flicked him on the tip of the nose. 'You win this round, baby cuz, but the next round…'

'Bruises.' He sighed. 'I know.'

'I heal them afterward.'

'True.'

'Swings?'

'Do I have any real choice in this?'

Tonks cackled. 'Well, you can choose to make your hottie of an older cousin happy and maybe she'll flirt with you some more, or you can not.'

'That sounds like a no.'

'It is.' She leapt off the sign and grabbed him by the elbow. 'Come on, baby cuz; it's time for something a bit more hands on.'

'Where are child protection services when you need them?' Harry asked the sky.

'Busy with—' Tonks stumbled on the edge of the underpass and sprawled face first across the concrete.

'Busy making sure karma comes back to bite the worst offenders,' he finished. 'And a good thing too.'

She bounced back to her feet, bending over to brush dust and bits of gravel off her knees. Harry admired the very snug fit of her dark purple shorts.

'I know what you're doing,' Tonks accused.

'No you don't.'

'You're staring at my butt.'

'No I'm not,' he denied. 'Staring doesn't convey the appropriate dynamic here. I'm admiring it. Those purple shorts really look rather good.'

A snort of laughter escaped her. 'Cute, baby cuz; that was almost smooth. If only you were about three years older.'

'But then I'd have menopause.'

'That's not how it works; you can't get menopause, remember? I explained this to you in great detail in the hope you would hate it enough to stop making jokes.'

'I wasn't listening,' he retorted. 'I was distracted at the time.'

'Two guesses as to what by.' Tonks's grey eyes gleamed with mischief. 'You done admiring or would you like me to bend over again?'

Harry pretended to think about it, stroking his very long and very imaginary beard with one hand.

'Really?' She shot him a long flat look. 'Seriously, baby cuz?'

'No,' he decided. 'It's not as fun when you do it deliberately like that.'

'Come on.' Tonks ruffled his hair with one hand and headed through the underpass toward the park. 'You have bruises to earn.'

'I know,' he complained, trailing the heels of her black boots and admiring the bright pink and black stripes of her socks where they stuck over the top of them. 'It's like being eight with Dudley and Piers again.'

'I'm way hotter than two eight year old boys.'

'And about as mature,' Harry chimed in.

'Mature?' Tonks pushed her boobs out. 'I'm plenty mature.'

'Like one of those smelly Italian cheeses nobody actually likes but are weirdly expensive.'

'Like a bottle of fine wine that leads to the best night of your life.'

'I am sixteen now; I could have a good night without getting someone sent to Azkaban.'

'But sadly no longer single.' Tonks shook her head, false tears shining in her eyes. 'Truly tragic. And there I was planning on letting you get to know your hottie of a cousin a bit better for your birthday present.'

'That just means more bruises.'

'Very bold of you to assume I like it rough, little cousin.' She cackled as heat rushed to his cheeks and winked at him. 'For once, you're not wrong.'

The heat flared up several notches further, leaving his face burning. 'There are so many things deeply wrong with you.'

'Madness does run in the family.'

'It's the only thing that runs for more than thirty seconds without falling on its face,' he shot back.

'Harsh but true,' Tonks conceded, drawing her wand from behind her back as they reached the gate of the park and casting a shimmering ward.

'Muggle-repelling?'

'Yup.' She grinned. 'You don't need an audience for your much deserved beat down.'

'I don't get beaten down.' He thought about it. 'Anymore.'

'You have gotten a lot better,' Tonks admitted. 'Let's see that stance.'

Harry shifted his weight and set his feet.

'Good.' She studied his posture with sharp grey eyes. 'Ready, but still a little loose and relaxed, not wound so tight you twitch at every little move.'

'I do though.'

Tonks laughed. 'Ready?'

He flashed her a mischievous grin. 'Ready and waiting.'

She sprang forward, unleashing a flurry of blows. Harry deflected them off his forearms and jumped Tonks's leg as she dropped and swung it at his ankles, leaving one foot trailing out to kick her shoulder as he came down, knocking her back.

'Good.' Tonks bounced to her feet. 'Nothing fancy. Nothing risky. Smart enough to push me back and not let me have it all my way, as well.'

'I got tired of you smacking my fingers with that piece of wood,' he groused.

'You stick your fingers out when you're fighting someone using Agwyd as a blade, and you can kiss them goodbye. Daphne will be a very disappointed girl if you've got no fingers, baby cuz.'

'Daphne's not an incorrigible flirt like you are,' Harry retorted. 'She's… different.'

'I bet if you ask her if she'd like you to do something fun with your fingers at some point in the future, she'd say yes.'

'She'd probably glare at me in a really icy fashion.' A couple of butterflies stirred at the thought. 'And then even if she did want to say yes, she'd turn her nose up and refuse to say it, which, you know, makes her look very pretty, so I really don't mind at all.'

'So that's the sort of girl you like.' Tonks cackled, conjuring two slim pieces of wood. 'Does she know you're always eyeing me up?'

'I am not.'

She raised both eyebrows and waggled them.

'Not always.'

'Just relatively often.'

'In my defence—'

'Your defence?'

'Shut up, I'm trying to think of one.'

Tonks snorted with laughter and held out one thin piece of wood. 'Next bit, Harry. Come on. Focus.'

'We do this every morning.' He sighed and poked his glasses a little further up his nose just in case. 'Do I have to say it?'

'Yes,' she murmured. 'I want you to know it off by heart. I want you to have the habit of saying it at the start of things like this so, if you ever get caught up in something serious, you can repeat it to yourself and calm down. Panic gets more people killed than anything else.'

'I'm not going to panic.'

Tonks fixed him with a long look, her grey eyes as hard and sharp as steel. 'Little cousin…'

'Fine, fine, I was just holding out in the hope you'd try bribery.' Harry flashed her a small grin, taking a deep breath. 'Doubt is the kiss of defeat. It is the heart's downfall, the first small step into indubitable oblivion. Doubt nothing. Doubt nothing; know only victory.'

'Good.' She held his gaze for a moment, bright mischief bubbling up in her grey eyes, then bent forward, letting the front of her white t-shirt slide down to bare a little cleavage and the shadow of her bra.

Harry's gaze dipped. 'Wait—' he shifted his balance as she unleashed a high kick at his chest and dodged it by a hair's breadth, feeling the wind of her heel whisper past his chin.

'Excellent!' A massive grin spread across Tonks's face. 'You might not get killed by the first auror who thinks of showing the teenage boy her boobs to distract him.'

He rolled his eyes. 'You could have at least bent forward for another couple of seconds before trying that.'

She flicked him on the forehead. 'You're too young for that.'

'Not anymore.'

'And I'm way out of your league.'

'Daphne is prettier than you and she's in my league.'

'She'll learn better when she's older and the high of going out with a boy for the first time wears off.' Tonks raised her hand. 'Wait. Sorry, that was a bit mean for someone your age. I take that back.'

'Take your silly piece of wood back instead.' Harry laughed to himself. 'We both know you'd absolutely date me, but your menopause has made you insecure so you're playing hard to get to feel more valued.'

'Okay, I don't take it back.' She cackled. 'You're made of some tough stuff under there, huh, baby cuz? Good for you. Can't let everything get to you.'

'I have killed one basilisk, two dementors, and one possessed Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor—' he counted on his fingers '—oh, no, technically two professors, unless Umbridge counts as headmistress. How many things did you kill while you were at school?'

'Mostly goldfish,' Tonks confessed with a laugh. 'And a few plants.' She wrapped an arm around his shoulders and ruffled his hair. 'Come on, baby cousin, let's go to London where the weather is nicer and buy you some ice cream.'

'Like a good little child.'

'Exactly.' Tonks grinned. 'Holding on tight? I'm going to apparate us right there.'

Harry held out his hands. 'What am I meant to be holding onto?'

'Me.'

He shot her a mischievous look.

'Don't even think about it.'

Harry slid an arm around her waist, letting it slip just a fraction below the line of belt loops.

Tonks snorted. 'Get that arm back up there or I'll apparate you into a cupboard in the auror department and leave you in there while I get ice cream by myself.'

He laughed and took a firm grip on the waist of her purple shorts.

'That'll do, but if that thumb goes anywhere near the hem of my underwear, Harry, I will give you some real bruises. There's playing around and there's sticking your fingers in my knickers without invitation.'

'I wasn't going to,' he promised. 'Not even with permission; I do actually have a girlfriend.'

'You do.'

A deafening crack echoed across the playground and Harry found himself staggering out of a whirling blur of colour across the cobbles of Diagon Alley. Tonks slammed into the glass window of Fortescue's and bounced back, ripping his hand from the waist of her shorts; she went sprawling across the cobbles with a grunt.

'How are you a first-class auror?' he asked, pushing his glasses further up his nose and holding out his hand.

'I'm fine fighting.' She grabbed his arm and hauled herself to her feet, groaning and stretching. 'Is my nose bleeding?'

Harry peered at it. 'No.' He looked her up and down as blatantly as possible with a huge grin. 'You look fine.'

Tonks laughed and flicked him on the ear. 'Nice, baby cuz. Come on. I'm buying. I get paid a fair bit. Not many first-class aurors, so most of the Ministry's gold goes on stopping us being unhappy with our living, and deciding to run off and be very well-paid retainers for Pendragon.'

'So all this time I had a hot older cousin to buy me things and I never knew to take advantage of it?' He shook his head. 'How unfortunate.'

'Not for me.' She pushed the door open with two fingers. 'I have a weird taste in ice cream, by the way, so make your own choice, don't let me do it.'

'How weird can it be? I kind of want you to choose for me now just to try it.'

Tonks drifted along the counter toward the thin old wizard dressed in neat white and pastel blue robes behind it. 'Hello, Mr F, how are you?'

'I'm very well, Miss Tonks.' The wizard reached behind himself for a clean scoop. 'What horrible mix are you going to make me serve you today? I had both little girls try that mix of rhubarb, bubblegum and cranberry after you, and they were both in tears when their parents refused to get them a second ice cream after they didn't listen to their warnings the first time.'

'On second thought, I'll choose for myself,' Harry said.

'Most wise Mr…' Fortescue's light brown eyes flicked to the scar. 'Mr Potter.'

'Yes, I know, there's something on my face,' he said. 'I keep trying to wash it off, but it never works.'

Tonks snorted with laughter. 'Maybe give the brat one of my concoctions. He deserves it after sneaking so many peaks at my legs and down my top.'

'That's a bare-faced lie,' Harry said. 'And I resent it immensely.'

'Are you trying to tell me I didn't see you looking?'

'No, that bit is absolutely true,' he said. 'But I wasn't sneaking any looks. It's only funny if you catch me.'

Fortescue's forehead wrinkled, his bushy white eyebrows curving into a steep vee above his long, crooked nose. 'Are the two of you…?'

'She's taking advantage of me even though I'm underage,' Harry quipped.

Tonks swatted him over the head, turning a little red in the face. 'He's my cousin. Don't listen to a word that comes out of his mouth; it's all malice and lies.'

'But you told me I had to get better with my tongue, Nymphadora.'

She flushed bright crimson. 'Okay, that's enough out of you. Pick an ice cream like a good child and be quiet.'

Harry cackled to himself. 'At last, sweet revenge.'

'Children should be seen and not heard,' Tonks retorted. She turned to Fortescue. 'We'll have two of what I had yesterday; hopefully this child also ends up in tears.'

'Well, my parents definitely aren't going to buy me another one,' he replied. 'Or I hope they aren't, that would raise all sorts of questions. Like, why is my mum an inferi? And why does Fortescue serve inferi ice cream?'

'If they pay me, I'll serve them,' Fortescue replied, packing three cones full of bright pink, fierce crimson, and pale red ice cream. 'Enjoy your day. Mr Potter, I would suggest eating this one bit at a time; it is truly an abomination.'

Harry took the cone he was handed. 'Don't worry, I only listen to her when she's threatening to hit me again.' He paused. 'Does the magical world have any kind of child protection agency?'

Tonks laughed, still a little red in the face. 'Come on. This way. Where nobody else can hear all the nonsense that comes out of your mouth.' She led him to a table in the corner by the window. 'I see you've learnt a little too well from your hottie cousin.'

'I was a very… attentive student,' Harry promised.

'You brat.' She gave him a huge grin. 'I think you're definitely going to be my favourite cousin.'

'Who's the competition?'

'Draco Malfoy and a couple of very annoying, boring Muggle teenage girls,' Tonks replied. 'The fact that Draco Malfoy is second favourite should really tell you how annoying they are. All they do is read pink magazines and squabble over posters of pretty boy bands.'

'Does this mean I can stick my fingers under your clothes? Or are there no real perks to being favourite cousin?'

She flicked him on the forehead. 'Tell you what, baby cousin, I'll make you a deal. In about six years, when I'm creeping toward thirty and you're in your twenties, I'll come date you if you're single. Not actually that many decent guys out there and you might turn out okay in a few years.'

'No deal.'

Tonks blinked. 'I wasn't actually screwing with you, you know; I would.'

'I know.' He took a bite out of all three flavours and shuddered. 'But I'm with Daphne.'

'You know you might not be in six years, right? Not everyone stays with their first girlfriend. Most don't, actually.'

Harry considered that, but the butterflies stirred, threatening full blown rebellion at just the thought. 'I will. She's just… amazing.'

'I hope you're right,' Tonks said. 'But if you're not...'

'I will be.'

'I'm going to take the deal back at this rate,' she muttered. 'My confidence is being trampled right now. I'm powerful, funny, extremely hot, we get on pretty well and I make decent money, and you didn't even hesitate.'

'Okay, fine. If—' Harry let the word hang '—in six years we're both single, then it's a deal.'

Tonks held out her hand. 'I might genuinely need to come and hide in bed with you to avoid ending up as some kind of concubine retainer if I get really desperate, so fair warning that I half mean this, little cousin.'

'Wouldn't you be running away from shagging one guy you don't like to another?' Harry shook her hand all the same. 'But deal, I guess. Can't leave my favourite cousin to suffer.'

'Trust me when I say there's a huge world of difference,' she promised. 'I could, if you were about four years older, consider letting you hit this without breaking out in a cold sweat at just the idea. Being kept perpetually pregnant on some retainer's estate makes all my skin crawl.'

'I wouldn't let them.' Harry felt a few sparks of anger flare up, rising like glowing embers from a bonfire. 'That's just… I don't even know how to say it. Wrong.'

'That's the point of the deal being half-serious, Harry.' Tonks studied her ice cream as the tip started to melt, her grey eyes sober and serious. 'I don't want to say that I'd try and get between you and another girl to avoid that, but… well, you know what, I won't lie to you or myself, I absolutely would. I'd do pretty much anything; if you were my ticket to escaping that, I'd grab it with both hands.'

Harry flashed her mischievous grin. 'Maybe you'll need both hands.'

A small snort of laughter burst from her. 'Thanks, baby cuz. Needed that. I'd say you've got no idea how it is to live with that sort of thing hanging over you, but I reckon you do, don't you?'

'Yeah, I used to be really broody and miserable,' he admitted. 'Spent all of last summer sulking in my room having horrible nightmares about Cedric and everyone I care about dying. That's when my magically sensitive dreams started, and some of them were…' Harry recalled the memory of having felt that all-consuming dread, but even the echo of it evaded him. 'I was more scared in those dreams, even knowing I was dreaming, than when that basilisk was trying to eat me or when I thought I was dying.'

'Hooray for being magically powerful.' Tonks gave him a small toast with her ice cream. 'I got your back, baby cuz. I'll help you not die this summer. And later on, if Pendragon tries to force me into bed with his son or one of his retainers to get his hands on the Black Family gift, you can help me not spend my life being forced to make babies with someone I will probably come to utterly despise. That will come with real perks, because I'll be very grateful.'

Harry weighed that up. 'Okay. You are pretty hot, so I guess you make an acceptable fallback for Daphne. I'm not telling her though; she might decide to graduate from mildly evil to very evil and betray me to Voldemort in return for saving her sister from a curse.'

'Your relationship really intrigues me sometimes.'

'Actually.' Harry lowered his voice, a little heat creeping onto his cheeks. 'You're a girl. And an older girl, so you know stuff, right?'

'I do…' She waggled her eyebrows at him. 'But don't ask to practise kissing with me, I'm not falling for that.'

'No, I mean… seriously.'

Tonks face sobered. 'Of course. Ask away.'

'What should I be doing? And not doing?' He scratched the back of his neck as Tonks ate her ice cream in small, patient bites. 'I want to make her happy.'

'Uh huh.'

'And I was going to ask Hermione, but she's never had a boyfriend and would probably quote romance books at me. I like Hermione and she always tries to be helpful, but I don't think romance books would be the best help.'

'Probably not.' Tonks smeared ice cream off her lips with her thumb and sucked it clean. 'Don't overthink it, Harry. There's nothing to be afraid of, she's just a person like you.'

'I'm not scared, but I want to know how to make her happy. Her family is… different, I think. Because of the curse. And she can't tell them about me. I can't fix that stuff, so…'

'You're a good guy,' Tonks murmured. 'It's a bit selfish of me, but I'm kind of glad I made that deal right now.'

'Glad enough to help?'

'I'll always be here to help my favourite cousin.' She crunched through the top of the ice cream cone with a thoughtful expression and swallowed. 'I'll just say it. She's your first girlfriend. You're going to mess some stuff up and so is she. Just… be nice about it. Neither of you are going to mean it. Now—' she stole Harry's ice cream '—all girls like different things, but generally just doing things for her, showing her you think about her, care about her, value her for who she is as well as how she looks.'

'I do!' Harry abandoned the lost ice cream with no small relief. 'It's just, is that all it takes?'

'Little things mean a lot; you'd be surprised how many guys don't show what they feel.' Tonks waved the ice cream at him. 'But don't let her walk all over you, either. Don't do all this stuff for her and accept nothing back. And don't pressure her into stuff she's not ready for. Or let her pressure you. A little bit of pressure is good to get you to try new things when you're nervous, but nothing you're seriously not okay with.'

'I mean, all we've done is kiss.'

'Yeah…' Tonks wrinkled her nose. 'Okay, talk time.'

Harry flushed. 'No, I know that stuff.'

'The magical culture version?' She took a bite out of the cranberry and the bubblegum together. 'Because you're sixteen and in the Muggle world that means you're free to do things together. The magical world actually has that line at seventeen, the traditional coming of age for us, but with so many Muggle-borns, a blind eye is turned.'

'Is that it?' Harry asked, with great caution and rather feeling like it very much was not.

'I wish.' Tonks snickered. 'You know we have our own faith and culture, don't you? How deeply wizards and witches believe varies, but generally there are some things that are considered associated with high magic or are supposed to be magical. Things like love. And expressions of love…'

'Oh you're going to say sex.' Harry groaned. 'I should have guessed with you.'

'Look, I had to sit through this with mum—'

'Whereas I have fortunately escaped that grim fate,' Harry joked. 'Thanks, Voldemort.'

She sniggered. 'The short version is life and love and sex are all intertwined, and some girls take that seriously. I'm going to go out on a limb and assume Daphne will be one of them because of her family.'

'You're probably right,' Harry admitted. 'But I don't care. If she doesn't want to, then fine.'

'Oh, she'll want to, I'm sure,' Tonks promised. 'But she'll be very conflicted about when is okay and what it means for the two of you, so… try and be nice about that. I know guys struggle to think at all when a girl starts taking her clothes off, but if you can manage it…'

'I can.' Harry made a silent vow to himself and the butterflies crawling around within, then flashed her a grin. 'Can I practise with you?'

Tonks cackled. 'No. Six years, remember? I will teach you that contraceptive charm though, because it just occurred to me that there's nobody to teach you anything like that.'

'Not really. Usually I just ask Hermione, but…'

'She might take that the wrong way.'

'And get angry and violent,' Harry said. 'Or worse, excited.'

'I'll teach you later when I take you back to Privet Drive if I remember,' Tonks promised. 'Want another ice cream that you can actually eat?'

'Yeah, I don't know how you can stomach that.'

'My tastebuds are just highly cultured.'

'Highly broken, more like.'

She laughed and stood up, wincing as she smacked her elbow on the wall. 'Come on then, I have much more dating advice still to give you. And then… the really important bit. How to make girls not just happy, but very happy. I promise not to smack your fingers for this bit; you'll need them.'

'Something is very wrong with your head,' Harry said, heat flooding his face. 'Did you trip over a lot as a baby too?'

AN: Loads more of this and other stories via the linktree!

linktr . ee / mjbradley