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Chapter Text

Harry Potter was used to running.

Until his legs burned and shook and his chest was ready to burst with the frenzied beat of his heart, each gasp for air like molten fire down his lungs.

People usually ran to stay fit, to unwind, to avoid being late. They did not know the gnawing fear of an enemy's breath down their necks, that blind desperation to outrun death, to push past the stabbing pain in their side, the agony that crawled up the spine, to the skull, reverberating in every bone each time their foot hit the ground.

Harry knew.

Running was a constant in his life, was a need with the likes of food, or sleep, or air. 

The sky above was filled with dark, angry clouds. It rained buckets, the air thick with the scent of mud. The downpour blanketed the world, blurred its edges to a rundown mass of drenched-grey and sodden-green. Harry could hardly see the slick, slippery ground under his battered trainers. Rainwater struck his flesh, ice-cold and merciless. It sluiced down his matted hair, to his neck, plastered the shirt to his body like a second skin. 

He could hear the Death Eaters in the distance, hollering like a pack of hounds, wild and blood-crazed and hungry.

They had been so careful, he and Hermione, in all their long, terrible months hunting Horcruxes. They had lived like shadows, scared silent and starved, ghosts of themselves since Ron left, but careful, always, with what little remained of themselves. Harry had listened to Hermione cry herself to sleep, and let the sound echo through the empty halls of his own chest. He had lain in bed and listened to the radio rattle the names of the dead, wondering, when will it stop. They held on, in spite of it all, made hard and ruthless by life on the road, and careful, careful.

He did not hear the Cutting Hex over the thrumming rain, saw a flash of red, then agony exploded over his back, knocked the air from his lungs. The strength of it hit him sharp and jarring. For one awful moment, Harry’s sight greyed, lurched. His mouth filled with the red, coppery tang of blood.

"DID THAT HURT, BABY POTTER?!"

His heart was loud, so loud in his ears, rushing, drowning him, nothing existed beyond the bright, tearing burn of his back, and  –

He did not fall.

Harry locked his knees, pushed past the nauseating spin of his head. Kept going. He ran, fast, faster, because to stop would be to die, and everything in him revolted against the idea. His breath came raw and ragged and everything hurt, lungs and muscle and his broken, open back, and it did not matter. If he were to die today, he would die fighting.

His face slick with sweat and tears and rain, he. Ran.

A Crucio hissed past his ear and he threw himself to a side, pace faltering. He fired a Stunner over his shoulder, arms pin-wheeling for balance. The wand fit the curve of his palm like an extension of his hand.

He scanned ahead for Hermione, but had long since lost the wavering shape of her. It was the middle of the day, but the world had been swallowed under heavy rain.  Panting, Harry shook droplets from his eyes.

Stonehenge detached itself from the greyness of the sky, great hulking shapes beyond the sheets of water and – 

There.

Hermione pelted toward the stones, body bent against the wind. Harry veered after her, heart kicking his ribs, his split back screaming. Behind him, Death Eaters whooped, and Hermione

Slipped.

She skidded on a patch of damp grass and swayed, tipped forward. Harry watched, heart in his throat. She fell on one knee, pushed up again. She had almost made it. Almost. Come on, Hermione, faster.

Harry had to get her out of here. He had to. It was him the Death Eaters wanted, him who Voldemort could use. Hermione they would kill on the spot, and Harry. Could not.

Green coloured the rain. Harry's blood froze in his veins. He heard himself yell a warning, one continuous scream, and Hermione jumped aside. The Killing Curse missed her by an inch, brushed past her shoulder. Another spell wheezed beside Harry, a deep violet hiss. It caught Hermione in the legs, and she went flying. She crashed against a bluestone, arms raised in protection. She heaved herself back to her feet, trembling, her back pressed against the bluestone for support. An easy target.

Harry put on a burst of speed. He ran so fast his feet barely touched the ground. A firework of curses rained around him, bright spells streaming sparks. Almost there, almost, he could see Hermione through the rain, her dark eyes feverish against the stretched, livid skin of her face. He stumbled, righted himself. Hermione's wand-arm rose, shaking.

Come on 'Mione, come on come on come one.

Her complexion turned ashen. She swayed on her feet.

Shit.

Harry skidded to a stop, turned, conjured a shield. He caught hexes with the crackle of angry magic, his every nerve strained. His head swam. Two iron bars constricted his lungs; he could not get enough air.

Bellatrix Lestrange laughed, high-pitched and maniacal, and Harry’s guts twisted. He bared his teeth. Planted his feet.

"Run,” he said, brokenly.  He did not dare turn around. As he had thought, the Death Eaters no longer cast Unforgivables now he was in the line of fire. He cleared his throat. “Hermione, go. Disapparate." 

Black shapes moved through the thick curtain of rain, but no sound came from behind him, no crack of Disapparition. Harry could feel Hermione behind him still, and for the first time since he had started to run, cold, heart-stopping panic seized him.

They were coming and she was not moving.

Head snapping around, Harry found her through the rain, through the distance between them.

"NOW!" he roared.

Despair tainted her features, but finally, finally, the words seemed to pierce through her exhausted daze, a primal part of her brain reacting to the order. Her eyes fluttered close. She Disapparated in a whirl of magic, there and gone, Slytherin's locket shining at her throat.

Harry would not be following her. He no longer had the strength. Already, his shield weakened under the onslaught of dark spells. Already, the strength waned from his arms. He gave a grim smile.

It was fine. Hermione was safe.

Breathing hard, he waited until he could see each of the Death Eaters' faces. He broke the Protego , threw an overpowered Blasting Curse in the same motion, and spun on his heels.

He ran to Stonehenge in the confusion, keeping low to the ground, ignoring the cries and shouted orders behind him. He crossed the two circles of stone unhindered. Cracks rent the air. Death Eaters snapped into existence, in front of him and to the sides, death-white masks jarring in the watery greyness, and Harry skidded to a stop. Trapped.

He backed to the middle of the circles, head swivelling from side to side. The Death Eaters followed, smug and sedate, sure of their success. Harry walked until his calves bucked against a hard surface. He swayed on the spot, light-headed. Blood sluiced down his back in thick ropes. His limbs buzzed, heavy and weak. He clutched his wand in a tight grip.

“Give up, boy,” a Death Eater told him, his voice low and rumbling. “Make things easier for yourself.”

Harry cast a glance over his shoulder. He stood in the middle of Stonehenge, backed against a fallen monolith. He clambered on top of it without thinking, his back screaming in protest. It offered a vantage point if nothing else. His right hand tightened, white-knuckled around his wand, and the closest Death Eater took a half-step back.

"Throw down your wand," said the same man. “It’s over. It’s done. Yield, Potter, so we won’t bring you too damaged to the Dark Lord.” 

Harry smiled a bloody smile.

A sense of calm had enveloped him. Not resignation, or even defeat. He felt detached from himself. His body was a stranger to him, a shell whose hurts were foreign and far-away.

He would die soon, and Harry found himself at peace with the thought. He had done his best. He had given everything. He had loved and suffered for it, and it had been his choice . To be here today. To die, so a friend might live. Harry stood alone, bruised and battered and bloodied, and one resolve pulsed through him, strong and steady as the earth beneath his feet.

He thought about his parents. About Sirius. About Hedwig, and Moody, and Dumbledore, and he gathered himself in a tight coil. Magic pooled beneath his skin, bottled lightning crackling at his fingertips.

"Stun him! " someone shouted, voice pitched with fear.

With perfect synchronisation, the Death Eaters took aim. Their mouths moved without sound. Wandtips glowed a bloody red.

Time

slowed.

Harry watched as curses flew in slow motion, jets of red crawling through the air like flies caught in amber. The relentless pounding of the rain hung suspended in mid-air. Streaks of water glittered, crystalline, like a million fragments of the world. Harry listened to the thready pulse of his heart, and found he could not move. 

Was it a trick of his dying mind, he wondered. Adrenaline-drugged brain stretching his last moments, letting him live an eternity in-between two heartbeats.

The world caught fire. 

A white, blinding flare came crawling from Death Eaters' feet. It spread inward like a wildfire, outpaced the static spells. Runes, Harry saw. Intricate, interlocked runes, circling and twisting, odd arches and deep curves. They scored the earth, swift and silent, and swept toward him.

Harry watched, stolid, stunned, as they reached his stone. As they weaved upon its surface. As they reached for his skin.

He felt that first touch on himself like the pain of rebirth. It touched him with all the tenderness of defibrillation on an arrhythmic heart. It wove down to his bones, to the very core of him, and it broke him. And it made him anew.

His  mouth opened in a silent scream. 

He burned. He burned. He burned.

He knew in a dim, distant way, that the air warped with the heat of him. Rainwater curdled to mist. On their knees, the Death Eaters cried in agony, their flesh seared with light, aglow with a thousand thousand runes. A wild, ancient thing opened one eye and loosed a deep and terrible roar.

Time stopped.

Something snapped. Tore itself open. Harry's heart missed a beat. He felt himself tip forward and start to fall, and, sobbing with relief, he let the dark take him.

Harry James Potter, the Boy Who Lived, disappeared on January 3rd, 1998, to the great despair of the Wizarding community.

Long afterwards, rain fell over Stonehenge, washing the bodies of some of the most feared Death Eaters of the Second War.

Chapter Text

Harry came to in the sweet-smelling twilight, night-cool air on his face, the taste of blood lingering on his tongue.

Pain.

Searing, burning, etched into bone and sinew, an overload of sensation that wrung a moan from his lips. He could feel the ground sway under him, rock like the deck of an old ship. He was dizzy. He was nauseous. His whole body ached. There was a pebble digging in his back each time he breathed, a keen needlepoint of pain, sickly warmth spreading over his skin because –

Oh.

He had been hurt, hadn't he?

Thinking was. Hard. Thoughts and ideas freely drifting through his head like so many snowflakes. Sense escaped him, unravelled at his touch, ribbon-like, thready and frayed.

He tried to move. His body was slow, listless. The faintest twitch sizzled up his nerves in bright flashes of agony. He rolled on the side anyway, because the alternative was to stay, was to think, and he. Could not. He wriggled until the pebble no longer dug into him and it did not feel like each breath flayed his back raw.

The pads of his fingers brushed against rough stone. Harry pressed his hand against it, felt blunt edges burrow into his skin, solid and here, a foothold for his ebbing consciousness. His breathing was ragged, was loud, was the only sound he could hear with the drumbeat of his heart.

He was alive.

His eyes flew open.

Alive, alive, alive.

He stared at the stars, incredulous. Gem-silver, scattered like the embers of a dying fire in the pitch-black curtain of the sky, the stars stared back. The moon hung overhead like a fat pearl, full-bellied and opalescent.

Harry laid beneath the liquid, cloudless night. He counted down his breaths, and listened to dry wind whistle between Stonehenge's monoliths, a soft, otherworldly song. No other noise came to break the quiet; he was completely, utterly alone. Which was. Odd.

The pain of his back receded in waves. His thoughts coalesced in a simulacrum of sense, and Harry frowned. He had left the conscious world in the middle of a rainy day. Now there were stars, and the moon, and quiet. His ears rang with a dull, high-pitch noise. There had been Death Eaters. There had been – 

Hermione.

Teeth gritted, Harry struggled into a sitting position. His stomach heaved. He swallowed back the urge to vomit, the uneasy roil of nausea. To throw up was to bend over, and the thought alone laced livewires of pain down his spine. He breathed deep, throat working, and forced himself to stillness.

His shirt was damp with rain and fresh blood. It stank of sweat, of mud, of ashes. Harry peeled it off with trembling fingers. The motion had him suck a sharp breath. The world darkened at the edges, swayed in and out of focus, threatened to wink out.

Panting heavily, he shredded the shirt into uneven strips. Blood slithered down his back, past the dirty band of his jeans. He made himself tie the makeshift bandages around his midsection, and, light-headed and shivery, he lowered himself on the ground. He listed, gently, onto his side. He was cold down to his marrow. He was. So tired.

The grass under his cheek was soft and dry.

Strange, he thought, and let darkness claim him once again.

{. . .}

He burned.

There were flames licking at his blood, scalding his skin. He cracked and withered under the sweltering heat. The fire had taken root deep inside his chest. Harry heard himself sob from the roaring, burning agony of it. His head would burst with it. His bones would split, his lungs collapse. He could not breathe. The inferno under his ribs consumed all the air. 

Please, he begged, writhing. Please make it stop.

He burned and burned, like his ancestors at the stake, like a thousand wizards before him. He choked on smoke and the scent of burning flesh, and the world was red, scarlet like fresh blood and slanted pupils watched him from the depths, darker than night, all-seeing.

Harry screamed, wild with inchoate dread, the weight of charred corpses pressing down on his chest, and he was burning – 

Hands found his face, carded through his hair in a careful caress. Harry leaned into the cool touch with a sob of relief. A string of whispered words wove over his skin, clear and cold as water. The intolerable heat eased. He sank into oblivion.

{. . .}

He laid on his stomach, buried in a cocoon of cloth, sweet with the scent of clean straw. He could hear birdsong. Wind skated over his skin, light and summer-soft. He was naked.

The world was strange. Muddled. It reached him as though from a great distance. He was in pain, but the pain was far-away. His aching head. His torn back. His strained, stretched muscles.

He wished he had stayed asleep.

There was a tinkling noise beside him, the rustle of clothes his only warning before sure fingers found the raw skin of his back. They prodded at the open mouth of its wound. Harry muttered in discomfort. He tried to shift away, but stones hung from his limbs. A voice spoke. Low, reassuring tones. It was a nice voice. He had heard it before. 

An arm wrapped around his waist, and Harry was pulled up against someone else's warmth and the hummed cadence of foreign words. His head was heavy. He let it rest on a shoulder that wasn't his.

A cool vial pressed against his lips. A thumb stroked his throat until he swallowed the contents. The action was repeated twice more, and Harry drifted back to sleep.

{. . .}

He woke from heavy, dreamless sleep to sunlight on his face, a deep crimson bleed against his eyelids. 

Pain was a slow, sluggish pulse radiating from his back. Harry stretched tentatively. He ached in a bone-deep, exhausted way, but no bright flare of pain came to steal his breath. The skin of his back was tender, taut, his entire left arm itched, his limbs were shaky and stiff, but –

He was fine.

He kept his eyes closed. Sunlight warmed his face. He remembered rain. He remembered mud. Cloying fear, Death Eaters chortling in the distance. Stonehenge. 

Harry opened his eyes. His memories dissolved into fever-clouded hallucinations. Bright searing pain; a feeling like falling down through the earth crust, down to where lava was formed and tectonic plates shifted. His every cell bursting.

The bloodloss must have gotten to him. Harry did not know how he had escaped. Someone had found him. He remembered hands on his face, potions pressed to his lips. Someone had pulled him back from the chilled touch of Death on his blood-wet skin.

Something was wrong. Bits and pieces of information jumbled around his head in a mismatched bundle. Something was very wrong.

Anxiety squeezed his chest. Harry sat, his heart pounding, bedsheets pooling around his waist. A bolt of pain pierced his head. He blinked against the way his sight lurched, eyes squinted for focus.

There was a soft, indistinct edge to the world, the kind of blur that would morph into a headache by the end of the day. Harry had not needed his old glasses since bad eyesight nearly killed him one time too many, and Hermione handed him a potion a few months back. His sight was far from perfect, but he could function without glasses now, was no longer helpless without them.

He laid in a narrow bed, inside a small, rudimentary tent. The thick canvas shifted with gusts of wind. Another bed faced his. There was a table littered with Potion-making tools, a pile of chopped wood in a corner, a couple of bags. Harry could see tall, green grass through the tent flap, a slice of clear blue sky.

There was a noise, outside the tent, footfalls, and Harry’s heart kicked his ribs. He patted around his bed with clammy palms, feeling for his wand and he found nothing, nothing , and a line of shadows obscured the entrance. 

Cursing himself, Harry slung his legs out of the bed, his arms trembling, his limbs weak and head spinning, and –

In the entrance stood a man. He was tall, lean, pale as bones. There was a strange, angular beauty to him, from the hollows of his cheeks to the sharp sweep of his jaw. He could be any age at all, from late twenties early forties. Outlined in the slanted sun, he watched Harry with his head tilted to a side, hands held loose at his sides. Black hair framed his face, fell down his back, one thick braid like a spill of ink.

“Who are you?” Harry breathed.

“Læt þær, frēond mīn,” the man said, soft and soothing.

Harry shook his head. His breath came sharp and hard. “What?”

"Alecgan baec gnapa, feran aet aebaere wundian."

The man stepped into the tent, flap falling behind him, closing them in soft semi-darkness.

“I don’t - I don’t understand,” Harry said. His ears rang. He struggled to his feet. His heart beat loud, loud, loud, and his head lurched, and the man was right there, a hand gripping Harry’s forearm, the other against Harry’s shoulder. 

“Ðū ne scealt bewegan,” he said. Pale eyes, Harry saw. More silver than grey.

Distantly, he could feel himself shaking.

The stranger guided him back to the bed, pushed him into the mattress and the sweet scent of straw. He pressed a hand to Harry's chest and kept it there, a firm touch. Harry’s heart beat against his ribs as though to leap into the waiting palm. His breathing slowed by degrees.

The man walked back a step. He reached into a sleeve, and pulled out a wand. Harry stiffened in alarm, but the man was faster. He tapped his wand under Harry's jaw, whispered a spell. The air flashed. Magic rattled up Harry’s skull. Vertigo sized him, then eased. Harry touched a hand to his jaw.

"Can you understand me now?"

Harry started. The man was looking at him, eyes searching Harry’s face. 

Numb, Harry nodded. “Yes,” he said. “What did you do to me?”

The man gave a smile. "Focus, my friend," he said. "Hear the words as they leave your mouth. You speak your language still."

The ground opened beneath Harry’s feet. Vertigo swept through him, threw him flat on the bed. He gasped, a dull ache growing at the base of his skull. Something clicked into place. His vision swam, blacked out. Knowledge rushed through him, words words words words words, so many words tearing through his brain, a blinding spike of pain, great and iron-sharp and –

A cool liquid slid down his throat. The pain eased, shackled down to a vague headache. Breathing hard, Harry blinked against the tears stinging his eyes. His sight wavered, then focused.

The man crouched beside the bed, his hands held open in front of him. He watched Harry and held himself still, the lines of him supine and unthreatening.

"My apologies," he said. He bowed his head, bared his neck, the jut of his spine stark against white skin. "The spell is new. I did not mean to cause you harm."

Harry did not answer. New words roiled and shifted inside his head, pressed against his tongue, crowded behind his teeth, tried to fit past his mouth. It did not hurt. It felt instead like the slick slide of a needle under the skin, sewing shut an open wound after anaesthesia kicked in. 

“How long,” Harry said, and cleared his throat, foreign words ill-fitting on his lips. “How long was I out?"

The man stood. He walked back a few steps. Giving Harry space. He leaned a hip against the worktable and crossed his arms. His eyes never left Harry’s face.

"Three days," he said, and Harry's stomach dropped like a stone.

“Three days.”

Three days. Anything could have happened in three days. Hermione could have been captured, could have died. Ron. The Weasleys, all of his friends. How many more names had crackled through thin radio speakers, Harry wondered. In the span of three days.

“Breathe, lad,” said the man. He straightened away from the table, uncrossed his arms.

“You let me sleep,” Harry said, panting. “For three days.”

“And you should have slept three more,” the man said. “You were one step beyond living when I found you.”

Harry stared numbly. He wanted to shout. Wanted to grab that man by the shoulders, shake him until sense tumbled out of him. It was war. People were dying. He had no right. No right to look so calm, so perfectly unperturbed while Harry – 

Harry sucked in a great, shuddering breath. He clenched his fingers in the bedsheets, feeling the coarse grain of the cloth. The taste of rust filled his mouth. He had bitten his tongue.

“You lost a lot of blood,” the man said. “You were feverish for days. The burns on your arm had festered.”

Harry did not care about his injuries. He wanted to know where Hermione was. He wanted to know she was safe. He wanted to know what had happened in Stonehenge, and why he was not dead.

“You were a canvas of injuries,” the man said. “New wounds. Old ones. I rebound your chest as best I could.”

Nagini had cracked four of Harry’s ribs a week prior, had wrapped around his chest and squeezed. The red splash of blood on snow. The wet, awful sound of bones breaking. Going to Godric’s Hollow had been a mistake. 

“You had the look of one who had walked the pits of Hell,” the man said. “I feared I would lose you. To the rot, or the exhaustion. Here.” He reached behind himself, then approached Harry with a hand held out. “Drink.”

Three flagons laid on the open palm. Harry eyed them with his mind gone blank. He recognized none of the potions. Yellow, purple and blue. His nostrils flared. Cold sweat dewed his back.

“Had I wished you dead,” the man said. “I would have left you sprawled on the stones.”

Harry plucked the vials from his hand. His fingers shook. He felt sick.

“For the pain,” the man said. He tapped the purple potion. “For the putrescence. For strength.”

Harry blocked his breathing, and drank.

The warm, pulsing ache in his back eased. The migraine cleared from behind his eyes. Breathing came easier. Harry closed his eyes in sheer relief. 

“Thank you,” he said. “I suspect I owe you more than I know.”

The man accepted the empty vials with a deep nod.

“I will not ask for your story before you are willing to tell it,” he said. “But I would, if it please you, have your name.”

Harry’s hand went to his forehead. Matted with sweat and grime, his hair stuck up at odd angles, in dirty, messy lumps. It left bare the puffed skin of his scar. Harry’s heart hammered up his throat. His name was naked for the world to see.

“Show me your arms.”

“Beg your pardon?”

“Your arms,” Harry said, and he snatched the stranger by the wrist. The man let himself be yanked forward, let Harry roll up his shirt, baring the thin, delicate skin of his forearm, blue-veined and unmarked.

Harry ran a finger on the warm flesh, from wrist to elbow, feeling for scarred, tattooed skin, for the sizzle of spells. Nothing. 

He sagged in relief, and let go of the stranger’s arm. 

“You’re not a Death Eater, at least.” He shot the man a wry smile. “That’s good to know.”

The man watched him, a frown etched on his brow. He clasped his own wrist with two fingers, then let go. “A - Death Eater?" he repeated, a note of puzzlement in his voice.

“They were after me,” Harry said. “Lucky they didn’t find us yet. I don’t suppose you’d know what happened to their lot?”

“I do not,” the stranger said slowly, “know what they are.”

Harry blinked at him. Something squirmed in his gut, a sense of foreboding. Nothing was adding up. He gave a hesitant smile. “Are you - you’re not British, are you? Where are you from? Where are we?”

"I was born in the Isles," the man said. “And we are near where I found you. I made camp a little outside the standing stones.”

Oh, Harry thought, vaguely.

Nothing was adding up.

“Is this another country?” he asked. His voice sounded strange. “I thought, well. I thought even foreign papers talked about Voldemort."

The man took a step closer. 

“Are you well?” he asked, and touched the back of his hand to Harry’s forehead.

“I’m,” Harry said. “My name is Harry. Harry Potter.”

Nothing.

Harry swallowed convulsively. He wanted to vomit. His chest buzzed. He could not feel his hands.

His eyes fell on the stranger’s chest. Wandered down to his waist.

A sword.

There was a sword, hanging from the man’s waist. Harry. Harry had not seen it before.

The man wore dark trousers tucked into knee-high riding boots. A tunic fitted his chest, fell past his narrow hips. It was laced-up at the throat, delicately stitched and lovely and completely, utterly outdated.

 Black dots danced across Harry’s sight.

He. Harry. Harry had gone mad. Surely. Surely he had gone mad. He had taken a lick to the head. He was fevered. Delirious. It was all a trick, some elaborate trap, a joke in bad taste. It had to be.

Nothing was adding up.

Nothing was adding up.

“Who are you?”  he heard himself ask. It was not the right question, not right at all. “Please. Tell me who you are.” I am begging you, tell me I am hallucinating. Tell me the date is January 1998. Tell me. Tell me.

“Peace, lad,” the stranger said. Then, horrifyingly, “My name is Salazar Slytherin. On my oath, you are safe with me.”

Chapter Text

Salazar Slytherin. 

Harry looked at the man and heard white noise. Salazar Slytherin. Which Salazar Slytherin? The Salazar Slytherin. No. No, it could not be. Salazar Slytherin was dead. Centuries dead. A footnote for the History books, a memory from dark times gone by. It could not be.

The air in the tent was stifling. It bore down on Harry, closed in from all sides. He couldn't. Could not breathe. His skin was too tight. He. He needed. He had to get out.

He pushed away from the bed. His legs caught in the sweat-damp sheets. He kicked them aside. Struggled to his feet. His knees gave out. He fell. Got up again. He was naked save for a pair of underwear. He shivered, but did not feel cold.

One step. Two. He brushed off the hand – whose hand? – that reached out to steady him. He wrenched at the tent flap. Stumbled outside. 

Dawn shimmered a handspan over the horizon, white gold light glowing over lush, thick grass. Under its soft peach undertones, the sky was a deep, fierce blue, magnificent prelude to a burning summer day.

Summer.

Something was wrong.

Morning dew glittered over the field, stuck to blades of grass in small, translucent prisms. Black, wet soil clung to Harry’s bare feet. There was. No dew in winter. No soft soil. Only ice, mud, frozen ground. It had been winter, Harry remembered. It was not, anymore.

Something was. Something was wrong.

Salazar Slytherin.

Stonehenge stood alone in the distance. Its long shadows played with the rising sun. No tourist barriers surrounded the site. The signboards were gone, and the dark asphalt road. There had been barriers, and signboards, and rumbling cars. There were not, anymore.

My name is Salazar Slytherin.

Harry wished the ice in his veins would melt back to blood. The high-pitched whine in his ears muted the world. He was deaf. He drowned.

Hogwarts was founded a thousand years ago by the four greatest witches and wizards of the age. Godric Gryffindor. Helga Hufflepuff. Rowena Ravenclaw.

"Salazar Slytherin," Harry said.

His tongue sat leaden in his mouth. He could not feel his lips.

Stonehenge was swimming.

A thousand years ago. Ten centuries. Was. A lot of time. Salazar Slytherin had lived ten centuries ago. Harry had gone back in time, once, three hours to save Sirius. Hermione had been there. She was not here now, and Harry –

Harry could not focus. His chest hurt, and his stomach, a crawling, clamping ache. He could not think, couldn't – could not even, he was –

Pitching forward, his legs limp, strengthless. Harry watched himself fall, and could not find it in himself to care. Blood thundered in his ears. His chest rose and fell, rose and fell. He could not seem to find his breath.

Arms caught him around the waist before he could hit the ground, pulled him up against another body. Two hands pressed hard against his chest, palms flat, fingers fitted between the indents of his ribs.

On my oath, you are safe with me.

“Easy, lad. Easy. Take a deep breath and calm your mind. Be here with me. This feeling is but a trick of the senses. It will pass. Breathe.”

The voice was calm. Soothing. Harry did not register the words so much as its tone. It punched through the haze of his panic, wormed its way to his brain. Anchored him back inside his own body. 

“Very good. I am only holding you, sweeting. Breathe for me now. Take some deep breaths. Excellent. Let us get you back to bed, shall we?”

Around him, the arms shifted. The man put Harry’s arm around his own shoulders, pressed Harry’s side against his own, balancing the bulk of Harry’s weight. He walked, steering Harry back toward the tent, and Harry walked with him.

Inside was cool and dim. The man sat Harry on the edge of the bed, then sat in front of him. Harry watched him move, and traced the lines of his face. He studied the narrow nose, the deep-set eyes, the curve of the cheeks. Here was that sense again, of beauty, of loveliness. The man would be pretty, if not for the sharp slant of his cheekbones. Handsome, if not for the fullness of his lips. Was there anything of Tom Riddle in him, Harry wondered, and was not sure of himself.

"You believe yourself from another time," the man said.

Harry looked up into pale eyes, and found himself watched the way he had watched, studied the way he had studied.

“I don’t know,” he breathed. “I think I may be dreaming.”

In front of him, the man who called himself Slytherin nodded. “What year?” he asked.

“Ten hundred years from now.”

Slytherin rested his forearms on his thighs. He breathed a slow breath, then looked at Harry. “Look at me,” he said softly. “Convince us both of your sanity.”

He reached across the distance between them, and closed two fingers around Harry’s chin. Harry let his head be tipped up. He let his eyes find Slytherin’s, and, mesmerised like a snake to flute song, stayed there.

There was the touch of a consciousness against his own. Harry had not been a good Occlumency student, had not taken well to Snape’s teachings. He did not understand so much as the basics of Mind Arts, and did not attempt to resist. He was so very tired. Gasping, boneless, he sank down the pathways of his own thoughts.

Slytherin greeted him there, a sense more than a man, a feeling like the cool dark-green depths of the sea, like sinking beneath the waves and letting them roll over you. He radiated power like a tsunami trapped behind saltglass, and Harry understood with horrifying clarity just how easy it would be, for him to ravage Harry’s mind, to come crashing down and leave broken ruins behind. Slytherin could unearth Harry’s darkest, deepest thoughts, and it would be nothing, nothing at all, but –

He wouldn't, would not storm the privacy of Harry's mind because he only wanted proof, a proof, just a proof of Harry's claim, a proof he was not delirious and Salazar could trust him.

Here, Harry said. Here, take it. Have it all. 

Muggle London, white stone buildings rushing up to the skyline, rain-slick and monochrome, the claustrophobic press of too-large crowds, life and movement and noise. The murky brown waters of the Thames, the roar of a hundred cars, loud loud loud, tires eating up the asphalt in soot-black clouds of gasoline. White-blue glare of a computer screen, the choking pain of Dudley's fist in his stomach. Harry was not  allowed to look, let alone touch , smooth-cool keyboard under his fingertips; dozens and dozens of screens, flashing in Piccadilly Circus, bright colours on white stone. A telephone booth in the distance, stark red in the dull greyness, and he was underground; the damp-mold smell of closed spaces like his cupboard, just like his cupboard, tight and confining, but the Ministry was grand, was a thousand twisted corridors. Dark tiles gleamed, the Atrium gold statue glowed, and two formidable wizards battled, magic a blaze around them. Harry couldn't feel it, could not feel anything, not the fire-hot heat blistering his skin, not the cuts of broken stone, because there was grief/vengeance/hatred at war inside of him. It devoured his heart. He wished he could rip it out, his heart, take it bleeding from his chest and stamp it down on broken tiles. Sirius was dead, and everything hurt so much. The Dark Lord tore his mind, slit him to pieces and Harry screamed and screamed, and Sirius, Godfather, family, was dead, dead and never coming back, dead and it was all his fault –

Enough, he heard, and there was a wrenching pull inside his skull, and –

Silence. Loneliness.

“I am,” Slytherin said, and Harry knew for certain now, had seen the name branded on that man’s soul as his, “so sorry.”

He gasped the same air as Harry, forehead to forehead, their noses alined but not quite touching.

“Yeah,” Harry said. “Me, too.”

They stayed like that a long time, catching their breaths. Harry thought he should be bleeding. His chest should be split open, should show the pink, squirming insides of him. He wanted to sleep.

Slytherin peeled himself away. He took with him the warmth of his breath. Harry swayed at the loss. No one else inhabited the confines of his skull, and he was. Empty.

“You should rest,” Slytherin said. He scrubbed a hand over his face. The long fingers shook. Harry was seized by the sudden urge to catch them between his palms. “You are weary beyond words.”

“And now,” Harry said, watching the slumped arch of Slytherin’s shoulders, the lassitude in the dark hollows of his eyes. “So are you.”

Slytherin accepted the rebuttal with a graceful bow of his head. This, for some reason, solidified the situation in Harry’s mind. The easy acceptance, so utterly at odds with anything he had ever imagined about Salazar Slytherin. Harry buried his hands in his hair, wrenched until his eyes watered. 

"Will you let me treat your injuries?”

Harry barked a broken laugh. “Will you leave me alone if I refuse?”

“I will.”

Harry looked up, fingers untangling from his hair. Slytherin gave a bitter smile.

“I believe I have encroached well enough upon your consent for today."

“This isn’t how it goes,” Harry murmured. “You should not be so kind.”

“How else, then, would you have me be?”

Harry did not answer. He planted his hands on the bed, braced himself. He tucked his knees and turned to face the tent, exposing the bare stretch of his back, the vulnerable slope of his neck.

Behind him, Slytherin blew a slow breath. “Thank you,” he said, and Harry heard him approach. Fingers pressed under his shoulder-blades, found the line where bandages gave way to skin. Slytherin unknotted the rough cloth, and Harry let him.

He glanced down as the dressing peeled away. It wasn't a pretty sight. His chest was a colour palette of bruising, black and blue, green and yellow, the curled flesh of an apple gone bad. He was gaunt in a way he had not been in years, ribs showing under pallid skin.

“I am afraid this will scar,” Slytherin said, his fingers flush against Harry’s back, smearing a sharp-smelling paste.

“Scars I can bear,” Harry said. 

“Yes. I rather imagine you can.”

Slytherin redressed Harry's back in clean bandages, each motion swift and sure. "Tomorrow we will speak,” he said. “I would help you, if you let me. But for now, Master Potter, you must rest.”

He guided Harry down into the sheets, and Harry, finally, gave himself to oblivion.

{. . .}

He woke to complete darkness, to the thudding of his heart and the ghostly hoots of a night owl. The room swayed under the cool touch of a summer breeze, quiet and lovely.

It wasn't a dream, was his first thought, and the world settled in his bones like lead. Harry pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes. Fireworks exploded behind his eyelids. 

Wide-awake, thrumming with urgency, he kicked off his blankets, balanced his legs out of bed. He stood carefully, testing the strength of his legs, the way it held up his body’s weight. His back twinged with phantom pain.

On the bed across from him, Slytherin laid still in sleep. Harry traced the outline of his chest, the ebb and flow of his breaths. He grabbed a cloak, and padded outside.

The night was a deep, dark charcoal, the vastness of space speckled with a thousand thousands bright, burning stars. Harry breathed the scent of wet grass and cooling soil. He walked toward Stonehenge without thought, the standing stones a black, looming shape in the distance. The night air made him shiver. Tall grass tickled his bare calves. He walked by moonlight, weak silver shafts clearing the way.

He did not know what he expected to find. Runes, perhaps, scored into the ground like so many scars. The warning pull of power. Anything. Anything at all. To hint at what had happened to him. To prove it was more than memories of half-remembered pain.

Harry pressed a hand against rough stone, and saw nothing. He walked past the first circle, then the second. He moved as though through a dream. He had last come this way ankle-deep in mud, his back a mess of pulped flesh. There had been skull-white masks and pouring rain. Now there was nothing.

A wide stain darkened the fallen boulder. Harry watched his blood rust an altar of stone, and sat heavily on the ground. 

There was a scream, trapped behind his teeth. Harry could feel it in his throat, the roots of it in his chest. He wrapped his arms around himself and closed his eyes. Breath hissed past his nose, too hard and too fast. He willed himself elsewhere. Anywhere. He would take Hogwarts. He would take the cupboard under the stairs. His aunt hammering at the door. Wake up, boy! Up!

This was no nightmare.

He stayed a long while, listening to the pregnant silence of the night, letting its chill sink into him.

The moon had moved, by the time he uncurled himself, had wheeled over constellations and distant stars. Harry stood, shuddering. He turned away from the stones after a last look, and – 

The tent he shared with Salazar Slytherin glowed in the darkness, the soft orange of firelight. Harry watched its warm shadow on the long grass, and teetered where he stood, caught between dual urges. He wanted to curl up in bed. To get warm, and forget.

He wanted to run far away from this man. As far as his legs would carry him. 

Salazar Slytherin had fathered Voldermort and the idea of blood purity. He was the root of the murder of Harry’s parents. One thousand years dead, he had sown war on British soil. Harry carried his name written in each of his scars, and Salazar Slytherin – 

Slytherin saved his life. Slytherin found a broken boy in the mud, and chose to care for him.

Sighing, Harry walked back to the tent. Inside was warmth and soft light, and Slytherin sat awake in bed, a book open on his lap. Harry crossed over to his own bed. He sat on the covers, a knee dawn up to his chest. Slytherin closed his book .

"I thought," Harry said. "I thought there would be something." He pressed a hand to his mouth.

Slytherin swung around to face him, hands clasped on his lap. He watched Harry with eyes like silver coins.

“What will you do next?”

Harry curled his hands into fists, nails digging into his palms. 

"I don't know."

“Come with me,” Slytherin said.

Harry looked up. His heart pulsed in his wrists, on his tongue. Slytherin met his gaze.

“There is a place,” he said. “A place we built in the north, a home of learning for our kind, of safety for our children. We would teach wizardry there, my companions and I. You would be welcome to join us.”

“Hogwarts,” Harry breathed, and Slytherin froze. Harry watched his lips part, his eyes widen. Harry swallowed. He said, “I know you. I. I know of you. Hogwarts was my home for six years. I grew up there.”

Slytherin curled around himself, his back bowed, hands clasped on his knees as if in prayer. His shoulders shook. Harry watched with his chest tight. His fingers twitched.

Slytherin raised his head, then, and Harry.

Harry stared.

“Oh,” he said, and wondered, how would ten hundred years wrap the truth. How would they twist it around itself. Because this. This was the madman whose hatred for Muggles spanned an age of bigotry. This was the Dark wizard who stuck a giant snake in a school full of children. The man with a legacy of discord and darkness.

This.

Harry watched the fierce, prideful smile on Slytherin’s mouth. He watched eyes overfull with tears of joy, and felt like the ground had flipped beneath his feet. How much of it was a lie, he wondered. How much a  prophecy waiting to happen.

“It endured,” Slytherin said. His voice trembled. “It endured a thousand years.”

He blew a hard breath. He straightened himself, smoothed the expression on his face, but his eyes. Merlin. 

His eyes burned.

“Come with me,” he said again. “See the place you call home open its doors. There is room for you in my House. It would be my privilege to have you. We will have time, then, to think of ways to send you back to your own age.”

“Yeah,” Harry said. His throat ached. “Yeah, alright. If you’ll have me, I’ll follow you.”

{. . .}

He lived the next three days in short bursts of consciousness. The fever came back, left him writhing, delirious, on sweat-soaked bedsheets. The after-effects of the language spell racked through his inflamed brain. Harry called for Hermione, in his madness, called for Ron and all the friends who were not there. 

Slytherin kept him fed. He held Harry’s neck between careful fingers and he pressed water to Harry’s lips. He bore Harry’s weight when Harry could not stand the stretch of his own body.

Harry got better in leaps and bounds. His injuries healed. He stayed awake longer, regained the strength to care for himself. Slytherin left him alone for hours at a time, vanishing into the moors. 

He woke on the fourth day to silence and a weight on his chest. Wisps of half-remembered dreams scattered with awareness. Hermione and her haunted eyes. Ron snarling. Sirius' barked laugh. Nightmare again, but his mind felt clear, and –

The weight on his chest. Moved.

Harry froze, the stretchy fogginess of sleep vanishing. He opened his eyes.

There was a snake on his stomach.

A snake. Smooth scales a gradient of greys, dark as slate and clear as mist, long body a column of sleek muscle. Its diamond-shaped head rested on its thick coils. Its dark, beady eyes fixed Harry, a steady stare, full of intelligence. Its forked tongue darted out, tasting the air.

Harry did not have his wand. He had left it with his dirty clothes the night before.

‘Hello,’ Harry said softly. ‘Are you here to bite me?’

The snake hissed; a long, sibilant noise.

Harry swallowed.

There was a noise outside, footsteps, and moments later, Slytherin walked in the tent, a leather bag over one shoulder. His eyes fell on Harry. The bag made a thumping sound when it hit the ground.

“Please,” Harry said. “Tell me it’s yours.”

‘Sila,’ Slytherin said. On Harry’s stomach, the snake quivered. ‘You should not be here.’

‘I should with you,’ said the snake. ‘It is my appointed place. You told me to hunt, and I hunted. Now I am come back.’

‘The boy could have killed you.’

‘The boy is slow, and smelled warm.’

‘So you thought to use him as a nest.’ Slytherin approached. He held out a hand. ‘Come, my familiar, before either he or I lose our patience.’

The snake unwound, stretched. It glided across Harry’s belly, long and sinuous. Harry held still.

“My apologies,” Slytherin said. Harry watched the snake crawl up his arm, coil around his chest. It fitted Slytherin’s shoulder with the ease of long habit. “You met Sila, my familiar. She was under instructions not to disturb you, but has, I am afraid, never learned to leave well enough alone.”

‘The boy,’ Sila said, tongue flicking Slytherin’s ear. ‘Ssspeaksss.’

Slytherin stilled. 

‘Does he?’ he asked softly, and pinned Harry down with a sharp stare.

Harry looked away. His mouth was dry. ‘It’s a long story,’ he said. A long story did not begin to cover it.

Slytherin watched him as one might a ghost, or an apparition. Harry stiffened.

“I’m not your descendant,” he said, and that, at least, broke through Slytherin’s stillness.

“I would be greatly surprised if you were,” he said. His lips tilted up in the barest smile, and Harry, uncertainly, smiled back. “You hide many surprises, Master Potter.”

He turned around, then, gave Harry his space, to Harry’s great relief. He shimmied out of bed and dressed quickly, picking the new clothes Slytherin had brought him. Harry’s old, tattered t-shirt and jeans he had burned some nights ago.

“Do you feel well enough to travel?” Slytherin asked as Harry joined him at the breakfast table. 

“We’re leaving?”

“We may have to. I would rather have left you another week to recover, but I have drawn attention to myself. It won’t be long before someone follows me to camp.”

Harry gave a nod. “Alright,” he said. "Let's leave."

Chapter Text

The summer sun beat down Harry’s neck. Sweat dewed on his face, rolled down his back in fat drops. He sat bent in the saddle, swaying to the horse’s ponderous gait. They trodded down the road from London to Doncaster, a wide dirt path girdled by copses of trees. A heat haze rose off the ground, tricking the eye.

Everything stood still in the mid-afternoon sun. No gust of wind came to rustle the dry, burnt grass. No animal chirruped in greeting. The sun pounded unrelenting, and robbed the world of its softness.

“Here.”

Harry looked up blearily. Slytherin rode beside him on a piebald stallion. He proffered Harry a waterskin, the other hand holding the reins. 

“Drink,” he said. “Before you fall off the horse.” 

Harry accepted the waterskin. He drank deep draughts of warm, stale water, relishing the immediate relief for his parched throat.

“You aren’t taking too well to the heat,” Slytherin remarked. “It will get better as we move north. The highlands are much more forgiving.”

Harry lowered the waterskin and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. “A week ago, it was winter,” he said. “I was knee-deep in snow and fighting to keep warm.” He tapped the mouth of the waterskin with his wand. “ Aguamenti,” he said, and handed it back to Slytherin.

“Aguamenti,” Slytherin repeated. "I grow water with my mind. Ingenious. Tell me, how is your Latin, Master Potter?”

“Nonexistent.”

“It was never taught to you?”

Harry shook his head. “Never beyond what was useful to cast spells,” he said. “And even then. I couldn’t tell you what most of them mean.”

“A shortcoming we shall have to remedy. Words are the basis for power. Come.”

Slytherin led his horse down a cattlepath, veering off the main road to make for a copse of trees. The stallion kicked dust and clods of dirt as it went. Harry followed a moment later, pulling on the reins. His horse snorted in discomfort, ears flattening to her skull. Harry stroked her neck with a murmured apology. Slytherin had acquired the lovely, even-tempered mare for him some days ago as they crossed Salisbury, but Harry had yet to master horse-riding.

He ducked his head as he passed under the cover of the trees. They offered some welcomed shade.

“Give the mare her lead,” Slytherin said, and demonstrated by loosening the grip on his own reins. “She will thank you for it.”

Harry mimicked him, and was rewarded when his mare’s strides lengthened, her gait lightening. She caught up to Slytherin’s stallion, her nose to Slytherin’s thigh.

“Sorry,” Harry grunted. “I’ll get the hang of it.”

“You are better already. Your body is a fast study. You have a horseman’s build.”

Harry had woken too sore to move after his first day riding. Everything had hurt, from his thighs, to his abdominal muscles, to his arms. The pain from his back had kept him pinned to his bedroll. It had been two days before he could take to the road again. Slytherin had taken care to ease the pace after that.

Harry wondered whether the sudden excursion through the woods was for his benefit.

“Tell me about your world,” he said, watching the line of Slytherin’s back, the side of his face.

"What is it you wish to know?"

“Everything,” Harry said. “Anything. Talk to me about Britain like I’m a five-year-old who never got out of his home.”

Slytherin remained silent for some time. Harry watched his lips flatten in thought, watched his brow furrow, his gaze lose itself in the distance. Then he watched the expression clear, and reminded himself to breathe. His heart beat uneven, disjointed beats.

“The country is divided into regions, and each region has its king,” Slytherin said. “King Æthelred II rules Wessex, Northumbria, East Anglia and Mercia, which we are now crossing. His ealdorman oversee an appointed province, and swear fealty to him. Ælfric Cild is currently earl of Mercia.”

“You’ll have to draw me a map,” Harry said. 

“The West is the fiefdom of the Wealas people, who call themselves Cymry. No one king has his hand over the Wales. They are themselves separated in principalities. Gwynedd, Powys, Dyfed, Morgannwg.” Slytherin looked back at Harry. “You will have to ask Helga if you wish to know more. She is a Norsewoman. Her clan settled in Glamorgan when last Norsemen raiders invaded, and stayed when the Cymry reclaimed their land.”

“Helga Hufflepuff,” Harry said.

“You know of her,” Slytherin said. He sounded pleased.

“Is a Viking,” Harry said.

“I would not call her such to her face.”

It occurred to Harry, then, that he was most certainly going to meet all four Hogwarts Founders. Witches and wizards of legend who had changed the course of their people’s fate. He looked at Salazar Slytherin, at the strong line of his back, at the snake curled around his waist, and, for the first time, saw more than Voldemort’s ancestor. This man. This man had altered history. This man built Harry’s home.

“We are heading north,” Slytherin said, and Harry found himself memorising the pitch of his voice, the cadence of the words. “Into the land of the Picts, the Briton and the Scots. Rowena is of the latter.”

“What about.” Harry cleared his throat. “What about Gryffindor?”

“Godric, I suppose you could say, is from Mercia, though he feels no loyalty for his countrymen. He roamed most of the Isles in his youth.”

“And you?”

“I spent most of my childhood in Mercia,” Slytherin said after a pause, a non-answer if Harry had ever heard one. “Godric and I met as boys. I take it the shape of the world is much changed, in your time?”

“Yes,” Harry said. “It’s not quite so divided. This many kings. Sounds like the recipe for war.”

“There is often conflict,” Slytherin admitted. “Though I would have thought you familiar with war, considering your injuries.”

Harry felt himself flinch. His hands tensed on the reins. 

“Not this kind of war,” he said tightly, and nothing else.

{. . .}

Exhausted and saddle-sore, Harry dismounted with trembling legs. He caught his breath with an arm over the saddle, his face against sweet-smelling leather. His mare snorted in discomfort.

“Sorry, girl,” Harry said. He patted her neck. “Be up in a sec, yeah?”

Horseback was a slow, painful way to travel, but lacking the discovery of Apparation or the possibility of making a Portkey, Harry and Slytherin were left with little choice. The journey was hard on Harry’s recovering body.

“Come this way.” Harry looked up. Slytherin came up beside him, leading his own horse by the bridle. “I have accommodations for the night.”

“Real beds?” Harry asked hopefully, and Slytherin inclined his head with a smile.

He guided Harry to a roadside inn, a thatched building of timbered wood. A sign swung off its door, proclaiming The Three Crones in blocky lettering. A boy came to take their horses with the promise they would be brushed down and fed good grain this evening. Harry relinquished his mare, then followed Slytherin inside, keeping close.

Inside was cool and dark despite the heat of the day. The sticky smell of spilt beer permeated the air. Harry’s eyes took a moment to adjust to the obscurity. Light filtered in thin shafts through openings in the walls, fell on a dirt floor strewn with sweet-smelling rushes. Wood tables girdled the room. Oak barrels stood behind a poke-marked counter. On the side, a rickety flight of stairs led to the upper floor. Patrons sat around the fire-pit in the middle of the room. There was no chimney. Harry’s eyes watered from the smoke.

Slytherin walked to the barmaid behind the counter, a plump woman with greying hair wiping her hands on a wine-stained apron.

“Evening, my lord,” she said as Slytherin approached. “Drinks for you and your man? Or supper’s going if you’d care to eat, venison and sauce au vin, just caught this past morning.”

“Lodgings for the evening,” Slytherin said. “Though we’ll gladly taste your food. My companion and I are famished.”

“We’ve only the one room left. There’s blankets to rent if your boy is to sleep on the floor.”

“We’ve our own,” Slytherin said.

“Good. The room’s at the end of the hall on the right. You’re welcome to get settled. I’ll spare a table for you.”

Slytherin paid the woman her due, and gestured Harry toward the stair. Their room, as promised, was at the end of the hall. It was decent enough, with a bed pushed against the far wall, a small table with a lit candle near it. There was a washbasin filled with clear water, and an empty chamber pot under the window. The shutters had been left open in deference to the warm evening air.

“Will you mind sharing?” Slytherin asked.

Harry eyed the bed, freshly-made and tucked with woollen blankets. It might fit two grown men, he supposed, so long as they did not object to each other’s company.

Do I object to his, Harry wondered, and gave a shrug. 

“Better that than the floor,” he said. “So long as it’s alright with you.”

“We are fortunate enough to have the room to ourselves,” Slytherin said. He laid their bags at the foot of the bed. “There should be time enough to buy supplies before the evening meal, if you’d care to join me.”

They made their way back outside. The day was still bright despite the hour. The sun slanted between the houses in golden rays, caught dust motes in glittering particles.

There were people out in the street, enjoying the balmy summer evening. Harry watched old women walk by arm-in-arm. Young men jostled each other as they heaved a cart piled high with hay stacks. A father carried his daughter on his shoulders and a toddler on his hip. The little girl pulled on his hair, kicked her heels in his chest, and the man laughed a great, booming laugh. 

“Are you well?”

Harry looked at Slytherin. “Everything is so different,” he said. “From my time. From anything I’ve ever known. And yet.” He gave a shrug. “It’s all exactly the same. People are still just people.”

“I don’t know whether I ought be reassured or horrified,” Slytherin said. “To hear you speak so.”

Harry smiled, helpless to stop himself. Slytherin smiled back.

They walked the town on narrow dirt roads wedged between cramped, low-ceilinged houses. Harry breathed baking bread, wet clay and woodsmoke, then turned the street and gagged. Curing leather, blood, offals. He breathed through his mouth until they had passed the tanneries and butcher shops. Everywhere lingered sharp animal scents, neither pleasant nor bad. Sheep, goats, the occasional cow. Chickens scuttled underfoot. Harry figured he smelled of horseflesh himself. It had been some days since he bathed. Sweat and road dirt clung to him in a thick sheen.

A market fair bustled with animation at the edge of town. Stalls overflowed with a rich summer bounty. Harry saw all sorts of fruits and vegetables, small, sweet peaches and apricots, lemons and strawberries, onions and lettuce, carrots, beetroot. Meat roasted on big spits between the stalls. Pork, venison, pheasant. Flowers were sold in great heaps. There was thick, golden honey, and wine aplenty. Vendors shouted for attention from the passersby.

Harry stuck close to Slytherin, side-stepping children and harried housewives. The man cut an odd figure among the townspeople. It was in the simple elegance of his clothes. In the way he carried himself. People saw him, and steered clear. Peddlers bowed their heads if he stopped before their wares. My lord, they called him, and Harry wondered whether they had it right.

They bought food enough for another week, and, rucksacks laden, prepared to leave. Harry saw them as they turned back the way they had come.

Two corpses hung from the town walls. 

They hung by the neck, blue-faced and limp. Swollen tongues poked from gaping mouths. Two men, Harry thought. Middle-aged. Bloated in the sun.

A hand touched his arm.

He was going to throw up.

“Look at me,” he heard, and the touch on his arm moved up to his shoulder. “Look at me, lad. Not them.”

“What.” Harry swallowed. His throat clicked. “What did they do?”

“Murder. Rape. Theft. Perhaps they hunted in the kingswood, or failed to pay tax to their lord. Look at me.”

Slytherin stood before him, limned in the orange dusk light. He drew himself up to his full height, under Harry’s gaze. He held his shoulders broad and strong. As if to protect Harry from the sight. As if Harry could forget.

“No one’s even looking at them,” Harry said.

“Death is commonplace,” Slytherin said. “And cheaper than dirt. Come. We should go.”

Slytherin’s hand tightened on his shoulder, and Harry let himself be steered back toward the narrow streets. He did not know whether he wanted to lean into the touch, or shrug it off him. Thinking about Slytherin’s hand on him was easier than to think about anything else.

They retraced their steps back to the inn. They stored the new supplies in their room, then went downstairs to eat. As promised, the matron had kept a table for them, away enough from the fire-pit that they would not swelter, and near a window to catch the last of the falling light. She saw them seated promptly, and went to fetch their food.

“I know death,” Harry said. He watched Slytherin through the smoky gloom of the common room. “I wouldn’t want you to think I grew up sheltered from it. I’ve lost people. I’ve seen people die in a lot of ways. Just. I’ve never seen death treated like this.”

“And what would this be?” Slytherin asked.

“Casually,” Harry said.

“It is not,” Slytherin said. “Casual. A loss of life is, always, a tragedy. But what parent has never lost a child to disease? What man has not lost a brother to war? Death is everywhere, and we cannot let it keep us from living.”

Harry took the words like a punch to the stomach.

The matron came with their food. She served a thick, wine-scented meat stew, and set beside it a dish with four pasties, the bread sweet-smelling and darkly golden. There was also a plate of pickled radishes, carrots, and a root vegetable Harry could not identify. Finally, a girl came with two tankards filled to the brim with a dark, foamy ale.

A spread fit for a king.

“Are you a lord?” Harry asked. “Everyone seems to think you are.”

“And do you?” Slytherin asked. “Think I am.”

He speared a piece of meat and brought it to his mouth. Harry watched him chew, and swallow. He thought again about the way Slytherin held himself. About the way people bowed their heads when he passed. Harry watched him now, and saw instead the way his hair came undone from its knot, a bit lank as neither of them had washed in a few days. He saw the dark smears beneath Slytherin’s eyes, tiredness etched on his skin like thumbprints of charcoal. He had never seemed to Harry more human than in that moment.

“I don’t know,” Harry murmured. “Maybe you are.”

“Eat,” Slytherin said. “You need your strength.”

The stew was delicious, tart with the taste of red wine and berries. Harry broke open a pasty and found it stuffed with mushrooms and savoury cow cheese. He ate three of them, and a fair helping of vegetables besides. He found himself famished. He washed down the food with great gulps of the yeasty ale. It left him loose-limbed and warm, and entirely too agreeable to carrying light, easy conversation with Salazar Slytherin.

There was an altercation, as they prepared to leave. A man accused another’s wife of witchery. The husband, insulted and quite drunk, threw the first punch, and Slytherin ushered Harry from the room before the brawl could escalate.

“You must keep yourself hidden,” Slytherin told him as they ascended the cramped, creaky stairs. “Be wary of Muggles, Master Potter. Never let them see who you are.”

Harry clenched his jaw, and did not answer. 

Slytherin stopped him with a hand on his arm.

“You told me of death, earlier,” he said. “Let me, then, tell you this. A mother may smother her own child if she suspects him of sorcery, lest she be accused of it herself. A healer too skilled at her craft may find herself facing the fire. You told me of the people you had lost. There isn’t a wizard alive who has not seen a friend die at Muggle hands. A lover. A parent. There is a reason we are building our school, lad, and it is to stop our children from dying in troves.”

Slytherin stepped closer as spoke. He lowered his voice. The darkness made his eyes appear black.

Harry swallowed. He remembered stories of their people’s lives before the time of Merlin, and found himself nodding.

“Alright,” he said. “Hide. That I can do.”

Raised voices exploded from downstairs. There was a crash, a scream, and Slytherin gestured Harry to move. 

They reached their room. Slytherin closed and barred the door behind them.

They changed in silence. Harry used the washbassin to scrape what dirt he could from his skin, then completed the job with a spell. He went to bed, pressing himself against the far wall. Slytherin joined him. The mattress dipped under his weight, and Harry wondered, dimly, how he was going to sleep with him so close. He could see the dark outline of his body. He could hear Slytherin’s breaths, feel his warmth on his skin. If Harry uncurled, if he moved at all, they would be touching. 

He watched the slice of darkened sky through the open window, the deep slash of the Milky Way. He fell asleep to the sight of wheeling stars and the sound of someone else's breaths in his ear.

{. . .}

“Get up.”

Harry swam to consciousness heavy-limbed and sluggish. He laid on his stomach, his face squished to the pillow. A warm morning breeze skated across his bare back. He remembered dreams of swinging corpses and burned down pyres, ashes curling in the wind, and a voice through the nightmares, easing him down into more peaceful sleep.

A touch on his shoulder, fingers closing tight and retreating. 

“Wake, Potter.”

Harry snapped his head up with a start. He found himself sprawled sideways into the narrow bed, clutching a pillow that was not his. Slytherin bent over him, hand hovering near Harry’s shoulder.

“I kicked you out of bed?” Harry asked thickly. He shook himself, willing the scattered pieces of him to come awake.

“We must leave,” Slytherin said, and Harry saw him, then, fully dressed and standing up.

"Something wrong?" he asked, but he was swinging his legs out of bed already, reaching for his clothes.

Slytherin did not answer.

Harry dressed quickly. Outside the window, people ran past, shouting at each other. They disturbed a dog somewhere down the street. Harry listened to its barks. It filled him with a sense of urgency.

Slytherin had already prepared their bags. Harry shouldered his, and followed him down the stairs. The common room was deserted. Slytherin crossed it swiftly. Harry kept pace with him, and did not ask questions. 

They found their horses in nearby stables. They pawed at the straw-covered floor, their tails switching. The groom was nowhere to be seen, but both horses had been saddled. Harry took hold of his mare’s bridle, murmuring reassurances when she tried to shy away.

“Mount up,” Slytherin said. “Hurry.”

Harry swung himself on the saddle. The mare tossed her head and danced two steps to the sides. He reined her in as best he could. She needed no prompting to launch after Slytherin’s horse, but despite her best efforts, Slytherin kept them at an easy, trotting pace. Harry saw the expression on his face, and touched a hand to the wand strapped to his waist.

It began with a smell. Greasy, acrid smoke, heavier than woodfire. 

Harry felt his hands go slack on the reins.

They went past the city gates, and Harry saw a crowd had gathered where yesterday had been the market fair. It roared like a many-headed beast, and before them.

Harry slid down his horse without conscious thought. Behind him, far away, a voice called out his name. He ignored it.

“Move,” he said, weaving between people. “Move.” The crowd thickened the farther he went, and soon, he had to push his way through, tapping shoulders, ducking under swinging arms. He had to get to the other side. There were people burning.

A woman, he thought. Her skin cracked and blackened and leaking fat. Beside her, strung up to the burning wood, a child.

A child.

Harry’s eyes watered for the smoke. He could taste ash and meat on his tongue.

A man grunted when he shouldered past him, but he ignored that, too. There was a scream, growing behind his breastbone. Shrill and sharp and ugly, and Harry. Harry wanted to let it out. Wanted to feel it tear through his throat. He. He wanted – 

Someone grabbed his arm. A hand went around his waist, pulled him back against another body, and Harry snarled, thrashed wildly against the hold, but the grip around him changed, shifted, pinned his arms to his sides and kept him there.

"It's too late," he heard, and Harry was panting, panting, and he could smell nothing but smoke and burned bodies. “It’s too late, lad. It’s too late.”

"Let me go."

"No."

“There’s a child - ”

“I know."

The tone of Slytherin’s voice stopped Harry dead in his tracks, snapped him back to himself. He fell limp in Slytherin’s hold. He could feel Slytherin’s breaths on his cheek, the rapid rise-and-fall of his chest against his back. The grip on his wrists would bruise.

“We must leave,” Slytherin murmured in his ear.

Harry cast a glance around, and saw the looks trained on them, the shifting postures. He nodded, stomach cramping, and when Slytherin released him, he stood on his own feet. Slytherin took his elbow, and started shouldering his way back.

"Where will you be going, stranger?"

A man stood in the way, feet planted shoulder-wide, arms crossed over his chest. He was tall and wide, skin weathered from outside work. Harry’s heart kicked his ribs. Cold sweat broke out on his brow. People were turning toward them, now, were taking notice.

"Let us pass," Slytherin said.

“The woman was a witch, goodsir. Her child had the rot in her samewise. God willing we caught them before they befouled the town.”

"Let us pass.”

Something went from Slytherin to the man. Harry felt it. Harry saw it. The man swayed on his feet as though a blow had struck him. His eyes went glassy, his face slack. He took one wide step to the side. Slytherin hauled Harry forward, and Harry could feel him shake, faintly, from where they were pressed shoulder to shoulder.

They made it back to the horses, somehow. Harry climbed on the saddle and kicked his mare’s flanks, wheeling her around.

They fled.

They rode hard through the day, pacing themselves only for the horses’ sakes. Harry’s mare breathed heavily, her bay coat snarled with sweat, but Slytherin did not relent. He took them through shaded forest paths and winding animal tracks, away from wide, well-trodden roads. No matter how far they went, Harry could not shake the scent of burned flesh from his nose, from his mouth.

They stopped at dusk, when the shadows grew long and the horses threatened to collapse from under them. Slytherin made camp while Harry took care of both beasts, unsaddling them, rubbing them down, first with a cloth, then with a handful of straw. He led them to the water, a small brook babbling among the tall grasses of the hill, then gave them their nosebags and secured them for the night.

Slytherin had laid out their bedrolls in the leeward cove of a hill. They would be forgoing the tent tonight. It suited Harry just fine. The sky was clear, the air balmy, and he wanted to sleep belly up beneath the stars. He joined Slytherin by the fire, and, wordlessly, did as he had not done in two weeks. He laid wards around the camp.

He did not think about Hermione as he worked, wand moving from one sweep to the next in the studied patterns she had taught him. Slytherin watched him in silence, and Harry did not think also about the gaze burning the back of his neck.

“You are skilled with wards,” Slytherin said as he lowered his wand. “Allow me.”

He raised a hand, and Harry watched strands of magic come rushing at his call. Glowing and rune-laced, they wrapped and weaved around the stretched fingers, and Slytherin led them where he pleased. Harry felt the wards, not change, precisely, but shift , felt it down to his core where his breaths formed and his heat beat. Slytherin bound the layers of spells together, made a dozen wards into one coherent whole, into something better, stronger, and Harry watched him with a sense of awe.

“I’m skilled with wards?” he asked as the spell, now singular, settled into itself with a faint crackle.

They sat together around the campfire. They ate for the first time that day, sharing bread and cheese, dry meat, and sweet, sour apples. They passed watered wine between them, and Harry, leaden with exhaustion, watched firelight dance on the planes of Slytherin’s face. He watched shadows settle in the concave curve of his cheeks, in the hollows of his eyes.

"What do you think about Muggles?"

He heard the question before understanding he had been the one to ask it.

Slytherin handed him the wine. Harry took it but did not drink.

“I think they fear us viscerally, in a way that defies their own understanding,” Slytherin said. “I think they live their lives as best they can, and protect themselves as best they know how. I think.” Harry watched Slytherin’s jaw tighten. “I think on days such as today, I find myself hard-pressed to forgive them their ignorance.”

He looked at Harry, then, and Harry met his gaze.

“I would take them to the sword,” Slytherin said. “Each of them who stood aside and let our people be slaughtered. I would tear their cities asunder, that they may never again threaten one who is mine.”

Harry closed his eyes.

"Is there anything you would not do for the people you love, Master Potter?"

Harry saw him, then, with his eyes closed, saw the shape and stretch of him, and he understood. I know you, he thought. Recognition rang through him clear as a bell. I know you.

"Harry."

Silence.

"You should call me Harry.”

To think Harry had believed it the Gryffindor in him. His willingness to show teeth when his friends were in danger. His readiness to do violence.

How very wrong he had been.

He opened his eyes.

Slytherin watched him from across the distance, half his face in shadows.

“Then you must call me Salazar,” he said, and Harry bowed his head in defeat.

{. . .}

The drizzle slid, liquid and languid, over the greenery of the Scottish mountainside, warm as a summer rainstorm. Water fell in sheets from the open skies, clattered with an audible rumble on blunt grey rock and soft tree leaves. Droplets hung from glossy-sheened grass, silver on green.

Harry closed his eyes, tipped his head back. Rainwater soaked his hair, glided down his throat. His clothes were drenched and stuck to skin. He breathed air made fresh with the scent of wet earth and green things. Mud ran warm brown between his feet.

He loved Scotland.

Harry recognized the mountains, the jagged peaks where clouds gathered. He recognized the trees, the tall firs creaking in the wind, the rich scent sap. He was headed home.

“You know your way along these paths.”

Harry opened his eyes. Raindrops clung to his lashes. 

“We’re almost there,” he said, and turned.

Salazar stood before him at the hill crest. Behind him was a backdrop of mountains and swollen clouds. He was soaked, dark hair plastered to his skull, his skin dewed with water. Drops ran down his cheek, curved to the point of his chin. He gave a faint smile, and held out a hand.

“Almost?” he asked, and Harry clasped his wrist.

Salazar helped him the rest of the way. Harry clambered beside him, feet finding holds in the rocky hillside and –

Hogwarts stood haloed in rain in the deep valley below, towers rising to pierce the clouds. There were a handful of windows lit and the faintest edge of a glow to the dark stones. The Black Lake lapped at her feet, darkly green, its surface curled with rain. Harry’s breath caught in his throat.

“Yes,” Salazar said. “I thought you might understand.”

On the wrong side of a thousand years, Harry had made it home.

They still had a distance to go, and the way on foot promised to be difficult. Salazar had sold their horses before the path became too treacherous for shod hooves, leaving the two of them alone for the last stretch of their journey.

Harry adjusted his bag and started down the hill, his feet slipping on soft mud. Water ran up to his ankles. Salazar followed after him.

Getting down into the valley took the better part of the afternoon. Harry kept his eyes on Hogwarts throughout, on the tall, stately shape of her. He noted her differences from his time; a tower unfinished, the suspended bridge halfway done. The East Wing seemed to be missing a whole floor. There were no greenhouses, owlery or Quidditch pitch. Still Harry knew her, would have recognized her deaf and blind from the way she sang to him.

Salazar led him on the viaduct to the main entrance. The doors swung open at his approach, and for the first time in too long, Harry was back in Hogwarts castle. 

They shook water from their clothes and strode through the empty hallways, each corridor grand and achingly familiar. The walls were missing paintings, the alcoves some suits of armour, but it was all the same, down to the marrow of its bones. Harry found himself looking about with all the childish hunger of his eleven-year-old self. They walked, and their footfalls echoed with the pattering rain.

The Great Hall came into view, its carved doors thrown open, funnelling the golden light inside. Harry heard voices, too distant to make out the words. Beside him, Salazar breathed a slow, controlled breath.

“Alright?” Harry asked.

“I've not seen them in months,” Salazar replied.

Harry watched him set his shoulders, and stepped through the doors at his side.

The Great Hall was cavernous and near-empty. A hundred candles hung from the rafters of a ceiling that was not yet enchanted, lighting the watery gloom. The four House tables clustered together under the latticed windows at the other end of the Hall. Only one of them sat full.

It fell silent at their entrance.

“You.”

A woman rose from the table. She made her way around, her eyes dark and furious.

“Where have you been? "

Chapter Text

Long angry strides rebounded in the cavernous silence of the Great Hall. The woman marched toward them with fury in her eyes, exuding all the focused rage of a vengeful goddess.

Harry took one prudent step back.

"Weeks," she hissed. "Without a single word. Would it have killed you to write? "

Salazar spread his arms wide, the hands open in a gesture of supplication.

“Helga, I – ”

The woman reached him, then, pushed into him without slowing, and she wove an arm over his neck, the other around his waist. She brought him to her in a tight embrace, chin fitting the curve of Salazar’s shoulder, her hands splayed across his back, and Salazar.

Salazar brought her in the rest of the way. He put both arms around her waist and pulled, pulled until she stood on tiptoes and his nose was in her hair. His shoulders sagged. He melted into her, and the woman smiled in the hollow of his throat.

“Do you have any idea how worried we were?” she breathed, voice tight with emotions Harry could not name.

“My apologies," Salazar said. “I did not intend to worry you.” Then, softly, “I have missed you as well.”

The woman sighed. She shifted away, fell back on her feet. Her hand came to Salazar’s neck, the thumb below his ear. Running an easy back and forth. 

“You have some explaining to do, my friend,” she said, and smiled a fond, lovely smile. 

"Godfather! "

A red-headed boy rushed between them, hands grabbing for Salazar, a wild grin on his face. Salazar danced half a step away, and caught the boy by the scruff of the neck before he could go sprawling on the hard stone floors.

“Good evening, Meic,” he said. “I'm soaked through, boy, and have no wish of dealing with your father should you fall ill because of me.”

Meic seemed undeterred. "Where've you been?" he asked, bouncing on the balls of his feet. "Pa wanted to go look for you, he did, and I woulda come with him, and I said, I said – "

“You must be a new student.”

Harry turned to the woman. She had blonde hair, pale as wheat and thick as honey. Her eyes were a dark, earthen brown that shaded to black. She had the lean, athletic build of a fighter, but there was a rounded softness to her, in the arch of her brows and the fullness of her lips. She was, Harry thought, beautiful in the way dawn was beautiful. All warm, curving light and gentleness.

He bowed to her, repeating the greeting he had seen Salazar give countless times before, graceful and practised. On him, the motion came stilted, entirely unfamiliar, but wholly heartfelt.

“Harry Potter, my lady.”

She smiled at him, delighted and charming, and Harry, for a moment, forgot his breath.

"I'm Helga Hufflepuff,” she said. “It’s very nice meeting you."

Helga Hufflepuff. Another name bearing the weight of History. Kindness, loyalty, hard-work. Hufflepuff House had held Hogwarts together through its darkest times, and Harry now stood before its Founder.

“Lady, it’s an honour,” he said quietly.

“Helga, please,” she said. “I can see why Salazar chose you.”

Salazar appeared at Helga’s shoulder. He offered his arm, and she slipped a hand in the crook of his elbow. Harry watched them, and felt as though he stood a step outside his own body.

“Do not try and poach my student, my dear,” Salazar said. “I would have to take offence.”

Helga patted his hand. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

"Salazar."

A man approached the pair of them. He was tall and broad, his skin richly golden and freckled across the bridge of his nose. His hair was the same dark, fiery red as the boy who clung to Salazar’s hip. There was something in the way he moved that put Harry in mind of a great hunting cat, sleek and footsure and effortlessly graceful.

Salazar met him halfway.

"Godric."

Harry promptly short-circuited.

The two men clasped forearms.

"Still alive, then."

“Surprised?”

“Hardly. I bet good money a lover was to blame for your tardiness.”

Gryffindor’s eyes met Harry’s. Hazel eyes, Harry thought dumbly. Godric Gryffindor had hazel eyes, clear as steeped tea and speckled green.

“Shall I fetch Rowena her due?”

“You ought know better than to think I would elope on you.”

“Yes.” Gryffindor brought his forehead to Salazar’s. “Indeed I ought.”

Salazar closed his eyes into the touch. He put a hand to Gryffindor’s neck, and Gryffindor bowed his head for it. They leaned into each other, their bodies bent like matching parenthesis. Breathing the same air. Existing together.

Harry looked away.

Another woman stood beside Helga. Pale and statuesque, she was sharp where Helga was soft, all keen cheekbones and a well-defined jawline; dark where Helga was fair, with the heavy fall of black, russet-tinged hair down her back. She held herself with the poise of a queen, straight and stern, wearing an air of regal authority.

Harry watched Salazar approach her with his hands tucked behind his back. He bowed to her. He did not reach out, did not try to touch. The woman smiled, and pressed a hand to his chest, over Salazar’s heart.

"It's good to have you back," she said, the words accented with an undertow of Scottish bur. She kissed Salazar’s cheek. "I felt certain you would know to stay far from yet another pyre."

“A man gets sentenced to the fire one time –”

“Once, I would argue, is more than enough.”

“You may wish to inform Godric.”

Gryffindor winced.

“Introductions, I believe, are in order," Salazar said. He looked at Harry, then, and there was a smile in his eyes. “My friends, may I present Harry Potter. Harry, meet Godric Gryffindor, Helga Hufflepuff and Rowena Ravenclaw."

Four giants stood before Harry.  Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw, Gryffindor and Slytherin. Names wrought in legend, worked into the bone of wizarding history. Harry had grown into himself to the shape and stretch of them. He had worn them on his skin, and now.

Breathing deeply, he bent himself into a bow.

"Welcome to Hogwarts, Master Potter," Ravenclaw said. Harry met her pale eyes. His hands shook. He tucked them behind his back. "I see you've had quite the journey."

"The hazards of following Salazar," Gryffindor said. He shot Harry a wink. “It may not come as much of a reassurance, but I don’t imagine it went so badly as Rome.”

"Rome would have gone perfectly, had you not run your mouth," Salazar said.

"Rome would have gone perfectly if you, my friend, had not taunted half the city’s witch-hunters into chasing us.”

A pause.

“Rowena required a distraction.”

Helga clapped her hands. “Have either of you eaten?”

“Not since last night.”

Harry followed everyone to the dinner table. The sense of surreality had not left him. He sat himself down beside the Hogwarts Founders, feeling removed from himself. He felt himself shaking, faint trembles travelling the length of his spine. The long day climbing mountains in the pouring rain was catching up to him.

"Tell us, then," Ravenclaw said, her head angled toward Salazar. "What took so long?"

"Everything," Salazar said. “It had been too long by far since last I walked among our people. Their trust came like pulling a weed by the roots. They listened, but few agreed to let their children into our care."

“As was to be expected,” Rowena said. “We shall have to prove ourselves, then, and our worthiness.”

“Word of us spread fast,” Salazar said. “Families knew to look for me afore long. They were no more forthcoming, but I saw a change in them. A hopefulness.”

“Aye,” Helga said. “I saw the same. The wheel is in motion.”

A beat of silence stretched thick and tense. Harry flexed his fingers against his thighs.

Gryffindor cleared his throat. “Eat,” he said roughly. “You may not feel hunger, you cold-blooded serpent, but the boy is surely starving.”

“Of course,” Salazar said. He inclined his head toward Harry. “My apologies.”

He drew the closest dish toward himself, and served a fair helping of game pie with a hunk of steaming barley bread. He pushed the plate toward Harry before serving his own meal.

“I secured students for my House regardless. A six score, excepting Harry.”

“Why bring him ahead of the others?” 

Salazar glanced at Gryffindor, then at Harry, a hand suspected over his plate. “He had been injured,” he said.

“Injured?” Helga turned toward Harry. “Anything I ought look after?”

“I’m fine now, Lady,” Harry said. His heart ran like a galloping horse. His palms were slick with sweat.

“What befell you, boy?” Ravenclaw asked, and Harry – 

"His Master was found and murdered," Salazar said.

Harry breathed a slow sigh.

"My condolences, Harry," Helga said, and Harry turned from the sorrow on her face.

He had lost so many, left them all behind, when he came here, to this strange land where fables walked. He would, he knew, give everything, everything, to get back to them, but the thought that he might not. Was.

Was not something he could afford to contemplate.

A hand touched his back, and Harry blinked away the ghosts in his mind. He met Salazar’s eyes. Salazar looked back.

"You're safe now, Potter," Gryffindor said.

Salazar took away his hand. 

“Nothing to fear within these walls,” Gryffindor said. “No one will find you here.”

Gryffindor talked with the fierceness of a given oath, his body bent toward Harry, his eyes fast on Harry’s face, and Harry, in spite of himself, believed him.

“Thank you, sir,” he murmured.

The conversation wandered on. Harry dug into his meal, not understanding how hungry he had grown until the first mouthful touched his tongue. He watched the Founders as he ate. He saw Hufflepuff laugh with her head thrown back while Slytherin watched her. He saw Ravenclaw draw arabesques through the air and Gryffindor nod along to the invisible numbers. Hufflepuff touched a hand to Ravenclaw's arm, and Gryffindor shifted in his chair to let her, Slytherin moving with him, unthinkingly, a mirror image.

They were friends.

They were friends, all four of them.

Harry knew the stories of the Hogwarts Founders. He knew how they quarrelled and fought. He knew how the subject of Muggle-borns had Slytherin walk away like a dark wraith, leaving his House isolated and betrayed, and the Chamber of Secrets to remind the centuries of his legacy.

The enmity was legend. It spanned a thousand years, infecting the castle from inside. Harry had known House rivalry all through his schoolboy years. How Gryffindors and Slytherins loathed each other, and Ravenclaws wrapped aloofness around themselves like a shield, and Hufflepuffs were bereaved for their perceived meekness. Acquaintances were made inter-Houses, but true friendships were rare, far in-between, and often short-lived.

He remembered thinking the Sorting Hat must have been let into Dumbledore's liquor cabinet, the night it sang about the friendship between Gryffindor and Slytherin, between Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. 

Now Harry was here, and the truth sat before him.

The Founders were friends.

Amazingly. Impossibly. They fitted together like puzzle pieces, jagged and sharp-edged, but very much belonging at each other's side. Every line of their body made it clear, every word from their mouths. They talked and laughed and bantered, and their hands reached out, and it was right.

This was how Hogwarts should be. It was how Harry had never seen it in six years under its roof.

A woman walked through Great Hall doors toward the end of the meal, startling Harry from his reverie. She was in a shirt and trousers. Blades hung from her belt, a well-worn longsword and dagger. Two young girls walked at her sides, one red-haired, the other dark.

Harry pushed to his feet when the Founders rose to greet her. Gryffindor took her hand in his and brought it to his lips.

"Evening, my love," he said in a low voice. He looked at her the way Ron looked at Hermione when he thought no-one was watching.

The woman smiled. There was a deep scar on her cheek, curving from jaw to eyes. Her arms were thick with muscle. 

"Salazar,” she said. “You're back."

"Marya," Salazar said. “You are on your way out.”

"I'm glad," Marya said. “To know you will be here to keep an eye on my husband.”

“Lady, there is nowhere else I could be.”

Helga cleared her throat.

“Will you be joining us?" Salazar asked, a little too cordially.

Marya shook her head. “I came only to say goodbye."

She fell into conversation with Helga and Rowena while Salazar held back. He talked to the pale, dark-eyed girl who had accompanied Gryffindor’s wife. They were somewhat alike, Harry thought, with their black hair and mannerisms. He watched the girl give Salazar a fleeting, reserved smile, and wondered.

Ravenclaw came to put a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Come, Helena," she said, and the girl bowed her head.

“Mother,” she whispered.

Harry followed everyone out of the Hall. Now his stomach was full, fatigue crept on him in waves, made him numb and his eyes heavy.

“Follow me,” Salazar told him, and Harry did.

They went down toward the Dungeons. Everything was quiet and lovely, all of the castle’s sharp angles softened in the deep-blue dark. They crossed long corridors and descended steep staircases, their footfalls muffled against the stone. Harry walked the halls of his home, and tension went out of him with every familiar step. 

They stopped in front of a bare wall deep within the castle’s bowels. The air was cool and damp. Harry recognized the wall. He had stood before it as a boy.

Slytherin hissed a word, and brick and mortar slid away, rearranged into a sweeping archway. Harry stepped through to the Slytherin common room.

The room was plunged in soft, cushioned darkness. Great latticed windows opened to the depths of the Black Lake and the long-limbed swaying of algae. Moonlight bent as it passed through the water, and shadows danced on the ceiling and floors. Banked lanterns gave a muted silver glow.

The room was lined with bookshelves and richly-embroidered tapestries. Green and silver-stitched rugs padded its stone floors. The furniture was of dark wood. Rounded desks, leather sofas, deep, inviting armchairs. Tunnels branched from the sides, no doubt leading to dormitories.

The result lacked the warm, exuberant cosiness of the Gryffindor common room, but it was elegant. Soothing. It was.

“Lovely,” Harry said.

“I’m glad you approve.”

He slanted Salazar an apologetic smile. “It’s been a while since I came here.”

He walked deeper into the room. The air was dry, was warm. It smelled of news things, of book and leather and wood cuttings. Harry could hear the burbling lake.

"You lied," he said. "About me."

“Would you rather I hadn’t?”

"Doesn't it bother you?"

“The lying? No.”

Salazar sat in an armchair, one leg crossed over his knee. Harry joined him after a moment of hesitation.

“Don’t you trust them? The others?”

“I trust them with my life,” Salazar said. “Which is not to say they are privy to every secret I bear.” He propped his chin on a closed fist. "You seem surprised. Is there nothing you keep from your own friends?"

Of course not, died a quick death on Harry's tongue. He had kept plenty of secrets from Ron and Hermione over the years. Bits and pieces of his self he held back, folded away out of their reach. His childhood and the bleakness of a life neither of them could understand. The grief and anger that burned below his ribs. Harry wore the painted mask of normalcy. He built barricades around the frayed chunks of his soul to hide the darkness simmering through the cracks, and neither of them knew. 

“Besides,” Salazar said softly. “Your story is not mine to tell.”

Harry looked away. He wanted to hide himself, to escape the uncritical, knowing gaze. Salazar Slytherin was a stranger. It should not feel as though every time he looked at Harry, Harry was seen . 

“I want,” he said, and stopped. “Don’t you think we should tell them? Don’t you think they could help?”

“I think,” Salazar said, “The magic that bound you here is as ancient as the Earth. I think you and I are touching powers beyond our ken. We cannot know what your presence here will incur, and must proceed with great caution.”

Harry scrubbed a hand through his hair. “I don't know what to do,” he admitted.

“I said I would help you, if you would permit me,” Salazar said. “I cannot promise success, Harry, but you have my word, I will try and see you home.”

Harry leaned his elbows on his thighs. He pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes. “You don’t even know me,” he said.

“I am sure time will rectify that mistake.”

Harry laughed a bitter, broken laugh. The irony. The sheer, bloody irony. That he should find himself stranded one thousand years into the past, and find an ally in Salazar Slytherin. In the man whose descendant would want Harry dead.

“Whether you should tell the others is a choice I cannot make in your stead,” Salazar said. “But know that, regardless of their response, I will be here. You are of my House.”

“I wasn’t always.” Harry gave Salazar a smile. “Got Sorted into Gryffindor the first time around.”

Salazar cocked an eyebrow. “Was the one who chose you blind as well as deaf?”

Harry leaned back against the couch. “Maybe he was.”

Salazar was giving him a choice. To speak or stay silent. He would neither betray Harry’s secrets, nor force him into muteness. All his life, people had treated Harry as though he was too fragile to bear his own weight. They sent him to the Dursleys to protect him from a murderer. They shut him away from Order meetings. As though he would not understand. As though he did not understand already. The reality of their war. The lives lost. The duty he carried. Only Sirius, in his own brash, defiant way, tried giving Harry a voice, but Sirius was long dead. They had, Harry knew, tried to be kind, and treated him like a child when he had been anything but. 

Salazar treated him like a man.

“You said I had a Master.”

“To explain away your skills,” Salazar said. “No-one would believe you without training.”

“An apprenticeship,” Harry said. “That how you learned?”

“It is how most of us learn. I was fortunate. My own Master was a brilliant man.”

Harry hesitated. “What happened to him?”

“He died.”

Harry watched the careful blankness on Salazar’s face, and did not ask.

“The only way we teach magic is from Master to apprentice,” Salazar said. “It has been the way because one man may protect one ward and no more. But one man cannot know all there is about magic. And should he be too weak, or too vile, who, then, is left to protect the child?”

“You're hoping to temper that with Hogwarts.”

"We're hoping to erase that with Hogwarts.”

“Merlin,” Harry breathed. “It’s quite the task you’ve set for yourselves.”

“It had to be done. Too many of us have died, and many more will. If we do not unite into a stronger whole, our kind will cease to exist.” Salazar paused. “I do not know who Merlin is, but I would suggest you stop swearing by his name.”

Harry froze, because Merlin. Merlin had been Sorted into Slytherin House. No one yet knew his name. “Please,” Harry said. “Forget you ever heard me say his name. He will be – important. I don't even know if he's born yet.” He sighed. “I need to sleep.”

“Then sleep. Dormitories are on this side. Choose whichever room you prefer. Would you like me to show you the way?” 

Harry shook his head. “I can manage." He rose, and bowed his head. "Goodnight, Salazar. And thank you.”

"Goodnight, Harry."

Harry grabbed his bags. He entered a short tunnel with windows panelling the length of the walls. A thick rug muffled his footfalls. The tunnel led to a circular room with a domed glass ceiling, and Harry looked up, breathless, at the dark, swaying depths of the lake. He stayed a while, transfixed, watching thick algae and shimmering fish shoals.

The room branched into curving corridors. Following Salazar’s instructions, Harry went to the one furthest on the right. Wizard's lights floated on the walls, casting pools of warm, muted light. A dozen wooden doors lined the walls on either side of the corridor. Harry opened a few, and saw each door led to an individual bedroom. He went toward the back, and picked the last door for himself.

The room had a floor-to-ceiling window framed by heavy curtains; several lamps; a four-poster bed with green silk hangings and bedspreads embroidered with silver thread; a desk, a chair and a wardrobe of a wood that looked like ebony. The stone walls were lined with tapestries and empty bookshelves, and the floor was covered by a green carpet with silver patterns. Harry had never had such a room to himself before.

He stripped in a daze, each motion heavy with tiredness. He washed himself with a spell, and slumped into the bed without further ceremony. Sleep claimed him before long.

{. . .}

Harry woke gasping for breath, his heart hammering in his chest.

Struggling with his sweat-soaked sheets, he sat up hurriedly. His vision swam with after-images of creeping darkness and Hermione, calling his name. He closed his eyes. Breathed deeply. He waited for his pulse to slow. Outside, the Black Lake lapped at the windows.

He had had nightmares all his life. He had seen green lights and heard a woman scream, as a boy in the cupboard under the stairs. After Hogwarts, new images began to plague him. A man with two faces. A great snake rearing up to strike. A friend, lying dead in the grass. Ron had helped as best he could, those nights. He reached for Harry across their beds, touched Harry’s arm. Alright, mate, whispered in the dead hours of the night. Yeah, fine.

Voldemort had left him shaking. Had left Harry slick with cold sweat, his throat raw from screaming. Afterwards, Harry had carried with him a sense of the sickness in the Dark Lord’s mind, an understanding of his organised madness.

Harry pressed a fist to the scar on his forehead. It was not hurting. It had not hurt since Stonehenge.

He got out of bed. He went to the window and opened the curtains. A pale green light filled the bedroom, wavered, dreamlike, on the floor and walls. Fish swam away, startled into a multi-coloured blur. In the morning light, Harry saw a door he had not noticed the night before. Depicting a seamless continuation of the tapestry around it, it stood beside the wardrobe, near invisible.

Harry took his wand from the night-stand and went to it. He tried the handle. Unlocked, the door swung on its hinges.

Beyond it was a room. Lake-filtered light gave a sleek sheen to bare, polished stone. Circular, it was a smaller room than the bedchamber. Carved pillars arched to the ceiling between its two windows, and between them was tucked a cabinet filled with towels and unmarked bottles. A basin took up most of the space.

Harry stepped in, leaving the door open behind him.

The rounded pool had been dug into the floor. It was deep, and certainly wide enough to fit Harry twice over with room to spare. It was made of clear, veined marble. A tap had been fitted in a wall on its side. A tap .

"Revelio, " Harry muttered, tapping it with his wand. The charm rang back with blurry images of a network of pipes inlaid with spells. Spells to clear lake water. Spells to warm it.

A bathroom.

There was a bathroom attached to Harry’s bedroom. The Founders had invented running water. Harry, a thousand years into the past, was going to live in more luxury than he had known most of his life.

He did not know whether to laugh or cry, so he stripped off his sleep clothes, and had his first real wash in months. He scraped himself down to raw, red skin, and washed his hair twice. The feeling of his body in hot water came like a revelation.

Dressed and smelling something like lavender and lemongrass, Harry made his way through the deserted common room, out into the Dungeons. He retraced his steps to the Great Hall with little difficulty. A few secret passageways were missing, but the castle layout remained the same.

The four Founders and their children were seated in the Great Hall, breaking their fast. Harry took the open seat beside Salazar, who greeted him with an incline of his head. 

“I take it the Poltergeist still roams free?" Salazar asked.

Harry took stock of the breakfast spread. There were peaches and apricots, a thick porridge, loaves of fresh barley bread with honey and soft-yellow butter to go with it. Posset, a warm, spiced milk-based drink steamed in the middle of the table. Harry reached for it. He served himself a large mug, then ladled a good scoop of porridge in a wooden bowl.

“We don’t know that it is a Poltergeist,” Rowena said. 

“Broke every window on the third floor,” Godric said. “Don’t know what else it could be.”

“We should hunt for it before the children arrive, in any case,” Helga said.

“Agreed,” Salazar said. “Tell me, then. What remains to be done. I can feel the wards have settled.”

“The Astronomy Tower lacks a roof,” Helga said. “The Covered Bridge is only halfway done, though its foundations are good and strong. I will take care of The Hospital Wing this next week.” She took a distracted sip of her drink. “I will send you the Greenhouses layouts to review. I hope to build them next spring.”

"Good," Salazar said. "They will provide an income once they start producing."

Helga raised her cup in a salute. "And produce they shall."

"The Greenhouses are not a priority," Godric said. "The furniture – "

"Can wait," Rowena cut in. She was looking at Helga, whose smile had stilted at the rebuttal.

"Truly it cannot."

"We have twice as many desks as students, Godric."

"Magical students, sweeting. Ten farthings, my money on half of it being broken afore month’s end."

A beat.

"In good conscience, I cannot. My abilities would make unfair –"

"Ten shillings."

"Agreed."

"The hour is too early for this," Helga said.

Ravenclaw served her a cup of posset, which she took with a world-weary sigh.

“Do you not tire of defeat?” Salazar asked Godric, sounding vaguely puzzled.

"I certainly don't object his obstinacy," Rowena said. Helga snorted, and Rowena’s haughty poise was momentarily broken by a surge of warmth in her clear eyes. "Classrooms are in need of finishing,” she said after the sound had faded. “It is no pressing matter, but we would fare better with it out of the way. Furthermore, the staircases insist on moving. You may wish to investigate.”

Salazar nodded. “The staircases, I’m afraid, have grown a life of their own, though I will see to it they are made secure. The East wing?"

“Missing a floor,” Harry said. “I can help. Where do you need me?"

Salazar threw Helga Stinging Jinx when the woman started coughing for reasons unknown. Rowena dispelled the charm before it could reach her with a practised flick of her wand.

“Your injuries have not yet fully healed,” Salazar said softly. “We require no labour from you.”

Harry looked at him. “Let me help,” he said, and it was more of a plea. Anything. Anything at all he could do to see his home made whole.

“Very thoughtful of you, Master Potter,” Gryffindor said contemplatively.

"Godric."

Gryffindor gave Salazar a smile, all teeth. "Very thoughtful indeed.”

“No,” Salazar said.

“The boy is offering.”

“And I,” Salazar said. “Am not. Weeks have I been with him. I will neither haggle nor barter terms over the matter, Godric.”

Gryffindor leaned back into his chair, all playfulness gone from his expression. He looked instead at Salazar with an air of consideration, carefully thoughtful.

“Won’t you, truly,” he said, more to himself than anything.

“He has consented already to joining my House. A student’s choice, we agreed, must supersede our own.”

Harry sucked a sharp breath, finally understanding what the two Founders bickered over. Gryffindor and Slytherin. Gryffindor or Slytherin. Harry had chosen the latter when last the question was put to him, and now.

The thought of going back to Gryffindor House had its appeal, but Harry found he did not wish it. He had changed too much from the eleven-year-old boy who first wandered these halls. The boy had been hungry. For affection. For belonging. Harry had outgrown him, and now found himself curious to know the person he had left behind. Salazar was also the only man alive who knew his story, and Harry.

Harry thought he might want to know Salazar’s in turn.

“Slytherin,” Harry said softly. He looked at Salazar. “I choose Slytherin.”

The tension around the table broke. Harry watched the set of Salazar’s shoulders ease, watched his lips tilt into a smile.

“You should have let them settle the matter themselves,” Ravenclaw said. “Quarrelling over students is something of a ritual, and much more entertaining besides.”

“Very well,” Gryffindor said with a huge sigh. “Terrible choice, Master Potter, but since you insist.” He gave Salazar a bow. “My friend, the boy is yours. But beware, I shall borrow him.”

Chapter Text

The marble was pleasantly cool against his flushed, overheated skin. Summer was in full blast, cutting into the castle and its countryside, brazen and searing to the bone. There was little anyone could do to escape the fever of the hottest days.

Harry sat on the ground. Sweat cooled on his back. He had a leg drawn to his chest. The other dangled over the railing and a seven-story drop. He ached with cramps and kinks, his body strained from exertion. He had been there a while, tracing with his eyes the cracks and ridges in the white wall across from him. He wondered whether could jump far enough to touch it before tumbling down. Probably not. It was a large stairwell.

Stone dust and rubble wafted from under the door he slammed closed moments before, the scent choking in the afternoon heat.

The topmost room of the North Tower, which sat at the very end of its spiral staircase, was in dire need of finishing. The windows had gone missing. No one could seem to find them. Bit of a safety hazard, Godric said. He said, "Think you can manage?", and Harry answered, "Yes," like the idiot he clearly was, because there was no way he could refuse that man anything. He watched Gryffindor wander off, and not once thought to ask him for help. Harry had battled Dark Lords and monsters his whole childhood. Surely. Surely he could manage.

Stumbling about in the dark, he woke  a nest of Doxies. He recognized the sound of their beetle wings flapping in alarm just in time to avoid a bite. He cast a spell. Which, he was not sure, but it proved effective. Both the Doxies and a chunk of wall got blasted off.

He glanced sideways. Puffs of smoke still filtered past the doorway, particles shimmering amber-grey in the light slanting from the arrow slits. Shifting uneasily, he tapped his wand against the ground. Faint echoes of the next room travelled up his arm in small electric shocks. Stone dust in thick clouds. A bright slash of light on Doxy corpses. He grimaced. He would have to wait longer for the air to clear. Small mercies, the Founders were too far to have heard the explosion. Harry hoped to hide the damage before any of them came up to see him.

"Good job, Potter," he muttered. He closed his eyes. Anxiety knotted his stomach. "Bloody brilliant."

His magic had acted by itself. A curl of his wand, half a thought, and power burst out of him, exploded solid stone to fine dust. Harry couldn't remember when he last lost control so spectacularly. Even now, he hummed with magic and restlessness.

Fear and frustration he could deal with. All had gnawed at him since the moment Voldemort came back from the dead. But uncertainty? Indecision? Harry had always had a plan. Someone to save, someone to stop, something to seek, win or lose. He had always known where he was going, what the next step was. The choice always evident, no questions asked. Protecting the Philosopher's stone. Rescuing Ginny from the Basilisk. Killing Sirius Black. Saving Sirius Black. Killing the Dark Lord.

Now Harry was in a thick fog. It robbed the world of its stark, clear lines. Colours blurred, shapes melted away. He was stuck, trying to find his way in a place that had no concept of left, right, up or down.

He did not know why he had been sent a thousand years into the past. He did not know whether there was a reason for it. Wrong place, wrong time. A freak accident. As far as he could see, there was nothing he could do to change his situation. Time was not an enemy he could fight. He had no all-knowing being to turn to. No plan. Harry had nothing.

He had entertained the thought Voldemort was responsible for his situation before discarding the idea entirely. Had he not owed Salazar a life-debt, Harry might have killed the man before he could father children. He could have ended the war centuries before it started. It was too big a bet, too great a risk for the Dark Lord to take. Not to mention there had to be quicker, cleaner ways to get rid of an enemy than to send them spiralling through time.

Harry laid awake at night, trying to give sense to a situation that didn't have any. He wondered, caught between sleep and wakefulness, whether he would have killed Salazar if he had had the chance. He hoped not. The war had left him a little more jagged, a little more ruthless  but the day he killed in cold blood was the day Voldemort won himself an heir.

So Harry blasted a wall without meaning to. On the plus side, he supposed the hole counted as a window of sorts.

"Did you do something stupid?"

Harry jumped so badly at the question, asked in a high, innocent voice, that he came close to tipping over the few inches between him and certain death. Hissing quietly, he steadied himself and got on his feet.

"How did you get here?" he asked, catching sight of a mess of bright red hair perched atop a windowsill. It took him a moment to recognize Godric's son. Meic.

The boy gave a light shrug, curious blue eyes riveted on the door of Harry's room. He jumped to the ground, swift as a cat. "Dad said I could come," he said airily, kicking up dust with a booted foot. "Did you do something stupid?"

"Didn't seem like it at the time," Harry muttered.

The young Gryffindor blinked up at him. "It's alright," he said soothingly. "Pa and Salazar do stupid things all the time. Rowena says so."

"I believe you," Harry laughed. "You think I should try again?" Meic nodded enthusiastically, red hair switching around his face. "You promise to stay behind me?"

"I promise."

Harry grabbed his wand, pushed the boy a few steps away, and opened the door. He slipped back inside the room, nose and mouth buried in the crook of his elbow. Thankfully, most of the dust had settled, and the only Doxies he could see laid in dismembered bits across the floor. The damage to the wall wasn't too bad. The hole was wide enough to let a ray of light the size of Harry's head to slant in.

The wall was easy to deal with. "Reparo, " Harry intoned, sweeping his wand over the damage. Dust rose in a great swirl. Debris rolled on the floor, chunks of stone glued themselves back together, and in an instant, everything was whole again. Harry summoned a blob of fire, sent it floating to the ceiling. Salazar taught him the spell not long ago. Harry found it a good variation to the usual Lumos. Another wave of his wand cleared the Doxy remains.

"You can come in," he called, and Meic peered through the door. "I don't suppose you know how to make windows?"

The boy sauntered in, a look of concentration on his face. "You can change the wall," he suggested after a moment.

"Change?"

"Change ," the boy repeated, fingers tapping the wall for emphasis.

"Transfigure." Harry smiled, a wry, weary thing. He'd gone through six years of magical education. Should've thought that up himself. "Good idea," he said, and Meic beamed.

Now, to the difficult part. Harry was sure he'd known a spell to turned solid matter into glass at some point, but he could not remember the incantation. Transfiguration was a complex art that twisted the fabric of nature, rearranged its shape and property with a touch of will. It had to do with energy transfers, burned away any and all Muggle law of conservation and danced on its ashes. It was, possibly, the most difficult field of magic to master. The backfire of a messed up spell could be disastrous. Harry didn't fancy the thought of rebuilding the whole room again.

He closed his eyes. Wand motion: three taps to turn an animal into stemmed glass. Incantation – did he need one? Intent was all that mattered, in the end. Every single Transfiguration feat he had witnessed through the years couldn't have had a specific set of words to go along. Surely, the caster had to extrapolate from what he knew, work from there. Harry's experience was limited, but he was getting good at thinking on his feet, dealing with the day-to-day trials that came with a life on the road.

Casting and praying was probably not the wisest thing to do, but Harry had never pretended to be a wise man. He preferred action to reflection, instinct to logic. It wasn't always the best way to deal with a problem – the alarming number of detentions he had gotten through the years was proof enough of that – but it was a way. Sometimes, it even worked.

He opened his eyes. Holding the Latin word for glass and the image of a window to the forefront of his mind, he tapped his wand three times against the wall. Nothing happened.

So he tried again.

Again.

Half an hour and a near-collapsed ceiling later, sunlight was streaming down the top of the North Tower.

Harry looked at his work in amazement. His windows were a bit crooked. None of them were the same size. The glass panes were far from translucent, but. He had done it. Usually, Hermione was the one who managed such feats, and he stood back and watched her. Harry had never given much importance to his education before, magical or otherwise. He had never had anyone to impress with good report cards. The Dursleys accused him of cheating when he brought home better grades than Dudley. Vernon locked him in his cupboard a whole week the first time it happened. Harry had never seen the point of focusing on something that estranged from his relatives and left him hours alone in the dark, weak with hunger. Then there had been madmen looking to murder him, monsters and tournaments and people dying, and he'd had more pressing preoccupations than doing well in school.

Maybe he should try and change that now.

Meic bounded up to him. The boy had been quiet, kept out of Harry's way the entire time, save for a few joyful whoops when he managed his first window. "Can we go exploring now?" he asked, giving Harry's sleeve a tug. "Pa says we can go exploring if you say yes."

"Explore what?" Harry asked. He ruffled the boy's hair.

The grin that curled Meic's lips was full of mischief. "The Dungeons."

Harry grinned back. The child's excitement was communicative. He felt a bit like a child himself. For all that his situation terrified him, he marvelled at the chance he had been given. He got to see Hogwarts, his home, beloved beyond reason, within months of its completion. He knew a few wizards who would happily give both kidneys to stand in his shoes.

"Alright,” he said. “Let's go then.”

{. . .}

"I think it's a skull."

"Where? "

Harry dodged Meic when the boy made a dash for his sister. Alma covered her finding with her cloak, hid it from view before Meic reached her.

"It's not for little boys," she quipped.

"I'm not little!" Meic jumped for the bundle of cloth, but Alma held it out of reach above her head.

Helena snorted.

"I'm not," he insisted.

"You're six," the black-haired girl retorted.

"So? I'm a boy."

"So?"

"So I'm in charge."

Helena blinked. "Your mother,” she said. “Is a mercenary who hunts monsters for a living. Your Godmothers, the best witches of this age, built a secret school of magic in a place crawling with witch-hunters."

"Remember what her mum did to the merchant who insulted Helga last summer?" Alma asked. Meic shuddered. "Exactly. You don't want her to hear that."

Helena frowned. "Wasn't it Salazar who cursed that idiot mute?"

"He made him bald."

"You're not funny," Meic muttered.

His sister pinned him with an unimpressed stare. "I'm not trying to be."

The boy went to kick her in the shin. Alma side-stepped easily, looped an arm around his neck, and proceeded to ruffle his hair.

Harry tuned out the two bickering siblings and turned to his makeshift map of the Dungeons. Salazar had pointedly refused to hand one of his own maps. What was the point of laying an underground labyrinth, if you don’t get to see people get lost once or twice, after all?

"The Triwizard maze wasn't so bloody difficult," Harry grumbled to himself.

"Gross! It's a rat skull!"

"What did you think it was? Human?"

"Don't think we've gone there yet," he told Helena, pointing at a dark corridor. It gave the same glow as the Slytherin common room, the pale green of the sun through water. 

"Indeed," Helena said with a nod. "We must be under the lake."

“Why did Salazar build this?" Harry wondered. The lower levels of the castle only hosted a handful of classrooms. It had been days before he and the others figured their way around the first level of corridors. The entire layout seemed like a waste of time and energy. 

"In case we're attacked," Helena said. "We can hide here. There are hidden rooms. Safe rooms. Anyone who doesn't know to look for them could walk right past and not even notice. For instance, Salazar's common room is around, is it not? I'm sure it is, but I've not seen it."

Harry gave the girl a lopsided grin. "You know I can't tell you that."

"Give it back!"

"Finder's keeper, little brother!"

"It's mine!"

"It was."

Clang!

Both Gryffindors froze, Alma with an arm around her brother's neck while the boy tried to elbow her in the ribs.

"That wasn't us," she said tersely.

For a moment, no one moved.

Ca-clang!

This time, it was unmistakable. It echoed down the corridor, sharp and loud. The sound of a door slamming shut.

They waited a moment in bated breath. Nothing else came to pierce the silence. The children relaxed progressively, but because he had lived through a war and stopped to believe in coincidences long ago, Harry slipped a hand inside his pocket. His fingers found his wand.

"Time we head back, yes?" he said. "Your parents will think we got lost again."

The proposition was met with approving nods.

"D'you have something to do this afternoon, Harry?" Alma asked as the four of them began to retrace their steps to the surface. "We're going to the lake. See if we can find Merpeople."

"I thought you were supposed to study today?"

The girl grinned. "That's why we need you."

"I –," Harry said, and stopped. The back of his neck prickled. He whipped around, his wand brought up. " Lumos."

The corridor was bathed in bright bluish light. Shadows withered away, took refuge in nooks and crannies. Nothing.

Nothing I can see, Harry corrected. A sense of unease crawled on his skin. The silence was too perfect. The air was too still.

He wondered what kind of creature could hide down in the Dungeons. He had already dealt with Doxies and a couple of Boggarts who made a home in brooms cupboards. Salazar talked a nest of Ashwinders out of the stables before they burned down anything. What else?

"Maybe it's a rat," Meic pointed out hopefully.

Harry doubted it.

They walked on, followed the intricate twists and turns of the dank, darkened hallways. Their footsteps echoed ominously in the roughly hewn stone tunnels. Harry’s ears strained for sound.

Nothing. Had his years at Hogwarts not made him somewhat paranoid, he might have convinced himself some skittering animal caused the strange noises.

Meic went to walk past a door, and Harry, unthinkingly, grabbed the boy by the collar and jerked him back.

The door slammed shut.

Bang!

The following silence was deafening.

"Door's locked," Alma announced.

"Did you try the Unlocking Charm?" Helena asked.

"Yes."

Neither girl seemed particularly fazed, but Harry could see Alma's white-knuckled grip on her brother's hand, the shake to Helena's shoulders.

"We're going this way," he said, gesturing at the corridor across from them. "Quickly now."

Without prompting, his companions started to run.

Harry let them get a headstart. He looked over his shoulder. The corridor had gotten darker, the light leached off unnaturally. He did not pause to wonder what had caused this. He ran.

The air grew cold.

They pelted down the poorly lit corridors. Left, left, right, then left again. Helena stumbled. Harry caught her before she fell. She was out of breath. He pushed her in front of him. Alma pulled her brother by the hand. The boy struggled visibly to follow the pace on his shorter limbs. Harry could see the way his chest heaved, the way his legs trembled.

They were slow. Too slow.

"Well, well, what have we here."

Harry felt a putrid breath blow over his ears. Without looking back, he threw a Stunner over his shoulder. He heard the spell crash against a wall, rebound once on the stone. The corridor glowed carmine-red.

A mocking laugh, low and guttural.

Half-carrying her brother, Alma staggered up a flight of stairs, closely followed by Helena. The three of them burst into a hall just above ground-level, and disappeared from sight.

One, two, three steps. Harry ran up the stairs. The burn in his legs was easy to ignore, lost under the urge to escape whatever was after them. Ten, eleven, twelve. Steam misted from his mouth with each panting breath. Fifteen, come on.

Something cold and vice-like grabbed his ankle.

Harry tripped with a soundless gasp. He went down, stomach plummeting. Stars exploded before his eyes when he crashed, air fled his lungs. His head spun. Sharp pain burst on his knees, his ribs, his elbows.

"Harry!"

"Slow. Far too slow, little wizard."

Harry rolled aside, his wand held up.

"Protego! "

The blue shield sizzled to life. Pushing back the throbbing pain in his limbs, Harry let his eyes roam the darkness, searching, looking. Something looked back.

He clamped his jaw shut to keep from shouting in alarm, and forced himself to move. He gripped the rough, damp stone under him. Heaved himself up another step. Just outside the protective magic, the creature looked at him with a too-wide grin.

"HARRY!"

Hurried footsteps, getting closer.

The thing in front of him smiled, its large, blackened mouth pulled back to reveal razor sharp teeth.

"Stop!" Harry shouted. The footsteps faltered. "Get back! Get back, now!"

"Har – "

The creature – not quite a ghost, but clearly some kind of spirit, grey-skinned, with colourless eyes gleaming with malicious jubilation – shook its head from side to side.

"DO AS I SAY!"

Up another step.

The spirit cackled. "Humans," it wheezed between two giggles. "Funny little things, aren't you?"

Then, to Harry's horror, it extended a clawed hand toward him. After a brief resistance, the limb went through his shield. A hair's breadth from Harry's face.

"Depulso!"

The creature was thrown back a few feet. It grunted. Shook itself like a dog.

Harry stood and leaped over the remaining steps. The children stood just beyond the stairs, frozen and wide-eyed.

"What are you waiting for?" Harry growled. He took Helena by the arm, pushed the girl in front of him. "Go. GO!"

He knew it was too late before the words left his mouth. Doors slammed shut. There was a whoosh of displaced air near his ear. Harry pushed the children aside before something cold and heavy collided with his back. Groaning, he tucked his body into a roll, absorbing the shock. Blood ran down his temple.

"Reducto!"

He staggered back to his feet.

The creature sidestepped the spell easily, laughing in delight. A great boom rang through the room when the spell hit the nearest wall. Dust and rubble flew around. The spirit clapped its hands, a look of pure joy on its face. Harry summoned a Patronus. Prongs leapt from his wand, silvery and majestic.

“Go find Salazar,” Harry told it. “Tell him we’re in trouble.”

"A good one, aren't you?" the spirit said, happily.

Prongs rushed away in a shower of sparks.

Harry placed himself between the creature and the children. "What are you?" he asked. "What do you want?"

The creature laughed. "Your people keep changing the way they call me, little wizard. Hard keeping track. As to what I want." It smiled, something hungry and wicked that had Harry tighten his grip on his wand. "Food, if it please you."

"What is he saying?" Helena whispered behind him.

Harry frowned. The creature wasn't speaking Parseltongue; Harry had come to recognize the hissing tones of it from listening to Salazar and his familiar. Still the words sounded like plain English to him. It could not be plain English, because the dialect would not come to light before centuries.

Right?

The spirit giggled.

Harry threw it a Stunner, just for the sake of it. It moved out of the way with preternatural speed.

"Magic tricks don't work on me, silly boy."

"Then tell me what does ," Harry muttered between gritted teeth. His gaze followed the creature across the room. Instead of attacking, it seemed content to observe them with manic eyes, idly floating above their heads. Harry did not trust its passivity. He had to find a way out.

"No one is going anywhere, my dear."

Harry froze.

"So, what do we have?" the spirit wondered. It gave a twirl. Its eerie stare focused on the children. "A daughter reneged and abandoned." Behind Harry, Helena let out a strangled gasp. "Two wanderers, more at ease on the road than at home." Alma gave a hiss. Her brother whimpered. "And you ." The last words, addressed to Harry, were filled with gleeful trepidation. "The Chosen One."

Harry felt his heart give a painful twist.

"What a rare specimen you are." The spirit grinned, wider than ever, a shock of rotting, blackened flesh. Harry felt sick. "I mean, the others are far from, ah. Stable. But you." It cackled, the sound like nails on a blackboard. "This far from shattering, aren't you?"

"What do you want?" Harry repeated.

"You fight and rage and try so, so hard –"

"Diffindo!" The spell went through the spirit without leaving a mark.

"– All for nothing. They all die , don't they?"

Harry felt blood drain from his face. His heart kicked his ribs. His legs felt like jelly.

"One after the other, no matter what you do, no matter what you give. They all. Die."

A mind reader , Harry realised. Breathing deeply, he turned his attention inwards.

"They look at you for guidance. They put their hopes in you. They think you're going to save them. You."

He couldn't though, could he? He was Harry. Just Harry. Just as overwhelmed as they were by the sweeping strength of their enemy. Sometimes, the weight of other people's expectations was so heavy it crushed his chest, squashed his lungs. All Harry wished was for it to stop. He was a seventeen-year-old with average grades, average powers, no redeemable skill, and they wanted him to take out the mightiest Dark Lord of the age? Him?

"It's madness, isn't it? You're not good enough. Never have been. Even your mother's kin couldn't stand the sight of you, you little freak."

The first few years of his life. The Mother’s Day gifts his Aunt threw in the trash. Worthless . Learning to outrun his cousin, to keep his mouth shut, to duck his head and mask his thoughts. Harry hid the tears, the scrapes, the bruises. Showing weakness only ever brought disdain or worse, indifference. His family locked him up without food for days at a time because strange things kept happening around him. He never meant for anything to happen, it wasn't his fault. There was no such thing as magic. His Uncle said so. Harry knew his worth, and it was not much.

He was shaking. His wand trembled. He could not hope to fire a spell and have it meet its mark. Reality swayed in and out of focus. He was trapped between memories and a blackened smile. Sharp teeth, a putrid breath. Close. Closer. It ate him up, swallowed all rational thought, and it was all spiralling down into the inevitable losing of his mind.

"They think you're mad, don't they? With your visions. Your loss of control. They think you've finally lost it. And they're right. No one can survive what you did and not be broken."

Something in Harry snapped.

"Expelliarmus! "

The blast of bright red dislodged dust from the ceiling. The spirit was thrown away with a muffled grunt. Panting, Harry shook his head, tore away the last shackles around his mind. He was not broken. He had lived with these memories for years, and even though he often wished that he did not have to carry them, he had come to accept them as part of himself. He would not. Apologise for living.

"Stay behind me," he told the children. None of them seemed hurt. The creature had solely focused on him.

A snarl, high and furious, and the spirit pushed itself away from the wall, its face twisted in something ugly.

"Stay away," Harry warned when it made to lunge at them. "Or I swear I'll find a way to kill you."

The creature smirked. "I'd like to see you try."

It attacked.

The next few minutes were a blur. Harry fought. He parried every blow the creature tried to land. He cast spell after spell. His brain felt stuffed full of cotton. He felt sick. Wobbly. He made himself a barrier between the spirit and the children, and tried his best to usher them toward the door.

Finally. Finally, he heard cries, footsteps. A door blasted off its hinges, went crashing to the floor. Harry nearly dropped his wand in relief. The distraction almost cost him an eye.

The Founders looked angry.

"No, you don't," Ravenclaw hissed. Her blue eyes looked like shards of ice. She whipped up her wand. A flash of light. The whole room shook when the creature was all but embedded into a wall.

There was a flurry of motion. Helga strode to them and started asking questions. Were they hurt? What had happened? Where had they found the creature? The children answered, speaking over each other in their precipitation and relief. Meic started crying. Harry let it happen around him. The flow of words a comforting buzz. He felt detached. Far away. Behind Helga, Godric held up a long metal chain. Links clinking. The creature fought and snarled. Its eyes bulged. Its scrawny limbs strained against the magic that held it. It spoke, and the words were the only things Harry heard past the fog in his mind.

"Filth! Sorcerers! You let your own people burn! Not even your beloved Master survived, snake-speaker, and you expect to do better? He begged for death in the end. Do you remember? Remember you granted him this last kindness – "

Salazar waved a hand and the creature fell silent. It mouthed words for a few more moments before it realised it could no longer speak. It screamed without sound, all rage and madness. It was awful. The silence inside Harry's head was like white noise; static and confused.

"Master Potter? You can lower your wand now. Lower your wand, please." Someone called to him. A hand on his arm, squeezing lightly. "Harry, I think you should sit. You're pale as a sheet."

Harry tried. To focus on Helga. But it was. Hard. Godric wound the chain around the spirit, bound it tight. It could hardly move. It was furious.

"How do we kill it?" Salazar asked, and Harry's head spun.

"It's more a matter of banishing. It’s already dead."

"He fell down the stairs," Helena told someone.

Harry had fallen earlier, hadn’t he. He felt fine. Couldn't feel any of the bruises on his skin. The curse wound on his back had given a mean twinge, but now he felt. Nothing.

Meic and Alma rushed to their father's arms. They clung to him, their faces buried in his chest. Helena stayed by his side. She did not seek comfort from her mother. Harry wondered why. He wished he still had a mother.

He could smell stale air and dust and sweat, the stinking grime that coated his cupboard walls after he spent too many days locked inside. He could feel his Uncle's hand in his hair, pulling until his eyes watered. Dudley laughed somewhere near, taunt about Harry’s dead parents, and Harry –

Harry blinked. Salazar was here. Right in front of him, both his hands on Harry’s face. Holding it up. Cradling him.

"Took you long enough," Harry muttered.

"Apologies," Salazar said. He gave a wry smile. "I should've known. If anyone can get attacked by a Romanian Moroi in a warded castle, it would be you."

"Yeah," Harry replied. He closed his eyes. Leaned into Salazar’s hands. The ground was slipping under his feet. "It's an art."

Next thing he knew, he was being pinned to a wall and Salazar's eyes were all he could see. Beautiful eyes, Harry thought. A dark outer ring around the irises. The rest of it a shade of pale, silvered grey.

"Harry," Salazar said. His hands were two burning brands on Harry's arms. "Harry, the Moroi fed off you. You're bleeding out. You must focus. Focus on me. Focus! "

The word was like a discharge through his brain. Harry inhaled sharply. He could feel the roughness of the stone behind him, the warmth of Salazar's body in front. He ached. The world was keen and clear, painful to look at.

"Good," Salazar said. He looked relieved. “Very good. You need to rest. Come now, lad. Let's get you to bed."

{. . .}

It took Harry a full day to get back on his feet after the incident with the Moroi. For weeks after, he slept trapped in childhood nightmares he had thought long outgrown. He never saw the creature again, and never asked what happened to it.

August wheezed by at a frightening speed.

The days blurred together. All four Founders worked from dawn to dusk. They spread their arms wide and at their call, stone flowed from the earth. Sheened in sweat like holy oil, they shaped it into deep arches and stately halls.

Harry, in turn, took care of the children. He taught them their letters. Sat on lapping lake shores, he directed them through their first spells. Rocks spun around them like planets around a star. Butterflies flew on rainbowed wings. Simple, pretty things. He fed them, and carried them to sleep.

He stayed up late. Salazar worked deep into the night. He bent over architectural drawings, tracing angles and curves with fingers charcoal-stained. He smudged everything he touched. Harry watched the bow of his neck, the sharp jut of his spine, and stayed awake with him.

September fell upon them like a swift blow.

After long weeks of heavy, muggy heat, the air at long last grew cooler. The trees began to turn vibrant shades of red, orange and gold. Crisp leaves blew in on the wind as dark rain clouds filled the skies.

The Harvest Moon sat bright and full-bellied in the sky, and Harry could not sleep. He tossed and turned in bed, restless, exhausted into insomnia. Tomorrow was the last day of the reaping season, and the students would arrive. It was time for the new school year to begin. Harry had been in the past near two months.

He thought about Hermione. He wondered if she had escaped. He wondered if she was safe. 

He wondered if he would see her again. 

He woke from fevered half-sleep to a touch on his shoulder and a back-lit figure over his bed. He came into awareness gasping and clamped a hand on the arm touching him. He yanked down, a strangled cry working its way up his throat. 

There was a sound, soft and startled, and Harry opened his eyes to the sight of Salazar Slytherin leaning over him. A sliver of pale green light slashed his cheek and one of his eyes. It bled silver. The other was dark.

He laid over Harry with a hand braced next to Harry’s head, one knee between Harry’s legs. Harry had a hand on his throat, thumb stuck in the warm hollow between his clavicles. Salazar stood still, and Harry could feel the rapid stutter of a pulse on his thumb, and he was locked in place, suspended between confusion and the hiss of air that slid from Salazar's open lips.

Salazar circled Harry’s wrist with two fingers. He moved slowly, and did not pry Harry’s grip from his throat. Simply brushed his thumb to the inside of Harry’s wrist.

“Easy now, boy,” he said, his voice low, and Harry, at last, settled back into himself.

He jerked his hand away and pressed both palms to his eyes. Hiding his burning cheeks. “Sorry,” he said. The word came on a panted breath. “Fuck. I’m so sorry.”

He felt Salazar ease away from him. The bed dipped. His knee left the inside of Harry’s thighs. 

“You’ve not slept,” Salazar said. 

“No.”

“Forgive me. It was foolish of me to startle you. I knocked, and worried when you would not answer.”

“Forgive you.”

“Yes.” A pause. “I will leave you now. Join me in the common room when you can.”

Footfalls. A door closing. Harry peeled his hands from his face and blew a hard breath. Embarrassment roiled hot in his belly. His hands clenched on the bedsheets, chasing after remembered warmth. He shook his head and pushed the blankets away. He stood on unsteady legs. His head knifed with pain. His eyes were gritty with sleep sand.

He went to the bathroom, turned the tap to cold, and let the water scrub sleep from his skin. His arms prickled with gooseflesh. He picked fresh clothes, and, bracing himself, walked to the common room. 

Salazar sat at a desk before a spread of parchment sheets. Each sheet ran dark with his slanted handwriting. Lesson plans, Harry knew. He helped draft them the night before. His familiar lay on Salazar’s shoulders, her coils curled around his waist. She watched Harry approach with slanted eyes. Her forked tongue flicked out.

‘The boy,’ she hissed. ‘Tastes of you.’

‘Good morrow, Harry,’ Salazar said. ‘There is a draught for you on the table.’

A potion vial sat next to Salazar’s elbow, the liquid inside a soft orange. Harry racked his brains.

‘Invigoration Draught?’

‘Are you asking me, or telling me?’

Harry plucked the vial from the table. He hesitated. ‘Telling.’

Salazar inclined his head, pleased, and Harry downed the draught in one gulp. He sighed in sheer relief at the burst of energy that went through him like a lick of flame. His migraine cleared, and with it, the fogginess weighing him.

‘This,’ Salazar said. He set down his quill and reached into his pockets. ‘Is for sleep. Should you find it escaping you once more.’

The potion was deep-blue, nearing black. Something to keep away nightmares. Harry swallowed.

“Thank you,” he said, and curled his fingers tight around the bottle.

“There is much to be done today.” Salazar put his writing away with a negligent wave of the hand. “Will you assist me?”

“You’d have a hard time stopping me.”

Salazar pushed his chair back, and as he stood, his snake gave a long, sibilant hiss, a soft and wordless sound. She glided across his chest, silvered scales catching the lake light. She stretched the length of her body towards Harry, sinuous and straining, and Salazar stilled.

She brought her head to Harry’s collarbone, settled its weight there. Harry held his breath. There was the smooth rasp of scales against his jaw, his throat. She moved over Harry’s shoulders, his chest. She coiled around Harry’s waist, the end of her tail reaching as far as Harry’s hip.

‘Sila?’ Salazar said. He still had not moved. Harry watched his face and could not read it.

‘I stay with him,’ Sila said.

She was heavier than she looked. Hesitantly, Harry brushed a hand down the cool length of her. She made a satisfied sound, and squeezed his chest once in response.

Salazar ran a hand over his mouth. He looked pale. ‘As you will,’ he said. ‘So long as Harry is willing.’

Harry was not sure what to think, but Sila found the way inside his cloak, and that was that. 

The three of them walked out of the Dungeons into open air. Outside, the day dawned bright and sunny, and the crisp wind brought with it the green scent of grass and pine. Helga found them on their way to the Great Hall. She took Salazar's arm by the elbow and greeted Harry with a wink.

“I believe these breeches are mine,” Salazar said.

“But I wear them so much better,” Helga replied sweetly. “Come. You’ll break fast in the kitchens, I’m afraid we’re behind schedule already.”

The kitchens were an ant-hive of activity. Fire roared in the hearths where meat cooked on great spits. House-elves scurried to and fro. Pans and pots danced above their heads. They heaped vegetables in steaming stews, carrots, cabbages and sweet onions. Knives worked themselves on the cutting boards. Everything smelled of woodsmoke and dripping fat.

 Helga dismissed the house-elves. They disappeared into whorls, hurrying to other parts of the castle. The dormitories needed preparing.

“Can you make dessert?” she asked. “I will endeavour to manage the rest.”

“If we must,” Salazar said without much enthusiasm.

“I can cook,” Harry said. “I’ll show you.”

Gathering the ingredients took some poking around, but Harry unearthed milk, eggs, honey, flour and fruit, and, to his surprise, sugar, which he understood cost its weight in gold. He piled spoons and bowls on a table, and set about mixing dough.

Salazar watched him with a hip leant against the tabletop. “How did you learn?” he asked. His eyes followed the motion of Harry’s hands.

“My family,” Harry said. “Had me cook for them when I was a boy. Could you cut the apples into slices, please?”

The fruit bowl painting swung open just as Salazar picked up a knife. Godric and Rowena walked through one after the other.

“Heard you may need some help,” Godric said by way of greetings. He blinked. “Salazar. Do my eyes deceive me, or are you cooking?"

A saucepan veered off its course and made a beeline for Godric’s head. Godric sidestepped neatly before it could crack his skull.

"How might we help?" Rowena asked. She gathered her dark curls into a knot, turning away from Godric as he dove out of the way of another saucepan.

“Come here,” Helga said, and she went.

Godric, in turn, plastered himself to Salazar’s side. “Cease this,” he hissed, and ducked his head behind Salazar’s shoulder. “Or you’ll knock both of us out.”

“Cease what?” Salazar asked, and gave a flick of his wrist.

The saucepans stopped coming. One hand around Salazar’s waist, Godric detached himself. His eyes fell on Harry. He froze. “Your familiar is on Harry’s neck,” he said blandly.

“I’m aware.”

“Merciful gods, Salazar.”

"It's fine," Harry said. "I don't mind her."

“I make no question of that, lad,” Godric said.

“The boy is a Parselmouth,” Salazar said. “She has taken a liking to him.”

“She has, has she.” Godric blinked. “A Parselmouth, eh. I’ve not seen one of those West of Türkiye aside from you.” He paused. His mouth crooked into a teasing smile. “Verily, the lad’s past the age of being your son, is he not? After all these years, it would, I must  admit, astonish me to learn your proclivities lay – ”

“Godric,” Rowena said. “Careful now.”

“To record all that astonishes you would yet fill a library,” Salazar said, and Godric gave a full-throated laugh.

“True enough,” he said. His hand on Salazar’s hip flexed. Harry caught himself thinking about his bedroom in the pre-morning light. His fingers flush against a beating pulse.

Gryffindor flicked flour in his face. “Fret not, lad, I merely jest. I would surely know, had Salazar ever begotten a wom – ”

A white streak flew through the air, collided with the back of Godric’s head. Godric yelped, a hand going to his hair. It came back coated with yellow yolk. Bits of eggshell trickled down his neck.

“Careful, I said.” Rowena reached for another egg.

Godric grabbed a handful of flour.

A knife went thunk in the wall next to his head.

“We have an agreement regarding food fights,” Helga said. She called the knife back to her hand with a twitch of fingers. “Settle down, the both of you.”

“Apologies, my dear,” Rowena said.

Harry escaped the kitchen hours later, unscathed, which he counted as nothing short of miraculous. Godric Gryffindor was a menace. He spent the entirety of his morning, along with the better part of the afternoon, antagonising both Salazar and Rowena while the two had easy access to well-sharpened knives. He teased and badgered, and as time wore on, Harry watched the tight lines around Salazar's mouth disappear, and he understood. The terseness in Helga's shoulders eased, the restless glint in Rowena's eyes. Godric touched their backs and arms and slowly, steadily, the strain lifted from their postures. By the time they put the food on stasis and walked from the kitchens, they had all settled back into themselves.

With two hours left before the students were due to arrive, Harry followed Salazar back to the Dungeons. He needed a long shower and a change of clothes. He stank of sweat and grease, and his hands were stained with red-berry juice.

“Will you join us in the Hall?” Salazar asked. “We would welcome your company.”

“As soon as I can,” Harry said. He gave a smile. “The last hours are always the longest.”

They parted ways. 

Back in his rooms, Harry shucked his clothes. He left Sila coiled on his bed and bathed quickly. He touched the scar on his back, feeling the seams of infection, but it healed well, one perfect line from shoulder to hip.

Another scar. Harry had not gathered many, despite his years under the Dursleys’ roof. Muggle scrapes faded from wizards' bodies. There was the lightning-bolt forking his forehead. I must not tell lies carved on the back of his hand. Now the split on his back.

How would he look, he wondered, by the time war ended. How mangled. How deformed.

He tied a towel around his waist and padded to the bedroom.

Salazar had gifted him sets of his own clothes, spelled to fit him. Harry dressed in a dark hose and a fine woollen tunic, cinched at the waist by a leather belt. The tunic was bleached white. Harry grabbed his wand and dyed it dark green. He did not let himself think of why.

Sila wound herself around him, and Harry faced the door with her coils tight around his chest.

The first of Hogwarts’ students were on their way.

Chapter Text

Of the four of them, Helga was the most patient.

Godric liked waiting the way house-elves took to offered clothes. Wailing, moaning, begging. Occasionally challenging Giants into drinking games. Rowena wrote. Spells, runes, mathematics. A snail trail line of her quill remade the brushstroke of the world. Salazar, though through no dramatics of his own, was the worst. He sat with Rowena and made her creations on the wrong side of lethal. He poked at Godric to the limits of his restraint, and then well past.

Of the four of them, Helga was the most patient.

She was not, however, a patient woman.

Years it had been. Before they built Hogwarts and claimed it as their home. Cold, hungry, lonely years. Running and hiding and fighting and waiting. Watching her people suffer the mindless hatred of the world. Watching children die. They had survived on whispers, she and Rowena, Godric and Salazar, on next to nothing, sweet hopes shared between them in the dead hours of night, when all was quiet and none would hear them.

Her patience wore thin. The time for silence and secrets was at an end, and Helga wanted to scream. She wanted to spread her arms wide and shout at all who would hear, Watch. See what we have done, and be not afraid.

Breathing out a slow, steady breath, she pressed a palm flat to Hogwarts stone and felt the castle hum for her in response. It had her and the others’ blood mixed within its mortar, worked down to its bones. It sang with it. She smiled, and rested her head against the cool wall. She tasted their combined magic on her tongue, and willed it take root down in the core of her self, that she might carry it with her always.

A hand brushed the curve of her waist, and Helga went spinning into the touch. Salazar caught her hand with practised ease and spun with her, the dance long since familiar between them.

“Happiness becomes you,” he said, and steadied her with fingers on her hip.

“I was thinking about the distance we walked,” Helga said. “And how much changed, before we found ourselves standing in this moment.”

“There is much yet to change,” Salazar said. “Tonight is the beginning of something greater than ourselves.”

“Greater than ourselves,” Helga repeated. She leaned against him, and Salazar took her weight. “Ah, my friend. Always looking ahead. I will count myself lucky for each day we have here, and each life that passes through our halls. I take my victories as they present themselves.”

“Our victory,” Salazar said. “Will endure a thousand years.”

Helga smiled at him, and, a hand on his chest, placed a kiss on his cheek. 

“To a hundred thousand nights, then,” she said. “And many more besides. Have you lowered the ward?”

Salazar inclined his head. “All that is left to do is to wait.”

Helga grimaced. Salazar squeezed her waist.

“Take heart, my sweet,” he said. “Savour this peace before the storm comes calling.”

They stood together from shoulder to hip, and Helga breathed with him. Sunlight slanted from the Great Hall’s windows in ruddy shafts. Stained, latticed glass caught the light and spread it in wild shapes on the floor and walls. It would be soon.

Salazar tensed against her, and Helga, glancing up at him, followed his gaze. 

Godric had walked in on light, silent steps. His face was set, his eyes hard and distant. Godric was a being of warmth and easy laughter, of languid grace. To see him so cold and stilted was jarring, always. Helga had not seen him such in a long time. He had been on tenterhooks since his wife left for Africa, and had, it seemed, come to a boil. How very like him to bottle his emotions and reach a breaking point before he bothered anyone with them.

Salazar went to him. Helga watched as he put a hand on Godric’s arm. She watched Godric freeze, watched him reach for the scabbard that was not on his hip. He found Salazar, and restlessness bled from him like pus from a wound.

Godric had been raised a sellsword. He grew with blood on his hands and knew no softness until Salazar brought it into his life. He kept himself sheathed, nowadays, and never once turned the lethality in his bones on the rest of them, only ever outward, but there was an edge to him which only ever eased with Salazar at his side.

Helga left them to themselves and their strange intimacy, and went to Rowena.

Rowena sat at the dining table before a roll of parchment already wet with ink. She wore a deep-blue dress that showed the pale column of her throat, darkened her eyes to midnight black. She had tied her thick hair back. A lock brushed the corner of her lips.

Helga wanted to tuck the hair back behind one ear. She wanted to run fingertips down the length of Rowena’s throat, and chase after her pulse.

"Rowena?" she called.

Rowena did not answer, did so much as twitch. She had gone under completely, lost to the swift storm of her thoughts. 

She was beautiful.

Helga pulled a chair and sat at her side. She watched Rowena think. Watched her brow frown, her nose wrinkle. Watched her run a thumb over her cheek, and leave an ink smear behind, so heart-wrenchingly domestic that Helga swallowed, aching.

Carefully, utterly unable to help herself, she touched Rowena’s hand where it lay lax on the table. Rowena turned her palm over, tangled their fingers. She would not have gone so easily into the touch, before. Helga’s heart swelled in her chest. She thought it must take all the space from rib to spine, and took a moment to compose her face, to fold back the naked wanting etched there. 

She looked at her fingers with Rowena’s, and thought, if this is all I ever have of you, I shall die content.

Rowena sighed. She put down her quill.

"Back with us?" Helga teased.

Rowena gave a faint smile. “I never left,” she said, and squeezed Helga’s hand. “Is it time yet?”

“I’m afraid not. I simply wished for the pleasure of your company. The wait seems much more bearable with you here with me.”

“I am glad,” Rowena said, and stopped. “I am glad also. To be at your side.”

Helga’s heart was in her mouth. She reached out, and brushed a thumb over the ink smear on Rowena’s cheek.

"I feel like I'm dreaming," she said. “I live with the fear of waking up, and finding all we have achieved melt into wishful thinking. It seems so improbable. So impossible. That we sit here tonight, in spite of everything."

“Then we dream together,” Rowena said. “More’s the fool for the both of us.”

“More’s the fool,” Helga repeated, and inclined her head. “I wonder what shape my life would hold, had I not met you.”

“I have no doubt you would fare quite well," Rowena said, wryly. "The best healer of this age. Possibly you would have allowed the chieftain’s son his suit. He used to gift you flowers and pelts, if memory serves."

"Perhaps,” Helga said. “I may have found contentment in such a life. But there is no happiness when one is missing half of oneself.”

Rowena’s mouth fell open, then closed again.

A hand touched Helga’s shoulder, calloused and warm.

“Alright, my ladies?” Godric asked, and Helga leaned back into him.

“Are you?”

“Tragically, he is,” Salazar said.

"You're an appalling friend.”

"I am very sorry, Godric, but I'm exactly the friend you deserve."

Godric took his hand from Helga's shoulder, then, brought it to Salazar’s nape. He smiled a soft smile, and something passed between them, an expression of wordless care. When Salazar shifted away from the touch, Godric let him go.

Helga had missed this. The camaraderie between them, the ease, the shared jokes. She was reminded of their years on the road. When she fell asleep back-to-back with Rowena, lulled by the steady rise-and-fall of her chest. When Godric cooked with her and the two of them traded stories over the campfire light. When she and Salazar trod shaded forest paths side by side, foraging for herbs. Simpler times. It had been great, in some ways. It was about to end.

“It is not the end, Helga,” Salazar said. “This is where our story starts.”

"I know," Helga said. “What we built here we gave everything to achieve. A part of me simply longs for our younger, carefree years. Stay out of my thoughts, sweeting.”

Salazar inclined his head. “I shall try.”

“Evening.”

The four of them startled.

“Harry.”

Salazar turned toward the doors. Helga had no need to see his face to hear the smile in his voice.

The boy stepped closer.

He had improved in his two months here. Not quite so sickly gaunt. Not quite so haunted. Bruises still ringed his eyes, but Helga hoped these, too, would fade with time. Gods knew what the boy had been through before Salazar found him.

He wore green, Helga saw. Salazar’s colour.

“Am I late?” Harry asked.

“Not at all,” Salazar said.

“It’s good you’re here,” Helga told him. “Make the rest of them behave.”

The boy gave a faint smile. "I very much doubt that, my lady." 

As always, there was an air of foreignness about him, a sense of strangeness. In the way he walked, in the way he talked. He was, Helga knew, remarkably well-lettered and an able enough wizard, but showed in turn ignorance over the simplest matters. She could not make sense of it. 

She caught him looking, sometimes, at Godric or Rowena, at Salazar, with a rapt attention the moment did not warrant. She wondered why it was. What it was he saw in them to grant such focus. Such reverence.

Stranger still, was the way Salazar was with him.

Helga watched them talk, one body bent toward the other, and wondered.

{. . .}

“It's time,” Salazar said, and Harry felt it. The prickle of magic raising gooseflesh down his spine. Its ozone taste. 

He blinked, and the Hall exploded with life. 

Flying suitcases and tangled limbs and groaning youths. Most of the children fell upon landing, went sprawling face-first on the floor with cries of pain. Those who stayed on their feet ran distracted hands down their bodies, and looked around with wide, frightened eyes. 

Helga reacted first. She plowed into the mass, reaching with a string of reassuring words for a young girl who shook with nerves. The other Founders were quick to follow, and Harry, bracing himself, went after them.

He helped children to their feet, brushed them down, checked for breaks and bruises. He talked to them, in low, easy tones, and, trembling, they clung to his words. The Founders and their children worked alongside him, but still, it took a while. To get everyone to calmness, and direct them to their appointed place.

Harry joined the Slytherin table. Seven students. They sat with stiff postures and wary eyes. Two of them wore richly-stitched doublets and surcoats, but the rest were in simpler garb, in well-worn, undyed tunics many times patched. One of the girls wore a cotehardie a size too big for her, while the other, her skin several shades darker than Harry’s, was in loose, moss-coloured robes.

“Good evening,” Harry said. He bowed. “I’m Harry Potter. Welcome to Hogwarts.”

“Will you be our teacher, Lord?” asked one of the boys. Golden-haired and not much younger than Harry himself, he was one of the well-dressed ones.

Harry shook his head. “I’m afraid not,” he said. “That would be Lord Slytherin. I’m one of you. Can I have your name?”

“Alfric,” the boy said. He ducked his head, then straightened again. “Alfric Barden.”

“Enchanted.” Another boy gave a friendly grin. Pale hair, a pointed face. “I’m Glenn. Mate, I hate to state the obvious, but there's a snake on your shoulders."

Sila squeezed Harry’s chest. Her tongue flicked out. ‘What does the boy wantssss? Should I bite? Ssshould I bite him?'

‘Easy,' Harry said. ‘You can’t hurt him. Any of them. These are our new siblings.’

"Again, apologies for the obvious, but are you hissing ?"

“I’m sure you all have a lot of questions,” Harry said. “I’m not Salazar, but I’ll do my best to answer them. Just know.” He paused. “Just know you’re safe here. You’re home.”

A hand touched Harry’s shoulder, strong and long-fingered, and Harry smiled when Salazar took a seat beside him.

“This evening is not for questions,” Salazar said. “Tonight we feast, and we rest. Tomorrow we shall start.”

He rasped a finger on the tabletop, and food appeared on the empty plates. Stews and dripping meats, pies and pasties, platters of cheeses and freshly-churned butter, dark, steaming bread. The students exclaimed in astonishment, but recovered quickly enough when the rich food smells hit them.

“All of them accounted for?” Harry asked in an undertone.

Salazar bent his head close. “Godric and Rowena both are missing one student,” he said. “Neither of them sent word. The girl we believe may be late, but the boy.” A muscle played in Salazar’s jaw. “I can no longer feel his Portkey.”

Harry closed his eyes. “I’m sorry.”

“Eat, Harry,” Salazar said. “Tomorrow I will need your strength.”

Harry drew the closest dish to himself. Fresh trout cooked in butter, with thyme and parsley for garnish. He bit in the soft, white flesh, and let conversation wash over him.

" – blew up a vase the first time. Thought my ma would strangle me."

"Should've seen mine. She was so glad she nearly rattled us out to the neighbours."

"You live with Muggles?"

"What other choice is there?"

"The name Barden is familiar. Where have I heard it before?”

Beside Harry, Alfric shifted. “My family are of the merchant Guild,” he said. “We trade far and wide across the isles.”

Across from him, a boy with dark, deep-set eyes nodded. He had black, chin-long hair and a pale, thin face. “Thought so. I believe I met your siblings, once. Though you were not there.” 

Glenn elbowed him in the ribs. “Bradley. Leave the man alone. You’re being nosy.”

“Have you been here long?”

The question was directed at him. Harry turned toward the girl. She was red-headed, with sharp, cautious eyes. A pale wrist poked from the sleeve of her too-big cotehardie. The skin dark with bruising.

“Since late summer,” Harry said.

“How come?” she asked. 

“How do you mean?”

She jerked her chin toward the other girl in mossy robes. Beside her was a young boy near Meic’s age. He wore shorn, tawny hair, and the same set of ample robes as the girl. Neat runes stitched their hems and collars.

“Those of us without shelter went to the Druids for guardianship. How come you did not?”

“I was injured,” Harry said. “When Salazar found me. What’s your name?”

“Audra.”

“Audra.” Harry glanced at the thin wrist. At the blackened flesh. “I won’t ask, but. We can heal you, if you want us to. Ask Helga, if you’d rather go to a woman. We don’t hurt children here.”

Audra’s fingers tightened around her knife. She gave a stiff nod, and lowered her gaze on her plate.

The dark-skinned girl was named Gytha, and the boy beside her was Ashton. She spoke for the both of them while the boy picked at his plate, his shoulders hunched.

“Do you know any magic?” Harry asked, and she shook her head.

“Ashton and I are from the streets,” she said. She had a low, pleasant voice. “Though the Druids were kind enough to take us in, they do not teach their ways to outsiders.”

“Just as well.” Harry winked. “No bad habits to break out.”

The girl hesitated. “We can neither read nor write.”

“That’s alright. We’ll teach that, too.” He turned to the last boy around the table. “Don’t think we’ve been introduced. What’s your name, mate?”

The boy had light-brown hair and sunken eyes. He sat stiffly in his good coat. “Dallin,” he said. “My lord.”

“I’m no lord. Call me Harry.”

“Yet you hold Lord Slytherin’s favour,” the boy said. “Yet you would lead us in our time here.”

“I would help you make Hogwarts your home,” Harry said. He slanted a smile at Salazar. “Do I hold your favour, my lord?”

“Verily, you do,” Salazar said.

Harry looked away.

The rest of the feast went pleasantly. Harry carried easy conversation with his fellow students. He and Salazar answered what questions they could. The children ate their fill and, full-bellied and sleepy-eyed, followed the two of them as the Houses parted for the night.

They went down steep stairways by lantern-light. The children huddled close together. Their footfalls and murmurs filled the quiet. Harry breathed the cool, damp Dungeon air, and for the first time that day, his shoulders hung loose and his steps went easy.

“How far underground do we go?” Dallin asked him. “Are we to sleep with the rats?”

"We will sleep where we are told," Gytha said, coldly. “And count ourselves fortunate we are here at all.”

“You’ll like your lodgings, I think,” Harry said. “Don’t let appearances fool you.”

Dallin’s lips thinned, but he bowed his head at Harry and made no further protests.

Salazar led them through the Dungeons maze. He stopped before the common room wall. The children exchanged puzzled glances. 

‘Would you like to do the honours?’ Salazar asked.

Harry shook his head. ‘After you.’

Salazar breathed the password, and the wall swept into an archway. The children exclaimed in surprise. Harry stood back. He watched awe soften their faces. Watched them take their first, hesitant steps in their new home. His throat ached.

“Are we,” Glenn said. “Under the lake?”

"Yes," Salazar said.

'You're enjoying this,' Harry said, and Salazar cast him a smile.

"This is – ours?" Alfric asked.

"Yes," Harry said.

"All of it?"

"All of it."

Harry showed the boys their rooms while Salazar went with the girls.

"Each of you pick a bedroom," Harry said. The new Slytherins trooped behind him, looking overwhelmed. "The house-elves will bring your stuff. My room is at the end of the corridor. Give me a holler if you have a question, if you’re not feeling well – anything. Don’t hesitate to wake me. Let me show you how the bathrooms work."

It took a while to get everyone settled. Harry helped Ashton unpack. The boy did not have much, and Harry made a note to ask Salazar to give him more clothes. He had nothing suitable for the winter months.

“Will you be alright on your own?” Harry put a knee down and watched the boy. He was. Young. Eight or nine at most, a tiny slip of a child.

Ashton gave a tight nod. He did not speak much.

“Alright,” Harry said. “Go wash your face and hands. I’ll make you some sleeping clothes.”

Harry ushered Ahston toward the bathroom and got working. The other boys kept poking their heads in the doorway. Asking questions. How do you turn off the light, Harry. What time should we get up. Harry. Are there mermaids. 

Harry answered as best he could. He was fortunately at ease with start-of-term chaos. The half-dozen young Slytherins had nothing on a houseful of Gryffindors. He handed Ashton his new clothes, sweatpants and a soft t-shirt, and left him alone to change. 

He went from room to room. He found Glenn seated on Bradley’s bed, kicking his heels and chattering away while the other boy arranged a cauldron by his desk.

“Get out of here,” Harry told him. “Time to get some sleep. You’ll need it tomorrow. Bradley, you need any help?” The boy shook his head. “Suit yourself.”

Harry knocked on Alfric’s door and found the boy in front of his window, hands behind his back as he watched the dark depths of the lake.

“Quite the view, eh? Might catch a Selkies if you look long enough.”

Alfric turned toward him. “Do you ever get used to this?”

The boy was near Harry’s age, but in that moment, he looked much younger. Fragile.

“You're going to be fine.” Harry caught his gaze and held it. “I promise. These will be your best years yet.” 

Alfric ducked his head, his throat working. Harry touched his shoulder. 

“Try and rest, alright? Give it time. It’ll be better in the morning.”

“Thank you,” the boy said softly, and Harry left him alone. He suspected none of them would sleep well tonight.

He slipped out into the corridor. Everything, at long last, was quiet. The lanterns on the walls sputtered a soft, silvery light. Harry heard water against stone, and imagined himself in a sunken ship. A long-lost wreck on the ocean floor. Safe from the elements. The waves rolling over him.

“Harry.”

He turned to the sight of Salazar in the shadows. He leaned against the wall with his arms crossed. Half his face gilded silver, the other in the dark.

“You wanted to talk to me?” Harry asked.

“I wanted,” Salazar said, “to thank you.”

“What for.”

“You went beyond your duty. To care for my charges.”

“Of course,” Harry said, confused. “There was nothing else I could have done.”

“I wonder,” Salazar said. “How well you will fit with them. For all that you will be among their ranks, there is a difference between you. In age. In experience. You may find yourself fulfilling the role of a teacher, more than that of a friend.”

“I think I have plenty to learn,” Harry said. “From you. From the others, but. I’ll be here, if you need me. It’s the least I can do. I owe you my life.”

"You owe me nothing."

Harry laughed. The sound escaped him dry and bitter and barely like himself. “I owe you everything,” he said. “My lord. Down to the very clothes I wear. You saved my life.”

"There was nothing else I could have done."

Harry flinched. His heart drummed in his chest. Silence sat between them was thick and tense.

“Do you know,” Harry said, softly. “I’m starting to believe that.”

“Get some sleep, Harry. Tomorrow I will need you at my side.”

Harry bent himself into a bow and escaped to his rooms. He did not think about the debt that bound him to Salazar. A lifetime would not free him of it. Harry knew. He carried the knowledge down to the roots of himself, and it scared him more than he could say.

He closed his door. Pressed his forehead against the wood, and breathed deep. He felt feverish. He listened to the lapping lake, and wondered, dimly, how he was going to survive the new school year.

Chapter Text

Six o'clock the following morning found Harry wide awake in bed, breathing deeply to calm his pulse. His chest sat heavy, his heart like lead. Tremors ran through him. He felt slow. Sluggish. As though kicking up from deep water, his mind still caught in the current.

He swung his legs out of bed and, shivering, leaned his elbows on his thighs. The room smelled of sour sweat. The scent turned his stomach. Harry grabbed some clothes and went to the bathroom. He sat in steaming water until the cobwebs parted from his brain.

The Lake was still ink-black when he emerged. Liquid darkness moved against the windows, muffled every sound. Harry thought he might as well be alone in the world, sheltered from it by a length of water. He sat on his windowsill and watched the lake, an arm against the glass. The touch of water made it pleasantly cool. Outside, algae swayed sluggishly. The occasional creature darted in the depths like so many dancing ghosts.

How had his life changed in the span of two short months. Yesterday, he was a wanted man in a country at war. Now he awaited the start of a new school year as a Slytherin student. As Slytherin's student. There was something vertiginous in the notion. Something dream-like.

He had dreamt of Hermione again. Her lips blue and moving without sound. Gold dripping from her eyes.

Harry shuddered. He hoped. He hoped she was alright.

He hoped he would see her again.

Anxiety tightened his chest. Harry breathed through it, fingers pressed against the coarse grain of his trousers.

There was a blur outside the window. Harry watched a black shape melt into the depths. He saw the sleek flick of a tail. The trailing end of thick hair. He sighed, and willed his hands lax on his lap. He had to keep it together. Just for today. And then another day after that.

He rose from the windowsill, and made his way to the common room.

He heard the murmur of conversation as he approached. Quiet voices, smothered laughter. Glenn and Bradley talked with their heads bent together. Huddled on a sofa, Audra and Gytha listened in. Ashton slumbered with his head on Gytha’s shoulder.

"Morning," Harry said. “You’re up early.”

The boys looked up, straightened. They mumbled their own greetings. Ashton yawned awake. Harry watched the drawn, tired faces, the bruised, too-wide eyes. 

“Couldn’t sleep, could you.”

“Not a wink,” Glenn said, and grinned maniacally.

“I do not feel tired,” Bradley said.

“Then you’ll crash all the harder tonight.” Harry flicked his wand. “Try and get another half hour if you can. There’s plenty of time before breakfast.”

A book came soaring to his hand. Harry flipped the cover. It was an old, untitled volume about Earth-bound magicks. Salazar lent it to him. Apparently, the witch who wrote it thought she could talk to trees . The manuscript was half spellwork, half unhinged theories about the ancient being in the cracks of the world. It helped Harry practise his Latin if nothing else.

Glenn breathed a loud sigh. “Fine,” he snapped. “I ’ll ask. Harry. What is it you did to that book, and can you do it again?”

Harry spent the next hour showing basic spells to children who, before yesterday, had never seen much magic. Even Glenn, whose parents were wizards, had had little contact with his gift. In a time when their kind burned in public squares, ignorance was a bliss.

Harry levitated books and candlesticks, he made dancing lights, turned paper cranes into living birds, and the children bent toward him with naked hunger. He answered their questions the best he could. They ran from their lips like water.

Alfric and Dallin joined them eventually, and froze at the sight, wide-eyed and open-mouthed. 

"Is it my copy of Ars Moriendi I hear chirping?" 

Harry turned. Salazar stood in the entrance, one shoulder against the archway. He watched one of Harry’s birds with his head tilted to a side. The creature flew to the nearest window, twittering happily, and bonked it.

“I’m afraid so,” Harry said. “Finite.”

The book flopped down. Harry set tables and candlesticks back to their appointed places. He banked the witch-fires, un-Transfigured everything he had turned. He could feel Salazar’s eyes on him throughout. He thought about the night before. About silvered skin and conversations held in the dark and – 

"Ow!"

“Sorry, sorry,” he said quickly. A cushion had hit Dallin over the head on its way back to its rightful place.

The last objects returned to their respective shelves, setting down or skittering away on their new sets of legs.

“Harry,” Salazar said, and Harry braced himself. “Has my predecessor started you on Human Transfiguration?"

Harry held a fond memory of an afternoon in McGonagall's class spent snickering with Ron over the state of their respective eyebrows. “Yes,” he said. “Just the basics though. Some Conjuration, too. Something wrong?"

Salazar did not answer. He straightened away from the wall, and with him, the whole room came to attention.

“Sit,” he said. “Please.”

His students crammed themselves on the nearest available seats. Harry followed them after a beat.

“These,” Salazar said, and he stood before them backlit in green, watery light. “Are the last moments of quietude before your life starts. You are on the verge of metamorphosis. Ever have you been shadows of yourselves. Alive but not living. Your circumstances have blunted you to dullness. These.” Salazar stressed the word, and Harry found himself holding his breath in the pause that followed. He was aware of his own skin, of the stretch of himself. “Are your last moments of quietude. Enjoy them well. Breathe them in, that you may look back far from now and remember the stench of them. For I will be your teacher this year, and by God I will make knives out of you.”

Salazar looked at each of them in turn. “That is my oath to you,” he said. “Make of it what you will. Now.” He gave a faint smile, and something in his posture shifted, eased the set of his shoulders, the sternness of his stance. With it, his students drew a collective breath. “I’m afraid there is no time for questions. We are fully beyond schedule. On your feet, and follow me.”

They did.

They were last to arrive in the Great Hall. Harry sat himself at the Slytherin table with the others, and let the excited buzz of conversation wash over him. He spooned porridge into a bowl, and ate without tasting. Salazar left after he saw them seated, and joined the other Founders by the Great Hall's doors. Harry kept an eye on him, on the way he bent close to whisper in Rowena’s ear, nodded to something Godric said.

"What d'you reckon they're talking about?" Glenn asked.

"I'm sure we'll find out soon enough." 

A stranger walked in as they finished eating. He had skin made paper-thin with age. A cloud of white hair crowned his head. The Founders greeted him warmly. They turned to the students assembled in their hall, and introduced him as Ollivander.

Ollivander.

Harry smothered a laugh. He bit his tongue hard enough to taste blood, clamped an arm around his middle to keep himself contained. 

Ollivanders, makers of fine wands since what's-the-year B.C.

Harry was one thousand years into the past, and still familiarity caught him at every turn. His throat ached with a swallowed smile, and he thought he might collapse laughing.

He watched Ollivander set up shop. He pulled wand after wand from the depths of his pockets, and lined them in a neat row on the Gryffindor table. The students went to him one after the other, and he fitted them with their match. Harry watched children close tight fingers around the promise of power. He watched them find the way to themselves, and shivered with sympathetic awe.

The Slytherin joined him in turn. They clutched the wands to their chests with the reverence of holy artefacts. Gytha cried quietly, and Alfric talked to her in a low voice. The others sat in silence. Their gazes met and held, and Harry thought, this is how it starts.

Ollivander approached him as the sun neared its zenith, its light blinding through the Great Hall’s windows.

“I can smell a wand on you, young man,” he said, and Harry rose to meet him.

“Yes, sir,” he said. “I’ve no need to purchase another today.”

The wandmaker had eyes pale as the moon and just as bright besides. The irises bled into the whites like ink on parchment.

“May I request you let me hold it?” Ollivander tilted his head to a side. “Its song is familiar to me, even though you are not.”

Harry stiffened. 

Ollivander's nostrils flared. “What have you to hide, boy?”

Harry clutched his wand, anxiety drumming in his chest. If he saw, Ollivander might recognize his own craft. He might ask questions. Might ask of Harry things he was not ready to give.

“Our wand is our self, Geraint, as you well know. I suggest you do not press a matter which does not concern you.”

Salazar stood at Harry’s shoulder, his stance relaxed, a polite smile on his lips. His eyes were cold and flat, and Ollivander walked a half-step back.

“I meant no offence, Lord,” he said. He bowed his head, bared his neck. “It is rare for me to encounter another craftsman’s work. My intent was not to pry one who is yours.”

He retreated quickly, and Harry eased the fist around his wand. 

“Thank you,” he said.

‘You feared he would mark the craftsmanship.’

‘I wouldn’t have let him take my wand away from me. It’s seen me through too much.’

“You do not easily give your trust, do you?” Salazar’s eyes bore into him. Harry avoided his gaze. “I wonder. What sort of a life you lived, to make you so. I perceive the outline of it, I believe. Perhaps one day you will share it with me in full.”

Here it was again. The feeling of being seen. Of being understood. Fully, and without judgement. Harry clenched his jaws, and Salazar, seeing this, smiled.

My story, Harry thought, Begins where yours branches out.

“Perhaps,” he said. “Though I wouldn’t hold my breath.”

“I am nothing if not tenacious, Master Potter. Give me time. I may yet prove myself worthy.”

Salazar inclined his head. He left Harry to his thoughts, and Harry, having nowhere else to turn, sat at his table. 

It was how it began.

{. . .}

The castle settled into its new routine.

The Founders held class from dawn to dusk. They taught in amphitheatres where voices echoed; they taught their own Houses in the quiet of the common room. They taught all the subjects Harry had studied, and then a handful more. Healing and swordplay, Arithmancy and Ancient Runes, Mind Arts.

The Slytherins, though faster than most, took a while to grow into their new life. The schoolroom discipline was familiar to them as a foreign language. They clenched their jaws, and they learned.

Harry taught them their letters. He helped them with homework. They listened to him with open eagerness, and Harry struggled under the weight of their expectation.

He was exhausted.

Nightmares plagued him daily. Despite the Sleeping Draughts, he hardly slept. He went through life in a haze, with leaden steps and gritty eyes. Classes finished what sleeplessness began, and left him worn to the bone. Harry gave himself to them in full.

“Can you handle a sword?” Godric asked him on a clear morning, and Harry shook his head.

“I can learn,” he said.

Godric showed him how to place his feet, how to balance his grip. He had Harry hold the blade in his non-dominant hand, and Harry looked at the blunted edge, at the distorted reflection of himself, and readied his stance.

First thing every morning was Defence. The Founders taught them to fight, Godric first among them. He made his students exercise before breakfast. They hardened their bodies and learned to bear the weight of a sword. 

Helga taught Runes and Healing, and Harry floundered with both. Her classes left his head pounding and his eyes sore. She was kind and fair in her teaching, and Harry applied himself to both subjects as best he could. Stonehenge had glowed with runes. He wanted to understand their meanings, and anchor it in the marrow of his bones.

Rowena was stern where Helga was fair. She taught Charms and Arithmancy. The latter sat at the heart of all spellwork, and she suffered no fool in her class. Harry took to it with his meagre memories of Muggle mathematics, and found, to his own surprise, he enjoyed it well. Dudley and his cohorts had kept him from stretching the scientist in himself. Harry rediscovered it with childish joy.

The Founders singled him out in Charms, in Herbology and Transfiguration. Harry sat apart from his peers, and his teachers challenged him with more advanced knowledge. He read books and essays revisiting the core of each subject. He learned to feel his own magic, and shaped it to his will.

Salazar taught Transfiguration and Mind Arts, and he taught Potions.

“I see you care not for my class,” he said, and smiled at Harry in the Potion-lit gloom.  “I ask only that you allow me to try. Let me teach you to pull a man from the brink of death. I would  show you how to make luck, or heal a lovesick mind."

Harry tried. He listened when Salazar told him about patience and precision. He watched long, clever fingers handle sharp-edged knives and poisonous plants, and mimicked each motion. He got better in leaps and bounds, and watched Salazar’s eyes dance in the cauldron's light.

It all caught up with him, eventually.

He snapped for no reason he could see, one hour too many at the end of a long day. He was in the common room, his head aching, his muscles sore. He let his housemates’ conversation wash over him, and his chest grew tight, his breathing short.

“Harry?” he heard, but shook his head. He climbed to his feet and fled, out of the common room, up the flights of stairs. He did not stop until fresh air cut his face and he was outside.

Clouds streaked the pearly sky, and the sun burned bright orange in the deep valley. Raindrops hit Harry’s flesh, bracingly cold. Harry gasped, and bared his face for it. 

He went to the Black Lake .Wind churned the dark waters, and sunlight broke itself on their imperfect mirror. Tall grass whipped his legs. Harry walked to the shores and.

And.

There had been a beech tree. He and Ron and Hermione sat in its shade on warm spring days, their backs to the wide, weathered trunk, their legs tangled in its roots.

It was not there.

Harry folded in two. A fist was clenched around his heart, and his chest. Hurt. Grief, he thought. This is what grief is like. He sank on his knees on the wet grass, and he waited. For his breathing to ease, for his heart to stop pounding. He shuddered with his arms wrapped around himself. An awful, mangled noise worked its way up his throat. His jaw ached from clamping down on it. Tears dripped down his cheeks, silent and ceaseless. 

He did not know how long he stayed there. A vast, empty numbness crept in place of the pain. Harry watched the blades of grass in front of him. He feared he would bleed out, if he moved, if he uncurled at all. The sewn seams of himself would tear, and he would come undone.

“Harry,” he heard, and a presence settled at his side. 

He felt warmth. Not close enough to touch, but close enough to bleed through the windswept space between two bodies. They stayed a long time. Unmoving. Not a word between them. Salazar did not reach for him, or offer empty words of comfort. He sat with Harry on the mud, and kept watch. 

“They’re all dead,” Harry said. “All of them. It. It’s all gone.” 

“They aren’t born,” Salazar said softly. “You may yet find your way home to them. Come.”

Salazar stood. Harry looked up at him, at the hand he offered. He clasped Salazar’s wrist, and let himself be heaved to his feet. Salazar walked back to the castle, a shadow against the watercolour blues and purples of the sky. Harry followed after him. Unfurling behind his breastbone like new growth, like skin over a scabbed wound, was something like peace.

{. . .}

“Will you follow me?” Salazar asked him one evening. “I thought we might talk.”

Harry rose, and, nodding at his Housemates, let himself be led from the common room. Salazar took him deep in the Dungeons, well under the lake, to where Hogwarts grew rough, her stone chipped and unpolished. Salazar pressed an open palm to a filled archway, and his arm sank right through. 

"After you,” he said, and Harry ducked through the enchantment, into the room beyond.

It was an office, or perhaps a laboratory. Fake windows lined the walls, gave shafts of illusory sunlight. High shelves pressed tight against the walls. They groaned under the weight of books and bottles of all shapes and colours. Gold trimmings glowed along the seam where ceiling and walls met. 

“How can I help?” Harry asked, looking around himself.

“I thought to ask this very question,” Salazar said. “I promised you, some time ago, that we might together look for ways to send you back to your own age.”

“Oh.” Harry blinked. “You meant it.”

Salazar watched him with his head tilted to the side. Harry crossed his arms over his chest.

“I rarely speak without thought,” Salazar said. “And I do mean to win your trust. However little of it you seem to have to give. I will not count myself among your betrayers.”

Harry bit his tongue hard enough to sting.

“You have to know,” Salazar said. “It might be years yet before you and I find a semblance of solution. You must ready yourself for a long wait.”

Harry closed his eyes. “I know,” he said. “I. Waiting is fine. It’s alright. But if I don’t get back. A lot of people are going to die.”

Written somewhere on the pink insides of Harry’s chest was a prophecy binding his life to another man’s. Harry had blood waiting for him at the end of this road. His, or Voldemort’s.

"Flight of Death."

“Excuse me?”

“You carry his name like a brand in your thoughts. Vol-de-mort. A strange way to name a child.”

Harry’s hand went to his waist. “Are you reading my mind?” he asked, and his voice came cold.

Salazar opened his hands in a gesture of appeasement. “I cannot help it,” he said. “I was born a Legilimens, and your mind sometimes screams at me.”

“Screams?”

“Yes. You are intense in everything you do, Harry. Is it truly a surprise your thoughts should reflect yourself?”

“You cannot know that name,” Harry said, and his heart kicked his ribs. His mouth was dry; he could feel cold sweat on his back.

“Then learn to shield yourself from me,” Salazar said. “I had not planned to start Occlumency so early in the year, but I can make you the exception. Harry. I never looked upon your thoughts if I could help it.”

Harry drew a long breath. He forced himself to stillness, forced himself to silence. He steered his thoughts clear of the future and all awaiting there. 

“Swear to me,” he said.

“I swear it,” Salazar said, and Harry.

Harry, the utter fool, believed him.

Salazar smiled. “Shall we start?” he asked. “Tell me everything you remember. From the night time spun counterwise.”

{. . .}

Later that night, Harry made his way back to the common room. The hour was close to midnight. The lamp-fires had been banked to a dull glow. Outside, the lake was a wall of black. Harry heard a noise, soft and choked, and he approached carefully.

Gytha was curled behind a settee, arms around her legs, face in her knees. Her shoulders shook.

“Hey.” Harry sat beside her. “Gytha.”

The girl tensed.

“You don’t have to say anything. Just shake or nod. Are you hurt anywhere?”

She shook her head.

Harry relaxed. “Alright,” he said. “I’m going to stay right here, yeah? I don’t know what’s wrong, but I’ll just stay with you. If you want to talk, I’ll be here. If you don’t, I’ll be here, too.”

Gytha peered at him with eyes reddened from crying. She scrubbed her cheeks with the heel of her hands. “Sorry,” she said. “Sorry. Please, don’t mind me. I'm being a fool.”

“I very much doubt that,” Harry said, and she gave a tremulous smile. “And even if you are. Whatever it is, I promise you, I’ve done much worse.”

She giggled, then shivered. Harry pressed a shoulder to hers. He remembered Salazar by the lake. The warmth of him. The solid presence. He had not left Harry alone to his grief.

Gytha leaned back against him.

“It’s my family,” she said, softly. “I just realised. I don’t think I will ever see them again.”

"Why not?”

“They are Muggle. I ran from them before Lord Slytherin found me. There was a witch in my village. They saw to it she burned. My father held the torch.”

Harry closed his eyes. “I’m so sorry," he said.

“I didn’t know,” Gythat said. “No one had told me what I was, then, but I knew . So I left without saying goodbye. I think. I think they will kill me, before calling me daughter again.”

“I know some of what it’s like,” Harry told her. “To be feared by your own family.” He pressed harder against her, and she put her head on his shoulder. “But you’re here now, love. Family doesn’t always go with blood, and we’ve got you. You found your way home already.”

They stayed like that a while, sharing warmth. Listening to the lake outside.

“Have you?” Gytha asked. She had stopped crying some time ago. “Found your way home?”

She gave Harry a pause.

He thought about his life here. He thought about studying into the late hours of the night surrounded by his Housemates’ voices. Parchment everywhere, the sharp smell of ink. Ghostly shapes swimming by the windows, and the gentle lapping of water. He thought about cold early morning air, the burn of well-worked muscles, the weight of a sword in his hand. Simmering cauldrons, sparkling bursts of power. He thought about rolling clouds reflected on dark waters and sharp laughter ringing down stone corridors.

He thought about smooth scales on his shoulders and sly, sideways smiles that felt like victory.

Harry wrapped an arm around Gytha’s shoulders, and she nestled close to his side.

“I don’t know,” he said.

Chapter Text

There were moments when the world held its breath and waited in suspense. Turning points in the life of a man where instant decisions changed the turn of events. Some paths fell into shadows, others emerged from a convergence of choices. Shards of possibilities cut through the fabric of time, and the universe shifted.

She did not know when her universe had started to shift. When the wheel of fate spun her thread into a different shape. Snarling. Pulsing with war drums. There had been no gut-wrenching sense of impending danger, no bell tolling in warning. Only the vague awareness that came with standing on the brink of a precipice with her eyes closed. Everything unstable. Ready to fall with the tipping of scales.

It happened quickly, in the end. She chose.

She fell.

{. . .}

She landed rough. Twisting darkness rearranged her limbs. Flesh slapped on bared bones, on wet muscle and the squirming of sinew. She scraped her hands and bruised her knees. Her skull clanged like a bell. Everything hurt. Air gurgled down her lungs. Her heart lurched in her ears, deafening, shattering her thoughts with each vicious beat. Beyond herself, the world was blurred. Distant, as though seen behind thick glass. All shapes clouded, all sounds muffled. Bodies moved at the edges of her consciousness. Dashes light and life, far away, drowned under the shrill hissing in her ears.

"Watch where you're going, sweetheart!"

"What's wrong with her?"

Voices. People. So many people. So many indistinct features, none of them right. All of them wrong wrong wrong. They parted before her like water, wariness in countless stares. She carried fire and war like a blood-stained cloak. They scented its stink on her skin.

A hand touched her arm, and thunder roared in her ears. She did not want to be touched. There was a hole at her side and the taste of her own betrayal on her tongue.

"All right, love?"

An old woman. She had a kind, wrinkled face and soft green eyes. Green as spring grass. Not the right shade, not right at all.

"Dear – is that blood? Did you have an accident? Sweet thing, you should sit. Let me call an ambulance. You’re pale as a sheet."

She wrenched away, evaded the gentle touch, the startled grass-green eyes wrong wrong wrong looking at her in alarm, and would her heart stop pounding, she needed to think. No ambulance. No authorities. She. She had to find.

Harry, oh God, where's Harry?

"Who's Harry, love?"

Her mind cleared. Ice chased the veil of shock, and the world came into merciless focus. The cold rain in her hair. The blood oozing from her scalp.

Hermione breathed deeply once, twice, hands closing into fists to keep from shaking.

She stood on the side of a road with no idea how she had gotten there. Stone buildings stood on either side of the street, smooth glass and stainless steel reaching up to the darkened skies. The pavement ran slick with rain and melting snow. Cars splashed the mush on the bustling passers-by.

"Where am I?" she asked, the detached calm of her voice foreign to her own ears.

The old woman reached a hesitant hand toward Hermione, the palm open in offering. Ready, Hermione thought, to catch her if she fell.

She had fallen once already, and had no intentions of doing so again.

“Where,” she said.

“Tottenham Court Road," the old woman said, and Hermione felt herself pale. Nausea roiled in her stomach. The persistent pounding of blood was back in her ears, a loud thumping noise. She. She was in Central London. She was back where the hunt started, all those months ago. She was.

She was miles from Stonehenge.

The woman was talking again, but Hermione could not make out the words. Black cabs rushed by, Muggles hurried away, coats drawn up to their ears against the biting rain, and Hermione staggered.

What had she done?

"Can you hear me, love? Listen, you should – "

"Run, Hermione! Disapparate!"

" – a moment. Did you hit your head? Do you even know? Can you tell me your name, or today’s date?”

Time was all wrong. It stretched and turned seconds into decades of agony. It sped moments of peace into faded into memories. All became dust, with time, as inevitable as the revolution of the Earth. She did not. Remember the date. She remembered screams. She remembered the black-clad shapes, the bone-white masks. She remembered heart-wrenching panic, the fear humming in her blood. She remembered Harry pushing her in front of him, and the shortness of her breath, the burn of her legs. Blood-red and death-green bolts of light past her ears. The mud, the rain, the stones.

"Run, Hermione! Disapparate!"

Her frantic pulse, so quick she had feared her heart would burst from her chest, and Harry’s eyes, green as sea glass, aglow with power.

"NOW!"

She remembered leaving.

Slytherin's Locket hung heavy around her neck, the gold chain cold on her skin. You left, it crooned.You abandoned him, left him to die, you ran, you left, he's alone now, poor little Hermione, so scared, so lost.

"I have to go back," she said.

"Go whe – "

The last words were lost to the hubbub of the crowd. Hermione ducked into the flow of passers-by. She tried to melt in the mass of bodies, of business women, construction workers and uni students hurrying home through the polar sleet. As though her trousers were not caked with mud. As though her jumper were not blood-soaked. 

She was painfully aware of time, passing. How long, she wondered, had it been. Since she Disapparated. Since she left Harry alone. How much time before he cracked. Before the Dark Lord was called.

Panting, she shoved herself in an alleyway tucked between two walls. The walls glistened with rainwater. She braced her arms against the dark brick. It was cold. Cold and wet and real. She forced a deep breath, and anchored herself back inside her own body. Now was not the time for dread, or weariness.

Water trickled down the bend of her neck. The tumult of the busy street was more distant here. The purr of engines, the pound of footsteps, the murmur of voices. Now more than ever, the few steps between Hermione and Muggle life seemed a great distance away. The balance of the world was shifting. She could feel it in her bones, happening at this very moment, and none of them knew. Their last hope in a war they did not know fought for his life, and they ignored his very existence.

He's fighting alone, all alone, left to die by his very best friend – 

She dug her nails in her wounded arm.

Get a hold of yourself, Granger.

Lips pressed in a tight line, she breathed slowly through her nose. She needed a plan.There's no time for a plan. She needed backup.There's no one to turn to. She needed to be strong.There's no strength left in you.

"Oh, do shut up," she snapped. She wrapped a hand around the Locket. "I don't have time for you."

She detached from the wall. Desperate times called for desperate measures. She sank a hand in the beaded handbag, and called her potion case to her fingers. A great ruckus came from the depths of the bag – she really needed to store the books away from everything else. The leather pouch slapped into her palm. She pulled the drawstrings open, and extracted a potion vial. Electric blue.

She closed her eyes, thumbed it open, and swallowed the contents in two great gulps. Warmth spread through her like wildfire through tall grass. She stopped shaking.

Then she turned on her heels and was gone.

Something you must understand: It never sat well with her, how some Hogwarts students were more powerful than others. Harry, for example, carried enough magic in his bones to fuel a nuclear powerplant. As a child, it struck Hermione as unbearably unfair. For all the arguments of philosophers, Men were not born equal, and though she was without doubt above average, pure-bloods bore more magic in their veins than her.

But where they held the benefit of their birth, Hermione had bullheaded stubbornness on her side. She refused. Refused. To let such a thing as genetic lottery set limitations on what she could or could not do. At all of eleven years old, here is what she did. 

She studied. 

She buried herself in books. She read well into the night, until her eyes stung and her head swam for lack of sleep. Her teachers mistook her for a genius, when the simpler truth behind her good grades was sheer will . She clawed her way to the top of her every classes. What she lacked in strength, she gained in control. She came to understand her powers better than pure-bloods understood genealogy. 

Today, it saved her life.

She Apparated in complete silence.

"What happened? What in all the hells happened?"

Hermione flattened herself to the ground behind a large boulder, a hand pressed against her mouth to keep from crying out.

Stonehenge crawled with Death Eaters.

"You! Take care of the Muggles. Don't want vermin mucking about. I don't care what you do, just keep them away! Someone tell me if they're alive. Goyle, call Snape and Malfoy right now. I don’t care if the pricks are busy, just. Get them here. And for pity’s sake, stay away from the cursed stones! "

"They're breathing, sir! They're alive!"

Hermione curled tight behind her rock. Her heart raced. There were so many of them. There had not been this many, before. Something. Something had happened. Something big. She. She needed to find Harry. 

Footsteps.

She pulled the beaded handbag open. Her fingers shook. The booted feet drew close. Closer. A pile of books tottered under her fingertips and her breath stuck in her throat. Where was it. Where – 

"So, what d'you reckon happened to them?"

"Not sure I wanna know. It took out Lestrange. I'm not going' any closer to these stones than I have to."

She touched silken fabric, cloth sleek as water.

"Is that a footprint?"

Hermione draped the Invisibility Cloak around her shoulders just as two men walked around her boulder.

"Anything?"

"Nah. We’re clear."

She held her breath until they went away, her lungs screaming. The two men wore the Death Eaters regalia minus their masks. No need for that, she supposed, now their Master controlled the Ministry. Hermione had never seen either of them before. The Dark Lord had been recruiting.

She stood slowly, the Cloak tucked tight around herself.

There were bodies. They laid haphazardly on the muddy ground, their limbs sprawled at odd angles. Unmoving. Masks hid their faces, gave the impression of deathly pallor, of exsanguinated corpses. There were the Death Eaters who attacked her and Harry. Their comrades cast protective wards over them. There was no point in protecting the dead, all the more’s the pity.

She squinted. There was. Something. Strange shapes between the standing stones. The ground looked scorched. She edged closer, one careful step after the next. Puffs of smoke rose from the soil. The grass that grew between the monoliths was singed. Soot marks marred the ground, curling designs that ran all the way to a lonely boulder at the centre of the two rings of stones, complex arrays overlapping, forming a strange layout that could not be accidental. Runes, Hermione thought. Runes by the hundreds.

Harry was not here.

Harry was not there.

She drew a sharp, shaky breath. Her ears rang. Her heart beat too fast, too hard. She scanned the ground, she looked and looked, but all she could see were more prone, black-clad bodies. More runes. Nothing more. 

"What are you doing here? "

She startled. A man walked past her, his cloak brushing her shoes. Thorfinn Rowle. She knew him. He had been at Bill and Fleur's wedding. He was a mountain of a man, broad-chested with a thick face. Hermione locked herself in place, willing herself not to move. Not to betray herself.

"Think there's time to dawdle, do you?" Rowle growled. "Go help Selwyn with the Muggles, or I swear you'll be the one calling our Lord when we're done here."

"Y-yes, sir," squealed a voice behind Hermione. "Sorry, sir. I was just wondering, these marks – "

"You’re not here to think, boy. Go do your job if you don't want me doing mine. GOYLE! Where's Malfoy, you incompetent – "

Crack!

"I hope,” drawled a cold, clear voice behind Hermione. She closed her eyes. “For your sake, Rowle, this summon is justified.”

Lucius Malfoy stood beside her in a richly-embroidered cloak. A tall, slim woman held his arm. She had the same white-blond hair, the same aristocratic grace. His wife. Severus Snape was on her other side. Greasy-haired and sallow-skinned. He looked thinner than usual. The tight, angular lines of his face jutted out against the black of his flowing robes. 

“Lord, Lady,” Rowle said. “See for yourselves.”

He gestured them toward Stonehenge, and Hermione exhaled a slow breath. She followed them a distance away.

The soot marks, she saw, were not precisely soot marks. The ground had been gored. Runes seared the soil, great lacerations several inches deep. Three circles of varying width girdled Stonehenge. A seven-point star linked as many of its monoliths, a triangle three others, perfect geometry interwoven with runes. Spellwork layered over spellwork. It was a work of artistry.

The air sang with power. She could taste ozone on her tongue, the distant promise of a storm. She touched a stone with two fingers, and a shiver crawled up her skin. Ghostly heat of a dying star, the dark crush of ocean depths, the musky scent of wet earth, and it was spinning backwards, all of it, the stones and the sky and  – 

"Bella," someone breathed behind her.

Hermione wrenched her hand away with a soundless gasp. Black dots danced before her eyes. The ground tilted up and close, and she fell on her knees, her legs like two strings of melted rubber. 

She breathed heavily, an arm around her stomach. She looked up, her sight swimming, and saw nerveless, delicate fingers holding a bone-white mask.

Narcissa Malfoy knelt on the ground without a care for the mud on her fine robes. She pressed a hand to a woman’s chest. The woman laid still and slack. Heavily-hooded eyes, livid skin, a strong jaw. An air of faded beauty. Even in unconsciousness, the reek of madness clung to Bellatrix Lestrange. Her lush black hair fanned out like a pool of the darkest ink. She looked like a slumbering panther; wild and dangerous, bloodthirsty for all her languid slouch. Her chest rose and fell under her sister’s touch.

Hermione made herself look away. She needed to go. She had to get out of here. She made to rise to her feet. Froze. There were eyes on her. Dark, unfathomable, narrowed with suspicion. Snape looked at her, and Hermione tasted blood from her bitten lips, the tang sharp and coppery. The ground was tilting again. She was rooted on the spot, limbs sunken into the mud, her body like lead. With a sense of detachment, she waited for Snape to call out. The man was an accomplished Legillimens, surely he heard the scream of her thoughts, high-pitched and desperate and – 

"Severus," Narcissa said, and Snape looked away. "Is there anything you can do? She's very weak. I believe something is wrong with her magic. I barely feel her.”

Hermione was shaking. Nothing made sense, except everything did . She had felt the penny drop, the path lock around her feet. Something had changed, in the primaeval fabric of the world, and there was no coming back from it.

“She has been drained,” Snape said. “Something, or someone, syphoned her dry. Whatever happened here dealt with great amounts of power.”

Lestrange gasped awake. She drew a long, whistling breath, and all activity stopped. Death Eaters froze where they stood. Eyes snapped on Lestrange, waiting in bated breath to see whether she regained her bearings.

"Bella?" Narcissa said. "Can you hear me, sister?"

“Cissy?” Lestrange’s voice came weak and wrecked. Narcissa clasped one of her hands between hers, whispering a string of appeasing words.

"We have to get them to St Mungo's," Snape said. "They need professional care." A delicate pause. "They need it urgently."

Lucius gave Rowle a sharp nod. Hermione ignored the ensuing snap of orders. She angled herself toward the Black sisters, ears straining. Lestrange attempted to prop herself up on her elbows, her arms trembling with effort.

"What happened, Bella?" Narcissa asked. "Tell us what did this to you."

Lestrange blinked up at the other woman. She looked feverish, her gaze vacant. "Where's the brat?" she muttered. The hand not shackled in Narcissa's hold patted down her pockets, searching for a wand. "Where's the filthy half-blood?"

The Malfoys exchanged a glance. Hermione's breath quickened.

"Was Potter here, Bellatrix?" Malfoy asked carefully. "Did he do something to the stones?"

"The st – " Lestrange's eyes drifted, a frown on her brow. A violent shiver shook her.

"Bella?" Narcissa asked.

"Potter," Lestrange muttered. Her crazed eyes focused on the lonely boulder at the centre of Stonehenge. "He was here. The mudblood escaped but he was here. He was here.”

“And where,” Snape said. “Is he now?”

"He was here. He. He was. Where is he? Where – let me up, Cissy. We had him. We – ” 

Narcissa gripped her shoulders tight, kept her from rising. "Did Potter do this, Bella?" she asked.

"Don't be ridiculous," her husband said. "The boy doesn't have the power to conjure such magic."

"Yet he escaped, my love. Once more he proves himself a match for the Dark Lord. I recall that you yourself thought he may– "

"A discussion for another time, Narcissa," Snape said. "Another place."

"He disappeared," Lestrange said. "It all stopped after he disappeared."

"What stopped?"

The corner of Bellatrix's mouth twitched. "The burn."

"We must report to our Lord, Severus," Malfoy said. “If Potter truly disappeared – " His voice trailed off. "Rowle. Get everyone moving. I want the wounded evacuated within the next ten minutes."

Hermione clambered to her feet. The world clouded at the edges. She moved in a haze, past pain, past sorrow. She should have left minutes ago, she knew. Her thoughts came frayed, driftwood on a capricious sea. The only coherence was the soul-crushing ache that pulsed through her to the rhythm of the Locket's litany. He's gone, gone gone gone, taken away where you can't follow, your fault, all your fault, what will you do now, poor little Hermione, he's gone gone gone – 

The Cloak slipped from her shoulders, and everything happened at once. Hermione stood witness, a stranger in her own body. She saw:

A ferocious spark in Lestrange's eyes. Glowing wands. Pressure against her skin, the feel of wards breaking. A sound like gunfire. Red hair, familiar faces like colourful ghosts. Screams and bursts of lights. She did not remember moving or diving for cover. Death rushed at her in emerald sparks.

Strong arms closed around her waist, and darkness swallowed her whole.

She could not breathe, could not see, could not hear. Iron bands constricted her chest, her head. She was forced through a rubber tube, unable to move, to do anything. It spat her back and she slumped, dizzy, panting, the arms around her the only thing keeping her on her feet. The man behind her shook uncontrollably. Great tremors wracked him, wracked her. He was not holding her so much as holding on.

"You're alright," he breathed in her ear, soft and full of relief.

She knew that voice.

"Let me go," she said. "Let me down."

The arms unwound from her waist. Cold air replaced body warmth.

Hermione shifted her weight, spun with a fist pulled up. She clipped Ron on the jaw with everything she had.

Ron reeled back with a grunt, his eyes wide with shock and hurt but not pain, and because he deserved it and she was so angry she could hardly see straight, Hermione followed him and punched him again. It wasn't fair, was not rational, but she no longer cared about justice, about logic, all the tiredness and despair and hopelessness of the last few months condensing into pure, burning fury.

"You," she growled, and raised her fist. Her knuckles ached. "How dare you – "

"Mione – "

"Shut up! " She punched him in the stomach, and he stood there and took it. "You left, Ronald, you utter – How could you? "

Ron looked at her with an air of resigned desolation. She wanted to wipe the expression off his face with her fists. He had no right. No right. To feel sorry. He abandoned her. Abandoned Harry. Now Harry was gone, gone , and if Ron hadn't left – If you hadn't left – perhaps things would be different. He was too late – you were too late – and he thought he could just saunter back into her life as if nothing had happened, as if nothing was completely, utterly wrong .

"I'm sorry, 'Mione, I'm so sorry – "

"Do you have any idea what it was like?" she said. Her voice shook. “Any idea at all , what we went through. What we endured. Harry – ”

There was something pleading in Ron's eyes she could not bear to see. For days after he stormed out on them, she sat hoping. Pleading. For him to come back to them. To her. Days became weeks, and weeks, months. They survived on stolen food and scant hours of sleep, she and Harry. They lived like animals, lived in fear, wondering how long they had before Voldemort caught them. Before their broken bodies were displayed in the public square. It had been hell, and Ron had not been there. To make Harry laugh, to make Hermione smile. He had not been there when they needed him most, and now.

She hit him one more time, just because she could. She kept her fist against his heart, and felt it pulse against her hand.

“Hermione,” Ron said, softly. He covered her hand with his own, pressed her fist harder against his chest. “Hermione, please. Tell me. Where’s Harry?”

Hermione closed her eyes.

“I don’t know,” she said, and swayed on her feet. “I think he’s gone.”

Ron went still. “Gone,” he said, voice blank. “D’you mean. Merlin, Hermione, please, tell me he’s not – ”

She shook her head. A full-body shiver went through her, from neck to toes. “Don’t know,” she said again, faintly. 

The next thing she knew, she was on a wide, comfortable couch. A quilt had been laid over her. Warmth suffused her limbs. She had forgotten what it was like. Being warm. A headache pounded behind her eyes, but the pain from her wounded arm was gone. She blinked at the ceiling overhead. Firelight danced on the gnarled wood.

"Back with us?"

Loose-limbed with sleep, she manoeuvred herself on a side, orienting toward the voice. Ginny. Ginny watched her with a leg thrown over the arm of her recliner. Her red hair glowed like coals in the hearth light. 

"Hey," Hermione murmured

She was in the Burrow's living room. The low-ceilinged, cluttered room was silent save for the regular ticking of an ancient clock, the crackles of a burning log. Wind whispered against the sturdy walls. Night had fallen outside. Shafts of moonlight pooled on the rug-covered floor. 

“How do you feel?” Ginny asked. “Remus said you’d be muggy. Said you overdosed on Invigoration Draughts."

“I’m alright.”

Hermione propped herself up. She drew her legs to her chest. Someone had taken the time to rid her of her blood-stained, muddy clothes. She was left wearing a loose, white T-shirt and a pair of sweatpants too big for her.

"How long was I out?" she asked. Dread ran with the sluggish flow of her blood, lifting the shroud of sleepiness.

"Just about four hours," Ginny said. "Charlie patched you up as best he could. They thought it best to let you sleep. You were a wreck."

Ginny looked tired herself. Her cheekbones jutted out against the tense lines of her face. Her eyes were bruised dark. There was a stiffness in the set of her shoulders that put Hermione in mind of a hissing cat.

“Are you?” Hermione asked. “Alright.”

Ginny gave a sardonic smile. “Tell me,” she said. “Tell me he isn’t dead.”

Every time Hermione closed her eyes, she saw blood gushing from a torn back. She saw bruises on protruding ribs, burnt flesh on shaking arms. An emaciated face, the too-sharp outline of high cheekbones, the grim downturn of snarling lips.

Ginny put her head in her hands at the prolonged silence. For that reason alone, for the shuttered pain on Ginny’s face and because he was the greatest moron to ever live, too blind to see people were willing to die for him as much as he for them, because he was selfish enough to sacrifice himself as though it was nothing, Hermione was going to kill Harry with her bare hands the moment she found him back.

"Why does it always have to be him?" Ginny said, low and rough and angry. 

“I think,” Hermione said. “I think I would know it. If he were dead. I think a piece of me would be missing.” She watched the bowed line of Ginny’s back, the tight clench of her fingers. “Do you still love him?”

Ginny huffed a broken laugh. “Do you ever stop?” she asked. “Loving someone. Is there such a thing as falling out of love?” She shook her head. “I don’t love him how I used to. But I don’t think I’ll ever be fully rid of him.”

Hermione thought about the way Ron laughed, loud and full-bellied. The way he looked at her, his eyes creased at the corners. She thought she understood.

“I’m the one who ended it,” Ginny said. “Did you know? I just. I knew. I couldn’t hold on to him.”

Hermione nodded. This, too, she understood. She had watched a nation put its hopes in winning a war on a seventeen-year-old, only for him to take the responsibility and not break from the weight of it.

Harry joked and laughed and managed all the adolescent antics admirably, but none of his masks concealed the truth of him. Hermione had known him since he was an eleven-year-old boy with wary eyes too big for his face and clothes better suited for someone twice his size, and she was anything but stupid. Harry may have convinced himself he was like the rest of them, but she saw him, bloody and victorious, after he killed a Basilisk. She saw him fend three hundred Dementors alone. She saw him face the greatest Dark Lord of their age, and come out alive.

There was a strength to him. A gravity. Harry stood apart, and he stood alone.

Hermione had long since accepted the risks that came with loving him like a brother. She wondered, sometimes, what it would take to have his heart. What sort of person could love him, and hold fast. Who could stand beside him, and not not burn.

"I’m sorry," she said, aching for Ginny, for Harry, for the unfairness of it all. 

Ginny gave a tight nod.

"Tell me about Hogwarts," Hermione said. “You’re on Winter Break?"

“Term starts tomorrow," Ginny said. "I'm not looking forward to it. You know Snape's Headmaster?”

“I've heard.”

“You're lucky you dropped out, 'Mione. Hogwarts has changed. Snape changed it. We have a Muggle Studies teacher who tells us Muggle enslavement is the natural order of things, and a Defence professor who wants us to Crucio First years.”

Hermione clenched her jaws. Hogwarts had been built a haven for their kind to learn magic, safe among their own people. Their entire world had been shaped in its shadows. The idea of Voldemort stomping on its legend with pureblood ideology – 

“Yeah,” Ginny said. “It’s bad. Even the Slytherins, believe it or not, don't seem too happy with the state of things. Not that the bastards say anything about it, mind.”

"Do you?" Hermione asked. "Say anything about it?"

"We do what we can. We've reformed the DA, Neville, Luna and I. It's not easy."

“I’m surprised your parents let you go back.”

"They didn’t have a choice. People who don’t send their kids to Hogwarts go to Azkaban. We’re hostages, Hermione. Through us, he’s got the country on its knees.”

The door to the Weasley's kitchen opened. Light and voices came pouring out, and both girls startled. Hermione climbed to her feet as Bill Weasley came walking out.

“She’s awake,” he said over his shoulder, and gave Hermione a friendly smile. “How are you feeling?”

"Much better," Hermione said.

Bill gestured toward the kitchen. “Up to talk?”

Hermione nodded, and joined him at the door. Inside, the Weasleys and their guests were crammed around the large kitchen table. The air was stuffy with body heat. All the Weasleys were here; Fred and George, Charlie, Ron, Mr and Mrs Weasley. Only Percy was absent. Fleur sat beside Remus Lupin, with Tonks across from her. Everyone bore the same haunted look, the same dark bags under the eyes. There were new age-lines at the corners of Mrs Weasley's mouth, near Mr Weasley's thinning hairline. A fresh scar slashed Lupin’s forehead, red and raw. He was all bones and sinew, lean as a greyhound.

Ron pulled out her chair, and Hermione sat. Ginny, her chin stuck out in defiance, sat beside her.

“Hermione,” Lupin said. His fingers were laced on the tabletop, white-knuckled. When he looked at her, his eyes flashed bright yellow. “Thank you for joining us. Will you tell us what happened? Start at the beginning, if you please.”

Ron served her a cup of tea. Hermione wrapped her hands around the hot china. She felt oddly detached from herself, floating a step outside her own body. Dissociation, she thought, and pressed her palms against her mug until they burned.

She talked.

She talked about Godric's Hollow, and how the Dark Lord caught their scent. The screams. The wet crack of Harry’s ribs. Running by the light of burning houses. The clear, cold air. Red splotches on the snow. Harry writhing in agony, and Voldemort’s cry of rage when Hermione grabbed his hand and Disapparated with him.

She edited the Horcruxes from her story, and told them everything. She told them about the hunt that followed. About running without rest. They could not stay in one place for more than half a day. She told them about the near-misses, about the slow, creeping tiredness. She told them about Stonehenge. About the runes. About leaving, and coming back.

"How did you find me?" she asked, her throat raw from talking.

"I was stationed at St Mungo's," Tonks said. “We had the feeling something was wrong. The Death Eaters have been in a right state since you visited the Hollow. We were prepared to act. When Rowle and his lads burst into the hospital, yelling nonsense about Stonehenge, we were ready."

"We need to take a better look at Stonehenge," Lupin said. "To understand what happened to Harry. See if we – how we can find our way to him."

"There are loads of old legends around this place," Bill said. "It's been a subject of speculation in Curse-Breaker circles for generations. Some believe Merlin himself built it."

“There’s no need to go back,” Hermione said. “I got a good look at it. Give me some parchment. Charcoal, too.”

She took a sip of her tea, and got to work.

{. . .}

"Can I talk to you?"

Hermione, leaden with exhaustion, her eyes gritty from overwork, turned toward Ron. The boy stood behind her, a foot on the first staircase step. He gripped the bannister with a white-knuckled hand, but held his head high, and met her eyes without flinching. Bravery, Hermione thought, tiredly. Bloody Gryffindors. Looking at Ron hurt like a knife between the ribs.

She nodded.

Relief flooded Ron's eyes. "My room?" he said.

They climbed the uneven stairs up to the Burrow’s top floor. Ron's shoulders hunched more and more as the ceiling lowered. They went past empty rooms, the doors left afar. The others were still in the kitchen, pouring over Hermione's notes, discussing the best course of action. Mrs Weasley had ushered Hermione from the room when Hermione threatened to fall off her chair in sheer exhaustion. "It's all right now,” she’d said. “We'll take it from here. You've done enough dear, go get some rest," and Hermione nearly sobbed in relief. She had been forced into adulthood the day she wiped her parents' memories. She learned to care for herself in the most trying way possible. It felt good, just this once, to let someone take charge of her wellbeing.

Ron pushed open a door labelled 'Ronald's Room'. Hermione followed him into the small, welcoming space, with its burnt-orange walls, its sloping ceiling and clustered furniture.

"Er – would you like to sit?"

She flopped down unceremoniously on the rug-padded floor. Ron sank in front of her, his back against the foot of the bed. For the first time since he rescued her, Hermione allowed herself to look at him. Some months had gone by since she last saw him. He was no longer the gangly teenager she remembered. His shoulders had broadened, muscles filling out all the right places. He looked at ease in his own skin. Freckles still dusted his long nose, delicate pink spots on pale skin. There were bruises under his eyes. A sense of gravity that had not been there before.

"You cut your hair," Hermione said.

“Yeah.” Ron gave a lopsided smile. “Kept falling in my eyes.” He drew a deep breath. “Listen,” he said, and squared his shoulders. “I know excuses are probably the last thing you want to hear from me, but. I wanted to say. I. I wanted to explain.”

“Please, do,” Hermione murmured.

Ron clenched his jaw. “I regretted leaving the moment I did,” he said. “I tried. I tried to find you again, but when I Apparated back to camp, you were gone already. I couldn’t find you. Didn’t know what to do, so I went to Bill’s. Was too ashamed of myself to show my face home.”

Hermione bit her tongue. Bitterness coated her throat. Ron saw the look on her face, and gave a minute flinch.

"I looked for you," he said. "I looked everywhere I could think, but you hid too well. I couldn’t find you. Then one night, I heard you call my name." Hermione cocked a sceptical eyebrow. "It came from Dumbledore's Deluminator. I clicked it, and this ball of light went right into my chest." Ron pressed a hand to his heart. "I packed my things. It took me to the Forest of Dean. I knew you two were around, but you were warded tight, so I waited. You never showed up. The Deluminator took me to another location, then another one. Snatchers were on your tail, so I led them away a couple of times. And tonight." Ron shook his head. “I knew I’d find you tonight. I’m sorry I was too late to find Harry, too.”

Hermione closed her eyes. What-ifs and near-misses. What would have happened, she wondered, if Ron found them before the attack. She wanted to scream.

“Did you find anything, with the Horcruxes?" Ron asked.

Hermione dug Slytherin's Locket from under her jumper. Gold and green glittered in half-gloom. Ron breathed a sharp breath.

“I hate that thing,” he said with fervour. “I could hear it whisper to me.”

“So can I,” Hermione said. She tugged the Locket back under her shirt. The cold metal settled against her skin. It never warmed to body heat.

"I'm sorry, Hermione," Ron said. “I can never say it enough. I’m so sorry I left.”

“You're not the only one who left,” Hermione said. 

“You,” Ron said. He sounded scandalised. “You did not fail him, 'Mione. You saved your life when it was the only thing you could have done. I left because I got tired.”

“And yet,” Hermione said. “Here we are.”

Ron shifted up on his knees. He grabbed her shoulders. Made her look at him. His eyes were dark in the muted bedroom light. Hermione watched the line of his jaw, the bow of his lips. His eyes fell to her mouth.

When he pulled her to his chest, she went willingly. He wrapped both arms around her waist. She rested her head on the curve of his shoulder. Breathing the warm scent of him. He held her close, and for the first time in months, Hermione felt safe. They clung to each other like two drifters lost at sea, fingers flush against ribs, skin on warm skin.

“We’ll find him,” Ron whispered in her hair. Hermione shivered. “I promise you, Hermione. We’ll find him together.”

Chapter Text

There were maps everywhere. Wedged in place under books, pinned to the ceiling like cobwebs, stacked on desks and chairs and canvassing the floor in thick sheets of parchment. The library was covered in them. They made the whole room groan in the wind as though it were alive, the stomach of some great beast seen from the inside.

Cadmus brushed fingers on the dry, wrinkled paper as he walked between the familiar aisles. Crushed charcoal and pigments clung to his skin. His hands looked like maps, smeared forest-green, smudged river-blue.

Sunlight streamed down from hidden windows, the thin rays slanting through the dusty confines in colourful prisms. People laughed outside. "Look," they said, and Cadmus heard them. "The Peverell boy with his maps again. Come out, come out, Peverell boy. Come out and play.”

Cadmus could not. He pressed a thumb to harsh mountaintops. Shouldn't spend all his time alone with mouldy old books, people said, but he liked it here. Besides, Mum said he had to, and she was never wrong.

Strange woman, they said, when they talked about her. Unnatural. 

Cadmus bet they were jealous. His mum went to the forest and came home smelling of the trees. She brought him rocks and flowers and squirming tadpoles. Cadmus kept the tadpoles in a bucket in his rooms. He and his brother watched them swim and swim.

Still, there were. Lots of maps. They were so dull. Cadmus didn't understand why he had to study them. His brothers didn’t. Antioch was too old and trained to fight. Ignotus was a baby. Smaller than Cadmus; couldn't even read. So Cadmus was alone with the old tutor who had a voice that droned and droned and smelled like old people and fell asleep a lot.

But Mum said Cadmus had to know his geography, so Cadmus learned.

Cadmus tapped his chin in consideration. The old tutor wasn't there, and neither was Mum, and there were way too many maps in here. Perhaps. Perhaps he could go outside with the other boys. Just once. Just today.

He nudged the maps clogging the door and sidled out the corridor. He walked on tiptoes. Didn’t want Father to see him. Father was always cross, one way or another.

Cadmus had always hated their home. A cold, draughty stack of grey stones. Always damp. The whole thing was held together by wood joists and squeaked at night. It was grim and dreary and full of ghosts, and everything was so much worse today because no one was there –

Cadmus frowned. Why was no one here? He didn't like to be alone.

Everything was very quiet. The crackle of parchment had gone. The voices outside, too. All left was thick, oppressive nothingness. Cadmus shifted from foot to foot.

"Mum?" he called, hopeful. His mum was always here when he needed her. When he was scared or had a nightmare. She always knew.

"Mum?"

Oh.

Cadmus blinked. He had forgotten.

Mum wasn’t here anymore.

Head spinning a little, he looked down at his colour-stained hands. His stomach squirmed. The blue-greens were all red, were warm and slick and dripped down his fingers.

Something grabbed his ankle from the sticky blackness that lingered at his feet. It pulled before Cadmus could scream, and he hit the ground hard, his heart thudding. He kicked out, but there were fingers around his ankle, clamped hard and tight.

"Oh no oh no lemme go, please – " He stifled a sob and wiggled and kicked, but the fingers held on, and Cadmus twisted, got a hand under him.

He came face to face with his mother.

Her eyes were huge. Her lips were blue. Her skin was very, very white.

Cadmus froze. His heart pounded very loud in his ears.

"North," his mother said, and her voice was awful. A red bubble popped at the corner of her mouth. Black bruising ringed her throat. “Go North, Cadmus. The place I showed you. Promise. Promise me."

Cadmus was gasping and trembling and his hands were red and dripping blood.

"Go with your brothers. Say you'll go. Say it."

He could go North. He knew the way.

His hands were wet, sticky with shocking, vivid red. Everything spun and spun, and his father was here, appearing out of nowhere, without warning. He looked mad. Yellow foam spittled from his mouth.

" You filthy witch, ” he said, and advanced toward them, a giant with giant's fists, and Cadmus whimpered. He looked at his mother, but she was not moving any more, her eyes huge and empty and – 

A sharp pain stung his cheek. Cadmus gasped awake to the sound of his brother's voice.

"Wake up, idiot!"

Breath short, he struggled to sit up. His balance tipped. Antioch caught him before he fell off the horse, and pushed him back on the saddle.

"Bloody hell," Antioch said. "Told you not to sleep up here. You could crack your head falling down."

"Sorry." Cadmus rubbed sleep from his eyes. He scrubbed the after-images of his mother, disjointed in death, grey and not breathing. He chewed his tongue until he was sure he wouldn't cry. “Are we there yet?”

“You tell me,” Antioch grumbled.

Careful not to disturb Ignotus who slumbered in front of him on the horse, Cadmus looked around. Endless fields, the stretch of a river in the distance.

"We're in Pictland," he said. He pointed at the river. "That's Moray Firth."

Hours later, the thin rope of water had grown into a river larger than Cadmus had ever seen. Its muddy banks were covered in reeds. At the middle, brackish water turned clear enough to see the riverbed stones.

They left the horse before they crossed. Antioch went first, a rope around his waist. He waddled in the murky water with a log of driftwood to keep afloat. Cadmus feared he'd be swept off to sea, but he ploughed on through the eddies. On the other side, he tied the rope to a tree. Cadmus and Ignotus followed together, clutching it for dear life.

They walked.

Cadmus felt as though he had been in a swamp since they fled their home. Each step pulled him down into stagnant, mud-like water. The world had come crashing down around his ears, and now he drowned in bogwater.

Small fingers tugged his wrist. Cadmus looked down at Ignotus. The boy looked about to keel over. He was waxy-pale, except for the skin beneath his eyes, which was purplish and seemed to eat up his face. A sheen of sweat plastered his hair to his forehead in messy lumps.

"Tired," he said. His face scrunched up. The word alone seemed to cost him. 

Cadmus was tired, too. His stomach was cramped with hunger and everything ached. He wanted to curl up between thick tree roots, to make a bed of red and gold leaves and sleep . 

"Promise. Promise me."

“Just a little longer,” he said. “See that forest. We’re almost there.”

Ignotus had been there with Cadmus when it happened. Tucked up with him in a mouldy room by the attic. Cadmus had shown Ignotus how to make the dust swirl without touching it. They shrieked with laughter, and butterflies swooped in from a crack in the ceiling, tangled in their hair, powdery wings like kisses against their cheeks. Butterflies always flocked to Ignotus as though he was sunlight made flesh. All had been well and light and warm.

Then Father found them, and Mum was gone, gone and never coming back, and Cadmus would rather Father had broken every bone in his body, would rather have fractured into a thousand pieces .

“No, no, no, come here, brother, come – ”

Arms slid around his shoulders, and Antioch drew him to his chest. Stubborn, fierce Antioch, whose hands had been red as Cadmus's after he drove his sword in their father's back. Cadmus cried on his brother's shoulder. Two more arms closed around his waist. Ignotus cried with him, his face buried in Cadmus’s side. Each other was all they had left in the world.

Antioch sat them down and made them eat, after their tears dried. They ate bread and the apples they stole from their kitchens, and they turned their faces to the crisp autumn sun.

"D'you reckon they're still after us?" Cadmus asked, and Antioch shrugged.

"Probably,” he said. “They always chase people like us."

Cadmus swallowed hard. "Did you know?" he asked. "About mum?"

"No one knew about mum."

Cadmus wanted to be sick. "We're witches too, aren't we?"

Antioch climbed to his feet. “Get up,” he said. “Still have miles to cover before sunset.”

Cadmus thought about the broken toys made whole at their touch. He thought about candlelight flaring on its own when the dark scared him. He had never thought those things made a monster of him.

Nauseous, he stood, and he walked.

Grassy flatlands turned into rolling hills with rock-jagged sides. Mountains shrouded in clouds blocked the horizon. They reached the forest as dusk fell, the sky bursting with shades of scarlet and amber. The gnarled, twisted trunks towered over them, distant canopy a thick foliage where the sun fractured. Light threaded down on the root-laced ground in small, perfect circles.

Within the trees was the rich scent of rotting leaves. Damp wind whispered through the thick boughs. All around them were sounds of life. Everything was green and rust-coloured.  Patches of spongy green moss crawled on the dark trunks. Tufts of grass poked through a carpet of gold and red leaves. It was like stepping in another world.

They went deep into the trees. Darkness descended and the birds grew quiet. They walked between moonlight shafts until they found a glade.

"We'll sleep here," Antioch said. He dropped their bags. “Cad, see if you can’t find firewood. It's gonna be cold tonight."

Cadmus nodded. "You stay here," he murmured when Ignotus made to follow him. 

Ignotus looked at him with fever-clouded eyes. He swayed on his feet and, without a word, went to fold himself against the smooth bark of a dead tree. Cadmus pushed down a twinge of worry and went to his task. He made sure to stay within sight of the glade as he filled his arms with fallen branches. When he came back, Antioch had laid their provisions in a row, and frowned at the results.

"Something wrong?" Cadmus asked, and the frown smoothed out.

"Put the wood here," Antioch replied. "Let's see if it’ll start."

They made a quick job of building a campfire. Antioch struck his flint over it, but the wood was damp, and reluctant to welcome its sparks.

"Come on! " Antioch snapped

The fire went up.

Flames crackled merrily, a white-orange burst. Shadows went dancing among the trees. Antioch looked at the flames. Cadmus reached over, and touched his hand.

They ate in silence while Ignotus slept. Cadmus joined his little brother. The boy muttered in his sleep, his skin stretched and clammy. Cadmus spread his cloak over them both, and laid himself down to sleep.

He woke some hours later for no apparent reason, hurled into consciousness with a sliver of awareness down his spine. Cadmus shrugged off his cloak. He sat up, shivering. He was cold.

The campfire had burned itself down. Only a faint red glow came from the blackened charcoal. Puffs of ashes rose in the wind, glimmered in silvered arabesques in the starlight. The night was still and silent.

Too still. Too silent.

Cadmus breathed slowly. Shadows seemed darker, thicker all of a sudden. He wanted to pull his cloak over his head and hide from them.

"Brother?" he called. The silence stretched like spring ice on a lake.

"Bro – "

A hand covered his mouth, muffled his scream.

"Shh," Antioch hissed in his ear. Cadmus froze, breath short, heart hammering in his chest. "Something's here."

Cadmus knew. He felt it. A terseness in the air, a prickling on his skin. His eyes roamed their small campsite, looking for anything out of place. Their bags on the ground. Antioch's empty scabbard. The dead tree where he and Ignotus slept –

Alarm washed over him.

"Ignotus," he breathed. “Brother, where is he?”

A twig snapped.

Two eyes gleamed like gold coins in the shadows of the trees. Leaves crunched under invisible hooves. Cadmus watched, frozen, his heart in his throat, as a form, tall, monstrous, taken right out of his worst nightmares, emerged from the trunks, muscles bare under the weak light of the moon, teeth and claws and – 

There was a sharp tug on his shirt, and Cadmus flew back, away, weightless in a way that defied all logic. He landed hard. Pain flared over his back. He scrambled up, frantic with fear. He looked up. Wished to scream. Wished to run to the other end of the world, because, Christ’s wounds, what was this thing.

Antioch dived under its inhumanly long arm, sword a silver flash behind him. "GO, BROTHER!" he yelled, his voice like thunder to Cadmus' ears. "GO!"

Paralysis left Cadmus in a rush; ugly, gaping horror turned into a mindless urge to escape.

He ran.

{. . .}

Harry ducked under the swerving sword, the cutting edge grazing skin. He moved. Tried to move. His foot missed the next stump and he went down, breath short, body shaking with the pounding of his heart. A hand miraculously landed on a pole while the other remained white-knuckled around his blade. He pushed himself up, away from the next stroke of Godric’s sword. One step, two, not quick enough, he parried the next blow. His arm took the hit with a spasm. He gritted his teeth, pushed back. Staying up was a struggle, his balance constantly shifting for lack of space to centre itself.

Across from him, Godric grinned.

“Come, boy,” he said. “Swing at me afore I take your head!”

Harry jumped back, narrowly avoiding a slash to his legs.

"If I – " He ducked, lunged. "If I attack, you'll have me on my arse before I can swear."

"I'll have you faster if you don't."

Groaning, Harry dodged the next strike. His legs started to quaver. His breaths came hard and short. Gryffindor followed effortlessly. He moved on the wood bollards as though he were on solid ground. Harry glanced down at his feet, shifted his weight.

"Eyes on me, Potter. Focus. Where else is there to look?" How Godric managed a flourish down his own body while balanced on scant inches of wood and swinging a sword, Harry would never know. "I'm gorgeous."

Harry wheezed out a laugh. He gathered  himself, spared a second to study Gryffindor's posture. He rectified his guard, lifted his sword. "Redheads," he said, and lunged.

A dozen moves later, there was a hand on his neck and a sword in his stomach. Harry held very still.

"Dead," Godric pronounced. He shook Harry like a kitten. "Yet again . Now. What clever quip were you saying regarding my hair?"

Harry's breath came in white puffs. He grinned, high with mirth and receding adrenaline. "Nothing at all," he said. "My mum was redheaded. Lovely people, the lot of you."

"Good lad."

Godric hauled him up. “You improve with every passing day,” he said. “Now go hone your drills. I’m done with you for today.”

"Yes, sir." 

“Wait, Harry. Hand me your sword.”

Harry narrowed his eyes. Godric had his own sword, silvered and ruby-studded, a Basilisk-killer. The sight of it made Harry’s arm ache. It remembered the tear of poison, a fang in its flesh.

“Now, if you please,” Godric said, and Harry, carefully, gave him his sword.

Godric gave an experimental swing, then chucked it at Harry's head. Harry dove down instinctively. The weapon sailed past him in a perfect curve and passed out of sight. It made no sound as it fell. Tense, ready to spring, Harry watched Godric, the way he held himself, how he hefted his sword, but Godric did not look back.

"Good morning Salazar," he said. "Fancy seeing you outside so early in the day. Dungeons finally collapsed on you, did they?"

Harry looked over his shoulder. Salazar stood outside the training ring, one hand on the pommel of Harry’s sword. He leaned on it like a walking stick. 

"Godric," he said. “Harry, good morning.”

Harry bowed his head. “Sir.”

“Fight with me, my friend,” Godric said. “It’s been too long.”

Salazar looked at Harry’s training sword, its point driven into the ground. “No,” he said.

Godric hopped down from the wood stumps. He brought himself into guard, sword at an angle with his body. 

Salazar gave him a flat look. “Godric,” he said.

Godric grinned. “Salazar,” he said, and lunged.

He attacked with a flurry of blows, fast and unrestrained, with none of the care he showed with his students. Salazar shifted back half a step, kicked up his sword. He parried a deep slash to his side, blocked an overhead strike. Metal clanged and spat sparks. For a breathless moment, Harry watched Salzar move with a dancer’s grace, and thought him a match against Godric. Godric struck, drove the butt of his sword in Salazar’s jaw, and Salazar dropped like a stone.

Harry's wand fell to his hand. He placed his feet, gathered himself. Spells crowded his tongue. He aimed them at Godric’s back. Godric fell on his knees beside Salazar with a muffled curse, sword clattering to the ground.

"Salazar!"

He had his hands on Salazar’s shoulders, fingers on the turn of Salazar’s jaw. He turned Salazar’s face, carefully, tenderly, and Harry’s fingers went white. He wanted to bare his teeth. He wanted – 

Salazar knocked Godric’s hand aside, drove a foot in Godric’s knees. Godric overbalanced, and Salazar punched his chest, pulled one of his arms. Godric fell flat on his back, and Salazar climbed atop him, smiling, a knife pressed to Godric’s throat. 

Harry's heart roared in his ears.

"You keep falling for the same tricks," Salazar said, looking down at Godric, his hair a waterfall around his face, his hand on Godric’s chest.

A cheer went through the students.

“Harry.”

Alfric stood at Harry’s shoulder. He touched a hand to Harry’s back.

“Harry, lower your wand.”

Harry blew a hard breath. He pressed back against the other boy, grateful, and did as he asked. “Thanks,” he said, and Alfric gave a knowing smile.

Salazar still straddled Godric, knees on either side of Godric’s waist.

"Since when do you carry weapons," Godric said.

Salazar took the dagger away from his throat. "This is yours,” he said. “A gift, I believe.”

“From a treacherous, unrighteous friend. Yes.”

“I am not above kicking a defenceless man, my dear.” Salazar rose, at long last, and let the knife fall on Gryffindor's chest. "Come. You and I are needed. Rowena has taken ill.”

Godric touched his eyelids. Salazar nodded.

“Helga is with her?”

“She is.”

“Very well.” Godric looked at his students. “Dismissed,” he said. “Go bathe, you miscreants. We meet in the Great Hall in half an hour.”

“Come on,” Glenn said. He nudged Harry’s shoulder. “Before they make you tutor the Gryffindors again.”

Harry looked back. His House had gathered behind him as Godric and Salazar spoke, had arrayed themselves in a neat line. 

“I don’t mind it,” Harry said.

“We do,” Audra said. “Let’s go.”

Salazar caught Harry’s eyes as he turned to leave. He gave a minute shake of his head. Harry gestured for the Slytherins to go on ahead, and lingered behind as the children went past him, rolling their eyes.

Godric and Salazar bent their heads together, and did not gesture him closer. Harry walked around the courtyard and let them talk. He gathered his discarded bag and clothes, and found a bench to sit on. Sighing, he stretched his neck, his back, working out the stiffness of too much training. A crisp breeze played on his skin and cooled his brow.

The morning was beautiful, was bright and sunny, a rarity at this time of the year. Dawn broke over the mountains in soft pinks and violets. Pale gold clouds drifted overhead, soft as lamb’s wool. Abandoned swords caught the sunlight in a spray of sparks. The air carried with it the first biting notes of winter, and Harry breathed it deep.

He had settled into himself, over the last weeks. He had grown into his new life, and he was – good. He was alright. He befriended his Housemates, quiet whispers kept between them, smirks and silent mirth and wordless complicity. He made himself into an attentive student, into a capable mentor. He was fine so long as he did not think of home. 

He caught himself thinking of home less and less. His life before sat on his mind like blurred photographs on a bookshelf, and that, in itself, was betrayal enough.

He straightened abruptly. He thought he had seen. Something. Motion along the treeline, a shape in shadows of the trees, and – 

A silhouette, small, frail, came stumbling out across the field, and Harry was on his feet before he could think. A child, he thought. There was a child running from the Forbidden Forest, and Harry ran to meet them.

It was a boy. Dark hair knotted with filth, dark eyes full of fear. He lurched toward Harry with his whole body shaking, a hand reaching out. 

"Help," he said, and Harry caught him as he fell. 

He gathered the boy against his chest, cradled his head. The boy’s heart hammered against his palm, too fast, frenzied.

“Alright, love, breathe,” Harry told him, and the child grasped him in a surprisingly strong grip.

"Help," he said again. He had a look about him, of sheer, stubborn will, of one fighting to keep awake.

“What do you need?” Harry asked. “You’re safe now. You’re safe, I promise."

"Promise," the boy said. "I promised – my brothers – "

“Your brothers are here? Where?”

"Harry."

A touch on his shoulder. Harry looked away from the small body in his arms, up at Salazar. Salazar squeezed his shoulder.

“Harry, lower your shield. He needs the Hospital Wing."

Harry blinked down. A blue light blanketed the boy, kept him safe. He had not noticed himself calling it. Salazar bent over. He put a hand on it. The ward resisted, then gave way. He leaned over Harry, his chest against Harry's side, and put an arm under the boy’s legs, another around his back. He lifted the child from Harry’s arms, and when he rose, Harry rose with him.

They hurried to the castle. Salazar walked ahead, his strides long and light. He whispered sweet nonsense to the boy, who clung weakly to him in turn. Godric brought up the rear, a hand on his sword.

"Helga!"

"No no no, my brothers, please – "

"HELGA!"

The Hospital Wing doors burst open at a flick of Salazar’s fingers. Helga was with them before they crossed the threshold. Her lips were pinched, her eyes bruised in the way of someone who had not slept all night. Her arm was steady when she raised her wand. Harry thought about his Housemates, Ashton's scars, Audra's mutism her first weeks, Bradley flinching from touch. He wondered how often Salazar brought broken children to her door.

"He came from the Forest," Salazar told her. "Must have been on the run for days by the looks of him."

Salazar lowered the boy on the first available bed while Helga vanished his rag of a shirt. Harry drew a sharp breath. Cuts and bruises crossed the child’s throat and arms. He was unhealthily thin. Each rib jutted out from pasty skin.

“Is he one of us?” Harry asked.

“Yes,” Godric said. “Wouldn’t have found us for the wards otherwise.” 

“Fleeing Muggles, most likely,” Salazar said, and around him, the shadows seemed darker, deeper, and his voice hissed around the words. 

"Salazar." Helga put a hand on his chin, forced him to look at her. "I need you to get out," she said.

A muscle ticked in Salazar's jaw. The rest of him held still. Harry thought of a coiled beast, raring to strike. Helga's hand moved to the back of his neck. Nothing changed in the way Salazar held himself, but there was a shift in the air, voluntary and controlled, a pressure easing. He nodded.

"Very well."

"No, can't, please, I promised – "

"What's wrong, sweeting?" Helga pressed a hand to the boy's forehead.

"Brother,” he said, twitching and feverish.

“He has two brothers,” Salazar said. He looked at the boy with glazed eyes. Harry twitched toward him. “Alive when last he saw them. Lost in the forest. In the moonlight and the trees. Eyes like gold coins in the dark.”

“A beast?” Godric asked, and the boy whimpered.

"Godric," Helga said. “Not here, not now. Out, all of you. Fight your own battles while I fight mine.”

She shoved out without further ceremony, and shut the doors behind them.

"Are you certain about the boys?" Godric asked.

"Yes."

“And that they live, still?”

Salazar's eyes wandered in the distance. "A beast set upon them. It stalks the boy’s every thought. I cannot tell what became of the brothers, only that they were together ere the attack.”

Godric looked past Salazar’s shoulder. Toward the trees.

"I'm not certain,” Salazar said. “It would be wise.”

“Have we a choice?” Godric set his shoulders. “Our duty is to try. To recover the bodies, if nothing else. And the beast must be slain lest it harms our own.”

"What do you propose?"

"The boy will have left a trail a blind man could follow. I will track it to its source, and from there, do what I can.” 

“You cannot go alone.”

“We cannot go together. Rowena is sick. Helga cares for the wounded. One of us must remain to protect them. You well know I am the better hunter.”

“I’ll come with you,” Harry said.

Both men turned to him. Harry lifted his chin. Made his back straight.

“I can hold my own.” He looked at Salazar. “You know I can.”

Salazar looked back. Something had stilled in his posture, in his expression. He watched Harry, and Harry could not guess his thoughts. He made his hands lax, his eyes pleading. I can do this, he thought. I have done it before. Let me repay some of your kindness. Let me. Let me. He let Salazar see him, and his heart beat like a drum. 

“Godric,” Salazar said, but Godric shook his head.

“Your House,” he said. “Your choice.”

Salazar closed his eyes. He blew a slow breath. “Bring him back to me alive,” he said.

Godric touched Salazar’s shoulder. “Lad,” he said, and did not look at Harry. “Meet here in half an hour. Bring a blade.”

“Yes, sir.”

Godric squeezed Salazar’s shoulder. “Keep the home fires burning, my sweet,” he said, and gave a crooked smile. “We'll be home as fast we can.”

He turned to leave, and Harry made to follow him.

“Harry.”

Salazar stepped close. Harry stilled.

“I have told you before,” Salazar said. “Allow me to tell you again. There is no kindness for you to repay. I will ask no more of you than I would of the child who, at this moment, is screaming in Helga's arms. Go, if you will, for his siblings. Go for yourself. But do not go in my name.” Salazar inclined his head. “Were you mine to command, I would, selfishly, ask you remain at my side.”

Harry swallowed. His mouth was dry. “I wouldn’t be the best company,” he said.

“You have been terse these past days. I meant to ask. Are you well?”

“I – ”

Harry looked at Salazar. His eyes silvered in the slanting sun. His skin gilded white gold. Harry watched him, sometimes, in the quiet of the common room, across busy classrooms, and the world tilted off its axis, rearranged itself. It lost consistency. Lost significance. Harry’s instincts screamed as though a sword swerved toward his throat, or perhaps his heart. He ought to duck, he knew, to step back, but something in him craved the bite of metal in his flesh.

“I don’t know.”

“The approach of Samhain can unsettle some. Perhaps in a few days, you will be better.”

“Samhain?”

"The day when the veil between our realm and the next is thinnest. Our magic can behave in odd ways. The day marks the beginning of winter for Muggles."

A spark of memory, many years old and faded with time. The bluish glow of black candles. Air cold as death. Ghosts dancing in silvered mists.

"Halloween,” he said. He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Tomorrow is Halloween.”

“The day holds significance to you?”

“My.” Harry cleared his throat. “My parents died on Halloween night.”

Salazar took the words as though Harry had landed a blow. “I share in your sorrow,” he said, softly, and Harry felt himself sway toward him, felt himself pulled in. The world, rearranged. A shift in gravity.

“I,” he said. “I should go.”

Salazar nodded. “Then go,” he said. “And return safely.”

Chapter Text

The Forbidden Forest was alive with the scent of green things. Damp soil, rotting wood. Wind rustled dry leaves, the sound like waves roiling to shore. Roots writhed underfoot, treacherous and thick as a man’s torso.

Harry followed Godric down a narrow earth path winding through the thick trees. Dark shapes lingered just out of sight, elusive as faded ghosts. Godric moved through the shadows with the skill of a silent, stalking thing. He followed a trail of footprints and broken branches invisible to Harry’s eyes. Harry kept a hand on his wand, and made his steps careful, his breathing light.

“Do you know how to hunt, boy?” Godric asked.

“No,” Harry said. “I know what it’s like to be hunted.”

“It is yet unclear,” Godric said. “Which half of the game we play today.”

“Do you know what we're walking into?”

Godric glanced back at him. His eyes were the colour of rich soil in the forest’s dappled light. “What would be your guess?” he asked.

Harry thought about Boggarts, about Acromantulas, about Will-o’-the-wisps and Hidebehinds. Green scales and fangs the size of his arms, rattling breaths in putrid cloaks, agonised howls in the pearly glow of leaf-shafted moonlight.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I can’t think of any creature who’d kidnap someone, rather than simply kill them. An Erkling, maybe? They have a taste for children. Or an Acromantula. Spiders store their food for later.”

Godric shot him a look of pure alarm. “How have you heard of those beasts?”

It had been one of the worst nights of his life. Not because of the danger itself. Not because of the spiders, or the feel of sticky web on his skin. Because Ron. Ron had been with him, and Harry thought he had led his best friend to slaughter.

“Came up on a whole nest when I was a lad.”

“It is a rare thing,” Godric said, carefully. “Even for a wizard, to have travelled so far to the East.”

“Sorry?”

“Acromantulas can be found only in the faraway lands of the Orient. The Hindustanis make remedies of their venom. We travelled there in our youth, Salazar and I. It surprises me to learn you have as well.”

Harry sucked a sharp breath. His heart tripped over itself. “I – ”

“I would hear no lies from you, boy. Keep your secrets if you must.” Godric stopped. He turned toward Harry, drawing himself up to his full height. Harry watched sunlight drip like honey on his darkly golden skin. “Salazar, for reasons unknown to me, seems to trust you. Rarely have I seen him come to rely so easily upon someone else. That alone earns you a measure of leniency from my part. Know this, however: I will be the one to drive a sword through your throat, should you prove deceitful to him. I will carry your corpse, and bury it where none shall find it.”

“You won’t be the one to kill me, sir. The lot’s already been drawn, as far as I’m concerned.”

Godric grunted. “Found you half-dead, didn’t he? There’s a fire in you, lad, I’ll give you that. You fight like a man who’s more than passing familiar with Death. Come this way.”

Godric veered off the path, into the deeper darkness of the wider trees, and Harry followed after him.

“Tell me, then,” Godric said. “How come someone wants you dead?”

Spun-glass and swirling mist and prophecies spoken before Harry drew his first breath.

“He doesn’t very much like my family,” Harry said.

Godric snorted. “You sound like Salazar,” he said. “He, too, found himself at odds with questionable men by virtue only of his blood.”

Harry, carefully, tamped down the urge to ask Godric what he meant. Salazar was an intrinsically private man. He would not appreciate having his secrets laid bare before Harry, and Harry, for reasons he would rather not scrutinise, could not stand the thought of betraying his trust.

“Thank you, sir,” he said. “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You will, will you. And Christ’s wounds, lad. Call me Godric.”

“Yes, sir.”

Godric barked a laugh.

He led Harry through the undergrowth, around a pond green with rampant life and growth. The forest grew dark and deep, the trees too thickly clumped together for two men to move abreast. Here the trunks were wide and deeply-furrowed from the passage of time. Moss crawled on the weathered bark in sheets thick enough to swallow Harry’s hand to the wrist.

“Pick up the pace,” Godric said. “There's a clearing ahead.”

A funnel of golden light pierced the dense coating of tree leaves. The glade broke a perfect circle on the forest floor. The remnants of a campfire sat at its centre, a mound of ashes and charred wood.

Godric touched the ashes with two fingers. He walked a slow circle around the camp, and stopped. Harry joined him. Godric stood before two deep tracks in the soil, the earth raised as though ploughed. Brown splotches smeared the grass.

“The boys fought here,” Godric said. “The tracks continue this way. We will – ”

He cut off. He turned on his heels, pulling Harry behind him, and drew his sword in the same motion. He fell into guard. His blade spat mirrored sparks in the surrounding gloom, and within the trees, branches rippled, parted. There came the sound of hooves. Then, a voice, deep and clear.

“Peace,” it said. “I mean no harm.”

Into the clearing came a creature who was a man to the waist, with wild, black hair and a beard set on a handsome face. Below the hips was a horse's powerful body. The centaur’s coat was as dark as his skin.

“My name is Hexo,” he said. “Welcome to the forest, Sorcerers.”

Godric eased his stance.

The centaur gave a smile. “You are, I assume, the cause for the castle that sprang at our door.”

“We didn't know centaurs resided in these woods,” Godric said.

“We did not wish you to know. Consider this our introduction.” Hexo peered at the campfire. “You search for your children,” he said. “Your kin is threatened from all sides.”

“Do you know anything about the thing that took the boys?”

“There have been disturbances in the stars,” Hexo said. His gaze fell on Harry. “In their studied paths. Something has shifted. Predictions my ancestors made decades ago came undone. Great change comes in its wake.”

Harry bowed his head. “I’m Harry,” he said.

“So you are.” Hexo returned his greeting. “I would not linger too long, Harry Potter. Ere long something will break.”

Cold sweat dewed Harry’s back.

“Your children,” Hexo said. “A dark creature took them. It, too, senses the change. The veil runs thin and gives it strength.”

“Where did it take them?” Godic asked. “Do you know?”

“There is a cave,” Hexo said. “Deep in the trees. Follow this way, and you may yet find them alive. The beast does not feast by daylight.”

Godric bent himself into a bow, and Harry followed him. “Thank you,” Godric said.

“My herd’s greetings to yours, Lord Gryffindor,” Hexo said. “May we meet again.”

He melted into the tree’s shadows. After a moment, Godric sheathed his sword, and, turning his back on the clearing, led Harry deeper into the woods.

{. . .}

Antioch woke to the taste of blood in his mouth and the slow drip of water. Water sluiced down his back, drop after drop after drop. He was cold. Rocks poked between his ribs.

Groaning low in his throat, he rolled on his side –

Tried to roll on his side.

His arms. His arms were twisted behind his back. A length of rope chafed his skin. Someone had bound his legs together. He ached with cramps.

He drew a sharp breath and tasted blood. The air smelled stale. A rush of awareness cleared his mind, the world all stark contrasts and fear and pain.

The night before came to him in disjointed fragments, shards of memory; the empty space where Ignotus should have been. Cadmus trembling in his arms. The moon overhead, fat and dripping silver. Eyes like two gold coins in the sun. 

There was an empty pounding in his ears. Feeling sick, Antioch gasped for air. He jerked against his restraints in blind panic, pulled and pushed and felt his muscles tear. His heart bruised his ribcage and he could not move, could not breathe –

A sob, quiet and terrified and not his own, broke through the cloying grip of fear. He froze. Cold sweat slicked his brow. Warmth trickled down his wrists. He trembled uncontrollably. 

He curled his hands into fists. He stared at the rubble in front him, dull stone smudged with mud, and willed his breathing slow, his heartbeat steady. He listened to someone else’s whimpers, and wrestled himself back to calmness. He. He had to look. He did not want to. Inside him beat the childish belief he would not be seen by what he could not see, but Antioch was fifteen years old and a man now, and his brother needed him.

He looked.

He was in a cave. Deep and dark and dank. Jagged rock glistened with water. Thin sunrays slanted from an entrance overrun with tumbled stones. Light pierced the shadows on a few feet before smothering blackness swallowed it.

Ignotus was prostrated against the wall opposite him. His knees were drawn to his chest. A length of rope, nailed to stone, held his arms up above his head. He looked ridiculously young, brittle as a blade of grass. His eyes seemed huge on his pale, tear-tracked face. Sweat rolled down his skin. His breathing was laboured.

"Brother?" Antioch called. His voice was rough from disuse. He cleared his throat. "Ignotus!"

The boy looked up, eyes dark and feverish and empty of recognition.

Fear flooded Antioch’s veins. Cursing, he tested the strength of his ropes. They bit into his flesh and did not yield, and another wave of panic crushed his chest, iron bands around his lungs.

He was scared. More scared than the day Cadmus fell from a bookcase ladder and bounced off the ground without a scratch. More than the day Ignotus almost drowned in the pond near their house, and water parted to let Antioch pull him to safety.

He was terrified as the day he came from training to a silent home. To brothers half-mad with grief and coated in their mother's blood. To his father raising a fist on Cadmus. Cadmus, pale and thin-shouldered, who was all books and quiet enthusiasm, sweet and smart in ways Antioch could never be. Antioch had been scared to death, then, but he had known. What he must do. How to protect his brothers. He was the oldest, and it was his job.

He did not know what to do now.

There was something befuddling in the fact he was alive enough to breathe and hurt. There had been teeth and horns darker than the starless sky, and nothing in his mind but the hope that Cadmus, at least, would escape with the time Antioch bought him. He had seen nothing but moonlight and blood, and one inevitable ending.

Yet here he was, impossibly. There was air in his lungs, a pulse in his chest. He lived. Ignotus lived.

Antioch took a deep breath.

He worked his fingers around the knots, cracking his nails. His hands were numb. The rope dug too tight. He tried crawling on his belly, only to find his bindings, like his brother’s, nailed to the rock. His fingers ached and bled, and he tried sawing through the ropes with a sharp rock. The rock broke in his hands. Tears of frustration stung his eyes. He focused on his hands and tried, as he had the night before, to call fire to his palms.

The sun moved outside the cave. It fell to the west in faded shades of burnt orange. Shadows lengthened, deepened, and from the depths of the cave, where light flickered and died, came the clop of hooves on stone. Blood froze in Antioch’s veins. Ignotus put his head in his knees with a whimper.

It was too soon. Antioch. Antioch hadn't had time. Had he truly survived his father and a country who wished him dead only to meet his end on his knees, in a cave? All of this, only for his bones to rot here, cursed and forgotten – 

A silhouette emerged in the dark. The curl of goat horns, the curve of bare shoulders. A trail of hairs snarled down a gaunt chest wiry with strength. Hips and legs like a goat's, thin and powerful, ending in a pair of split hooves. The creature advanced another step, and Antioch saw its face. Blank eyes. A goat's muzzle, the same ears, features hidden under matted hairs.

Bile rose in Antioch’s throat.

The beast approached his brother, and Antioch struggled blindly against his ropes, his every limbs screaming.

“Leave him alone,” he snarled, and the beast, one long arm extended toward Ignotus, stopped.

 Blank, yellow eyes looked at him. Breathing fast, Antioch bared his teeth. The creature's mouth pulled back into something that was either a smile or snarl, and it. Blurred. In a moment it was here, right here, bringing the stench of crusted blood and goat musk, and Antioch retched. He screwed his eyes shut, and prayed, prayed he would not feel himself die.

There was a sound like thunder, and a word that made his ears ring. A screech, furious, wrathful. A blast threw Antioch to the side. Rocks and debris fell around him. He curled up instinctively, shaky, nauseous. Confused, coughing through the dust, he cracked an eye open.

The monster's grotesque face no longer filled his sight. Instead, standing half-hidden in the swirling dust, was a man. His back was to Antioch. He stood with his knees bent, a protective stance, and before him was the beast.

"GODRIC!" he yelled, and dived to the side, narrowly avoiding having his throat ripped out. "GODRIC I'VE FOUND THEM!”

He raised a hand. In it, he held a stick.

A stick.

Antioch watched in muted horror as the fool stood his ground, brandishing his piece of wood. He looked utterly unconcerned in the face of a half-goat, half-man monster before him. The creature towered over him, its horns curved, its mouth foaming. It bared its teeth, and attacked before Antioch could shout a warning. An arm struck out with inhuman speed, straight for the young man's chest.

The man said a word, and a blue dome sprang to life in front of him. The creature's clawed hand impacted with the wet, awful noise of bones breaking.

Sorcerer.

Antioch watched with mingled fear and fascination as the monster howled in pain. It stumbled back and growled, low and ferocious, and moved again, too fast for the eye to see. The man ducked a horn before it gored him. He moved with the steady confidence that came from hours of weapon’s training.

The creature feigned to the right, and the man groaned with pain when a claw scored his hip. Blood welled from the deep laceration, dark red against white linen, but the man did not slow, did not stop. He crouched low under another blow, and two bolts of light burst from the stick in his hand, purple and white. The second bolt hit. A deep gash appeared on the monster's torso. The strength of the blow threw it back against a wall. The whole cave trembled.

The beast shook its massive head, pushed back from the rock. It lunged, muscles tensed taut and – 

A shape burst from the dwindling light of the entrance, a flash of sleek golden fur and lean muscles. A four-legged animal landed on the monster's chest, forced it down, its tail switching, its fangs bared. The beast had not hit the ground that the feline's form blurred. Shaggy mane shrunk, yellow-brown eyes darkened, and a man, red-headed, sword in hand, stood in its place. Face hard, he swung his blade, drove it through the creature's chest in a fluid motion. The beast spasmed against the weapon.

It did not move again.

For a breathless moment, no one moved. The world rubbed against Antioch’s senses from far away.

"You're a lion Animagus." The man who had saved him turned to the other. He was smiling.

“I am not,” his companion said. He wiped the blood off his sword. “Going to ask how it is you know what a lion is.”

The next thing Antioch knew, there was a hand on his shoulders, another cupping his face, softly-spoken words in his ears.

"Can you hear me? You alright, mate?"

He blinked, and into focus came a handsome face, skin richly brown and hair black as a crow's wing.

“You'll be fine," the boy said. He had the greenest eyes Antioch had ever seen. “We have your brother. He's safe. We’ll take you to him. D’you think you can walk?”

Inhaling sharply, Antioch reached out. He gripped the other man. Moving his arms tore a moan from his throat. His shoulders ached, the muscles stiff and slow, but.

He could move.

"Ah." The stranger gave a sympathetic wince. “That looks painful. Let me just – ”

He touched his stick to the pulped, bloodied flesh of Antioch’s wrists, and the torn skin knitted itself back together before Antioch’s eyes, welts and angry cuts closing, healing, until the wounds looked several weeks old.

“You are a witch,” Antioch said. His tongue sat thick in his mouth.

The other man’s eyes crinkled into a smile. “I’m a wizard,” he said. “As are you. My name is Harry.” He rocked back on his heels, giving Antioch space. “I’m a student at Hogwarts. It’s a school for people like us. We’d like to take you there, if you let us.”

Harry rose to his feet. He held out a hand.

“What do you say?” he said. Antioch clasped his wrist, and was heaved to his feet.

“We must hurry.” They turned toward the redheaded man. He stood near the cave entrance, Ignotus cradled in his arms. “The boy isn't well.”

Antioch took a step toward them. His legs gave out. Harry caught him before he could fall, an arm around his waist, balancing Antioch’s weight.

“Easy there, love,” he said. “You can’t carry the kid yourself. You can barely stand.”

“What is wrong with my brother?” Antioch asked, panting.

Harry squeezed his hip. “Godric?” he asked.

“I cannot tell,” the redheaded man – Godric – said. “Healing was never my calling. We must get him to Helga. Harry. Your side.”

Under Antioch’s arm, Harry made a confused noise. Godric gave a sigh.

“Your side, boy,” he said. “Heal it before you collapse. And hide the scar from Salazar, if you please. He'll gut me otherwise.” 

Antioch looked down. Blood oozed from the gash on Harry’s hip. Harry muttered a curse. He tapped his stick to the mouth of the wound, and the heavy flow slowed, then stopped.

Harry half-carried Antioch from the cave. The boy gave heat like a furnace, and Antioch found himself pressing closer to his side. 

They walked. 

The sky was visible in patches through the thick foliage. It darkened as they walked, the rich reds and umbers of the setting sun bleeding into black. Thick trees swayed in the wind. The forest shivered with nightlife, all manner of animals waking from slumber. They came out to hunt, foraging for food in the undergrowth.

Antioch lost track of time. Exhaustion weighed his every step. He thought he might be walking through a dream. He lost the thread of consciousness several times, but never seemed to stop walking.

A shake on the shoulder roused him from a doze.

"We're almost here," Harry said.

The trees were thinner, Antioch saw, their bark smoother. The soil underfoot was free of creeping roots. One last turn, and the path opened in front of them.

Antioch lost his breath.

A castle stood against the backdrop of the sky, grander by far than any Antioch had ever seen. Turrets and towers pierced the silver clouds. Its thick walls seemed grown from the mountains themselves. A handful of windows were lit, spilling fantastical, stained-glass shapes into the night. The grey stone glowed in the darkness.

Two massive doors opened as they approached. Candle fire bathed the field in shades of warmth. A lone figure came through. A man, tall and lean, his hair a spill of ink down his back. Harry's fingers flexed on Antioch’s waist.

“Salazar,” Harry said, near too softly for Antioch to hear.

The man met them halfway. Backlit in candle glow, shadows made a home in the hollows of his face. He carried with him an aristocrat’s easy grace, but the shadows. The shadows gave him an air of fey beauty, sharp and wild. His eyes went to Harry. Caught. Stayed.

“Harry,” he said, and stuttered a step toward them. “Where are you hurt?”

Antioch felt Harry straighten against him. Felt him broaden his shoulders, hold his chest wide. 

“I’m alright,” Harry said. “I staunched the bleeding. The boys are in more need of help.”

The stranger’s lips tightened, but his eyes, at long last, freed Harry of their snare. He looked at Antioch instead, and Antioch’s mouth went dry. He swallowed thickly. Do not eat of their fruit, he thought, wildly.

“Then let them be welcomed,” the stranger said, and Antioch was led inside.

{. . .}

Harry knew something was wrong the moment the youngest of the three brothers was lowered onto a bed. 

He knew it from the way Salazar froze. From the way his breath hitched.

“Salazar?” he called, softly.

“You must leave,” Salazar said, and Harry stiffened at his tone. He raised his voice. “Everyone. Leave, now.”

Helga came from Antioch’s bedside, where the boy laid curled with his brother, to stand with Salazar.

“What have you seen?” she asked.

Her eyes fell on Ignotus, the youngest of the three. The boy’s skin was a pallid grey. Sweat rolled down his brow in fat drops. He moaned and struggled in his sleep. A smell surrounded him, charcoal and smoke, oily as a cook fire. Helga’s hand went to her mouth. At her side, Rowena went pale.

Salazar caught Helga around the waist. “Get out,” he hissed, and pushed her toward the doors. “Before he loses control. I will handle him as best I can.”

“Salazar – ”

“He has family here. He stands a chance at living.”

“What’s wrong with my brother?” Antioch demanded. He made to rise from the bed, but Salazar pinned him down with a look.

“Your brother,” he said. “Has twisted his own magic against himself. If we do naught, the beast growing in his bones will devour him, and all of us with it.”

“There is naught to be done,” Godric said.

“You know well I can try – ”

“No.”

“Godric.”

“No. I will not – I cannot. Let you risk yourself in this manner. Not again, Salazar. Not after last time wrought so much tragedy.”

“What would you suggest, then?” Salazar asked. “That we let the beast run rampage? That we allow it rend the child to pieces?”

“I would suggest we contain it while we still can.”

“That is a death sentence and you know it.”

“Salazar.” Godric cupped Salazar’s face in both his hands. He pressed their foreheads together, breathing heavily. “Do not ask again,” he said, softly. “That I walk away while you face an enemy I cannot fight. I am begging you.”

“Godric,” Salazar said, tenderly. “He is as old as your son.”

Godric flinched.

Harry had heard of them before. Obscurial. Children whose distress was so great they fought to suppress their own magic. Twisting themselves into a mangled, monstrous thing. Harry thought about the Dursleys. About being alone in the dark, weak with hunger, and feeling a wrongness take root deep in his chest. Sometimes he thought it a miracle, that he had not met Ignotus’s fate.

He watched Godric detach himself from Salazar, and felt sick.

“Damn you,” Godric breathed. “Damn you, my friend, all the way to the darkest hell.”

“Leave,” Salazar said. “And meet me on the other side.”

“I am not going.”

Antioch had risen from the bed. He stood with his chin lifted and his shoulders squared. His eyes were dark.

“No,” Salazar said, softly. “You are not. You, I shall need. There is a path to saving your brother’s life, though it may yet cost me my own. Now listen, boys, and listen well – ”

Helga ushered Harry from the Infirmary. Harry’s last image of Salazar was of him drawing a knife. The doors shut and silenced his voice.

“We must ward the Infirmary,” Rowena said. “And evacuate the West Wing in full.”

“Godric,” Helga said. “Don’t stay here. Clear the Wing; make certain there is no one around. Take the children to their common rooms and guard them well. Harry.” Helga looked at him. “Your Housemates may appreciate your presence.”

“I am not going,” Harry said.

It may yet cost me my own, he heard, and his ears buzzed. He could no more make himself leave than reach within his chest and wrench out a rib.

“As you wish,” Rowena said, and she and Helga raised their wands.

Harry stood back and let them work.

They weaved magic in tandem, over and around each other. They cloaked the Hospital Wing in thick layers of wards, and the air sang under their combined weight. Hogwarts’ walls glowed with power, with runes and spell graphs.

By the time they were done, Rowena, weakened by sickness, staggered. Helga caught her, wove an arm around her waist and spoke softly in her ear. Rowena leaned her forehead against Helga’s cheek, panting wetly. 

“I will be back,” Helga told Harry, and she led Rowena away, down the torch-lit corridor. 

Harry sat on the marble staircase. The torch fire banked itself. Moonlight swarmed the corridor in great swathes of silver brilliance. Harry listened to the wind whistling through the empty halls. No sound came from the Infirmary.

He pressed his fingers against his thighs, feeling the coarse weave of his trousers.

The night ticked away. Clouds passed before the moon, and shadows speared its silvered light. Rain pattered on cobblestones. Gusts of cool, damp air whooshed through the night. Everything was a deep marine blue.

Helga joined him on the steps. She sat beside him and silence, and lay between them an offering of bread and beer. Harry drank the beer. He ate some of the bread, and found it fragrant and still warm from the oven.

He closed his eyes.

He did not sleep.

He tuned his ears to the Infirmary and what lay beyond it. He heard the wind. The rain. He saw, over and over, the glint of Salazar’s knife. It may yet cost me my own. His jaw ached from clenching. Every moment stretched longer than centuries.

A hand touched his shoulder. His hand jumped to his wand.

“Come,” Helga said. “Hurry.”

Harry stood without question. Helga ran, and he followed a step after her. He could feel the pulse in his wrists, at his throat. 

Helga jabbed her wand in the thick braid of her warding. Magic ribbonned to the wandtip, streaming sparks. Helga struggled and strained as though pulling sword from stone. The wards stretched. Shattered.

Beyond, the Infirmary doors gaped open. Claw marks gored the wood. Inside was dark as pitch. The stench of blood wafted in warm gusts. The hairs on Harry’s nape stood on end. 

Helga shouldered past the gutted doors, her wand held high. Witch light pierced the tarry blackness. Harry saw burn marks on the walls. Eviscerated beds spilled feathers on the floors. A lonely candle burned at the end of the room. The sphere of weak light illuminated a bed spared from the devastation.

On the bed was a thin, still boy.

Knelt beside it was Salazar.

“Salazar,” Helga called, and he stirred at the sound of his name.

He looked up. His eyes were ringed dark. His mouth a slash of red against his pale, pasty skin. Harry watched. He watched it part around a breath. He watched it stretch in a slow smile.

“The boys,” Salazar said, softly. “Are, I think, in more need of your care than I.”

He tilted his head to the side, where the candle light pattered into darkness. He pointed toward another bed, where Cadmus and Antioch lay together, slack with sleep. 

"And the youngest?" Helga asked.

"Alive. Healing. I will guard him tonight. He would not take well to a touch other than my own."

The boy on the candle-lit bed breathed. His chest rose and fell, rose and fell, small and spasmodic. His tunic was wet with blood. Even unconscious, pain lingered on his brow, in the pinch of his lips, the tightness around his eyes.

Salazar stood. “Will you take the two brothers to real beds?” he asked Helga. “More than anything, they need rest.”

“They’ll sleep with my House tonight,” Helga said. She looked at Ignotus. “Are you certain I cannot help?”

“Yes,” Salazar said. “Go. I'll be fine, you have my word. Harry will be with me, should I need assistance.”

Helga touched his cheek. “I am very glad you’re alright,” she said, then turned toward the two older brothers. They did not rouse when she waved her wand over them and lifted them, blankets and all, from their bed. 

She went with them, and Harry was left with Salazar and a sleeping boy.

“Thank you,” Salazar said. “For waiting.”

Harry nodded mutely. “What do you need?”

“The boy’s wounds have to be bandaged.”

Salazar waved a hand over Ignotus. The boy’s shirt vanished. Bile rose in Harry’s throat. 

“Here,” he said. He gave Salazar clean gauze and a potion to keep a wound from festering. Another to help it heal.

Deep cuts overlapped on Ignotus’s torso. The wounds had inched closed, the bleeding had stopped. Still his chest was red and raw, the flesh gaping open.

“Will he live?”

“He clings to life with rare fierceness.” Salazar slanted Harry a smile. “He will be fine. The Obscurus had not burrowed into him fully. A testament to his brothers’ care.” He began applying generous amounts of both salves on the boy’s wounds. “Tell me, then. What is it you found in the forest?”

“A Phooka,” Harry said. “Or so Godric tells me. Big, ugly thing. Midriff of a man, head and legs of a goat.”

Salazar hummed. “Púca,” he said. The word tripped on his tongue, light and melodious. “An old wife’s tale.”

“You know them?”

“Every Irish child grows to stories of the ancient creatures in our hills. Some say Púca is a spirit, others a ghost. A harbinger that stalks Samhain nights.”

Salazar rolled Ignotus on his side. Harry watched his fingers at work, watched the gentleness in them. He held Ignotus’s shoulder while Salazar wrapped his wounds.

“You’re Irish,” Harry said. Salazar’s hands stilled for a breath.

“I am,” he said at length.

“You implied you were from Mercia. Same as Godric. It’s not even the same island.”

Salazar carefully set Ignotus flat on his back. The boy did not stir.

“As I have said,” he said. Harry found in his voice the same carefulness he showed Ignotus. “My homeland is a place of old tales and strange creatures. To hail from it carries its weight of prejudices. It has been a long time. Since I have not felt the need to lie about my past.”

“To protect yourself.”

“Yes.” Salazar glanced down to the side. “There is a stain. Attached to my name. For lies someone else spread about my mother. For things I have done in my youth. In grief. In anger. I did not know. Whether you had heard echoes of it yourself. You were wary of me when we first met. You are, still. I found I did not want to widen the wedge by binding myself in your eyes to old happenings in a foreign land.”

“Oh, Salazar. In my time, the only thing attached to your name is you.”

Salazar met his eyes, then, and something in Harry gave.

“For what it’s worth,” he said. “I know what it’s like. To be known only as a name. To be known before you’re known.”

Salazar opened his mouth. Harry watched his lips. The up-and-down of his throat. Salazar sucked a breath, but did not say anything.

They finished their work in silence. They wiped the sweat and dirt from Ignotus's skin. They secured his bandages, dripped restorative draughts in his mouth. Harry stole glances at Salazar. His eyes returned to him, again and again, without his accord. It was as though Salazar had gained a pull Harry could not escape. He watched Salazar care for a broken child. The scar on his back ached every time he moved.

"Is this what I am to you?" he asked. Salazar looked at him from across Ignotus’s body. His eyes were the colour of the ocean in a rainstorm. “A boy whose life you saved? Another child in your care?”

“You were never a child, Harry,” Salazar said. “I fear no one ever gave you the chance."

Harry closed his eyes. His eyes felt hot. He sighed a shaky breath, and could not tell whether the loosening in him was relief, or resignation.

“Is this what I am to you?” Salazar asked. “Another teacher. A stranger who healed your wounds.”

“You were never a stranger, Salazar.”

Salazar bowed his head. “I see.”

They dressed Ignotus in warm clothes, swaddled him in blankets. Salazar washed and dried his hands on a clean cloth. He moved around to the other side of the bed. Harry’s side. Harry stepped back, gave him room. Salazar watched him, his eyes dark, his face betraying nothing. He came closer. Harry felt the wall against his back, the stone cold and hard.

“Allow me,” Salazar said, and he.

He sank to his knees in front of Harry. 

Harry’s heart kicked his ribs. His mouth went dry. He stared down uncomprehendingly at Salazar, knelt between his legs. He sank his weight in the wall at his back. The stone dug in his flesh. Harry felt weak. His chest buzzed. Salazar brought two hands to his hips, and – 

Pain. 

Sharp and sheer. It bloomed where Salazar touched him, the hot tear of wounded flesh, and Harry gasped, and his back arched. His heart thundered in his ears.

“Easy,” Salazar said. “Easy, my dear, easy. Good grief. It’s a wonder you could walk. The cut is rubbed raw. You barely closed it.”

He put his wand to the gash on Harry’s hip. The flesh knitted before Harry’s eyes, muscle coming together, skin sewing shut. Salazar pressed his thumb to the jut of Harry’s hipbone, then smoothed Harry's shirt back in place. He pushed to his feet, and – 

Fell.

Harry caught him. He wrapped both arms around Salazar’s waist and drew Salazar to him, against the safety of his chest. Salazar slumped against him. He panted wetly in the hollow of Harry’s throat. Harry could feel the bumps of his ribs, the rise and fall of his belly. He shook in Harry’s arms.

Harry flattened his palms against Salazar’s back and held him close.

“Are you alright?” he asked. His nose was tucked in Salazar’s hair. His lips against Salazar’s ear. “Gods, you’re shaking.”

“Apologies,” Salazar said, slow and slurred. His voice came thick with a lilting accent, the vowels broader, the consonants shoved together for space. “It seems I am more drained than I thought.”

Salazar pushed away. Every movement was sloppy, ran over itself. He detached his face from Harry’s throat, pulled his shoulders back. Harry saw his face, the skin stretched tight, the eyes half-mast and bruised dark. Salazar swayed on his feet. He leaned his forehead against Harry’s, breathing hard. Harry set his hands against the bowed bend of his spine.

The child thrashes on the bed. A terrible scream tears through his throat. Blood slicks Salazar’s arms, drips warm drops down his fingers. His wrists give an awful, pulsing pain, but he pushes past it, focuses. Around him all is darkness, smoky and deep, and a many-toothed thing roars from its depths. Magic howls against him, sinks into his bones and sings. He ignores the honeyed trap of its beauty, and coils it into a rope.

Salazar shoved himself away with a gasp. He crashed on the table behind him, rattling potion vials. He looked at Harry with wide, fevered eyes, his breathing hard and fast. 

“I am,” he said. His skin was tinged grey. “Sorry. I am. Gods. I need. I beg your forgiveness, Harry.”

Harry’s head spun from having shared someone’s thoughts, and lost him.

“What do you need?” he asked.

Salazar swallowed. He did not answer.

Harry went to him like one might approach a frightened, skittering thing. “C’mon,” he said, gentle, coaxing. He touched Salazar’s wrist, and felt him shudder. “I’ll get you to the common room.”

He tugged Salazar’s arms until it rested on his shoulders. He wove an arm around Salazar’s waist. He pulled Salazar to his side, and Salazar let him. “C’mon,” he said again, and Salazar. Salazar sagged against him, his body one long line of warmth.

A flick of his wand, a whispered spell. Harry lifted Ignotus from the bed. He squeezed Salazar’s waist, prompting him into motion. They picked their way out of the thrashed, gutted room. They walked around the broken corpse of the Infirmary doors, and together, ventured out into the night.

Harry breathed air made damp with fallen rain. He thought about Salazar’s mind against his own. About its questing fingers, and how sweetly they clung to him. He thought about the gasp of sheer relief Salazar breathed against his mouth. He focused. He turned inwards, felt along the seams of his fledgling Occlumency shields. He pulled low the walls around his mind, and made his thoughts soft, made himself welcoming.

Beside him, Salazar stuttered to a stop.

“Harry,” he said. His fingers curled against the bruising on Harry’s hip. “Be careful what you offer so freely. I am a selfish man. I will take what you give, and glut myself on it.”

“Good,” Harry said. He met Salazar’s eyes, and Salazar’s mouth fell open. Harry watched the blunt edge of his teeth, the pink flick of a tongue behind them. “Take all you need.”

Salazar made a noise, deep in his chest, soft and hungry. Harry smiled. 

He started walking again. Salazar leaned into him all the way to the common room. Their minds touched in the same places as their bodies, and both their steps were steadier for it.

{. . .}

Some miles away, midnight fell on a forest of ancient trees. The woods shook and shivered from its weight. The air twisted. Something tore between the trunks, split down in the middle like a rotted fruit.

A sliver of darkness came wafting through.

Chapter Text

Godric was five years old the first time someone put a sword in his hands.

Five and young, five and a child. Soft and bright and without strength to hold the blade. He'd looked at the length of steel that made his arms tremble, the blunt edge that reflected faint sunlight. The hilt chafed the tender skin of his palms. Shiny metal looked back at him, a mirror of blood-red hair and gold-flecked eyes. "That's what you are, now," someone told him. He could not remember who; father, brother, trainer. An ageless voice that gave him function and identity in the same sentence. "You're a sword that fights, a sword that strikes and little else."

But he had been a little boy who could not lift a sword in a family that had no use in it for a child, a family that lived for war and needed a weapon. So he became someone else. He became the burn of overworked muscles that strained up from hard floors, the hiss of steel that slashed through fire-warm air, the grind of bone-white knuckles that punched and punched and punched.

He was eight years old when his mother died.

Eight and proud, eight and trying. Black and blue and heart-bruised. His father far away, fighting someone else's battles. Their house full of death. Of life. Newborn wails and soft whispers. He took his sword, no longer too heavy to bear, too rough to his skin. He went to his training field and raged. Grieved the only way he knew how, pushed everything that hurt and mattered into the blade and struck.

Someone gave him his mother's wand that day. He couldn’t remember who, could not bring himself to care. "This is yours," they told him. "And that's what you are now. A wand that destroys, a wand that curses, and little else."

But he had been a wizard who could not do magic in a family that no longer had a witch in it to teach him, a family different from who he was and needing a protector. So he became the heat of power that rushed through veins, the lightning that pooled under the ribs, the burst of spells that crushed and razed and shattered.

He was ten years old the first time he killed a man.

Ten and lonely, ten and angry. The back-alley had been dank, reeking of beer and stale water. Mud sucked his boots, darkness weighed his shoulders. The man had been drunk, had had a knife in one hand and a girl in the other. Godric had not known him, or the girl. He saw the knife, and the girl's eyes, and he struck. He unsheathed his sword, the grind of metal familiar as his own voice, dodged the first clumsy swing of the other's blade, the second. He bent his knees, readied his stance, and thrust, up in someone else's body.

It had been easy. His sword slid between two of the man's ribs, split soft flesh and yielding muscles, a frail body against tempered steel. The drunkard choked, coughed dark, dark blood. Godric watched him fall with his heart in his throat and his arms steady.

This is what I am, he remembered thinking. Flesh and blood and steel. Death for gold. Little else.

Then he met Salazar.

He had been eleven. Splitting at the seams, rough and unpolished, hard the way the world taught him. His father and older brothers killed their way into nobility through dubious services to the crown as he watched from the sidelines, too young yet to slick his hands as red as theirs, but far from innocent nonetheless. He had been steel that shed blood and magic that slaughtered, the breath that caught in his enemy's throat in the heartbeat before death.

Salazar crashed through his life like a tidal wave, overwhelming, sweeping everything away, leaving behind the sharp tang of change, crisp as sea brine. A storm-eyed boy with a snake on his shoulders and shadows in his steps, silent as a ghost but riveting in the way of a tempest on the horizon. There had been something both utterly foreign and achingly familiar about him.

The two of them collided with all the strength of racing warhorses, dug their nails under each other's skin and did not let go. It had hurt, this meeting, this shared life, had torn them both to pieces and glued them back together differently. The sellsword brat who posed as a squire and the beggar boy who carried the poise of a king. Two entities that should not coexist but lost meaning without the other.

They became friends. They fell in a violent, all-encompassing relationship that bared Godric's heart, pulled him back from the abyss he had been falling down to. The mad wilderness in Salazar's eyes tamed itself by degrees. They met in the dead of night and before daybreak. Godric always went with his sword. He pushed the blade in Salazar's hands, and showed the other boy how to fight. "Look, Salazar," he never said. "That's what I am, and it's yours now."

Salazar brought with him with stories of faraway realms that did not revolve around pain and grave-dirt. "Look what the world could be," he said, and Godric listened, mesmerised. "Not everything is death and betrayal, my friend. Look all we could do together, look all we could be."

They taught each other magic, they laughed and played and lived. Godric loved Salazar with bare-toothed fierceness, and Salazar loved him.

Godric climbed the army's ranks, and watched Salazar charm his way from the sludge of the streets to the polished halls of the royal court, from ragged vagabond to prodigal apprentice of the kingdom's most respected sorcerer.

They'd been fine, for a while. If not happy, at least content, each pursuing his own ambitions with the other's help.

Nearing their sixth or seventh year together, a Norman warlock stormed the city. Within a night, the fragile peace they had found gave way under their feet. A great purge began. Their people, who had been tolerated before, were hunted like rats. Soldiers who Godric had known since childhood, ransacked the city in search of anyone with magic in their veins. They ripped families apart, and blood ran thick in the streets.

Salazar found him through the screams. "Come with me," he said. "They killed everyone. We are alone in the world. So we must live. From now on, only the two of us matter." He took Godric's hand and Godric followed, and he never stopped.

Now Salazar was locked with an Obscurial, could be dead for all Godric knew, and there was nothing Godric could do about it.

He drew a slow breath. The air smelled of red apples and firewood. Godric paced his rooms on silent steps. Outside, the night was dark as pitch, plunging the room in cushioned semi-darkness. The glow of a lonely candle bled crimson and gold against heavy drapes of his bedsheets.

His son and daughter slept on the bed, their limbs sprawled, their faces slack. They exhausted themselves waiting for him to return from the forest, and only went to sleep after hearing a watered-down version of the truth.

Godric had not told them about Salazar. Salazar who they loved like family. Salazar who, in his arrogance, was likely to die before sunrise.

Godric bit down the surge of magic that tingled his fingertips. His body was tight and thrumming with restlessness. He reached the end of his chambers, whirled around. His fingers tapped the empty air that should hold his sword hilt. The lack of weight at his side threw his balance like a missing limb, but Godric always left his weapons at the door when he met with his children.

He watched their still, sleeping faces, and walked out the room. He went down the stairs leading to his common room. All was silent at this hour. He heard only the whistle of the wind, the cracks and hisses of the hearth fires. Light trembled over the thick rugs, painted the room in warm reds and ambers. Godric picked his way around schoolbags and abandoned books. A thought had his sword fly to his hand. It smacked his palm, and Godric stepped out into the night.

He walked Hogwarts’ halls, everything dark and blue in the witching hour. Godric breathed the smell of stone and wet wood. The silence sat thick and tense. He wove through shortcuts and suits of armour, past statues aglow with moonlight. Hogwarts was grand and stately, majestic in its architecture. The staircases danced their slow, grinding dance, and they moved at Godric’s call. 

He went to the entrance hall, down the marble staircase and toward the West Wing. 

Helga and the Potter boy were there, seated on the staircase off to the side. Helga’s eyes snapped to him the moment Godric emerged from the shadows. A hand wand her wand, and Godric opened his palms in surrender.

Helga saw him and relaxed her stance. She looked lovely in the wan, cloud-filtered light, her golden hair spun moonsilver, her tan skin aglow in its shroud of darkness. Godric cocked his head toward the Infirmary doors. Her lips thinned. Godric’s arms ached, his hands balled in twin fists.

It took hours, last time. Godric felt himself unravel with each passing heartbeat. It was Sila who warned him of the danger, then. She convulsed around his shoulders, hissing a wrathful, furious hiss, and Godric had not cared. He had not cared that interrupting such a ritual could kill him, could raze the whole city to the ground. Salazar had been on the floor, mouth and nose gushing blood, his eyes open and unseeing. The room had reeked of power so dense Godric felt it like a tangible thing.

Godric ran a dagger through a girl's heart, that night. He killed a child. He carried Salazar in his arms, praying, praying, praying, and fled under a hail of arrows.

Godric bowed to Helga, easy and deep, and walked away. He passed Harry on his way. The boy had his eyes closed, his forehead against the staircase railings. Dark hair fell across his face, hid his expression. He could be asleep, but for the tense set of his shoulders, the white-knuckled fist on his lap. His whole body was coiled tight. Godric wondered, not for the first time, what bound him so to Salazar. What earned the dedication, a devotion plain for all to see. He wondered if Potter himself knew. If he himself saw.

There were hidden depths to the boy. Everything in him screamed of a troubled past, of scars deeper than flesh wounds. Godric had met countless men like him before, death-stained and world-weary. They raided villages for coin, killed and raped because they could. Potter may be of the same ilk, but Godric had been trained since childhood, had honed himself sharp as a sword. He could look at a man and tell whether he was a threat by the shift in his eyes, the way he held himself. He could act, move for a kill in the half-instant after they met, and Harry. 

Harry did not strike him as a killer.

The boy held great kindness within himself. He had known the filth of the world and remained unbroken. He would hold Godric’s respect for that alone.

Godric vaulted a windowsill, knees bent for landing. Torches flared to life around the courtyard. Shadows danced on sword-steel and cobblestone. The air was cold, and thick with the promise of rain.

The spell was quick and easy, was something he created in the lonely years following his mother's death. A sigh, a touch of will, and rocks were rolled on the ground, catching moonlight. They shaped themselves in familiar patterns. Quicksilver for the blade, lethal and bright, coal for the face, changing and featureless. Eyes like forge-fires.

Godric drew his sword. He bowed to the coalesced shade, and the shade bowed back.

They came together with raised blades and easy violence. Godric became flowing motions familiar as breathing, the sleek pull of his body, the whistling of sword through wind. He let everything fall into insignificance. He fought until he was loose and breathless and once more settled inside his bones.

He could live without Salazar, even though it seemed sometimes as though he had forgotten how. He could live and be complete, without his friend. He had followed Salazar to the ends of the earth. He would do so again without a heartbeat of hesitation, but for all that their lives were intertwined and better for it, who they were did not stop where the other started. Salazar was his best friend, cherished beyond words, but Godric was no longer accountable for his choices. He could only pick up the pieces afterwards, move on with what was left.

One last step, a downward slash aimed true and Godric spun away, let the construct shatter, scatter like stardust.

“Enjoying the sight?” he asked, breathing hard.

A snort came from the darkness. Rowena leant a shoulder against the archway, her arms crossed over her chest. In the night, her eyes appeared as pools of ink, black as the starless space. Her hair, unbound, fell in heavy locks down her back.

“I am keeping count,” she said. “Of the property damage your nighttime exercises often produce.”

“I shan’t accept reproach from the woman who came close to blowing up the North Tower.”

Rowena stepped forth into the courtyard. Torch fire washed her skin deep bronze. She gave a sharp smile. “Who spoke of reproach?”

Godric huffed a laugh. He sheathed his sword, wiped the sweat from his brow. Rain clattered over the slate roof. He joined Rowena under the passageway. 

“It seems sleep evades us all tonight,” he said. “Have you come to spar?”

It was not uncommon for Rowena to seek him in the early morning or deep into the night. Of the four of them, she alone had not been trained in her childhood. She was a Scot, and her people, unlike Helga’s, did not teach their girls to fight. Godric started her instruction in swordplay some time after they met.

“Would you like to learn?” Godric asked her on a clear summer night. Before them, Helga led Salazar into a fight, wielding axe and shield with ruthless skill.

 Rowena took the blade Godric offered her, and never gave it back.

“I was hoping for someone with whom to share a drink,” Rowena said. She reached a hand inside her cloak, and extracted a bottle of dark, lacquered wood.

Godric smiled. “You know I can never refuse you anything.”

They sat together on a windowsill. Their knees touched. Rowena gave a half smile, her eyes warm, and handed him the bottle.

Godric uncorked it. He smelled malted barley, spices and herbs to flavour it. “Usquebaugh,” he said. “Christ’s bones, but I love you.”

He drank. The spirit slid like liquid fire down his throat, a clean burn.

“There will be snow, soon,” Rowena said. She brought the bottle to her lips and drank deep. “Will your wife be back in time for winter? I fear she will not manage the roads once the frost sets.”

Godric bowed his head. “I’ve not had news in a fortnight. She was headed into the desert.”

Rowena watched him, her eyes sharp and shrewd. “You miss her,” she said.

“With all my heart.”

Marya was not one to be tied down. Wanderlust called to her as the moon called the sea. She went to the burn of African deserts, to the roiling, open oceans. Godric loved her, and she loved him, but loving someone did not suffice for the sharing of a life. Marya craved freedom. She was less of a mother to their children, more of a stranger who bore them offerings of ancient sands and foreign flowers. Godric was bound to Salazar’s side, and could not go with her. He would sooner part with the breath in his chest than part from Salazar, and had known it such since first he and Marya came together in a wild Iberian plain. Since first she smiled at him under the stars, and brought his hands to her hip. 

Rowena patted his thigh. “I wonder, at times,” she said. “At the cruelty of the Fates, that they never let you lust for another man.”

Godric took the bottle from her hands. “Have mercy, woman,” he grumbled, and drank. “The hour is too late for such truths.”

“On the contrary. I find night and drunkenness the only tolerable states in which to speak my mind.”

They settled into silence. They watched the rain fall, listened to water patter on tile and stone. The air smelled of damp and rotting leaves.

“Is this, then,” Godric said, considerately. “An opportune moment for me to ask about Helga?”

Rowena frowned. She cocked her head to the side. “I don't know what you mean.”

She was good, from the pitch of her voice to the angle of her body, but Godric had grown into manhood at Salazar’s side. Rowena, for all her talent, could not hide herself nearly so well as he.

“Do you not,” he said, and she flinched.

“I – ” she said. She stopped.

“Rowena?”

She peered out into the dark, her posture stiff, her eyes glazed. Rowena, the more sensitive to magic of the four of them, was cursed with a Seer’s sight, and often subject to visions which left her numb to the world. Godric touched her hand. Her skin was cold. She gave a great shudder, and turned her eyes to him. 

“We ought to go,” she said, and when she rose to her feet, Godric did not question her.

They went back inside, walking through the Entrance Hall. Their footfalls echoed off the darkened walls. Godric kept an eye on Rowena as they made their way to the Hospital Wing. They moved briskly, and, coming at a bend in the corridor, saw –

No one.

Potter and Helga had gone.

Godric’s hand went to his sword. He could perceive his surroundings in great detail. The friction of clothes on skin, the caress of air on his face. He saw the lazy dance of dust in the moonlight, and he knew his eyes bled a lion’s yellow. Fangs pushed at his teeth. He advanced on silent feet, and heard – 

Voices.

He spun, every nerve strung tight, and he saw, and he stilled.

Harry and Salazar stood alone at the end of a hallway. They faced each other. Washed in moonlight, they looked intangible as two ghosts. Beings of mist, roused from slumber to dance together through darkened halls. Harry's hand was Salazar's waist. Salazar's hand was on Harry's shoulder. One looked up, the other down.

Oh, Godric thought, and he breathed his first full breath this night. Salazar was alive. Salazar was well . He looked at Harry with wonder and a soft, quiet awe.

Oh, Godric through again.

He knew where laid Salazar's interests. Through the years he found in his bed naked, boneless men aplenty.

They had been on the cusp of manhood when first it happened, fifteen summers at the most. Godric had known, by then, the softness of a girl’s lips, the swell of breasts against his chest. He had known what it was. To want. To yearn so sweetly for another’s flesh. 

He found Salazar pressed against a wall, one day. His hands in another man’s hair. The man’s thigh between his legs. Godric nearly killed him on sight, the man. For daring. For thinking, for one instant, he could lay a hand on Salazar and keep the arm. Then he saw. The way Salazar angled his head. The way he pulled the man close, so their lips could meet and merge. He watched Salazar roll his hips into the man’s thigh, and left without a sound.

"Are you mad at me?" Salazar asked, hours later, when they met in the rose garden outside the castle walls. Godric remembered the honeyed smell of the flower. The redness of Salazar's lips.

"Of course not," he answered, because Salazar was his, and he was Salazar's, and nothing much mattered beyond this one truth. He asked, “Aren't you afraid?" and Salazar laughed at him, bitter, mocking.

“One death knell is as good as the next, my friend,” he said, and Godric never questioned him again.

There had been other men, after. Godric distanced himself when they appeared. His fingers itched, always, for his sword when he thought of them. He would not trust nameless men with his friend's heart. Still he retraced Salazar’s steps. Made certain he was safe. From the men, and from other’s eyes. All had been well, but Godric.

Godric had wondered.

One night they met in the home of Salazar's master. The man had been out of town, affording the two of them the rare pleasure of an evening in each other’s company. They talked. About magic, and inconsequential things. The room smelled of woodsmoke and the curious herbs wreathing the walls. Godric caught himself looking. He watched candle light dance on Salazar’s skin, and wanted to follow its patterns with his hands.

Salazar closed his book. He set it aside, and straightened from his slouch on the floor by Godric's legs.

"You can,” he said. “Kiss me, if you wish. It is all you have been thinking all evening.”

Godric remembered feeling his heart stutter, his stomach drop, and Salazar slid, slow and languid, between Godric's knees. He put a hand on Godric's thigh. 

“Kiss me, Godric,” he said, and fitted their mouths together. 

He kissed Godric gently, kissed him as though they had all the time in the world. He swept his tongue over Godric’s mouth, and Godric, helpless, opened for him. For the bite of his teeth. He put a hand on Salazar’s neck.

He kept his eyes open. As he kissed back. As a long-fingered hand carded through his hair, tilted his head to a side. There had been strength in Salazar’s touch, a demanding firmness. It would have been easy. For Godric to close his eyes. To imagine softer lips against his own, fuller curves under his hands.

Salazar, who had worn long hair and a coltish, adolescent prettiness, deserved better. Godric would not do him the insult of picturing him as a woman, when, in the androgynous time before manhood broadened his shoulders and sharpened his jawline, he suffered enough lustful leers for his beauty. 

Salazar smiled, spit-slick, against his lips. "There," he whispered, and shifted back. “Now you know.”

They had gone on with their lives, but to this day, Godric wondered. At what would have become of them, had he wished to take Salazar to bed. Had Salazar let him. 

"Well,” Rowena said, jostling him from his thoughts. She came to rest beside him, and slanted him a smile. “There is that.”

Salazar and Harry began to walk. Harry with an arm around Salazar’s waist. Salazar with an arm around Harry’s shoulders. Leaning his weight. Their bodies pressed together, moved together. Together, they disappeared in the night’s shadows.

Salazar and Harry, Godric thought.

Harry-and-Salazar.

“Shall we bet on it, do you think?”

Godric blinked. His chest felt tight. “Beg your pardon?”

Rowena slanted him a smile. “What would you wager, Gryffindor,” she said. “On the time Salazar shall require, before he takes the boy to bed. I say in another year at the most. Two months and a year.”

“Rowena. We cannot – ”

“I am willing to bring to the table the explosive tags I acquired when we visited the Middle Kingdom in our youth.”

“You stole those things.”

“And I think you ought to play the cloak of dragon’s scales you bought two summers ago." Rowena cocked her head to the side. "Unless, of course, you fear losing to me.”

“Woman,” Godric said. “I fear nothing. And you are, certainly, far off the mark. Harry is of Salazar’s House. What we saw is no simple matter of lust besides. Eight months and a year, and not before.”

Rowena patted his arm. “We shall see.”

{. . .}

The common room was quiet. The silver lamps burned low. Outside the windows, moonrays broke themselves on lake water. Dark-green shadows danced on the rug-covered floors.

Harry lowered Ignotus on a couch. He took his arm from Salazar’s waist, and sat Salazar on another. Detaching Salazar from himself was like peeling wet clothes. Baring his skin to the wind. Harry shivered, and stepped back. 

Salazar sank into the couch with a soft sigh. His head fell against the backrest. Stretching his throat. Harry watched the long, vulnerable line of it. White noise blanketed his mind. He watched Salazar with his eyes closed in repose, his body lax with deep weariness. 

He wondered if he should find Helga.

“Do not,” Salazar said. He did not open his eyes. He stretched, long and languid, arms over head, one wrist clasped in a hand. The motion bunched his shoulders. Arched his back. Harry swallowed. “I am well enough.”

“You’re sure?” Harry asked. His voice came rough. “You look like half a corpse.”

Salazar slanted him a look, his eyes half-mast and crinkled into a smile. “So long as it is only half.”

He lowered his arms. Harry’s eyes went to the exposed skin of his wrists. Alarm shot through him. He snatched Salazar’s hand, knelt beside him on the couch. He turned Salazar’s hand over.

A scar curled a tight spiral on each of Salazar’s wrists, the skin puckered and raw. Harry touched a finger to the deep red slash of it. Salazar sucked a sharp breath. Harry’s head spun. He felt the thin bones of Salazar’s wrist. He followed the curve of the scar, its tender seam. 

“Harry,” Salazar said.

Harry let him go. He flexed his fingers on his thighs. He thought about the flash of a knife. About warmth pooling in Salazar’s palms. About the hot, pulsing pain of split skin. “You did this to yourself,” he said. “For the boys.”

“Yes,” Salazar said.

“You shared your blood with them.”

“Yes,” Salazar said. He said, “They are. The only sons I shall bear.”

Harry closed his eyes.

“Your sons,” he said.

One of these boys Harry helped save would one day father the line of the man who would murder his parents. Who would want Harry dead so ardently he put an entire country in pursuit of him. It should be a betrayal, Harry thought. His very flesh should rebel, should rot on its bones. He had saved his parents’ murderer, and the act should come with its weight of Oedipian curses. Harry should feel guilt, or perhaps disgust, but.

There were three boys who breathed tonight when they might have been dead, and he could not bring himself to regret one moment of it.

“Congratulations,” he said. He gave Salazar a crooked smile. “I’m sure fatherhood will suit you well.”

“I’m glad one of us believes it so.”

Harry sat more comfortably, facing Salazar with his legs crossed. “You need to rest,” he said.

“Not yet,” Salazar murmured. “The boy. Needs looking after. Talk to me, Harry. Keep me here.”

“What do you want to hear?”

“Anything.”

Salazar’s mind was a murmur at the back of Harry’s. Harry felt it like waves lapping his feet on the seashore. Heavy with sleep.

Harry wondered, what more can I give. What more can I share, Salazar, before you own me entire.

“Have I ever told you about that time my friends and I battled a full-grown mountain Troll?” 

Outside Samhain sat thick with the scent of pumpkins and apples, all grotesque smiles and black burning candles. Harry shared the story of a Halloween night long ago. He talked about Ron, his bright red hair and pale blue eyes and steadfast loyalty. He talked about Hermione. Her bushy hair and shining eyes and ruthless intelligence. He talked about their first months at Hogwarts, when everything was new and tasted, already, of home. He remembered the smell of caramelised sugar and candied squash, and running with Ron through empty corridors, looking for a girl who was not yet their friend. The stinking grey-green mass of the troll, its smell of old socks and public toilet. He talked about the battle, and the birth of a friendship which would survive pride, and loss, and war.

He talked the night through, and Salazar, all the while, listened. They looked after a healing boy. They sat together until dawn broke in pale green shadows through the lake, and, when Ignotus’ fever broke with it, parted ways to sleep in separate beds.

Chapter Text

He stood in a graveyard, the scent of rain and recently turned earth in his lungs, the wind a damp caress on his skin. Rows upon rows of tombstones stood on either side of him, stretching as far as the eye could see. Headstones emerged from pallid mists like so many contorted shadows, some brand new, others crumbled with time. A sea of the dead.

He walked with a funambulist’s caution, all tight focus and mindful steps. He felt as though the world might shatter if he were not careful. Leaves crunched under his feet, a dry rustle like bones snapping. He was the only moving, living thing he could see.

He walked, between the tombs, in the night and the silence. There was nothing left for him to do. He walked.

Then he stopped.

The realisation came to him in increments, worming its way to his awareness. He had thought himself alone; he was not.

Off to the side of him, shadows had condensed in a solid form. A tear. A gash in the night’s skin. Fog curled around it like a cloak. Beyond the darkness, blurred with shadows, a woman stood. Gold dripped from her eyes. Blood slicked her cheek. He raised an arm, in the silence, in this necropolis of rotting corpses. He reached for her. He brought fingers to the shadows, and the shadows brought fingers to him. 

Harry woke screaming.

{. . .}

Alfric could not sleep.

He watched water shadows dance on the ceiling. The hour was late. The hour was early. The first fingers of dawn dusted light through his curtains. Insomnia weighed on him. He was exhausted.

Beside him, Gytha snorted and snuffled in her sleep. Her bare shoulder touched his, her skin soft and sleep-warm. She laid on his bed in a graceless sprawl, the blankets bunched across her thighs, her face buried in his pillow. Farther away, Dallin snored quietly. Alfric could see the shape of him in the soft semi-darkness, stretched on the floor in a nest of blankets, his chest rising and falling. Bradley huddled close to his side, Glenn to the other, his head on Dallin’s stomach.

They fell asleep in his room late last night, after Harry’s absence drew them toward the comfort of each other’s company. Alfric was grateful. That he did not spend the night alone. That his Housemates shared bread and wine with him, and did not talk about the Forbidden Forest and its many beasts.

He listened to his friends in sleep, and clocked his breaths to theirs.

How odd, he thought, that he, gifted with many brothers, should find his family here. Piled on his bedroom floor. How odd, the ease with which he accepted people he had known a threescore days as his.

How cruel, that he should have found them, and risk so soon to lose the one who was their heart.

A hand touched his shoulder.

“Jesus wept, Alfric. Have you slept at all?”

Gytha watched him in the bedroom dark, her eyes heavy with sleep.

“Sorry,” he murmured. “Have I woken you?”

“You should go,” she said. “See if you find him, or perhaps Lord Salazar. He may yet have heard news.”

“And he may not,” Alfric whispered.

Gytha gave him a light shove. “Only one way to know, my friend,” she said. “There is no use in you staying here, fretting. If you see him, do tell Harry he owes us a full day of his time. As reparation for undue worries.”

Alfric left the warmth of his bed. His feet sank in the pile of blankets strewn over the floor. He dressed quickly, silently, stepping over and around sleep-slack bodies. Gytha stretched across to his side of the bed with a contented hum. Alfric watched her with his heart full to bursting. He bowed to her. She waved back lazily, and he stepped over Audra’s legs to reach his door.

He slipped in the corridor without a sound. The door clicked shut behind him. Globes of light flared to life above his head, a pale glow against grey stone. He was halfway to the common room when he heard a noise. A muffled crash, something falling to the floor.

Something in Harry's room.

A blink, a breath, and Alfric turned, ran. He knocked on Harry’s door and heard no response. Only a noise, low and pained. He tried the handle and found it locked. 

“Harry?” he called, his heart in his mouth, panic making his fingers shake. 

Harry did not answer. 

Alfric pushed his shoulder against the door. He rammed against it, once, twice. Another noise, something like a sob, and Alfric, blind with fear, threw his whole weight behind the next blow. The door opened with a crash.

The first thing Alfric saw was Harry down on the floor. Bedsheets tangled with him like a rope. Sweat slicked his chest. Harry had his head thrown back, his mouth opened in a silent scream. His eyes were empty.

“Harry!”

Alfric threw himself on his knees beside him. He touched Harry’s shoulder, pressed a hand against Harry’s chest. Harry’s heart ran like a racing horse. His skin was cold to the touch. Alfric moved a hand to Harry’s neck, forced the other boy to look at him. Harry breathed hard and fast, and Alfric heard himself make soft, soothing noises, as though to appease a wild, wounded thing.

“Alf,” Harry said, more question than statement, and his eyes cleared, focused.

“I’m here,” Alfric said. “All is well. You. You found the way home.”

Harry choked a laugh. Dry, and entirely humourless. “Home,” he repeated. “I haven’t been home in a long time.”

Alfric flinched. 

Oh, he thought, and swallowed. Harry always seemed perfectly at ease here, in Hogwarts’ stately halls. He led the Slytherins through their depths, so mindlessly comfortable they, in turn, let themselves believe. About finding with him a place where they could live. Where they belonged. Harry made them see, with soft words and guiding hands, and they followed blindly in his wake.

Alfric looked at Harry, who did not see for himself the truth he had made for them, and ached.

“Nightmares, still?” Alfric asked.

Harry blinked at him. “What are you doing here?” he asked.

“We were waiting,” Alfric said. “For you. To return to us. We worried.”

Harry’s brow creased. “You did?”

Alfric bit his tongue. “Of course,” he said. “You are. One of us. Do you think you can stand?”

“You shouldn’t,” Harry said. “Worry. With me, it’s likely to turn into a full-time job.”

Harry rose to his feet. Alfric’s eyes went to the bandage sat low on Harry’s hip. His jaws tightened. His chest felt hot. He looked away. Outside the window, a Grindylow wobbled by, its green scales shimmering in the murky waters. Its spindly fingers were closed around a dead fish. Alfric watched it take a bite, flaking white flesh.

Harry touched his arm. “Are you alright?”

I haven’t been home in a long time, Alfric thought, and wanted to bare his teeth.

“I am,” he said. “Angrier than I can say.” He looked at Harry, at the bruises under his eyes, at his mouth, opened in surprise. “I do not know,” he said, carefully. “What lives inside you. What it is that keeps you awake at night. What drives you to surpass yourself in our studies. We understand there is something you keep out of our reach. You lie so elegantly, Harry, but in a House of liars, secrets scream louder than truths.”

“Alfric – ”

“We do not care,” Alfric said. “Understand this. We do not. Care. You may keep as much of yourself hidden as you wish. You brought us together. Harry, when we were lost, you made a home for us. So we worry. We stay awake when you are not safe. You. Are ours. And you may not see it yet, but give us time, and some day, you will.”

“Alfric.”

Harry looked at him with the air of a man with a broken heart.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I hadn’t realised.” He stepped close to Alfric, and Alfric watched the lines of his face in the bedroom dark. He traced the bone ridges, the hollows of his cheeks, the curve of Harry’s mouth. His heart beat in his throat, on his tongue. “I won't be staying,” Harry said. “I’ll leave. I don’t know when, but. Once I’m gone, I won't come back.”

“You are a fool,” Alfric said. “If you think we won’t follow.”

“You won’t. Not where I'm going.”

“Watch us.”

Harry breathed a hard breath. He clamped a hand on Alfric’s neck, brought their foreheads together. His skin was damp and warm. He smelled like soap and sweat, a sharp, clean scent. Alfric clenched his jaw and held himself still.

“Please,” Harry said softly. “Don’t make this any harder than it already is.”

Alfric straightened. He eased away from Harry’s touch. “You’re tired,” he said. “I should leave you to rest.”

“Alfric –”

Alfric bent himself into a bow, deep and practised. “Goodnight, Harry. I’m glad you're well.”

He left. Harry’s eyes burned the back of his neck, but he did not turn back. He held his head up and his shoulders back. He walked to his bedroom. Closed the door behind him. He looked at the sprawled mass of his friends. Audra had joined Gytha on the bed. Glenn slept, mouth opened, with his legs across Bradley’s lap. Alfric breathed the scent of stale air and warm skin, and he clapped his hands.

Dallin woke with a snort. Ashton groaned and rolled on his other side.

“Wake up,” Alfric told them. He poked a toe in Glenn’s side. The other boy muttered an insult, and turned his head on Dallin’s stomach. “Wake up ,” Alfric said, louder. On the bed, Audra propped herself on her elbows, blinking blearily. Alfric gave her a nod. “Harry is back. We must talk.”

{…}

Harry walked the castle’s dawn-touched halls, his eyes gritty with tiredness, his throat raw from screaming. He had barely slept. His head knifed with pain.

Everytime he closed his eyes, he saw writhing shadows. Headstones with familiar names. A woman in the darkness, her form blurred as though seen through water. Hermione, he thought, and shivered.

 He was so cold.

He kicked up into a run. Hogwarts rang with his footsteps. Breath fogged from his mouth. He could not outrun his own mind, but he tried anyway. 

He ran all the way to the inner courtyard, with its racks of swords, neat lines of weapons and weights. Fog hung in strips on the whispering grass. Turbulent wind disturbed piles of fallen leaves. Harry stood there, panting, and reached for a blade. He let himself fall into guard, sword in his off-hand, an extension of his arm. He moved, followed the familiar rhythm of simple drills. He worked against the restless buzzing in his limbs. He worked until his heart picked up speed, until his arms ached with effort. He worked until the pulsing pain in his head did not seem so much like it radiated from his scar.

Harry had not had so vivid a nightmare since Voldemort forced them into his head. 

He drove his sword in the training dummy. Wood splinters showered his boots. Harry freed his sword, and struck again.

“You,” he heard, and spun on his heels. He brought his sword up in a sharp slash, touching the dulled edge to the skin of a throat.

Antioch looked at him, frozen still. The boy clenched his jaw but did not flinch. He tipped his chin in defiance, dark eyes meeting Harry’s.

Harry dropped the sword.

“Sorry,” he said. “You startled me.”

Antioch gave a terse nod. “I am looking for my brother,” he said tersely. “What have you done with him?”

Harry looked at this boy who was Salazar’s son. He looked at the stubborn line of his jaw, at the proud draw of his shoulders. Had his skin lightened, Harry wondered. Was his hair darker. Was there more of Tom Riddle in him than there had been before.

Harry looked at Antioch, and saw a frightened boy who fought hard to hide it. 

“You brother is safe,” he said, and sheathed his sword. “He’s doing better. His life is no longer at risk.”

“Where,” Antioch ground out, “is he?”

“With Salazar,” Harry said. “I’ll take you to him, if you’d like. Not now, though. He needs to sleep.”

Antioch’s hands closed into fists.

“Easy, lad,” Harry said. “There’s no need to rush.” He met the boy’s eyes. “Your brother is safe. And so are you. I promise.”

“And I should take you at your word?”

Harry gave a shrug. “Saved your life, didn’t I?” Antioch fixed Harry with a hard stare, his back stiff as a board. Harry sighed. “Listen,” he said, and forced his voice soft, his words soothing. “I can only imagine what it’s been like for you. To live out there. Looking after two brothers with magic in their blood. I understand it’s made you hard. I understand you distrust everyone. But you’ve found your people now. We’ll take care of you, if you’ll let us.”

“Let you?” Antioch’s eyes narrowed. “Would you, then, let us leave? If we wanted to?”

“Of course,” Harry said. “This is a school. Not a prison. You ask to leave, and we’ll give you some provisions, send you on your way.”

“I could talk,” Antioch said. “Betray your secret. I’m a lord’s son. I would be listened to. I could have the king’s armies at your door.”

“You could,” Harry said. “Do you want to?”

Antioch opened his mouth. Closed it again.

Harry nodded. “We can teach you how to control your gifts, here. We can make sure you’re never vulnerable again. You can learn to protect your brothers. You can learn. Anything. And besides.” Harry cocked his head to the side. He gave a bitter smile. “Do you have anywhere else to be?”

Antioch flinched.

“I’m sorry,” Harry said, softly. “For what it’s worth. I’m sorry.” He gestured toward the castle. “How about we head inside? When’s the last time you ate something? I’ll show you the kitchens. We’ll get some food. I’ll answer all your questions, and I’ll take you to your brother after. How does that sound?”

Antioch gave a stiff nod. He did not say a word, but when Harry started toward Hogwarts, he followed suit, each step more assured than the last.

{. . .}

Time began to dissolve within itself. Winter descended on the castle and the surrounding countryside. The rich gold-red hues of Autumn gave way to the stripped bleakness of the colder months. The nights were long, and the days were cold. Snow fell in heavy drifts. Frost sparkled on the windows in delicate latticework. Icicles grew from roofs and doors. The lake froze overnight, its waters the solid colour of chilled steel. The cold wormed inside the castle's walls, and made itself at home.

Harry watched the world cushion itself in a thick blanket of snow, and did not think about his last winter.

The Founders let themselves be snowed in, and closed the doors against the worst of the cold. Defence classes had to be moved inside. The Great Hall's tables were pushed against the walls, and the castle echoed with the clashing of swords and spells.

The pace slowed within the castle’s walls. As the kitchens moved onto the winter stores, the Founders eased the working hours. Their students ate salted meat and apples wrinkled from storage, and saved their strength as the rations diminished.

“Will we make it through winter?” Harry asked Salazar one evening, the two of them alone in the common room, the lamps banked to a muted glow, the lake a wall of liquid blackness against the windows.

“We will,” Salazar said. “We have food enough to last until the ice thaws and the roads clear. So long as the storms do not extend into spring, we will not starve this winter.” He gave a pause. “The one after is another matter, but you should concern yourself with it as of yet.”

The lessening of lesson hours left Harry with more time on his hands than he knew what to do with. Nothing was asked of him. There were no relatives to demand his labour. No sinister plot to call his attention. No war to fight. Nothing beyond surviving the winter months. Nature shuddered to a standstill, and Harry became restless in its icy hold.

His temper grew short. He fought to reign himself in, his tongue, the urge to bare his teeth. He walked with anger in his breast. He distanced himself from the children, and spared them the worst of himself. Most days. Most days, he kept himself smiling. He kept his words sheathed and his hands gentle. A beast paced the cage of his ribs, but Harry hid it from sight. Most days. 

One day, his wand was in his hand, and his hand was around someone’s throat. A boy. The boy looked at him with wide, frightened eyes. His breathing short. His body frozen still. A Gryffindor, Harry thought. A Gryffindor who should have known better than to mock Ashton. The youngest, smallest of them, with his delicate hands and fine-featured face. Harry felt the Gryffindor choke under his hand. Felt him try to swallow, and fail. Curses roared through his blood, pressed at his wand-tip. Harry watched panic fill the boy’s eyes, and forced his fingers loose. He stepped back, and walked away.

Salazar found him, later that day. He laid a long-fingered hand on Harry’s shoulder, tipped Harry’s head up, knuckles under the chin. Harry met his eyes. He thought about the boy, whimpering with Harry’s hand on his throat. His chest felt hot. His mouth filled with saliva, and he swallowed down the urge to vomit. Salazar did not say a word. They were alone, the two of them, and under Salazar’s eyes, Harry felt himself unravel.

“I'm sorry,” he said, his voice thick, his breathing fast. He tried to bow his head, but Salazar would not let him. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I could've hurt that boy.” Harry was trembling. "I. I wanted to – "

“I know,” Salazar said. He touched fingers to Harry’s temple. He traced the line of Harry’s cheekbone, fell to the corner of his jaw. Salazar settled his hand on Harry’s shoulder, and Harry wanted. He wanted the fingers to press harder. He wanted to feel them burrow into his flesh, and leave five dotted bruises on his collarbone.

“The boy is well,” Salazar said. “I talked to him. I tended to his bruises.” Harry closed his eyes. Salazar’s hand tightened on him. “Give yourself time, my dear.  You will find your place amongst us.”

Harry did, eventually. He found  himself in bits and pieces, and learned to live with the sharp edges.

He found Salazar in the early morning, when sleeplessness drove him from his bed. They sat together cross-legged, and Salazar farthered his Occlumency teachings. He showed Harry how to clear his thoughts, how to shield them. They tangled together in the recesses of Harry’s mind, and fought for dominance over his thoughts. Harry learned more in a few weeks with Salazar than in a year with Snape.

Outside, everything was frozen still, and Harry, for the first time in his life, turned inward. He took stock of himself. Of his situation. He asked why restlessness lay buried in his bones, and here is what he found.

He was no one. In this place. In this time. He was no one that he recognized. He was no one’s freak. He was no one’s saviour. He was not demented, or delusional, or dangerous. He was no prophesied prodigy. He was neither an enemy that needed killing, nor an asset to keep safe. He was none of the things which made Harry Potter. Harry Potter carried his story on his skin. He came with burdens, with his weight in expectations.

Harry did not understand the man he saw reflected in other people’s eyes. His narrative was changed, a shift in paradigm. Harry was just Harry, and the revelation was like gasping air after years spent drowning.

He held his head up with a newborn’s wonder. Here is what he saw.

He saw his Housemates at his side. They ate with him, walked with him, learned with him. They shadowed his steps. They looked at him for instructions. They let him speak for them when someone addressed them as a group. They granted him authority over them. A responsibility to give Harry sense and purpose. Harry saw the duty they gifted him, and did not know what he should do with it.

So he learned.

He looked after them. He taught them the spells they struggled with. He helped with their homework. He made sure they ate, and slept. He made himself into someone they could laugh with, into someone they could talk to. They relied on him, so Harry became someone who could be relied upon. He carried himself in a way they could follow.

The Slytherins marked the change, and smiled to themselves.

Harry had nightmares. Vivid visions no potion could keep from him. He woke gasping in the small hours of the day, sheened in sweat, his heart running. Some days, tiredness sat on him like a shroud. He went through life in a fog, and his friends shouldered his weight. Gytha walked with her hand in the bend of his elbow. Glenn cracked jokes under his breath, teasing laughter from Harry’s lips. Alfric stood, always, half a pace at Harry’s back, watchful, a steady presence.

On those days when Harry could not stand the stretch of his own skin, the Slytherins closed ranks around him. They trailed in Harry’s wake and bared teeth at all who dared approach them.

Harry found himself a room on the Seventh floor. He went there when the world was too much to bear. The room was bare of furniture. There was nothing for him to break. He let himself loose within those four walls. In it he carried training dummies, carried sword and knives. There he willed away the darkest hours of his sleepless nights, of his empty days. He practised new spells to perfection, wielded his sword until his chest heaved, his muscles ached. Until his head was blank, and it felt as though he could function again.

It took two weeks before Godric found him. Harry pivoted in the middle of a drill, a hand on his sword, the other on his wand, and saw Godric, a shoulder leant against the door, watching.

“You are making yourself strong,” Godric said. He uncrossed his arms. Harry watched him approach, and shifted his weight. “Why?”

“There is a man,” Harry said. “I have to kill.”

The words weighed between them. Godric watched him in silence, and Harry, his head held high, met his eyes.

Godric bowed his head. “Then kill him,” he said, and drew his sword.

From then on, when Harry woke in the night and fled his bed, when he willed away the free hours of his days, Godric came to meet him. They fought together, in the bare room on the Seventh floor. Godric hit hard, with studied violence and little restraints. He drove Harry to the ground. He did not relent until Harry laid face-down, choking on his own breath, his finger clenched hard enough to bleed. He left Harry bruised and bloodied, and Harry grinned through the ache.

He had gone to war like a child. Utterly unprepared. Pushed by circumstances greater than he, with no control over his fate. His survival had been a matter of luck. He meant to make it a matter of skill. He threw himself into training with wild abandon.

One late afternoon, Helga met him in Godric’s stead. She was dressed in supple leather, her hair tied in a tight braid. She held a short sword in one hand, a round shield in the other, and faced him with a gentle smile.

“Godric informed us you wish to train,” she said. “I will be the one you fight tonight. We may start when you will.”

She was a ruthless fighter. She taught him to fight with and around a shield. She taught him how to break an opponent’s defences. With her, Harry learned new ways to move and place himself. For all her relentlessness, Helga was never a cruel teacher. She let Harry collect himself when he needed it. She explained his mistakes, and never lost patience when Harry failed, and failed again. They conversed over the grind of steel on steel, the bright bursts of spells, and Harry taught himself to the cadence of her voice.

The next day, Rowena was the one to join him. She met him in trousers and a shirt opened at the throat, a naked blade held in one hand. She was no less beautiful divested of her sophisticated dresses.

She cocked an eyebrow at him. “Shall we,” she said, and when she fell into guard, Harry followed her. 

She proceeded to tell Harry about speed and momentum. She showed him how to turn an enemy’s strength against himself. She told him there was no place for pride in a fight. Go for the throat, she said. The ground is stuffed full of fools and braggarts. She fought with clean efficiency and obvious relish. Harry watched her, and learned to fight with the same swift savagery.

The next night brought a snowstorm. Wind howled against the castle wall. Snow fell thick, twisting around itself in heavy drifts, a wild and ghostly dance. The cold bit down to the bone.

Harry sat with his bared blade on his knees. Waiting. Breath rose in white puffs from his mouth.

Salazar met him at the stroke of midnight. In his hand he held a sword, the blade sharp and thin. Harry watched him approach without a word. His heart drummed in his wrists, at his throat. Salazar’s eyes were unreadable in the darkness. He placed the point of his blade under Harry’s chin. The edge was not dulled. Harry pressed against it, shy of breaking skin. Salazar’s eyes crinkled into a smile.

They faced each other in the dead of night while the castle slept. Neither spoke a word.

Salazar talked with spells and swordpoint, the chilled edge of the blade against Harry’s skin. An invitation to either move, or cut himself failing. He put fingers to Harry’s hips, to his spine, to his chest. He guided Harry into the correct position, and his touch trailed bruises. He fought viciously. He bared Harry’s weaknesses, and hurt him with them.

Harry took punches. He broke three ribs on a curse Godric aimed at his chest. Helga knocked molars from his mouth with the edge of her shield. Rowena burst both his eardrums with a concussive spell. Salazar cut into the meat of his shoulder, trailed a scar down to the muscle above Harry’s heart. A sweep of dagger so swift and smooth Harry did not feel his skin as it split.

The wound gushed blood down Harry’s chest. It stained Salazar's hands. After he healed himself, Harry touched a thumb to the crimson specks on Salazar’s cheek, spreading red like wet paint. Salazar watched him with clenched jaws, and touched fingers to Harry’s wrist. His hand shook as it followed the rhythm of Harry’s pulse.

Harry did not let him heal the scar.

He went through life bruised and sore, his knuckles crusted with blood. The other students muttered at the sight of the marks on his skin, the purples and yellows of short nights and hard training. The Slytherins scolded at the stares, but Harry smiled. He had known far worse.

Yule tide came and went. They wreathed the castle in garlands of evergreen, ivy and mistletoe, green and waxy red. They hung fairy lights from the ceilings and balustrades. They celebrated the shortest day of the year with a feast. They ate roasted meat and drank thick, spicy wine. The Founders told stories about the renewal of time. Harry listened between his Housemates, warm and loose-limbed. His head lolled on Alfric's lap. Ignotus sat tucked against him. The boy was thin, still. He bore the marks of ordeal. He blinked against sleep in Harry's arms, unwilling to leave his side. His road to recovery was a long, arduous one. Harry helped him through the nightmares. 

Nearby, Antioch grinned at something Audra said. Cadmus played Exploding Snaps with the gaggle of younger students spread out on the rug.

Harry listened to Gytha laugh. He heard the rumble of Alfric’s voice, Glenn’s answering lilt. He watched his friends, safe together, and swallowed heavily. His chest ached. He wished he could freeze the moment, preserve it in amber. He wished he could stand guard to it always.

Across from him, Salazar watched him, gilded in firelight. His mouth curled in a smile. He raised his cup in salute, and Harry, closing his eyes, drank his own wine. 

"You have a place here," Godric told him some time later, his sword at the juncture between Harry's shoulder and his neck. "Understand, you may stay if you wish. You would make a competent teacher."

"Don't," Harry said, and he pushed against the blade, ducked, landed a fist in Godric’s stomach.

Do not make me dream of a thing I cannot have. Do not make me think. Do not make me think. 

(I think I could be happy here.)

Chapter Text

Breathe, Lily used to tell him when the pain was too great, vast and blind-siding. He remembered long nights where the world was red and he would bare angry teeth at the white moon, wild with agony. Breathe, she would tell him, and touch a hand to his back, easing the awful twist of tendons under raw, human flesh. He would breathe the scent at the base of Jame's neck, and listen to her voice. He whimpered like a beaten dog, but they soothed away the ache. Just breathe, Remus.

He remembered to breathe now.

A fraction of heartbeat to brace himself, and the Cruciatus caught him full on the chest. White-hot knives pierced his skin, sank deep and tore at exposed nerves. Remus let the curse push him back, his jaws set against bright pain. He crashed into something, felt it give under his weight. Snarling, he swallowed around a howl, forced air into his lungs, then back out again. He braced himself, pushed past the pain, and fired a spell.

The Cruciatus lifted. Remus slid to the floor, getting his feet under him and onto dark tiles. He lurched a step to the right. His knees gave out. He hit the ground with a grunt. Dark spots danced furiously across his vision. A warm liquid sluiced down his back, too viscous for blood. The contents of one of the jars he had crushed. It held the lemon-acid scent of malicious potions. Spasms knotted the muscles of his back.

There was a sharp crackle to his left, and Remus rolled. A burst of magic hurtled past his ear. Teeth gritted, he twisted, ducking behind an overturned table. Glass shards sliced his back, but he shook himself, pushed to his feet.

The air was clotted with smoke. He scented the coal-grey, effervescent smell of stone-dust. Ghostly silhouettes swayed through the swirling veil, transient shadows too quick to follow. His ears still rang from the explosion of a Blasting Curse. There was nothing for him to see, or scent, or hear, no means for him to perceive the battle raging around him. But he had to, or else he was dead.

Eyes watering, his throat closing up around a cough, he forced himself to stillness, focused outwards with everything in him that was not human.

There.

Under the whistle of his damaged eardrums, a heartbeat. Erratic, frenzied, reeking of fear. Thirty degrees to his right and moving.

Remus murmured a spell, and closed his eyes. He listened to the dwindling of a pulse. To the stopping of a pulse. The Death Eater collapsed without so much as a scream. Dead. Dying.

There was a monster curled around Remus' bones, chortling behind the cage of his ribs. Moony grinned in savage satisfaction, pointed teeth dragging along the seams of Remus' skin. Remus bit his lips, swallowed a smile and tasted blood, tangy and copper-red.

He had to move.

The smoke and fumes started to clear, lending weight to the battlefield. Debris littered the ground, a sorry mesh of cracked tiles, splintered wood, broken bodies. Below the salt-rust scent of blood, the wet-brown rot of underground rooms emerged, cold and damp.

The Department of Mysteries bore down on them with the weight of ancient caves. Guttering candles spat a weak, gloomy light on its black-tiled walls. Sirius died here, within those walls. On quiet nights when the moon was dark, Remus still felt a phantom ache in his arms. Harry, struggling against him. His whole body bent toward the Veil, begging to join his godfather in the world where no living soul could tread.

Moony growled in the cavern of Remus’ chest. Remus breathed a careful breath through his nose, and forced himself back into focus. 

None of the corpses on the ground was a friend’s. They had come better prepared into this fight than the Death Eaters and Ministry employees. Fleur was finishing with the last fighter, a large bulk of a man, perspiration slicking his forehead. As Remus watched, he slipped on a pool of blood, staggered. His eyes grew wide, then resigned, in the half-second it took for Fleur to grab his head, slam his skull against the nearest wall. There was the sharp, wet sound of cracked bone.

Fleur pivoted on her heels before the body hit the floor, silvery hair cascading down her shoulders. She saw Remus, and grinned, a savage, blood-sated thing. The pull of her allure tugged at him with a strength like gravity. Somewhere in the back of Remus' chest, Moony howled in wild acknowledgement.

Fleur crossed the room in long strides, stepping over sprawled limbs. "You are bleeding," she told him. She smelled of sweat and something brine-blue and sweet. Veelas were creatures of storms and ancient fires where Remus was of sharp moonlight and the quiet of deep forests, and he wanted to bare a hunter's teeth.

"It’s not much," he said lightly. “It can wait.”

Fleur cocked her head at the door. “Others will come,” she said.

“Is it caution I hear,” Remus said, “or wishful thinking.”

Fleur gave a smile. Remus scented blood on it, the taste of ozone on her breath. "Let them come," she said, and Moony crooned in the back of Remus’ head, and if their teeth no longer fit Remus's mouth, and if Fleur's eyes flashed silver in the lamplight, neither of them mentioned it.

The clock was ticking. They got to work. 

The room was crammed full of dusty shelves, piled high with artefacts collected through centuries, long since forgotten. With only a handful of minutes before reinforcements flooded over, they thrashed the room. Upturned the shelves. Spilled the artefacts on the floor. A muddying of waters.

Bill and Hermione knelt amongst the chaos. Before them was a safe of iron and fossilised wood. Remus watched them work, muttering between themselves, wands trailing light in the gloom. A few floors overhead, people ran. Remus heard the footfalls, the snap of orders. He tamped down the first flutter of panic. 

Ron came to stand at his shoulder.

"How are they doing?" Remus asked in an undertone. "They know we're here. We don't have much time"

"We'll give them time," Ron said.

"We're almost there," Bill said without looking up, his voice tight. His long hair was plastered to the back of his neck. "The spellwork on this thing is awful . The warding has been layered over time and no one's thought to – shit." Electricity sparked between his fingers. Remus broke out in goosebumps.

Beyond the room, a crash. The ragged hiss of people panting for breath.

"They’re here," Remus, and Fleur cursed, something in French that did not need translating.

They moved to stand between Bill, Hermione, and the door. Someone had thrown a Locking Charm, but no amount of warding would hold long against the combined might of trained Aurors.

They were deep underground, and Remus felt as though he stood on a mountaintop, the oxygen rare and each breath a struggle. Moony pawed down his spine, feral, hungry. The wolf looked for the spot where Remus's skin was thinnest, where human flesh would tear and let him claw his way to freedom. Neither of them liked small spaces.

Let me out let me out let me out.

Breathe, Remus.

He thought about red hair and green eyes that caught the fading light of a warm Autumn day. Callused hands and a low voice. Touches on his skin, warm as sunlight. Remus breathed. He had never yielded to the wolf's madness, and he never would.

A bang on the door, flesh against wood.

"It's us, open up!"

"Ron cries when he sees spiders because we turned his teddy bear into one when he was three!"

"I bloody hate you," Ron said. He unlocked the door.

The twins came through, tripping over each other. Tonks followed closely, along with a pungent smell of rotten eggs. Remus' eyes watered. The boys' faces were grime-tracked. George had an arm around his brother's waist, pulled the boy after him with frantic hands and the sour tang of fear on his skin. Fred grinned over his twin's shoulder, eyes huge and unfocused.

"What's wrong with him?" Ron asked. He threw Fred's free arm over his own shoulders, helped George move him further into safety.

"Don't know," George replied, jaw working. "Got jumped while we were wrecking the Hall of Prophecies. Couple of jinxes caught him. Didn't see what." He poked his brother in the stomach. "Hang in there, you stupid sod."

Tonks slammed the door shut behind them.

"We gotta move," she said. “They're right around the corner." She rounded on Bill and Hermione. "Oi, you two! Snap out of it, we're leaving!"

"We can't," Ron said when neither Bill nor Hermione gave sign they'd heard her. The air around them crackled, weighted with buildup power. "We need the stone."

"Won't do us any good if we're dead, will it?" Tonks growled. Fred wheezed a sound that was either approval or amusement.

She was right. They were in no shape to confront reinforcements. Fred was out of the equation. Ron favoured his left leg. Bill and Hermione were vulnerable, already pale and drained of their strength. To make a stand here would be suicide, but –

If they left here today without what they had come to find, they would be back to square one. There was a strong chance they would die if they stayed, forever trapped under black stone and packed earth and Remus hated this place, despised every inch of it, but the alternative –

The alternative was to lose Harry, and he. Could not.

Only one of them needed to make it out of this place.

"Give them one more minute," he told Tonks. The woman's hair turned black. "We can spare that much. Kingsley and Arthur should have secured the way out by now."

"Kingsley and Arthur can’t fight off an army. " There was tempered fire in Tonks's eyes, and Remus' heart ached, full of half-forgotten pain and regrets.

"I know," he said, in supplication more than anything. "We knew the risks coming in. Tonks. We must – "

A wave, something warm and electric over his skin. Across the room, Bill slumped with a soft grunt. Hermione caught him with one arm, wrenched open the chest's lid with the other. She swayed with victory and relief. They had it.

Hermione stuffed her bag with the chest's contents. Fleur helped her husband stand. Fred went to give a hand, and was firmly held back by his brothers. They dashed for the exit. 

"We have to split," Remus said. "Hermione, Ron, circle back. Find Arthur and Kingsley, take the long way out. We'll cut them off."

"Fred comes with us," Hermione said. The girl looked at him with dark eyes and her jaw clenched tight. Hermione was arching brilliance warped up in ruthless practicality. She knew why they came here, was entirely ready to pay in blood the price for a paved path to success. But she was a Gryffindor to the bones, and none of them liked to walk away from a fight.

"He'll slow you down," Remus said, and knew what she would hear. Only one of us needs to make it out alive.

"He'll slow you down," she replied.

"'Ermione is right," said Fleur. "We cannot defend him. He would make us weak." She looked at him, pale eyes burning in the low, guttering lighting of the room. "So he would make them weak."

"Very well," Remus said. "We have to leave. Go. Go! "

"We'll see you later," Ron said. He took Fred's weight and did not bow from under it. His voice was steady, the words with all the steel of orders to follow. "Don't be late, or mum will gut me."

He and Hermione took off, rushing to the opposite end of the corridor. They would find a way out, Remus was sure of it. These were children forged by war. Hermione knew the Ministry maps better than any Unspeakable. Ron would meet death with swift spells and a bloodied grin before he let anything touch her.

"Good," Fleur said. She kissed the corner of Bill's lips. "Shall we?"

They carved their way out. The next slew of Death Eaters found them at the next bend, between steep stairs and a forgotten court-room. The battle was gruesome; Remus only remembered it in fractions. The blood-slick floors. The smoke-filled air. Trails of light. Moony peered out of his eyes, smelt out of his nose. The wolf snarled out his mouth, and Remus let him. They killed together, and thrilled in the hunt.

Bone cracked under his fists. Blood coated his hands, a rust-red scent. Remus moved with all the speed and ferocity he kept leashed tight. He caught himself short of sinking his teeth into a woman's throat. Stunned her instead. Her heart stopped for stretched beats.

Fleur followed two steps beside him, fey-like, lethal with the magic of her blood, a shock against his heightened senses. She killed men as though leading them into a dance. Together, she and Remus ripped humans apart. Tonks, Bill and George walked in the carnage.

They made it, impossibly. They took another patrol by surprise. They crept their way through unused passageways, one sinuous tunnel after the next, and reached a dingy broom cupboard in the Ministry’s bowels, where its wards were weak, frayed enough for Bill to cut through, enchantments unravelling under skilled fingertips.

"Let's go home," Bill said.

A crack, a sudden wrench. They turned on the spot and disappeared.

They landed outside the Burrow's grounds. Tonks fell on her knees. The side of her face gushing blood. Bill collapsed in Fleur's arms, passed out before he touched the ground. George breathed heavy gasps, hands on his thigh, looking like someone about to throw up.

It was alright. They were alive.

{. . .}

As a boy with a fresh bite-mark at the juncture between his neck and shoulder, Remus spent long nights contemplating his place in the world. With sharp teeth and a deep growl growing from his mouth, he had known, in the way one knows the stretch of his own body, that the human in him had died a brutal death, under cool moonlight, on blood-soaked grass. He had resigned himself to isolation and the occasional burn of silver spoons, by the time Dumbledore walked through his bedroom door, offering sweets and a place to belong.

Remus had taken both candy and letter with the deep, quaking hunger of a wolf in child skin. He had been eager, and touch-starved, and he had not thought about risks or how they used to cut werewolves's heads with silver axes. He had been a shy boy, then, always turned inwards, keeping watch on the beast stirring behind his breastbone. He had not known the world outside the confines of his home and the forest around it. Only the bright-burn smell of silver and the fear on his father's skin.

Remus had long since grown into a man whose Hogwarts days were well past, but sometimes, he wondered. For all he trusted Dumbledore and his wisdom, he was not sure the old wizard had known what he had allowed inside his school. Near children. The monster behind Remus’ ribs tore long, bloody gashes on the pink flesh of his skin, and Remus knew the smile he pulled on his lips wanted to twist into a snarl, and he dreamt of sinking blunt teeth into soft throats. Even as a young boy, with Moony subdued by the pack they found in Hogwarts' towers, he had been wanting.

Lily settled him in a way the Marauders had not. She had not been studied in old magics and tamed powers like James or Sirius, but she had been a bright girl in her own right, and a steadfast friend. Remus loved her the way a creature like him could love the sun. She taught him acceptance and the easy laughter in shared jokes. She gave him a human's voice, and her death wrecked him.

Remus failed her and James. After their deaths, he trusted a traitor. Half-mad with grief, he turned his back on Sirius. He believed a lie and the darkness in Sirius’ eyes, and gave up on him before their bed stopped smelling of him. 

Remus failed all of them. He would not fail their son.

"How are we doing?" he asked quietly.

Hermione smelled of sweat, of blood, of dead magic. Her left wrist was wrapped in bandages. A faint, exhausted tremble travelled the curve of her spine, rippled across dark skin in a continuous back and forth. She looked wide-awake, riding post-battle weariness with too much coffee and a will sharp enough to cut herself with.

Around them, papers quivered, the rustle of parchment loud in the deep silence of the night. A cool draft spilled in from a cracked window. The air was night-sweet, damp with fresh rain. The Burrow's foyer was overtaken by scribbles, was covered in runes, in arching diagrams of ink and charcoal. The warm, orange shine of oil lamps plunged the cluttered space in a flickering game of light and shadows.

Hermione took her time to answer, the raindrop patter on dark-blue glass clocking the silence.

"We are better than we were this morning," she said at length, the words careful, studied. "But you know the equations as well as I do, Professor. Even if we crack the central nexus, we're still short of pinpointing a clear place and date." She raised her injured hand, fingers shy of brushing the small stone on the mantelpiece. It was a clear, clean-cut crystal that looked utterly inoffensive, facets splitting light in a dozen rainbows.

"Careful," Remus murmured, because the stone had a weight, pressed on Remus's senses with the static hum preceding lightning storms. It was stuffed full of magic, every sharp edge strained to bursting.

Merlin pulled it from the Earth, it was said. He went to where mountains grew roots and magic was born. He mined the stone from their depths. The stone, it was said, had been passed down generations long dead, though no one had unlocked its uses.

Hermione stopped reverent fingers short of touching it. "It's familiar to me," she said, and her eyes burned with a light that should not be there. "That sensation. It was at Stonehenge, etched in the stones. It was – less, though. More diffused." Her hand fell away. "If we're right and Harry was sent back in time, this is the source that'll pull him home. I'm sure of it."

Remus gave a low hum. "Provided we find him first."

"Yes. Provided we find him first." Hermione sighed, long and weary, head rolling on her shoulders. Her eyes jumped to their research, pinned to the walls like so many butterflies. "If he's dead," she said, perfectly mild, "I won't ever forgive myself. And I'll never forgive him."

"I don't think he would dare," Remus said, just to hear her scoff, petulant and dismissive and –

Remus forgot sometimes, how young she and Ron were. They were kids, the both of them, teenagers who fought a war most adults long since surrendered to. They knew blood, and the price of loyalty, and it – jarred. To think of how far Remus' generation had fallen, that it would let children fight its battles. It shamed him, even from under all the grit cloying his soul.

"You should get some rest," Remus told her, gentle in a way he forgot he could be. "You've done enough for today. Go sleep it off, Hermione. Take Ron with you. I'll manage from here."

The girl shook her head. "I don't think I can sleep," she said, drawn and war-hardened and fever-bright.

I don't sleep anymore, Remus heard. He was not surprised. Hermione had lost weight, since coming here, soft tissue melting from her bones. She pushed herself harder than any of them, past insomniac nights and gruelling days, Ron carrying both their weights. There were children leading the war effort, and Remus had never felt so old.

"We'll go over the notes one more time then," he suggested in defeat. "Bill will take a closer look at that stone tomorrow, and we can – "

A soft hiss pierced the silence, shrill to his ears. The hearth burst into green flames. In the light was a familiar face, young, half-hidden in a fall of long hair.

"Guys," Ginny said, hushed and hurried. She breathed hard and fast, her eyes wide. "Guys. There's something you need to see."

{. . .}

There were metal links sunk deep in stone, flaking rust with age but sturdy enough for human limbs. The lock was a big, ancient thing from times long past. Its half-jammed mechanism creaked like arthritised bones.

"Keep still," Ginny said. She stuck the screwdriver between her teeth. The lock was bolted tight, would require more strength than finesse to break, and –

The girl's eyes were wide and terrified. She sucked sharp breaths through her mouth; her wrists wept blood. The manacles dug deep bruises in her skin, ugly and purple, and Ginny wanted to scream .

She spat out the screwdriver and slowly, carefully, started to twist.

"I'm getting you out of here," she said, casting the girl a quick smile. "You'll be back in bed before you know it. What's your name?"

The girl ran her tongue over chapped lips. "I'm Lena," she said. Her voice cracked, quaked with contained tears.

Giving a light hum, Ginny switched the screwdriver for a metal tongue. "What year are you in, Lena?"

"First," the girl said, and Ginny had to stop and breathe, for a moment.

What kind of a sadist locked up First Year Hufflepuffs?

"Nice meeting you," she said. Behind her was the sound of shuffling steps, quick murmurs rising with hushed urgency. She shook her head at Seamus when he made toward her. Whatever it was, it could wait. Ginny was getting the chains off that girl if it was the last thing she did. She heard a faint click, tumblers starting to give. "Listen kid," she said. "I'm very sorry this was your first taste of Hogwarts. I'm going to ask you to please, please don't scream."

She gave a hard pull, and the cuffs came loose. Lena fell free with a cry of bitten-back pain. Ginny caught her, let the girl breathe broken breaths in the crook of her neck.

"Shh," she murmured, getting her arms around Lena and giving a careful squeeze. "You did great, love. You're alright."

She guided the sobbing girl away from her blood-stained chains. Lena walked with her arms stretched out in front of her to avoid hurting the mess of torn flesh on her wrists, Ginny mused about anger and the benefits of revenge. She had never cared for the sentiment, for hard words and gratuitous pain, but –

She wanted to hurt someone, with great violence and bloodied fists. Fury was a roaring, snarling thing burning red below her sternum. She smothered it down behind curled lips and too many teeth.

"We're taking you somewhere safe for the night," she told Lena. "We'll get you healed up, and then you can sleep, alright?"

Lena gave a small nod, wiping red eyes with a dirty sleeve.

"Good."

"Gin! "

A hand tapped her shoulder. Seamus stood beside her, mouth twisted in grim satisfaction. His sandy hair stood up at odd angles. He had pieces of papers stuck all over his robes.

"Everything good?" Ginny asked. She picked a scrap of paper. It looked like it came from a Muggle textbook. The Carrows were going to see red.

"Yeah. Ernie's almost done rigging the Charms corridor." Seamus gave a wild grin, his teeth bloodied from a split lip. He shot a swift glance to the other side of the room, where Neville was extracting a Third Year Ravenclaw from his restraints. "I, uh. I think we got a problem, though."

He took a step back and to the side, wand raised. The blue-white glare of a Lumos had shadows shrink back into walls, wither away until the room came into view. It was a dingy, windowless cell that smelled strongly of mould, fried fish and stagnant air. A thin layer of grease coated the walls, glistened like sweat. The floor was dusty, splattered with brown stains that looked suspiciously like crusted blood, so deeply soaked into the stone centuries made it a permanent fixture. A single oil lamp hung from the low ceiling, casting a gaunt, cadaverous light to its surroundings. It was a bare room, with old chains on the walls and a feeling like the inside of a coffin.

A third student hung by the wrists, tucked in the farthest corner where the oil lamp gleam did not reach. Like the others, his arms were held up above his head, skin scraped raw from the wear of long hours in manacles. The boy was young, thin face shrouded in dark curls, serious eyes darting between them.

His clothes were lined with silver and green.

"Fuck , " Ginny said.

"Yeah," Seamus agreed.

Neville looked up from his work, turned to face them with a hand on the Ravenclaw's shoulder. His eyes fell on the Slytherin boy. His mouth went slack. In any other situation, Ginny would have laughed.

"So," Seamus said. "What do we do with him?"

Neville approached, shadows shifting on the sharp slants of his face. He had changed, in the months they had been at school, flaking childhood shyness and the stutter of a sweet boy. He was the only one of them whose body had not diminished under the Carrows's treatment. Where other students shrank to make themselves smaller, Neville grew. His shoulders broadened, his jaw squared. He stripped teenage awkwardness and the meekness of boyhood. Ginny had yet to see weakness in him. He was all easy strength and the warmth of soft smiles.

"What d'you mean?" he asked.

"Well – " Seamus gestured at the Slytherin. "Can't exactly take him with us, can we? I don't remember the Carrows putting a Snake here before. Boy could be a spy for all we know."

Across from them, the Slytherin was silent, breathing careful breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth, measured like clockwork.

"Do we – ? We should leave him here."

"No," Neville said. "He can’t be older than a Second Year."

No nod of acknowledgement or denial. The Slytherin's eyes jumped from Neville to Ginny to Seamus, then back again. The continued silence was grating, measured in deliberate breaths. There was something off about the way the boy looked at them. Ginny could not put her finger on it, but something was off. She felt like a Bludger was swerving toward her head.

"We cannot take him," Seamus said. "Half his House's got Death Eater affiliations. Can't risk it. If he rats us out, we're dead. "

"I know." There was a frown deeply set between Neville's eyebrows. He rubbed tense fingers to his neck. "We can't leave him either. He's a kid."

"Maybe we could wipe his memory? Ginny, you any good with Obliviates?" Seamus was adjusting his stance, levelling up his wand, and –

There. There it was. The faintest widening to the boy's eyes, a hitch in his clockwork breaths. Starved wrists pulled at heavy chains, a quick jerk, gut-wrenched and panicked and –

Fear, white-eyed, visceral, directed at them. The boy was afraid of them, had been since the moment they broke into Filch's office. He had kept the stillness of a hunted prey, and the green on his clothes bled to black in light of that.

"I'll take him," Ginny said. She felt sick. There was a frightened boy held up by the wrists in a rotting, airless cell, and he was afraid of them. "Lower your wand, Finnigan. I'll take him to the Dungeons. You go ahead."

"Absolutely not."

"That is not your decision." Ginny rounded on Seamus. The boy backed away with both his hands raised. Ginny looked at Neville. "I know more secret passages than any of you. I can take him back."

Neville carried leadership with broad shoulders and a soft smile. He had kept them together through long months and longer days, bearing torture and the slow disappearance of friends. Ginny would go with the Slytherin no matter what he said, but. Neville's was an opinion she trusted, and she would rather go with his blessing.

"Are you sure?" he asked, and smiled at Ginny's swift nod. "Alright. Be careful, I don't fancy breaking you out of here next."

Ginny gave a scoff. "Don't be ridiculous. As if they'd catch me. You be careful. Remember the time you knocked over the Trophy Room and ended up on Alecto Carrow's lap. Just go."

Neville's grimace was pained and entirely horrified, but he went to the door without protest. Trailing children and a snickering Seamus, he hurried from the room with due haste. Ginny watched him go with a warm curl of amusement and the knowledge she was trusted. Being the youngest of seven siblings, Ginny was used to being the kid, the one that needed protecting. For all that she loved them, she had always had to shout louder than her brothers to be heard. The easy give of Neville's friendship was like a fresh breath of air.

She let the boys meet shadows with silent steps, and was left alone with a chained Slytherin.

"Alright," she said. She faced the boy. "Let me get one thing clear. I'm going to get you out of the chains, back to the Dungeons. I won't hurt you. I’ll do all I can to keep you safe. Don’t try my trust, and everything will be fine. Deal?"

After a moment of hesitation, the boy gave a nod.

"Splendid," Ginny said. She crossed the room with quick strides. "No one needs to regret tonight. Once this is over, we can both forget about it and go back to tripping each other down the stairs."

She set to work. The lock was easier to pick this time. She understood its mechanism, the amount of pressure needed, the noises to look for. Silently thanking the twins and how they taught her to pick open the family broomshed, she freed both the boy's wrists. Good thing the Carrows were as stupid as anyone else when it came to the Muggle way of solving problems. Though the chains were warded against just about any enchantments, they were utterly defenceless against a good lockpick.

The boy staggered free with a wince and cut-off breaths.

"C'mon," Ginny said. "We have to go . "

She rushed him to the exit, forcing her steps light, forcing them measured. Her heart was a beating tattoo behind her ribs, anticipation curling at her spine like wings. She shoved down the dread and took slow breaths. Precipitation was when you made mistakes. When you got caught, and was tortured. She set off at a swift jog.

The castle was empty, filled with nothing but the night’s creeping darkness. The corridors were cold. Hogwarts felt like the cooling corpse of a great beast, but Ginny had walked her back since childhood. She knew the twists of her ancient bones.

She took the boy down a winding tunnel, beyond a lost door pretending to be a tapestry. She sacrificed an Ice Mice to Mrs Norris, watched the damned cat trot after the enchanted candy and out of sight. May she choke on it.

They edged their way down to the Dungeons undetected. The moment the castle's weight settled over them, Ginny watched the boy's shoulders drop, watched him close his eyes and breathe , all the way in, all the way out, so deeply relieved he staggered with it. Ginny had never been fond of the Dungeons herself. The air was always cool-damp here, no matter the weather outside. There was a stilted sort of calm lingering everywhere, the low hum of raw magic and timeworn stone. The Dungeons had a weight to them, rang deeper than the rest of the castle. It always made her uneasy, but –

The Slytherin boy dragged small fingers against aged stone, a quiet smile on his lips, and Ginny supposed it could not be all bad.

She knew the general direction of the Slytherin common room. Harry described it to her one lazy spring day, his head on her thighs, her fingers in his hair, nothing between them but sunlight, the lapping of the Lake at long grass. Ginny pushed the memory down before she could cut herself on it. She pressed deeper into the Dungeons, counting down her steps.

Beside her, the boy stopped, halted abruptly at the top of a flight of stairs, its stone steps weathered from the sweep of too many feet.

"What is it?" Ginny asked, hand tensing on her wand. He did not appear to be in pain. "Something wrong?"

The boy held a finger up to his lips, his head cocked to a side. Listening.

Footsteps.

Shit.

Heart hammering all the way to her throat, Ginny took a step back, motioning for the boy to follow her. He cut a sharp look in her direction. His hand shot up, grabbed her sleeve.

"What are you doing? " Ginny hissed, and he could be a spy for all we know and she was trapped, would not be quick enough to escape even if she broke free. She would be strung up in the Hall by morning, today's practice for whatever Dark spells the Carrows would teach their class, she –

Pansy Parkinson rounded the corner, and all of Ginny's thoughts ground to a halt. The girl startled at the sight of them, a soft, surprised noise spilling from her lips. The hand clutching her wand jerked up, not nearly fast enough to defend herself. The standstill stretched for long moments, Parkinson's eyes darting from Ginny to the boy, then back again.

She wiped surprise off her mouth like a bad stain. "What are you doing here," she asked none of them specifically, her voice a hushed growl.

The boy let go of Ginny. The little bastard was smiling, a bright, relieved thing, all teeth and silent laughter. He pointed to Ginny, then brought his hands up in a swift series of gestures, mouthing along.

Parkinson watched him with dark eyes and half a sneer. She snorted, entirely unlike her usual high-pitched giggles. "Did she, now?" she asked. She cast Ginny a baleful glare, full of suspicion. "Why?"

The boy gestured, a flurry of motion too quick for Ginny to follow. Ginny looked on with a growing sense of bemusement.

"I was going to get you," Parkinson told the boy, a petulant twist to her lips. She shrugged as he signed something else. "Right. I was held up. The vote – you know how it gets."

She closed the short distance between them, looking with critical eyes. She extended both her index fingers, brought them together before twisting them flat and forward. The boy shook his head.

"Good," Parkinson said. "That's – good."

Ginny cleared her throat. "You can't speak," she told the boy, because there was no delicate way to put this. It was something she knew happened in the Muggle world, people born deaf, or mute, or both.

The boy signed something. He gave Parkinson a pointed glance.

"No," the girl said, with a tone of great reluctance. “He can’t speak. Something about his voicebox.” She spared Ginny a look. "We’ve got it handled."

"You what."

"Merlin, Weasley. Who the bloody hell do you take us for? We’re looking after him. The Carrows don’t know about him.” Parkinson's voice was all bite and venom. She curled a hand on the boy's shoulder, stood half-a-step to the side and in front of him. "And keep your voice down. I'm throwing you a peace offering if the Carrows show up to your screeches."

"You would," Ginny sneered, and dear gods, she wanted to punch that smug face. She forced herself to breathe, forced her voice soft, because being the youngest of six oafs had not robbed her of all tact. "Was your voice cursed off?" she asked the boy. 

He answered.

"You don't have to tell her anything," Parkinson grumbled at him. He signed again, broader, faster. Parkinson grimaced. She said, "He was born like this," and that –

Did not make sense. Health care was free by Wizarding law. Any half-decent mid-witch would have given the boy his voice back, any doctor he had seen in childhood. They had not, because the boy.

The boy was Muggle-born.

The boy was Muggle-born, and a Slytherin, and they were at war.

Parkinson took quick steps towards Ginny. She fisted a hand in Ginny's tie, gave a sharp pull. Ginny choked. "You breathe a word of this to the Carrows," Parkinson murmured, her eyes dark, the words pressed against Ginny's lips like punches, "and Weasley, I swear it on my House, you will regret ever stepping foot inside this castle."

"Fuck you, Parkinson." Ginny grabbed the girl's hand, forced it down with a hard shove. She leaned close. They were practically nose-to-nose. Parkinson's eyes were depthless, and Ginny's skin burned. "I got the boy out of Filch's office. You think I don't know what they do to them in there? I do. What makes you think I'd want him back in?"

A perfectly plucked eyebrow ticked up to Parkinson's hairline. "What indeed," she drawled, tapping the lion on Ginny's cloak, then the Prefect's badge on her own chest, a small silver snake, coiled and showing teeth.

Ginny scoffed. "Don't flatter yourself. I hate them more than I hate you. And, for the record, I hate you a lot."

"I'm hurt."

"Shut up."

"You shut up."

Beside them, looking entirely too entertained, the boy stomped his foot on the ground, loud and pointed.

"What ?" Parkinson growled, then rolled her eyes at what he signed. "Yes, yes, we're leaving. Relax. It's not like there's anything they can do to us down here." Ignoring Ginny, she stepped away, turned around, and Ginny breathed in something that was either relief or disappointment. "You and I," Parkinson said, walking away with a hand on the boy's shoulder, "are going to have a nice, long conversation about the idiocy of sneaking out and getting caught."

About to disappear in plunging shadows, she paused at the bend of the corridor, half-turned to Ginny, her eyes cast in darkness, short hair a dark fall around her face. Slowly, not looking at Ginny, but not quite looking away either, she gave a single nod. "Weasley," she said between tight lips.

Then she was gone.

{. . .}

Ginny dragged herself to the Seventh floor with slow steps and weariness set deep in the curve of her shoulders. Her mind rang blank, empty with the kind of exhaustion that stretched to the bones. She reached the safety of the Room of Requirement, and found half the madhouse shouting at the other. A gaggle of older students had rounded on Neville, demanding to know why he let her help a Slytherin. Ernie had puffed like an angry frog. Thank Merlin they made the walls soundproof.

"Guys," Ginny said, long-suffering. No one heard her over the din of furious voices . She sighed.

It took a half-hour and one of the twin's Wildfire Whiz-bangs before everything quieted down. They sent the younger kids to bed. The Ravenclaws insisted they hold a briefing, and though Ginny wanted nothing more than to crash and sleep for the next ten hours, she let herself be towed along. They spoke in the sparkling, wheezing light of winged, pig-shaped fireworks. Ginny kept her part short, skipping over Parkinson entirely. No unforeseen complications, she lied. The kid went home safe, and that was the end of it. She had no wish to waste an hour explaining she had a semi-civil conversation with one of Slytherin's top dogs. Especially since she could not make sense of it herself.

Ginny did not know Pansy Parkinson, had never talked to the girl herself. Her impression of Parkinson was of a superficial, self-centred pureblood heiress who spent her time lobbing insults at Malfoy's side. Ginny would never have pegged Parkinson as someone who would risk getting caught after curfew to help a Muggle-born child. There was a feeling like sandcastles crumbling under her feet, and Ginny did not like it one bit.

She was half-asleep by the time she crawled into her hammock. She fell into uneasy dreams within seconds, and woke before dawn to confused flashes of tan skin and dark hair, venom dripping from between red lips. Weasley, she heard, like teeth against her mouth, Who the bloody hell do you take us for?

She pulled herself out of bed with the greatest reluctance, and staggered to the Great Hall with the other Gryffindors. She listened  half-heartedly to Colin's excited run down of their latest plan, wishing, vaguely, for coffee by the bucketful.

" – and the animation went perfectly," Colin said. "I heard the hyenas nearly bit off Carrow's leg, that's awesome. Look Ginny, look, there's one right there!"

Ginny followed the direction he pointed. One floor down to their right, a life-sized monstrosity of an origami was lopping up the stairs. A big cat, white, papery teeth protruding from its mouth. The origami froze at the sight of them, ears going flat against its creased skull.  It perked up at a crash further down the hallway, and darted in the other direction.

"That's great Colin," Ginny said, impressed in spite of herself. "You and Ernie really – ah! "

The sudden shock of another body against hers, a loss of balance that made her head spin. She flung out a hand, gave a sharp pull, and after a few awkward, lurching steps, the ground under her feet became steady again.

"Merlin, sorry, I didn't see – " Ginny froze, tensed. She was face-to-face with the Slytherin snake on a girl's chest.

The youngest Greengrass girl regarded her with a cool stare and neutral face. With an air of annoyance at the world in general, but not Ginny in particular, she looked away, dismissive and disinterested. The boy beside her did not so much as flinch. He straightened her cloak with an aggravated sigh. Nothing more. No hissed insult, snide remark, whispered curse.

"The hell?" Seamus muttered. Ginny grabbed his arm, yanked him away before the tension in his voice could bleed into something more aggressive.

They went to the Great Hall, ducking past a herd of llamas busy munching portrait frames, indifferent to the occupant's angry shrieks. Ginny fell on a pot of coffee with the desperation of a woman with problems to solve, and not enough sleep to deal with them.

They ate breakfast in subdued silence. The Carrows had long since banned talking during meals. They listened to the clink of cutlery, and the papery flaps of the Pterodactyls' wings overhead. Between scarfing pieces of toast and distantly trying to muster the energy to drag herself to class, Ginny – stopped. There was a feeling like fingers tracing the divots of her spine, an alertness that shivered in the lungs and made gooseflesh rise .

She looked up. Across the Hall, through many watchful eyes, Parkinson looked back. She met Ginny’s eyes and did not waver. Ginny’s heart skipped a beat. She swallowed. She tipped her chin, made her back straight. Parkinson cocked her head to the side. The moment stretched, and Ginny wondered, how much weight could time gain before it burst and became something else?

She raised her coffee cup, a mocking salute. A recognition. Parkinson's mouth ticked up, was forced back down. She bowed her head, the smallest of nods. Ginny watched the dark fall of her hair, her heart in her mouth.

Merlin almighty. What was happening?

Whatever it was, the effects rippled, through days and long lessons. It was the small things. Slytherin students refused to raise hands in Dark Arts studies. Harmful spells flickered out before meeting their mark. No more smirks, snickers, snide insults. Professor Flitwick bounced off his desk when Morag pushed her book an inch toward Ginny on a day she forgot her bag. The snakes still avoided punishment at all costs, saved their skins when it came down to it, but. But. A fragile truce stood on trembling knees, and it was change, a step toward something.

"It's all getting tied back together, isn't it?" Luna said one rainy afternoon, the two of them tucked in a secluded windowsill, rainwater pattering delicately against cool glass. "That's nice."

The watery light swayed over Luna's pale hair. In the dimness of the dusty corridor, it looked soaked through.

"There's Muggle-borns among them," Ginny said. She tapped her discarded textbook with a finger. "Did you know?"

Luna gave a slow blink, like an owl startled from sleep. Ginny nudged her with a knee, gave her something to focus on before her mind wandered off. "Are you surprised?" Luna asked, and –

Ginny did not know.

A few weeks later, she found a Slytherin girl locked in Alecto Carrow's floorboards. Ginny smashed the floorboards with the axe a suit of armour helpfully lended her. She helped the girl out, then showed her a secret passage to the Dungeons. She went to assist Colin and Luna with turning the marble staircase into a giant ice slide, and did not think twice about it.

The next morning, a box of suspiciously fancy chocolates sat at the foot of her bed. Ginny Levitated it to the nearest trash can.

The time after that, it was a high-end writing set, more costly than anything her parents had ever owned. Ginny stashed it at the bottom of her trunk.

Next she received a pair of Quidditch gloves, dragon hide soft as doeskin. Ginny touched them with dumbstruck confusion.

She was not one for patience. She preferred the direct approach, preferred blunt words to half-truths. Being stuck in this uncertain state, this game of things unsaid, set her teeth on edge. Still, she let it lie. She bit her tongue and stayed her hand. She watched. She learned.

She spied the mute boy several times between classes. Always half-hidden in a mass of green and silver cloaks. He showed no signs of distress, even in a pure-blood crowd. Slytherins, Ginny noticed, travelled in groups. The older students protected the younger, guided them from class to class with gentle hands and sly, sideways smiles.

Ginny kept feeling Parkinson's eyes on her. An awareness like a cool breath on her skin. She would turn in crowded corridors, and the girl would be watching, standing still in sounds and bodies. Sometimes, Ginny looked back. Sometimes, she let herself be watched. She grew restless with the ghostly fingers on her neck.

It lasted a while, this in-between. She let it last. Let her Housemates mutter their confusion. Let the situation steady, or fester.

"Her," Amycus Carrow said one grey morning, dim sunlight slanting from large windows. "Her next," he said.

The classroom held still. The silence was sweet with pre-storm violence.

"Make it snappy," Carrow said. He said, "You girl. You do it. Chop chop."

Ginny stepped forward. One, two, three paces. She thought: electrocution. She thought: deep burns, muscles seizing up, the stopping of a heart. She thought: I'm going to die.

Behind Carrow, Colin was livid. With rage, with fear, with nascent grief. The bruises on his face stood like paint on white canvas. Behind Carrow, Morag moved. Away from the crowd and all its dead children. Her eyes were hard. Her hands trembled.

There was the crack of lightning, the rent of a storm let loose. Then, darkness.

{. . .}

Ginny woke in the Hospital Wing. She tasted ozone on her tongue, the acidic tang of fear. Her muscles felt as though they had been pulled at the same time. She could smell cooked flesh on her skin. Saliva pooled in her mouth. She stared at a crack in the whitewashed ceiling. She ground herself in the scent of clean linens and antiseptic.

It was night outside. Moonlight dripped from wide windows. Oil lamps were lighted around the walls, casting pools of warm orange. 

Cake, sweets, and a bottle of pumpkin juice were gathered at the end of her bed, a small pile of get-well presents. There were flowers. Red roses and carnations, fat blooms a deep burgundy, dark as blood. Red on green.

Ginny propped herself up on trembling arms, overly aware of the shift of bones under her skin. She felt strangely lopsided.

"Oh, good. You're awake."

Madam Pomfrey came to her bedside. Her nightcap hung loosely on greying hair. "Baubillious Spell," she said crisply. She took Ginny's arm by the wrist and tapped her wand along the underside. "You're lucky, Miss Weasley. You went into shock right away. Your Housemates were sensible enough to bring you straight to me." She looked up, the scowl easing from her lips. "You're going to be fine, lass. There's no lasting damage. But you'll have to stay the night."

"Thank you Madam Pomfrey," Ginny said. Her throat hurt. “I won’t be moving.”

Pomfrey cast her a look of deep suspicion, but finished her examination without comment. She gave Ginny potions to swallow, then shuffled back to her chambers, muttering insults to the Carrows's lineage under her breath.

Ginny waited another half hour before she kicked off her blankets and shimmied out of bed. The floor was cold under the soles of her feet. She shrugged on her cloak, grabbed her shoes, and crept out of the Infirmary, bent low to stay out of sight of Madam Pomfrey's windows.

The corridor was cool, silent, obscured with whispering shadows. Ginny put on her shoes. Thinking about sandcastles and a sharp pull on her school tie, she walked Hogwarts by the light of moonlit stones. She turned from the warmth of the Gryffindor common room, went down forgotten tunnels, full of century-old dust and the stickiness of cobwebs.

She picked her way to the Dungeons. To bend where she met Parkinson so many weeks ago. From there, she went on guesswork and instinct. Distantly wishing for her brothers' map, she sank deep in the Dungeon's maze.

She walked. She walked. She found unexpected pockets of madness within Hogwarts. She crossed vaulting passageways, wide as churches. She found windows, deep underground. Splattering moonlight on stone floors. She heard the wet clapping of water on stone, and wondered if the Dungeons stretched into the Black Lake. The walls grew coarser, as she walked. Rough-hewn stones snagged her fingertips. She walked back in time. Back to some primitive state in which Hogwarts lingered, untouched by the chafe of centuries.

She got lost. Completely. Utterly.

She walked on. In a state between sleep and wakefulness, she let her feet carry her further down. Her lungs filled with damp, lukewarm air. She was safe here, in the castle’s womb.

She stopped before a stretch of wall, not quite knowing why. There were markings along its edges, as if an archway once stood there. Ginny tapped the wall at wandpoint, and heard a low groan, jammed mechanism waking from deep sleep. The wall swung as though on hinges. She squeezed through the small gap, then promptly tripped on a hidden step. She went down in a cloud of dust.

"Lumos, " she said, coughing. Light shone off the end of her wand. Dust glittered like sparks. Wherever she was, no one had strolled these floors in a long time. She did not recognize anything of this wing of the castle. The silence was soft, mellow, a bedroom in early dawn. Here and there, random pieces of furniture spilled into the labyrinth of corridors.

She pushed herself up on shaky legs, heart a beating tattoo in her chest. She braced herself on a wall, riding out a wave of dizziness. She stilled. Her ears strained. She could hear a sound, faint, like the rustle of dry leaves on the forest floor.

She picked her way closer, her wand raised high . She approached the bend of the corridor. Voices. There were people talking. A man’s deep  tenor and a woman’s lighter lilt, the words foreign, and oddly familiar. Ginny peered around the corner.

Two ghosts floated above the ground. Made of mist and silver, they glimmered in the dust and darkness. The man had his head bowed, in defeat or supplication. The woman looked at him with a sorrowful air. They spoke with the gravitas of lovers long dead. 

Ginny had no place here, among dead things and broken relics. She should not bear witness to such old hurts. She backed away one careful step, heart beating like a drum. Another step. A third. 

Her elbow thudded against something, a flash of sharp pain. She froze.

The temperature dropped.

"What are you doing here?"

The Bloody Baron stood before her in blood-stained chains. He spoke softly, his youthful face melancholy. Beside him stood a tall woman. She was beautiful. Dark hair fell to her waist in gentle waves. Dark eyes, soft as a doe’s. The Grey Lady, Ginny thought. Ghost of the Ravenclaw Tower.

Before her stood two of the school’s oldest ghosts.

"You should not be here," the Baron said, his voice a lamentation, soft-spoken sorrow. "How did you find this place?"

The Grey Lady ran vaporous fingers on Ginny's face. Ginny’s breath rose in a fog.

"You are Ginny Weasley," she said. Her voice was rich in tone, a pleasant rasp, full of deep vowels. "Harry Potter's former lover."

Ghosts, Ginny knew, held no interest in the affairs of the living. They roamed the Earth locked in a self-made prison of old torments, indifferent to the rise or fall of Empires.

'Lover', the woman said. 'Former'.

Ginny had had Harry's smiles pressed to her belly, to the inside of her thighs. She had loved Harry with teenage abandon, before the war made adults of them both. There was a knife in her gut which twisted every time she heard his name.

"Yes," she said. “How do you know me?”

Neither ghosts answered. The Baron turned mournful eyes on his companion. The two of them talked without words, centuries worth of history and the weight of many regrets lingering between them.

"Is it wise, my love?" he asked, and the Lady smiled.

"Nothing either of us has done has ever been wise, I fear. But this, I think, is as it should be."

He bowed with the soft clink of chains. "As you wish." He faced Ginny, the pained, bland look in his eyes like a deep lake, like an endless pit. "Lean into the wall," he said. He extended a hand. "Should you bear, still, enough of Harry in your heart, it shall let you pass."

He offered the Grey Lady his arm.

"Wait," Ginny said but the ghosts disappeared together, fading like a mirage in the sun.

She was left staring at a blank wall, with no idea what to do.

'Ginny Weasley,' the woman had said. 'Harry Potter'.

With a deep breath and the shiver of trepidation, Ginny pushed against the wall, both hands raised in front of her. There was no resistance. Just like at King's Cross, her arms went right through. She wiggled her fingers, relieved to find them still firmly attached to her hand.

"Alright," she said.

She breathed deep, and stepped forth. It was as though walking through a whisper of falling silk. She opened her eyes. 

She stood in a small, circular room. Golden runes etched the ceiling’s seam, glowed softly with protective magic. Bookshelves lined the walls, groaning under the weight of books and potion jars. There was a desk, several work-tables. Two ancient chairs. 

"Merlin," Ginny breathed. She spun in a slow circle.

She cracked open a few of the books. The bindings were frail-looking, but held strong. They smelled of mould and old parchment. The words were written in an archaic language. Not Latin, the alphabet unfamiliar.

Ginny approached the desk. A single volume sat on a lectern. Its cover was of green leather. It sang under the weight of conservation spells. Ginny opened it with reverent fingers.

It had been written in a slanted, elegant hand. Annotations, scrawled in a much messier script, darkened the margins. Ginny’s mouth went dry. Her heart threw itself against her ribs. Hands shaking, she backtracted to the first page.

'Salazar Slytherin,' she read.

'Harry Potter'.

{. . .}

Ginny wondered, how much weight could time gain before it burst and became something else. 

She could not breathe. A knife twisted in her gut, counterclockwise with every cycle of her heart. Clutched to her chest, the green book tasted of old dust, of enchantments sank deep.

She stumbled out the corridor and into dim light. The wall closed behind her with the groan of rusted machinery. She. She needed to find her way. She needed to contact her family. She needed to get a grip.

Harry, she thought, and ached.

(Salazar Slytherin)

Stuffing the book inside her cloak, she pushed away from the wall. Everything was out of focus, straining sideways. She retraced her steps to the surface on animal instinct. She counted down the windows that should not be there. She found rooms she had not seen on her way down . There was a rush like blood in her ears. She took a sharp turn and she heard. Voices .

Voices again.

"Come quick brother." The words made her stagger to a sudden stop, panting. Her head spun. "Filch says his cat saw her sneak down here. Poor little lion must be very lost indeed."

Ginny. Ginny could not get caught. Not now. Please, anytime but now, with a weight like stones inside her cloak. Footsteps marched closer, closer, and Ginny could not think, she –

Muffled a scream against the warm skin of a hand.

"Quiet Weasley," someone hissed in her ear. She recognized the voice, and nearly bit through the hand on her lips. "Shut your mouth and follow me."

Pansy Parkinson walked back three steps, into the shadows of an alcove. She had a hand pressed flat on Ginny's stomach, and Ginny walked with her. The alcove was small, barely deep enough for two. The snap of boots approached fast. Ginny pushed back against Parkinson. The girl's arm tightened around her waist. Pulled close against another body, Ginny could feel Parkinson’s breaths on her neck. Breasts against her back. Parkinson held her with a hand on Ginny’s mouth, and Ginny panted wet breaths in her palm.

The Carrows came and went in a whirl of black cloaks.

"Merlin, Weasley. Breathe. They won't catch us." Parkinson sighed against Ginny’s neck. Her grip on her eased, drifted up under Ginny’s ribs. "What are you doing here?” she asked softly. “Gods, you should be in bed."

Ginny shrugged off the hand on her mouth. She was dizzy, everything lurching sideways into a sharp spin. There was a deep, echoing ache in her limbs. Maybe Madam Pomfrey had been right, and she needed another night in the Infirmary.

"I," she said, "was looking for you."

Parkinson gave a quiet snort. "What for? Looking for your pound of flesh?"

Ginny pulled away from Parkinson's arms. Her legs held strong. The green book burned inside her cloak, but she pushed aside the sight of Harry’ name, written in faded ink, on old parchment. She was off-kilter in a way she had not been since Tom Riddle tore through her soul. She needed to focus. 

“We should talk,” she said. "You and I. Before something breaks."

You're lucky, Pomfrey told her, and was far from the truth.

“Morag saved my life today,” Ginny said. “She cursed me unconscious, but. I’m not blind. She messed up the spell on purpose. She risked torture. For me. But no one else is going to see it that way. If you and I don’t do something. The truce is going to break.” Ginny set her jaws, and met Parkinson’s eyes. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t want that.”

Parkinson breathed a sharp breath. "Come with me,” she said. She grimaced. “The Carrows will be making rounds. In any case. You're in no shape to head upstairs."

Parkinson slid past her. Ginny watched her go, and after a few moments, followed.

They did not walk far. Parkinson stopped in front of a blank wall. She murmured a word, and the stone rearranged itself into a doorway.

For the first time in her life, Ginny stepped inside the Slytherin common room. It was not nearly as cold or bleak as she had pictured it. All dark, polished wood and stark pieces of art. Every inch of stone seemed padded with thick rugs, with tapestries of raw silk. Bright silver lamps hung from the ceiling, their soft glow a nice counterpoint to the black-green sway of water against the room’s latticed windows. The Dungeons did spread into the Black Lake, she thought, amused. The view was astounding, deep and dark, otherworldly.

A few students were awake. They lounged on the black-leather couches. Sprawled belly-down on the rugs. They bent over homework, between stacks of parchment piled high. Their ties were off, their sleeves rolled up. The hum of conversation was muffled, blending with the bubbling lake. Everything was relaxed. Soft in a way Ginny had never seen in Slytherins before.

She went down the flight of stairs to the entrance, and a tremor went up the room. She resisted the urge to slap a hand over the lion roaring on her clothes.

Parkinson's hand found the small of her back. "She's with me," Parkinson said. “Drop the long faces. She's a guest. We have business." She bent her mouth to Ginny’s ear. “Walk, Weasley. They won't bite."

Ginny let herself be led deeper into the common room. Parkinson was right. The two of them weaved between the scattered groups of students, and no one protested Ginny's presence. There was something studied in the way the Slytherins held themselves. A forced kind of nonchalance. Postures stayed lax, non-threatening, all of it a show. Welcome, said Slytherin House, welcome Gryffindor, and be at peace.

"Business, " a dark-skinned, handsome boy said from one of the windowsills. Blaise Zabini, a book lying spine up on his chest. He gave a wink. "Is that what they call it, these days?" Scattered chuckles rang through the room.

Parkinson flipped him off. She walked Ginny down a flight of stairs, to a side-room with a domed ceiling made of glass . It looked up into the lake, up into deep waters and the flicker of fish tails . The room branched into narrow tunnels. Parkinson led Ginny down to a bedroom. She held the door, letting Ginny in first.

It was luxurious, as far as dorm-rooms went. A large trunk of varnished wood laid at the foot of a queen-sized bed. There was a sturdy desk. A wardrobe of dark wood, its door half-open. Heavy curtains blocked the lake-light. Books and a cauldron were strewn on the rug-covered floor. It was a comfortable room, well-lived in.

"Sit," Parkinson said. She closed the door. "You look like you're about to pass out, and I shan’t pick you up if you do."

This, Ginny thought, is how you end up in a Slytherin's bed.

On. On a Slytherin's bed.

Merlin help her.

She sat.

"You rich kids," she said, and did not know whether she was disgusted or impressed.

Parkinson gave a shrug. "Our Founder had good taste," she said. She kicked out a chair and sat next to Ginny. "You said you wanted to talk."

Ginny looked at Parkinson. She traced the lines of her face in the bedroom’s muted light. Parkinson’s mouth was red as arterial blood. Carnation red.

"You're the one who's been sending me gifts," Ginny said.

Parkinson arched an eyebrow. "Who else did you think? Just how many suitors have you got lined up, Weasley?"

Ginny's heart jumped.

Suitors?

Parkinson waved a hand. "Nevermind that now. You have questions - or your House does. What is it you want to ask?”

“I want.” Ginny cleared her throat. “I want to know where we stand. Your House and mine. I want to know why you changed gears the way you did.”

Parkinson drummed her fingers on the armrest of her chair. “There's one thing you must understand,” she said at length. “About us Slytherins. Weasley, not just any eleven-year-old can get into the House of ambition and cunning. It takes a peculiar kind of personality. A peculiar kind of, shall we say, upbringing.”

“Simpler words, Parkinson. What are you saying?”

“I am saying,” Parkinson said, “that a lot of Slytherins students get into Slytherin House because someone, at some point, fucked them up.”

Ginny’s stomach dropped. She opened her mouth. Parkinson cut her off with a sharp look.

“It was, we think, a deliberate choice on our Founder's part. To gather us all under the same roof. To raise us together, and teach us to hold our heads high. We do not mingle with the other Houses so easily as you do because we close ranks around ourselves. We look after each other. We look after the youngest amongst us.”

Ginny thought about the mute boy. About Parkinson’s hand on his shoulder. Her fist on Ginny’s tie.

“So you see,” Parkinson said. “We do not take lightly to people hurting our own. The Carrows crossed a line the day they took Nathan because he failed to answer a question. The day they chained him by the wrists.” Parkinson smiled, more teeth than humour.  “We would have set the whole castle afire. To free him from them. Do you see where I am going with this?”

“I freed him for you.”

“You freed him for us. We felt we owed you a debt.” 

Ginny blew a slow sigh. “And the fact it shifts your House’s side in the war just as there’s rumours of You-Know-Who going off the rails, has nothing to do with it, I assume.”

The corner of Parkinson’s mouth ticked up. “A happy coincidence.”

“Since when has there been Muggle-borns in Slytherin?”

“There has always been Mudbloods in my House, Weasley.” Parkinson shrugged. “We simply make sure they neither look nor act like it.”

It had been a long day and longer year. Ginny carried anger in her breast like a heartbeat. Her fists ached from clenching. Mudblood, Parkinson said. There was Hermione, war-worn, shaking too badly to stand. There was Colin, with his enthusiasm, with the bruises on his face. There was Harry who was missing, and the green book in Ginny's cloak that had weight.

She had her hands in the lapels of Parkinson's shirt before she remembered moving. She pushed the girl back against her chair. Parkinson winced, her lips parting in a silent gasp. Ginny wanted to snarl.

"Do not," she said. Parkinson flinched as though expecting a fist to the nose, and Ginny. Burned. "Do not call them that, you bloody hypocrite."

“Apologies,” Parkinson said, her breaths on Ginny’s cheek, her warmth on Ginny’s skin. “I spoke out of turn.”

“Yes,” Ginny said. She was breathing hard. “Yes, you did.”

Power roared through her veins, filled the room to bursting. Parkinson watched her, eyes dark with something that was not fear. She dipped her head to the side. Baring the soft skin of her throat. Ginny watched her mouth, the redness of her lips. Parkinson turned her head. Her nose brushed Ginny’s cheek.

“How could I make it up to you?” Parkinson breathed against Ginny’s lips. Ginny fisted a hand on the back of her neck.

It was a hard, graceless kiss. Ginny fitted their mouths together with a groan. She pressed in, mindless with urgency. She took, because it was the only thing she could think to do, the only thing that made sense . Warm fingers slid under her thighs, pulled her in. Parkinson yanked at her shirt with a frustrated noise. She found skin. She stroked her hands down Ginny’s flanks, gripped Ginny’s hips. Ginny rocked up and into it, and Parkinson’s mouth opened in a gasp. Ginny licked inside her lips, a slick tangle of tongues. She wanted more, more, more.

She came up for breath astride Parkinson’s thighs, a hand cupping her breast. Parkinson’s lips were kiss-swollen, her hair a mess of tangled black. Heat coiled in Ginny’s gut.

"I did not mean to insult your friends," Parkinson said. She watched Ginny with hungry eyes. She bent her head to Ginny's chest, kissed one breast over Ginny’s rucked up shirt. Ginny threw her head back at the light suction, panting. Parkinson smirked against her. Ginny clenched fingers in her hair, and watched Parkinson’s eyes go hooded. She pulled, and Parkinson went lax in her hold, let herself be dragged off, her mouth open, a moan shuddering from her throat.

“Would it be terribly premature of me to ask if you should like to spend the night?” Parkinson asked.

Ginny snorted a laugh. She leaned their foreheads together. “You’re going to be the death of me.”

“Make no mistake, I intend to court you in due form,” Parkinson said. “But by the gods, Weasley, do I want to take you to bed.”

Ginny swallowed. She could hardly think past the promise in Parkinson’s eyes, but.

“I need something,” she said. She trailed fingers down Parkinson’s throat. “A gesture of goodwill. Do this, and I can get my House and the others to stand by yours.” She hesitated. “It’s important.”

“Name it.”

Ginny leaned back. “I need a fireplace that's connected to the Floo.”

Chapter Text

"Truly, Salazar," Helga said, the beginnings of a dimple on her chin, "Was this necessary?"

Salazar gave her a wounded look, all offended dignity. It would be more convincing by far, Rowena thought, were he not dripping water all over their floor. 

“I will have him on his knees,” Salazar said. “Begging for mercy before the day is done.”

“That's hardly fair," Helga said. She chewed the insides of her cheeks, her eyes laughing. "I would not have thought you, in particular, would mind a short swim in the lake. I'm sure Godric meant nothing by it."

"Helga," Salazar said in a voice two tones too sweet, because he was nothing if not overdramatic. "By it he meant war, and you well know it."

Rowena rolled her eyes. Men. "Can the bloodbath wait until after the meeting?" she asked tartly. "Surely, the two of you can be civil to one another for an hour more?" Helga snorted, which Rowena chose to ignore, because one of them here had to try and behave like an adult. "Where is Godric, do you know?"

Salazar folded himself against the wall, his arms crossed. “He was held up,” he said. “A matter of some urgency, as I understand it. He is. Quite tied up.”

"Salazar. "

Salazar gave a slow blink, affecting an air of wide-eyed guilelessness which had not worked on her since he was a boy.

“I should never have addressed you on that Beltane night when we were children,” Rowena said in disgust.

Salazar tossed a towel at her. She sidestepped neatly, and did not throw it back at his face. A towel, after all, would do little damage. A nice, heavy book, on the other hand .

Biting down a sigh, she went to the nearest window. She listened to Helga's voice, low and lovely, to Salazar’s answering tenor. She let the words meld together, a reassuring roll. There was an itch behind her eyes, a pressure at the base of her skull. She leaned against the window, the glass cool against her cheek .

The view below was magnificent. The sprawling grounds were little more than a patchwork of wild grasses from the castle’s topmost tower. Scottish mountains rose in the distance, ice-capped peaks shrouded in clouds. Red turf streaked their sides. Sunlight painted the dark bluff in gold slabs.

Hogwarts stood alone in this wilderness, a stack of stones on a bed of mad dreams. Rowena felt the castle’s stretch beneath her feet. She had Hogwarts etched in the soft parts of her bones, a constant counterpoint to her beating heart. She closed her eyes, and, listening to its song, breathed against the spiraling of her thoughts. 

A hand settled on her neck. She smelled wildflowers, the sweetness of honey, and tangled her fingers with Helga’s where they touched her.

"Dark thoughts?" Helga asked. Rowena felt the heat of her body at her back, and swallowed around the soft, mewling thing in her throat.

To think she used to shy from Helga's touch. She had been sharp in the way of broken glass when they first met, but Helga stripped her of her affected disdain. She met Rowena’s coldness with a friend's patience and, for her, Rowena shed amour like scabbed skin. Shed until naked. Shed until craving.

“I am well,” she said.

Helga gave a quiet hum. “Does your head aches? I can give you something for the pain.”

Rowena turned. She pressed herself against the windowsill lest she pressed forth, into Helga’s arms.

The sun spun gold threads in Helga's hair. Her eyes were dark as wet soil. Her lips were full. Rowena wanted to feel their give under her tongue.

“I am well,” she said again. 

Salazar watched her from the other side of the room. His eyes were made silver in the dappled light. He looked at her with the bitter half-smile of cursed lovers, knowing and sharp-edged. She met his gaze with a swift glare.

Don't you dare, she said with all the strength of her mind.

He blinked. Water sluiced from the corner of his eyes. The glide of his mind against hers came light as a breath down the spine.

My friend, he said, tired, amused, his thoughts sweet with memories of lips sucking the soft skin of a throat. Moans swallowed in bedsheets, the clutch of fingers on rocking hips. Do you truly know her so little that you think she could bear the thought of hurting you?

Get out of my head, Salazar, she said. He shuddered at her weariness. He tucked his consciousness against hers, like a kiss to her knuckles, then faded with a sigh.

He straightened from his slouch with a squelch of wet clothes. "Godric is on his way," he said. “And, unless I am mistaken, he is making haste.”

"Dry yourself off," Rowena said. "You could break such a curse in your sleep. You're a Ward’s master for pity’s sake."

Salazar smiled. "Indeed I am," he said.

Godric came through the door, flushed and breathing hard. He opened his mouth. Salazar unspooled from the wall before he could speak, took Godric in his arms as though he were a long-lost brother home from war.

“Godric,” he said. Rowena watched him put a hand to Godric’s neck, finger tracing a swift pattern on the skin. Godric gave a great shiver. “Good of you to join us.”

“You are,” Godric said. “Such a pain in my arse.” Belying the words, he took Salazar’s weight without protest, and returned the embrace readily.

When they detached themselves, Salazar was dry, and Godric soaked through. Water darkened his red hair, weighed down his clothes. He shook droplets from his eyes and shot Salazar a glare.

“Apologies for my lateness,” he said. “Someone spelled my feet to the Great Hall's ceiling.”

“Someone,” Salazar said blandly, “shoved me in the Black Lake.”

“I did not shove you, I shoved Potter , you great dunce. You dived after him of your own accord.”

“What else was I to do? For all either of us knew, the boy could not swim, and you well-nigh drowned a child.”

“A child,” Godric said. “Truly, my friend. Is this the argument you wish to make?”

Salazar did not flinch. He held himself still, his posture stiff, his eyes distant. The mask of a punch well-aimed.

Godric made a noise of distress. He brought a hand to Salazar’s cheek. Rowena watched Salazar allow the touch. Watched him bow his head in silent defeat. Godric murmured a word, too low for her to hear, and Salazar’s lips curled in a smile.

Rowena had borne all her sorrows alone, and could not comprehend the bond between them. A thing of desperation, made in a time of great strife. Godric and Salazar clung to each other as boys when the world around them was set aflame. Now when one was hurt, the other shuddered with the pain.

She wished, sometimes, with the morbid curiosity of an astronomer watching asteroids on a collision course, they had yielded to the temptation and taken each other to bed while they had the chance. Would it have quelled the violence in their skins, she wondered. Would it have made it worse.

Godric and Salazar struggled to balance themselves in times of peace. They failed to recognize the man they saw in the other’s eyes. So on deep nights when the air was still, Godric would take Salazar by the wrist. He would take him somewhere none would hear, and put a sword in his hand. They would greet the morn with bruised faces, their fists wet with the other’s blood. Smiling. Settled. They touched each other the only way they knew how, and thus brought themselves back to tameness.

It was, Rowena thought, the reason Salazar had taken to Potter's training without a word of protest.

“Shall we start?” Helga asked. “We’ve plenty of work ahead of us, and the hour is growing late.”

They took a seat at the round table at the centre of the room. Helga led the discussion. They talked about their dwindling funds, about setting up exams, about the summer break and how to keep their students safe.

Rowena kept a wary eye on Salazar throughout. He lent an attentive ear, contributed to the discussion in all the right places. He also held himself with a nobleman’s nonchalance, his eyes shrewd and sharp.

“There is another matter we must discuss,” he said as Helga broached the subject of next year’s students. “It is not a pleasant one.”

Helga gestured for him to continue.

“I've had news from the South,” Salazar said. “There is unrest among Muggles. There has been for months. Old friends reached out to me with warnings.” He bowed his head. “Rumours of our existence have spread. Children vanishing into the woods, never to be seen again. The number of witch-trials has increased. Whole families. Slaughtered on the suspicions of witchcraft.”

“Your point, Salazar?” Godric asked.

“More concerning,” Salazar said. “The Peverell boys’ story has travelled. The tale of three monstrous brothers who murdered their father, then disappeared without a trace. I am told it reached the ear of the English king.”

“And what would you have us do?” Rowena asked. “Each action has a consequence. We could not hope to go entirely unnoticed.”

“Secrecy is our strength,” Salazar said. He closed his eyes. His jaw worked. “Should we lose it, we may as well walk ourselves to the pyre and light the flame.” He opened his eyes. Looked at each of them in turn. “We need,” he said. “To cease welcoming Muggle-born children within our walls."

“Christ’s nails, Salazar,” Godric said.

“They are. Our greatest weakness. Children hardly grown we send home come the reaping season. How long before one talks, in jest or boast. How long before one reveals himself a wizard. Before he is caught. And made to talk.”

“Then we fight,” Godric said. “We built a castle we could defend. Should the worst come of it, we fight ‘till our last breath.”

Rowena’s eyes lanced with pain. She pinched the bridge of her nose, blinked her sight back into focus.

“You would die,” Salazar said. “And sacrifice every child within our halls. For the sake of your morality.”

“Morality. ” Godric shifted forward. His eyes flashed a lion’s yellow. “You propose we abandon most of the children we swore to protect because it is safer . Salazar. Muggle-borns are the most at risk. They are the reason we built this school.”

“Some would die,” Salazar said. “A handful. The more powerful. Those who cannot contain the magic in their blood. But most of them. Most of them – ” He raised a hand, halting Godric’s next words. “ – Would live full lives. Without us waking their somnolent abilities. We must save those we can. It is a hard choice to make. It is, also, one I can live with.”

“They would not,” Helga said softly. “Live full lives. I know some of what it is like. To mask my gifts. My people tolerate magic in women, but even they did not take well to my strength. I kept myself tamed all through girlhood.” She met Salazar’s eyes. “It was as though I bore a hole in my chest. Had Rowena not given me reason to leave, I do not see how I would have lived to be full grown.”

“I understand,” Rowena said. The other three turned to her. She inclined her head at Salazar. “My friend. I understand the argument you make. It is not without merit.”

Salazar watched her from across the table, his eyes guarded. He was too well-versed a politician not to perceive the antithesis she prepared.

Rowena truly understood. His wariness. His willingness to pare down parts of himself, and count himself lucky with what remained. But his desperation had been born of swift betrayal and a long fall into the sea, where Rowena had carried hers from her first moments of awareness. He blinded himself with old losses, and Rowena had known him too long and too well to mistake his darkness with hers.

“You forget the oath we made,” she told him. “It is not one we can break. We are building here the foundations for wizardkind. We cannot sow rejection and mistrust into this soil. No strong tree grows on rotten ground.” She softened her voice on her next words, and still he flinched. “And, Salazar, surviving is no way to live. I, for one, would rather die in a blaze than a whisper.”

“So you would,” Salazar murmured.

“Half of your House is Muggle-born,” Helga said. “I cannot say I understand why you would change your views so readily.”

“My students,” Salazar said, “are orphaned. They are urchins and destitute. None will go home to Muggle parents this summer, or any summer to come. I understand you have made your choice. Know I have made mine.”

The meeting came to an end shortly after. Godric and Salazar went their separate ways. Godric had his jaws clenched. He walked with a soldier’s gait, and did not look at Salazar as he left.

Rowena closed her eyes. A faint ache still radiated through her skull. 

"These two," Helga murmured. “Tell me, do you think I have done wrong? Do dismiss Salazar’s argument so readily? I can compromise on much, but not the way I choose my students.”

Rowena looked at Helga. She stood limned in sunlight, her hair aglow.

“You were never afraid to forge your own path,” Rowena said. “We need you. To stand up to us. We choose our students in a way that stokes our pride, Godric, Salazar and I. Do not think me so conceited that I cannot see it. You are stronger than we can be, and I would never wish you to be less than you are. Or to compromise on a matter you feel so strongly about.”

Helga touched Rowena’s shoulder. “Thank you,” she said. “Do not sell yourself so short. We each take the students we think we can best help.”

Rowena bowed her head. “As always, you are kinder than I deserve.”

“Never,” Helga said. “Never that.”

Gods, but Rowena loved her.

She breathed through another spike of pain, sharp as blades. Pieces shifted inside her head, a vision starting to form. The first tremors before earthquakes, or the shuddering start of childbirth.

Helga’s hand on her shoulder tightened. “Are  you well?” she asked. “You look faint as the day we met. And if memory serves, this day you swooned right into my arms.”

“ Swoon ,” Rowena repeated. “I had an arrow in the thigh.”

Exhaustion worn to the bone, a piece of wood protruding from meshed flesh. Rowena fell that day. Fever-crazed and fatigued beyond caring. She fell sideways towards her death.

Helga caught her as she tipped from the saddle. Rowena saw her, beautiful as the dawn, and thought, there. There you are.

“Did you?” Helga asked. “I hardly noticed.”

Rowena smiled. “I would not have thought myself so distracting.”

Helga laughed, her cheeks flushed, her hair tumbling down her back. Rowena traced the line of her throat, and killed a noise of need.

She shuddered as her head speared with pain. 

“Rowena?” she heard. It hurt to open her eyes. “Sweeting, what’s wrong?”

“I think,” Rowena said, the words thick and slurred. Helga’s hands were on her face, thumbs against her temples. Rowena leaned in her touch. The world spun away from her. “‘Nother vision,” she said. “Some. Something is coming. Helga, I – ”

She's six. Six and headstrong, six and different, six and staring down the edge of an old oak tree, at a boy who's sneaking up the neat stone path that leads away from the castle. His clothes are deep green and stark silver. He skips from stone to stepping stone, over the mud and dirt, and shadows skip along with him. Wizard , Rowena thinks, delighted. She wonders if, like her, he slipped away from lessons to escape the sheer boredom. He stops in front of her tree, looks up. He has an odd smile. It's careful, curious, full of mischief. Hello, she hears inside her head, with a rush like the sea. I'm Salazar, pleased to meet you!

She's sixteen. Sixteen and learning, sixteen and breaking, sixteen and running. Away, away, away . This is not her home, that is not her bed. There's wind in her hair and pain in her body. Tall grass whips her legs and streaks with blood. The sun bears down on her, burns pale skin that's spent too much time indoors, bent over thick books. The sky is blue, is boundless, and for the first time in her life, she is free, pulsing with the joy and terror of it. She's dreamt of hair blond like wheat and eyes dark like rich soil, and she wants. She's heading west, she hopes. Salazar told her about villages there, with people like them. She hasn't seen the boy in ages, but he never lied to her. He has probably forgotten her. She never forgets a thing.

She's twenty-six. Twenty-six and hopeful, twenty-six and happy, twenty-six and drunk on stiff ale and cheap wine. Tomorrow brims with possibility. Tomorrow, she will find the daughter she loved and lost. Tomorrow, a new life begins. A bonfire bigger than she is tall spits bright sparks in the lukewarm sweetness of the night. The sky is black, is purple and silver-white, and their castle glows against its glory. It is but bare bones yet, but it will grow into so much more. She has seen it. She dances with Salazar to enchanted music as though they are children again. Neither of them has danced in a long while. Godric kisses Helga, kisses Salazar, kisses her, and she lets him. His lips are warm, pliant when they move on hers. She laughs against his mouth, Helga's body a touchstone against her side. Rowena wants to kiss her, too. There's the burst of spellwork, a blurry shape taking form, something vaguely pig-shaped. Salazar, a lot more drunk than he lets on, makes a grand, sweeping gesture at it, and it morphs. Godric follows suit, then Helga, then Rowena, because she can't think of a good reason not to. The result is atrocious. It's a misshapen boar that's got wings it cannot seem to us, a snout that looks like it's been crushed against a wall. Hogwarts! Godric roars from where he's laughing against Salazar's neck. Rowena's chest is so full she can't breathe. She –

She does not know where she is. She is not herself. Hills roll around her, grass bending in the summer wind. The sun is low, about to set. It makes everything look on fire. There's a weight on her shoulders, on her limbs. She hears the grind of metal. Armour. There are voices, countless, rising to the pace of cadenced steps. She's been on the road a long while, marching north. The men are loud, on edge. She understands. She's not the superstitious sort, but sorcerers are not to be taken lightly. She climbs to the top of a hill, and the mountains part, open in a wide valley. Nestled between a lake and mountain feet is a castle. It reaches for the sky, all bridges, arches and strong, sturdy towers. For the first time since she started walking, she feels a stab of fear. A horn sounds in the distance. It's time.

{. . .}

It happened like this:

The day was warm, the glow of June only just washing away the last dredges of the dank, rain-drenched winter days. The soil was soft with the smell of wet grass and newborn flowers.

Harry was at work. The sun warmed the back of his neck. A breeze skated across the dark waters of the Lake, blew through his hair. He could hear children laugh from afar, and birdsong through the wind.

He brought his wand down in a steady sweep. The wood log pivoted in mid-air, and fitted itself in the trench Harry dug earlier in the day. Above his head, a dozen more sturdy trunks hoovered. Harry cut them out of the forest trees, pared them down to the desired shape. He could feel their weight in the muscles of his back. 

He breathed a slow breath, and fitted the next log.

The Founders had decided upon an obstacle course to test their students’ readiness to be released into the wild. Summer approached fast, and they grew more anxious with every passing day. More demanding in their lessons. 

Harry woke early to find Salazar already at work in the common room. His eyes ringed dark, his fingers stained with ink. Harry watched the curve of his cheeks, the tense line of his mouth, and offered help.

“You’re worried,” Harry told him in the deep-blue of early dawn.

“I am terrified,” Salazar replied. “In two month’s time, I shall send children into a world that does not want them. Their ability. Their differences. They have grown in their time here. Enough to be noticeable.” Salazar sighed. “And, I fear, not enough to defend themselves.”

Harry put a hand on his arm, and met Salazar’s gaze. “You’ve taught them well,” he said. “They’re stronger than you think. You did everything you could, Salazar. You have nothing to regret.”

Salazar looked at Harry’s hand on him. “Thank you,” he murmured, and touched fingers to Harry’s wrist.

Harry thought about Salazar’s smile. Soft. Weary. His mouth tilted at the corners. His eyes bright when he looked at Harry. 

He brought the next log into alignment, his chest warm with remembrance.

Soon enough, the trench was solidified, its earthen walls held apart with wooden planks. Tomorrow, Harry would need to cut more wood, and give it a gentle curve. He would seal the tunnel, then cover it with soil. Inside it, Helga would place her traps. 

"Harry!" he heard, and turned to the sight of Alfric sprinting toward him. The boy’s face was flushed. His golden hair glinted in the sun like a crown.

Harry dropped the two remaining logs, and braced himself.

"Hide me," Alfric hissed, both his hands on Harry's arms, his voice frantic. "Quick!"

“I think that’s cheating,” Harry said, but he tapped his wand atop Alfric’s head. 

The Disillusionment Charm took hold, and Alfric vanished from sight just as more students rounded the castle and came pelting toward him. Harry leaned a hip against a pole, crossed his arms, and watched them approach.

"Where is he, Potter?" Helena asked. She breathed hard, her wand half-raised. Behind her, the other children skidded to a stop, giggling and out of breath.

"Where's who?" Harry asked.

The girl shot him a glare, but dashed off with a growl. The couple of Slytherins she had caught went cackling in her wake. Harry waited until she was well out of sight, then broke his spell. Alfric shimmered into view.

"Thanks," the boy said, grinning. "Girl's a bloody hellhound. What are you working on?"

"Your next nightmare," Harry said.

Alfric gave a wry smile. “One last trial before the fray, eh. Can’t say I’m looking forward to leaving for the summer." He tilted his head to the side. “What will you be doing? You have someone to stay with? Lord Slytherin, perhaps.”

Harry hesitated. “Salazar and I haven’t discussed it. But I don’t think so, no.”

“You should come with me," Alfric said. "If my parents notice you are here at all, they'll be delighted.”

“I.” Harry gave a moment’s pause. He swallowed. “Thank you, Alfric. It means a lot. But. You know Salazar and I have been doing some research in our free time.”

Alfric’s mouth ticked up. “Have you?” he asked. “I’d wondered.”

“We’ve stalled to a stop,” Harry forged on. “There’s not enough books in the library. And it’s. Important to me, this research. Since I’m not clever enough to puzzle it out for myself, I figure I might travel for a bit. See if anyone else has answers.” Harry hesitated. “I don’t know how long it’ll take me.”

Alfric hummed. “Then I should come with you,” he said. He raised a hand when Harry opened his mouth. “Trust me, I won't be missed. And you and I share a House besides. If we do not help each other in times of need, who will?”

“Alfric – " Harry said.

"POTTER YOU FILTHY LIAR!"

Alfric cursed. 

A pack of students ran to them at full speed. Helena led the chase. Godric and Salazar trailed behind them at a sedate pace, looking all too entertained. Harry braced himself just in time before a small body barrelled into him.

"Got you," Ignotus said happily, his face buried in Harry's middle.

"Oof," Harry said, grimacing exaggeratedly. He mimicked trying to shake free of the boy. Ignotus giggled against his stomach. "You certainly do, love."

He wrapped loose arms around Ignotus, holding him close but careful not to grip. Ignotus melted against him with his usual ease. Harry smiled, his chest full. It had taken weeks before the boy built a semblance of good health after his ordeal. Months before he acted like a child again. Harry helped him as best he could. Though he worked hard to welcome all three Peverell boys in Slytherin House, he gave more of his time to the youngest. Antioch was too wild a boy to let himself be approached without showing teeth. Cadmus was of the quiet, introverted sort Harry thought would fare better in Ravenclaw.

Ignotus, though. Harry knew about scars, about nightmares and how to breathe through them. He soothed the boy through long nights, and Ignotus, in turn, clung to him like a lifeline.

Harry tuned off the animated banter beside him, the children debating over whether there had been foul play. He ran a hand down Ignotus's back. "You got caught?" he asked.

The boy groaned. He looked up at Harry with a pout. "Yes," he said. "Brad wouldn't let me go with him."

"That's alright, then." Harry ruffled his hair. "Though you should try and hide on your own next time."

Ignotus nodded gravely. His arms tightened around Harry's waist.

"All I am saying is," Alfric said, loud enough to silence the general din. "If anyone here is to blame, surely it is Harry. He is the one who hid and abated me, even though I am certain he knew the rules of our game."

A dozen contemplative stares and three traitors to their House pivoted to face Harry in unison. Godric, who Harry was sure was here to keep score, and possibly make certain no throats were slits, bent close to Salazar’s ear, and murmured to him, the words too low to catch. Salazar watched Harry, his mouth curled in a half-smile. He arched an eyebrow. Harry rolled his eyes at him.

Sorry, Alfric mouthed at him behind everyone else's back.

Harry detached Ignotus from his side. He shifted his stance.

“I may be guilty,” he said. He cocked his head to the side. “The question is. What can you miscreants do about it?”

"GET HIM!" someone shouted, and the children yelled war cries.

Laughing, Harry dodged three hexes hurtling at him. Nothing major, small spells for pranking purposes. He shot his own curses into the mix. Glenn’s hair turned green, Alfric’s purple. A Gryffindor girl fell laughing to the ground. Ignotus squealed happily and joined the melee. He took Harry's side, and shoved an impressively bright Lumos in someone's face.

Harry kept Ignotus shielded at his side. He caught spellwork with the tip of his wand and on open palms. He refused himself the use of anything stronger than Levicorpus. He held his own as best he could against the onslaught, but soon found himself backed against the Black Lake.

A blast of air came at him. Harry felt the drop in pressure, heard the curse’s fury, too fast and too strong to have been cast by a student. He had no time to dodge, no time to parry. The spell caught him full on the chest. It punched the air from his lungs, snapped his head back. Harry felt himself lifted from the ground. He went flying, and fell down to victorious whoops. He saw Godric holster his wand, saw Ignotus' face scrunch up, saw Salazar move, he –

He saw nothing at all. He impacted the surface at an angle, and sank. His nose and mouth filled with lakewater and the taste of reeds. For one terrible moment, his limbs seized up . The Black Lake took its source on mountaintops, was born of ice and endless snowfalls. It was cold, so cold, Harry could not move .

Silence pressed upon his ears. His clothes dragged him to where Merefolk sang and everything drowned in watery darkness. His mind was numb. He could not tell which way was up.

There was a rush beside him, the swirl of a wave. Harry opened his eyes to a myriad of silvery bubbles darting up. A blurred shape swam toward him, then a hand was on his arm. He was pulled against another body . There was water in his throat. Harry could not breathe. His heart kicked his ribs. Panic filled him. He flayed blindly, and arms closed around his waist. He felt heat, a wrenching pull.

They broke the surface. Harry coughed, sputtered, took air in great gulps. His ears rang with white noise. He shook with cold.

"Easy," Salazar whispered behind him. His hand stroked Harry's stomach as Harry retched lake water. "Easy, Harry. Deep breaths."

“I know he's your friend,” Harry said, panting. Black dots danced across his vision. “But I'm going to kill Godric in his sleep."

"I will show you the way to his bed," Salazar said. He traced small patterns below Harry's ribs. Harry felt his breath on his nape, and suppressed a shiver.

He let his head fall against Salazar's shoulder. He bared his throat, and enjoyed the rush of air in his lungs. The last of his dizziness faded. Salazar held him afloat. He was a line of warmth against Harry's back. Harry felt the shift of his body behind him. His skin sang with awareness.

"Harry," Salazar said.

Harry turned his head. Salazar’s hands had grown still. Harry could see the sweep of his jaw and little else, but should Salazar look down to the side –

"I will pull us to shore," Salazar said. He did not turn. His voice was strained. "You mustn't move."

"I can swim," Harry said.

He watched the skin of Salazar’s throat pebble with goosebumps. His lips were close to the warm flesh, and Harry.

Harry detached himself. Salazar’s arms slid from him. Cold water rushed between them.

Salazar watched him with dark eyes. His long hair was water-logged. His skin glistened in the sun. Harry followed the path of a drop across Salazar’s cheek, down to the point of his chin. He swallowed. Heat squirmed in his gut, tightened his stomach.

“Shall we?” Salazar asked.

Harry nodded, and Salazar pushed away. He cut through the water with swift, fluid strokes. Harry watched him move. Watched the muscles of his back. He shook himself, and followed gracelessly. The Dursleys let him follow his school to the local swimming pool, back before Hogwarts. Dudley used to push him off the deep end. Harry remembered the taste of chlorine. He learned to swim, but never cared for it. 

His waterlogged clothes weighed him. His breaths wanted to shudder on something that was not the cold.

Thankfully, the way to go was short. Salazar pulled himself to shore, then turned and waited for him. He held out a hand. Harry clasped his wrist, and Salazar lifted him out.

Salazar’s shirt was soaked through, the white linen made transparent with water. Harry watched his chest. The lean muscles of his stomach. The darker ridge of hard nipples. His heart ran fast.

Salazar’s hand was tight around his wrist. He watched Harry with was a faint widening to his eyes, his mouth parted and Harry –

Harry let him go. His cheeks burned.

"Shody reflexes, Harry.” Godric pushed himself between them. He pinned Harry with an unimpressed stare. “You should have seen my spell coming . You cannot focus on a single opponent to the exclusion of all others, boy. It will get you killed. And you.” Godric rounded on Salazar. “This, also, is a thing you should have seen coming.”

His hand shot out, wand tapping Salazar's chest. There was a flash of light.

Salazar breathed a slow sigh. "I'm going to skin you for a hearth rug," he told Godric, 

Godric grinned. “The price for distraction, my friend," he said, and side-stepped a hex with easy grace. He squeezed Salazar’s shoulder. “You and I should hurry. We’ve a meeting an hour hence.”

He sauntered away. Students trailed in his wake, jostling each other, laughing.

“What has he done to you?" Harry asked Salazar in the silence that followed.

"He spelled my clothes against drying," Salazar said. He opened his mouth. Closed it again. Harry watched him swallow. "Harry," Salazar said.

“I should go,” Harry said. He forced a smile. “I'm due for a hot bath. I'm sure you'll excuse me for keeping out of your way while you go murder Godric.”

He turned. Alfric waited for him a few paces away. The boy looked out at the Lake, away from the two of them. He smiled when Harry joined him. They headed to the castle together. Harry ignored Salazar’s eyes on the back of his neck, and listened to Alfric’s apologies. Harry laughed him off. They made their way to the Dungeons. Harry excused himself and went to his rooms. 

He drew himself a bath and stripped his wet clothes. He washed mud and the Black Lake smell from his skin. His hands shook. He thought about Salazar’s eyes on him. About his warmth, and the play of muscle under his shirt. Anxiety squeezed his chest, and Harry forced a slow, even breath.

Dressed in fresh clothes and steadier on his feet, he rejoined the common room. Most of his Housemates were there, catching up on homework or playing cards. Harry joined the game, seated on the floor between Cadmus and Audra. He lost every round, and was gently mocked for it.

It was getting late by the time the common room entrance opened again. The light from the Lake was the pale, dusty green of the setting sun. Salazar walked in on silent steps. He had dried, loose hair curling around his face. He swept a look around the room, and his hands were curled out of sight, and Harry. Knew.

Something was wrong.

He stood without a word and went to him. Salazar backed against a window, away from the children. Harry followed him.

“What is it?” Harry asked in an undertone. From up close, he could see the way Salazar clenched his jaws. He breathed hard and fast, and watched Harry with the intensity of a coiled thing ready to strike.

“Rowena had a vision,” he said. “The castle will be under siege before the night is through.”

Chapter Text

Harry tried to calm his racing heart as he moved through the throng of Slytherin students rushing in and out of their rooms. Salazar knelt in the middle of the corridor. He clasped a cloak over Ashton's shoulders, talked to the boy in a soft voice. The other students navigated around the two of them without pausing.

''Salazar," Harry said.

Salazar finished with Ashton's cloak, then looked up at him, his face overcast with shadows. Harry jerked his head to the side. Salazar rose to his feet. He moved with deliberate grace, each motion forced into calmness, but Harry. Harry could see the way his eyes burned.

Too many words pressed against his teeth. Harry clamped his jaws around everything he wanted to say, and clasped Salazar’s wrist in one hand. He tugged without a word, pulled Salazar after him, away from the commotion. Salazar followed, his gaze a weight on the back of Harry's neck.

Harry took him to his bedroom. The door closed behind the two of them. Harry breathed in the green light, the watery silence. There were rumpled sheets on the bed, books and parchments strewn over the floor, clothes lying on the chair by the desk. Harry burrowed into this room, made himself at home here. He closed his eyes. Gave himself a beat to gather his thoughts before he rounded on Salazar.

Salazar was looking at him, eyes roaming Harry’s face with the sort of intensity Harry thought should leave a mark, red as hot iron.

"Talk," Harry said.

"There's no time – "

"Make time." Harry curled his hands into fists. Salazar’s breath caught. Harry still held his wrist. "Tell me what it is we're facing."

"An army marches to our door," Salazar said. "Rowena Saw it. It was driven here by rumours of us. They followed the Peverell boys’ scent."

“Then we wait them out,” Harry said. “Hogwarts is warded. It’s built for siege. We let them break themselves against her walls. We’ll be alright.”

“There are.” Salazar paused. Swallowed. “There are traitors amongst them. Sorcerers either paid or tortured into guiding them here. Helga scried their ranks. Several dozens, she thinks. They likely emptied the entirety of the kingdom’s cells, but. There are. Enough. That they might break our defences. It is not a risk we are willing to take. And besides.” Salazar’s lips twisted. “We do not have food enough to withstand a siege. The coffers are running low as they are.”

Harry breathed hard through a wash of cold panic. “Do we stand a chance?” he asked.

Salazar did not answer.

"Then we run," Harry said. He stepped closer to Salazar. “We lose them in the Forest. Live another day to reclaim Hogwarts."

“How would you have us run?” Salazar asked. His voice was soft. His eyes. He looked at Harry with such heartbreak. Harry’s throat ached. “With young children making half our numbers. No food reserves. We could never outpace them.”

There was buzzing in Harry’s limbs, a high-pitch ring in his ears.

“Then, what?” he asked. “We lay on our backs and let them kill us?”

“Then we fight,” Salazar said. “We meet them in the field, and fight to our last breath. Rowena and Helga. Godric and I.”

“And me.”

“No.”

“Salazar.” Harry bared his teeth. “If you think for one moment I will leave you – ”

“You will not,” Salazar said. “Accompany me into the field.”

“Watch me.”

Salazar breathed a hard breath. He closed his eyes. Ran a hand over his face. “You must listen,” he said. “And listen well. We have need of you. You will not be idle for the fight ahead. Listen.” Harry ground his teeth. “We cannot be there,” Salazar said. “We will not. Be there. For our students. You talked of fleeing from our enemy. That is what you shall do. With the children. You will take them into the trees, and we will hold them off. Till victory, or so long as we can. Should they storm the castle, they will not find you within her walls.”

“And after that?”

“Then,” Salazar said. “You will have a few days, with their forces sufficiently diminished, to seek help in sending the children home. To be hidden, and never seen again.” Salazar’s eyes bore into him. “You will live, Harry. And so will they.”

“You can’t,” Harry said. “You can’t. Ask this of me.”

“Please,” Salazar said, and Harry heard himself make a soft, helpless noise. “Harry. I need you.”

“Damn you,” Harry said, but it was in defeat, and they both knew it. He could never refuse Salazar anything. The man had too great a hold on him. “Damn you, Salazar.”

“Thank you,” Salazar said. Relief slackened his shoulders. Harry watched his body unwound, and raged. “Going to battle will be easier. Knowing you are safe.”

“You do not die today,” Harry said. He fisted his hands in Salazar's shirt. “Hear me, Salazar. Today is not the day you die.” He met Salazar’s eyes. “It is me saying it. Do you understand?”

Salazar’s eyes widened. His breath caught. He brought his hands to Harry’s face. His fingers ran over Harry’s cheeks, caressed Harry’s cheekbones. Harry swayed into the touch. Salazar leaned their foreheads together. Their noses brushed. 

“Thank you,” Salazar said. Harry felt each word on his lips. “I do not know whether it was wise of you to reveal such a thing. But your words make the night ahead much less daunting.”

Harry’s jaw still cradled in his palms, Salazar straightened. He looked at Harry for long moments. His eyes fell to Harry’s mouth. He leaned in slowly. He pressed his lips to Harry’s forehead in a warm, lingering kiss.

"I shall meet you on the other side, my dear," he said, and stepped away.

He swept out of Harry’s room, and Harry let him go.

Harry dressed in a haze. He cinched the cuirasse on his chest, put a heavy cloak around his shoulders. He strapped sword and daggers to his waist. Sheathed his wand on his forearm. His mouth tingled.

He went back to the common room. Salazar had already gathered the Slytherins. He stood among them, dressed in black armour, a supple, flowing ensemble of hardened leathers and warded fabric. He held a black scarf in one hand. Sila was coiled around his torso, her tail whipping the air.

They were moving before long. Salazar ushered them through the darkened corridors. The students walked silent as spectres.

They met with the other Houses deep in the Dungeons, in a room wide as a cathedral, pillars of arching stone disappearing in the darkness. Godric and Rowena were in chainmail and metal plates. Helga's armour more closely resembled Salazar's, with cured leathers and reinforced fabrics. All of them wore blades like jewellery.

The students held still, the silence tomb-like. They breathed together, and no one said a word.

Godric stepped forth. He talked about war. The Founders would cover the castle's gates, he said. You will flee to the Forest. Harry will lead you. Harry will show the way.

Harry was terrified.

 He had tried to care for the Slytherins these past months, but had never taken responsibility for lives outside his own. His friends had known what they were getting into when they chose to follow him in war. They could defend themselves, and never relied on him for protection. Though he had led them, they had been his equals. Now children’s lives would depend on him. Dread curled in his stomach.

Salazar met his eyes. Harry watched him, and saw no doubt in him. No hesitation. Salazar gave the slightest incline of his head. I shall meet you on the other side, Harry thought. My dear. He watched Salazar’s mouth curl in a smile, and made himself look away.

Far away in the distance, carried over by enchantment, a horn sounded. Once. Twice.

“Go,” Godric said. “Harry. Go now. And do not look back.”

The students turned to him. Expectant. Trustful. Harry forced a smile. 

"If you'd be so kind as to follow me, ladies and gentlemen," he said. His voice did not waver. The students gave hesitant smiles.

He herded them together, and got them walking. Harry led them deeper into the Dungeon’s maze, and did as Godric asked. He left the Founders behind, and did not look back. It was, he thought, one of the hardest things he had ever done. Each step weighed like stones. His ribcage felt pried open.

The Slytherins stood behind him. They fell in step with him with practised ease, and the other students followed their lead.

Harry conjured witchfires against the surrounding darkness. The students' faces gleamed like ghosts in the bleached light. 

They marched on. Soon, the neat stone corridors dissolved into uncut tunnels, little more than earth paths dug out of the mountains. The air grew damp as they passed under the Lake.

Harry traced the stone walls weeping moisture. He wondered how long it would be before the battle began. A handful of minutes. Several hours, if anyone had the mind to negotiate. Would he hear the clash of steel from the Forest, he wondered. The cries of men fighting. Dying.

Surely the Founders would hold their own. They were wizards powerful beyond reason, and skilled warriors beside. They would not lay amongst the dying or mutilated.

We think there are traitors among them.

Harry tasted blood.

They trekked deep under the mountains. The air grew progressively cooler and lighter, less encumbered by the Dungeon's clamminess. The weight of the castle above them lifted, and the passage curved in a soft upward slope. Harry felt wind on his face, the barest breeze. It carried the rich scent of sap, wet earth and rotting leaves. A splash of dusky red light grew wider and wider in the distance, eclipsing the white starlight of their wands.

Harry stopped as they neared the entrance. He faced the children gathered behind him, and drew himself up to his full height.

"Listen carefully," he said. His voice echoed off the jagged rocks. "The Forest, as you know, is a dangerous place. I need you to obey me without question while we're in there. Pair off with someone you trust. Never lose sight of that person. Stay behind me at all times. Do not wander off, and keep your wands ready. Understood?"

"Yes sir," the students intoned in unison.

The Forest was awash with the colours of the setting sun, warm red light seeping everywhere, shattering on branches and leaves, pooling on the earthy floor. The tree trunks were wide and ridged deeply with the passage of time. They were deep in the Forest, where the trees were gnarled with age and their thick roots twined over the soil.

Harry strained his ears, his heart racing, but they were upwind; he could hear nothing but the low groaning of the trees, the delicate shudder of their leaves.

The Forbidden Forest was not a place they could make camp. Staying still for too long would attract the attention of the many creatures who roamed the woods.

Without giving himself too long to hesitate, Harry set off in a direction that would drive them further from Hogwarts. A full day's walk should lead them safely out of the woods. Once there, he could loop back to Hogwarts, assess the situation. Then –

Best not to think about what he would do, then. Because if the Founders lost and the Muggles murdered them, Harry was not certain he would have the sense to turn back and return to the children. If Hogwarts fell and Salazar with it, he would track and kill every last one of the soldiers, then turn to their masters if he survived the fight.

Harry breathed deeply through his nose, inhaling the cooling scent of the Forest. The sun was dipping behind the horizon, leeching away the last of the day’s warmth. Shadows lengthened, swallowing the light until the Forest was plunged in a deep, velvety darkness. It was a moonless, eerie night. The stars burned diamonds light overhead. The Forest seemed to hold its breath in anticipation. Harry could hear nothing beyond the crunch of earth and gravel under the students' boots.

Gytha sidled up to his side. "What are you thinking?" she whispered. She put a hand in his, twining their fingers together.

"That if Salazar doesn't make it out alive, I'm going to murder him," Harry said.

The girl laughed, a soft, lilting sound, at odds with the ghostly quiet of the Forest. "You really care about him, don't you?" she asked. Her dark eyes gleamed in the fire from Harry's wand. "They're going to be fine though, aren't they?"

"Of course they are," Harry said. He squeezed her hand, and Gytha gave a warm smile.

They walked for a long while. Harry lost sense of time. Gytha left his side, and was replaced by Alfric, then Glenn after him, Audra, then someone else. Always a Slytherin. Harry wondered whether they were keeping an eye on him. He was restless. Bugs crawled under his skin. There was an itch at the back of his neck, the sense of something vertiginous about to happen.

The children trudged on. They looked tired, their faces drawn with effort. How long before their feet gave from under them. No one was complaining, but they were fairly young. Some of them, such as Meic, had not even hit the two digits. Harry did not see how they would hold until sunrise. He had to find a way to keep them safe. He had to find shelter before they collapsed.

A sound nearby in the woods caused him to stop dead in his tracks. 

“Harry?” Dallin asked. Harry gestured for him to be silent, and the boy closed his mouth with a snap.

“Did you hear that?” Harry asked.

“I heard it,” someone said farther down the line.

Harry's hand tightened on his wand. Sweat pooled on his back despite the cold bite of the air. He scanned the woods, but the dark was too deep, the trees too thick. He closed his eyes and strained his ears. Beneath the sputtering of his fire spells, he heard the rush of the wind. The students breathing. Something rustling through the undergrowth. 

“Gather ‘round,” Harry said. “Youngest children in the middle. Anyone who can fight on the outside. Quickly.”

He was obeyed swiftly. The Slytherins jumped to the task. They formed a loose circle, the older students surrounding the more vulnerable amongst them. They looked pale in the glowing red light of Harry's fires. Harry’s heart beat in his throat. His palms were slick with sweat.

“Steady,” he said. “Remember your training.”

Branches snapped. A low, rumbling growl rose from between the trees. Harry saw a flash of bright yellow eyes in the blackness of the Forest, and between a moment and the next, they were surrounded. Dark shapes leaped at them without warning. The silence shattered to the sound of vicious snarls and alarmed cries. The students around him surged to meet the threat, knocking him from side to side.

Harry saw teeth and claws and sleek muscled bodies shining in the cold light of the stars. He shot his first spell before anything else registered. The burst of magic hit the great beast lunging at his throat. It went down in a spur of blood. The creature died with a high-pitched whine. It was a hound, some kind of war-dog, a huge bulk of a beast with short fur and long fangs. Harry stared in horror as more beasts prowled forth, swarming them and lashing out with furious screams.

He drew his sword. The steel sang as he pulled it free, and Harry buried the blade in another dog's neck before it could rip his side open. He fired a spell, and knocked two more against the towering trunk of a nearby tree. They crashed with the wet, sickening sound of bones breaking and did not rise again. More hounds laid dead on the ground, killed by other students. The pack had formed a half-circle around them.

He could hear the screech of metal against flesh, the cries of poorly aimed spells. Harry breathed deep, shifted his stance. He cast a blast of fire. It caught a beast in the chest, lifted it off the ground and flung it away at great speed. At the same time, he blocked bared teeth aimed at his stomach. Blood sprayed his clothes, soaked his skin.

There was a momentary lull in the battle, a breath where nothing moved. The pack retreated a few paces. Its numbers had greatly diminished. Harry did not lower his guard, wary the last dogs might attack. By the time he realised the men were here, it was too late.

"NO!"

A single, gurgling cry rang through the Forest. Harry's blood ran cold. He turned as if in a dream. He felt as though he moved through honey, each motion made sluggish by fear. It took him forever to lose sight of the hounds. His ears were deaf with the roar of his blood. He breathed in short, searing gasps. People were shouting but he could not hear them. There was movement around him, nothing but pointless bustling.

Someone laid on the Forest's floor. Someone who Harry knew instantly would never rise again. Blood oozed from a gaping wound. It soaked the dark earth beneath.

A lance was stuck deep in Gytha's chest, still vibrating from the impact.

A handful of men stood a little way off, at the edge of the trees. A small scouting party no doubt, who stumbled upon them while sneaking up to the castle. They were dressed in dark colours, none of them in armour. One of the men had an arm raised for having thrown the lance.

Harry moved. He pushed through the crowd, and he could not hear the screams, could not feel the hands reaching to touch him. The tip of his wand glowed green. The lancer looked at him. His eyes grew wide with fright. Harry wanted to rip the life from them. He wanted to hear him scream with it.

He watched with detached horror the tip of an arrow pierce through the lancer's throat in a spray of flesh and bone. The man fell down, burbling around the blood flooding his throat. He clutched desperately at the steel and wood protruding from his skin. Behind him, his companions shouted in alarm, their voices muffled to Harry's ears. More arrows appeared from the dark, all aiming true. They sank in thighs and hearts and lungs. Soon, all the men were dead, sprawled in the dirt without a breath left in them, bodies twisted absurdly.

As suddenly as it had started, it was over. For a long moment no one moved, stunned by the echoing silence. Harry took in the scene around him. Centaurs emerged from the woods, bows held aloft, calm in front of the massacre. Many of the children were hurt, though no one seemed in need of urgent care. A few had claw and bite marks. The cuts bled profusely, but were not life threatening. Several students already rushed to the wounded’s side, wands raised to stop the haemorrhage. Others had fallen to their knees, either sobbing or numb with shock. In the middle of them, Gytha was dead. She had been his friend. She had held his hand and walked with him just a few heartbeats ago. Now she was dead.

Dead.

Harry tried not to look at her, but his eyes were drawn to her prone form against his will. Blood had soaked through her shirt. There was an unnatural paleness to her skin. The other Slytherins gathered around her. Alfric knelt by her head. He clutched her hand in both of his, insensitive to his own injuries. Glenn stroked her hair, his pale eyes dulled with grief. The others stood as silent vigils, faces wet with tears.

It was Harry's fault she was dead. He had been charged to protect her, and failed. He stood still, too shocked to move. His ears rang with noise no one else could hear. His chest felt like a mess of ripped flesh. He was bleeding out from wounds that did not show. He could taste blood at the back of his mouth. He thought he might throw up. His sight was blurred; he could not see properly.

"H-Harry?"

Ignotus looked at him with eyes that swam with tears, face scrunched in pain and terror. The boy reached out to him with trembling arms, hands held out in supplication. Quickly, without thinking, Harry gathered him up in his arms, lifted him off of the ground and pressed him close to his chest, tucking Ignotus’ head at the base of his neck. Ignotus went to him with a sob, full body shaking from the strength of it. He clung to Harry hard enough to bruise.

"Shh," Harry heard himself whisper. "Shh, you're alright. You're alright."

It was not true, of course. Gytha was dead.

"Shh," he said again, and muffled a sob into Ignotus' hair. He breathed the scent of soap and sweat and warm skin, and shook apart.

Gytha was dead.

"You will come with us, Harry Potter."

One of the Centaurs had approached him, weapons hidden out of sight. Harry recognized Hexo, the black skinned and coated man he met when he went into the Forest with Godric, looking for the three brothers. Hexo stared at him calmly, not once glancing at Gytha's mangled, lifeless corpse. Harry thought about lashing out. He wanted to tear Hexo's face with his nails.

"Many roam the Forest tonight, Harry Potter,” Hexo said. “You are not safe here. Neither is your kin. I would help you protect them."

His kin. Harry looked at them. All the children he had failed. They looked back at him. Traumatised. Awaiting orders. In his arms, Ignotus seemed to weigh a ton.

Harry had to keep the boy safe. He had to keep them all safe. He had no choice; they relied on him.

"For what price would you help me?" he asked, his voice hoarse and wretched.

The Centaur smiled, a flash of white teeth bright against his skin.

"Follow me."

Chapter Text

It took another half hour to get the children moving again. Harry pushed aside how nauseous he felt, the trembling burn of shock suffusing into a sense of empty horror. He went from student to student. He healed gaping lacerations, quenched wells of blood. He whispered encouragement. Murmurs urging the children to stand and move. Several of the older students took to trailing after him. They helped however they could. None of the Slytherins reacted. They stayed by Gytha's body, pale as death, unmoving.

Alfric snatched him by the wrist when Harry walked close, his grip tight. "We can't leave her here," he said. His eyes were feverish under their cloud of grief. "Harry. We can't leave her to rot with them." He pointed at the broken soldiers. "She deserves better."

Harry nodded. He could not bear to look at Alfric. At any of them. Dallin's lips were bloodless. His hands were curled into fists; arms shaking visibly. Audra's cheeks were wet with silent tears. Pressed against her side, Ashton's eyes were huge. He stared fixedly at where the lance had pierced Gytha's chest. Glenn's head hung low over his chest. 

Harry freed his wrist from Alfric's bruising grip. He raised his wand. Pointed it at Gytha's corpse.

"Mobilicorpus," he intoned. Obeying his command, she rose horizontally up off the ground, held together by his magic. Her dark curly hair fell in waves behind her head. Harry was grateful his stomach was empty. He feared he would have thrown up otherwise.

"Let's go," he murmured. He looked at Hexo. The Centaur had been watching him, dark eyes impenetrable in the red witchfire lights.

The creature inclined his head, almost a full bow. He uttered some short orders to his people in a language Harry did not recognize before taking the lead. He sank within the trees. 

Guiding Gytha's body at wandpoint, Harry fell into steps behind him after a backward glance ensuring everyone was following.

"Where are you taking us?" he asked. Hexo's only answer was an eerie smile.

As they walked, the adrenalin from the battle wore off fully and Harry was left with cold sweat lathered on his skin, and a deep, permeating chill that froze him to the bones. Blank emptiness descended upon him. The thick buffer was the only thing that kept him putting a foot in front of the other. Branches snapped like bones under the students' feet, the only sound to trouble the heavy padding of the night.

They crested a hill and Harry saw campfires burning in the hollow below. The flames rose high and bright, illuminating the still blackness of the Forest, bathing the basin in glowing golden light. Harry could see Centaurs guarding the edges of the camp, all armed with tall bows. Behind them stretched a moving, swaying sea of tents made of animal pelts. Centaurs went between them, cooking over the firepits or talking animatedly. It seemed that no one was sleeping in the Forest tonight.

Harry felt a tinge of awareness spark in his chest at the sight of the soldiers pacing back and forth at the entrance of the camp. Centaurs were renowned warriors, quicker and stronger than any human, famously skilled with a bow and arrows. Harry watched them, and felt his heart quicken.

As they came closer to the camp, a horn blared to signal their approach, shattering the soft bustle of the night. Harry winced at the sound. The Centaurs' activity ceased abruptly. They looked at the approaching humans. The gazes trained on them were far from friendly. Harry spied several Centaurs snarling their way. Whispers followed in their wake, a low, threatening buzz. Around them, the warriors tightened ranks. Harry wondered whether he had walked his people into a prison cell. Wariness had him curl his fingers more securely around the handle of his wand.

Hexo marched them to the centre of the camp. A large bonfire stood there, stretched toward the darkened skies, a burst of cherry reds and pale yellows. Even from a distance, Harry could feel its heat on his skin. Clumps of Centaurs were clustered around the fire. The flames danced on their skin and coats, making them look like statues of molten bronze.

"Wait here," Hexo told Harry. He went to the larger of the assembled groups, half a dozen Centaurs standing apart from the others in a loose semi-circle. They all bore some mark of authority, faces or flanks painted with broad patterns, necks and heads adorned with jewellery.

"Harry," Alfric hissed the moment Hexo was out of earshot, voice full of urgency. Awaiting orders. Begging Harry to act.

"Wait," Harry said. The boy shifted behind his back, coiled tight with restless energy. Blindly, Harry reached with his free hand and gripped his forearm, forcing him to stillness. "Wait," he repeated.

To his relief, Alfric subsisted. Harry could feel the boy's gaze on his neck. Looking for the first sign of tension, for a signal to attack. Harry relaxed his arms by his side, forced his screaming body into an air of calmness. They were surrounded by warriors. No way for them to fight their way out without more casualties. Harry would not risk it. Not with Gytha's cooling corpse hovering at the tip of his wand.

Hexo came back. He gestured for Harry to step forth. Harry planted his feet in the ground and did not move. Alfric sidled closer, a wordless show of support. The other Slytherins fell into ranks.

"We do not harm younglings, Harry Potter," Hexo said. "Your charges are safe here."

Harry ground his teeth hard enough to hurt his jaw. Several hands brushed his arms and back when he took a deliberate step forward, away from the students.

"It's alright," he told them. They let him go.

He followed Hexo to the half-circle of painted warriors. Each proud, impassive face watched him approach in silence. Quietly gauging him, the way he stood and acted. Finding him lacking.

"This is the Counsel of Clans," Hexo announced. "You stand before the representatives of each of our tribes."

Not knowing how else to respond, Harry bowed at the waist. He wished Hagrid had taught him more about Centaur's culture.

"Welcome, Harry Potter," one of the females greeted. Dark warpaint obscured her eyes, running from temple to temple. It accentuated the strange, savage beauty of her angular face. "Hexo tells us you speak for your people."

"I do tonight, my Lady." Fighting down the bile rising in his throat, Harry added, "I am in your debt. Your warriors helped save my charges."

"And now you have come to pay off that debt."

Harry shot Hexo a glare but the Centaur ignored him. "I am here,” Harry said. “Because I have no other choice. My people were attacked by Muggles. We had to flee." He took a deep breath. "Our teachers are fighting as we speak. I would – I'd beg you to assist them."

One of the oldest males stomped the ground with his hooves. "You brought about your own doom, child," he said. His white, braided hair shone brightly in the fire light. "We owe you nothing."

Harry's heart was in his throat, trashing against his skin. "Please," he said, hating how wrecked he sounded. "They need you." Gulping down the cool night air to calm himself, "And you need them."

That elicited a chorus of snorts and angry snarls. "Our clans have lived here since before your kind roamed this land, boy," the old Centaur told him. "Your presence is the only thing that has caused us trouble. You are the reason why the Forest rings with steel and fire tonight. We'll be glad to see you gone."

"Do you really think these men are going to stop at Hogwarts?" Harry said. The strength of his own anger surprised him. " If they take the castle, you'll be just as vulnerable as we are. They'll come by the thousands. Hunt you down like animals." He looked around, eyes pointedly lingering on the Centaur's children. "You can't fight them off forever."

The clan's chiefs were unmoved. "This is our Forest," one of them told him. "They won't find us unless we want them to."

"So you'd let us die?" Harry was shaking. The pressure on his chest made it hard to breathe.

"You ask that we commit warriors to protect your people. That would weaken us," the female with warpaint told him. "If you cannot defend yourselves, why would we defend you?"

The words were out of his mouth before he could think to stop them, spilling from his lips on their own accord. "Because," Harry said, "one thousand years from now, there's going to be a war that'll shake this whole country. A war so great you won't be able to hide from it." He watched the Centaurs shrink from his words with wild satisfaction. He was speaking the truth; they could hear it imbuing in his tone. "If you don't help us tonight, I swear it, I will leave you to burn with it."

The silence that followed was thick and absolute. Belatedly, Harry remembered the Centaurs' grasp of the future, their unique ability to read the twists of fate from the shine of the stars.

From the corner of his eyes, he could see Alfric looking at him with his mouth hanging open. The shock and fear mingling across his face were the last things that registered before Harry felt a spearhead press against his back, and the entire camp roared to life. Shouting voices overlapped, drowning the sound of weapons being pulled free; three of the clan's chiefs had naked daggers clutched in their hands. All were yelling at each other.

"SILENCE!" the female shouted, voice blanketing all others. She was obeyed swiftly. Everyone quieted, though restlessness lingered in the air like storm clouds. She turned to Harry, the whites of her eyes gleaming against black war paint. "You," she said softly, and the spear against Harry's back pushed deeper into his skin, the blade starting to draw blood. "You do not belong here, boy."

Harry felt blood drain from his face, his knees turn to cotton. He had said too much; there was finality in the woman's voice, a deep-rooted certainty that had the hairs on the back of his neck stand on ends.

You do not belong here, boy.

No. He did not. He never felt it so acutely before. He felt sick. Diseased and feverish. His skin was stretched too tight over his bones, as though about to split from the effort of containing his soul, and all the souls of the dead he carried within him. There was wrongness in him.

He wet his dry lips. "I – "

"We will help you," the woman said before he could speak. "We will keep your younglings safe tonight."

The relief that washed over him almost brought him to his knees. "And the battle – ?"

At a sharp nod of her head, the warriors surrounding the bonfire retreated toward the trees, the rest of the camp moving aside to make way for them. Harry saw them gather just beyond the circle of light with shouted orders and pounding hooves. In a matter of minutes, a small battalion had formed, ready for war.

"They will fight for you. Protect what there is to salvage of your land."

"Thank you," Harry whispered, weak and light-headed. "Thank you, I can't – "

"As for you." The women advanced toward him until they were inches apart, silencing him with the intensity in her eyes. "You will help us as well. In exchange for the lives your name will reap."

Harry could only nod in agreement. "Anything," he promised. It did not matter what the Centaurs asked of him. Whatever it was, he would do it.

"Dark Magic has seeped into those woods. It pollutes the air, kills everything it touches. Hexo will lead you to its source. You will correct it, or die trying." A pregnant pause. "In which case it will correct itself."

Harry's head spun. There was an insistent buzzing in his chest, rattling his bones.

"Harry," He turned around in time to see Alfric be restrained by two guards. The boy kicked and struggled against their hold. "Harry, don't!" He growled at the arms pushing him back. Beside him the other Slytherins drew their wands. "They just said – they mean to let you – " He breathed deeply. "Stay," he pleaded. "Whatever this is about, just. Stay . We'll find another way."

Harry lowered Gytha's body as gently as he could. She laid still and unresponsive on a bed of twisted roots and fallen leaves. Harry worked his words around the lump in his throat. "I will do as you ask," he said, Alfric's furious shouts drowned under the thundering noise of Centaurs marching off to war.

Harry did not look back at his friends as he went to Hexo. He feared he would never find the strength to leave them if he did. They were safe, and if he wanted to see the Founders again, he would have to keep his word to the Centaurs. Harry pushed all thoughts from his mind, steeled himself for what was to come with an ease which should have worried him. Would have worried him, in another life. One where friends rose from the grave and loved ones were forever safe. Exhaling softly, he looked for Hexo. The Centaur waited for him to get his bearings, bow slung over one shoulder.

"We have a long walk ahead," the man told him.

"Let's go," Harry said.

They sank deeper within the woods. They soon lost the light spilling from the camp, the hubbub of life and voices. The Forest closed over Harry like a shroud.

Harry kept catching himself scanning the surrounding darkness for threats, for sounds of distress coming from behind him. He was twitchy, left over-sensitized by his previous trek through the trees. It took a while for this hyper-awareness to fade. It had been born out of a need to protect others; its absence found him numb, his mind and body detached from the world, a trance-like state. For the most part, Hexo respected his silence. The Centaur walked ahead of him, the muffled stomp of his hooves lost to the quiet rustle of the Forest.

When the ghosts sitting on Harry's chest screamed too loud for him to ignore, when stress and worry and soul-crushing grief weighed him past the point where he could think, he said, "So, tell me. What am I walking into?"

Hexo looked back at him, liquid eyes blinking slowly. "Do you have any idea how many Creatures are in this Forest, Harry Potter?"

Harry shook his head, startled at the non-sequitur. "No," he said. He took a moment to think about it. "A few hundreds. Maybe a thousand, counting you and your clan?"

Hexo chuckled. "There are well over two thousand Centaurs in these woods. Tens of thousands reside here beside us. Hundreds of species."

"All right," Harry said slowly. "That is. A lot."

"You do not understand. This Forest is one of the last refuges for Creatures of magic. Your kind has driven us from our lands. You killed many of us before we could find places to hide."

“My kin,” Harry said. “My kin is dying by the thousands. You saw, tonight. You saw.”

Harry trailed off. His chest felt hot. His throat ached.

"Not all see the matter as you do,” Hexo said. “A human is the same as any other. It is easier for you to conceal yourself beside."

Harry ground his teeth. “You haven’t answered my question.”

"This Forest is the last home many of us will have," Hexo said. "We would fight to the death to defend it, but we do not have your powers, Harry Potter. We are vulnerable in many ways wizards are not. You made us visible by coming here. You made a doorway, and something walked through."

“I,” Harry said. “Did no such thing. I’m not the reason for the army at your door.”

“The army,” Hexo said. “Is not what I talk of.”

“You’ll have to speak more plainly,” Harry said. “I’ve had a long night, and lost patience for your riddles.”

“I speak of a thing amiss,” Hexo said. “A thing we do not name even amongst ourselves. Since the equinox, the stars no longer speak to us.” Hexo stopped. He turned and looked at Harry. “Something dark roams our woods, Harry Potter. Your presence here tore the world’s skin, and such wounds are not easily healed. Still, it is your duty to try."

“I gave you my word,” Harry said. “Save the Founders. Save our children. And I will do anything you ask.”

Hexo inclined his head. “So it shall be.” He paused. “We are near.”

Harry looked around, searching for the wrongness Hexo talked of.

He saw strange streaks on the trunks, discolourations as though something had sucked the life from them. The trees looked diseased, dying from the roots up. No bushes grew underfoot. Dead branches littered the ground like thickets of dry bones, all of them the colour of dull silver. Harry could not hear the usual hum and patter of nocturnal wildlife; there were no owls hooting in the velvet of the night, no insects chirping in the dark. Everything smelled foul, suffused with the sweet, nauseating tang of rotten things.

It was cold.

The air was icy, crystalline. Each lungful scraped Harry's throat raw. His breath rose from his mouth in thick clouds. As he stayed still, the unnatural coldness bit deeper into him. He shivered and pulled his cloak tighter around his shoulders.

“What did this?” he asked softly.

"I cannot go much further," Hexo said. The Centaur had paled. His back hooves pawed the ground, raising clots of dirt. "Ahead is what you seek. Stars be with you, Harry Potter. Should you succeed, I will find you after."

Hexo melted in the shadows of the trees, there and gone in the span of a blink. Harry drew his wand, a breath, and ventured forward. He stepped over dead plants and withered roots. Between them, nestled snugly, he saw the decaying carcass of two rabbits. He went further still. Aside from his own breathing, everything was very silent. The air grew colder with each step, the damage done to the trees more apparent. It reminded him of his dive in the Lake. Watery silence pressing upon his ears, the cold sinking inside his skin.

It appeared without warning, after an odd twist on his path, trees vanishing as though blown by an explosion. Harry froze. His heart missed a beat. His mouth flooded with saliva. On some deep, instinctive level, he understood what he saw, and it filled him with horror.

In the middle of a small clearing devoid of any life, there was a tear. It was visible only because its shadows were deeper, heavier than those of the surrounding trees. Its jagged, blurred edges stretched obscenely through the air. The swelled split of a bloated knife wound. Within its depths, unknown nightmares writhed like coiled snakes. Its hunger could devour the world before it was satiated.

It should not be here. Everything about it screamed of wrongness, its very existence an abomination.

As though sensing Harry's presence, the tear pulsed, the single beat of a monstrous heart. Darkness came spilling out, skeins slithering across air and mud, animated by a life of their own. Harry could not move. He choked on dread, because he knew this. He dreamed this, lived this before, a hundred times, a thousand. He knew how this story ended; with him in bed, trembling through the aftershocks of a nightmare. He was dreaming. He had to be.

Paralysis did not leave his limbs even as cords of darkness warped around his ankles, slipped around his waist. The mere brush of it against his skin made him want to vomit; he could feel foulness spread like ink in water. His entire body wanted to bow and bend and run, but he could not. Move.

The darkness moved to his chest. It was agony, pain like he had never experienced before, worse than the Cruciatus, worse than anything. Every inch of his body was decomposing, turning to ash, his skin rotting to become grey and thin, his organs putrefying as though he had been dead for days, for weeks. Harry tried to scream but could not, he tried to move but could. Not. He was so cold.

From far away he heard a voice. A woman’s voice, calling his name. Hermione, he thought, and tears streamed down his face. Hermione called him, and he could not answer. The breath had frozen in his chest, and everything. Hurt.

Harry, he heard, and strained. 

HARRY!

His body heaved. His thoughts cleared of their mindless panic. Darkness ate through him, and Harry. Harry remembered a spell. A spell he found in Salazar's books. Books that talked about tears in the fabric of the world and the monsters beneath.

He was dying and beyond pain, beyond terrified. He found his voice, and his hand held his wand steady. Magic surged inside him, wracked through him. Words burned his tongue, and Harry unleashed them into the world.

"Egredere Mundi Comedenti!"

A blast of blinding light burst from his wand, bathed the Forest in silver-white. The spell found the crack, struck at its heart, and instantly, Harry felt a pull at his core, a burning strain in his muscles as they bucked under the formidable effort it took from him. He grit his teeth and kept his magic flowing, fighting back every instinct that told him to cut off the quick draining of his life. The darkness that had taken hold of him shrieked away, thick ropes letting go of him to crawl back in the abyss that birthed them. Inch by painful inch, the crack started to close.

It was not enough.

Harry watched the slow shrinking of the wound with growing despair. He knew he would not have the strength to heal it. Already, his breath came in searing, wheezing gasps; his heart thundered in his ears, too fast and too loud. Black spots whirled before his eyes in a disjointed dance. His head spun with pain, a sickening, dreadful lurch.

Harry, he heard, soft as a breeze, and sobbed.

He took a. Step. A single step. His body staggered forward. His foot sank deep in the ground. As if Harry had grown heavy beyond imagining. He shook so badly he could hardly stand. Another.

Step.

He fell to his knees.

"I'm here, 'Mione," he murmured. "'M right here."

She did not seem to hear. She was. So far away. Harry. Harry had to get. Closer.

Groaning, he planted one foot on the ground, and pulled himself up. It felt as though his spine would break under the weight of him. Magic still poured from him like blood from a wound. His wand-arm seemed to have developed a consciousness of its own, past needing input from Harry’s brain to keep pointing at the ever-shrinking tear.

Two more steps. His knees threatened to buck again. He could not get enough air in his lungs and back out again. The world was slipping away and the tear would not shut and Hermione still called his name and he was going to die here, his heart was going to give out –

Somewhere deep inside him, there was a great, resounding click, something snapping into place, or perhaps shattering open, and suddenly, suddenly.

He could do it.

Harry did not understand where the reserve of power came from; he did not care to know. It came to him vast and sweeping like the sea, and it felt easy, it felt obvious to simply reach out and take hold of what was his. Magic rushed through his veins. The Forest was awash with it, glowed from his touch. Harry watched the tear heal, the world sowing itself together. He felt elated; he felt infinite.

Distantly, muffled under the flux of energy in his ears, was a howl of ageless rage, a shuddering boom like thunder.

Then it was over.

The tear was gone. Gone. Harry could not hear Hermione any more. Silence had fallen upon the Forest, draped itself over his shoulders, a familiar cloak.

He blinked, and was surprised to find the ground close to his face. He could smell the musk of wet earth and dead leaves, a dark coating on his tongue. The world was greying at the edges, tunnelling down. Harry blinked again.

 {. . .}

He came awake to the gentle sway of powerful arms under his back and knees, to the scent of warm, pine-soaked skin. Breathing deeply, fully, Harry opened his eyes to a slanted vision of Hexo's face. The Centaur looked grave; serious. Solemn. Harry must have stirred, because he glanced down and did not startle at seeing him awake.

"We are here," Hexo said. He set Harry down, each motion careful, as though Harry was a precious thing in his care. Hexo nodded at something behind him, hands clasped loosely in front of him.

Wobbly, his limbs lined with rubber, Harry turned. Hogwarts. Hogwarts was here. Tall and proud and perfect, bridges and turrets arching off to the star-sprinkled sky, aglow with the magic in its bones. Candles burned behind many windows, yellowish warmth the most beautiful thing Harry had ever seen. Hexo had brought him home.

"It is safe to return," Hexo said quietly. When Harry turned to him, he gave a soft, strange smile. "May we meet again, Harry Potter." And he bowed, deep and respectful, waist and knees bent, presenting Harry with his open palm as though his heart rested atop it and it was Harry's to take. He slunk back behind the treeline before Harry could think of an answer.

Harry shook his head and, bracing himself, made his way home.

Chapter Text

It was said the world would die wrenched and racked with war, fathers slaughtering sons, brothers drenched in one another's blood. An axe-age, a sword-age, a wolf-age, then death without rebirth. Vaguely, morbidly, Helga wondered whether the end of times would look anything like this.

Driving her left arm upwards to block the sweeping blow of a spear, she pushed her sword in the juncture between two armour plates, short blade grinding past metal and muscle, deep into a chest. She felt the fluttering of a heartbeat all the way to her palm. A single, agonised howl rose from the cavernous depths of a helm, ending quickly in an awful, wet gurgle. She freed her sword long before the man hit the ground in a broken, lifeless heap. The blade came covered in gore, red flesh and thick blood sluicing down the hilt.

Deflecting the gazing edge of a sword with her left hand, blue shield sizzling with life in the other, bright in the confused clamour of the night, Helga let herself fall back a step, boots sinking in the battered mud below. Tasting death and copper in the back of her mouth, she gathered herself in a tight coil, magic singing beneath the thin stretch of her skin. She preferred to fight with a shield in one hand and a sword in the other, the way she had been taught as a girl, but had no choice other than to break habits now. Cutting off the steady strength of her Shield Charm, she drew a sharp Rune into the air, deep purple flickering in the wake of her wand.

At her command, the earth cracked, shattered, great gouges splintering the ground. Around her, dozens of men perished, impaled on rocks and roots, filling the air with dying cries.

Panting harshly, her body weighted down with all the stones she had pulled from the dirt, Helga staggered back, vision greying out, lurching dangerously to the side. All she could see were dead men, dismembered, twisted corpses sprawled like discarded dolls. The smell of carnage, of split, blood-soaked flesh already starting to rot was so pungent she thought for a moment she was going to vomit, her chest heaving.

A shoulder pressed against her back, a hand grasped her arm, hauled her up before she could drop on her knees. She startled, spikes of alarm clearing her sight, and she swivelled under the constraining grip, free hand holding up her sword, reared up to strike –

She saw dark red hair and yellow eyes, and Godric batted away her blade, swept it aside with ease. "Easy there, Helga." he said, his voice hoarse.

"Godric" she said, breathing past the heart in her throat, the last shudders of panic. "I could've killed you." She drew back, careful to let die the Cutting Hex at the tip of her tongue. She kept her eyes trained in the distance, weary. The sudden lull granted by her spell was not going to last.

"They're regrouping," Godric said. He squeezed her arm then stepped away. "See?"

Helga followed the direction he was pointing. The hills no longer crawled with warriors, metal armours shining like carapaces under the guttering light of the sliced moon. Clutters of soldiers lurched away, shouting, moaning, limping as they congregated out of sight.

"What happened?" she asked, taking a moment to enjoy the clear line of horizon.

"Salazar happened." A grin twisted Godric's face, mirthless and sharp as a blade. "He found the sorcerers amongst them. Tracked them down. Killed them. Their wards are fading as we speak."

The side of Godric's face was dark with crusted blood. A long, thin cut ran down his cheek, oozing out fresh, sluggish red. His eyes were yellow, reflecting weak moonlight like a mirror. He was vibrant, blood-soaked, as full of life as Helga had ever seen him.

"Where is he?" she asked. She remembered fighting beside Salazar before the ebb of battle drove them apart, but had not seen him in some hours.

Wordlessly, Godric nodded to the side. The twin shapes of Salazar and Rowena stood against the backdrop of the sky, near invisible in the surrounding gloom.

"We should go," Helga said, and together, they dashed back across the battlefield, Godric leading the way.

Half-drunk with exhaustion, Helga kept tripping over the uneven terrain. Bent, mangled limbs got under her feet. Some still twitched, one last quiver before death. Flesh and steel were pressed together in a revolting mixture, poking from the earth like the plants of some macabre garden. Helga wondered whose bones she trampled.

Soon, they had trudged up atop the soft hillside. The vantage point offered a sprawling view of the battlefield and its desolation. Corpses stretched far across the wide hollow. So many dead.

Godric had had them build Hogwarts in a way they could defend, using the terrain to their advantage. There was only one clear side from which enemies could come screaming, the castle being otherwise tucked between a mountain, a lake and a forest. The four of them were fighters, were teachers with students to protect and no expectations to live beyond this night. The damage they had inflicted upon their enemy was significant. Still, the field was large, difficult to defend with so few of them.

Rowena and Salazar stood still. Rowena's hair had come undone during the fighting. It tumbled down her back in heavy waves. Her face was grime-streaked, pale skin made dark with mud and ashes. Otherwise, she looked unharmed. Relief swept over Helga at the sight of her, had her stagger on her feet, heart soaring in her ears.

Salazar did not so much as glance their way when they approached. He was covered from head to toe in dark fabric, his face hidden from the world, his eyes the only part of him Helga could see, two thin slabs of hardened steel. He was not hurt so far as she could tell.

"Helga." Rowena came to her, two quick strides bringing her within arm's reach. Her eyes roamed Helga's body. She brought fingers to Helga's cheekbone, thumbing gently at the bruise blooming on her skin. "Are you well?" she asked. Her blue eyes shone like the stars.

"I'll live," Helga said, smiling in spite of herself, so full of pain and love she thought she was going to burst with it. "How are you?"

Rowena pressed a hand to her hip, fingers massaging the flesh beneath. She shrugged. "Nothing too dire."

"Good."

There was a hint of motion behind the hillsides, the rustle of chainmail like the shifting rocks of a riverbed.

"They're back," Godric said, eyes flashing yellow, a feline's stare. "Brace yourselves. We go together."

Helga let her head fall back on her shoulders. She breathed deeply, gulping down the cool wind drifting from the mountaintops, the air pure, free of the charred, cadaverous sweetness from the dead bodies below. Behind her, Hogwarts pulsed its heartbeats strength, a steady hum that rang in her bones. Far above, the night's sky was magnificent, crystal-sharp stars burning against the fluid blue of deep space. For one breathless, suspended moment, Helga held the world's beauty in her chest, deep, and true.

She drew her sword, wrist rotating to ease off the abused nerves. Beside her, Rowena did the same, steel shining like glass. She moved with mindless grace, deft from long practice. Dappled moonlight shimmered pale silver on her skin. She met Helga's gaze, and her eyes were stern, solemn, black as the sky above. Firmly, decisively, Helga clamped her mouth shut on all the words rattling against her teeth.

Salazar brushed past her, a gargoyle coming to life. Where Godric had filled with animalistic energy, ferocious and colourful, Salazar had become a ghost, leeched of all life. He moved carefully, without sound; his skin was pale and grey against the black of his headscarf. His eyes were translucent, bleached as the moon. Death clung to him like a cloak.

Helga had wondered before, at what his gift of Legilimency did to him in battle. His mind lashing out to the men around him, tasting their thoughts in the fraction of eternity before death. How intimately could he feel their agony, their fear and resignation as he ripped them apart? How much closer to madness did it drive him?

Watching the tight, drawn set of his shoulders, Helga thought she had her answer.

The clamour of men and horses was growing louder in the distance, shaking the dirt beneath her feet, rumbling all the way to her chest. In front of her, advancing like a surging wave, the army crawled out from beyond the hill, blackening its sides.

Their numbers had diminished in the span of the last hours, but though the ranks were sparser, the warriors that remained were coming at them with all the righteousness in their hearts, with the deep-rooted belief they were doing a good thing, a holy thing. They screamed in unison, the terrible howl of a gigantic beast.

How could the four of them have instilled so much hatred in the hearts of so many? Hundreds of men, ready to lay down their lives in fear of them. Helga understood the Peverell boys had led them here, but the swiftness of the reaction, the army at their door, spoke of something deeper, more visceral than the murder of a Lord by his sons. All they wanted here, the four of them, was a place to belong, a place of safety where they could grow without having to fear for their lives.

The senseless, mindless fear wizards inspired in Muggles had always puzzled Helga. Even amongst her own people, where magic was recognized as a natural thread to the fabric of the world, she had felt out of place, set apart by the forces strung along her bones. She had been a recluse, respected but regarded with caution, even when all she did was heal, was create.

Would mankind ever stop snarling at everything different from its norm?

Rowena pitched toward her, something wild blazing in her eyes. "Let us dance," she said, lips half-curled into a snarl.

Their horses had died some time ago, so they went on foot. Helga conjured a shield, soft-golden to protect them. Arrow shafts clattered uselessly against the magic, forlorn warning blows and little else.

Rowena and Salazar were chanting under their breaths long before the inevitable clash, hummed incantations falling and rising from their lips like water. Rowena rushed ahead before any of them could think to stop her, the air around her charging with power, crackling, heating. A wrench, a pull, like gravity had shifted forward, and dozens upon dozens of lances made of lightning sizzled to life on either side of her extended arms. A flick of her wrist, and they barrelled toward the incoming soldiers, groaning, whirring in deadly arches.

The first lines fell, burned to the bone, skin blistered beyond recognition, screeches of pain drowned out under the sound of thunder. Under the smell of storm-charged wind, sharp and suffused with ozone, the stench of charred, twisted flesh rose up, coating Helga's lungs, turning her stomach.

Salazar followed next, the stream of his words ending abruptly, definitively, with ringing silence. Arrays of runes flared above his head like a cloud, too thick and intertwined for Helga to discern meaning in them. They spun madly at his command. He threw his head back, eyes half-lidded, unhinged, a hand opened in front of his clothed mouth. Directed by an invisible gust, the runes scattered, dipping the black sky in shades of silver. They unfolded above the army's head. They plummeted at a twitch of Salazar's fingers, unperturbed by the pained, begging cries below. Helga watched as each rune attached itself to a different man, too swift for them to dodge, even though they tried, causing great ruckus among their ranks. One after the other, the soldiers fell. Their cheeks hollowed out, their skin turned the colour of ashes. They sank down, clutching at their throats, mouths opening and closing soundlessly. The foul, polluted feel of Dark magic crept over Helga like oil.

Rattled, it took an instant for the advancing men to recover. For one wild, hopeful moment, Helga thought they might take fright and flee, but whoever led them was skilled, was feared; there were shouted orders, and the army closed in again, ranks knitting back. It trampled over the corpses of fallen comrades, crazed with dread, with awe. Past the point where they could back away, the men marched on.

Helga steeled herself, and stepped forth into the melee. The first men clanged against her shield with a grunt. She punched them back with a blast of wind that threw them away, ribcages cracking under the impact. She swung her sword, let it catch against the tender skin of a collarbone, wrenched, and another body hit the ground, quickly replaced by several others.

Before the men could overwhelm her under the onslaught, Godric stepped close, took up her side with his usual skill. The man was by far the best of them in combat, had always been a sight when fighting. His sword became an extension of his arm, rearing and striking at the speed of thought, almost too swift to follow. There was an easy fluidity in the way he moved that was riveting to watch; his entire body tuned to the drums of warfare. He looked nothing short of beautiful, steel and spell a whirlwind around him. Corpses gathered at his feet like worshippers at an altar. He would be the last of them left standing tonight.

With Rowena and Salazar on her other side, giving death with savage ruthlessness, Helga fell out of herself. The four of them moved in perfect synchronicity, condensed together in a single being. There was something exhilarating in the grim and gore of the moment. She hated how alive it made her feel, how grounded inside of herself.

Minutes ticked away, dissolved into the blood-slick ground under her boots. It could not have been very long before the strain of exhaustion caught up with Helga. Her arms clamped, shook every time her sword met resistance, with each curse she fired. Sporadic shakes rocked her whole body; every breath burned her lungs. Her heart pounded furiously, so loud she feared it might fracture bones. She could feel that same fatigue overcome the others as though it was her own. As though each blow they took bruised her own body. Whenever one of them fell, the others would follow, overcome from the pain of it.

Not long now.

It all happened suddenly, at the same time, fractioned events bursting forth from the void. Her foot slipped on blood, caught on someone's corpse. The world pitched forward, slow and unhurried. Time ceased to matter when it came to an end. She saw the jagged edge of a stranger's blade, liquid silver in the moonlight. Saw it come down in a sweeping arch, and knew she would take the blow, a sword in the gut.

The world exploded.

It was remade in-between one heartbeat and the next. Sudden, staggering power washed over her, punched through her core, burned like lightning and it was too much, she was gasping, trembling under the surge, vast and devastating and –

She remembered being a girl, pressed against an old silver tree in the snow dusted ground, red and yellow leaves smelling of raw, rotten things in the breeze. She heard cheers, men making sacrifices to the gods, ecstatic in the giving of themselves. The slow-moving pulse of magic rocked through her. Everything was bright, was made alive with ancient rituals and the taste of ozone. She bared her throat and she –

She tasted mud on her lips, breathed it in deeply, hands clenched into the sludge, alive. All her nerves felt exposed to the open air. Hazy, confused, she looked up. Above her, a man stood with his sword held limply in one hand, mouth gaping open, no more understanding of the situation than she was. He glanced down at her, a furrow between his brows. He was a moment too slow to react. Helga leaped to her feet. She drove her sword up and into his stomach, raked it in one clean motion. The man coughed blood. He died before he fell in the muck.

A resounding roar rose from the distance, shattered between the dark outlines of the trees. The ground trembled from a heavy pound. Shaky, Helga thought another wave of magic was going to drown her on her feet. She braced herself for the impact, the enticing spur that would fill her skin, on the sharp edge between pain and pleasure. She was thrown off-balance when Centaurs came charging in instead. The Creatures pooled from the Forest howling war cries, wood spirits thirsty for vengeance. The thunder of their hooves overcame the cries of the dying. Helga staggered at the sight of them, clenched muscles easing.

"What – " she muttered, shaking her head. Everything was fuzzy, clouded over, worse than being drunk.

She could only watch, stunned and out of it, as the Centaurs flitted over the remaining men, cutting them down like wheat. Her back was pressed against Godric and Rowena, with Salazar behind, the four of them standing in a tight circle.

The respite they allowed themselves was short. Godric was the first to detach himself from their cluster, pulling away with more strength than the rest of them combined, mind already working out the tangles of their predicament, body tensed hard enough to shatter. His capacity to jump into action and cajole them into following was one of the reasons why Helga loved him so much.

Bracing herself, she gripped her sword, and fought on.

It was all over in a matter of minutes. The last men were picked out, hacked down without mercy. After it was done, Helga fell to her knees, coughing, too drained to stand. Rowena was beside her, both hands braced on the ground, her arms shaking. Godric joined them, slumping on Helga's left with a grunt. His sword clattered away. He reached for her hand. Helga reached back, twined their fingers. His calluses scraped her palm. Rowena moved closer and leaned her forehead against the side of Helga's neck, her moist, ragged breath on Helga’s skin. Over her head, Helga saw Salazar shift closer. He swayed on his feet. There was a feverish light in the grey of his eyes, something half-mad. He stayed where he was, a few feet away. Gazing at them with all the desperation of a drowning man at the sight of a land.

"Just come here," Godric growled, voice a rumble against Helga's back. He, too, had seen Salazar, stared at him with tired exasperation. He bared his teeth when Salazar hesitated. "Come here, Salazar."

Salazar moved at last, two jerky steps and he folded himself beside Godric, his eyes glazed, unfocused. Immediately, Godric's free hand went to the back of his neck, a firm grip Salazar did not protest. Godric slumped down and to the side until he laid in the spread of Helga's legs, his mouth against the jut of her hip. He took Salazar with him, guiding Salazar's head to the crook of his neck, soothing a hand down his back. Helga could hear Salazar's ragged gasps, wet and desperate as he breathed against Godric's throat. One of his hands crawled up over Helga’s stomach, fingers pressing down, seeking skin.

Shaky, feverish, Helga tangled fingers in Godric's sweat-damp hair. She reached for Rowena with her other hand. She pulled the woman in, close, closer. There was the drag of febrile lips along the length of her throat, against the curve of Helga's cheek. Rowena pressed her nose in the fall of Helga’s hair, closed both arms around Helga's waist and plastered herself against her back, a soft noise breaking from somewhere deep in her throat. Her grip was tight, just shy of painful, not nearly enough.

Godric moaned, rough and ragged. He fitted his face at a juncture between Helga's armour plates, setting teeth against her skin. He put a hand on Rowena's thigh, and settled Salazar more firmly on top of him. 

The four of them stayed like that for a long while, resting, breathing, living.

Eventually, a Centaur approached them, a fierce-looking female, black charcoal across her eyes, chest and arms drenched in blood. She eyed their tangle of limbs but did not blink. None of them made to stand even as she stopped in front of them, her weapons laid bare in the wan moonlight.

"We have your students," she said. She flicked coagulated blood off the edge of her daggers and ignored Godric's quiet snarl, his half-hearted shift against Helga, under Salazar. "They are being returned here as we speak. Unharmed."

Helga knew she should feel relief, should be violently grateful, but her own reactions were coming at her through thick mist. In the end, it was Godric who found the strength to speak.

"Why," he said, flat, without energy left for an actual question.

The female smiled. She was strikingly beautiful under all the paint and gore, all sinew and trained muscles. "A pact was made," was all she replied. "We are honouring our part in it."

She trotted away with a nod and nothing more.

"What just happened?" Rowena asked, voice muffled against Helga's hair.

"I do not know," Godric said.

Helga wondered whether they had felt what she felt. The surge of magic that brought her to her knees. Something old beyond reason roaring through her blood. How far across had the tremor echoed? Had it been localised near Hogwarts, or had it spread, stretched like a great earthquake, shaking every confines of the world?

"We have to go," she managed through parched lips. There were children wandering through a Dark Forest in the dead of night. "The students – "

As she spoke, she saw something in the distance, motion neat the gnarled edges of the trees. One after the other, the children trickled out of the Forest's shade, clinging to each other, steps unsteady with weariness.

"Oh," she said, with Rowena's breath on her hair, Salazar's hand on her heart, Godric's mouth on her skin.

Thank the gods.

{. . .}

A child was dead.

She had taken a spear to the chest and through her heart. They set her body down in a quiet room. Cleaned her. Closed her eyes. She was Salazar's, and her Housemates refused to leave her side, would not let anyone else care for her. They went through funeral rites with blank eyes and steady hands. They lit incense by her bed. Weaved flowers through her hair. Shrouded her in white linen. They sang soft words of lament in their native tongues, prayed to their God to give her peaceful rest. A boy who had been raised with Helga's customs closed her hands over the pommel of a sword. They kept vigil until they dropped, and Salazar carried them to bed.

Harry Potter was missing.

One of Salazar's students, a blond-haired, harried-looking youth, recounted their ordeal in the Forest, the attack by a scouting party, the stay in the Centaurs' camp, his words chopped, stilted, suffused with quiet horror. Harry Potter had been needed, he said, to accomplish something no one else could. Centaurs took him deep in the Forest, and did not return.

There had been a moment by the Forest's edge when Salazar snapped. He raised a fist with a sharp Parseltongue curse and a cry of tortured rage. He reared back to strike, through a chest, into a heart. Godric seized him before he could kill Centaurs, whispering soft pleas into his ears and not letting go.

Darkly, viciously, Helga almost wished he hadn't.

She weaved her way between mattresses and sleeping bodies, her feet light, her breaths careful. Sprawled out on the Great Hall’s floor, most of the students were dead to the world. The slow rise and fall of their chests made a reassuring cadence under the gentle flicker of floating candles.

Helga looked at Slytherins, piled together at the far end of the Hall, set apart in their grief. They shared beds, shared warmth and pillows, so tightly strung together it was hard to tell where one body ended and another began. They looked old beyond their years, even in restless sleep, and something cracked open in Helga's chest.

She knew loss, knew the stabbing, drowning pain of it. Her gods were great, were wrathful and terrible. They hungered; for food, for sex, for blood. They demanded sacrifices, lives given to battle with their names chanted on warriors' lips. They took and raved and raged with a fury that burned hotter than the sun, because such was their nature, but this?

This was not right. A child was dead , killed by a coward's hand. Helga could feel god-fury beating behind her ribs. She was awake and craving blood, craving compensation for what had been taken. She wanted the bloated bodies on the field outside to rise up again, so she could offer them to the crows once more.

Her skin was tight, thrummed with deep grief and hapless rage. She was restless, strung up on anger, on a desire for touch. She reached an end of the Hall and looked up without knowing why, raw with on old instincts and nerves singing, and –

Harry Potter stood in the Great Hall's threshold.

He stood between glowing shadows and deep light, his face all sharp angles in sputtering candle fire. Even from a distance, Helga could see the green of his eyes. His head was cocked to the side. A curious motion rocked him back and forth. He turned to her.

Fleetingly, behind closed eyelids, Helga saw the swaying waters of a depthless lake, gold and silver coalesced together in a crown of thorns. She heard the deep, ageless thrum of bells ringing up from sacred caves. She tasted sharp ozone and rich wine on her tongue, and heard the distant crackle of thunder. She remembered being on her knees in the battlefield, mud on her lips, the world bursting anew, earth and sky collapsing together.

Harry dipped his head, in respect or acknowledgment, and the clean smell of earth in summer rainstorms rose up to Helga's nose. She blinked, dizzy, staggering.

Then he was gone.

Left alone with the heavy pound of her blood, Helga thought about Salazar with his fist raised to punch out a heart. Salazar who was in love. Salazar, who suffered for it in silence. She thought about her people, about red leaves like blood on snow, about booming laughter and the time wasted before battles. Her skin was tight, burned from wanting touch, burned from wanting.

Rowena lingered by her students at the far end of the Hall. Helga went to her with a beast growling in her chest and measured steps. She reached for the gap on her wrist where gauntlet and armour gave way to skin.

"Helga?" Rowena said, quiet, startled. There was blood on her cheek and Helga wanted her panting for breath. She wanted her writhing, clutching at damp sheets for purchase. She wanted to watch her break, come undone with the press of fingers and on Helga's tongue.

"Come with me," she said, and it was more of a plea. She tilted her head toward the double doors, her heart hammering in her throat. "Please."

Rowena nodded, her eyes wide. Her pulse rabbited under Helga's fingers. She did not ask where they were going. Helga led the way, and forced her steps slow, forced her grip light. She did not think about setting teeth to Rowena's throat. She gestured at Godric on the way out, then slipped into the night.

Outside, the air was thick with a taste like wet earth and hot metal. Helga took Rowena two rooms down the corridor, pushed the door open, let it fall close behind them. It was a classroom, scattered with desks and a few books, the moon pooling in from wide windows. Rowena stood wreathed in the deep blue of the night. She watched Helga with cut-off breaths.

"Helga," she said, her voice rough, rounded with her native accent. "Do you want –"

"Yes," Helga said, and kissed her.

Helga's people lived hard, lived fast. They laughed and they fought, they fucked, with wild abandon, with the deep knowledge of how fleeting life could be. Helga wondered where along the road she had forgotten their principles, the wisdom in them.

She set a hand against Rowena's jaw, an arm around her waist. She pushed, with trembling strength and feverish lips, pushed until pressed close, pushed until Rowena slammed against the door, a soft noise breaking from her throat.

"Please," she breathed against Rowena's mouth, and kissed her again. Rowena's lips were warm, were soft under the sweep of Helga's tongue. "Can I – "

"Yes," Rowena said, her entire body shuddering, her eyes space-deep and caught in stars. "Yes," she said. " Yes, gods, don't stop."

Her arms went around Helga. Her hands fisted in Helga's hair, clutched at her back. She brought Helga up, brought her close, and kissed her back, hard and bruising and desperate. Helga crowded close, pushed Rowena more firmly against the door, fitting hands on Rowena’s hips and taking her weight. Rowena's mouth opened on a sucked breath, and Helga took, slid her tongue between willing lips and kissed her deep.

Vaguely, distantly, Helga knew she was shaking. She could feel tremors in Rowena's legs under her palms. She did not care . There were soft curves against her body, pressed snugly in all the right places, and she wanted more . She sucked Rowena's bottom lip into her mouth, felt an answering pull at her hair, a moan ringing deep in Rowena's throat.

"Helga," Rowena kept murmuring in-between drawn breaths, like a plea, like a prayer. "Helga," she said, and rocked small thrusts in Helga's thigh between her legs.

Helga detached their mouths. She ran lips along the length of Rowena's throat. She pressed open kisses to the soft skin behind Rowena's ear and sucked a bruise there, Rowena's fingers in her hair, urging her on. Rowena's head fell back against the door with a bitten cry. She trembled under Helga's hands.

Helga pressed her forehead in the crook of Rowena's throat, gasped panted breaths against damp skin. "Alright?" she asked, and felt Rowena nod, eager, hurried.

"Helga," she said, her voice wrecked, a look of focused wonder on her face. "Helga, I need – I've never – "

"Dear gods," Helga said, heat licking her spine, tightening her stomach. Then, "Help me with this," and her hands were scrambling, pulling at Rowena's clothes, wrenching at straps and buckles, shedding pieces of armour.

Rowena's fingers joined hers. She kept pressing feverish kisses to Helga's temple, her forehead, her cheeks, her mouth, and Helga's skin felt stretched taut over her bones, felt like it might burst. She pulled at Rowena's belt with a frustrated groan, seeking skin, wanting more.

By the time she pushed fabric aside, there was a flush riding high on Rowena's cheekbones. Her eyes were wide, dark, her mouth was parted open, swollen, shining wetly in weak moonlight. She swallowed on a whine when Helga pressed a hand down her trousers. Her fingers dug in Helga's back for purchase, and it hurt, pressed into bruises and battle-scars, but gods, they were alive, and Helga wanted her lost, wanted her spasming in pleasure.

She hitched Rowena higher with a hand under her thighs, set her mouth against the cloth binding her chest. She found the hard ridge of a nipple, caught it between her teeth. Rowena jerked in her grasp, rolled her hips against the heel of Helga's palm, the motion shaky, instinctive, made clumsy with want. Helga pressed harder, gave her something to grind against, and she kissed the underside of Rowena's breast, wet and open-mouthed. Rowena was slick under Helga's hand, was warm and dripping, and Helga wanted to push fingers inside her, wanted to stroke the hard nub at the top of her sex until she shattered.

"Rowena," she said, with a calm she did not feel. She stilled her hands, eased her grip, because her people had never shared Muggles's punishing views on sex, but Rowena, married too young to a man she had never loved, was not of the same culture. "My love, if you want me to stop, now is the time to say it."

"Don't you dare," Rowena said, and it was more of a snarl. With a sharp tug on her hair, she brought Helga up in another kiss, a messy tangle of tongues and rasping breaths. "My God, Helga. Do you have any idea how long I've wanted you for?"

Helga huffed a laugh, bright and delighted, fingers tracing the divots of Rowena's spine. "Good," she said, and sucked at Rowena's earlobe, listened to her bite on a moan. She settled back against Rowena, pinning her with her weight. "Then let me take you to bed."

"God," Rowena said. She pressed her forehead to Helga's, dragged her close with shaking hands against her back. "Yes."

Chapter Text

The sound of his footfalls against smooth stone walls rang back to Harry's ears. Hogwarts at witching hour was cushioned in darkness, peaceful in a way that invited mischief. Midnight was the time of ghosts, of secrets and careful lovers, and none cared about the scarred boy wandering her halls. Harry was inconsistent, free to walk in moonlight, in the scattered dust of empty corridors, paced to the swell and sway of enchantments etched in blood.

There was a low, pleasant thrum beneath his skin, the buzz of high flights, of free falls and strong liquors. It was a thrill like Samhain nights, and it set his nerves alight. He had had darkness reach between his bones with the sweet touch of rot, of the abyss between stars, but there were twin whispers in his ears, a weight like the world, and Harry felt so full he might burst.

Something nagged at him, beyond sight or sound or smell, an awareness like the surge of approaching waves. Harry swayed with it, let it ring in his bones . If he blinked, he could see old victories and ancient losses, could feel the press of gold upon his head. There were threads weaved within Hogwarts, bound in magic and sacrifice, warped around Harry's neck like a noose. He stood on the cleft between past and future, with unsteady feet and something new unfurling in his chest.

A jolt, a wrench, and he stretched, faster, further from himself. He fell on his knees, was pulled back up again. He found the Founders within two breaths, beacons in the night. They burned in time with Hogwarts' heart, bright even through sluggish exhaustion. Godric blazed with fiery heat, with the run of molten steel. He stood guard with blood-soaked hands and a warrior's ferocity. Helga rang strong, rang steady. She was the stretch of sacred trees or the roots at mountain’s feet, pulling the world together with a drag like gravity. Rowena had all the mercurial, sweeping strength of oncoming storms, sharp like the breeze preluding hurricanes. She raged with the roar of blue lightning and the splinters in broken glass.

Harry stumbled down the stairs with his heart in his throat and his head spinning. Below, the Dungeons faded into darkness. Above, the students gave a warm, sleepy pulse of growing power, and Salazar –

Salazar he could not find.

He was not in the Great Hall, Harry would have seen him. He was not on the field outside; all that was left were the cries of dead men, corpses for the crows. He was not there. Harry would have seen him. Harry would have felt him.

He could not think. Panic clutched his throat, beat on his wrists. He reached, out, out, out , hurling himself into the night, but Salazar was not there, and Harry was running . He shook with alarm, with secrets crooned in his ears like confessions. The dampness of the Dungeons greeted him like an old friend, dimmed his footfalls, cooled his flushed skin.

He skidded to a stop in front of the common room. He scrambled for the password but came up blank.

'Let me in,' he said, Parseltongue coming to him like his mother tongue, and the wall opened without delay.

The common room was dark, was silent but for the gentle slosh of lake water on glass windows. The silver lanterns were snuffed out. Thin shafts of watery moonlight lifted the lingering darkness, bleaching the floor in monochrome colours. The place was hollow, forlorn, empty. The only sign of life came from the ghostly sway of algae in lazy current.

"Salazar?" Harry called, knowing there would be no answer.

He picked his way further in, eyes scanning the shadows for Salazar's silhouette, unease a heavy pound in his chest. All he could see behind closed eyelids was Salazar, broken, bleeding. He had taken a sword in the stomach, a spear in the lungs. He choked on blood and then grew still. He stood on a pillory, in a great blaze of fire, bright in falling dusk. A mob watched as he lingered in the air like smoke. There was nothing Harry could do, and Salazar was dead, dead and being picked by crows.

I shall meet you on the other side, Salazar promised, his lips on Harry's forehead, but Salazar was a liar.

"Damn it," Harry muttered. His hands had started to shake. "Think."

He doubted Salazar would seek sleep on a night such as this, keyed up on post-battle adrenaline. It was not likely he had died in battle; the other Founders had nothing to show for it. Maybe he was hurt. Maybe he tended to open wounds somewhere. He could be injured, weak from blood-loss, passed out. Dying. Maybe he was dead already, and Harry had to brace a hand against his stomach, had to breathe through the sharp lurch of his head.

"No," he said, and turned around, pivoting on his heels with a bitten-off curse, with crowing in his head and out of himself, and –

Salazar.

"Salazar," Harry said, and only heard the shock in his own voice, frozen, fragile with broken hope, with the jolt of relief.

Salazar stood among the shadows. He was cloaked in them; he breathed with them. He looked at Harry with empty eyes, eyes pale as silver coins. His fingers were curled taut over holstered weapons.

With his skin thrumming and breathlessness holding his throat, Harry took a slow step forward.

"Salazar?" he called softly, but Salazar did not react.

He just stared.

Another step. Shadows parted, lightened. If Harry narrowed his eyes, looked away and to the side, he could see them breathe, swell like living things. Another step, and they gave ground. The outline of Salazar's body bled seamlessly into the night. He wore all black, a flowing armour twisted in spellwork. There was a scarf around his face, over his nose, muzzling his mouth. Now Harry had adjusted to the stifling gloom, he could see the fabric rise and fall in time with Salazar’s breaths. He thought about Dementors, about cold screams and decayed flesh rotting under black robes.

He stopped an arm's length away, with dead eyes on his skin, ragged breaths the only thing he could hear. He kept to Salazar's line of sight, kept his hands open, kept them relaxed at his sides. He was aware , of himself, of the stretch of his own body, of the space Salazar occupied.

He was afraid.

Salazar had gone inwards, far out of Harry's reach. There was a dangerous tightness strung along every line of him, the unforgiving rigidity of man about to lunge, or shatter.

He looked at Harry and kept quietly, perfectly still, the scarf on his face rising, falling with wet breaths. His mouth made a dark, empty gap against the cloth. It looked suffocating, fabric sticking to the skin beneath.

Harry went for it, first. With trembling hands and the agonising burn of fear, he raised his arms, kept his fingers slow, his breaths careful. His heart thundered in his ears, frantic with the urge to run, or bare teeth. He did not want to shatter the standstill, wary of what lurked beyond. Harry thought the world might turn to dust before he reached the knot on the side of Salazar's jaw.

Salazar looked at him and did not blink. Harry set fingers against the turn of his jaw, making his touch light, making it gentle and far from skin. Salazar burned under his hands. Harry had half-expected to find dead flesh.

He loosened knotted fabric, pulled the scarf away, rolled it back until it fell from Salazar's mouth. Harry reached up, tugged, dragged it off and to the floor, and perhaps he had been right, perhaps the cloth had been a muzzle, because the moment it was gone, Salazar swayed, rocked on his feet. He leaned into Harry's hands with his eyes screwed shut and a soft, ragged noise.

Harry slid the tip of his fingers against Salazar's scalp, under the fall of his hair. He felt a muted rush under his skin, working its way up his arms, like the low roll of waves on sand.

"Oh," he said. "There you are."

"Harry," Salazar said, with his eyes shut, the weight of his head in Harry's hands. "Harry," and he turned, fitting his nose against the curve of Harry's palm, his lips to the pulse in Harry's wrist.

"I'm here," Harry said, through the heart in his throat, the deep pull below his ribs.

Salazar shuddered, full-bodied. A soft, kneeing sound broke from his mouth. "You were dead," he said, with the brush of lips on Harry's skin, the shiver of moist breath. "I could not find you. You were dead. Harry."

There was the press of a mind against Harry's own, breath-thin, seeking entry. Harry pulled down his shields, and Salazar folded against him, a soft curl of acknowledgement, of recognition. There was a disjointed feel to him, like a bone wrenched from its socket, like the pain of dislocated limbs.

"Come on," Harry murmured. He wasn't any good at Legilimency, but he made his mind open, pulled Salazar deeper with studied stillness and quiet encouragement. "Come on, Salazar. What do you need?"

Salazar went to him, pushing gently against the welcome in Harry's mind . It was like fingers in the dark, flitting over skin, relearning the shape of Harry's body. Salazar traced the edges of him, and he broke, all at once, with a noise of deep relief. There was a surge against Harry's consciousness, the flash of memories not his own. He tasted blood on his tongue, heard the singing of steel as it sawed through bones. There was a snarl on his lips, and a curse that could rip out someone's heart. He saw men and felt them die.

Where were you, he heard, where were you where were you where were you, and Salazar gave a sharp pull, a growl. He flowed, against Harry and into him. Harry let him, with sudden hunger, with  desperation that wasn't his. Salazar took . He urged Harry inside himself as though he wanted Harry under his skin . He felt like the crush of ocean depths, like the birth of waves far from shore, the sharp-toothed smiles of gods long drowned, the slide of a serpent's scales. He sank , into Harry and over him, and Harry gasped for air, drunk and drowning and wanting more –

'Salazar!' Harry said, and Salazar jerked, wrenched. He put both hands on Harry's chest, shoved back hard, stumbling away with his face gone pale.

"Sorry," he said, his eyes wide, translucent in the pearly reflection of the moon. "My God, Harry. I almost – I'm. I'm so sorry."

"Thank Merlin," Harry breathed, because Salazar was here , clear and focused and present. "Salazar," he said, and put out a hand to steady him. To keep him here. "Salazar, are you alright?"

Salazar breathed hard. He stared down Harry's hand on his arm, frozen, shaking. Harry tasted sea brine and the grit of green salt against his lips. He felt the press of water like feverish fingers into his skin, and –

"Salazar," he said, and tightened his grip, untangling the wrapped pieces of himself. "Salazar, focus. Are you hurt?"

"No," Salazar said, then paused. His eyes roamed Harry's face. "I don't think so," he said, and Harry had to bite on a disapproving scowl, because Salazar was not sure.

"Come here," he said.

When he stepped back, Salazar followed. Harry did not let himself hesitate before guiding him deeper into the room, towards moonlight. He cleared the edge of a desk with a careless sweep of fingers, then turned Salazar around, back against the wood. The moon bled just enough light to see by. Salazar's face was ashen. His hair, tied back, was matted with sweat. He was caked in the grime of long battles, but his heart beat a reassuring rhythm against Harry's palm.

"Don't move," Harry told him, pressing against his chest, forcing him to lean his weight against the desk. Salazar went without resistance. Satisfied, Harry took his hand away.

It came back glistening red.

Harry sucked in a startled breath, steadied the uptick of his heart, the way his hand wanted to shake. "Is this yours?" he asked, showing Salazar the blood. He could not see tears in Salazar’s armour, nowhere a blade had slipped through, but the fabric was enchanted, and Harry's hand was coated in blood.

Salazar looked at the red sheen and did not blink.

"Merlin," Harry muttered, and swallowed back his heart, the first shivers of panic. Forcing his hands careful, he started groping for the straps holding Salazar's armour together, fingers skimming the light fabric, working out the knots and buckles.

He eased off Salazar's bracers, heavy and reinforced with steel. He let them drop to the ground, under the desk. The chest plate went next. Harry dragged it over Salazar's head, murmuring a quiet warning. The boiled leather was scratched in places, had a deep gouge over the heart, a long slash along the ribs. Harry tasted faded wards under his fingers, flickers of exhausted magic. He gritted his teeth; the protections were worn-through, just about useless. He set the plate down beside the bracers, and started to pull on the layers of black, airy fabric that made the rest of Salazar's armour. It came away easily enough, sliding off with the rustle of falling silk.

Under that, Salazar was in a shirt and trousers. Harry tugged at the shirt, pulling it from Salazar's belt. It came tacked with blood, sticking to Salazar's skin. Harry was about to lift it off when he became aware of Salazar watching him, eyes boring into the side of his face.

Harry dropped the hems, backed away a hurried step. There was a burn sitting low in his stomach, something like shame that made him want to hide.

"Take that off," he said, and it came rougher, quieter than intended. "Please."

He turned around, ducking his head. Merlin. He felt like a child caught out. Shaking himself, he called his first-aid kit. Helga had had all her students put together basic healing tools in preparation for the summer. Harry had never been more grateful for anyone's teachings than when the leather pouch came soaring into his hands.

When he glanced back, Salazar had tossed away his shirt. He was pulling off at the gauntlets protecting his fists. Under, his knuckles were red with dry blood, bruised and tender-looking.

"You hit someone?" Harry asked, because focusing on Salazar's hands was safe.

"Yes." Salazar gave a swift smile, sly and crooked. "Bastard caught me by surprise."

"Forgot you were a wizard, did you?" Harry said gruffly, and he did not think about Salazar, punching someone with bare hands. He did not think about how Salazar would look, shaky from a fight. Salazar, giving up restraint, his breath coming in harsh pants, his skin streaked with sweat and dirt. Salazar, wild, violent, victorious, looking up with sly eyes and a bloodied smile.

His skin was a dark, ugly purple along his ribs, low on his stomach, near his right hip. Mottled bruises ran the length of his arms. The sick, discoloured patches stretched against pale skin, swelled like overripe fruits. Beyond that, under the grime and gore, Salazar was built like a fighter, like a dancer, all lean muscle and corded sinew. There was an undercurrent of lithe strength to him, something that was practical rather than aesthetic. Jagged scars criss-crossed the expanse of his skin. Harry wanted to feel their seams under his fingertips. Wanted to push at battered flesh and hear breath catch –

He made himself look away, his mouth dry,  his stomach clenched with dread. "Does anything feel broken?" he asked.

Salazar shook his head, but Harry checked anyway. He counted two cracked ribs, pulled muscles, and a fractured collarbone. He knitted the bones as best he could, with careful taps of wand on skin and the last dredges of power in his veins. He forced spiderweb fractures closed shut, pushing past the dull ring in his ears. Salazar didn't so much as grunt at the pain, but Harry knew the slackening on his mouth was relief. Satisfied, Harry stood, blinking back stars, a hand braced on the desk for support.

"Don't," Salazar told him when he made to start on the bruises. "You'll pass out."

"You'll hurt like hell."

Salazar's shoulder ticked up in half a shrug. "They say, the tongue of dying men," he murmured, in the cadence of a song, the rhythm of old poems, "Enforce the attention, like deep harmony. For they breathe the truth, they that breathe their words in pain."

Harry gave a quiet snort. He pushed away from the desk on careful legs. "Is breathing the truth something you'd care to do tonight, Salazar?" he asked, and started groping for his first-aid kit without waiting for an answer.

Salazar watched him, a smile buried somewhere in his eyes. "Perhaps not," he said softly, just as Harry's fingers closed around a vial of ointment.

He pulled the vial out with a quiet noise of victory. The paste inside was a viscous green, wholly unappealing. It had the strong, pungent smell of arnica, of ground herbs mixed with potion chemicals. Rubbed into skin, it would reduce the bruising.

Harry uncapped the lid. The smell hit his nose as he leaned close to Salazar. On a stuttering breath, he realised what he meant to do, and wavered.

Salazar watched him, his hands braced against the desk, his head tilted back. He had blood on his hands and battle-scars on his skin. He kept himself still and showed his throat. He made himself unthreatening. There was an invitation somewhere in the openness of his posture, a silent plea.

Harry thought about snakes and the stillness before they struck. There was danger here, invisible lines treacherous to cross. Harry could feel it, on the nape of his neck, in the way his breath wanted to catch. The smart thing would be to hand Salazar the jar, to let him tend to his own wounds.

But Harry had thought him dead. Dead, and burned at the stake, dead, and gurgling on blood. Harry had seen the murder of a child, had been touched by darkness and the monsters that lurked beyond sight. He had felt himself die a thousand deaths. He was not sure, even now, he had come out of the Forest whole, or alive. There were weights on his shoulders, cackled whispers in his ears, and he. Wanted.

Harry dipped two fingers into the jar, gathering ointment at the tips.

"Lean back," he told Salazar, and Salazar did.

He hissed at the first touch of Harry's fingers on his skin. He flinched, hard enough to rattle the desk. Harry froze, but Salazar caught his hand before he could snatch it away, pushed it back to his chest and then let go.

"No," he said, quiet, hurried, grey eyes fixed on the point where Harry's hand met his skin. "Apologies. The pain startled me."

"Alright," Harry whispered. He pressed down, lightly, kept his hand against warm skin and did not move.

He waited for the touch to settle them both, waited for his heart to stop racing. For Salazar to grow lax under his palm. Slowly, with careful fingers and measured breaths, he began to rub the ointment in, sweeping over the tremors in Salazar's muscles, over the dips between Salazar's ribs. Salazar held studiously still, and Harry tried hard to be gentle.

"Tell me," Salazar said in the silence, between held breaths and smothered winces. "Tell me what happened."

Harry watched blood rush around the bruises on his limbs, watched the smear of paste on his skin. He talked. He told Salazar about the attack. About the dogs. He told him how Gytha died. Words caught in his throat, but Harry forced them out, spat them into the night with the taste of blood. He owed her that much. Salazar interrupted only once.

"The man who took her life. Is he dead?"

"He is."

"Good. Did you kill him?"

"No. I wanted to."

Harry told him about the Centaurs, and the Centaurs' camp, and the deal they struck. He talked about the crack deep in the Forest, about the black rot beyond. He told about dying, but not, about fighting back, but losing. He described the spell he had used, taken from Salazar's own books. He talked about Hermione, about delirium and her voice, calling out to him, shouting his name.

Salazar closed his eyes when Harry started to talk about the fissure, something on his face speaking of repressed pain, of a dig for control. He showed no surprise when Harry mentioned Hermione, letting him finish his tale in silence, with the implicit understanding that Harry would not have the strength to start again if he stopped now.

"I'm sorry," Harry said. He swallowed, feeling like one raw wound, like he was bleeding out but no one could see. "Salazar. I'm so sorry. She died while my back was turned. I couldn't – I didn't even – "

Salazar shushed him with a quiet sigh and a hand against Harry's cheek. "I know," he said, and tugged Harry down, gently bumping their foreheads together. "I know, Harry. I know. Her death is not on you, my dear."

His thumb ran a mindless back-and-forth on Harry's chin, under his lips. Harry's fingers had drifted low on his chest, sliding over the jut of Salazar's hipbone to rest on the red bruise marring the skin. Harry let Salazar take some of his weight. He pressed his hand against battered flesh, into the heat of bruised skin. Salazar took a sharp breath. He shifted under Harry's hand with the easy roll of bones, but did not try to shake him off. The bruise was warm, burned like a brand. It was a bright splash of colour, solid, alive, and it sank down beneath the top of Salazar's trousers. Harry wanted to see where it led. He wanted –

"Harry," Salazar said, low, and laced with warning. Looking up at him and then down at the patterns he was tracing on Salazar's skin, Harry saw Salazar's hands, gripping the edge of the desk. His knuckles had gone white with pressure. They wept blood, brown scabs cracked open.

Harry's breath stuttered to a stop. His mind went blank, filled with white noise. He could feel his heartbeat below his mouth, inside his head. There was an odd, cramping pain twisting his stomach, an anxious buzz along his arms. Salazar was warm under his hands.

"I'll get something for your hands," Harry said, and he shoved back, away, feeling light-headed, like he was about to throw up.

He turned around. He was feverish, with his heart trying to beat out of his ribs, with the memory of Salazar's heat plastered on his skin. He and Salazar never touched, but by God, tonight Harry's hands itched. All he could think about was the urgent press Salazar's mind against his own. How he pulled Harry into himself, and begged for more.

There was a cry lodged in Harry's throat. He wanted to feel a trembling pulse under his hands. Wanted to anchor himself in the beats of Salazar's heart. He wanted to forget, to lose himself, to know what noise Salazar would make if Harry –

Harry dug a clean rag out of his first-aid kit, and told himself his hands were not shaking. He turned a pencil into a bowl and filled the bowl with fresh water. He did not think. He did not think. He did not.

He dunked the rag in the water, wrung it out, then faced Salazar with set shoulders and defiance long practised. Salazar let him approach, his eyes grown dark in the faded light, his skin glistening with the medicine Harry put there.

Harry ducked his head. He took Salazar's hand, and dragged the rag over the bloodied knuckles. He set about cleaning the filth and gore lathered on like a second skin. He let the task soothe him and did not think about the sword calluses on Salazar's palms, did not take note of the unassuming strength in his long fingers.

"Her death isn't on you, either," he said into the quiet, and felt Salazar twitch.

"She was my student," Salazar replied, tired and edged with bitterness. "I took an oath."

In the bowl, the water had turned pinkish brown. Harry set it aside.

"I'm your student, too," he said. "You fought for us, Salazar. You bled, for us. If it's forgiveness you need, take mine. You have it."

"Harry," Salazar said, then paused, mouth parted around a drawn-in breath. "Harry," he said again, and Harry –

Harry still held his hand. Harry was looking. He felt weak with thirst, with hunger. His world had tunnelled down to the soft shape of Salazar's lips, to the gleam of white teeth beyond. Harry stood in the spread of Salazar's legs, their clasped hands held between them. Salazar was half-naked. Salazar was not breathing, and Harry could not look away, and, oh.

Oh.

Of course.

Of course he wanted Salazar.

"I’m," Harry said, and staggered, sick with awe, with muted horror. "I'm an idiot."

There was a roar in his ears, a sense of this is it, this is it for you, and Merlin, how the hell had he not noticed before? How blind. How naive. Of course he wanted Salazar, who else? How long had this been going on? Weeks? Months? Since the moment they met?

Salazar was talking, quiet and urgent, but Harry could not hear him. There were hands on his skin, a steady touch. His blood burned. He wanted those hands in his hair, wanted them to pull. He wanted to taste the sweat gathered at the base of Salazar's throat, wanted to part his lips open with a sweep of his tongue. He wanted Salazar's weight over him, wanted to set hands on his hips and feel him move. He wanted.

He wanted.

The magnitude of his mistake fell over him like stones. There was a weight inside his chest, and he knew. He knew. It was too little, too late. There would be no rooting out this feeling, this craving for another man. It had long since grown behind his lungs, it was planted inside his spine, it unfurled against his skin.

Of all the people Harry had met, had known, had loved. Of all the people, it was Salazar Slytherin he wanted, with the roll of hips and feverish fingers. It was Salazar Slytherin, whose life had shaped Harry since before his birth. Salazar Slytherin, who had opened the way for his parents' murder. Harry wanted to know what he would look like with Harry's thighs on either sides of his hips, rocking down.

Harry wanted to throw up. The air had gone from the room. He was going to be sick. It was too much. Harry. Harry couldn't. He could not –

'Harry!' Salazar said. He had a hand on the back of Harry's neck, gripping his hair with firm fingers. He forced Harry's head back, forced him to look up, and Harry had to kill the moan in the back of his throat. Salazar looked lovely, his breathing hard, his hair undone, and Harry –

Harry had never been more grateful for the strength of his Occlumency shields.

"Harry, focus. What is wrong?" Salazar's eyes were wide with alarm. "Can you hear your friend again? Stay with me. Focus on me."

Harry shook his head. He wanted to curl in on himself, to protect the soft parts of his belly. To hide, but Salazar would not let him. Harry's head spun. He couldn't get enough air into his lungs.

"I can't," he muttered. "Merlin, I can't. I just can't, I can't – "

He pitched, forward and into Salazar, utterly unable to help himself. It was as though Salazar had acquired a tangible mass, strung with something stronger than gravity. Arms went around his waist, pulled Harry in, in, in, until his head was tucked in the crook of Salazar's neck, until he could pant hard breaths against his skin. There were black dots dancing across Harry's sight. Salazar set steady hands against his back. He stank of ashes, of sweat and blood-soaked mud, but Harry did not care, he couldn't breathe, why couldn't he breathe?

"Shh," he heard, and Salazar was tracing slow, soothing circles across his back. "All right, my friend. Breathe through it. All is well."

A choked moan, a deep shudder, and Harry yielded. He gripped Salazar back, held on for dear life. He felt shaken loose, the shields around his mind strained from keeping him sane. He crushed the building pressure in his chest against Salazar's body. It had to push against Salazar's mended bones, had to stack fresh bruises atop the old ones. It had to hurt, to shoulder such weight, but Salazar bore it and did not protest. He kept murmuring soft reassurance against Harry's hair, in old English, in Parseltongue, in a lilting language that had to be his mother tongue. Harry paced himself to his heartbeats until the world stopped spinning.

"I need to go," Harry said.

Salazar watched him. He held Harry in a loose embrace, trailing gentle hands over clothed skin.

"I am going to break, Salazar," Harry said. He felt oddly calm. "I need. I need some time. I need to think. If you care for me at all, you must let me go tonight."

Good reasons would come later, Harry was sure. Pretexts to justify the impulse; Following Hermione's voice, searching the world for a way home. In this instant, Harry knew this: If he did not run, he would shatter.

"Where would you go?"

"Anywhere."

Salazar's arms eased down. His fingers caught on Harry's hands, then fell away. Harry took a step back. He ached with it, so he took another, then two more.

"One more night," Salazar told him, and Harry tasted blood in the back of his mouth. "Stay one more night. Rest. We can talk in the morning."

"If I stay one more night, I will want to spend it in your bed," Harry said, with great calm and rusted English. "I doubt you would let me, but either way, I would never have the strength to leave here, or leave you. So many people would die, Salazar, for me wanting you."

Salazar shook his head. He stood bowed toward Harry, his hands curled into fists. "I never learned your language," he said softly.

"I know," Harry said.

Outside, the lake was dusting with a lighter green, a prelude to dawn. Harry wanted to step in the water and drown in it. He was so tired.

"Harry," Salazar said. "I swore I would see you home. Please. Do not make me break another oath tonight."

Gently, Harry reached for Salazar's hand. He pressed two fingers against the tight clench of his fist, a reassurance. A wordless promise. "We will see each other again," he said.

He thought, Goodbye, Salazar, and when he turned to leave, Salazar let him go.

Chapter Text

His mother used to tell him about sea-monsters and the drowned gods that rest on ocean floors, about the formidable gliding beasts in the depths, a thousand teeth gleaming in the dark. She told him, there are creatures sunk so deep under the cold sea, the world has forgotten their names. As a child, he would listen with wide eyes and endless questions. He trailed after her on deserted beaches, the surf lapping at his feet, thinking about the glide of fish scales and how much he wanted to swim.

The steady cadence of her voice stayed with him as he dreamt, of underwater serpents lying in wait, of Krakens pulling ships down to be lost and feasted upon.

Those were times long gone, but Salazar still heard her voice on quiet nights, a distant ressac on wind-beaten bluff.

He did not hear her in the nights following the battle.

Foreign, fragmented memories lurked the forefront of his mind. He heard dying cries by the thousands. He died by blade, by magic, around a sword in his stomach, gurgling through the collapse of his lungs. He died afraid and cold and crying. He died without knowing how, or why, or from where, a great, endless void welcoming him between heartbeats. He died, a little, to fingers on his skin, a bruising tenderness after so much violence.

He woke heaving for breath, tasting salt on his lips, teeth against his heart.

{. . .}

Three days later, they buried Gytha under an oak tree by the lake. The girl was of Muggle descent, and they followed the way of her people. They put her six feet under the ground, swaddled in white linen and fresh flowers.

The children laid tokens at her feet. Strips of coloured cloth, toys, drawings. Things from home she could take with her. A student familiar with her God recited mourning rites, praying for safe passage, for peaceful rest. Salazar stayed silent throughout.

He closed the earth over Gytha's body, and thought, I did this.

He may not have killed the girl himself, but he had been the one to take her from her home, to bring her here. To make her his responsibility, and fail, in the worst possible way.

He watched dirt swallow a child's corpse, and thought, never again.

Yards away, outside the castle's reach, was a pit of flattened mud. Here they gathered the dead soldiers come to slaughter them in their home. Here Salazar piled corpses, the morning after. He threw every last hacked limb into a hole deep enough to contain the carnage, and set it all aflame.

{. . .}

He wondered sometimes, at the inviolable laws of nature that said good things were meant to break, to be damaged beyond repair in his hands. Salazar built Hogwarts with careful words and the fragile parts of his bones. He let himself love her, and feared she would be next, for perhaps there truly was a God, and He gave his creations flesh so they could hurt, and a heart He could scar.

Perhaps.

Salazar had long decided he had no care for the wills of men or gods. He fought for what he loved, and broke fingers from holding on, and smiled with bloodied teeth. There was nothing so dangerous as a broken man who had rebuilt himself.

{. . .}

Harry put him back together, afterwards. He set gentle fingers on Salazar’s skin, made his mind a siren's song to guide Salazar’s out of the dark.

Salazar held him as Harry panted with stuttering horror against his skin, his thoughts for once silent. He counted the beats of Harry’s heart, felt the fractured panic in his pulse. Harry asked to leave, and by morning he had gone.

"Do you know where?" Godric asked, hours after they searched the castle, rounded everyone and found a student missing.

"I don't."

"That boy has had a foot out the door since the moment he arrived, Salazar." Godric gripped his shoulder and squeezed it tight. "He may find his way back to us," he said. "Once he has done what he has to."

Salazar did not answer.

{. . .}

They set to work, after their dead had been cared for.

Classes resumed, none of the students having shown the wish to leave early despite the circumstances. Alfric stepped forth to take Harry's place. He talked for Salazar's students. He was the oldest remaining Slytherin, and well-suited for the task.

"Do you have a way of contacting him?" the boy asked one evening, approaching Salazar after the others had gone to bed.

"I do not,” Salazar said. “I can only take what he chooses to send me.”

“And has he? Chosen.”

“That is not for you to know,” Salazar said, and the boy gave a minute flinch. “Alfric. His leaving was not your fault. Give him time.”

“Time,” Alfric said. His lips twisted. He bowed his head. “Thank you, lord. I hope - will you tell me regardless, if he is well?”

“Child,” Salazar said. “He is an able swordsman, and a powerful wizard besides. I am certain he will be well. But yes. Rest assured, you will know.”

Salazar kept a close eye on his children afterward. They had always isolated themselves from the other Houses. Closing ranks like an animal around a wound. Harry’s influence withdrew them even more, their reverence for him taking up the space. Salazar watched the divide grow in the weeks following Gytha’s death. Shared grief and perceived abandonment, too visceral for outsiders to understand. They mured themselves in silence. None dared approach them.

Salazar hoped it would pass.

In the lost hours of his nights, he worked on Hogwarts' wards. He drew diagrams and calculus. He mused about the properties of blood, and how much of himself he could gift to make certain the wards never failed again. He was sick of having corpses thrown at his feet every time he found a home. He would not desecrate Gytha’s memory through negligence.

Rowena helped. She met him for every insomniac hour. They filled the darkness with spellgraphs, with chalk dust. When white noise drowned their thoughts, they sat on the stone floors and waited out the night. Rowena told him about her Pictish Clan. She told him about growing up in the wild hills, to the wing-beats of crows and tall grass whispering in the wind. Salazar told her about living by the sea. He told her about the swathes of sand he explored at midnight, looking for mermaids.

He never asked about her Clan trading her off to Helena's father. She never mentioned the slaughter of his family, his being thrown out into the waves to die. The arrangement worked for the both of them.

"I never congratulated you," Salazar said one night, loose with spiced wine. He gestured at the bruise Helga had sucked on Rowena's throat. "I'm happy for you."

He watched the tip of Rowena's ears blush red. Her mind tasted of rainstorms, of lashing hurricanes. Salazar saw the red of kiss-swollen lips, fingers twisting in wheat-gold hair. A weight settled over him, the delirious pull of wet skin, the firm press of a thigh. Underneath it all, the lightning strike of fear.

"Rowena," he said. "I am happy for you. It would be. Incredibly hypocritical of me to pass judgement upon who you take to your bed."

Rowena snorted. She reached for the wine. "Sorry," she said, and drank deep. “I forget."

"It's alright."

Rowena was brilliant, was beautiful beyond compare. She burned with rare genius. She had been singular since the moment she drew breath, standing out, North-star bright. She had known jealousy from her first moment of awareness. Salazar could never begrudge her defensiveness.

"It's all so new," Rowena said. "And Helga – "

"Helga," Salazar said, "is in love with you. No force in the world would convince her to let go of you."

Rowena's lips quirked. "You would know a thing or two about that, wouldn't you," she said, handing him back the wine. She stood. "Come, my friend. We have much work to do."

{. . .}

They set the new cornerstones on a balmy evening, June drawing to an end, the air rich with pine sap and warm earth. The setting sun cast deep orange shadows on the long grass.

The blocks of granite glowed with interlaced runes, pulsed to the steady beats of four synchronised hearts. As they sank under the ground and out of sight, the castle's wards flared, twisted in lines of blue, red, yellow and green. They settled with the crackle of fading lightning.

Salazar stood watching the whorls of magic long after the cheering students had gone to dinner. Godric stayed with him, but left after a while, going back to the stone army he and Helga were building.

Salazar kept watch until a dull ache began to pound behind his eyes. His head swirled with gleaming lines. Improbable bursts of energy built, collapsed, were born again. Spellwork layered over charms and enchantments, a tight weave which nonetheless allowed for new threads. For growth. He sensed the stronger, sturdier spells which grew Hogwarts from the mountains. He steered clear of the teasing quirks giving life to its staircases, the simple currents meant to regulate the temperature on colder months. He brushed over the darker, more vicious coils singing with his and the other's blood.

Where a nexus should meet he found empty space. Strands of spellwork drifted aimlessly, threads afloat like delicate spiderwebs. 

Salazar forced a deep breath and closed his eyes. His head gave a sharp spin. Night had fallen. The last sunrays faded in pale gold rings beyond the horizon. The moon hung low in the violet sky, casting shadows on the silvered grass.

Something had latched on Hogwarts’ wards and sucked power from them. A spell. A person. Another creature entirely. It fed on Hogwarts’ magic and made it weak. Made it. Visible.

Anger burned like coals in his breast. Salazar tucked it out of sight, and walked the soft-sloped hill leading to the Forest. He ducked under low-hanging branches, and ventured within the trees. The air smelled of green, rotting things. He breathed deep and made his steps light, made them careful. Creatures stalked these woods, old monsters he would rather not awaken.

He walked for hours, keeping to the shadows, moving around wide, weathered tree trunks and thin pools of moonlight. The chitter of night creatures dogged his steps. He walked to where the Forest grew deep, grew solemn with the passing of centuries. There was magic here, vibrant with life, with sluggish growth.

He glimpsed ancient beasts mounting guard, felt the whisper of their presence on dead leaves. He carried no weapons. His wand was sheathed at his waist. He held still and they let him pass.

The fizzle of fraying wards took him to a small clearing at the bottom of a curved depression. Moss and lichens crawled on wide stones. Tall, time-ridged trees reached to the sky with branches like bared bones. The air was cold. 

Salazar knew darkness. He recognized its touch . He blinked and saw dripping jaws, bloodied teeth. He felt the touch of hungry bones on his throat, the slide of a cold tongue against his neck, the scrap of nails over his ribs. A thousand dead hands gripped his clothes, wrapped him in mangled limbs. He tasted grave-dirt, corpse-rot, he –

Fell.

The forest floor was soft with wet leaves. Salazar found purchase in gnarled roots, stained his hands with sap, a stickiness like drying blood. His heart beat rabbit-fast in his ears; he shook with the urge to run from a hunter's teeth.

"Gods," he said.

Harry had been here, drowned in oil and spreading rot. He seared himself into the dirt, and the trees, and the rocks. Harry bled in soil, and made it holy. Salazar wanted to tear out the trees and the rocks, and ground them within himself.

'I don't like it here,' Sila told him, forked tongue flicking Salazar's ear. She coiled, uncoiled, then coiled again around his chest. 'This is a place break-thin and life-leeched. We should go.'

Salazar ran a hand down her length of smooth scales, the reassurance made rote since childhood days.

'We will not stay long,' he said.

'The boy was here.'

'You can feel him?'

'Yes. Forests have long memories.'

Salazar smelled ozone in every breath, the promise of lightning. Harry lingered in his lungs like smoke, like the memory of a lover's touch. The boy had bled power with a martyr's abandon, and the ground remembered him after long weeks.

Salazar stood, and walked the clearing. Moss flaked like dead skin. The trees were diseased, the trunks discoloured. He questioned the moss, the trees. He braided spells through the air and asked, What happened here?

Only silence answered him, an abyss of dead things. Life had been sucked from the clearing, its absence like a wound. He found nothing beyond the ghost of Harry's pain.

He heard a noise, twigs snapping, and turned on his heels, killing words crowding his tongue.

"Peace, wizard."

A Centaur detached himself from the shadows of the trees, his dark skin moonlit.

"Centaur.” Salazar lowered his wand. He forced himself into a bow. "You should be more cautious of approaching unannounced."

"You should not lose yourself to thoughts," the Centaur said. "Not in this place. The forest is host to creatures older than men. It is easy to get lost among the gateways between trees."

Gateway, Salazar thought, a flicker of insight, the very edge of realisation. The thoughts connect, or they start to. The Centaurs' fears, and their legends. Harry had heard a friend's voice in the dark. Salazar only heard the disjointed beats of his own heart, but the picture starting to form held all the horrors of a nightmare.

"Your name?" he asked.

"I am Hexo.” The Centaur touched two fingers to his forehead. "I had hoped to see Harry."

“Harry is long gone."

Hexo gave a slow, surprised blink. "Do you not know where? I am surprised you would let him out of your sight."

"He is not mine to look after."

"Is he not?" Hexo asked, and Salazar's heart, stupidly, twisted.

{. . .}

Salazar never meant to fall in love.

He did anyway.

He had loved Thomas with adolescent recklessness. Thomas, older and so very at ease in his own skin, with his wit, his philosophy, his barbed tongue and unerring kindness. Salazar had loved him, and men whose name he could hardly remember, with gasping breaths and the clutch of fingers.

He met Harry wreathed in light, in time, in old magic. Salazar took him in his arms and thought, come back to me, my brother.

He watched the shape of Harry's lips, the curve of Harry's neck. He had had Harry under him, trembling with euphoria and exertion. He saw Harry breathless, grinning with a wet, open mouth. He laid in the spread of Harry's legs and wanted that grin on his lips. He found himself wanting the way only he could want, with great greed and selfishness. Desire had grown roots and sharp thorns, but he did not take the boy to bed.

He knew attraction, the sweetness of its teeth, but loving was the giving of oneself. It was prying open his own ribcage, closing someone else's fist around his heart. It was feeding himself to a lover's lips. It was, before all, a choice.

Harry regarded him with reserve, with obvious mistrust. He spoke to Sila in Salazar's mother tongue. He cared for Salazar's students. Harry bore scars and unbroken pools of darkness, and Salazar wanted to cut himself on all his sharp edges. Trust grew between them like a weed, and with it something more.

Harry gave him his mind, one night. He tore down the walls Salazar helped him build, and said, come, friend, take my strength. Take from me what you need, and let me guide you back to yourself.

Salazar broke, that night, and was remade. He saw Harry and thought, I will tear open my chest, my love, and offer you what is yours.

{. . .}

They sent the children home within the first week of July. Some took Portkeys. Others were brought back. Rowena and Godric wrote cover stories to feed Muggle parents. Salazar had no use for them. None of his children had Muggle relatives to go home to.

The week flew in a haze of lies and summer heat. They said goodbye on the seventh day, with sunlight descending from spun glass windows in shafts of burnished gold. Dust swayed lazily in gusts of evening air, carrying hints of fresh grass and lavender. The Great Hall was cavernous in its emptiness.

"Don't do anything stupid," Godric whispered in his ear, his grip tight on Salazar's neck.

Salazar pressed their temples together. "Take care, my friend," he said, and eased out of the embrace.

He hugged Helga, kissed Rowena on both cheeks. The gates closed behind him, and he let the Portkey sweep him away, a wrenching pull behind his navel.

He spent a month on the southern coast. He travelled from Anglia to Cornwall, scrying for students. He had found a dozen by the time he reached Devon. He took them from crowded cities, from wild villages, hungry places where they stood out. Parents thrust them in his arms like diseased rats, with great relief and a sneer of disgust.

Salazar swallowed back anger, the rage of dark spells, and talked the children through their pain. He took them to Druid camps, to be looked after until the school year. He told them about Hogwarts, about a castle that stood between a lake and the stretch of tall mountains. Here they would be safe, he said. Here they would belong.

He made camp in Cornwall. The Irish sea was ablaze in the pink glow of dusk. Waves lapped the polished rocks. He listened to the cries of seagulls skirting waves, and looked for stagnant pools of saltwater.

He found one drying between stone cracks, and used it to scry for the next child. Water turned mirror-smooth. He saw a girl pelting through a busy street. She ducked around people's legs, a loaf of bread tucked in the crook of her arm. She leapt, took a sharp turn, plastered herself against a wall, where she laid, breathless, silent. Salazar recognized the streets.

He broke the illusion.

'What is it?' Sila asked, lazy with sun, a cool rasp on his shoulders.

'We are heading home, my dear,' he told her, with the bitter twist of a smile.

{. . .}

There once was a boy who lived in a house by the sea, whose whole world stood between the land and waves. He swam flanked by fish, his hair knotted with salt and seaweed. He looked for sunken gold to mermaid's songs, and he was happy.

The boy was magic. The boy was secret words in the dead of night, the sparks that danced on fingertips. He was ink-smeared skin and quick, sly smiles, the cool glide of shadows on ballroom floors, the silver gleam of moon-sliced scales.

The boy was cursed-blood. The boy was a Lord's bastard son, born of a mother from lands unexplored. His mother was beautiful. His mother was a witch. His mother shed skin and turned a snake. She fell in love, and paid the price in blood.

She took her child and ran, but the lord had other sons, and they knew magic. They found the house by the sea. Waves bled red, and the boy drank sand, drank salt.

'Live, my son,' his mother told him, so he drowned but did not die.

He wondered, sometimes, at what had risen from the ocean that night. Fairy tales are ripe with princes and monsters, and he did not know which he was. The monarch's son, or the beast that would see the kingdom asunder.

{. . .}

It took Salazar two days to build a boat. He sailed the choppy Irish waters with good wind to push him across the sea. He arrived at night, anchoring off the coast of Dublin.

The city was as he remembered. Tall, weathered, steadfast walls beaten by sea brine. Its sturdy towers were lined with watchers, quivers and arrows ready to fly. It had narrow, twisted alleyways webbed between looming thatched houses. The streets were dusty, cramped, stank of fish and rotted algae. Salazar walked them with the sea clinging to his skin, a host of ghosts at his heels.

He spent three days combing the lower town. He tracked residues of the girl's magic, but only found faded footprints. He circled the docks and markets, the street of steel, all without success. Resigned, on the night of the third day, he headed to the cleaner, wider streets where nobility resided.

The sun was a rim of gold and violet on the horizon. Torches blazed in the tepid dusk, spitting flames at the elongating gloom. Salazar let himself be drawn to one of the city's main arteries. There was cheering, music, the low beat of drums. Two rows of armoured guards lined the street, holding a crowd at bay. Salazar felt the soldier's tension, the people's ecstasy. He staggered, with drumbeats and too many bodies. Fresh flowers rained from open windows, a blanket on cobblestones, trampled by hundreds of feet. The heady, sugary scent covered the omnipresent stench.

Salazar weaved his way to a protected corner. He scanned the crowd, looked for children, sharp minds bent on picking pockets. A city was a multi-headed beast, a thousand voices clamouring to be heard. Salazar drowned in a press of foreign minds. He knew their taste, their cries of pain, the stab of their hunger. His head ached to splitting. He was tired; exhaustion made him careless. He kept only a distracted eye on the procession of knights and nobles parading down the street. It was his undoing.

He felt the touch of a familiar voice, tangled in memory. He saw a glint of gold, the colour of hair he had gripped with fevered fingers.

He made a noise, with his mouth, with his mind. Thomas turned in the saddle, and Salazar saw the face of a ghost. Everything fell into white noise. Thomas found him through the crows, and Salazar held his gaze. He watched blue eyes grow wide, felt the sharp slant of Thomas' thoughts, narrowing into disbelief, into pain, into relief.

Salazar, he mouthed, and Salazar shook with mangled breaths.

Thomas murmured something to the woman riding beside him. He slipped off his horse, through the crowd of shouting men, anonymous enough that none of the guards sought to stop him. Salazar thought to run, but could not. He tracked Thomas' progress through the shout of his mind. Thomas burned, with old grief and nascent hope.

Salazar, he said with the fervour of a holy man's prayer. Wait for me old friend, my love, it has been so long, Salazar, Salazar, Salazar.

"Salazar," Thomas said. The name shook on his tongue, trembled with disbelief. "Salazar," he said again, with something like blooming joy, his fingers tight on Salazar's arm, his eyes a clear, summer blue. He touched Salazar the way one might an apparition, the delirium of a dream.

It hurt, in all the good ways, to hear his voice again.

"Not here," Salazar said. He set gentle fingers on Thomas' hand, and pulled him away from the crowd.

Salazar retraced his steps down empty streets with Thomas' hand on his arm. The night was deepening around them. The air hummed with the first winds of a summer storm, heavy with the scent of dirt, with the heat of chthonian depths.

"My God, Salazar. I thought you were dead. I thought they killed you."

"They did, in a way," Salazar said, and heard Thomas draw a sharp breath. "They laid to rest the boy you knew. For a long while, I hardly knew myself."

"Jesus wept," said Thomas. He tugged on Salazar's arm. "Stop. Please, Salazar. Stop."

Salazar let himself be stopped. He let Thomas turn him around. Place a hand against his cheek. Trail fingers down his jaw, the line of his neck. Fall away. Thomas, like the city, had changed in a way that kept him unchanged. There were crows' feet at the corners of his eyes, but the blue was as sharp as Salazar remembered. He had forgotten how quickly Muggles aged.

"Will you tell me what happened?" Thomas asked, gentle, and that, too, had not changed. "Did you find them?"

"I found them," Salazar said, with the whisper of Thomas' mind against his own, with the stretch of long years apart between them. He said, "I can show you," because Thomas was owed this story, and a piece of his heart. He offered Salazar friendship, helped a broken boy make sense of a world that wanted him dead. Salazar had grown, aware of all the ways he was different from others. Thomas taught him acceptance and the sanctity of another man's lips. Salazar loved him for it, and love, before anything, was the giving of oneself.

This he could give.

Thomas searched his face for long moments.

"You may," he said, so Salazar looked into his eyes and brought him into his mind.

He was young, barely a man, a willowy silhouette cast in shadows. A deep hood was pulled over his hair, his face barely visible underneath. He knelt facing the sea, atop a plunging cliff. Foam beat at white stone. Clouds roiled deep purple in the falling dusk, the colour of a fresh bruise. Behind him stood the charred ruins of his home.

Silent as death, three men crept closer. All three were richly dressed in thick travelling clothes. They held their wands ready. They moved swiftly, with all the lethal grace of trained hunters.

A thin smile of wretched delight stretched his lips. His eyes drifted shut for an instant, better revel in the moments to come.

"I had hoped you would find me, brothers," he said, pitched to carry. "It is fitting to meet here, for the last time."

The three men paused at his words, exchanging quick glances. One of them spoke.

"We thought you might be sentimental enough to come back to this place," he said. "That you might seek death where your mother fell. We learned what she was, you know. Such a shame, for one such as her to perish so pitifully."

"Won't you stand, brother? It is unbefitting of a Slytherin to die on his knees."

A soft, terrible laugh rose up from the depths of the hood.

"I was told you were an idiot," Salazar said, and he jumped, lithe, snake-quick, a spell striking the earth where he'd been kneeling.

He bent, dodging another spell, too quick to be touched. The other two men took up arms, fired their own curses, each more vicious than the last. Salazar plastered himself against a rock. One hand snagged a dip in the stone, and he heaved himself up, out of reach.

A quiet command hissed past his lips. The ground opened under two of the men's feet. They fell to their death screaming. The earth closed over their bones.

"Coward!" the survivor snarled, his leg a shredded mess. "Traps, truly? You would kill your own brothers with trickery. Without honour. Our father's blood must run thin as water, you cowardly little shit."

Salazar rolled out from behind his hiding place, rising up to his feet with graceful ease.

"Coward?" he repeated, head tilted in consideration. "Yes, I suppose I am a coward. Gladly, if it means I survive to watch you die such a death."

Before the other wizard could react, he drew a dagger and plunged the blade in the man's heart, a slick slide between two ribs. The man whimpered, a stunned, fearful sound. His eyes grew dull. He swayed backward, dead before ever hitting the ground. A boot pressed against his chest for support, Salazar tore his dagger free. He leaned forward to contemplate his brother's face, frozen in a last expression of pain and horror.

"Goodbye brother," he breathed, a fist pressed against the other's heart. He turned. Behind him, the wound kept weeping blood.

The memory faded.

Thomas breathed gasping breaths. Salazar wiped his tears with careful thumbs, collecting wetness.

"You should have come to me," Thomas said. "I could have helped."

"You could have died."

"For you my love, I am not sure I would have cared."

Salazar laughed. The sound hurt as it shuddered out of him. He met Thomas as a boy. Thomas had been an accomplished politician in the mind to integrate magic users into the city. The two of them had spent long hours arguing over citizenship, over how to make thought into law.

Thomas' unwavering idealism struck Salazar as naive, in a time when peace between magic and the mundane had seemed ludicrous, but the man wielded charm like a weapon. Salazar had been helpless to resist then; he felt just as helpless now.

"Gods," he said. "Have I missed you."

"Yet you left."

"I should have sent word," he said. "I'm sorry. It has been too long."

"Yes," said Thomas. "It has."

He took Salazar's hand, and Salazar let him. He bent, pressed their foreheads together, and Salazar went shuddering into the touch. How long had it been since he last touched skin?

"Let me take you home," Thomas said, his breath on Salazar's lips, his warmth on Salazar's skin. Thomas' eyes were heavy with promises, an invitation lying somewhere in all that blue, and Salazar –

Salazar remembered how good they had been together, long afternoons and shortened nights watching light play on the muscles of Thomas' back, kissing the damp skin of his neck as he pushed, down and inside him. Salazar remembered shaking with ecstasy, with the too-tight too-hot too-much feel of it. He had been careful, worried about pain, Thomas making sweet sounds under him, legs spreading further, a roll of his hips driving Salazar deeper in.

He remembered being on his back, Thomas' fingers on his hips. Breathing through the stretching burn, his world narrowed to the gentle encouragements in his ears. Clutching at golden hair as Thomas adjusted the angle of his thrusts and scattered liquid lightning at the base of Salazar's spine.

Salazar's heart was a stubborn, careless thing that craved with great avarice and gave itself away too easily. He was Harry's now, unreservedly. All the man had to do was ask, and Salazar would open his ribcage to present him with proof of ownership, but –

A piece of him was Thomas', always would be and Harry. Harry was not here. Harry was long gone.

"I cannot stay," he warned quietly.

"I don't care."

When Thomas brought him up into a kiss, Salazar reached to meet him.

Chapter Text

The air was sweet with the scent of woodsmoke. He felt the heat of a fire on his face. Golden sparks shot to the silver-speckled sky, dancing like fireflies. Harry sat on the grass, and listened to thrumming drums.

“Drink,” the priestess told him, and so he drank. 

Sage and nutmeg, a sharp, earthly taste. The world lost its edges, the voices muffled, the sights blurring together. He heard a rush like the sea, refluxing with his blood. He watched the fire’s sparks streak the night, bleeding light. He could feel the oak tree at his back, its rough bark, how it hummed in the wind. His heart pounded with the drums.

The priestess touched her palm to his forehead. Harry felt her breaths on his lips.

“You asked for answers,” she said. She kissed both his eyelids, and Harry let her. “Look inside yourself. Look. ”

{. . .}

Yesterday

"Flaming arrows, really?" Nick hissed, skidding to a stop beside Harry. "What next, ballista? Get down Potter. "

The other boy grabbed him by the scruff of the neck, forcing Harry behind an overturned cart. Arrows wheezed past their heads.

"Look at it the bright way," Harry said. He elbowed Nick in the ribs until the boy released him. "At least we’ll have money for food before the day is out."

Nick grunted. Harry straightened from his half-crouch. He waved his wand at a stack of hay, smothering the fire before smoke could spread. An arrow thunked in the wood of the cart. The archers in the church tower were going to make themselves a nuisance.

"How far are the others, do you reckon?" he asked. There were soldiers approaching.

“They’re late,” Nick said. “Should be here already.”

"Right.” Harry drew a deep breath. “Listen. Nick , listen. We don’t have long. We have to make a run for the church. Too vulnerable here. I'll draw them out. You follow. Understood?"

Harry rolled out from behind the cart before Nick could protest. He came up with his sword raised, and caught the first man under the knees, bringing him down with a clean smack on the temple, pommel smashing soft flesh. He stunned another before the unconscious body hit the ground, shimmied out of the way of a falling blade. Steel sliced through air. Harry parried a blow to his stomach, flowing with it, then another. The soldier seemed clumsy in comparison to Godric's swift grace. Harry dodged his sword, came up against him, back to chest, and rammed his elbow into the opening of the man's helmet. There was the wet snap bone. The soldier reeled away, howling.

"Duck!" Nick yelled, and Harry dropped, sweeping another man's legs from under him. Daggers soared overhead. Each enhanced blade met its mark.

"You didn't have to kill them," Harry snarled as men fell from the tower in a shower of blood and unused arrows.

“ Move ,” Nick said.

They pelted across the square. The town was small, little more of a fortified hamlet, rickety houses pressed together on hard-packed earth. They were quick to clear the open space.

Harry breathed hard, sweat sticking the hair to his forehead. Nick swung left and he followed, veering swiftly in a narrow alleyway. He could hear cries of alarm, the blare of a horn. They rounded the street corner, huffing in the afternoon heat. Harry registered the clank of metal, hooves on muddy ground. Mounted soldiers. He called a shield on instinct, protecting Nick before a spear gutted him.

Nick swore and jostled to a stop. Harry fisted a hand in his shirt.

“Easy,” he said, as much to Nick as to the soldiers. “Easy there. We mean no harm.”

“Witch’s filth,” said one of the guards. “Lord willing, you’ll burn by morning.”

“Give us the boy,” Harry said. “And we’ll be on our way.”

Under his hand, Nick was tense at a bow. His nostrils flared. 

“I will gladly die before I give way to the likes of you,” the soldier said.

Harry released Nick’s shirt. Nick lunged past Harry’s shield, grabbed the man’s spear, unhorsed him in the same motion. The soldier went swinging. He crashed against a wall head first and slumped unconscious to the ground.

Harry took up Nick’s side, and together, they made quick work of the men. Harry caught most of them with magic, and the soldiers piled prostrate at his feet.

“C’mon,” Harry said, panting, and he ran inside the church, Nick hot on his heels. They pushed the doors closed behind them, and Harry warded them as best he could. 

The church was rundown, shabby. The air was cool and moist despite the heat outside. It smelled strongly of mould and cankered wood. They walked down the nave to the transept.

“You think they keep him here?” Nick asked.

“Where else would they put him? To their mind, they need to contain the evil in him. This way.”

Harry steered Nick toward a door behind the altar. It was bolted from the outside.

“Brace yourself.” Nick touched Harry’s arm. “They may have finished with him already.”

Harry nodded, and pushed the door open.  It came loose with a reluctant creaking noise. Inside the room was dark, thin sunrays flitting through the boarded windows. Dust danced in the muddy light. A child sat huddled against the far wall. Eyes closed. Unmoving. Harry’s heart sank.

"Lumos."

The child was a thin, gangly boy. He sat hunched on a bed of stale straw, head bowed over his chest. His dark hair was matted with filth. He seemed fast asleep. Harry fell on his knees beside him. He touched the boy’s shoulder, set fingers on his throat. Seeking a pulse. 

“Alive?” Nick asked.

“Yes,” Harry said. “Drugged, I think.” He tapped his wand to the boy’s chest. “ Ennervate .”

The boy came awake with a gasp. Blue eyes, deep as the night’s sky. Harry’s head gave a sharp spin. 

“You’re alright,” he said. He helped the boy straighten into a more comfortable position. “My name is Harry. We came to rescue you.” 

“Harry,” the boy repeated. The world lurched to the side. Harry’s chest felt tight. The boy watched him with his head cocked to the side, and Harry shuddered with recognition. “I’m Merlin,” the boy said, and Harry, Harry was – 

{. . .}

The pounding drums rocked through him. Harry felt himself sink against the oak tree at his back.

“Further back,” the priestess said. “Look further, boy.”

{. . .}

A week ago

"This is fine," Harry muttered, going cross-eyed through the head-rush. He hung by the ankle, tied to a tree by a length of rope. He thought he might have broken a bone. He tried to move. Pain shot through his leg. "Just perfectly bloody fine ."

The boar snorted as if in agreement. The beast was a mound of coarse hairs and corded muscle. Two curved tusks poked from the sides of its snout. It pawed the ground, raining clots of dirt. Harry breathed a slow sigh.

He did not have his wand. Nick stole it from him again, the bastard.

The boar eyed him with dark, beady eyes, and backed away two steps, its body coiled.

“Nick,” Harry said, keeping his voice level. The boar snorted. “Nick, I need some help.”

And amazingly, from the depths of the forest came a shout of, "POTTER?!"

"I’m going to kill you and feed you to the pig, you thieving b – "

He heard a crash, the rattle of crushed underbrush. The boar started running. Harry ground his teeth. Darkness gathered at the edges of his vision. He was going to pass out, and the boar approached fast, launched at full speed now, and – 

A low, menacing growl rose from the nearest thicket of trees. Nick surged into sight, lips pulled from his teeth in clear warning. He pounded on the boar, quicker than Harry could see. The animal whined in alarm, but could not escape him, driven by its own weight. Nick slit its throat and it collapsed on the grass, gushing blood.

“Dinner,” Nick said happily. He turned to Harry with a smile. “Alright there, Harry?”

"Just cut me loose please," Harry said. He was having trouble breathing.

Nick grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled. A swift swipe of his dagger severed the rope. Harry went down. His sight whited out from the impact, weight landing on his injured leg.

"Wand," he said. Nick pressed his wand into his palm. He put Harry’s arm around his shoulders, held him steady. " Episky ," Harry said, and his bones snapped back into place. He grunted and let Nick carry his weight while the pain receded. Nick held him without protest. 

"We found the cave,” he said. "Bran and Marya went on ahead. The day’s work is almost done. Hopefully they'll have killed the trolls before we get there."

"Hopefully," Harry said. Not one job had gone to plan in the months since he joined Marya's sellswords.

“Tonight we feast,” Nick said, jostling his shoulder. “Don’t look so grim.”

“You people eat like a herd of starved Thestrals,” Harry said. He pointed his wand at the boar. The carcass rose through the air, dripping blood. “The meat will be gone before the sun is set. Shall we?”

He and Nick made their way through the trees. Nick kept silent as they walked. He tread the forest floor without sound, his steps light as a hunting wolf. There was a tension to him, around his dark-rimmed eyes, in the line of his back. Harry watched the salient jut of his cheekbones, the starved angle of his jaw. 

“Full moon in two days, isn’t it?” he said.

Nick froze. He stopped dead in the middle of the path, and stared at him. He swallowed. Harry watched the painful up-and-down of his throat.

“You know,” he said.

Harry cocked an eyebrow. “You’re a werewolf? It's kinda hard to miss, mate. You look like you’re about to crawl out of your own skin. I wanted to ask if there’s anything I can do to help. Aside from stitching you up after. I have a painkiller that might help with muscle pain.”

Nick kept staring, stunned silent. He looked as though Harry spoke in a foreign language. Harry reached for him. He touched Nick’s shoulder, worried the boy was about to keel over.

“Alright?” he asked.

“Sorry,” Nick said. He blinked rapidly. “It’s - ah. This is not. The reaction I usually get.”

Harry smiled. “One of the men who raised me was a werewolf,” he said. “I’ve never met anyone stronger, or kinder.” He squeezed Nick’s shoulder. “You won’t get any prejudice from me.”

Nick smiled back, a small, hesitant thing. He ducked his head, avoiding Harry’s eyes. Harry let him compose himself, and stayed at his side. 

“Where is he now?” Nick asked. “The man who raised you.”

Harry thought about Remus after Sirius’ death. The drawn, haggard look of him. The fatigue in the slump of his spine. Grief seized them both by the throat, that night in the Ministry, and never let them go. There had been no body to bury.

“I don’t know,” Harry said. His eyes felt hot.

“I’m here,” Nick said. He bunted his head against Harry’s cheek, a playful, wolfish gesture. “Call, and always, I shall come.”

“C'mon,” Harry said. “We should check on the others.”

They began walking again. The air was pleasantly warm in the forest, away from the dry, scorching heat of the Mediterranean summer. The trees stood in absurd shapes, twisted by the salty brine constantly blowing from the sea. Birds and cicadas chirped out of sight. The land differed vastly from the thick English forests, full of rocky valleys and babbling streams.

They found Marya atop a crag of stone, peering down at the opening beneath. Her hair was bound in a tight braid. Her arms were bare, and coated in blood to the elbows.

“It’s done, I take it?” Nick asked.

She flicked them a smile. “You’re back,” she said. “Good lads. And you brought food for the night.”

“The others still in there?” Harry asked.

The cave gaped dark as a mouth.

"See for yourself,” Marya said. “You can help them with the butchering.”

Harry grimaced, but went down the soft, earthly slope of the cave. Inside was pitch-dark. It smelled strongly of old socks and stagnant sewer water, a foul stench he remembered from his first year at Hogwarts, when he, Ron and Hermione confronted a mountain troll. He gagged, and pressed a sleeve to his nose.

“Like roses, innit?” Bran appeared from the darkness. He smiled, stretching the scar on his cheek. “Bit late, lad. We’re just finishing up.”

“Went boar hunting,” Harry said. “You’ll thank me tonight. Anything interesting?”

Bran shrugged. “Scrap and junk,” he said. “You’re welcome to look. Mind the smell, though. Gets worse the farther down you go.”

Harry conjured witchfire with a flick of his wrist, and walked on. The cave stretched far underground. Its floor, a mix of sand and hard-packed earth, was strewn with dirty, yellowed bones. Some from animals, others decidedly human. Harry spied a couple of skulls, one of them still speckled with old blood. Though trolls were immensely stupid, they wielded their own kind of magic, making them hard to kill. These took a liking to the nearby villages. No wonder the Muggles grew desperate enough to call on Marya.

The cave branched in small alcoves. Places to store meat and treasure. Harry went through them, and found them filled with more bones, ragged animal pelts, a handful of shiny rocks. One of the rocks caught Harry's eyes. The stone was no bigger than a chicken egg. It was cool and smooth to the touch, as though the years had polished it to a perfect lustre. It was made of a dark-green mineral that caught the light, reflected it in soothing river-green shades. Its ever-changing, wavering colour reminded Harry of the lake sloshing against the common room's windows.

He pocketed the stone, and did not let himself think of why.

He helped Leofric and Oswulf butcher the trolls' carcasses. They extracted teeth and swathes of skin. The trolls laid like small rockslides, corpses already starting to bloat. Bran had been right. The stink was awful. They left the bodies unburied in case the village chief contested their kill, and went back to the surface together. They breathed fresh air in great gulps.

They made camp on a beach, that night, facing the Mediterranean sea, listening to the slow roll of saltwater on the sand. They lit a bonfire and cooked the boar. They glazed it in herbs and honey, and left it to roast until the skin curdled and the meat fell off the bones. With it they ate olives and fresh cheese on flat, fragrant bread, and figs for dessert. They drank mead and beer till their heads spun, and watched the sun sink under the dark waves.

Hayden started to sing, and Oswulf procured a lute. Harry listened to the music, and thought this was a life he could live. Mercenary work was perilous and bloody, but it came with good company and no concerns beyond the next job. No fear. No responsibilities. Only a sword, and whatever the day would bring.

Nick flopped beside him. "You look pensive," he said.

“Are you happy here?” Harry asked. “I mean. Doing this. Living – ” He gestured at the camp.

Nick huffed a laugh. “Am I happy? Harry, I am. Content with my lot. People like me have little choice in how they live their lives. I am lucky to be where I am.” The boy looked out at the sea. The firelight gilded his skin rich gold.  “I am happy to be with you. I can’t say a sellsword’s lot is a fate I would wish on anyone.”

Harry processed the words in silence.

“Why do you ask?”

“I’m thinking about home,” Harry said. “I’m thinking about duty, and the cost of turning my back on it.”

Nick jostled his shoulder. “If I may offer an opinion,” he said. “Stay.”

“People would die.”

“Stay anyway.”

Harry closed his eyes.

“People die all the time,” Nick said. “It doesn’t fall on you to save them, despite what you seem to think. Is this about the castle where Marya’s husband teaches?”

Harry thought about Salazar. His skin warm under Harry’s hands. His eyes the colour of moonlight through water. His mouth. His mouth. His mouth.

“Your heart,” Nick said. “Is singing. You left someone there, didn’t you.”

“It’s not about Hogwarts,” Harry said. “I. Nevermind. You’re right. I’ve no right to complain.”

“Didn’t get a girl pregnant, did you?”

Harry pushed him down into the sand, laughing. “No, you dolt. I told you, it’s not about that. It’s just. There are some things I have to do. People who need me, but. Time is slipping away from me.”

"It's the middle of August, Potter. You don't need to be a cursed wizard to know that."

Harry snorted. He flicked sand in Nick’s face. Nick grinned at him, boyish and charming. Harry wanted to kiss him.

“August,” he said.

Nick hummed. Farther away, Hayden finished a song. The men cheered.

“I’m eighteen,” Harry said blandly. He did the maths. Snatched from 1997 in January. Landed here some time in July. “No, I’m. I’m eighteen and a half. Bloody hell."

“Happy nameday,” Nick said.

Harry looked at him, stretched out on the sand. Hands under his head, bringing definition to his arms, to the muscles of his stomach. Since his epiphany regarding Salazar, Harry’s attention kept getting distracted. His eyes lingered on the breadth of men’s shoulders. On the strength of their backs. He watched their hands, the sharp line of their jaws. He found himself wanting. Was this new, he wondered. Or had it always been there. Buried with great care.

He could not say whether his new desires were normal. He had been raised to his Aunt and Uncle making snide comments about women holding hands in public. His schoolmates pretended to retch at the sight of two men kissing. Harry never let himself look before. Never let himself wonder. 

Salazar, half-naked in front of him, stripped him of illusions and wilful blindness. He made Harry see, and Harry, the fool that he was, could not look away.

Nick propped himself up on his elbows. He looked at him, his head cocked to the side. Harry averted his gaze.

“I have to talk to Marya,” he said, and stood.

He walked around the campfire, picking his way between the men.

He remembered his time with Ginny. The softness of her mouth. How good it felt to have her against him. To run fingers on the skin of her thighs, of her breasts. To move with her, inside her, watching her eyes roll back, her back arch in pleasure. He still thought of women and felt his mouth go dry, his stomach flutter.

Harry did not understand himself, and it terrified him more than he could say.

“Harry,” Marya said. She sat on a log of driftwood, rolls of parchment beside her. “Is there something I can help you with?”

“Lady,” Harry said. “I understand you have a way to contact Godric.”

Marya cocked an eyebrow. “I do,” she said. “My familiar is an owl. She is currently running an errand for me, but will be back soon enough.”

“Could I.” Harry cleared his throat. His heart raced. “Could I borrow her services?”

“Certainly,” Marya said. “This is for Hogwarts, I imagine?” Harry nodded. “Good. I received word from my husband, and meant to reply sooner rather than later. We can send our letters in one package.”

Harry bowed. “Thank you.”

“On the subject of Godric,” Marya said. “His letter, among other things, came with a demand for favour from the company. I will address the men tomorrow, but I think this may be of particular interest to you.”

Harry clasped his hands behind his back and waited.

“Godric wishes to hire our services to retrieve a wizard boy,” Marya said. “His life is at stake, as I understand it. He risks execution - or will soon, from what Rowena could see. But neither her, my husband, Helga, or Salazar, are in a position to intervene. Our mission is to find where the boy is, and save him if we can.” Marya paused. “I think I shall send you, Nick, and three of the men to investigate. As this will be in the Isles, you will lead them. You may take your pick at them.”

“Very well, ma’am.”

Harry did not know how he felt at the thought of going back to England. He thought about the wizard boy whose life would depend on him, and walked back to Nick on the other side of the camp.

He sat, and conjured ink and parchment from the sand. The ink turned sea-green rather than black, and the parchment cream-coloured and grainy. 

He missed Salazar like a limb. He set his quill to the parchment, and wrote, 

I thought you might like it.

He extracted the green stone he had found in the troll den, its surface smooth as silk. He attached the stone to his letter. Then, because he couldn't help himself, added:

Yours, Harry.

{. . .}

Harry's head spun. Spun. Spun to the rhythm of drums. The world whirled before his eyes. His skin tingled, his breathing was short. He thought he saw Merlin from the shadows, looking at him with wide eyes, and Harry saw the green waters of a lake, saw a woman with gold dripping from her eyes. Memories flashed before his eyes, rose from the depths in a clamour. He was being pushed under, farther down, faster –

{. . .}

Months ago

He spent a miserable month roaming England, listless as a ghost. He felt out of his mind, blank with shock. He left Hogwarts with the clothes on his back, his sword and his wand. He turned his back on the castle, and walked, smelling the battlefield from the distance, its stench of blood and rotted flesh. He made his way to Stonehenge, Apparating as much as he could.  

He stayed at Stonehenge for weeks. He threw himself into work with grim dedication. He examined every inch of the stones. He fed them his magic. He poked and prodded, then he begged, and begged, and begged. He pleaded to every god that would listen. To be swept back home. He had enough. Of this time. Of getting attached, knowing full well he would lose everyone he met. He was tired of caring. Tired of wanting. Tired.

Tired.

The reality of Gytha's death caught up with him one balmy evening as the sun was setting, his stomach churning painfully with hunger. It was like losing Sirius all over again. His chest felt like a raw, gaping wound, and he could not stop bleeding. He curled up against an upturned stone and cried. He cried like a child, until his cheeks hurt with salt. Until he had no tears left to shed, and all he could do was ride out the great shudders that tore through him. It lasted all night, when finally he collapsed from exhaustion.

He woke to watch the sun rise, soft red and pale peach. He talked to Gytha, even though he knew she was not there to listen. He reminded himself of all the good memories he had of her. Teaching her to read and write. Hugging her as she grieved the loss of her family. Pulling pranks on Gryffindors. Hearing her complain about homework. All those quietly joyful moments in the common room. He asked for her forgiveness. He said his goodbyes.

By the time the sun had risen, Harry was at peace. His throat was desert-dry, his body hurt with hunger cramps, but the throbbing pain in his chest had changed. He wasn't alright, not by a long shot, but he was healing. Slowly. Painfully.

That same day, he gave up on Stonehenge. He could think of nothing else to do with it. He wished Hermione were there with him.

He went to the coast, and found odd jobs on the way. He spent two weeks helping a farmer with his fields. He bartended for a while, and beat a hasty retreat when he cursed a customer for having harassed one of the women he worked with. He hitched a ride to France, serving as deckhand on a merchant ship owned by Alfric's family.

He wandered. He made his way to southern France. He got acquainted with the magical community of Toulouse, an old, convoluted city of red bricks and cramped, timbered houses. There he met a vampire, a tall, wax-skinned man, lean as a greyhound. He gave Harry full access to his library. Harry spent some time in the vaulting, stretching aisles, copying a few texts he thought could be of interest. He discussed his time-travelling situation with Ambroise, which the vampire found endlessly entertaining. He proposed to Turn Harry, arguing that immortality was a way like any other to rejoin his timeline. Harry politely declined.

He continued on, crossing the Pyrenees onto Spain. He walked alone under the swollen blue skies, on golden-plains spread level, golden-tawny grass swaying in the wind, mystic patterns as wide as the world. Somewhere on a flatland tucked between mountain peaks and a powerful river, feeling utterly lost, utterly alone, Harry drew what felt like the first true breath of his life. He breathed lavender and river water, and felt the stretch of freedom in his lungs. With each day that passed since, he felt like he was meeting a little more of himself.

He was deep in Andalusia, glimpsing the sea, aquamarine clear as glass, when he happened upon Marya and her people. They took him in, offered him a job, and Harry -

Harry –

{. . .}

Harry was dimly aware of himself. Memories spun quicksilver-fast before his eyes. He did not know where he was, or who he was with. Urgent voices tried to coax him back to himself, but he was.

He was tending to Salazar's wounds, feeling the breath catch in his throat. He was confronting the tear in the Forest. Hermione screamed his name. Magic leaked from him like blood. There was something wrong with him. There was something wrong with him. There was –

He saw Runes flaring, a sear deep inside his skin. He saw time twist, bend, fracture, and it was terrible, and he was in the middle of it all. Cause and consequence looped around themselves, infinite. He heard the rumbling shift of the earth's plates, saw red-gurgling magma. He looked deep, deeper, to where the world cracked and was made of shadows. He saw inside of himself and he saw.

He Saw.

Harry broke from his trance, screaming.

Chapter Text

He laid on his back and felt beneath him the earth’s curvature, gentle as a pillowed bed. Above him stretched the night sky, a pool of black and endless stars. He felt the weight that held him down against soft soil, the pull that dragged him towards the darkened heavens. He lingered in-between, caught in immensities. He flexed his fingers against the damp grass, smearing dirt under his nails. He breathed out. Closed his eyes. From the earth’s belly came a note low as mountain’s roots, the hum of deep and ancient caves. In it was a touch of wrongness. He heard many-toothed things waiting with the hunger of starving wolves, their jaws bare and dripping. They crooned in the dark, and through it, their voices echoed.

“Merlin. There you are.”

He opened his eyes.

Cadmus looked down at him with a slanted smile. Death lingered on him like a cloak, kind as the hunter who snapped the wounded rabbit’s neck. Merling blinked and saw its soft and patient smile.

Cadmus held out a hand. “Come,” he said. “We’ll be late.”

Merlin clasped his wrist. They walked to the castle together, keeping close to each other’s side. The night was cool and damp, the air cloying with the musk of rotting leaves. Merlin could taste enchantments on his tongue, a metallic tang. Everything was alive in the chill wind. Tonight October came to an end, and they would feast to celebrate its passing.

There was a pull under Merlin’s ribs, behind his lungs. His heart sang with awareness. 

“Something is going to happen tonight,” he said to himself. Cadmus shot him a questioning glance. Merlin smiled. “A good thing, I think.”

They went through the Dungeons to the common room. The Slytherins had gathered together under the silvered lamps. Merlin’s year-mates, more numerous by far than the Second Years, had gathered at the end of the room. They sprawled together on the rugs and dark sofas, playing cards before the dark waters of the lake. Cadmus joined the game, and Merlin sat with him. 

He watched the Second Years, sat together around a low table, bent close to each other, their faces sombre. They formed a tight-knit group, the six of them, and though they guided the younger students through their time at Hogwarts, had not allowed for new additions to their ranks. They were better, stronger than Merlin’s year-mates, and some believed it the basis for their aloofness. Merlin knew better.

“It has been near a month,” Dallin said, his voice low. His hands were fisted on his lap. “I wish him back as much as the rest of you, you know I do, but have you considered he might need time . Away from us. From the memories of last summer. I wouldn’t blame him. And besides, what would you have us do? Go out into the world?”

“Do not, I beg you, put that idea to a vote,” Glenn said. “You know very well Alfric was rearing to leave within the first week of term.”

“I think he blames himself,” Audra said. “And thinks we blame him. For. For Gytha’s – ”

The girl’s jaws clenched. Bradley took her hand. Ashton leaned his head on her shoulder. No one spoke for a while. The First Years laughed and jostled each other. Merlin ached with sympathetic grief. A girl had died last summer, and all felt her absence like a wound.

“We need a way of contacting him,” Bradley said. “I know you asked Lord Salazar before the summer, Alfric, but in the meanwhile perhaps Harry – ”

“Harry,” Merlin said. He saw green eyes, a kind smile, a feeling like a door closing. His chest strummed. “Harry Potter.”

As one, the Second Years swung to look at him. Merlin shrank away from their stare. 

“It’s Merlin, isn’t it,” said the eldest of the group. Tall and blond, Alfric was sixteen and near a man. He pinned Merlin down with cool blue eyes. Merlin saw the stillness of a snake before it struck, and wanted to hide from his gaze. “Come join us, lad.”

Merlin rose on shaky legs.

“Sit,” Glenn said. He kicked out a chair. Even he looked stern, his usually smirking mouth held still.

Merlin sat.

“Talk, boy,” Audra said. “How do you know his full name?”

I have known it always , Merlin thought, and swallowed the words.

“He saved my life,” he said. “Two months past.”

He told them his story. About caring for himself in the hut he and his mother once shared. He told them about being found after a long year of loneliness. A long year of waiting. He talked about the church, about falling into drugged sleep, and waking to Harry’s hand on his arm. Green eyes. A kind smile. A feeling like the earth and sky collapsing together. 

“And then?” the Slytherins asked. “What happened then?”

Then Harry took him deep into the woods. To a Druid camp. He danced to their music. Sat around their fire. He ate their meat and drank their wine. He fell into drugged sleep, and dreamt of things to come. In the morning he had gone.

“He was well,” Merlin said. “Otherwise I would have known.”

The Slytherins exchanged heavy looks. Here was the stillness again. Snakes, coiled to strike.

They trooped to the Great Hall together, walking through the castle’s shadows without bothering to light the lamps. Tinsels of wheat and holly wreaths hung on the walls and staircase railings. Suits of armour wore crowns of late-harvest flowers, blooms of reds and fleshy pinks. 

The Hall was full, all students having come at the appointed time. Voices rose in an indistinct mass, laughter, the sound of cutlery. At the end of the Hall under its stained glass windows sat the teachers, all six of them, the Founders in the middle. Merlin watched Lord Slytherin. He conversed with Lady Hufflepuff at his left, his head bent toward hers, a faint smile on his lips. He had his hair in a thick plait tonight, in the style of Northern warriors. His skin was pale as snow, even under the warm candle light. Merlin thought he looked tired.

“He’s lost weight,” Dallin said. Merlin looked over his shoulder, but the boy addressed Alfric, his lips pinched tight. “Been working on something since the start of term, disappearing for hours. Might have to do something about it, since Harry isn’t there to deal with him.”

“I’m sure Lord Salazar knows his own limits,” Alfric said.

Dallin snorted.

“And besides,” Alfric said. “Harry is worse than he is.”

They sat together at their table, and the feast was brought up. Merlin ate without tasting, the food like ash on his tongue. He thrummed with restlessness. Conversation washed over him in a buzzing background noise. He was aware of the heart beating in his chest, of the Earth’s pull beneath his feet. Ghosts fanned behind him like a banner in the breeze, their breaths a cold caress on his nape. Tonight was Samhain, and magic sat thick in the air.

“Merlin.”

He heard bells ringing from the depths. He saw the waters of a lake, green as snake scales, rampant with life. The slow drip of hot metal. Gold shaping itself into a crown. He could taste minerals on his tongue and a clean, chemical heat. The scent of a storm before it fell.

“Merlin.” Cadmus touched his arm. “Are you well? You’re pale as a sheet.”

A sword. A stone.

“Arthur,” Merlin said. His head swam. “There you are.”

The Great Hall doors opened.

Silence fell like a knell.

In the entrance was a man. Merlin had known him always. Green eyes, he thought. A kind smile.

Harry stood tall and strong. His silhouette cut shadows on the Great Hall floors. His skin was darkly brown and slick with rain. The reddish-pink of diluted blood stained his shirt. Merlin drank the sight of him as a man dying of thirst.

Alfric rose to his feet. He detached himself from the table. His footfalls were the only sound in the thick silence.

“Harry,” he said, brokenly.

Harry smiled. He said, “Hello, love.”

There was an uproar. Everyone started talking at once. The Second Years of all Houses shouted questions and joyous greetings. The younger students turned to each other in confusion. Alfric ignored it all. He went to Harry, and Harry went to him. They met in the middle. Merlin watched Alfric throw himself in Harry’s arms. Watched him bury his face in Harry’s shoulder, fist his hands in Harry’s shirt. Harry caught him around the waist and bore his weight. He talked in Alfric’s hair. Merlin’s hands ached.

They were soon joined by the other Slytherins. Glenn embraced Harry and Alfric both, laughing. He drew the others with him, and they melted into the touch. They breathed together. Their voices overlapped. Harry raised his head, flushed and grinning, and answered the questions tumbling from their lips. They clung together, puzzle pieces made into a whole.

A small, dark-haired boy pushed past the tangle of bodies, rushed into Harry’s arms. Cadmus’s younger brother, his shadow many-toothed and clawed. Harry went on his knees and lifted him off the ground.

“I’m sorry,” he said as Ignotus hugged his throat tight. “I’m sorry I left. I’m sorry.”

“You won’t leave again?”

“I don’t know, sweeting. Not too soon, I don’t think.”

The ground splintered like thin ice under Harry’s feet, and Merlin thought, not all promises can be kept.

Harry set Ignotus down, ruffled the boy’s hair. He closed his eyes and breathed deep. Around him, the Slytherins grew quiet. They touched his back, his arms, then loosened their hold on him. Merlin watched Harry’s throat work, a painful up-and-down, before he straightened and turned toward the Head table.

Lord Slytherin had risen from his chair.

He watched Harry, his skin white as bone, his eyes pale as silver coins. Merlin could see the rapid rise and fall of his chest.

Harry watched him in turn, and when he stepped toward him, he stepped alone. His eyes never strayed.

Lord Slytherin met him in the aisle between the House tables. They both moved as through a dream. As though the world had ceased to exist, and they were the only people left in the room.

Harry bowed, deep and easy, and Lord Slytherin clasped his hands behind his back, the fingers white and bloodless.

“My lord,” Harry said.

He straightened, and Lord Slytherin bent at the waist. He tucked himself into a bow as low as Harry’s, his back a graceful curve. Harry sucked a sharp breath. His arm half-rose before he forced it to stillness. Lord Slytherin watched him, and did not move.

“My dear,” he said, his neck bared, his eyes on Harry’s face. “Welcome back.”

{. . .}

The door to Harry’s bedroom closed behind him, and left him cloaked in silence.

He leaned against the wall. A hand went to his mouth. Trembling. He felt drunk. He was aware of his lips. His tongue. His chest burned, and his gut roiled with a shaky, squirming heat.

I want him, he thought, delirious. I want him, gods help me, I want him.

He closed his eyes and forced a slow, even breath. He smelled stone, wood, laundry soap, and beneath it, the green, watery scent of the Lake. For the first time in long months, something went out of him, and breathing came easier.

His bedroom remained as he had left it. His cauldron and potions tools were still tucked in the left-side corner. Books laid open on his bedside table while rolls of parchment littered his desk. His cloak was draped over the chair. The Slytherin banner he made as a joke still hung from the wall, and the fairy lights his House-mates gifted him coiled around his bedposts.

Harry watched it all, his throat tight. It felt like home. 

He dropped his sword and rucksack on the ground, and padded to the bathroom. He bathed in hot water for the first time in months, and washed the sweat and road dirt from his skin. Soap stung the fresh scar curling along his ribs. The skin was still red and inflamed. He had done a shoddy job healing it.

He rose from the water, droplets and soap suds sluicing off of him. Harry saw the distorted reflection of himself in the darkened bathroom windows. He frowned, noting the width of his shoulders, the stretch of his own body. He conjured a mirror. 

For one dizzying moment, Harry did not recognize the man facing him. His own eyes, green as seaglass, green as his mother’s, stared at him in confusion.

He had grown. 

In his year here he had grown. His chest had broadened, his shoulders squared. Harry watched the muscles of his arms, the lean definition of his stomach. He had a swordsman's build. Harry had come to this time a teenager, lanky and underfed. Now a man looked back at him. His cheekbones stood sharper, his jawline more pronounced. A dusting of stubble covered his cheeks and upper lip.

Harry wondered when he had grown into himself.

He dressed in warm clothes and left his rooms.

A scattering of students lingered in the common room. New faces of all ages. The numbers of Slytherin House had increased threefold during the summer. The common room was more crowded than it had ever been. Harry’s friends sat together at the other end of the room. Dallin and Audra shared a window seat while the others were pressed together on a wide couch. They, too, had grown since Harry had last seen them, shooting up like weeds, all adolescent lankiness. Harry turned away from them, and, keeping to the shadows, slipped out into the night.

Though he had never been there, he knew the way to Salazar’s rooms, and found the door before long.

His heart hammered. He was aware of himself. Of his skin. He thought about the man staring back at him in the bathroom mirror, and straightened his back. He knocked.

The door opened.

Salazar has shed his cloak and surcoat, was dressed down to his shirt, the sleeves rolled to his elbows. His hair was still tied away from his face, baring its slants and gentle curves.

Beautiful , Harry thought.

"May I come in?" he said.

Salazar moved aside. "By all means."

Harry passed him in the threshold, and did not bend toward his warmth.

Salazar's private quarters were well-furbished. Candles and oil lanterns gave the place a warm glow. The main area was wide and welcoming, a sofa facing the depths of the Lake, plush armchairs on either side of a roaring fire, a low table set on a thick silver-threaded rug. The walls were covered in rich, foreign tapestries. Bookshelves groaned under the weight of old-looking books and journals, and an odd assortment of exotic objects.

Salazar closed the door.

There was a moment when neither of them spoke. Harry faced the room. He watched the dark swaying of the lake and did not see it. Salazar was at his back, and Harry’s neck prickled. Silence sat between them like a physical thing.

Salazar breathed a soft sigh.

“Would you care for a drink?”

“Gods, yes,” Harry said.

Salazar walked to his library. He extracted a bottle from its depths, produced two deep cups, and poured two generous measures of an alcohol Harry did not recognize, darkly umber, thick as honey. Salazar handed Harry one of the cups. The firelight made his eyes a dark, liquid grey. Their fingers brushed.

“Have a seat.”

Salazar sat on the couch facing the fire. Harry chose one of the armchairs. It felt safer.

Neither of them drank.

“You came back,” Salazar said. “I was not certain you would. Did you find what you were looking for?”

Harry’s fingers tightened around his cup. He looked at the liquid inside, catching firelight in warm orange shimmers. “I don’t know,” he said, slowly. “That I was looking for something. So much as I was. Fleeing something else.”

“You were frightened,” Salazar said. “When last we saw each other.”

“I still am.”

“Running did not work.”

“No. No, it didn’t.”

“Tell me what it was.” Salazar caught Harry’s eyes. “I may help. And you must name a thing to kill it.”

Harry smiled. “I missed you,” he said. “How was your summer?”

“I am more interested in yours by far.”

“How about a trade,” Harry said. “A story for a story.”

Salazar leaned back against the couch. “Be careful, my friend,” he said, “with whom you make bargains. I will demand equal value for what I share, and nothing less.”

Harry raised his cup. “Then you’ll have to start,” he said, and drank. The mead spread warmth as it sluiced down his throat, honey-sweet, tanged with late-harvest fruits.

“I retraced the steps to my home,” Salazar said. “And met with a lover I had not seen since I was a young man.”

“Oh,” Harry said.

“We shared hearth and bed so long as my duties permitted it. I left knowing we would likely never meet again.”

"Would you not want to?"

Salazar smiled. "A story for a story," he said. "Of equal value, if it please you."

"Right." Harry gathered himself, and did not think about Salazar, in bed with an old love. "I took the boy Merlin to the Druids after we rescued him."

"So you told me."

"Do you know the woman Gwenshlean?"

Salazar tensed for the briefest moment, his back straight, his eyes narrowed, before he wiped the expression from himself again. "I know her," he said. "She is accomplished in their ways."

"I told her I wanted answers," Harry said. "So we danced together, and she gave me something to drink. I saw." Harry swallowed. He finished his mead. "I saw myself suspended in mist. Standing on the frozen surface of a lake. But it wasn't water under the ice. It was. Something else. Something dark and alive and -" He paused.

"Yes?"

"Hungry."

Salazar fetched the bottle of mead. He served Harry another cup, then downed his own. Harry watched his throat work, and held himself still. Every breath he took wanted to tremble on the way out. He watched the spread of Salazar’s legs, the supine arch of his back. His mouth was dry. He brought the cup to his mouth and drank deep.

"I think there's something wrong with me," he said. "With me being here."

“Yes,” Salazar said. “I rather think there is.”

Harry snorted. “You’ll have to elaborate on that, love.”

Harry bit his tongue so hard he tasted blood. He kept himself from wincing by an effort of will, kept his expression pleasant, his posture easy.

Salazar gave a slow blink. “I followed your path through the forest,” he said. “Before I left for the summer. I tracked your way to the clearing where you battled darkness.”

“What did you find?”

“I found you,” Salazar said softly. “And a chorus of absences. Whatever it was you faced, it was not of this world. A gateway was made for it to climb through. I.” Salazar paused, and Harry found himself tensing in the silence. “I hoped I was wrong. Merciful gods, Harry. Do you understand what it may mean?”

“I don’t belong here,” Harry said. His hands had gone numb. He felt sick. “My vision. The ice fracturing under my feet. The gateway. I could be the cause for it. The cause for. The reason Gytha is – ”

“No,” Salazar said fiercely, and he reached through the gap between them, encircled Harry’s wrist in his hand. “Do not let yourself think it. Not for one moment.” His fingers tightened on Harry’s wrist. “The men who killed her made their own choices, and it led them to their grave.”

“It could happen again,” Harry said. “I could be a danger for everyone here. I – ”

He made to rise to his feet, but Salazar rose with him. He put a hand on Harry’s chest and pushed him back into his chair. 

“I will not,” he said. “Let you leave again. Not for so paltry a reason, while you have just been returned to me.”

Harry watched him with wide eyes, his breathing fast. Salazar towered over him, his knee between Harry’s legs, his hand flat on Harry’s ribs. Against Harry’s heart.

“Paltry?” Harry tried to rise again, but Salazar bore down on him, pinned him in place. “Salazar. You didn’t see. You weren’t there. It’s a miracle this thing didn’t kill me. I’m a threat to everyone in this castle. I can’t just stay – ”

“I have reinforced our wards, and reinforced them again,” Salazar said. “There is the combined might of Godric, Helga, Rowena and I behind the magic which shields us. It is no small thing. You’re safe here. The wards will hold so long as they must. Nothing so nefarious as this darkness will gain entry, and they will hide you besides. You are less of a threat here, Harry, than you would be out in the world.”

“You’re a liar and we both know it.”

“Not on this,” Salazar said. “I swear it.”

Harry laid his hand atop Salazar’s, trapped it against his body. He met Salazar’s eyes. “I want to trust you so badly,” he said. “Everything in me wishes it.”

“Please,” Salazar said, and Harry sucked a sharp breath. “You need not trust me to see the sense in what I tell you. Only listen to reason. We made great progress, you and I, in our research to send you back to your own time. We can redouble our efforts. Here you have food, shelter, and the means to learn.”

Harry watched him for long moments. “All right,” he said at length. “All right.”

Salazar gave a tight nod. He stepped back. His hand left Harry’s chest, and Harry did not chase after it.

“I need a drink,” Harry said.

Salazar smiled.

Chapter Text

Harry very carefully levelled an eyelid, then let it fall shut again. His head sliced with pain. It felt as though the inner surface of his skull was being pounded on with roofing nails. His mouth was stuffy and dry. He was well and truly hungover, and, judging from the way the mattress spun under him, still a bit drunk. He rolled on his stomach with a groan. A lazy, mellow warmth tightened his belly.

He could hear the lake, soothing underwater sounds. A faint shimmer of light pierced through his eyelids. He buried his face in the pillow.

He froze.

The scent.

The scent on the pillow was not his own. Green and crisp, potion’s herbs smeared on long fingers, the rich, woody tang of vetiver and juniper, the sweetness of bay leaves and mint. Beneath it was the darker, warmer musk of a man’s skin, of soap and clean sweat. Salazar. It was Salazar’s smell, and Harry wanted to scent it like a dog.

The vague, directionless arousal in his belly focused, sharpened, and Harry found himself half-hard, his whole body coming alive. He saw dark hair, pale eyes and paler skin. He thought about a hand on his chest, the ghost of a touch. His hips rolled down, instinctive and mindless, and the pleasure sparking like fire-crackers at the base of his spine, at long last forced him awake.

He opened his eyes, and for one hazy moment, did not recognise the room. The bed was larger, the room more spacious. Harry watched the light slant from a set of windows, and understood.

He was in Salazar’s bed.

His heart drummed in his chest. His breathing came hard and fast.

He was in Salazar’s bed, and could not remember how he had gotten there.

He staggered out of the bed, disentangling his legs from the sheets. He was alone in the room, everything peaceful in the muted morning light. He wondered where Salazar was. The pillow on the other side of the bed was fluffled, the sheets tidy. No one had slept on it.

Harry breathed through his nose against the hard knot of panic in his chest. His head pounded with pain. He desperately needed to drink water.

He stood bare-footed, dressed down to his trousers and undershirt. He padded around the bed, and found his clothes folded on a chair in the corner. He dressed quickly, sloppily, his fingers unsure of themselves, on the verge of shaking. He combed a hand through his hair, and made himself face the bedroom door. 

He opened it carefully, and stepped out.

Salazar sat bent at his desk. His quill moved over a roll of parchment, trailing ink. He looked up as Harry moved into the room. He watched Harry, and his quill stopped moving. Harry grew aware of himself. Of his rumpled, hastily put-on clothes, of his hair sticking up at odd angles. He felt bleary, barely awake. He thought about Salazar’s scent on him. His face in Salazar’s pillow, and his hips, bearing down. His cheeks burned.

Salazar’s eyes crinkled in a smile. “Good morning,” he said. Harry could see his collarbone through the open neck of his shirt, and thought he might die if he did not put his mouth to it. “How did you sleep?”

Harry rallied valiantly. “Like the dead,” he said. “Did I – ” He cleared his throat. “Did I steal your bed?”

“Hardly,” Salazar said. He blotted the fresh ink on his work, and rose from his desk. “I put you there,” he said, mild as milk. “You cannot steal what is freely given.”

Harry swallowed thickly. He saw a flash of memory, of languid clumsiness and a slow stumble to the bedroom, Salazar’s arm around him, his side against Harry’s. The whole world swayed under their feet, but they held each other steady.

“Bloody hell,” Harry said. 

Salazar smiled. “How’s the head?”

“Dreadful,” Harry said.

“Come and eat.” Salazar gestured at the low table. It was laden with a breakfast spread - toasted bread and freshly-churned butter, darkly-golden honey, porridge, fruits, eggs and cheeses. “I believe we could both use the nourishment.”

Harry joined him at the table. The fire had been built afresh, and the flames crackled merrily.

“Don’t you have classes?” Harry asked.

“I called in sick,” Salazar said. “Helga will cover the first hours for me.”

Harry made himself a toast with butter and a generous dollop of honey. He wolfed it down, and reached for another. He had not eaten since yesterday’s midday meal, dried meat and a handful of wrinkled dates.

“Oh,” he said. “By the way. Don’t worry if you find Thestrals in your backyard. I rode one to get here, and I think she called the herd to her. Seemed to like the forest. Don’t know that they’ll leave any time soon.”

Salazar slanted him an amused look. “You would know, wouldn’t you. If I may ask. Where were you, to make friends with such beasts?”

Harry hesitated. “The Black Sea,” he said. “A small village hugging the shore. I’d been thinking about leaving for a while. Since we went to the Druids, really.”

“What made you take the decision?”

“I – ” Harry reached for a steaming cup of barley water, and drank. His throat felt tight. “The village had a small wizarding community. Children mostly. A few adults banded together to look after them. Much like what you’re doing here, but out in the open.”

Salazar closed his eyes.

“It was bad, Salazar. They called for us in a panic, and we didn’t get there on time. Bodies. Bodies everywhere. The whole village aflame.” Harry shuddered. He could smell charred meat, the heavy tang of blood. “I very nearly lost it. My magic – I could have hurt someone. After, the only thing I wanted was to go home. So I came here.”

“Harry – ”

“It made me realise,” Harry said. “Just how precious Hogwarts is. What it represents for our people. I wanted to come back to you, and help you keep it safe.”

Salazar nodded. “Then this, I think, is as good a time as any to discuss your place amongst us.”

{. . .}

It was near midday by the time Harry left the Dungeons. The air was crisp and clear, a beautiful autumn day. He walked Hogwarts’ colonnades and breathed it deep. It felt good to be home. 

He found Godric in the middle courtyard, rearranging training dummies, stacking swords and spears on the weapons racks. Harry stepped beside him and helped him work. Godric acknowledged his presence with a bow of his head.

“Talked to Salazar, did you,” Godric said. 

“He told me to report to you,” Harry said. “Said I should talk to you about teaching.” He paused. “Your wife sends her love.”

 “I understand not all things you saw this summer were pleasant.”

“No,” Harry said. “They weren’t.”

“I also understand you carried yourself admirably. Marya will be sorry to see you go.” Godric leaned both his arms on a training pole and flashed him a grin. “I, however, am delighted by your decision. Will you stay long, do you think?”

“As long as I can. I – ” Harry forced himself to meet Godric’s eyes. “I needed some time. To figure myself out. To. To grieve. But my place will always be here, in one form or another.”

“Good,” Godric said. “I’ve no time to waste on an apprentice who cannot commit to his own path.”

Harry blinked. “Apprentice?” He understood the word held a particular significance amongst wizards. Salazar told him of his own master, and the bond between them.

“What is it you think you are, boy? Do you know of any student I agreed to training the way I train you?”

“No, sir.”

“I will expect you to attend physical preparation each morning with everyone else. But you shan’t sit my classes as a student any longer. You’ve long since outgrown them. You’ll assist me instead.” Godric paused. “In time, I will give you your own lessons to teach.”

Harry’s heart beat in his throat. “Sir, I – ” He cut himself. He straightened, and bowed deep. “It will be my honour. Thank you. I won’t fail you.”

Godric gave an approving nod. “Training resumes tonight. I hope you’ve not rusted too much in your months away.” He gave a smile, and gripped Harry’s shoulder with a broad hand. “It’s good to have you back, lad. Now help me finish with this, then go seek your friends. I understand they were looking for you.”

Harry went from Godric’s side directly to the Great Hall. He followed groups of students making their way to lunch. They spared him curious glances, but kept away.

Despite the new students, the Great Hall was far from crowded. Still, it was good to see the House tables fuller than last year. It was a step in the right direction. Times, changing.

“Harry!”

Harry turned toward the Slytherin table and smiled. His friends sat together at the end of the bench closest to the Head table. Audra pushed a First year as Harry approached, making room for him beside Alfric. She gave an imperious tilt of her chin, and Harry sat between them dutifully.

“Where,” Dallin said in clipped tones, “have you been?”

Alfric leaned his shoulder against Harry’s.

“With Godric,” Harry said. “Some things he and I needed to talk about.”

“And last night?” Audra asked. “You never made it to your room. We had alarms set up.”

Harry cleared his throat, and did not think about Salazar’s bedroom in the early morning. “I was with Salazar.”

“All night?” Audra said silkily.

“Audra,” Alfric said.

“Got pissing drunk,” Harry said. “Listen. I - this probably isn’t the best moment, but. I wanted to apologise. For leaving the way I did. It wasn’t fair of me to do that to you. I wasn’t there when you needed me. I just. I couldn’t. I have no excuse.”

His friends exchanged heavy glances.

“Harry,” Alfric said. “You have to know. None of us here blame you for what happened to Gytha. And we. We understand. That you needed time. We did as well. It was a long summer.”

“We didn’t like you leaving,” Glenn said. “I beg of you, do not do it again. Dallin might burst a vein. But do not think we hold any rancour against you.”

“You saved our lives, Harry,” Bradley said. “That night, you likely saved the school. You went beyond your duty, when we are not beside yours to look after.”

“Of course you are,” Harry said. He gave a tremulous smile. “And it might even be made official in the next few days.”

Dallin narrowed his eyes at him. “How do you mean?”

“You’ll see.”

The food was brought up, and they moved on to other subjects. Ignotus pushed his way under the table and onto Harry’s lap. He kicked his legs in Harry’s shins, but Harry found himself much too glad to be seeing the boy again to tell him off for eating like a much younger child on his father’s knees.

"So," he said. "Tell me about the new staff."

“There’s three of them,” Glenn said promptly. “Two teachers and a groundskeeper.”

“And?”

Glenn grinned. “They’re not the Founders, I’ll tell you that.”

“They’re fine,” Audra said, rolling her eyes. “Skilled at their craft, and anxious to teach us well. They are not, it’s true, the Founders, but I imagine very few in the Isles are a match for them.”

“The woman took Runes from the lady Hufflepuff,” Dallin said. “The man is here to teach their numbers and letters to those who arrive illiterate. Latin for the rest of us. He also assists Lord Slytherin in Potions.”

“I see,” Harry said.

After lunch, Harry did not follow his year-mates to class. He spent most of his afternoon meandering through the castle, reacquainting himself with her. He went to visit the Thestrals, bringing offerings of red meat with him. The herd had grown during the night. Three foals chased after each other through the forest tree.

His House-mates joined him in the late afternoon. They greeted the Thestrals with awed respect. Harry taught them to fly, and they went laughing full-throated into the wind. Together, they walked the lake shores by the burnished light of the setting sun, and shared summer stories as dusk fell into night. They stole food from the kitchens and ate on the common room rugs. There they stayed until late into the night.

Harry staggered into bed exhausted but happy, at peace as he had not been in long months.

In his sleep, as always, darkness waited to greet him.

{. . .}

In the darkness, the world was a dream, was smoke on fingertips. It might never have existed at all. Darkness was all there was. He walked it without aim, and something walked it with him.

He no longer knew how long he had lingered here, in this in-between place. Time was meaningless, a non-concept. He might have been born in the deep and endless dark. In it he would surely die. 

He had once had a name, he thought, but could no longer recall it to himself. 

He walked. With each step he lost himself a little more. Behind him, the old and terrible presence walked apace.

One day he saw light.

Sunlight, he thought, dumbly, and with this knowledge came a host of sweet memories. With sunlight, he knew, came warmth. He oriented himself towards it with a blind man’s surety. The presence followed.

His heart pounded like a drum in the recesses of his chest. He had a heart. He remembered now. He was a being of breath and blood. He had a man’s body and a man’s flesh. He was aware of himself for the first time in a long while, and awareness came with its host of hurts.

The presence lumbered closer. He picked up the pace.

He rediscovered words the closer he came to the light. He rediscovered pain, in his legs, in his joints and lungs. He rediscovered fear. Hope.

He relearned hope, and sobbed for the wonder and terror of it.

Behind him, the thing extended a many-jointed arm. He felt a touch on his shoulder, cold and rotten, and he ducked under it, running at full speed, and the light was here, it was right here, and he –

He jostled awake.

The sky was tumultuous and rain-heavy and the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. Two ravens circled overhead. He felt soft soil at his back, and he raked his nails through the dirt, gasping in sheer relief. He could smell wet grass and the rich, wooden rot of autumn days. Wind touched his thin, touch-starved skin, clean and damp. His lungs burned as though he had never drawn breath before.  His eyes stung from too much brightness. He was shaking.

He did not know where he was, but he could see the sky, and found he did not care. He was. 

He was alive.

He rolled to his feet, eventually, trembling with rebirth. Wilderness spanned around him. He saw bare, rolling hills and the slopes of great mountains in the distance, high peaks swallowed in morose clouds. Smoke rose in lazy plums down in the valley. A small village was nestled in its crook. The houses were a cluster of huts and hovels.

People, he thought. There would be people there.

He took half a stumbling step toward the village, then stopped himself. Something was off. About the houses, the shape and size of them. Uneasiness seized him, and he swayed on the spot. He was no one and knew nothing. He was cold and hungry and newly born. He did not know what to do.

He blinked, and saw a thousand candles burning a rich glow. Red and gold in a summer breeze; the distant echo of laughter on dark stone. Warm wood the colour of thick honey. Mountains. High peaks swallowed in clouds.

He had forgotten himself down to his own name, but still, he knew the way home. 

He turned his back to the village, and, nodding to himself, he started walking.

Chapter Text

Harry was put to work.

He followed Godric like a shadow, and stood at his shoulder as he gave class. They planned lessons together, graded essays, and Godric taught Harry everything he knew. Aside from physical training every morning, Harry no longer attended Defence classes. Instead Godric took him aside, and taught him spells he would not show the younger students. He took up Harry’s sword training. They fought with blade and wand, and Harry sharpened with each lesson. Then it was Helga’s turn, Rowena’s or Salazar’s. They fought him to tameness, taught him skill and ruthlessness. Harry grew in strength, in speed and power. In the evenings, he practised what he had learned in the day until he fell on his knees for exhaustion.

He attended his other classes, but there, too, the Founders isolated him. Harry assisted them in Charms, in Potions and Transfiguration. He spent more time behind the teacher’s desk than in front of it.

Godric left him to teach his first class on an autumn afternoon. Harry faced the students alone and wondered, dimly, when he had started to think of them as children. He taught them the theory for the Shield Charm, then paired them off for practice. Teaching came easily to him. He was reminded of his days with the DA, and smiled through the bittersweet ache. Professor, the children called him, and the title fitted his shoulders like a well-worn cloak.

Harry told Salazar about it, later that night, the two of them stilted in the middle of their research, made numb by tiredness. They were in Salazar’s office, books arrayed around them by the dozens. They shared wine and let the conversation meander, an easy back and forth. 

“We may need to make an announcement of it,” Salazar said. “It is not right for you to sit with the students as their peer, when you no longer are.”

“I don’t mind it,” Harry said. “It’s just strange, to hear them talk to me the way they talk to you.”

The next day at dinner, Salazar stood from his chair and said, “As most of you have surely noticed, Harry Potter has taken new responsibilities since his return amongst us. It is my pleasure to announce that, though you will find him still in some of your classes, he will, from now on, fulfil a teacher’s duties. I will ask you show him the respect he is due. Harry, if you would join us.”

Harry rose from the Slytherin table as everyone clapped and cheered. His friends hooted louder than the rest, banging the table with their fists. Salazar watched him with a smile in his eyes, and inclined his head as Harry joined him at the Head table.

“Professor,” he said in a low voice. “Congratulations.”

Harry sat at his side. His cheeks ached from grinning.

The Slytherins threw a party that night. They procured ale and wine, and brought food from the kitchens. Harry conjured music, a low thrum of drums and lutes, and celebrated with everyone else. He talked to the new Slytherins, who grinned with pride and offered congratulations. He danced with his friends until they sprawled, breathless, on the common room rugs, laughing, laughing, laughing. The party carried on well past midnight. Harry shooed the last of the students to their dormitories, and was the last to go to bed.

He juggled his responsibilities with homework and time spent with his friends, and enjoyed every moment of it.

"Do you ever sleep?" his friends asked him, one part worried and three parts amused.

"I certainly try .”

He dreamt strange dreams for nights on end, old nightmares fighting for space amongst visions of darkness and a woman in the mist, gold dripping from her eyes. Harry had dreamt about Sirius every night since he came back to Hogwarts. He saw the Veil, and Sirius falling through it. He heard Sirius’ voice, and woke in cold sweat in the small hours of the morning.

{. . .}

The days blurred together in an easy routine. Harry grew into his new role, and the students took him in stride. Salazar kept the promise he made on Harry’s first night back, and together, they discussed ways to send Harry back to his own time. They built wards and spell graphs, and made slow, ponderous progress.

Salazar sometimes disappeared for hours at a time. Harry searched, and could not find him.

“Where were you?”  Harry asked when he resurfaced, smelling of stone dust, weariness deeply set under his eyes.

“You’ll see,” Salazar said.

“Whatever it is, you’re running yourself ragged. Careful, Salazar.”

“My dear,” Salazar said. “I do not believe you are one to talk.”

Harry watched him closely, but let the matter drop.

Helga had started building greenhouses south-east of the grounds. Sundays were the only rest days of the week. Harry helped her then, and whenever he had a lunch hour to spare. Together, they levelled the terrain and laid the foundations, then, after long days of hard work, started on the framework, an ornate thing of stone and curved iron. Harry enjoyed the simple, physical work, seeing something grow from his hands. He carved decorative detailing on the stonework, and smiled to himself.

He and Helga transfigured sand from the Lake floor into sheets of glass, and set them, carefully, into the greenhouse’s walls and roof.

With one greenhouse done and two more to go, Helga decided on a break. She and Harry spent time making work tables and raised beds for the plants. They filled the beds with soil, and Helga started moving her plants, setting them in neat rows. Soon enough, the greenhouse crawled with fat, twisting vines and flowers in heavy bloom, with thickly-scented herbs and blankets of multi-coloured mushrooms. The smell of soil and green life sat thick in the air. 

One Sunday, Harry arrived early in the morning, two apples stuck in his pockets and a slice of honeyed bread in his mouth. It was half-dark, dawn breaking timidly over the mountains in blues and light greys. Dark rainclouds filled the sky from end to end, and the autumn air carried the first bite of winter. Harry finished the last of his bread as he crossed the grounds, the grass slick under his boots. The greenhouse gave a golden, oil-lamp glow in the pre-dawn blue.

Harry approached, and, looking through the fogged, dewy glass, stopped mid-step.

Helga and Rowena were inside. Rowena leaned against a table, both hands braced behind her as she watched Helga work. Helga carried a potted plant in her arms and talked to her. Harry could not make out the words. What arrested him lay in the bend of Rowena’s body. In the way she looked at Helga. Tenderness, Harry thought. Fondness beyond words. His heart drummed in his throat.

As he watched, Helga set her plant on a workbench, and, laughing, went to Rowena. She stepped between Rowena’s legs, hooked a thumb under Rowena’s chin, and kissed her deep. Rowena swayed into the touch with her whole self. She set hands on Helga’s hips and pulled her close. She smiled against Helga’s mouth, soft and wondrous, and Harry – 

Harry turned on his heels, and he fled.

He fled all the way back to the castle. He walked empty corridors and did not see them. A great blankness had fallen over him. His stomach ached. He was aware of nothing but the dull pound of blood in his ears. He kept seeing the way Rowena went into the kiss. The openness in her, the ease. 

Harry plunged into the Dungeons’ darkness, and went looking for Salazar. He burned, his skin hot as though he had caught a fever. He needed to ask. He needed to know .

He knocked on Salazar’s door, but no one answered. Harry closed his eyes. He sought the afterimage of Salazar’s presence.  Brine and cool ocean depths; pillars of green salt breaking the waves. Sunken palaces lying on shell-littered floors, sodden and unexplored. Smooth-scaled sea-creatures with timeless silver gazes. Harry chased Salazar’s ghost, followed its path to the ground floor, then up several flights of stairs. He stopped, puzzled, inside a bare Second Floor room. There was nothing here, the room yet unused. It bore a familiar air.

Harry turned on himself, frowning. He had been here before, he was sure of it. It hit him as he faced away from the narrow, slitted windows. He saw the room in full, its shape and size, the way its walls curved, the decorations on its pillars.  

“Oh,” he said, and he staggered where he stood, his legs gone weak. He wanted to vomit. “No.”

He knew where he was. He knew what laid beneath the floor.

As if in a trance, he walked to the circular stone slab that marked the centre of the room. He waved his wand. Harry watched, a scream trapped behind his teeth, as the slab moved, down and to the side. It revealed the opening of a tunnel wide enough for a man to squeeze through.

For the second time in his life, he stared down the entrance of the Chamber of Secrets.

He had known, somewhere, somehow, the day would come when his feelings for Salazar would meet the reality of him. History was set in stone, and Harry had walked its lines and looping letters. He had hoped. Fool that he was, he had hoped , and cloaked himself in willful blindness. 

A gust of cool, damp air rose from the tunnel depths. 

Myrtle would die here, and would never move on from this room. Sbe would linger in the air, the monochrome shell of the girl she had once been. Harry would hold Ginny through the night as she trashed in his arms, caught in nightmares of green scales and golden eyes. He remembered the look of awful terror frozen on Hermione's face, the iciness of her skin. He stared down the Chamber’s entrance, and understood his friends would be scared for his weakness. 

Harry sat on his haunches, and put his head in his knees. His forearm ached where a Basilisk fang once pierced the flesh.

There was much he could forgive, he thought, but the death of children was beyond him.

He clenched his jaw, and willed his spinning, spiralling thoughts to still. 

The ugly truth was, he called Salazar a friend. Harry, in spite of himself, trusted him. Salazar held every trait of his House, ambition and cunning and ruthlessness, but he was also passionate and kind, and Harry could not believe he would build the Chamber of Secrets in the name of blood purity.

Harry also understood he could not trust himself where Salazar was concerned. Not when he wanted with every inch of himself to make a lover of him.

"Fuck," he whispered, and scrubbed a hand through his hair.

He would have to ask. 

He would have to stand before Salazar, and ask.

Harry wondered, briefly, morbidly, whether the answer would change anything. Either way people would die. Either way, his feelings toward Salazar would not change. Looking down at the Chamber, he understood at long last how deeply ran his affection. It was carved into the marrow of him, irrevocable as the scar on his forehead. Salazar had clawed fingers through his chest, and now held his heart in a firm, fist-sized grip. 

Harry stood. He approached the entrance. He looked down the long length of the tunnel, and willed himself to take that last step. To let himself fall into the dark. Everything in him rebelled at the thought of a broken heart. He fought his every instinct, and inched closer. 

The door behind him swung open, and Harry jumped, his heart racing. He was almost tipped into the pit when the sparkling tail of a spell rushed past him. It plunged into the tunnel and out of sight, trailing light. It must have sensed Harry's presence, because as its last sparks sputtered and died, words assembled before Harry's eyes, leaving a message to glimmer in the stale air.

Salazar, it read, A man broke through the wards. Front gates by the eastern bridge. Hurry.

Alarm shot through Harry. Another intruder. The castle had been found again. Harry thought about last year’s battle and all it had cost them, and he staggered away, turned. He was running before he could remember willing himself to move, his chest hard and tight.

The eastern gates were on the other side of the castle. The stairs would take too long, so Harry launched himself out a window. The fall from the Second Floor was an impressive one, but he had played Quidditch for years, and breathed through the rush. He slowed his fall with a wordless spell, and landed on the grass with his knees bent. He righted himself, and tore through the courtyard. He vaulted the small wall, into the colonnades. The eastern bridge came into view, the castle’s ramparts, fortified stone protecting Hogwarts' flank, two turrets bracketing heavy, iron-wrought gates. There was a knot of people before the doors, shielding what lay beyond from Harry's sight. He saw Godric from the distance, standing with his sword unsheathed. Helga and Rowena were at his side, and students trailed behind them, chattering curiously, trying to peer over their shoulders. Harry wished he had brought his sword.

He slowed his pace as no one seemed panicked. He came up behind the students and heard voices as he approached, the children’s chatter and Godric speaking in low tones.

"I will not allow you in so long as you do not tell me your name,” he said. "I’ve no wish to hurt you, but God help me  should you take one more step.”

“I don’t know,” someone answered. It was a man’s voice, rough and ragged. Harry’s heart kicked his ribs. Saliva pooled in his mouth. He felt very cold. “I. I don’t. I don’t know who I am. Please. I just. I want to go home.”

“I cannot understand you,” Godric said, and Harry’s ears were buzzing. His breathing came hard and fast. “Do you speak the Northern tongue?”

“He does not,” Helga said. “Nor is it Gaelic.”

“Please,” the man said, and the words came on a sob, and Harry, his heart breaking, pushed his way through the crowd. “Please, I just want to sleep.”

Harry knew. He knew the man’s voice. He knew what language he spoke. It would not be born for a thousand years. 

A terrible pain lanced through him. Harry stood a step outside himself. He moved as though through honey. Something big crept along the edges of his awareness. Something momentous. He shouldered students out of the way. “Move,” he kept saying, his tongue thick in his mouth. The children looked at him, and cleared the way. 

The man spoke, sounding half-crazed, and Harry wanted to sob. He wanted to fall on his knees and beg. 

“This is home,” the man said. “You have no right. No – It’s my home, why – why won’t you let me in, you – ”

Harry staggered, fell, got up again. He lurched forward, caught himself on the hem of someone's cloak.

“Harry?” Helga called, but Harry could not hear her.

Godric took an alarmed step toward him, and Harry ducked past him. He pushed away, beyond the castle gates, and he saw, and his head spun, and it spun. One word fell from his lips, an orphaned, pitiful thing, thrown out into the world.

"Sirius?"

Chapter Text

"Sirius?"

Breath tore itself from Harry's lungs, rasped soft tissue on the way out. He choked. A great pain twisted his belly. The earth had opened underneath his feet; he teetered over the edge of a gaping, howling chasm. The world had cracked in the middle and come crashing down. He felt like a bloodless, bloated thing. His chest screamed. He staggered, senseless, his mind ringing and empty.

"Sirius?"

A breeze swept over the field. Dark clouds churned on the horizon, heavy with the promise of rain. Between the earth and sky stood a man who looked very much like Sirius Black on the night Harry met him fresh out of Azkaban. He had a gaunt, sunken face, the lines of him made sharp with starvation. His hair was long, was matted with oil and mud. It hung limply down his emaciated shoulders. His skin was waxy, stretched over his bones as though there was no meat left to his skeleton. He looked like a corpse whose marrow had been sucked by small, crawling things. He wore rags, flapping stripes of fabric that showed swathes of pale, tattooed skin. The cloth was disgusting, soggy with dirt and blood and excrements.

“You,” Harry said. His voice broke. “You’re here.”

The man who wore Sirius' face and Sirius’clothes, Sirius who should be dead, stared at him with sightless, fevered eyes. He wet his lips, opened his mouth, and Harry swallowed a noise of pain.

"You understand – " Sirius breathed, and pitched forward.

Harry caught him. He sized him around the waist and hauled him close, a shock of breath and hard angles. He could not tell which one of them was shaking the most, great tremors rolling through both bodies, an infinite loop. Arms wound around his shoulders, gripped him tight. Harry's legs collapsed under him, and they went down into the mud, clutching each other for dear life. The man babbled a string of words in Harry's ear, but all Harry heard was a high-pitched whine. He thought he was going to be sick. He thought he was going to pass out.

Sirius was a living, breathing weight against him.

"How can you be here?" Harry said. He heard himself speak, but the words came from a distance away. “You’re dead, Sirius. You’re dead. I saw you die.”

He stared into Sirius's face, death-thin and beloved. He traced the familiar lines of it, and recognized the faded beauty in them, Sirius’ aristocratic grace through the sweat and muck. He pressed a hand against Sirius' chest. His fingers trembled.

Thu-thump.

Harry sobbed. Fingers brushed his face. They touched his hair, moved over the dip of his cheekbones, the bow of his lips. They followed the sweep of his jawline and settled at the base of his throat, tapping along the mad rhythm of his heart. Sirius watched him with wide eyes. He pressed his forehead to Harry’s. They breathed the same air, and Harry felt himself breaking.

"James?" Sirius said, soft and hesitant, and Harry killed the noise rising from his throat..

“I’m Harry," he said. “I’m James' son.”

Sirius blinked at him. His throat worked. His eyes never left Harry's face. "Harry," he said, slowly, carefully. "Harry, yes. Do you know who I am?"

“You’re Sirius Black,” Harry said. “You’re my godfather.”

“I am,” Sirius said. He tilted his head to the side. A smile lifted his lips. “I am , aren’t I.”

A great shudder rocked Harry. Something was growing in his chest, taking up all the space between ribs and spine. Hope, he thought, and it hurt, and it was wonderful. Sirius kept making soft shushing sounds. His thumbs stroked Harry's cheeks and came back wet with tears. Harry pitched forward. He listed into Sirius's warmth, and Sirius caught  him, bony arms pulling him close, Harry’s face in the crook of his neck. Harry leaned his weight and rested there. He muffled his cries against skin, and let himself be held like a child.

"Shh," Sirius said against his hair, and he was shaking too, gripping Harry hard enough to bruise. "S'okay, lad. I got you. I found you and I'm not leaving again. I got you."

They stayed intertwined a long while. Sirius hummed quietly as he rocked Harry from side to side. Harry was insensate to anything but the man in his arms. He listened to the beats of Sirius's heart. He let himself be lulled by the devastating comfort of it. Sirius squeezed him tight. 

“Listen Prongslet,” he said. His breathing was laboured. “Listen, I’m not feeling too well. I think. I think I’ll just sleep now, all right?”

Harry straightened. Sirius was sagging against his, his eyes unfocused. Harry shifted his grip, supporting him. “Sirius?”

“‘S all right,” Sirius said. “Not going anywhere.”

He fell into a faint in Harry’s arms. Harry held him fast. He cradled Sirius to his chest and brought fingers to Sirius’ throat. He sighed in abject relief when he found a pulse.

The world came rushing back with vengeance, all its merciless practicality. Harry became aware of the ache in his knees for having spent so long in the mud. A damp autumn breeze shivered along his skin. Rainwater fell down his neck. His face itched with drying salt, and Sirius was in his arms, breathing, alive. Harry needed to get him to safety. He needed to get him warm.

"Harry?"

He looked up. Godric stood behind him along with the other Founders and a number of students. The children stood on tiptoes to peer at him. The Slytherins had elbowed their way to the front. They stood arrayed between Harry and the other children. 

“Harry,” Godric said, carefully. “Who is this man?”

“He’s my family,” Harry said.

Godric frowned. “Lad, I cannot understand a word you say.” 

A length of quavering shock blanketed Harry’s mind. He needed to get a grip. To make Godric understand. At a loss, Harry looked to Salazar.

Salazar stood with his wand in one hand and a dagger in the other. He looked at Sirius with a cold, closed look, and Harry felt himself bristle at the open hostility. He hunched over Sirius in a protective crouch. Sila was coiled on Salazar’s shoulders, and Harry sought her out.

'Salazar,' he said, and Parseltongue came to him with practised ease. 'Please. He needs help.'

'Who is he?' Salazar asked.

‘He’s from my time. I thought I’d lost him.’

‘Harry,’ Salazar walked a step toward him, then stopped when Harry stiffened. ‘You’re certain?’ he asked. ‘I do not trust this. You could be bespelled.’

‘I’m certain.’

"Salazar," Helga said. "What is he saying?"

Harry gathered Sirius close, shifted his weight. He put an arm under Sirius’ knees, another around his shoulders. He planted his feet and stood. Sirius was distressingly light in his arms.

He set his shoulders and faced the castle. He waited. Salazar spoke to Helga in a low voice. Godric watched Harry with his stance shifted, his eyes careful. Harry saw his House-mates look between him and the Founders. They had their wands drawn and their eyes hard. Harry understood with sudden clarity that his friends would fight for him in an instant. Should the Founders refuse him entry, they would raise their wands in defence of him. Harry met Alfric’s eyes and gave a minute shake of his head. Alfric tipped his chin and did not move.

“Come,” Salazar said. “Can you carry him?”

“Yes,” Harry said.

The crowd parted for him like water around a rock. He crossed the gates, and hurried through the courtyard as fast as he dared. Helga led the way to the Hospital Wing.

The Infirmary smelled of soap and medicine. A watery greyness filtered from the tall windows. Harry walked past the rows of neat, iron-wrought beds. He went to one of the private rooms at the back. Helga opened the door for him, and Harry lowered Sirius on the bed. He looked even paler against the bedsheets, his stretched skin an unhealthy grey.

Helga touched his wrist.

“Let me,” she said. 

Harry met her dark eyes, and gave a shaky nod. 

Together, he and Helga stripped Sirius of his dirty, stinking clothes. The other Founders hung back, watching. Harry saw Sirius’ chest. He swallowed bile. Each of Sirius's ribs poked through his shallow skin. The dip where his stomach should be stretching deep and wide. Hipbones jutted out against the rest of his body. His skin was bruised, blistered in places, but remained otherwise unbroken.

They got to work. They washed Sirius with soapy water mixed with healing draughts. Layers of grime and dead skin flaked off him and turned the water brown. They rubbed ointment on Sirius’ bruising, checked for illnesses and broken bones. Helga chanted a long spell under her breath. She touched her wand to Sirius’ plexus, and swayed on her feet with a grunt, grey-faced and weak.

“To give him strength,” she told Harry as he held out a hand to steady her.

Salazar handed them potions, and they fed each to Sirius’ lips. Harry watched the coloured draughts, and made a list. To rehydrate. To feed. To combat infections. To promote healing. By the time they were done, Sirius's heart beat a little easier. His cheek no longer looked as gaunt. A flush rode high on his cheekbones. They swaddled him in warm blankets and stepped back from the bed.

“I’ll stay here tonight,” Harry said. “Look after him.”

"His life is no longer at risk,” Helga said. “Now he needs rest, and time to heal.”

“I know," Harry said. "I’ll stay all the same."

Helga touched his shoulder, comfort freely given, and Harry leaned into her hand, his head bowed in gratefulness. 

“Thank you,” he said. “For helping.”

“Call to me if you need anything,” Helga said.

She left the room with Rowena. Godric followed after a last, heavy look in Sirius’ direction. 

“Would you like me to stay?” Salazar asked.

Harry did not look at him. “Are you saying that because you’d like to keep me company, or because you don’t trust him with me?” Salazar did not answer. Harry sighed. “No,” he said. “I think I’d rather be alone.”

The door clicked shut.

Harry pulled himself a chair and sat at Sirius’ bedside. He stared at Sirius's face, its hard lines eased out in sleep. He counted the rise and fall of Sirius’ chest. His mind cleared in increments, the blank shell of shock receding. Harry was left shaking in its wake.

Sirius was here.

Sirius was alive.

Harry saw Bellatrix kill him. He saw Sirius fall with his own eyes, saw him tip behind the vaporous, whispering Veil. He had not come out the other side. Harry had thought him dead. He had not had so much as a body to bury.

He reached out with a trembling hand and set fingers on Sirius’ wrist. He found a pulse, the clockwork beating of a heart. He swallowed. His eyes felt hot.

Sirius was alive.

Harry bent over, put his head between his knees. He gasped for air, his lungs tight, his sight swimming. He clutched Sirius's hand hard enough to bruise and pressed his forehead to Sirius’ knuckles. He counted Sirius’ breath, and, utterly wrung out, did not feel himself fall asleep.

He woke with a start some hours later, heart pounding in his chest. Sirius writhed and whimpered on the bed, his skin lathered with sweat. His eyes rolled wildly behind his eyelids.

Murmuring reassurances, Harry brushed Sirius's hair away from his face. He took his wand and checked Sirius for fever.

“You’re fine, Harry told him. “You’re alright Sirius. Everything’s fine.”

Sirius tossed and turned, growing more agitated by the minute. Harry looked outside. Night had fallen, leaving the Infirmary in semi-darkness. Harry thought about Dementors and Sirius being locked in prison for twelve long years. Harry had always known him to sleep with a light on, to keep away the dark. 

“Hang on,” he said. “I have an idea. Something that might help."

He closed his eyes, gathered himself. He thought about Sirius asking him to come live with him, offering asylum from the Dursleys. The light-heading joy of it. He thought about Hermione’s arms around him, about Ron clapping him on the shoulder. He thought about his first flight. About receiving Christmas presents for the first time. The feel of rough-spun sweaters and the scent of candied apples.

Harry frowned. It was not enough. Sirius had died. Ron left him. Hermione he left alone in a warzone. He set his jaws and looked further.

He sat cross-legged in the common room, Salazar in front of him. He could hear the babble of his House-mates, the gentle slosh of the Lake. “Brace yourself,” Salazar said, and Harry met his eyes with a smile. They fought for dominance in the recesses of Harry’s mind, tangling, pulling apart. Harry breathed deep and slow. His Occlumency was coming along nicely. 

The duel softened into something else. Harry tasted Salazar’s mind, and felt the cool, bracing glide of the sea against his skin. He smelled brine in the air, heard the distant cawing of gulls. He shared thoughts of a summer night, crickets singing out an open window, the cracks and groans of the Burrow after dark. Salazar trailed fingers on book spines, dusty parchment laying secrets before his eyes in the dim gleam of bubbling potions. Harry plunged after the golden glimmer of a snitch, swerving down, swift as the wind, giddy with elation, crisp air howling in his ears, drowning out the cheers of the crows, drowning out the whole world.

The back and forth between them was smooth, was easy. Salazar smiled across from him. Something warm unfurled in Harry’s chest, and Harry – 

Harry came back to himself with that same warmth held close to his heart.

" Expecto Patronum ," he said.

A silver wisp burst from his wand, magic surging forth. For a moment Harry could not see for the brightness, but he felt his Patronus taking shape, and even with his eyes shut, he knew, knew , down to where magic seared his bones, that something fundamental had shifted inside himself.

He squinted past the silver-white glow, his heart hammering. He looked for Prongs among the coalescing swells of light, and did not find him.

Something else unfolded before him, so very different from the familiar stag that Harry could not, even for a second, fool himself into believing everything was normal.

Floating in mid-air, a snake stretched its long coils. It pulsed to the rhythm of Harry's heart. It was bigger than any Muggle breed, easily outgrowing the boa Harry once set free in a zoo. It reminded him of a Basilisk, but for the leathery ridge rising from its spine like a fish fin. Two short, curving horns flared back from the top of its head. Its large, diamond-shaped scales shrank the closer they were to its underbelly, their colour undefinable in the silvery flare of Patronus magic.

Harry watched it, stunned, a sense of impending doom looming over him, some realisation niggling the edges of his consciousness. The snake undulated around the room, slithering gracefully despite its size. Its forked tongue tasted the air.

A pang of loss went through Harry. He had always taken Prongs for granted, his father guarding him from beyond the grave, but Prongs was gone.

Warmth enveloped him, and Harry opened his eyes to the snake’s head resting on his lap , slanted eyes watching him. His Patronus wrapped him in a protective coil. Though Harry could not feel it like a material, tangible thing, he got an impression of smooth scales on his skin, a steadfast weight. A sense of calmness stole over him. A sense of love dulled the sharpness of his grief.

"You're something else, aren't you?" he said, and ran a hand up the serpent's head, feeling the edge of its horns.

Patronuses changed with their caster’s life, when something profound shifted in them. A birth, a death. It could be caused by great sadness or great joy, by growing up or falling in love.

Harry sprang to his feet with such speed his chair went crashing behind him. He looked at his Patronus, and his Patronus looked back.

“I have to go,” Harry told it. He swallowed heavily. “I’ll be back. Will you look after Sirius while I’m gone?”

The snake draped itself over Sirius like a giant's scarf. The effect was immediate. Sirius's face eased in something almost peaceful. His breathing evened out.

“Thank you,” Harry said, his throat tight.

He slipped out into the night, and went hunting for Salazar.

Chapter Text

The tunnel stretched deep into the darkness, a wide, open mouth. Harry stared down the lip of the shaft. He could not see the bottom, though he had not expected to. The air was thick and damp. Salazar was somewhere beneath his feet. Harry braced himself, and stepped down. Down.

Down.

Wet, slimy stone scraped his hands and elbows. The tunnel seemed to contract the farther down he went. He fought the panicked thrum of his heart, the suffocating press of claustrophobia. He was being hurtled in depths unknown, far below the Dungeons. Each bump in the sinuous pipe flung him against the walls. The fall never seemed to stop.

The tunnel spat him in a shallow pool of stagnating water. It soaked through his trousers. 

Harry heaved himself to his feet.  Down here, the obscurity was not so absolute as it had been in the tunnel. A faint greenish glow suffused the low-ceilinged room. Several pipes branched from the walls before him. The curved walls of crude stone were lathered with a layer of lake mud. Everything smelled of damp earth. Harry had been here before; he remembered the way. He walked down the largest passageway, wading through puddles. The flare of light from his wand projected hideous, elongated shadows on the walls.

Except for the slow drip of water on stone, everything was quiet as a grave. Harry rounded a familiar bend in the tunnel. The shed snake-skin that had once been here was nowhere to be found. The Basilisk had not yet grown so great and terrible.

He walked on. The tunnel twisted on itself continuously. Several times, he hesitated over which path to take. There had been more pipes when last he had been here, varying in size, lined with steel. The contrast with the rough-hewn stonework sprawled before him was disorienting. It seemed to have been carved out with great brushstrokes, efficient rather than refined. The quick work of someone pressed by time. Harry trudged on. Each time he feared he had gotten well and truly lost, an odd bend on the way would spark up a memory from his Second Year and urge him on, deeper under the castle.

His nerves were alight, stretched taut with hypersensitivity. Every breath of brackish air slithering down the corridors made him shiver. Every noise wired his body a little tighter. He wanted to reach the end of the tunnel, and dreaded what he would find on the other side.

Finally, after one last curve, Harry found himself before a wall that made him pause. He recognized the way the pillars supporting the entryway arched to the darkened ceiling. One day in the future, that wall would be engraved with two green snakes, intertwined. Large sparkling emeralds set in place of their eyes, gemstones that shone with such vivacity the snakes seemed alive.

Heart pulsing painfully in his mouth, his tongue desert-dry, Harry pressed fingertips to the cool stone. 'Open,' he said.

Terribly, the door obeyed.

He stood at the entrance of a long, dimly-lit cavern. Its structure was familiar, well-remembered. Stacks of broken rocks and packed earth cluttered the farthest corner, suffusing the smell of crushed stone-dust. More pillars towered along the length of the room, sinking into the ceiling's low hanging obscurity. None were yet adorned with coiled snake statues. Splashes of stark silvery light spilled between them, pools of undying witchfires burning out of sight, in a weird, unsettling glow.

Short for breath, Harry paused, ears straining for sound. The eerie silence endured, unbroken and motionless. Salazar was nowhere to be seen. The Basilisk could be lurking in the shadows of any pillar. Harry held his wand high, and, ready to close his eyes at the first hint of motion, he edged his way into the room. The place seemed deserted.

In the time it takes to blink or breathe, the suspended place between one heartbeat and the next, Salazar came into sight with a shift of light. His back was to Harry, arms loose at his sides. His dark hair was held in a long braid, plaited in a tight pattern Harry had seen on him only once before, a weave Northmen wore before battle. Salazar seemed lost to the contemplation of the wall before him.

Harry was halfway across the room. He stopped, his legs parted shoulder-wide.

"You found it here," Salazar said quietly. "I'd wondered."

Salazar, Harry wanted to say, in prayer or supplication, in relief, but the name stayed a lump in his throat. In his hand, his wand had gained weight, was heavier to carry.

Salazar glanced over his shoulder, over at Harry, a half-smile tilting his lips, dry and weary, softening his whole face. A single eyebrow ticked up, as he took in Harry's stance.

"Something the matter?" he asked, an inflection to his voice stuffing Harry's heart up in his throat, having his knees bend in anticipation, wariness an itch under his skin. Salazar's next smile sliced his face like a knife. "Ah," he said. "I see."

And he – shimmered. The contours of his body wavered like summer heat. Disappeared.

Illusion, Harry had time to think, when a sudden gust of wind tore through the rancid air, whipped his face. The lights went out.

The transition to complete darkness threw Harry off balance. He had no time to adapt before something swiped his ankles, the blow strong and sure. He fell in a sorry heap of limbs, teeth knocking together.

A whoosh of displaced air, crackling like a whip. Harry rolled, his training taking over. He raised his wand in a swift jab, and a blast of wind exploded around him.

Laughter rang out, soft and full-throated. It made the hairs on the nape of his neck stand up on end. A warm breath ghosted the shell of his ear.

"I've often wondered about the way you sometimes look at me. You cannot hide wariness when it cuts so deep as yours." The shape of Salazar’s smile burned Harry's skin, and Harry swore, rammed an elbow back, in the general direction of his voice but not impacting anything. "Alright, Harry. Show me how your anger runs."

The lights flickered back on.

Salazar stood before him, naked sword held loosely in one hand, thin blade gleaming dangerously in the trembling firelight. Several knives were sheathed along his waist and legs, with more hidden out of sight. Harry could guess the holster of his wand strapped on a forearm. For the first time in a long while, Harry looked at Salazar, and recognized how formidable a threat he truly was.

"I would see you stripped of whatever you might have been taught," Salazar told him, his eyes bright as silver coins. "Whatever Godric taught you about restraint.” His lips twisted in something strange, soft, almost a smile. "I would see the violence in your skin, my dear. And you are, I think, of a mind to indulge me."

Salazar took two steps to the side, sword soaring up in a graceful twirl. Harry matched his strides, edging in the opposite direction, exceedingly aware of the space Salazar took up, the size and stretch of him.

"What is this," he said.

Salazar bowed deep. "You tell me," he said, and lunged.

This time, Harry saw him coming. He drew back a step, just enough to brace himself, and pulled his sword in the breath before Salazar reached him. He blocked the first blow with the flat of his blade, the strength swung behind making him grunt, surprised, the shock quivering along his arm.

Salazar smiled, inches from Harry's face. "Come, Harry," he said, his breath on Harry's lips. "Fight. You cannot expect to protect others if you cannot defend yourself. Are you so eager to once again lose the man in the bed upstairs?”

Harry gritted his teeth. He let his blade slide along the edge of Salazar's, steel against steel. He struck out a fist, and missed, Salazar bending out of reach. Harry shifted his stance, slashed at Salazar's unprotected side, and missed. Missed. Missed again. Eyes narrowing, Harry forced himself to breathe. To think.

Salazar inclined his head. “Good,” he said. “You learned. You know where arrogance leads you.” He gestured at the ceiling. Toward Sirius. "He,” Salazar said. “Died for it, did he not.”

The words hit Harry like a punch. "How do you know that?" he asked. He felt sick.

Salazar tapped the side of his face. "You showed me,” he said. “You shared the memory with me. The grief and guilt of it. The deep dark hollow where the love you bear him used to be. Tell me, Harry. Who is this man to you?"

"You have no right," Harry said. His hand clenched into a fist around his sword hilt. Something ugly shook itself free behind his ribs. "No right to ask - to use - "

“I have every right,” Salazar said. “You allowed me within yourself, Harry, and I may do what I wish with all you gave so readily. You cannot open yourself to me, and ask I make no use of your weakness."

Weakness.

Harry gave a cry of rage. He launched himself at Salazar with a series of swift strikes, his sword a blur. Salazar countered him with a grunt. Their blades spat sparks where they met. Harry feigned a thrust at Salazar’s belly, brought his sword down in a sideways slash. He forced himself into Salazar’s guard, kicked at Salazar’s legs, smashed his sword hilt at Salazar’s jaw. The blow connected, but Salazar moved with it, punched Harry’s chest, forcing him back a step. Harry spun with the momentum, brought his sword up in a sharp swerve, aimed at Salazar’s throat. Salazar parried him at the last moment, sword pointed at the ceiling, his arms straining.

“What I shared with you,” Harry said, panting. “I shared willingly. Giving pieces of yourself to someone else always comes at a risk. I made a choice, and weakness had no place in it.”

“No,” Salazar told him, tenderly. “It did not.”

He gave a hard shove, and Harry stumbled back. 

“You keep yourself so tightly controlled,” Salazar said. “Always mindful of yourself. I wonder. How long has anger festered in your breast, do you think?” He locked his guard. “Fight me.”

Harry gave a hollow laugh. "You think it's you I'm angry at, do you?" he asked, grinning.

"Of course not,” Salazar said. “You loathe yourself far more than you could ever loathe me. But think, my dear. Whose fault was it you found yourself here, truly? Who killed so many of your friends?" He caught Harry's gaze. " Attack me ," he said, and Harry did.

They met in the middle of the Chamber of Secrets. They met with swords and fists and teeth, the resulting clash resounding around them, amplified in the extremes, but there was no one around to hear. Harry dodged a stab to his ribs, hacked at Salazar’s legs, earning an elated laugh. He parried a slash to his belly, only to bruise his cheek on Salazar’s fist. He righted himself, blocked, attacked again. His blade cut the air as if animated by a life of its own. Harry felt he was about to thrum out of his own skin.

Salazar kept up with him with disconcerting ease. He painted Harry’s flesh in long welts of red and purple, and Harry grinned through the pain. He wanted to steal Salazar’s breath with his tongue. He wanted to dig fingers into Salazar’s skin, and make him pant with it.

"For the record," he said, gasping, and flowed with the sudden swerve of Salazar's sword. "For the record , Sirius is my Godfather, and the only family I've got left, you arsehole . You – " He grunted, rolled away from a stab that would have sliced his throat, surged up, bringing his sword down in a great arch, close enough to catch the dilation of Salazar's eyes, dark and deep. "You don't get to tell me how I feel about killing him."

His blow landed.

It would have opened Salazar from clavicle to hip, a clean diagonal stripe through bone and muscle. Harry saw it happen in his mind's eye, saw flesh split, blood start gushing, thick and carmine red. A shield sizzled to life over Salazar's skin in the half-instant before contact. Harry felt it absorb the strength behind his sword, felt it take in the shock. Felt it grind, give, horrifyingly, parting open for the edge of Harry's blade. A soft, huffing sound pushed from Salazar's lips. His eyes grew wide. His word-arm fell limply by his side, hand spasming from the aftershocks.

He stepped back, disarmed but no less dangerous for it. Harry saw the moment he regained his balance, centred himself. He rearranged his stance, a dagger in each hand, but Harry was faster. He dropped his own sword, bent, and punched Salazar in the plexus, once, hard, fist exploding with the impact. Salazar choked, diaphragm contracting. Harry swept his legs, and he fell to the ground, his head smacking the floor.

Harry let himself fall with him, on him. He pinned Salazar before he could reach for more weapons. Both their breathing came in harsh pants.

“Enough,” Harry growled, bearing down. “Enough.”

“Is it?” Salazar asked. 

“Small mercies, Salazar.” Harry watched the bruise starting to swell on Salazar's jaw. His brow was slick with sweat. “You wanted that.”

“As did you.”

Harry hung his head. Salazar’s belly moved against his.

“Harry,” Salazar said. He stretched, testing the strength of Harry’s grip. Harry squeezed his wrists in warning, and Salazar relaxed against the floor, his body soft and supine. "I won't tell you what happened to your Godfather was not your fault,” he said. “You have seen too much of the world to be condescended so. I would, however, advise you not blame yourself for the actions you took as a boy. What you did, you did out of love. Whatever hardships that man endured, he had the privilege of knowing he was cherished by you."

A faint, broken sound trembled behind Harry's teeth. His shoulders hitched up, drew in. He hated this man. Hated him. The easy perceptiveness of him, the quiet understanding he always bestowed upon Harry. Harry did not know what to do with such complete acceptance. He was not sure he wanted it.

"You don't know what you're talking about," he said, exhausted. "You have no idea what happened back then."

"Perhaps not. But I know you."

The fight left Harry in a rush. He pitched into Salazar, utterly unable to help himself, pressed his forehead to Salazar's chest, feeling the indent of his ribs, the warmth of his skin. He rested there. He thought about Sirius and the Patronus guarding him.

"You know," he said. "My story was written before my birth, and there’s no changing it. I have moments of clarity when I know I'm a dead man walking. I'm just – ticking away on borrowed time." Under him Salazar held very still. "Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn’t give up. If I’m to die young, I think I’d rather do it with my hands clean."

“Harry,” Salazar said. “Surely you must know. There is nothing in you that would lay on its back and show its belly. Bloody your hands, my dear. Paint your skin red to the elbows. Whatever you have been told, your life is your own, and there is no honour in dying without a fight.”

“You have to stop telling me exactly what I need to hear,” Harry said. “You’re killing me, do you know that?”

Salazar huffed a laugh. Harry wanted to burrow under his skin. He wanted to carry the sound with him always. He looked up to find Salazar already watching him, his eyes warm, a pained smile on his mouth.

“I think,” he said, and his eyes travelled the length of Harry’s body, the curve of Harry’s back, the stretch of Harry’s legs, “it will more likely be a matter of which of us succumbs first. I think, also, that you should stand before I do something we will both regret.”

“Oh,” Harry said, and he became aware of the way he laid on Salazar. Of the way he held him. He was on his knees between Salazar's legs, his hands on Salazar’s wrists. He could feel Salazar's thighs on his hips, and if Salazar moved, rocked up and into him –

“ Oh ,” Harry said, and he let go at once, sat up on his haunches, and it was a bad, bad idea, because Salazar arched with the motion, and Harry forced his legs further apart, and Harry was only human and going to lose his fool mind.

He lurched to his feet, his cheeks burning. Salazar stayed where he was on the ground, his eyes riveted to the ceiling, his face neutral, his breathing even.

“Salazar?” Harry said, and that, too, was a mistake, because his voice came low and rough, and Salazar said something vicious in a language Harry did not understand.

Salazar stood. He straightened his clothes. Thumbed at the bruise on his cheek. Harry’s mouth was dry.

“I presume you had a reason for tracking me all the way here,” Salazar said, and he had turned toward Harry, but looked somewhere to the left of him. “Was there something you wanted?”

“Yes,” Harry said. He cleared his throat. “I thought we should talk.”

Sirius was back from the dead, and Harry could no longer afford his leniencies and willful blindness. His Patronus had changed, and he feared what it might mean. He needed to know.

“Look at me,” he said, and Salazar did. “I am going to ask you something, and I need. I need you to answer truthfully.”

“Ask.”

“Why,” Harry said, “are you building this place?”

Salazar gave a slow blink. “Is it not self-evident?” he said. “Have you not stood here before?”

Harry closed his eyes. His heart raced in his chest; he fought for mastery over himself. “Answer the question," he said.

“I will not let the events of last summer repeat themselves,” Salazar said. “I mean to defend this castle should it be attacked again.”

"So your solution is to make a cave and put a monster in it. Have you lost your mind? "

"Wards can be broken, m'órán, but Basilisks will lay armies to waste in defence of their nest."

“Armies,” Harry said. “This is. To defend against armies.”

“It is also,” Salazar said. “To defend you.”

“How do you mean?”

"Basilisks live long lives," Salazar said. “Hundreds of years.” He paused. “Thousands."

“No,” Harry said.

“There is a legend amongst Northmen,” Salazar said. “About a great serpent who dwells in the world’s seas. It bites its own tail, it is said, and the day its jaws open heralds the coming of Ragnarök. I cannot give you something so terrible as Jörmungandr, but Harry I swear it on all Helga’s gods, you shall have the next best thing.”

Harry watched him with silent horror. “You did this,” he said. “For me.”

He was part of it.

“You gave me the egg as a gift,” Salazar said. “I thought you knew the use I would make of it.”

"Gift," Harry said, and he remembered. The pine and lavender smell of the Mediterranean coast. The troll's cavern. The green stone Harry found there, its surface smooth as silk. It reminded Harry of Salazar, so Harry, heartsick and homesick, sent it to him with a letter.

He was part of it.

He thought about Ginny thrashing against bedsheets, her hair spilling like blood on the pillows they shared, her mouth pressed wetly to the curve of his shoulder as she panted through her panic. He thought about Myrtle, dead, and Hermione, cold as stone.

"I'm part of it," Harry said. Cause and consequence in an endless loop, forever biting its tail. "I made it happen. I– "

Words left him and his tongue curled in his mouth. Harry felt his lips sewn shut, the sick slide of a needle under skin. He blinked and saw a thousand fractures splintering from under him. He stood in mist, on the thin ice of a lake, and beneath him darkness crooned.

He came to on his knees, breathing hard, his head spinning. Salazar knelt with him, his hands on Harry’s face, his warmth the only real thing in the world.

"Harry," he said. He was breathing fast, his eyes wide and worried. “Harry, talk to me. What happened?"

The air tasted of hot metal and powder and ozone, the elemental bricks that made the hearts of stars. Harry saw the darkness between galaxies, felt binary weights on each shoulder, feathers on his cheeks, soft cawing speaking secrets in his ears.

“I can’t,” he said thickly. “I can’t, I – I feel awful."

“All right,” Salazar said. He pressed his forehead to Harry’s and breathed slow, breathed deep. After a moment, Harry followed after him. He shook all over. “All right. Don’t speak if you cannot. Breathe, sweeting. All will be well, I promise.”

Harry looked at him. I think I'm in love with you , he thought, but did not say the words.

Above their heads, the snake on Sirius’ bed burned a little brighter.

Chapter Text

Harry woke from heavy, dreamless sleep. He was delightfully warm, his body lax and languid. He stretched, and found a deep-set ache in his limbs, the soreness of too much training. His jaw pulsed with pain. He remembered Salazar landing the blow, and with it, the day before came to him in full. His heart tripped. 

He opened his eyes. 

The day had dawned in pale, greyish pinks. The sun slanted through the Infirmary windows, scattered on the floor in delicate white-gold rings.  The herbal smell of medical potions wafted through the stillness of the air. Something moved against him, a clockwork up-and-down, and Harry turned his head.

On the pillow beside him was Sirius, his mouth slack in sleep, and for a long moment, Harry forgot to breathe.

"Sirius," he said, numbly. He reached across the space between them, and touched Sirius’ face with the tip of his fingers, gently, so as not to wake him. Sirius's skin was warm, dry, lined with years of hurt and worry. Harry pushed a lock of hair away from his face. His throat felt tight. 

Breathless, he sat on the bed, his arms shaking. His Patronus shifted from where it lay on Sirius’ chest, and touched its snout to Harry’s thigh. It helped with the tightness in Harry’s lungs.The great snake watched him with slanted, soulful eyes, and Harry touched a hand to its heavy coils. Its tongue flicked out. Its glow had dimmed during the night; now it was see-through.

Harry made himself get out of bed. He gathered his clothes and dressed quickly. He had just washed his face in a basin of clear water when the Infirmary doors swung open. 

Helga walked through, wearing men's clothing, a cup of something warm in one hand. She smiled at him and approached swiftly.

"Good morning Harry," she said. "Did you sleep at all?"

“I did,” Harry said. “Oddly enough.”

“Good lad. How is he?”

Harry looked at Sirius. “Better,” he said. “I think. He slept the night through. No fever.”

Helga took Sirius’ wrist, touched his chest with her wand. Harry gave her space and watched in anxious silence.

“His path to recovery will be a long and arduous one,” Helga said. “I cannot tell what happened to him, but he suffered a lot.” She met Harry’s eyes. “All his ills may not be physical. But you are right. He is doing better.”

Harry sagged in relief. “Thank you,” he said. “I. Thank you.”

Helga touched his hand. “Of course,” she said. “Always.”

Harry nodded, his throat tight.  He looked at Helga and thought about Cedric, fair and true and unfailingly kind. He looked at Helga and thought You've been saving me since long after you died.

“Help me with this,” Helga said.

Together, she and Harry fed Sirius his lot of potions. Harry murmured encouragements in Sirius’ ear and held his head as he swallowed. 

"Any idea when he'll wake up?" he asked.

“It may be another day,” Helga said. “Perhaps more. He is exhausted beyond anything I've seen. The longer he sleeps, the better. You need not worry.”

Harry bowed his head. Helga made a soft, surprised sound, and sized his chin between two fingers. She forced his face up and to the side.

“Who,” she said, coldly, “did this to you?”

She thumbed the bruise on his jaw, and Harry winced.

“It’s nothing,” he said. “Salazar – ”

“Salazar,” Helga said, her tone bland.

“He got as good as he gave,” Harry said.

“Sit,” Helga said. She drew her wand. “And explain to me why I should not hunt him down after we are finished here.”

{. . .}

Helga kicked him out of the Infirmary shortly thereafter, under the threat to volunteer him as a live dummy for the First Years if he so much as thought about coming back before dinner this evening. Harry beat a hasty retreat, and went down to the Dungeon.

The corridors were deserted, everyone already sitting their first class of the day. Harry went to his rooms and changed into clean clothes before heading back outside.

He had not eaten since lunch the day before, and found himself starving. His next stop was to the kitchens. He arrived in the lull between two meals, and the house-elves were all too happy to see him. They sat him on a counter beside one of the kitchen hearths, and piled his plate with eggs and rashers, beans and mushrooms. They gave him barley bread from the oven and sweet, savoury cheese to go with it. Harry ate with gusto, to the elves’ delight.

He stayed a while, chatting with them, watching the saucepans fly overhead. The elves told him about the work they had done in the summer; improvements to the House's dormitories, furbishing the South Wing. They told him about how much coin they spent on food, and how little of it was left.

“We’re running out of money?” Harry asked, and the young house-elf he spoke to wrung her ears.

“Seems such ways to Winky, Master Potter, sir.”

Harry made a note to ask Salazar about it, and left the kitchens. He considered heading to the Chamber of Secrets for exactly two seconds before discarding the idea. The very thought made his skin crawl, and it was unlikely Salazar would be there. He would be teaching Transfiguration at this hour.

Harry went to the Forest instead. The day was cold, roiling with the aftertaste of a rainstorm. Gusts of wind rippled through the long grass. Harry waded through the thick forest undergrowth, listening to the rustle of leaves in the wind. He found the Thestral herd on the shores of a small, marshy pond, its waters thick and muddy. The lead mare greeted him with a cry.

"Good morning, love," Harry said, laughing when she pushed her head into his chest, nearly toppling him over. The foals approached cautiously, sniffing at his pockets. Harry spent the hour playing with them. They looked healthy. The Forest had done well by them.

"Harry Potter," he heard behind him, and smiled.

“I thought you might find me,” he said. He turned.

Hexo stood between the trees, a dappling of sunlight on his skin. “I am glad,” he said. “To see you have returned.”

Harry cocked an eyebrow. “Are you?” he said.

“Your path leads you here always,” Hexo said. “I rest better, knowing you are close.”

“Did you want something?” Harry asked.

“To give thanks,” Hexo said. “For services well rendered.”

“We had a deal. You fulfilled your end of it. There’s no need to thank me.”

“Regardless,” Hexo said. “I come bearing gifts. Advice and portents, if you would hear them.”

“Speak.”

“Your time draws to a close,” Hexo said. “It is. Catching up. Yesterday a dead man found his breath again. You called him to you, and he followed your voice through the land of shadows.” Harry closed his eyes. “You must be careful,” Hexo said. “If you fall through the world’s skin before the moment is right, you will forever be lost.”

“And how will I know,” Harry said. “When the moment is right?”

“You will need a guiding light,” Hexo said. “Just as you led your parent here, so, too, will you need a voice on the other side. Pulling you home.”

“You’re not making sense,” Harry said.

He heard a snap from between the trees, a branch breaking, footfalls. "POTTER!” someone shouted. “WHERE IN THE SEVEN HELLS ARE YOU NOW?!"

Harry huffed a laugh. He turned back to Hexo with  a smile, but the Centaur had already disappeared in the thick forest trees. 

“Over here!” Harry called.

His friends found him quickly. They came trampling toward him in a disorganised file. Dallin tripped on a low-hanging branch and Glenn, coming up behind him, shoved him forward, making the other boy curse.

“You really shouldn’t be here alone,” Harry said amusedly.

“We’re not alone,” Glenn said. “You’re here.”

“Came to fetch you,” Bradley said. “Figured you would be in the Hospital Wing, and we worried when we couldn’t find you.”

“Helga kicked me out,” Harry said.

Audra slipped her hand in Harry’s elbow and started marching him back toward the castle. “Are you alright?” she asked. The others fell into step with them.

“Not remotely,” Harry said.

“Who is he?” she asked. “The man from yesterday.”

They emerged from the forest and walked the field toward Hogwarts. 

“I thought him dead,” Harry said. “He’s the only family I have left.”

“I see,” Audra said. 

Harry moved toward the Great Hall, but the others pulled him back toward the Dungeons instead. 

“We thought you may not want to face everyone just yet,” Alfric said as he led the way to the common room.

Someone had piled food on one of the low tables. They all sat on the floor around it, bumping knees and elbows.

“Is he alright?” Bradley asked at some point during the meal. “The man, I mean.”

“Helga says he should be fine," Harry said at length. “She also says it’s going to take a while. Before he’s back on his feet. I – ” he hesitated. “The next few weeks aren’t going to be easy for me,” he said. “You’ll probably be seeing less of me.”

“However shall we cope,” Glenn said with a wink. Bradley threw a cushion at him.

They parted ways shortly afterwards. The Slytherins dashed to their respective afternoon classes while Harry went back to his meanderings. He had been banned from lessons for the day, and Helga's wards would not allow him near Sirius before the evening.

He went to Salazar’s laboratory, hidden deep in the Dungeons behind an enchanted archway, and willed away the afternoon going over their notes. Salazar wrote their every breakthrough in a green, leather-bound notebook, with the occasional input from Harry’s hand.

Your time draws to a close, Hexo told him, and Harry thought about his dreams, thought about Sirius travelling between worlds, and shivered.

For some months he and Salazar had gone back and forth between solutions to sending Harry back to his time. Harry's favourite suggestion had been to dose himself with Draught of Living Death and wait out the centuries. Salazar flat out refused, mainly because the potion had yet to be invented. The idea also presented a fair chance of killing Harry outright, or keep him asleep longer than he wished.

“Then I’d just have to go back in time again,” was Harry’s answer to this argument, which resulted in Salazar hexing his mouth shut.

They finally agreed that, in order for Harry to travel through time, he would have to travel through time . They had since looked for ways to recreate what happened to Harry at Stonehenge, with varying success. To make such a spell was the work of a lifetime, and Harry suspected he would not have the luxury to wait the required years. 

Your time draws to a close.

It was no surprise really, that Harry caught himself thinking about goodbyes.

He sighed, unrolled a fresh sheet of parchment, hefted a Runes dictionary close, and, making use of his Occlumency training, plunged into his memories of Sotnehenge’s night.

He came back to himself with a start near dinnertime. The sky outside had darkened to the deep violet of a fresh bruise, the sun a ring of burnished orange on the horizon. The parchment sheet was dark with ink. Harry bolted it as fast as he could, left it in plain sight on Salazar’s desk, and hurried from the room.

Harry walked through the Infirmary doors unchallenged. The main area was deserted, the beds empty of patients. He crossed to Sirius's room at a near run. The door swung shut behind him.

Sirius was still here. He was asleep, and had not moved an inch since Harry last saw him. Harry leaned against the door, his breathing tight, and stared at him. He had spent his day with the fear he had dreamt Sirius’ return. Despite every proof to the contrary, the thought had stayed in the back of his mind. What if he had gone mad. What if it was another vision. What if. He understood how heavily the matter had weighed on him only when it disappeared.

"The markings on his skin look like art, but I cannot make sense of them. What are they, do you know?"

" Fuck, " Harry said, a hand snapping to his wand, his heart jumping. "Christ’s nails, Salazar. Do you want to kill me ? What are you doing here?”

Salazar ticked an eyebrow at him. He detached himself from the shadows on the other side of Sirius’ bed. “Helga and I have taken turns looking after your Godfather during the day,” he said smoothly. “Apologies. I did not mean to startle you.”

“Tattoos,” Harry said. “They’re tattoos. You take a needle and stab ink under your skin.”

Salazar looked at the loose collar of Sirius’ nightshirt with open interest. “I’ve a need to get one,” he said.

Harry laughed. “Not this century, I’m afraid.”

Salazar turned himself into the light, a half-smile on his mouth. Harry looked at him in the lamp oil, perfect as a painting. There was a bruise on his cheek, deeply black, from where Harry hit him the night before. Salazar inclined his head at Harry’s scrutiny.

“I understand Helga talked to you. About last night.”

“And leaving injuries untreated,” Harry said. “She very much did. How bad was it?”

Salazar gave a faint grimace. “Bad,” he said. “She never shouts, but I find her disappointment much harder to endure.”

“Serves us right.”

“Yes,” Salazar said. “It does.” He crossed his arms and looked at Harry from head to toes, his eyes narrowed. “How are you faring?”

"I – ” Harry cleared his throat. “I’ve been thinking. It’s good you’re here. I have a favour to ask."

"Then ask it."

"It's about Sirius. He didn’t quite recognize me yesterday. He was confused. I don’t think he even knew his own name, and I’m worried there’s something wrong with him.”

“You wish for me to look inside his mind.”

“Yes. Will you?”

Salazar’s lips twisted. “For you, my dear – ” he said, and left the sentence unfinished. 

He approached Sirius’ bedside. He angled himself, aligning his face with Sirius’. Harry stood at his shoulder, and Salazar brought fingers to Sirius’ skin.

He jerked as though he had been slapped, slammed into Harry, and Harry caught him as best he could, his hands on Salazar’s waist, his chin hooked over Salazar’s shoulder. A shudder ran the length of Salazar's back, and Harry found himself soothing it, holding Salazar close, murmuring reassurances in his ear.

"What happened?" he asked. Salazar did not answer right away. He held himself still in Harry’s arms, his breathing hard and tight. “Salazar?”

Salazar detached himself. He ran a hand over his face, then turned toward Harry. “He cannot remember much of himself,” he said. “There is a length of darkness in his mind. It infects his every thought. He went through horrors unknown to find you, and part of him lingers there.” Salazar closed his eyes. He breathed a soft sight. "I’ve an idea that might help, but we will have to wait for him to wake. Stay here.”

He swept from the room without another word, leaving Harry alone with Sirius, and the ghost of Salazar’s body against his. Harry watched the open door, and thought about yesterday. Salazar under him. His thighs on Harry’s hips. The curve of his back. He swallowed heavily, heartbeat tripping over itself. This thing growing in him, this helpless wanting for another man, would have to stop. Harry did not know how much of it he could endure before it drove him mad. He would need to root it out, all its shame and harrowing hunger, before it was too late.

He thought about his Patronus. His stomach twisted.

Beside him, Sirius made a noise of pain, and jolted awake.

Chapter Text

"SALAZAR!" Harry shouted over his shoulder, both his hands flat on Sirius's chest, holding him down as he thrashed his way to consciousness. Sirius’ breathing came hard and broken. His eyes rolled to the back of his head, stark white and unfocused. Harry could feel the great, shuddering thumping of his heart, and thought for a second it would tear from Sirius’ chest, and Harry would be left clutching it red and beating in his hands, slick, and bloody, and forever broken.

He had to do something. He. He had to do something. He had – 

Switching to English, he started talking to Sirius in urgent tones, trying his best to calm him, to bring him back to himself. The door banged open behind him, but he did not look up. Sirius flailed against his, his back a broken arch, his arms beating the air. He was going to hurt himself. Harry caught his wrists, bore down on him. Sirius was surprisingly strong. He bucked, strained, strained, hard enough to snap sinew, to break bones. Scared, pained howls tore through his shredded throat, the sound like a dog dying. Harry. Harry was lost, frantic with worry, he did not know what to do –

Strong hands took hold of him, hauled him off of Sirius. He struggled against the punishing grip, kicking out feet and elbows. There was a grunt of pain, and the hold on him loosened.

A word, a flash of magic. Glowing ropes appeared out of nowhere. They made a quick job of twining around Sirius, effectively tying him down, keeping him from moving. Sirius pulled against his shackles, his eyes bulging with the effort, veins popping under his wasted skin.

Harry gripped him by the hair, fingers tangled in the wild, knotted mess. He forced Sirius to look at him. "Stop,” he said. “Please, you're going to hurt yourself!"

It took several long moments before Sirius focused on Harry, his breathing heaving. His eyes were feverish, but alight with the barest flicker of recognition.

"James?" he rasped, and Harry studiously ignored the way his heart sank at the name. "James what's happening? I don't know – I don't know where I am."

"It's alright," Harry told him. He made  sure to keep Sirius's eyes on him as Salazar moved around the room. "You're in Hogwarts. You're safe, I promise. You've been very sick, but we're working on making you better. You need to calm down, yeah? Can you do that for me?"

Some old humour shone through Sirius' eyes, like a switch being flipped. It lit the lines of his face with mischievous, boyish delight. "That why you're keeping me chained up, eh Prongs?" Sirius chuckled. " Kinky ."

Then Salazar approached, and he was gone again, surging against the ropes with a broken growl. Dark eyes rolled madly in their sockets. Raving nonsense flowed from his lips.

"Here," Salazar told Harry. He  pushed a vial in his hands. "Make him drink. I'll be back as soon as I can."

Before Harry could fully register the words, he had rushed from the room again, leaving the door open behind him. Harry glanced down at his hands. A Calming Draught.

"Hey, Padfoot." He kept his tone level through Sirius's mad ramble and worked the stopper open with a thumb. He pressed the vial against Sirius’ lips. "Drink that for me."

When he tipped the vial in Sirius's mouth, Sirius swallowed readily, without protest. Within moments, he had relaxed against the sheets, appeased and pliant, humming appreciatively. He chased the last drops of potion from his lips. Harry caught himself hoping perhaps, somewhere deep in Sirius's subconscious, remained some shards of the love the man had once borne him.

Shaken, he flopped back on his chair. He clutched his hair, his fingers trembling. He saw Sirius give a vacant smile, just as unsettling as his earlier fury. His teeth gleamed blue in the glowing light of Salazar's ropes. Even through the placating sheen of the Calming Draught, fear and madness moved behind his eyes. Worry tightened its grip on Harry's stomach.

"You're not broken," he said. "They don't get to have you, and you don’t get to leave me. I'll figure it out. Sirius. You're going to be fine."

Sirius smiled beatifically up at him. Harry reached out and took his hand. He pressed a finger to the inside of Sirius’ wrist. He counted the sluggish pulse pounding there, and clocked his own breathing to its drugged pace. Together, he and Sirius waited for Salazar to come back. Sirius hummed Celestina Warbeck's A Cauldron Full of Hot, Strong Love under his breath.

About twenty minutes later, Harry heard the distant snap of booted feet. The Hospital Wing double doors opened with the screech of wood on stone. Salazar and Rowena sailed in Sirius's room, cool and beautiful, at odds with the sickroom clutter. Harry resisted the urge to fidget in their presence, acutely aware of how scruffy he looked in comparison, with his hair sticking out at odd angles, his ill-fitting, rumpled clothes.

A shallow stone basin hovered placidly behind the two Founders. Light spilled from the dark ridges of its carved runes, glinting off the precious gems fitted around the rim. Inside was a pool of cloudy, silvery substance. It appeared both liquid and gaseous at the same time.

"That's a Pensieve," Harry said. It looked exactly like Dumbledore's.

"We found it on the grounds before the castle was built," Salazar said.

"Interesting that you should know what this is, Potter," Rowena said. "Am I to assume you understand its many uses as well?"

Harry sketched a quick bow in Rowena's direction. "I've seen it used before. It can unclutter the user's head. Store their memories to be viewed later – " Realisation dawned on him. His eyes snapped to Salazar. "You intend to take Sirius's memories. From when he was in the dark."

Salazar gave a swift smile. His eyes glimmered a pale silver in the swirling Pensieve glow, bright and bottomless. Harry had a hook dragging behind his breastbone. He wanted to shout for sheer elation, wanted to press a clumsy kiss to Salazar's mouth.

“This could work,” he said.

"I certainly hope it will," Salazar said.

"We have to call forth the nefarious memories," Rowena said. "As you are the only one who speaks his language, Harry, you'll have to do the honours."

Harry went back to Sirius's side, drawing his wand. He looked at Sirius’ placid, vacant face, and forced a deep breath.

"Sirius," he said. He ran a hand through Sirius's hair. "I need you to listen, alright? It's important. Can you do that?"

Sirius smiled a sloppy smile up at him. "'O course Jamesie m'lad," he slurred. "An'thing you want."

"Do you remember where you were before you got here?" Harry said. "You've got to remember it for me. Remember where you went after the Veil at the Ministry. It was dark, wasn't it? The darkest place in the world." An uneasy frown creased Sirius's eyebrows. He shook his head a few times as if to dislodge an annoying fly. "There were things in the darkness,” Harry said. “Hungry things. Remember them, Padfoot? Remember what they felt like?"

"S-stop," Sirius said. He trembled like a leaf, a sheen of sweat slicking his forehead. "Please stop – I – I don't want – I don't – "

"Sirius. Look at me." Harry cupped Sirius's cheek, forced him to meet his gaze. "They won't get you here, but you have to think about them. Think. Did they chase you while you were lost? Did they get you? Do you remember the bite of their teeth? Do you remember how they smiled?"

"PLEASE STOP!" Sirius hollered, and he strained against his restraints, corded sinew bulging, skin weeping blood.

Harry pressed the tip of his wand to Sirius's temple. He felt something knock against the wood, felt the wandtip dip as though weighed down. He pulled, and a long strand of memory came sliding from Sirius's head. A thousand frail, delicate filaments floated after Harry's wand, moving fluidly in its wake. The memory was unlike any Harry had seen before. It was not the usual, pretty blue-white, but much darker, closer to ashy ink, a sickening shade.

Harry directed the memories over the Pensieve rim. He shook them loose, down into the swirling light. They sank, spread like an infection, before being diluted in the bright glow.

Sirius looked at him with eyes like the sky after rain. A wet, rattling gasp shuddered from his lips.

"Harry?" he breathed, and Harry felt himself break, a little.

{. . .}

It got better, the long way around.

Sirius spent another week drifting in and out of consciousness, too weak to even leave his bed. His fever rose and broke, rose and broke until it did not rise again.

Madness followed its own patterns. It nipped at Sirius's heels, dogged his steps in every flickering shadow. He could not stand to be left in darkness. Harry learned every variation of Lumos to ease his nights.

In-between episodes, Sirius had moments of lucidity. He knew who Harry was and what happened the last time they saw each other. He asked about Ron and Hermione, about Remus Lupin. He asked about Harry's classes and whether he had played any good pranks on Umbridge.

Sometimes he got confused. He called Harry by his father's name and whined about being confined to his Infirmary bed as though he suffered from a Quidditch accident that didn't deserve all this nagging about.

One time, he yelled at Harry to stop pretending to be his godson. He roared with uncomprehending fury, with a wealth of protectiveness for a boy long dead. Little Harry was a months-old baby. Did he think it was funny, pretending to be someone he wasn't?

How dare he wear Lily's eyes on James's face?

He worked himself into a rage, incandescent with the darkness of his blood. Even diminished, Sirius was of ancient curses and terrible knowledge. He was the Grim, death in dog skin, seeped in the blackness that lingered at the hearts of galaxies. He snapped hungry jaws at open skin, a touch of blood-stained bones on the living pulse in Harry's throat.

Harry had to restrain him again as red and salt smeared his throat.

Cut open on a parent's insults, he sought the solace of Salazar's presence. He knocked on the Founder's door with ringing ears, with waning strength, made vulnerable by wounds of filial love. He quested asylum in the banked heat Salazar made sing under his skin.

Salazar let him in without a word, his eyes lingering on the blood at Harry’s throat. He cleaned the wound with cool fingers and careful words, and gave space for Harry to breathe. He had a friend's warmth and a teacher's wisdom. Harry wished he had a lover's touch, too, but he clamped his teeth down on restless want.

"You should not be alone with him," Salazar told him, his fingers supporting the slumped curve of Harry's spine.

Harry smiled, and danced away from his soothing hands. "It's alright," he said. "He's getting better. He just – he relapses sometimes."

He spent most of his time by Sirius's bedside. His duties were balanced between students and family on uneven scales. It was a rope drawn taut between two lives. Harry walked it with a funambulist's grace.

He sat with Sirius at meals, during breaks, through early mornings and long nights. His Patronus coiled around them both, and he told the story of a boy who could turn into a great black dog. A boy who denied a family of old riches for the sake of a friend. The boy was broad smiles and studied pranks, endless loyalty wrapped in layers of mischief.

Harry sat with Sirius, and watched him stitch together the tattered pieces of himself.

Helga's careful ministrations bore their fruits. Sirius put on weight. He stayed awake for longer periods of time. Though there were still moments when he lost himself to the darkness in his thoughts, more time went by between manic episodes of white-eyed fear.

Sirius relearned to walk. Harry made himself a crutch as Sirius took steps with a newborn's unsteadiness. They picked their way between the rows of sterile hospital beds with the lurching gait of the truly drunk. Sirius snarled every time he stumbled, and Harry laughed, and he laughed. At the hapless frustration of a grown man with a toddler's balance. At every quiver of his Godfather's muscles against his side, redemption made life.

It got better. The long way around.

{. . .}

The first time Sirius ventured out of the Infirmary, they talked. They took slow, shaky steps, and breathed deep the clean outside air. Everything was awash with the taste of fallen rain.

Harry took Sirius to the sunlit grounds. Sirius turned his face towards the sky like a man given a blessing. Harry wondered about life, and the miracle of second chances.

Laughter burst forth from Sirius's throat. It spilled from his lips, rose to the distant clouds. Teeth and elation bared, he laughed from the crutch of Harry's shoulders, laughed at death and the freedom from it. It was a wild, mad sound, and Harry grinned with it.

They walked to a beech tree by the lake. Harry helped Sirius to a seat of roots against the pale trunk, then sat with him, crossed legged. The ground was cold with melted morning frost, but they pressed close to share warmth.

"The Whomping Willow isn't here," Sirius said. "Is this when you tell me why?"

"It's a long story," Harry said.

He leaned a little more into Sirius's heat, and spoke. He began with the years Sirius missed. The tense hell of Sixth Year. Dumbledore dying, and the world falling to pieces. He talked about Horcruxes, about war and being forced to flee Hogwarts. He told Sirius about the Locket. About Regulus Black, and his sacrifice.

Sirius's eyes closed with pride and pain. "Oh, Reg," he breathed. "Always such a fool."

"He was very brave," Harry said, and Sirius barked a hollow laugh.

"Yes. Yes, he was." Sirius's chin fell to his chest, grief and sorrow chasing each other across his face. Harry waited for him to collect himself. When Sirius looked up again, his eyes were hard as flint. "What happened next?"

Harry talked about the game of cat and mouse he played with Voldemort. He talked about Godric's Hollow, and the blood, and the screams. It was a tale of grief, of fear, and violence, and Sirius listened with the gravitas of a dead man given new breath.

Harry told him about Stonehenge. About the agony of a split back, about mud-slicked skin. He talked about scorched runes on hallowed ground. The Earth spun the wrong way, around the bruised body of a broken boy. I thought I would die, Harry did not say. I was sent back in time, he said. I woke on dry ground, to the loving kiss of summer winds. There, he faltered.

"I was lucky enough to meet someone who didn't think twice about saving me. When I realised how far back in time I'd landed – Well. It wasn't easy."

"But you still found your way here."

Harry gave a smile. "Yeah. Pulled you along for the ride, too."

"Wouldn't have missed it for anything," Sirius said, jostling Harry’s shoulder. "How old does that make you, then? Seventeen? Eighteen? You look more like James every time I see you."

"I'm nearly nineteen," Harry said. Sirius's mouth, pulled down in a wry twist. "What is it?"

"You've grown so much," Sirius said. "Look at you. You're a man now." He sighed, weighted with tiredness. "I'm sorry I wasn't there to see it happen."

"I'm just glad you're here," Harry said.

Sirius turned his head. He kissed the top of Harry's hair. "I'm never leaving again, kiddo."

{. . .}

Breath caught in fragile lungs, danced on the edge of a sharp smile. Wreathed in moving green light, Salazar watched him with shadowed eyes.

Lovely, was the thought that crossed Harry's mind, swift and unbidden. He tried to speak, but the words died in his throat.

"Harry?" Salazar called in a voice kept low, the name shivering in the space between them.

It took Harry a second too long to remember what the two of them were supposed to be discussing. He blinked against the treacherous warmth pulling at his chest, and straightened away from the way his body had curved toward Salazar, bowed like a question mark.

"Yeah," he said, and ignored the rough edge lining his voice. "I think we can definitely amp up the workload as far as they're concerned. Maybe split the classes in smaller groups like we did last year. We should sort the kids by age and skill if we don’t want to lose the ones lagging behind."

Salazar made a considering noise. "Forcing so much change mid-year is going to be difficult," was his assertion. "I'll talk to the others, but we will likely have to contend ourselves with giving more lessons when we can. "

"I'm not sure it'll be enough. Maybe we should try planning for another batch of exams 'round Yule. There should be enough time for it. Besides, it'll give everyone a fair chance to – "

The common room entrance opened with a groan, cutting any lingering, lazy morning chatter. Sirius strode in, an alarmed-looking Antioch trailing in his wake. He spotted Harry within moments, and his eyes softened with relief.

It was time, thought Harry.

"Harry," Sirius said, breathless, fierce, a world of protectiveness packed in a single word. He brushed off Antioch's attempts at stopping him with a warning flash of bared teeth. He took great marching steps across the room, quickly closing the distance between them.

Swallowing heavily, Harry forced a trembling breath. Questing fingers closed around the pulse beating in his wrist, tapped a silent interrogation along the pounding blood. Harry shook his head at Salazar. He pressed two fingers to his hand on Harry's wrist, holding him down when he made to rise.

"Let me handle this," he murmured.

Salazar's eyes dropped to his throat. His fingers tightened on Harry’s wrist, but Sirius reached them before he could speak.

A hand fell heavily on Harry's shoulder, pushing him back against his seat, away from Salazar. Sirius stepped between them, whip-taut with misplaced fear.

"You," he said, and it was cold, suffused with quiet rage. His eyes went to Salazar’s fingers on Harry’s wrist. "Let go of my godson."

"Sirius," Harry said, gently easing Salazar's grip from his hand. He pressed against Sirius, a firm palm on his thin chest.

"What is wrong with you, old man?" Antioch snapped, skidding to a stop beside them. He cast Sirius a furious glare, gave Harry and Salazar a half-bow in the same motion. "Sorry sir, Potter. Lady Hufflepuff let him out. Said to take him to you." He gestured helplessly. "When I told him you'd be here, he – I tried to stop him, but he just – "

"It's alright Antioch" Harry said. "Thank you."

The boy huffed at the dismissal, all petulant anger on drawn adolescent shoulders, but he left after one last sneer in Sirius' direction.

"Thanks for the help, lad," Sirius called after him, casting a wide grin with too many teeth. Though he could not understand the words, Antioch snarled, and stomped off at the sharp jerk of Salazar's head.

The smile slipped from Sirius's face. "Come on, Harry," he said. "Let's get out of here."

He started tugging on Harry's arm, frail strength buoyed by urgency. Harry heard a rustle of clothes from behind, Salazar getting on his feet with the sigh of rich fabric. The strain in Sirius's body wound tighter at the sound, his grip on Harry's shoulders jarring bones. Harry dug in his heels and did not move. This was where he belonged; he would not be shaken from it.

"Padfoot," he said, softly, watching confusion bleed on his Godfather's face. "It's okay."

" Okay?" Sirius shook his head. He kept wary eyes trained on Salazar, tracking every movement he made behind Harry's turned back. "Harry. Is that man not who I think he is?"

"He is," Harry said. His tongue felt leaden in his mouth.

"Merlin's balls, Prongslet. Don't turn your back to him. "

This was a conversation he should not have postponed, Harry knew. Now he found himself  cornered against the wall of Sirius's worry. When Sirius yanked on his arm again, fevered eyes darting between Harry and Salazar, Harry could only brace against his nervous strength.

I trust him, he said, with an exposed back, with every inch of a body Salazar moulded at swordpoint, with firm fingertips on battered skin.

I trust him , he screamed without words, and knew it would not be enough.

Lost in a haze of racing thoughts, he saw a pale hand grip Sirius's upper arm, dig until Sirius’ hand eased from Harry’s wrist, leaving dotted bruising behind.

Salazar drew away from Sirius, and sketched a graceful bow.

"Master Black," he said. "I don't believe we've been introduced."

The lazy slouch curving Sirius's back straightened itself. The miasma of emotion on his face eased into cool disdain. Sirius transformed before Harry's eyes, from the proud tilt of his chin to the sneering curl of his lips. For the first time since Harry met him, he saw the House of Black on Sirius’ soul, reaching deeper than the aristocratic beauty on his face.

"It's Lord Black to you," Sirius said, something vicious twisting behind his eyes. He could not speak the language the way Harry did, but he touched the talisman around his neck, Helga's gift and Rowena's invention. The weight behind his words carried, was received and understood.

"Lord Black," Salazar amended easily. He was angled at a safe distance from Harry, a hand clasped to the small of his back. There was something careful in the way he held himself. An openness in his manners Harry had never seen before. He inclined his head, the motion formal, polite. "I am Salazar Slytherin," he said. "One of this school’s Founders."

"Trust me," Sirius said. "I know who you are."

"And has who I am done anything to offend you, my Lord Black?"

"Sirius," Harry said. "Don't."

The crack running through his voice was heard, transcending the barrier of shared speech. Salazar turned to him with an expression of quiet concern. He reached out, automatically, touching a hand to Harry's neck. In the second before he leaned in, Harry spared a moment to wonder when in the past month he had come to expect Salazar's touch. When contact between them became natural, the press of fingers on skin speaking louder than words. There had been a time when Salazar held himself at arm's length, Harry was sure of it. No longer.

I'm here if you need me, the gesture said, but there were other voices in the room.

"I told you to get away from him ."

A snarl, a hard push. A wand appeared in Sirius's hand. Harry smelled gathered power in the room, heard his Housemates gasp. He moved.

"Harry!" two voices shouted, at the same time, undistinguishable in their alarm. Two hands reached for him, seeking to push him aside, safely away from the curses on beloved lips.

" No, " Harry said. He fisted his hands on Sirius and Salazar’s shirts. "Stand down, the both of you!"

Sirius had lowered his wand, pale-faced. He shook with fine tremors, a fighter's tension racking him. "Move aside, Harry," he said tightly, in a language only they shared. "You know what that man has done. What he's done to us. Him and his name, his ideology, his House. The bigotry. The war. It all traces back to him. Trust me lad. I heard my family spew his rhetoric often enough." His eyes left Salazar just long enough to flicker down to Harry. It was a hard gaze, full of a Gryffindor's determination. He pressed against Harry's fist on his heart. "We can end it here, before it begins," he said. "He's Salazar Slytherin Harry, and we can end it here ."

“You’ll have to fight me,” Harry said. “To get to him, you will have to fight me.”

“Harry – ”

“He saved my life,” Harry said. “He is nothing like the man you think, Sirius, and I won’t let you hurt him. I am a Slytherin, and when you threaten him, you threaten me .”

Sirius blinked at Harry, startled. Uncomprehending. "Don't be ridiculous," he said. "You're nothing like them."

“I am,” Harry said. “I think I’ve always been. In First year I had to beg the Sorting Hat not to send me to the House of my parents' killer. I begged it . " He breathed deep, feeling Salazar's stillness behind him, Sirius' in front. "I'm not begging anymore," he said, and though he never raised his voice, Sirius flinched. "The people around you have been my family for the past year. Sirius. For them I fought and bled and grieved . I won't let you hurt any of them, Salazar least of all."

"He's Salazar Slytherin. " Sirius looked appalled more than furious, with the wide-eyed alarm of someone whose world was upending. Harry had some idea of what that was like.

He grinned a mirthless smile.

"He is,” he said. “Trust me, I am. Very aware of that. But killing him won't solve any of our problems." He searched for Sirius's eyes. "It won't bring my parents back." When Sirius staggered as though the new strength in his legs deserted him, Harry reached a supporting hand. Sirius accepted his touch.

“Salazar is not responsible for Voldemort," Harry said softly. His lips twisted. “He's not even prejudiced against Muggle-borns."

Sirius barked a laugh. "Now, that’s pushing it," he said.

Harry smiled. "Do you trust me?".

Sirius nodded, quick and easy, and Harry breathed a sigh of relief.

"Then trust me ," he said. "I would have bled out on Stonehenge's grass if it weren't for Salazar. I – " he choked on a handful of words, trapped them before they could burst free from between his teeth. "Give him the benefit of the doubt. Please. For me, if nothing else."

Sirius considered him for a long moment, his eyes sharp on Harry’s face, seeing beyond the stretch of Harry's skin. It was a piercing stare. Harry met it with a straight back and hard-won confidence. He held still and let Sirius see. He would open himself up for Salazar's sake. He would leave himself vulnerable before a parent's judgement.

Sirius huffed out a slow, ragged breath, wry and tinged with amusement. His chin fell against his chest, and his lips moved around silent words, quick prayers to dead friends. When he looked up again, repressed mirth danced at the corners of his turned-up lips. His eyes went over Harry’s shoulder. Whatever they saw there made the boyish smile stretch further across his face, speaking of bitten-down hilarity.

Harry watched it bloom with growing dread.

"I still don't like you," Sirius said, jerking his head at Salazar. He grinned, ferocious and threatening. "But I suppose you'll have to do.”

Chapter Text

They soared for long hours, cutting through glimmering mist in the quiet suspense of the night. The air was cold, made pure with frost, but they laughed at its crystalline bite, baring mocking throats before the sharp ice of its teeth. Storm clouds rolled in the distance, roaring with shattering fury and the crackle of blue lightning. Leather wings carried them swifter than the wind. They had walked through the world's skin and suffered a thousand tortures; tonight, they would reach for the pale glow of full-bellied moons.

Harry grinned a raptured smile, leaning back against the corded strength in Sirius’ arms. Sirius held on tight. He shook with reckless mirth, laughed at the clear moon and all the space between them. Above thick fog and below bleached stars, they outpaced nightmares on Thestral's wings.

A sharp pull, a graceful twist, and black wings flattened against frozen air, brisk snap turning to easy roll. Harry unbent from the Thestral's neck, dragging Sirius up with him. He felt free, drunk on moonlit air and the weightlessness of a flight. 

"What do you think?" he called over the gusting wind. "How long has it been since you last flown?"

"Too long!" Sirius shouted back, gaunt chest heaving with dying delight. His hands pinched Harry's sides. "But let's head down soon, alright? It'd be a shame if my extremities started falling off."

Snorting, Harry shoved back against him. He gave a gentle push in the crease between the Thestral’s wings, and she glided down with sinuous strength, smooth and unhurried. They drifted like dead leaves, a lazy, swirling descent.

It was as they touched down, shaking out numb limbs, that Sirius slung an arm around Harry's shoulders, pulled him close and said, "So. When did you first realise you fancy Salazar bloody Slytherin, d'you reckon?"

It was said with warm interest and a parent's teasing, with such flippant nonchalance that Harry's heart tripped long before his mind registered the words. Then he understood, and it was as though the far-away lightning had found him after all.

He felt himself react, knee-jerk and helpless, body seizing up. He had paled, he knew from the empty buzzing in his ears, had taken too long to answer, but he had lived long years with lies cradled close. He pulled a smile on his lips, forced himself to meet Sirius’ eyes. He willed words past the tight fist of his throat, willed them steady, willed them incredulous.

“ Fancy? ” he said with a snort. “I'm not – I don’t – I – "

Words dried in his mouth, wilted like dead flowers. There was only so big a lie even he could tell. The thing in his chest had grown too great for the trembling confines of his rib; it spilled from him like blood. No words could hide it, under bones and far from sight.

Sirius looked profoundly unimpressed.

"Lad," he said with a slow, measured tone. "I endured six years of your father mooning over one damned redhead. I know what you Potters look like when you want someone. Bloody dumbasses, the lot of you."

Harry felt his composure slip, and was too slow to hold it back. He tried to wrench free of Sirius’ arm, but found himself weak before Sirius's wan strength. The little panicked gasps of his breath rang loud in his ears, in the deep quiet of the forest. His whole body felt numb as long-buried shame boiled under his skin. What could he do, he wondered numbly. What had he done?

Then, cutting through the mad spinning of the world, came a voice.

"Harry? Harry! " Hands cupped his face, pressed hard enough to be felt. " Merlin, kid, breathe . Just breathe, it's alright. It's fine. You're alright. Calm down, Pronglets. Deep breaths, c'mon."

His head was tucked in the crook of Sirius's neck. Sirius showed him how to breathe, deep and even, running soothing hands along his trembling back. It took long minutes before the awful pinpricks left Harry’s chest.

"All right?" Sirius asked, tightening his arms when Harry made to leave. He held on long enough for Harry to relax, melt against him like candle wax.

Harry took stock of the damage. They had landed in a small clearing, at the edges of the forest. The surrounding bushes had been flattened. Shredded bark littered the ground. A few small trees were uprooted, pushed clean off, bare-limbed and dying slow deaths. Harry could still feel the uneasy crackle of magic at his fingertips, growling power pooling under his skin, a sickly heat.

“Harry,” Sirius said. “Tell me you’re all right.”

“I don’t know,” Harry said, and Sirius sighed against his hair.

“Shit,” Sirius said. He pushed back, his hands cradling Harry’s face. Harry watched Sirius’ lips thin, his brow furrow. Then his expression settled in something firm, resolute. "I make an awful father, don’t I,” he said. He gave a narrow-eyed glare when Harry made a noise of protest. "Did you think I was going to beat you up over being attracted to Slytherin? Or is it because he's a man?"

Harry swallowed, treacherous throat working around harmful words yes, yes of course, I beat myself up over it, why wouldn't you? He had learned to live inside his own skin, in long months of quiet wandering, but not even the burn of the Mediterranean sun could cauterise childhood wounds.

"Son," Sirius said with a sigh. "No one gets to choose who they want to take to bed. It's not something I'd ever blame you for." His smile turned bloody, turned ferocious. He trapped Harry with affectionate arms and a father's authority. "You and I," he said, gleeful, and Harry braced himself for what followed, "Are going to talk about sex. "

{. . .}

It became a thing. Sirius found him in the corridors between classes, sat beside him at lunch. With casual words and a neutral face, he dropped small bombshells at Harry's feet.

"Did you know, the reason why my mother finally kicked me out is because she found out I'd been dating Remus?"

"You what? "

Or, "Your dad was strictly Evans-centric, but Lily? She had a thing for Alice Longbottom back in Fifth year. You probably get it from her. She'd be so proud. They both would."

"I mean, I don't get what you see in Slytherin, but. If I didn't think Remus would gut me, I'd climb Godric Gryffindor like a tree. "

"Oh my God Sirius, he's married. "

Though most comments were innocuous enough, others made Harry very, incredibly grateful he and Sirius spoke in a language foreign to the children around them.

"Sex should never, ever hurt," Sirius would tell him. "You're doing something wrong if it does. Take it easy. Use more lube. Try something else. There doesn't need to be penetration for it to be good. Do not get talked into anything you're uncomfortable with."

"And for the love of – use protection . I don't care if no one can get pregnant, STDs don't care what gender you’re fucking."

"First times are always messy. There are too many limbs you don't know what to do with. It's alright. Don't hesitate to talk about what you do or don't want. Now, if you want pointers about, say, giving head – "

For all that it left Harry feeling as though his face had caught fire, it helped. This avalanche of careless words, this nonchalance in Sirius's tone. The embarrassment never faded, but Harry stopped feeling like throwing up, like running away, like there were needles under his skin. The clench of shame and resentment he had carried in the pit of his stomach loosened with every off-handed advice. You are allowed to want what you want, Sirius told him between merciless teasing and the affectionate press of shoulders. It is right, it is normal. Cast shame aside, my godson, and carry yourself with pride.

It helped, and in some ways, it didn't. The hazy, directionless want Harry felt for Salazar found new focus. It sharpened, took on clearer shapes in the dead of sleepless nights. What would it be like, Harry wondered, to urge Salazar forward from the cradle of his thighs? Would he let Harry suck bruises in the hollow of his throat, down the flat planes of his stomach? He wanted Salazar's mouth on him, wanted to know the stretch of his fingers, the slow slide of him inside his body.

He wanted, with great hunger and a ramped pulse. He watched the way Salazar moved, watched the curl of his lips. Harry had averted his eyes long enough; now he looked his fill.

Salazar caught him at it, once. He watched Harry watch him for long moments and held still under his gaze. Harry thrummed with rabbit-fear when their eyes met, but there was a challenge in the way Salazar looked at him. With a face that told nothing, he arched back against his seat, chin tilted up to bare the vulnerable stretch of his throat. He looked at Harry, and he made his posture lax, and he wrote something defiant in the curve of his spine, in the spread of his legs. A dare, to look away.

Or, perhaps, an invitation, to come closer.

With his heart in his mouth and a mocking smile tracing the dips of his back, Harry fled and did not look back.

{. . .}

"You should tell him," was Sirius's advice, after he was done laughing, bright and raucous in the seclusion of his rooms. "If you think it's safe. We don't have long here, you told me. Don't deny yourself what little happiness you can find before it's too late. Harry. Better to live missing something you've had, than long for something you'll never know. Take hurtful memories over bitter regrets. Trust me on this. You don't want to look back, ten, twenty years down the road, and realise you've forgotten to live."

Perhaps, thought Harry.

Perhaps.

"Besides," Sirius added. "If he doesn't treat you right, I'll gladly break his legs."

{. . .}

With an ease that came from the passage of too many tragedies, Sirius settled into his life at Hogwarts.

"It's strange," he told Harry one day, contemplating the Great Hall with haunted eyes. "How much has changed, and how much hasn't."

He spent the first few weeks following his release from the Hospital Wing glued to Harry's side. It was, Harry suspected, as much for Harry's benefit as his own. Whenever common sense started to slip from underneath his feet and Harry came to doubt his own sanity, he could reach out, for warm skin and building strength. Assuring himself of Sirius's presence. He lived. He lived, and reached back for Harry with easy grins and crinkling eyes. He breathed with Harry when anxiety tightened his stomach; Harry guarded Sirius's mind from the monsters prowling in the dark.

With endless patience and the care that came from long separations, they bore each other's hurts and did not bow under the weight.

Sirius moved into the Slytherin Dungeons. Though he had come to a grudging acceptance of Harry's House of choice, there were limits to his concessions. Over two decades of prejudices would not vanish overnight.

"I am not leaving you alone down here," he snapped when Harry pointed out h would be more at ease in the Gryffindor Tower, where Godric offered him a place to stay. "Also, I want to keep an eye on your Lord Slytherin. You may be in love with the man, but I don't trust him as far as I can throw him. Especially not with you. "

"Sirius, I don't need a bloody chaperon ."

" Yes. Yes you do. "

In Slytherin territory, Sirius dogged Harry's steps with a grim smile and watchful eyes. He treated Harry's Housemates cordially enough, contenting himself with playing a few harmless pranks on the Snakes, which the children were all-too happy to learn from. He saved the burn of his hostility for Salazar. He only ever addressed the Founder with cool disdain or thinly-veiled threats. With Harry under the protection of his arm, he bared hungry teeth at the space between them, more Grim than human, made alive with the dark promise of untold pain.

Look, he seemed to say, from across the common room and the long stretch of empty hallways. This boy who was your student, this boy who is your friend. He is mine now, to protect and look after. You will not touch him, or else I will tear out your throat.

Salazar, to Harry's great surprise, did nothing in response. He bore Sirius's animosity with long-suffering grace, met snapping jaws with pleasant smiles. He greeted Sirius like an equal, or a better, with careful bows and polite words. My lord, he called at a studied distance from Harry, with hands tucked behind his back. This is my House; be welcomed here, for it is your own. It was an ostentatious show of respect, and Harry did not understand it.

"Bastard thinks he can make a good impression, does he?" Sirius muttered when asked, a dark glower curling his lips. "I'll crack him open like an egg ."

Harry just sighed, and let Sirius play his part.

{. . .}

Sirius's first meeting with Godric Gryffindor went something like this:

"You must be Sirius Black," Godric said, blood-red and golden, moving with easy warmth and a hunter's fluidity. "It's good to finally see you on your feet, Lord Black. I've heard much about you."

"...," said Sirius.

"My name is Godric. Godric Gryffindor. I've had the honour of taking your son as my apprentice. He is shaping up to be a great swordsman."

"...!" said Sirius.

In the background, Harry guffawed.

{. . .}

Harry walked Sirius through the castle, pacing his steps to a convalescent's rhythm. Sirius had endless questions, listened to answers with the look of a starving man offered a feast. For the first time in his life, Harry talked without restraints. He talked about the Horcrux hunt, about last year's battle. He talked about Ron and his betrayal, about Gytha and how she died. He had words of fear, and doubts, and loneliness. He talked, and Sirius let him.

"I missed you so much," Harry told him one day. "After you were gone. We hadn't spent a lot of time together, I know, but – "

"Speak your mind, lad. It's alright."

"But I felt your absence more keenly than I ever did my father's."

Sirius embraced him hard enough to crack ribs, fierce with a living man's strength. "I don't want to replace James, or betray his memory," he whispered in Harry's hair. "But you have to know. Before. Before the Ministry. I wanted to ask – that is, we'd have to – once my name was cleared, but – I wanted – it's – ah." Harry kept him close as Sirius struggled for words, held him together as Sirius shook with emotions and too many regrets.

I'm here, he said, with a firm touch, with patient silence. I'm here, and I will not leave. We spent long years, and I am done letting go of the people I love. Whatever you have to say, I will stay by your side.

"Blood adoption," Sirius blurted finally. "I'd found the ritual in my family's library. I was going to ask you, but. Never got around to doing it. Figured there'd be time later." Harry felt the dampness of tears against his skin, and couldn't tell whose they were. "I'm sorry I missed that chance, kid. I was reckless.I'm sorry I wasn't there when you needed me."

Harry laughed wetly, an ear pressed against the beating of Sirius's heart. "Well, you're here now," he said. "Ask me again once you get those papers back, yeah?"

Sirius pressed their foreheads together. "Yeah," he said hoarsely. "Yeah alright, I'll do that."

{. . .}

"Sirius," Harry asked, thinking about Remus, about Nick, about family. "Will you teach me to become an Animagus?"

"Ah, lad. I thought you'd never ask."

{. . .}

The boy found him some time after Sirius's recovery. He walked with weighted steps, the land and sky bowing before his dancing strides. The shadows of unnamed powers curled at his fingertips like tamed beasts, but his smile reflected only childish wonder. Harry watched him approach and saw the green depths of a sacred lake, the melted gold of a crown in the making. Oh, he thought through the sympathetic shivering of his soul. Oh, I know you.

"Hello," said the boy, with the rage of a storm in his eyes, the echo of laughter lingering in throne rooms. "Do you remember me?"

"Merlin," Harry said in two voices that overlapped, and he was reaching out, thinking, there you are my brother, over the splitting of his chest.

Merlin clasped his forearm with a firm grip and a broad grin.

"I've been waiting for you," he said. "I wasn't sure we'd meet again. It's been a while for you, hasn't it?" Then, head tilted to a side as though listening to voices Harry couldn't hear, "Arthur. Are you alright?"

There were phantom weights on both his shoulders, the taste of blood lingering on his tongue. Harry smiled from the foreign stretch of his own skin, spoke with a voice that rang deeper than it should. "You have me confused with someone else," he said. "Arthur you'll meet later. I'm just Harry."

Merlin looked at him with ancient eyes that could crack the world open. "So you've told me," he replied, terrible in his kindness. "Funny how destiny works out, isn't it?" He brightened, sudden as the sun coming over the horizon. "It's the first time we're here together though. It's great, don't you think? Magic everywhere. Harry, I have so many questions. I'm glad you decided to stay longer."

Merlin took his hand and Harry followed. It was right, it was wrong; his place was beside that boy, and it wasn't. He had already stood there, Harry thought, though he had no memory of doing so. The pull of Merlin's magic tasted like lightning, like the groan of the Earth underneath their feet, like Harry's . If Harry blinked for a second too long, he could see red blood drip drip dripping down the edge of a sword, hear the gleeful cawing of crows, the snarl of rotten darkness. He breathed in the brackish waters of a lake, felt a weight upon his head, the weary curl of a bloodied smile on lips that had been his.

Merlin tugged on his hand. "Do you remember that time we went hunting for wyverns?" the boy asked, light, carefree, brighter than the stars.

They were passing a tapestry the size of a small house. The span of rich fabric was taken by a roaring dragon, golden scales glinting in the sun. The beast was great and fearless, a lance piercing its heart. There had been mud, Harry remembered, and the touch of a fire that could melt bones.

"I don't," he said. "I don't remember. And neither should you. You haven't lived that yet."

Merlin cast him a smile, soft and full of mischief. "Does it matter?" he asked. "I haven't, but you have. It's really one and the same, isn't it? If you were to call me by your name I wouldn't be able to tell the difference." Then, "C'mon! I need to ask you about magic. You've been having troubles with control, haven't you? I thought we could help each other."

Merlin dragged him to an isolated classroom, a bare space with abandoned, broken desks. Harry thought about torn trees and all the damage that had followed him through the summer. 

"Alright," he said, facing Merlin with squared shoulders. "Where do you want to start?"

Early morning faded to late afternoon. Neither of them took note beside uninterested glances at the gliding sun. Harry lost grip on his shaky sense of self. He stood on school-grounds, in lavish ballrooms, in the mud of battlefields. Merlin raised his wand, but it was his own voice that spoke. He moved, but it was Harry who waved life into being. He broke and came together; he fell and grew bruises. He thrummed to bursting, with cracks splintering wider under his feet, with a distant call pleading his name, a name, over here Harry, here is your way home, here is the voice to lead you out of the dark, a friend's voice, Hermio –

"Harry," they called him, with teasing words and light hands on his skin. "There you are Harry. We've been looking for you for hours. Come back, friend, mentor, brother, you are ours still."

Harry came to in a midst of Slytherins, deep green and glittering silver, sly smiles and studied postures. Alfric had an arm around his waist, Ignotus was tucked under his arm. Audra was scowling, swatting at a cackling Glenn.

"When did you get here?" Harry mumbled, and he could feel himself settle back inside his own skin, could feel the receding crackle of his magic.

"We just did," Alfric replied, shaking him gently.

"Since when do you hold study sessions we're not invited to?" Dallin demanded, with crossed arms and adolescent petulance. "I swear, we should give you a collar with a bell. Maybe then you'd stop sneaking off."

"Possessive much?" Bradley asked him, earning a swift glare from the other boy.

"Sorry," Harry told them, keeping his tone bland and his manners unrepentant. "I didn't want to see your ugly mugs for half a day."

He met Merlin's eyes over hollering laughter and indignant spluttering. The boy winked at him over Cadmus's head. See? He seemed to say. Isn't that much better now?

And it was. Even through the daze of exhaustion, Harry felt a new ease sink beneath his bones. The classroom smelt of ozone, the heavy tang of spellwork, and something like peace loosened the tense knots of Harry's muscles.

He let himself reach back for the strength in Alfric's shoulders, the warmth of Ignotus against his side.

"Now that you're here though," he told his Housemates, "you might as well stay. I didn't mean to make you worry."

"We know, Potter," Audra told him with a roll of her eyes.

"We know."

{. . .}

"I keep hearing her," Harry told Salazar, one quiet evening after dinner had come and gone.

Salazar met his gaze over the soft glow of candle light, silver eyes made dark in the creeping gloom. "The friend you love and left behind," he said. "Hermione."

"Yes."

"It isn't the first time. Do you hear her more often?"

"I think I heard her a few times over the months I've been away. But I was never sure. It's been getting worse lately, though."

Carefully, Salazar set down his quill. He closed his notebook.

"You understand what this means, don't you?" he asked, leaning against a desk with deliberate slowness.

Harry inclined his head. "I think I do," he said, because he could not always tell the difference between delirium and reality, caught in visions of black wings and groaning ice, terrified of the dark lurking beneath.

"I’m sorry."

"Salazar," Harry said, and stopped. He thought about Greek philosophies, about pain and the avoidance of it. He held his restless tongue still between firm teeth, counting full breaths before he spoke. "Did you think I would blame you?" he asked.

“I blame myself.”

“Don’t,” Harry said. “You've done so much for me. I don’t think you understand how much I value you – your friendship." He was febrile, feverish with unrequited love, with a want that burned his skin, hotter than dragon-fire. He forced himself to stillness and said, "I won't ever forget it. I won't let anyone forget you, either."

A promise.

I will fight for your reputation for as long as I draw breath , Harry told him, with a heavy heart and the roar of blood, but Salazar could not hear him.

"I am missing half the equation," he said, low and frustrated, and Harry wanted to ease the tense set of his shoulders with soothing hands, with skirting lips. "We've made great progress, you and I. It could work, I am certain of it. I make a study of wards and old curses. If anyone alive is able to make such a spell that can alter time, I am. But there is something I am missing, and I worry I might kill you if I rush my work."

"Not likely," Harry said. "Another man is already waiting on that honour."

"Do not," Salazar said. "I beg you, make light of your own death."

"I'm not." Harry propped himself on the table beside Salazar with a weary sigh. "There's been too much blood spilled in my name for me to go down without a fight, I promise you."

"Maybe there has not yet been enough, considering," Salazar said. He hit the top of Harry’s head with his quill. “Focus, my dear. There’s work aplenty for the night.”

{. . .}

Life, as it was wont to do, followed its course. Harry trained with Merlin, with Godric and Sirius. He gave classes, and attended others.

Away from Sirius's distrustful eyes, Salazar pulled him in for long hours of research. In turn, Harry followed him to the Chamber of Secrets, keeping him company through restless nights. He never helped, and watched Salazar set his fate with broad strokes of his wand.

The two of them sometimes fought between the Chamber’s water-slick walls. They fought with sharp swords and bloodied fists, coming together with light steps and unrestrained violence. It did not satiate Harry's desire for touch, for long hours spent in bed with nothing but bare skin and cut-off breaths, but bearing Salazar's bruises, marking the man's skin with his own, made the furious, snarling thing in his chest purr in contentment.

Life followed its course, draped itself in heavy snows and the bite of winter frost.

An early morning in December, Harry woke, for the first time in over a year, to screaming pain, splitting his skull along the edges of the lightning scar on his forehead.

Chapter Text

There was:

Wood and stone and the touch of silk. There was the wrench of a fall, the splitting of skin. A silence broken in three, in four, in seven twisted things.

He ran through a maze, with grave dirt stuck to his feet. There was: the drag of teeth on his neck, the exhale of a breath that held the world's hunger, and he –

Fell.

Fell without air, fell towards the sky, up and up and upwards more. He watched stars spin and go nova, watched them collapse onto themselves, then burst with life again. He felt infinity. He –

Sank.

Sank into earth, through things long dead. Molten rocks burned his bones red. The slow shift of continents loosened his limbs. He learned the deep crack inside the world's flesh, he learned to count his breaths backwards and he –

Woke.

Woke alone and naked, with his back torn open and pressed to stone. He was spread on mountaintops, a sacrifice to an altar. Twin ravens stood on his shoulders, pecked at his sightless eyes. His head hung low, his throat exposed, dragged down by the weight around his brow. It was the weight of gold, the weight of a crown. It circled tight, tighter; he heard his skull crack, tasted the warmth of blood and the horror of a scream no one could hear.

"Harry!" called a voice, loud and alarmed and beloved. "Run, Harry!"

"Harry," said a voice, soft and sweet and dreaded. "There you are, Harry."

"Harry," he heard. "Wake up!"

{. . .}

Harry came to gasping for air, to the sharp spin of his bed's canopy and the press of hands on his skin.

"Gods, he's bleeding."

"I'll get someone."

"He needs to calm down before he brings the castle crashing about our ears."

"Harry? Harry, listen. You're safe, mate. You're home. You need to breathe now, c'mon."

Alfric stood over him, blurry and ghost-white. There was a great weight on Harry's chest, a tearing in his head. Distantly, he could feel himself shake, spasm with cold and receding dread. His ears rang with the hammering of his heart.

"Harry," Alfric said, grabbing him by the shoulders. "Harry, you need to stop. You're going to hurt someone."

Harry blinked, tried to bring the world into focus, but all he could see were the beaks of crows, the light of dying starts, and a smile, terrible and delighted, splitting a thin mouth like a wound. His eyes hurt. He was caught in a tangle of sheets and limbs, he, he had to, he needed –

"'s fine Harry," Ignotus said, crawling under Alfric's arms and on Harry's bed. The boy curled against Harry's side. Harry drew him in a loose embrace, out of instinct more than conscious thought. "'s alright. The monsters didn't get me, so you're safe. I promise."

For long moments Harry could not think, could not move, could not feel anything but the insidious growth of darkness between his bones, but Ignotus was a small, warm weight against his side, and he forced a breath in his lungs, then another. There was a feeling like a glass shard was stuck in his forehead, but the world righted itself in pieces. He sight cleared.

His friends stood on the side of his bed, watching him with gradients of calculation and worry. His room was a mess, books flung to every corner, wardrobe doors yawning open and spilling clothes. It was as though an Exploding Potion had gone off while Harry slept.

His skin was sticky with sweat. When Harry raised a hand to his face, his fingers came back wet with blood. He felt sick.

Alfric reached for him hesitantly, with a hand that shook and a broken look on his face. Harry let his touch ground him. He settled back into his skin with the feeling he had taken a half-step outside of it.

"Potter," Audra said, watching him from the side of his bed with her arms crossed, her hair gleaming burnished copper in the wan light of candles. "Harry. What in all the gods happened to you to give you nightmares like these?"

"And who do we need to kill for it," Glenn muttered.

Harry tried to speak, but found all his words had left him. The Slytherins watched him, grim, silent, with tense postures and wands held in white-knuckled fists.

There was the pound of running steps, the bang of a door thrown open. Sirius burst into the room like he had Dementors on his heels, snarling and wild-eyed. He took the scene in with a glance, the knot of students gathered by Harry's bed, the acrid scent of cold sweat lingering in the air.

"Harry," he said, then stopped. He went pale at the sight of Harry, bringing out the emaciated slants of his face, the dark rings under his eyes, and Harry found that he could speak after all.

"S-Sirius," he said, teeth clacking with cold and the onset of shock. "He k-knows Padfoot. He knows. He knows, he knows – "

Sirius crossed the room in long strides, pulled Harry into his arms. Harry shuddered in the embrace. He clung to Sirius like a child lost to nightmares, like a man hanging on to life by a thread.

Sirius breathed deep, careful breaths with him. "Shh. You're okay, kiddo. I've got you, you're okay." He pressed his lips to Harry's forehead, drew back just enough to meet Harry's eyes. "What did you see?" he asked, wiping the blood from Harry's face.

Harry's scar screamed. He just wanted out.

{. . .}

There was a crack, the heat of displaced air, and Salazar was moving before he could think.

He threw himself to a side, rolled, one hand closing around the handle of a knife, wand half-raised in the other. No one should be here. Not at his hour of the night, not at all. He came up ready to strike, with death on his lips and a blade to plunge in someone's heart –

Harry looked at him with half his face caked in blood and nightmares lurking in the whites of his eyes. Feeling like the ground had dropped from under his feet, Salazar killed the curse growing in his mouth, held his arm before he could let the knife loose. The boy kept looking and did not move.

"Harry?" Salazar called, with his pulse in his throat, his body tense with the promise of a fight, or the urge to reach out. "Harry."

Harry focused on him at the sound of his voice, some of the muted horror on his face clearing with the first wash of awareness. He staggered one step towards Salazar, spraying water in his precipitation. He looked drunk with exhaustion, dark bruises etched under his eyes. The blood on his face was fresh, gleamed wetly in torchlight fires.

"My head," he said, voice a low, broken rasp. "It hurts, Salazar, make it stop – "

He took another lurching step, pitched forward. Salazar caught him before he could hit the ground, slid an arm around Harry's waist. Harry wore only sleep clothes, radiated warmth in the dungeon's dampness. He leaned his weight against Salazar without hesitation, sleep-soft and shaking.

"Easy there, my friend," Salazar told him, a hand pressed to Harry's chest. He kept his grip gentle, kept the touch steadying. Harry's heart beat a frenetic tempo under his palm. The boy's skin smelled of sweat, thrummed with magic, with fading fear. Blood had seeped in the white of his nightshirt, circling his throat in red. Salazar set his teeth against the sight, against the first fluttering of panic. "Harry," he said, then set a hand against Harry's cheek. "Is anyone following you?"

Harry gave a soft, hollow laugh. His lips twisted into a bitter smile. "Yes," he said. "But he's not here yet." He straightened in Salazar's hold, looked up at him with a small frown creasing his brow. "Sorry," he said, brushing two fingers to Salazar's hand on his cheek. "How did I get here? Shit. I didn't mean to alarm you."

The boy had appeared out of thin air, bare-footed and bare-armed, soaked in blood and half-delirious. "Didn't you?" Salazar asked dryly. He shifted his grip around Harry. The man looked ready to topple. "Nightmare again? Did you cut your head open falling from bed?"

"Yes," Harry said heavily. "And no."

He shivered against Salazar, with cold and shock and bloodloss, green eyes dulled with a deep sort of tiredness. He looked old beyond his years, with the weight of a long war in the curve of his spine

"Come with me," Salazar said, because it was the only thing he could think to do. "Let me look at that cut."

Harry stood more firmly on his feet, but Salazar had no wish to let him go. Something greedy and entirely too selfish had him take more of Harry's weight. Harry cast him a quick smile, bittersweet and rueful, and he folded against Salazar, swinging an arm around his shoulders as Salazar led them deeper into the Chamber.

"Of course I'd find you here," Harry murmured, taking in their surroundings, the rough-stone walls weeping water, the room grand and cavernous, torches spitting flames against the gloom.

Which begged the question, "How did you find me?" Salazar asked.

"That's – " Harry paused. He gave a one-shouldered shrug. "I just did. You feel like the sea. Like salt and cool water and grey-green currents. I followed that, I suppose. Apparated here."

"You can feel magical signatures," Salazar said blandly.

Harry blinked up at him. "Is that what it is?"

Dear gods.

Harry hummed with life and power under his fingertips, warm and lightning-sharp and Salazar had to swallow the sound pushing against his throat, desperate and vaguely hysterical. The man in his arms could move through space with a thought, could recognize the taste of someone's magic from a castle away. Salazar had blood on his tongue to keep from saying something he would regret.

He took Harry to the small adjacent room where he kept a few books. The air was drier there, did not smell as strongly of wet mud and stagnant water.

"Here," he said, a hand on Harry's elbow, guiding him against the edge of a desk.

He called a clean rag with a distracted flick of fingers, a bowl of fresh water right after. He raised the rag to Harry's face, but Harry caught his wrist before Salazar could touch him.

"You – " Salazar watched Harry's throat work soundlessly. He held himself still. "You don't have to," Harry told him, with something in his eyes Salazar could not read, too tangled to be one emotion alone.

Salazar could not help the smile that flitted over his face, wry and private. "You were the one tending to me," he said. "Last time we found ourselves in this position."

Harry looked down, then, at the way both their bodies were arranged. Him, leaning against a desk in wan candle light, weary and bloodied and cracked open, with Salazar in the spread of his legs. One tending to the other. It called back to another night, to other wounds, Harry guiding Salazar back to himself. His hands on Salazar's skin, stitching together the torn, tattered pieces of him. Harry breathing broken breaths in the vulnerable dip of Salazar's throat, leaving finger-shaped bruises on the span of his back.

In the deep dungeon's silence, the catch to Harry's breath was whip-crack loud. The boy ducked his head, hiding behind a fall of dark hair. Not fast enough to keep Salazar from seeing the sudden reddening of his cheeks, the way his mouth fell open on a sucked breath.

"May I return the favour?" Salazar asked, and Harry choked on a laugh, the sound muffled, full of sharp edges and self-deprecation.

He looked up again, his eyes dark, the twist of a crooked smile on his mouth. He looked at Salazar with his throat exposed, his hands braced on the desk for support. Blood darkened half his face. Salazar wanted to wipe that blood with his bare hands, wanted that man's colours on his own skin.

"You may," Harry said, tipping an imaginary hat. His eyes fell on Salazar's lips, stayed there for long moments. It was a heavy stare, intent and focused and dragging like teeth. Salazar's skin itched with the urge to do something about it, to tilt his head just a fraction, to accept the invitation for what it was, but –

("You want the boy," Godric told him on a quiet night, the air still and winter-sharp. Salazar had concealed his reaction, the sudden tripping of his heart over itself, but Godric had only looked at him with curious eyes. "Why not take him?"

"Because I could," Salazar remembered saying, and it was no less true now than it had been then. Harry looked at him with naked hunger sometimes, confused and helpless with it, and it would be. Easy. "I could have had him months ago. I could have had him beg for it."

"Why haven't you?"

"He's a student."

"He's a grown man."

Except he wasn't. Harry was ten years his junior, was under the protection of Salazar's House, and all the ways Salazar could have seduced him to his bed were reasons why he shouldn't. Harry was more of an adult than most grown men Salazar knew, but he was still so damned young, and Salazar would never not hate himself for wanting.)

– he raised the rag instead, with Harry's eyes on his face, a long stretch of silence between them.

"What was the dream about?" Salazar asked lightly, rust-coloured water running between his fingers.

Harry shook his head, kept the motion small. "I'd rather not," he said.

Which meant he had dreamt of that man again, the one he refused to tell Salazar about, refused to give so much as a real name. The one who had left him broken and bleeding on Stonehenge's stones, so many months ago.

It was a man whose head Salazar would very much like to see on a pike. Surely Helga would lend him an axe if he asked nicely enough.

He finished cleaning Harry's face, the water in the bowl turned a dusky pink. Harry's scar split forehead above his right eye, jagged and forked like lightning. It stood sharply against nut-brown skin, inflamed and tender-looking, as though it had yet to fully heal.

Salazar had an affinity for curses, knew how to make them, how to break them, how they ticked and sang with dark magic. He recognized a curse-scar when he saw one. Some sort of backfired spell with a gnarled, twisted tinge to it, he thought, though he had never asked. Harry was frustratingly vague with questions about his past, and Salazar was a good enough teacher to know when to stop pushing boundaries.

Usually.

He allowed himself to ghost knuckles over the swollen flesh, watched Harry's lips thin at the touch. A shiver of something ran up his arm, not quite an awareness, but – close. Close enough for him to raise an eyebrow, for faint worry to stir in his chest. The blood was alarming enough, but a curse-scar still fully active after so many years, well. That was another matter entirely.

"It's the first time you've come to me with your forehead split open," he said, careful to keep his tone conversational. He waited until Harry looked up, pinned him down with a stare. "Was it the first time it happened?"

The thought that Harry might have seen to the wound on his own in the past was – disheartening, but well within the realm of possibilities. It had taken close to a year before Harry learned to trust him with pieces of himself.

Harry blew out a long, weary sigh. A shiver travelled the length of his back.

"Yeah," he said. "It's never done that before. Usually it's only active when – " His voice trailed off. Salazar saw his jaw flex, his hands curl into fists, only to be forced loose again. "It's only active when he's near. Or feeling particularly homicidal."

"Voldemort." Harry cast him a quick, startled glance, edged with sudden fear. "You gave me his name on the day we met," Salazar said, filing the reaction away. "It doesn't take a genius of Rowena's calibre to make the connection."

He let silence rush between them, gave himself time to grasp the implications of what Harry had told him. The visions had been bad enough, hearing a friend's voice call for him, searching and searching and getting closer with every passing day. There were cracks running the length of Harry's bones, and soon they would either pull him home or split him in two. Time was stitching Harry back into its fabric, threading skin with a needle neither of them could see. Salazar remembered the Forest, the rot he'd found there, the sense of wrongness, deep and gaping and full of horrors. Harry's scar hurting for the first time in over a year could be just another ill omen to add to the list. It could also be sign of an enemy seeking to rush the process, to leave Harry a disjointed, bloody tatter.

It was a brutal, efficient plan. Salazar would admire it, it were it not aimed at someone he loved.

Salazar was not Godric. He did not make harsh decisions with his heart leading, did not act before he had time to think. He had always listened to the voice whispering caution in the back of his head, survival instinct anchored deep. That voice was not whispering now. It was a shout, about black rot and dark paths that led into monster's jaws. Salazar considered what it was telling, with the weight of Harry's head in the palm of his hand, Harry's eyes trained on him, half-lidded and made dull with pain, and, well.

Salazar was not Godric, but he wasn't Rowena either. He had never laid claim to any semblance of wisdom.

"May I look?" he asked, meeting Harry's eyes. He allowed himself a smile when the boy blinked at him, sluggish and confused. "I may be able to help with the pain, at least."

Harry stiffened. Opened his mouth. Closed it again. He kept still for long moments, utterly silent. Not for the first time, Salazar regretted how well he'd taught him Occlumency. Then, slowly, gradually, Harry unwound. His shoulders slumped, whole body going boneless in Salazar's hold. He gave a soft, dry laugh. The expression darkened the bruises under his eyes, sharpened the lines of his face, already made lean with stress and sleeplessness.

"Paying off old debts?" he asked, but it wasn't sharp, rang with a strange mix of fondness and well-worn pain.

The sound of it was like a knife between Salazar's ribs, parting the flesh around his heart. "I think," he said, parsing through the words like a man walking bare-footed on broken glass, his whole being made vulnerable with tenderness, "That you and I have long since passed the point of debt and forgiveness, my dear."

Harry grinned at him then, quick and sharp and wicked.

"Have we?" he asked, not quite mocking, but – amused. He turned his head then, one fraction of a movement that could have been accidental, that brought his lips to the inside of Salazar's wrist. Harry pressed a kiss there, fleeting and reverent, a bare touch that set the entirety of Salazar's blood aflame.

Salazar had no time to react, no time to wrench his hand away, or to slide it in Harry's hair. Harry looked up at him, found his eyes and held his gaze. Salazar felt the moment he tore down the shields around his mind, a low shudder like the echo of a lightning storm in the distance, an invitation he had always been helpless to resist and he –

He sank into the whirlwind of Harry's thoughts. Sights sounds smells, tastes and touches that weren't his, that ran together like wet paint on skin. He saw a patterned snake blink at him from behind thick glass, a greenhouse's cloying heat on his skin. He heard the snap of a lock on cupboard doors, the roar of a great scarlet train belching black soot. He felt a friend's embrace, warm and bone-crushing. Blood ran down his arm, saturated the dark wool of his school uniform. There was a fang sunk deep in his flesh, tearing through skin, through muscle, through bone, and with it came the awful burn of poison, and his forehead hurt, like his skull was about to burst open. Merlin, he was going to die in his place, his bones rotted in pools of stagnant water, the marrow sucked out of them by –

The wash of Harry's panic came clear, came cold. He slammed shut the doors of his mind, his heart beating fey-dance quick. There was a sick, nauseous feeling in the pit of his stomach Salazar felt as though it were his own, as though his own heart that was about to hammer out of his chest. White-eyed dread crushed his lung, and he did not think.

He wrapped Harry in the memory of a warm summer night, a whole city bustling outside an open window. There was the murmur of a thousand voices, the distant pound of hammer on steel, the snap of halyards against ship's masts. The air was sticky with salt and the scent of the sea. He laid languid on a bed of feathers, on sheets of fine linen. A deep, pleasant hum weighed down his limbs, a sense of peace he had not found in long months. Thomas traced idle patterns on the bare skin of his back, brushed over new scars with quiet intent. Salazar kissed the crease where Thomas' hip met his thigh, felt a soft huff of laughter resonate in Thomas' chest, a tightening of fingers in his hair. He smiled against warm skin.

Oh, he heard, and did not know who the thought came from. He could feel the touch of Harry's mind again, could taste a shivery sort of surprise, stunned and tinged with something else, nameless and gut-wrenched, the sharp anticipatory slant that preceded a long drop in a flight.

It took him a moment to understand what he had shown Harry, the piece of himself he had given without thought. He braced for embarrassment, for the orange-sour feel of it to wash away that fragile stretch of surprise. Harry merely held himself still, with a vague sense of calculation, lightning-quick thoughts too quick for Salazar to grasp. When Salazar reached for him, hesitant and offering apology, Harry reached back. The boy had calmed, kept his thoughts behind a shield of curiosity. It was that much easier to pinpoint the pain he felt, now, the dull throb that radiating from his forehead.

Magic. Dark, oily, writhing like putrefied worms. Salazar smelled it like a battlefield, like the wet cracking of bones and the split flesh of a belly. This was not a wound, was not the stitched scar of some ancient curse. It stank of turned earth and mildew, a cloying graveyard scent, and it cut into Harry's head with all the cruelty of a serrated blade. It was wrong. Terribly, horribly wrong.

Against his skin, at an impossible distance, Harry made a noise of held-back pain.

The curse had burrowed itself into him, a parasitic growth. Harry had healed around it, but – not enough. Not enough to absorb it completely, to dissolve it within himself. Curses weakened over time, frayed into harmlessness. This thing had grown instead. It had fed.

There was nothing Salazar could do.

He held back his thoughts before Harry could grow restless with his own panic, killed the wash of rage before it could spill into Harry's mind. He counted down careful breaths, then stretched his mind into something cool, into a soothing touch. Harry sagged against him at the easing of pain. Salazar wanted to sink teeth into the boy's gratefulness, wanted to scream at it. He had done nothing to deserve the way Harry leaned into him, aglow with relief.

"There is something inside your scar," he said instead, keeping his voice soft, his touch light. He said, "Tell me how it happened, Harry."

Harry did not move. "I can't," he said, and his eyes were old, and so, so tired, and Salazar forgot himself.

"I will kill the man who dared."

"You can't," Harry said, his lips thinned in a bloodless line. His grip on Salazar's arms had grown bruising.

His reaction gave Salazar a moment's pause. He heard the sudden alarm in Harry's voice, saw the way his eyes widened, then were forced into neutrality. Exhaustion made Harry careless, made him slow to hide. His body had shouted No and Stop louder than if the words had left Harry's mouth, as though Harry had believed, for an instant, that Salazar could sink a knife in Voldemort's heart.

"Can't I?" Salazar asked, sweetly, pointedly, but Harry had wrapped himself in layer of lies.

He smiled a crooked, careless smile. It rang emptier than the trunk of a dead tree. "He's ten hundred years beyond your reach," he said, slipping from Salazar's arms. He swayed, made to right himself. Salazar helped him with a hand to the small of his back.

"I'm nothing if not resourceful," he informed Harry, and the boy barked a real laugh. "It's early yet. Do you think you can go back to sleep?"

Harry snorted. "Can you?" he asked. "Would you mind if I stayed a while?"

As though there was anything Salazar could refuse him.

"I understand you hate this place," he said because Harry had shed sweat and blood in the construction of Hogwarts, but he had never lifted a finger to help Salazar with this. He watched instead, sombre and silent, his eyes like brands on Salazar's skin. "But you're always welcomed to stay."

"Well," said Harry, with half a shrug and the echoes of weariness. "It is early yet. I don't suppose you'd be willing to go upstairs, and frankly I'd rather have your company in this forsaken excuse of a cave than be alone in my bed."

Harry gave a minute flinch. Salazar carefully, ruthlessly banished the image that rose in his mind, of a tangle of sheets, an armful of sleeping man, the press of warm skin. He took mercy on them both, and ignored Harry's slip.

("Why not take him?" Godric whispered in the back of his mind, and Salazar snarled at the thought.)

"You're always welcomed here," he repeated, and Harry gave a tight nod.

He gave Harry his cloak. The Chamber was never truly cold, was sank too deep underground to be anything but vaguely chilly, but Harry was hardly dressed for a mid-winter night. He and Salazar were almost of a height – the cloak fit him well. They went back to the main chamber. Salazar was almost done warding it. He had wrapped the entire space in layer of spells, to keep it hidden, to keep it safe. He could feel the the hum of his own magic with every step, a pulled string in his chest. He sank fingers in the weave of charmwork, and went back to work.

"I know why I'm awake," Harry said behind him. "Why are you?"

Making wards was just like braiding roses. You wanted to twist the stalks so the thorns pointed out, rather than in. The trick was not slicing your own skin in the process.

"What do you know of our finances?"

"Nothing," Harry said. "Do we need money?"

"Badly." The air flared a bright, electric blue. Runes spun into view, spitting sparks. Salazar fed them power, and the nexus settled again with a quiet purr. "We'll starve before spring at this rate."

"Can't we get a loan?"

"A loan?" Salazar glanced at Harry with an eyebrow ticked up. "If you know of a bank that would trade with a bunch of wizards responsible for slaughtering hundreds of Muggles, by all means, give us the name. No, what we need are sponsors."

Harry grimaced. He pulled Salazar's cloak tighter around his shoulders. "And that's supposed to be any easier?"

"Not in the least. You did ask what was keeping me awake."

Harry gave a pensive hum, but fell silent. Salazar focused back on his task. Magic streamed vapour around him, rose in smoke from his skin. He tangled two spells together, then three, then four, chanting inside his mind, a continuous incantation that permeated each thread, gave them shape. Ward-making was an art very few ever mastered, but Salazar had learned the bones of it before he could walk. His mother had whispered the words over the threshold of their home, had hummed spells like nursery rhymes.

A whirl, a snap, and the charmwork wove itself within the existing skein. Power sizzles along the walls, trailing sparks of faded lightning.

"We should hold a ball or something."

"Excuse me?" Breathing hard, Salazar sheathed his wand.

"You know. A charity dinner. Get a bunch of rich people here, feed them, get them drunk. Show them what you've done, and convince them the smartest thing they could do for themselves is to give us some of their money." Slowly, Salazar turned around. Harry tapped his lips in thought. "If we get started now, we could host the thing right around Yuletide."

Salazar stared at Harry. The man leaned against the jut of a rock formation, arms crossed over his chest, hair an utter mess, eyes ringed with dark bruises.

Gods, but Salazar loved him.

"Harry," he said, and kept his tone cordial. "Would you care to tell me how in the seven hells I didn't think of that before?"

{. . .}

Three nights later, Harry saw Hermione.

Ash streaked her face like warpaint. Blood trickled down her hair. Her jaw was set. The world around her was a blur of bright flames, of rain and mud. Harry spied the occasional burst of coloured spells. He tried to see through the darkness beyond her, but she was the only things in focus. The rest ran together into senselessness.

I'm dreaming, he thought, with his heart in his throat and dread in his stomach, and knew it was only a half-truth.

Hermione's eyes were alight on him. She watched him with a sort of hunger, of fierce intensity.

"Harry," she mouthed, but he could not hear her.

He reached for her. She was too far. Something broke over her face, fear and desperation, a flash of stubbornness. A dark shape rose behind her, great and approaching and –

The dream shattered.

Harry jolted awake with a shout in his throat and his arms half-raised. His heart pounded as though he'd run a mile. His lips wanted to pull back into a snarl; he smothered the urge to howl at the night. Something pull at this chest, a rope reeled taut. He pressed a hand over his ribs, angry at himself.

He tongued the piece of Mandrake root stuck to the roof of his mouth. Its earthen taste coated his throat, a strange sweetness, half a tone away from rot. Harry had moved up with his Animagus training. This stage was particularly unpleasant. The Mandrake heightened his senses in twisted, erratic ways. It loosened Harry's inhibitions, softened the hard edges of his mind. It left Harry feeling one misstep away from madness, and not entirely human.

Pushing past the tiredness lining his limbs, he pulled himself out of bed.

The rest of the day dragged on. Harry went through the motions with a migraine pinned behind his eyes and a feeling like reality was slipping under his feet. He was disconnected from himself, and thought that, perhaps, the potion Hermione had brewed for his eyesight was wearing off. Everything held the fuzzy, warped quality of myopic sight. He caught himself short of fleeing with a prey's sharpened fear, of letting loose the roar growing in his chest.

He dismissed his last class of the morning, a smile pressed over clenched teeth. The Slytherins kids shot him worried glances, but Harry shooed them along. He skipped lunch in favour of a dark, quiet room, where he stayed for about two minutes before restlessness had him moving again. He kept seeing Hermione every time he closed his eyes, the soot on her face, the way her skin was pressed tight to her bones. The look in her eyes, bright and relentless.

She needed him, and there was nothing Harry could do to get to her.

He paced Hogwarts like a caged beast, with destruction and the taste of ruin on his tongue.

"There you are," Salazar said, and the swords stopped vibrating in their racks, and the stones at Harry's feet eased back to the ground. Harry could could see Salazar in shades of warmth, could hear the thump thump thumping of his heart.

"Restless?" Salazar said, with no pity in his eyes and a mouth Harry wanted to bite.

"You have no idea," Harry said, the words sliding from his mouth in a serpent's sibilant hiss.

He called a sword to his hand with a half-thought, threw himself to a side as Salazar came at him with a knife bared. The blade skidded Harry's belly, trailing fire in its wake, and Harry grinned a hunter's smile. He shifted with another slashing strike aimed at his stomach. The sword smacked against his palm, and Harry rammed its pommel at the hinge of Salazar's jaw. He missed, grabbed the sharp edge of the blade with one hand, used the sword like a staff to parry Salazar's next blow. He blocked Salazar's arm between the blade and his own body, gave a sharp twist that forced the man to drop his knife. Salazar shimmied away before Harry could break his arm, a shoulder rammed in Harry's chest, head ducked below the swipe of Harry's sword.

Salazar's hands darted to his clothes, but Harry knew him now. He knew all the places Salazar hid his weapons, knew all vulnerable dips where his armour gave way to skin. He lunged, sword held for a deep thrust. Salazar jumped back a step, cursing. Harry used his own momentum, dealt a sideways slash that would have gutted Salazar like a fish, then a quick overhead blow. Salazar flowed with both strikes, then with the next. Bare-handed, he kicked at Harry's sternum, bleeding space between them.

Harry circled him, and Salazar matched him step for step. He summoned a stick to his hand with a twitch of fingers, then grew it into a broadsword, made it thin and deadly. Harry measured the steadiness of his stance, and shifted his own weight.

Cold wind rustled through Harry's clothes, drying the sweat dripping down his back. The winter sun warmed the back of his neck. They never did this in broad daylight, he and Salazar. Their lessons only ever came in the dead of night, in the liminal space between sleep and wakefulness. Salazar fought him to tameness, offered violence to the anger coiled in Harry's bones, and Harry always, always, met him blow for blow, so long as he could shroud his face in shadows. Harry watched light glide Salazar's skin in gold, watch it glint off the edge of his sword and thought, good.

Let their faces be bared into the sun. Let the whole world see.

There was a floating moment where they both stopped, watched each other from the paces between them. The only movement came from their heaving chests.

They attacked together. Harry parried Salazar's blow, right, then left and right again. He feinted a thrust to Salazar's weak side. Salazar deflected, rolled with the strength behind Harry's sword. It had been months since he had last taken the burnt of a stroke and not bothered to dodge.

Harry stopped Salazar's blade short of cutting his thigh, bent with the next breath before Salazar slashed his arm. He took a blow with the flat of his blade. There was motion as the corner of his eyes, a threat in his peripheral vision. Harry half-turned toward it, attention shifting a fraction, and –

Salazar grabbed him by the throat.

"On me," he snarled. "Focus on me, Harry, before I leave my own scar on your pretty face."

Harry choked, wheezed out a breath. He tried to tuck his chin in, but Salazar's grip tightened. Harry gagged. Blood pounded in his temples, made his vision swim with dark dots. The taste of rot and sweetness flooded his mouth, brought memories of Salazar's lips on someone else's skin, of a golden-haired man with crow's feet at the corners of his eyes, naked and languid in Salazar's bed.

"Trust me," he said, the words strangled, squeezed together on a half-breath. "You have all my attention."

Salazar shoved him away. Harry spun with it, the point of his sword aimed below Salazar's ribs. Salazar blocked him, but Harry was at an angle with his crossguard. He bore down against it, sword edges grinding together, then gave a sharp twist. The sword flew from Salazar's hand, clattered at their feet. Harry straightened, pushed away –

Salazar hit him in the jaw.

Harry's head snapped back from the strength of it. He saw stars, pain bursting across his cheek. His teeth snapped together; The taste of rust filled his mouth. He lurched back, ears giving a high-pitched whine.

Salazar sidestepped a clumsy swerve of his blade, one sinuous twist that brought him under Harry's guard. Harry ducked his head, fist half-raised, too late. Salazar grabbed a handful of his hair, forced his head back.

"Harry," Salazar said sweetly, his breath rising to mist on Harry's mouth. "I don't care how Godric's training drives you to distraction. I don't care how often you hear your friends cry out at night." He forced Harry's head back further, exposing more of his throat. He wiped the trickle of blood on Harry's chin with a swipe of his thumb. "When you fight me, I need you to fight me."

Harry smiled through the pain of his aching cheek, smiled past the taste of blood on his lips. He lifted his head a fraction, testing the strength in Salazar's grip. "Yes, sir," he said, and let bleed some of the soft, animal whine locked at the back of his throat.

Salazar's lips parted, grip slackening a fraction, and Harry slammed his head forward, smashed his forehead into Salazar's nose. Cartilage cracked wetly under the blow.

Salazar made a noise that was half-surprise, half-pain, a hand going to his nose. An opening. Harry struck at his sternum, all his weight swung behind the punch. Salazar was lean, was thin, lacked the bulk Harry gained in the past year. He chocked, stumbled back a step, and Harry followed him. He kicked at Salazar's knee, drove his foot in the soft flesh above the bone. Salazar buckled, fell, his breath cut short, his head level with Harry's stomach. His eyes were hazy with pain.

Harry grabbed his hair. Forced his head back.

Salazar smiled, and Harry touched the edge of his sword to the vein pulsing in Salazar's throat, careful not to break skin. He waited.

"I yield," Salazar said. He bowed his head a fraction, digging the edge of Harry's sword deeper into his skin.

Harry stopped him with a warning pulled on his hair. He nudged Salazar's chin up, his sword flush against Salazar's carotid.

"Don't move," he said softly, and he grasped his wand.

Salazar's eyes widened. He made an aborted motion to twitch away, but Harry kept him still.

"Episkey," he said. Salazar's nose snapped back in place, making him grunt.

Harry sheathed his sword, then pressed a sleeve against the flow of blood before it could ruin Salazar's shirt. He held the back of Salazar's head, steadied him when the man swayed on his knees.

"Well," Salazar said, slurred and groggy. Harry felt him smile against the bare flesh of his arm. "I fear you've outgrown my swordsmanship's skills, my dear. Be sure to tell Godric. He'll be positively insufferable."

Harry hefted him up to his feet. Salazar rose with a groan, pinching the bridge of his nose. He ticked an eyebrow at Harry.

"Better?" he asked.

"Much," Harry said, rolling his shoulders. He was. He felt calm again, loose despite the lack of sleep. Salazar had settled him, had forced him back inside his own mind with dripping blood and the sting of bruises.

Harry tapped Salazar's sternum, making him wince. "You should get yourself checked out," he said. "Might've bruised your ribs."

Salazar waved him off. "I'll go to Helga later, and consider myself lucky if bruised is all I am, thank you very much. You pack quite the punch." His gaze lost itself over Harry's shoulder. He straightened a fraction, eyes narrowing. "Don't you have classes to attend?"

Harry jumped. He spun around. Students had gathered under the courtyard's archways. Dozens of them. They stood gaping at Harry and Salazar, murmuring in each other's ears. Several pointed fingers at them. A kid jumped up and down in excitement. Harry grew aware of Salazar's warmth on his skin. Of how close they stood together. He hastened to step back, stumbling in his precipitation. Salazar spared him a glance, pointed and amused, but, thankfully, no one else seemed to notice. The children scattered under Salazar's unimpressed stare, though not without glancing back. Harry stifled a curse. He'd had Salazar on his knees, his throat bared before Harry's blade.

"How long do you suppose we've got before the whole castle's heard of this?"

"Rowena is adjusting lenses on the Astronomy tower," Salazar said lightly. "I'm certain she knows already. Though I'm more worried about your Godfather. You'd best be there when he finds me; I doubt this is a conversation either of us can escape without blood shed."

Harry buried his head in his hands, groaning.

Chapter Text

There was:

A feeling like a slow collapse, like Harry was sinking inside himself. A build-up of pressure made his limbs elastic. He breathed water like viscous air. He was pulled to the bottom of a lake, and gold crowned his head.

No. Not gold.

His scar seared with bright, splitting pain.

He died, or slept, and woke again. He stood in a labyrinth, in graveyard dirt. Red eyes smiled at him from the darkness.

Harry, said Voldemort, soft and sweet. There you are.

{. . .}

"The ball is in less than three weeks – " Salazar said.

"Is it?" Sirius asked. "I'd wondered if we were still hosting the blasted thing. Why, if you didn't keep reminding us every two hours, I think I'd forget about it entirely."

" – And we're running out of time to prepare."

"How much time do you need to plan a party?"

Harry closed his eyes. Forced them open again. His eyelids felt gritty, lined with sand. He was overly aware of his own weight, of the way his body rested against the couch cushions. The heat of the fire in the nearby hearth bled into his limbs, weighed him down. Even. Further.

"The children are going to need dress robes. Dance lessons. We have three weeks to teach them how to speak, how to behave, how to – "

"Your kids are smarter than you give them credit for, Slytherin, they – "

"We started them etiquette last year, but it will not suffice for high nobility. Harry, do you think you might clear some time – Harry?"

"Harry."

A hand gripped his shoulder. Harry sucked in a sharp breath, startled from his slow slouch, body going rigid. His heart gave a painful thump. One-two. The beat sliced through his head.

"Sorry," he said, blinking quickly to clear his fuzzy sight, sliding his feet from the low table where he'd propped them. "Sorry, what was that?"

Sirius's hand tightened on his shoulder. There was a deep frown set between his godfather's brows. His mouth had pressed itself into a thin, worried line.

"Alright kiddo?" he asked, sweeping Harry's hair back from his forehead, hand coming to cup Harry's cheek in a callused palm. Harry swallowed against the sheer tenderness of the gesture.

"Yeah," he said, and found he had energy left for a tired smile. "Sleepy is all."

"Been dreaming again, haven't you?" Sirius shot Salazar a glare. "I thought you were supposed to be making him Sleeping Draughts."

"I have," Salazar replied with a dangerously pleasant smile. His eyes flicked from Harry, to Sirius, then back again. "They stopped being effective some time ago. I can only up the dosage so much. Unless you're willing to let me put Harry in a coma, there is nothing more I can do."

Sirius's nostrils flared. Harry patted his hand, gently pulling it down from his face.

"I'm fine," he said, and hid exhaustion behind the careless curl of his lips. "I just take more naps."

"You look knackered, kid. Half-dead, really. There's probably an Inferni out there that looks more refreshed than you do."

Harry barked a laugh. "I know," he said, knocking his shoulder against Sirius's. "Shows people love me for more than just my pretty face though, doesn't it?"

"You can't go on like this forever. I just wish – " Sirius shook his head, voice trailing off.

"Listen," Harry said. "There's nothing we can do about it. I've been having bad dreams for as long as I remember. Let me deal with it. I've managed so far."

"Perhaps," Salazar said delicately, "we should adjourn to another day. That, or Lord Black and I can make the arrangements ourselves while you get come rest."

Harry levelled him with a flat stare. "I am not leaving the two of you in a room alone. We're here. We might as well get it over with."

"Yeah," Sirius said. He shot Salazar a too-wide grin. "Full offence, but I'd rather eat every hair on your head than deal with you unsupervised."

Salazar heaved a sigh. Harry grinned at him.

He settled more firmly against his seat, and willed himself to pay attention. He grabbed a quill, a roll of parchment, and prepared himself to be taking notes. It would give Salazar a clearer view of the work to be done, and would force his own mind to push beyond the sweet haze of exhaustion.

"How are we on food and drinks?" he asked. "We can handle decoration easily enough, but we need enough alcohol to get everyone drunk twice over. I think – "

They went over the various issues one at a time. Harry categorically refused to be giving dance lessons. He still woke in cold sweats over the Triwizard Tournament's Yule ball. He agreed to teach some of Salazar's classes for him instead – a beginner's Potions class, as well as some Mind's Arts hours reserved for the more advanced Slytherins. Salazar gave Harry copies of his lesson plans. Harry arranged them to the side, quietly amused over the fact that he found himself with enough Potions skills to be teaching the subject. The look on Snape's face.

Sirius volunteered to coach the Slytherins on the finer points of high-society manners. Sirius had swam those dark, shark-infested waters since the moment of his birth, bore its every code etched in the marrow of his bones. He promised to do his best to arm the students against social faux-pas. Salazar nodded at that, then moved on without arguing the point. Harry bit down a smile. The two men worked well together, though neither of them liked to admit it. Sirius had long since shelved most of his open, bared-teethed hostility towards Salazar. He only behaved himself for Harry's sake, had told Harry he could not watch him shove himself between two raised wands again, but, still. Whatever the reasons, Sirius's willingness to work with Salazar was progress, was a step towards cordiality if nothing else. Harry would take it. He felt certain Sirius and Salazar were more alike than they were different. They might never be friends, but Harry thought they might yet come to a grudging sense of trust.

"I think we've covered most of it," Salazar said, leaning back against his chair. Harry handed him his notes. Salazar flicked through them, then nodded to himself. "Harry, could you inform the students?"

"I'll get them to show up."

"Then I believe we're done." Salazar inclined his head at the both of them. "Thank you for your time."

Sirius stood, pulling Harry up with him. "Just in time for dinner," he said. He slung an arm across Harry's shoulders. "C'mon lad, we should hurry if we want the kids to leave us some crumbs."

"You go ahead," Harry said. Sirius cocked an eyebrow at him. "I was hoping to have a word with Salazar."

Salazar fingers stuttered from where they were busy gathering the parchments strewn across his table, a mere, fractioned slip. Harry's smile wanted to bare teeth.

"Not too many words I hope," Sirius muttered under his breath, switching to modern English.

Harry shoved him away. "Get out of here."

Sirius snorted, but dropped a kiss on Harry's temple and showed himself out, tossing a cheerful "Goodnight!" over his shoulder. The door clicked shut behind him, closing Harry in Salazar's rooms, to the sound of rustling parchment and ever-present burbling of water.

Harry leaned against a pillar, hands stuffed in his pockets. He let the silence settle over him, the sense of being held safe and sheltered. Salazar glanced at him, acknowledged him with a dip of his head, and went back to work without a word. Welcome, the gesture said, the easy silence. Being with you is as being with myself. Harry closed his eyes, breathed deep, willed himself to stillness. He did not want the hapless warmth uncoiling in his chest to bleed over his face.

He thought about walking out. Part of him wished to bask in the moment, then simply leave. He shifted his weight in preparation, muscles tensing, but –

A warm summer night, the scent of sea brine wafting through open windows, the caress of bedsheets against bare skin. Idle fingers walking the dips of his back, his mouth kissing the warm crease of someone's thigh. Harry remembered laughter that dissolved into a moan, remembered a pull at his hair, the liquid satisfaction that suffused all his limbs.

The laughter had been a man's, he thought, and nightmares were not the only things keeping him awake at night.

"You shared a memory with me," he said, and opened his eyes. "I haven't been able to get it out of my head."

Salazar set down the sheaf of paper he had been leafing through. He looked up at Harry, his head tilted to a side. Harry kept his posture lax, kept his shoulders loose and his hands tucked out of sight. He met the polite tilt of Salazar's head with an easy smile.

"You told me once," he said, "that every part of me I give you are yours to use. So I'm wondering what you want me to do with the piece you gave that night."

"You're going to have to refresh my memory, my dear" Salazar said. He leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs. "What is it I gave you that's been haunting your nights?"

That bastard. Harry's fingers twitched, wanting to close in on themselves, to fiddle out some of his nervousness. His palms were sweating. Merlin, his heart rammed itself against his chest as though he had run a sprint. It locked up his breathing, sent an anxious buzz down the length of his arms. He was fourteen again, asking Cho for a dance.

Memories over regrets, he thought, and exhaled a slow breath.

Salazar knew damn well what Harry was talking about, but Harry could play along if that was what he wanted.

"I remember harbour sounds," he said slowly. "I remember warmth from early sunlight. Bedsheets tossed aside. Someone else's legs tangled with mine." Harry paused. He swallowed heavily, his throat clicking. "I remember that person's fingers, and the taste of his skin."

That got a reaction, or the beginning of one. Something flashed behind Salazar's eyes, a nameless emotion Harry saw him bury within the same heartbeat, saw him fold away out of Harry's reach. Salazar stood with his hands clasped behind his back and that same sense of tight control. He stepped in Harry's direction. Harry resisted the urge to straighten from his slouch, to space his feet shoulder-wide.

"I–," Salazar said. His hands unwound from his back, palms opening in a gesture of apology. "I'm sorry."

Harry's shoulders hunched up towards his ears. He forced them down again. "Sorry?"

"I hadn't – " Salazar stopped himself. He looked off to the side, then back at Harry again. "You were distraught. I meant to calm you. It's unfortunate that that particular memory was the first to come to my mind."

"Unfortunate," Harry repeated blankly.

"It was inappropriate," Salazar said. His mouth twisted. "To share with a student."

"Oh."

"I had hoped you would not hold it against me. It was terribly inconsiderate of me."

"Just a mistake, then?"

Salazar made a strange, aborted motion, as though to reach out an arm toward Harry, only to catch himself on time, or to think better of it.

"Yes," he said eventually. There was something wrong with the smooth, easy tone of the answer, in the way Salazar's mouth worked around to word, but Harry could not make sense of it under the alarmed rush of blood in his ears.

So, he thought, faintly. This is what rejection is like.

A sinking in his stomach, as though the floor had opened beneath his feet. The middle of Harry's chest had been torn open. He wanted to scream. It was the coldness in Ron's eyes after the Goblet of Fire had spat out his name, was every Mother's cards Petunia had tossed in the trash, was the unhappy downturn of Cho's lips.

Harry.

Harry was not a child anymore. He was not the skinny, knobby-kneed boy who had starved for attention from the depths of his cupboard. He had long since outgrown adolescent hungers. He had taught himself to fit inside his own skin; He could bear his own weight. He would not stagger from under it, would not let raw-edged hurt show on his face.

Salazar had been kind about it, at least. He had danced around the subject to preserve Harry's dignity. He had apologized, had made it his own fault to soften the blow.

(It did not feel like a punch pulled back, it felt like a knife gutting him open, this quiet reserve, this careful holding-back etched in every line of Salazar's body. Harry would rather have had Salazar's disgust, would rather have had scorn, or even laughter. Anything but this careful indifference, and the yawning pit it opened in the space between his ribs.)

He made himself meet Salazar's eyes.

"I see," he said, and ticked his mouth in half a smile. He clung on his composure with trembling fingers."I should be the one apologizing, then. Pretty indelicate of me to ask after something so private. I'm sorry to have – imposed on you. I won't bring it up again. " He cleared his throat and straightened from his slouch. "I should be going. Godric is expecting me."

He made for the exit as fast as he dared. He wanted nothing more than to flee, but forced his steps unhurried, forced stiffness away from the curve of his back.

"Harry."

Harry froze with his hand on the door handle, his heart a beating a furious staccato in his chest. His throat ached. Just let me go, he thought with fervour. Just let me leave.

"Why bring it up in the first place?" Salazar asked, and Harry rested his head against the cool wood of the door. "Was there something you wanted to ask?"

"No," Harry said, strangled, choking down a laugh. "No, I think you've answered clearly enough." Then, because he was a damn fool who could never leave well enough alone, he drew a deep breath, turned around, and heard himself say, "When was the last time you gave me a class, Salazar?"

Salazar blinked at him. His mouth fell open. Harry tore his eyes away from the softness of his lips.

"Excuse me?"

"It must have been months," Harry said. "You can be sorry for a lot of things, Salazar, but treating me like a man isn't one of them. Do not mistake me for anything less than your equal."

He turned on his heel and walked out into the night. Behind him, the door closed on what might have been the echo of his name.

{. . .}

Harry climbed to the Gryffindor tower, insensate to the bite of winter air. His feet retraced the steps from muscle memory alone. Hogwarts passed him by in a mesh of grey streaked with the occasional fiery orange blur. He kept seeing Salazar's smile when Harry had sank a hand in his hair, had forced his head back with a sharp pull. His eyes had gone half-lidded, Harry remembered, and Harry had set a blade to his throat. Shoulder, neck, cheek. Harry had Salazar's touch seared over his body. The small of Harry's back, the back of Harry's hand. Salazar had drawn tracks all over Harry's skin. He had shown himself in bed with another man, how could Harry have been so wrong –

No, enough.

Enough.

Harry would get over this. He would; he was no stranger to pain, and a broken heart had nothing on grief. Harry would not let the ragged edges of it show on his face. He would do his duty, would put one foot in front of the other, in front of the next. The bright ache in his chest would dull itself with the time. All great hurts did. You died a little, or wished you were dead to escape the sheer agony of life, but you always, always, grew into your scars. No matter how impossible it seemed, no matter how unbearable. There always came a day when you woke up, and found that you could breathe full breaths, and not feel as though your lungs were filled with shards of glass. Experience had taught Harry well.

He would get over this.

(Salazar would stay with him the rest of his life, Harry knew. Harry loved him with a breadth and depth he had not admitted to himself, loved him with the perfect, bared-throated abandon of youth, loved him with the quiet, deep-set certainty that he would never love another again. He had Salazar's name written on the marrow of his every bone. He should know; He had been the fool to pick up the knife and carve out the words.)

The Fat Lady slumbered in her frame, chin on chest, pink silk dress fanned out behind her.

Harry came to a sudden stop in front of her, staggered, righted himself. He had no memory of climbing up the stairs, and very nearly slapped himself for it. He had to focus. There was so much to be done. He could not afford absences, could not afford weakness. He made his back straight, raised his chin, opened his mouth.

For the first time since his eleventh year, Harry realised he did not know the password to the Gryffindor common room. The epiphany came with a sense of disorientation. Harry did not know the Gryffindor password, because Harry was no longer a Gryffindor.

Shaking his head at himself, he cleared his throat. The Fat Lady let out a slightly louder snore. She mumbled under her breath, wiggled a little, and did not wake.

"Lady?" Another snore. Sighing, Harry raised his voice. "Lady."

She came awake with a start, blinking furiously.

"Wh- what is it? What? Oh." Groaning, she straightened herself. Her eyes lit on Harry's green shirt. "What do you want, boy? You're not one of mine, are you."

"No, Lady, I'm not, but Godric is expecting me."

"Mmh. Password?"

"Unfortunately, he's forgotten to tell me."

The Fat Lady slumped back in her seat with a humf. "No password, no entry. I was placed here for a reason, you know." She peered at him curiously. "There's something odd about you, young man. Have I seen you before?"

Harry gave a benign smile. "Not in this century, Lady."

He took out his wand.

"What are you doing?"

The scent of Hermione's hair. Ron's crooked grin. Ginny's head on his shoulder. The Slytherins dogpilling him in the common room. Salazar –

Harry caught himself.

Sirius, alive, whole, mostly sane. Bony arms around Harry, the shaking of wild, wild laughter. Harry's heart breaking from the feeling of warm skin, sharp bones, damp breaths in the crook of his neck. The awful, awful twist of hope and mangled love –

Sliver mist coalesced from the tip of his wand. It pulsed out powerful waves of light to the steady beats of Harry's heart. It whorled, arranged itself, grew scales and coiled muscles. Harry's Patronus looked at him with slitted eyes. It undulated in mid-air, full of lazy grace. It gave an impression of alertness despite its enormous size. Though Harry had never set it against Dementors, he suspected the snake could strike quicker than thought.

"Find Godric," he told it against the constriction in his throat. "Tell him I'm here."

The snake flicked its tongue at him. It wrapped a loose coil around Harry's waist, washed him in warmth, then let go without prompting. It had always seemed too intelligent for Harry's peace of mind. He watched it slither through the air, tail trailing luminescent smoke. The Fat Lady let out a shriek when it traversed her, then quieted as it sank out of sight.

"It's alright," Harry told her. "It's just gone to deliver a message."

"Slytherins," the Fat Lady said in a exasperated huff, a bejewelled hand pressed against her chest.

Harry sketched a bow at her.

He didn't have to wait long. A minute later, the portrait swung open. Meic peeked out, mop of red hair popping past the frame. His face broke into a bright, toothy grin.

"Harry!" he said, and pushed the Fat Lady's portrait open. "Dad said to come fetch you. C'mon."

Harry let the boy grab him by the sleeve. "Isn't it past your bedtime, mate?" he asked as Meic towed him past the entrance.

Meic ignored the question, tugging harder on Harry's sleeve. Harry grunted, surprised by the boy's strength, and ducked his head just in time to avoid bonking his forehead on the stone archway.

The general air of the Gryffindor common room remained as Harry remembered it, cosy and red-gold. Roaring fires washed the room in balmy warmth. Wood crackled in the hearths. The quiet rush of voices could just be heard over the wind hissing against the tower wall. A few students were still up. They sprawled on the thick rugs before the fireplaces, were squished together on stuffed armchairs. Harry took it all in a glance. He had braced himself for the pang of homesickness, but found, much to his surprise, that it came at him muted, entirely bearable. A vague sense of nostalgia, easy and bittersweet, and nothing beyond that.

He had another House, now.

Harry followed Meic as the boy wend his way between scattered school bags and low tables. He nodded to the students who greeted him with sloppy waves and calls of 'Professor'.

Meic took him up a winding mahogany staircase, similar to the ones that led to the dormitories. The boy pushed the door at the top of the stair. It opened into a cramped, homey living room, also decked in red and gold. Children's toys littered the space between the hearth and a large, sagging couch. The room existed in a state of organised chaos, cloaks thrown over the back of chairs, swords resting against a wardrobe by the entrance, empty mugs forgotten on coffee tables. A small cauldron was set by the fireplace, two volutes of blood-red smoke twining above its lid. A little stuffed Pegasus flapped its wing overhead. It perched itself on one of the ceiling's lamps, made it swing dangerously from side to side.

"Harry," Godric said, emerging from a side-door at the top of a short flight of stairs. "There you are, excellent. That's quite the spell you cast, that thing with the snake. You don't happen to know what species it is, do you? Seemed familiar."

Harry fell into parade rest, hands clasped at the small of his back. "You wanted to see me, sir?"

"It's been a month since we started you on the Mandrake root. How are you feeling?"

"Tetchy, sir."

"Anything to report?"

"I spent all of yesterday seeing in black and white." Harry gave a light shrug. "You told me to expect fucked up senses, so it didn't worry me. I've also been having – weird reactions to stuff. Nearly ran after a mouse last week."

"I hear you and Salazar got into quite the fight." Godric cocked his head at him, mouth ticked up into to grin. "I hear you kicked his scrawny arse."

"It was more of a mutual arse-kicking, sir," Harry said, raising a hand to his jaw. "In any case, I'm not sure I can blame the Mandrake for that one."

"All right then." Godric nodded towards his son. "Let me put the little hellspawn to bed, then I'm all yours. Make yourself at home."

"But Daaad, I'm not tired yet - "

Godric sighed, made a grab for the kid, and lugged him unceremoniously over his shoulder. Meic squealed in delight. Harry watched them disappear upstairs with a strange sense of disconnect, somewhere between fond and wandering. Was this, he wondered, listening to the rumble of Godric's voice, to Meic's sulky replies, what his childhood should have been like?

Godric emerged a few minutes later, rubbing a hand over his eyes.

"Never have children," he told Harry. He made straight for the decanter sitting on a table at the far side of the room. "They'll suck the energy right out of you."

"I'll keep that in mind."

Godric served them both a drink, then gestured for Harry to sit with him.

"So," he said. "Now the easy part's over, we can really get into the thick of it."

Harry snorted into his drink. "The Mandrake root was the easy part?" he asked. "The long, long hours of meditation chanting that bloody spell? The crash course on Human Transfiguration? That time you kept me awake for three days?"

"Yes," Godric said. "Open up."

Harry aahhed at him. Godric unstuck the piece of Mandrake root from the roof of Harry's mouth. The thing had changed colours over the last month. It had lightened from its earthy, muddy brown, to take on a distressingly flesh-coloured tint. Harry grimaced at it, resisting the urge to gag.

"Be a good lad and get me that cauldron over there."

Harry went to the cauldron belching the weird, red vapour, and brought it to Godric. He held it at arm's length as its twin streams of smoke quickened their squirming.

"Am I supposed to drink that?" Harry asked, setting the cauldron on the table in front of Godric. The potion inside was as dark as tar, and smelled faintly of musk.

"You young people," Godric sighed. "Never a word of thanks. Your Godfather took three months to brew this thing. Helga and Salazar both checked it to make sure it wouldn't turn you into something unpleasant that has tentacles for arms. A lot of work went into making sure it wouldn't kill you, you know."

"I am supposed to drink that."

Godric grinned at him. He tapped the glass Harry had abandoned on the table. "Bottom's up," he said, and dropped the piece of Mandrake root in the cauldron. The potion let out an angry hiss, bubbled, then settled again. It had taken the exact tone of Harry's skin, a rich brown.

Harry groaned, but downed his whiskey in one long gulp, faintly hoping that the strong, smoky flavour would burn off some of his taste-buds. Godric grabbed his glass, and ladled a generous serving of potion into it.

"I thought the potion needed to be taken in the middle of a lightning storm?"

Godric gave a shrug. "There's a snow storm tonight," he said. "It's much the same. It's not the lightning part that matters. There just needs to be a strong enough natural phenomenon." He pushed the glass toward Harry. "Just drink. It'll go down better if you don't think about it."

"I'm sure it won't," Harry said, but he picked up the glass, blocked his breathing, and chugged it in one go.

It was awful. It was, if possible, even worse than Harry had imagined. Worse than any dosage of Polyjuice, worse than anything he had ever put in his mouth. It tasted like blood, thick and warm and coppery. It tasted like raw meat held between hungry jaws, tasted like grass, tasted too-sweet and earthen like rotted fruit. Harry chocked, and it seared his tongue with the bite of venom, tore down his throat like a hundred bone splinters. He slapped a hand over his mouth to keep himself from retching. The potion sluiced down his stomach and settled there, a wriggling mass like tangled worms. A sudden warmth grew from Harry's belly, spread to his chest, crawled across his limbs. Harry could feel it on the tip of his fingers, on his cheeks, behind his eyes, raging like a fever. He clenched his teeth and waited and –

It eased back after long moments.

"Mmh," said Godric as Harry dropped himself back on the couch, breathing hard, his brow clammy with sweat. "I've never seen it happen, but I hear some people manage their first transformation straight after taking the potion. Not you, apparently."

"I might throw up on your rug," Harry said.

Godric handed him his own half-empty glass of whiskey. Harry drained it, thunked it back on the table, then drew out a long, heavy breath. His hands trembled faintly.

"What now?"

Godric gave a shrug. "Now you wait. Keep saying the spell every day. Hold it clear in your mind. You'll turn eventually. For some people it can take months."

"There's nothing I can do to trigger it?"

"A great shock," Godric said. "Or greater emotional distress. It does the trick. Certainly worked for me."

"Great emotional distress," Harry said. Just couple of minutes late for that one, then. "Right."

He shook his head and wiggled in his seat, slanting Godric a sideways glance.

The man sighed at him. "Just ask," he said.

"Godric," Harry said with relish. "What made you turn the first time?"

"It involved Salazar," Godric said, and gave a benign smile at the sudden snap of Harry's head towards him. Harry scowled at him. "Like most disasters in my life, now that I think of it, though for once, he had nothing to do with it."

"I'm sure he'd resent you saying that."

"We met as kids, did you know? I was a sword for hire, and Salazar, well. He'd wormed his way into an apprenticeship with the court sorcerer – "

"Court sorcerer?"

"Yes." Godric shot him a glare. "Our relationship with Muggles wasn't so bad back then. The job was more an open secret than a real position anyway. Now shut up and let me speak. You know, for all that you're a good liar, you should really work on pretending to know what's common knowledge for the rest of us. Otherwise, one might start asking questions."

Cursing himself, Harry forced a smile through the sudden stutter of his heart. "I had a very isolated upbringing."

"No you didn't. Hush now."

Harry settled more comfortably against the couch cushion, and, wisely, stopped speaking.

"We were fifteen, he and I. We had been in Maldon for four years by then – on and off, but the most stable situation either of us had had in a long while. I taught Salazar to fight. He taught me magic. I'd completed my Animagus training by the time I turned fourteen, but I couldn't make myself shift. Salazar thought it had to do with the fact that I wasn't done growing. I thought I was just shit at it."

"Which was it?"

"Neither." Godric rested his forearms on the backs of his thighs. "The simple truth is, changing your body into something it's not, is terrifying. You need to give yourself over completely, pray you'll come out the other side more or less whole. It goes against every instinct you have. There's always some pesky unconscious bit of your brain that resists the change. It can take years of study to get yourself into the right state of mind."

"I don't have years, Godric."

"And I was never the scholarly type," Godric said, his mouth softened with a wry smile. "That's why I'm telling the story. So you understand there's another way to change, and what it's likely to cost you."

Harry nodded for him to continue.

"I'm fifteen," Godric said. "More or less happy for the first time in my life. Salazar's got grand plans about getting deep enough into politics to influence the general view on wizards. Maybe get us equal citizenship in Muggle law. I don't care much for politics, but I love him enough that I very nearly give up on the only family I've ever known to go help him. I was born into a sellsword's company, you see. Killing people for money is what I do. It's who I am."

"It's not, though," Harry said quietly. "What made you change?"

Godric gave him a pointed look. "Who," he said, equally soft. "I'll give you three guesses. Weigh what you know of me now against what's I've just told you." Godric fidgeted in his seat, raised a hand halfway to his lips, then stopped himself. "You'll start to see how much of an influence Salazar had on me. How much he mattered. I'd say it's not something you can possible measure out, but, in your case, I suspect that's not entirely true, is it?"

"Godric," Harry said. "It's the second time tonight that you've called me out on things better left unsaid. I don't think my heart can take a third."

"My apologies," Godric said gravely. Harry snorted at him. "You do understand the context, and it's all that matters. Do you know who King Swein Forkbeard is?"

Harry narrowed his eyes at Godric.

"Yes, you absolutely should know who he is, but I swear not to ask any more uncomfortable question tonight."

"Forkbeard, really? Sounds like a made-up name."

"It isn't. He's king of Helga's people. Danish. Started invading about twenty years ago. He swept the whole countryside, attacking from the sea. He captured London and crowned himself there maybe two years before we finished with Hogwarts. About half the Isles are his now."

"Twenty years ago," Harry said. "Right around when you and Salazar were kids."

Godric gave a slow nod. "The war found us. We'd been expecting it, more or less, but not like this. Not so soon. War's always something that happens to someone else, up until it really isn't."

"I know the feeling," Harry said, with the ghost of a knife slicing the flesh of his arm, his feet in graveyard dirt, the oily tang of black magic on his tongue.

"They came in the night," Godric said. "Maldon isn't too big a city. They went through it like a farmer through his fields. Raiders who'd learned to fight from the moment they could walk. They slaughtered. Everyone. Burned houses to cinders. You couldn't breathe for the smoke, or the scent of carnage. I was down in the streets when the alarm sounded. Salazar was not with me."

Harry could just about imagine it. The Quidditch World Cup made worse. The panic, the screams. The awful, choking smells. Bodies littering the ground, trampled under people's feet. Realizing you had lost someone in the crowd, a sudden, jolting fear.

"Did you find him?"

"I went looking for him. Pushing through such a crowd is like trying to go upriver against currents stronger than you can swim. I fought my way to the castle and found him there. I tore the throat of the man ready to kill him with my teeth." Godric's mouth twisted into a smile. He raised a hand to his throat. "I can still feel the give of his windpipe every time I transform."

Harry winced. "Must have been a shock for everyone involved."

"You don't say. The point I'm trying to make is, you're going to turn, Harry. Probably sooner than I did. You simply need to be desperate enough to get kicked into it.

"And when you do, it's going to cost you a chunk of your sense of self."

{. . .}

The storm was well and truly upon them. Wind hissed against sturdy stone walls, rushed through empty corridors, churning snow drifts. It rattled shutters and banged doors shut. The air was crisp and sheer with frost, cold enough to burn with each breath. Outside, the sky was pitch-dark, shrouded in night and storm-clouds. Snow fell in great whorls as thick as mist.

With the potion's fire still smouldering in each of his muscles, urging him to move, Harry paced Hogwarts with silent, easy steps. The floor was made slick with ice. It caught torch-light in glimmering fractals, dangerous and beautiful.

He climbed up to the seventh floor, to where the Room of Requirements had not been created yet. Lost in thought, he walked on autopilot, pondering about the stupidity of love, and wondering how much of himself he would be willing to lose for the sake of power.

"Harry," the boy said, and Harry had not realised he had gone looking for him until he heard his voice.

Merlin's eyes were a deep space-blue in the cover of the night, his hair a spill of ink. He gave Harry a cheerful, careless smile, as though the two of them met for a prearranged meeting, and jumped down from his perch on a windowsill. Watching him, Harry felt he had missed a step going down the stairs. He stood to the left of his own body, was himself layered twice over.

"Were you waiting for me?" Harry asked, and Merlin laughed a light, fey laugh.

"All my life," he said, cheeks dimpled into a grin. Harry blinked away the feeling of his hand closing around the grip of a sword, the noise of steel grinding against stone. "It is too lovely a night to be asleep, anyway. I thought you might agree."

Harry thought about Salazar's polite rejection, about Godric's weighed remarks, about losing himself to time, or love, or magic. Why not a third, he wondered, and opened his mouth to speak.

"Why do you look at me," he said, "and call me Arthur sometimes?"

Merlin cocked his head at him, rocking on the balls of his feet. "I call you Harry also. Because you are. And you're not. But I think you know this already."

Harry closed his eyes and carefully, carefully, pushed away the sight of ice cracking under his feet, a thousand monsters lurking beneath. He straightened his shoulders against the twin weights that rested there, breathed out the brackish scent of lake water. There was a tear running along the centre of his ribs, like a sword through the chest. Harry held himself together with bared teeth and shaking arms, but the tears under his feet widened, widened, and something terrible crooned in the distance –

A small hand touched his arm. Reality wavered back into focus. Harry could once again feel stone under his feet, searing winter air in his lung. Merlin settled him back inside his bones with sure fingers and a touch Harry should not remember from another life. It came with the weight of a crown upon his head, came with the pain of steel in his belly.

"It's getting worse, isn't it?" Merlin asked him. The boy bore an unhappy downturn to his mouth and the world's weight in his eyes. "You feel like you're splitting apart."

"I'm," Harry said, "so tired."

Merlin's chin wobbled. Harry drew the boy into his arms without thought, tucked Merlin's head against the beating of his heart. Merlin went with a sigh of relief. He fisted trembling hands in Harry's shirt and did not move.

"You're dying," he said, voice muffled against Harry's chest, shivery with held-back tears. "If you don't get back soon, they're going to rip you to pieces."

Harry held him carefully, this slip of a child, this boy who had the weight of kingdoms and prophecies on the curve of his shoulders. He wished, with a growling, snarling sort of fervour, that he could shield him from fate's casual cruelty with the strength of his arms alone. There was bitter irony in the fact that neither of them had ever shied from duty.

"It's alright," he said, because he might have been a king, once, and he knew how to bear other people's burdens. "Shhh, it's alright. I'm sorry. I knew you as a man, once. I forget how young you still are."

He kept murmuring quiet reassurances into Merlin's hair, empty, comforting words they both knew to be lies. Gradually, Merlin relaxed his hold on Harry's shirt, though he did not move from the circle of Harry's arms.

"I wish it wasn't us, sometimes," Merlin said. "I know it's stupid. I know its selfish. But I wish we weren't alone."

The boy was so very young. He would grow into a legend. He would fight wars, unite a kingdom, carve a place for their kind in a world that would rather see them dead. There wasn't a wizarding child in the world who would not know his name.

He swayed in Harry's arms like a newborn foal, his head bowed in anticipatory grief.

"You're not alone, love," Harry said, gently. He thought about Ron's warmth and Hermione's fierceness, thought about them standing by his side, pale-face, bloodied, unwavering, and ached with more love than he knew how to hold. "There'll always be someone beside you. You have family here. Not by blood, but a family we chose. You'll face the end of your path alone, Merlin, but you will walk every step of it in company. And beside – " Harry ruffled the boy's hair. "In a few years, I suspect you'll even have me."

Merlin gave a watery chuckle. "Yea," he said, and eased himself out of Harry's arms, rolling back on his heels. "D'you know, I think you're right. It is going to be fine."

Just like that, all seemed right in his world. Harry watched with a touch of awe as Merlin straightened his back, grinned up at him. Half of it was elation, half was careless defiance. It was the sort of smile that might convince a mountain to move itself a few steps to the side, if only the boy asked politely enough.

"I call you Arthur," Merlin said. "Because it's who you are, Harry, more than who you might've been. It's a title more than a name, so I keep seeing you as him. You have to remember that. I think – I think it'll make sense to you, some day. I think it's gonna be important. You remember that, and I'll remember you."

Harry gave this some consideration. "You're not making sense," he said. "But all right."

He slung an arm across Merlin's shoulders. The boy leaned heavily against him. "I don't know about you, but I've had my fill of serious talks for the day. What do you say we go steal some snacks from the kitchens and haul them to whoever's still awake in the common room?"

Merlin nodded enthusiastically. Harry led him away.

They would pilfer grain-cakes sticky with honey from the kitchens, would fill their pockets to bursting under the house-elves' delighted eyes. Harry would grab a casket of Butterbeer from the stack that hid the Hufflepuff common room. Laden, they would race back to the Dungeons, giggling like children, light-headed with sharp, frosty air. They would share their loot with the handful of sleepy-eyed Slytherins they found slouched around the common room, and eat the food cross-legged in front of a fireplace, cherry-red coals crackling quietly, shivery red light spilled across the floor. They would stay up late through the long winter night, talking the dark away, and would fall asleep, puppy-like, on the thick rug, a pile of warm, heavy limbs, lulled by the lake's bubbling.

Outside, the snow fell thick, cushioning the world, but for a few hours, none of them felt the cold.

Chapter Text

Some birds die in captivity. You keep them fed, and clean, and watered, and still they die. Perhaps you didn't give them a big enough cage, you think, and you're wrong. It's not about the space, it never is. It doesn't matter how far across lay the prison bars, weak wings still strain uselessly against cold metal. Strain until broken, strain until dead.

So you try again, and it never fucking stops, a mound of small bodies piling up at your feet, broken-winged and empty-eyed.

(And maybe it wasn't a metaphor so much as a fucking nightmare, and maybe it wasn't about birds at all, but frankly he'd had a long week long month long year and he didn't fucking care.)

Carefully, with light feet and a ramped up heart, Draco slipped between two lingering shadows and down the flight of stairs. It was a narrow passageway, barely wide enough to fit a grown man. Its damp looming walls bore down on you, sucked the air from your lungs. He followed the light of a single guttering candle, held high by a rotten, putrefied hand. He'd been a stupid kid when he had purchased the Hand of Glory, but Draco had to recognise the artefact its uses.

The dungeons laid deep under the Manor, a sorry row of dank, stale cells that had been there since the time his ancestors made their fortune as mere merchants, trading magical creatures for their weight in gold.

(Cages, the lot of them, rusted metal and cankered wood older than memory.)

He tried hard to be quiet with held breaths and easy steps, closing the ancient dungeon's doors with fretful fingers. Behind him, darkness stretched on, deep and silent. The air was moist, tepid, stank of old must and older blood. It was like standing in the closed mouth of a dead beast. Beyond the wan, sputtering circle of orange light only he could see, shadows waited with eager teeth.

He should not be here.

"What the fuck," he muttered under his breath, barely even a whisper, raking a hand through his hair, pulling too hard with the faint shake of skittish fingers.

He should not be here. He did not do this. He was Draco Lucius Malfoy, of an Ancient and Noble House. He was Heir to his family's name, its traditions, its honour. He was a Slytherin, for Merlin's sake. He should know better.

He told himself the same thing every time, and always came back after.

"Draco?" came a voice, breath-thin and dissonant in the obscurity. He clamped shattering teeth down on the urge to scream. "Draco, is that you?"

A sigh, deep and steadying. He shoved the Hand of Glory back inside his robes, groping for his wand instead.

"Lumos," he said, and a pale glow exploded from the tip of his wand, bright and startling in the heavy swathes of sticky darkness.

The corridor came into sharp focus, the weeping stone walls crawling with moss, the dirty floors with centuries worth of accumulated grime. In front of him and behind heavy bars, light caught on matted hair, straggly and streaked pale blonde.

Luna Lovegood smiled at him from her prison cell, and it was a delicate, airy thing. Draco swallowed down the heart in his throat, reminding himself of his family, his honour, his traditions. With a back made straight and the spite of a frightened child, he took two stately steps into the room.

"Hi," he breathed, lamely, and bit down on a vicious scowl. He forced his head into a stiff bow. "Miss Lovegood. How are you?"

She looked at him with liquid blue eyes jutting out from an emaciated face. The smile she gave was light, careless, utterly at odds with the delicate bones poking from her wrists, with the trickle of dry, flaking blood caking one of her cheeks. She blinked, made slow from long days in captivity, owlish.

(Bird-like.)

"I'm alright," she said thoughtfully, "although I'm afraid this place is thoroughly infested with Nargles."

It had been long weeks since Luna had been captured and brought to Draco's home. In that time, he'd learned to stop questioning the existence of the many creatures inhabiting her thoughts. For all he knew, they were quite real.

"I'm sorry to hear that," he said, smoothly, because he might not be her host in the strictest sense, but he'd had manners beaten into him since before he could walk. "I – " He took a moment to pause, hesitate, and cursed himself for it. "I can't stay long. There's – we're expecting company later tonight."

"Oh." Luna's face fell minutely, but the expression cleared after a beat. "What sort of company?"

"The Nargle-infested kind," Draco said, dry as dust, because if he let himself think for too long, he'd start freaking out, and he was short on time as it was.

Careful of his robes, he sank down on the dirty floor, bringing himself to eye-level with Luna. Beyond the light of his wand, something moved in the darkness, a weak rustle of clothes. Draco didn't let himself tense, knowing better than to look at the sack of bones and shallow skin Ollivander had become. The old man was corpse-like, little more than a shadow, breathing rattling breaths.

"I brought some food," Draco said, reaching back inside his robes. He'd nicked some bread, chicken legs, and a handful of Cauldron Cakes from the kitchens before coming here, cold sweat beading his brow at the thought of getting caught. He pushed the food between the prison bars, towards Luna, a weak offering. "It's not much," he said awkwardly, "But it's the best I could find."

Luna accepted the meagre feast with a happy hum. "Thank you Draco," she said, carefully unwrapping a chicken leg and handing it behind her, where the light grew wan, eaten up by the damp, putrid darkness infesting the dungeons.

A thin hand with long fingers and longer nails reached back, snatching up the meat with an eagerness that spoke of deep hunger, interminable days spent waiting for scraps. Griphook gave Draco a sharp-toothed grin, more snarl than smile, and bit deep into the meat.

"Have you come to assuage your guilt, Mr Malfoy?" the Goblin asked, tearing into the chicken leg like he was going to eat through the bone. "Or were you sent here to make sure we'd live long enough to withstand your Aunt's treatment a little longer?"

Draco set his jaw against the icy dread that slithered down his spine at the words, something frightened and primal that felt like it might crack his chest open. There were long, angry welts streaking Griphook's arms, where skin showed through tattered clothes. Dark bruises littered Luna's collarbones, stark against thin, sun-starved flesh.

Interrogation, Bellatrix called it, cheerful and demented.

Torture, Draco thought, and wanted to vomit.

"No one knows I'm here," he said, breathing carefully through clenched teeth. He didn't want to think about what would happen to him if anyone found out. Didn't want to think about what Bellatrix would want to do, about how his father would surely fail to stop her from doing it. He'd heard the screams, once or twice, high-pitched, awful things, broken almost beyond human recognition, and –

A soft, cool hand skimmed the fringe of his hair, settled against his cheek. It was a gentle, grounding press of skin-on-skin. Draco caught the whimper rattling against his teeth, killed it before it could escape his mouth. In front of him, pressed up against rusty prison bar and filthy from long days in captivity, Luna hummed deep in her throat, a low, thoughtful sound.

"No one knows you're here," she said, soft and sure, and for one mad, mad moment, Draco's breath ground to a stop. Luna was all pale skin and pale hair, and she glowed against the damp, sticky Dungeon gloom, the most beautiful thing Draco had ever seen.

He leaned in, up against the curve of her hand, utterly unable to help himself. Seeking comfort, like the idiot he clearly was, from the girl held prisoner in his parents' basement. The curl of self-loathing settled, bitter and heavy, in the pit of his stomach.

I wish I could set you free, he thought, and that alone was betrayal enough. To his blood, and all the history it carried. To his parents, and every principle they'd taught him through careful childhood days. Draco was a selfish, frightful thing, and there was the taste of blood in his mouth, a scream trapped behind his lungs. High-pitched, and awful, and broken.

He swallowed around the scream, and the blood, drawing frail shoulders back with the strength of long habit. "I have to go," he said, shifting away from Luna's touch, deliberate and careful, so he wouldn't press a kiss to the inside of her wrist. "We'll both get in trouble if anyone notices I'm gone."

"Draco," Luna called, and he stopped, half-risen from the ground. "My friends. Is there any news?"

"Don't worry," he said, and it wasn't nearly as bitter as it should be. "I haven't heard from any of them."

Sneaking back up the stairs, he kept to the shadows. The air cleared with every step up, shedding its cloying scent of mould and rot, its humid, oppressive warmth, sticking to the skin like sweat. Draco caught himself thinking about Orpheus, walking the soft slope out of Hell, his wife following with silent steps. Carefully, pointedly, Draco did not look behind as he pushed open the dungeon's doors.

Everything was dark in the dead of night. A hushed kind of silence had fallen over the house. The kind that was aware, the kind that waited. It made Draco grit his teeth as he pushed forward, the curl of anxiety a nauseous weight in his stomach. Fear was a slow crawl up and down his spine, cutting his breath down in small, nervous gasps. I want to get out of here, he thought, like a rattling inside his skull. He had to stop, for a moment, lingering among the shadows, bent over as though he'd been punched. Distantly, he wondered when was the last time he'd felt safe inside his own home.

(Some birds die in captivity.)

"You are out late, Mr Malfoy."

The low drawl was a slap across the face. Draco straightened, a spring pulled taught.

"Severus," he said, careful, turning around with a hand smoothing down his clothes. "You're here early."

His Godfather detached himself from the shadows, where his long, flowing black robes had kept him hidden from sight. A cold slice of moon streaked the sky outside, casting just enough light to see by. It caught on Severus' sunken cheeks, on the deep hollows of his eyes. The Potion's Master had always been a thin, shallow man, framed in bitterness. The last few months had done nothing to blunt those sharp edges. Any trace of lingering softness had been flayed from Severus' skin. He was tinged grey in the wan light, looking as though all his remaining fat had been sucked from his bones. More Inferi than Man, but for the abrasive spark of intelligence burning quietly in the pit of his eyes.

Good, Draco thought, viciously.

(There had been a flash of green light, Draco remembered, and a single certitude streaking the ringing silence in his mind, sure and horrified.

I have killed a man.

He may not have struck the final blow that felled Dumbledore, but it felt as though he had, and nothing in Draco was gracious enough to forgive Severus for it.)

"It would not do to keep our Lord waiting," Severus said, and his voice was soft, almost delicate. He did not move further into the room, closer to Draco, or away, to where the meeting was to take place.

"It would not," Draco agreed. "Though I imagine, as his trusted hand, he would forgive a little lateness from you."

With a smug thrill of satisfaction, hard and coiling, Draco caught a glimpse of exhaustion, flashing just behind the dark slabs of Severus' eyes. It cracked his mask, just for a fleeting heartbeat, ringing true, deep with the kind of tiredness that ran beneath the bones and couldn't be blamed solely on a lack of sleep.

"Tell me then, Mr Malfoy," Severus said, the edge of a sneer curling his thin lips. "How is Miss Lovegood?"

With a mouth that wanted to bite and the gasping fear of a child after dark, Draco kept his hands steady, kept his smile cool and without teeth. "What's it to you?" he said, and it was more of a snarl. Cursing himself, he watched Severus's eyebrows hitch up. "The prisoners are secure," he said stiffly, "and none of your business."

"Isn't it just," Severus said, and he'd never been kind, exactly, when Draco had been a child stumbling into his father's steps, but –

He'd never looked at Draco with an edge of dark amusement curling his thin lips, either. Draco didn't like the shrewd spark of calculation running in the depths of his cold eyes, not one bit. It shouldn't sting, had not right to after everything that had happened, but Draco's life was nothing if not a fucking joke.

The flare of pain along his left arm, bright and burning and enough to make him stagger, came almost as a relief.

Beyond a faint tightening at the corners of his eyes, Severus gave no indication he'd felt the Dark Lord's call, the sudden yank on their collective leash. It made Draco want to scream at him, to hurl angry words in the space between them and watch him flinch, just for once. The searing pain in his arm went up a notch, turning snarl into a bitten gasp, and he could feel something crack open, deep inside his chest, all fury and fear and gagging helplessness.

"Well, boy," said Severus, and Draco took everything that was bubbling up his throat, shoved it back down ruthlessly. "Lead the way before he losses patience."

Fuck you Snape, Draco thought, as loudly as he could, before turning on his heels and stalking down the hallway. He forced his chin high, made his steps loud, made them assured. This was Draco's home, tied to his blood going back generations. He would not be made to feel like a rat inside of it.

(Merlin, but he was. He was.)

His mother waited for them by the Ballroom's doors. Her posture was stiff, severe, but Draco could see the anxious clasp of her hands, the way her eyes scanned every face in the approaching crowd.

She saw him, and for the briefest moment, her mouth went slack with relief, before being pulled in a tight-lipped smile again as she greeted the new Death Eaters.

"Mother," Draco told her quietly, with his head bowed and his eyes cast down.

"For Circe's sake, Draco," she said, her voice pitched low. She pressed his mask into his hands, adjusted the collar of his robes with swift fingers. "You cannot afford lateness, my son. Where have you been?"

There were lines at the corners of her eyes that hadn't been there two months prior, and Draco knew her traits were drawn taut under her make-up. His mother was a Black, she kept herself strong in times of war, strong in a way neither Lucius nor Draco could be, but those long months had taken their toll on them all.

"I apologize, mother," he said. "It won't happen again."

She shot him a narrow-eyed stare, knowing full-well Draco had avoided her question, but her eyes drifted over Draco's shoulder without pressing.

"Severus," she said, with buried warmth and a quick nod. "I was not sure you would be here."

"Narcissa." Snape inclined his head. "A pleasure as always. As you can see, my other duties had to be put on hold."

His mother shot a look around them. She took a step closer to Snape, setting two fingers against his arm. "The things I've heard, Severus," she hissed, quiet and urgent. "Are any of them true?"

"I cannot speak for what you've heard," Snape said. He caught Narcissa's fingers on his arm, squeezed and then let go. "But rest assured, I will keep an eye on your son. Now, we must go before He looses patience."

"Of course," said Narcissa. "Of course. Take care, my friend. And you, Draco."

"I will, mother," Draco replied, and he followed Snape into the ballroom.

It was a hall for great receptions, the architecture sweeping and stately, set in old stone and dark wood. Draco had attended countless formal events here, cinched in dress robes that made it hard to breathe, but proud, of his family, of the crowd of important people flocking his parents. It was a display of wealth, of power, the Malfoys at the centre of it, pale and beautiful, navigating the politicians and philosophers with practised grace. It had always been the brightest room in the house, warm with light, with rich food, with the hum of conversations.

Tonight, the ballroom was set in darkness. It had been stripped bare of furniture, picked from flesh down to its glass bones. The moon reflected off the crystal chandelier overhead, spilling broken light onto the floor. A few torches burned quietly against the walls, spitting a pale glow that did nothing the lift the oppressive gloom. The gathered crowd was dressed in black cloaks, scattered with masks white like death. At the end of the hall, the Dark Lord sat on his dark throne.

He had his legs crossed, his chin in the palm of his hand. The hood of his cloak was pulled up, casting deep shadows across his face. Only the sharp edge of a smile was visible, the faint glow of red eyes. His snake was coiled at his feet, wrapped around the chair. She curled around one long leg, wound around a lean waist. Her enormous head rested on the Dark Lord's shoulder, mouth half-opened around the warped hiss of Parseltongue. She watched the crowd with slitted eyes and lazy hunger.

"Stay here," Snape said, as if Draco had had any intention of getting closer. He had seen that snake unhinge her jaw and swallow humans whole.

He tucked himself against the far end of the hall, watched Snape slink deeper into the crowd. As part of the Dark Lord's inner circle, he was expected to stand near him, along with the likes of Bellatrix, or Draco's father. Draco had no desire to talk to either of them.

He smoothed clammy hands down his trousers, locked his breath at the back of his throat. He held it there for long moments, centring himself on the anxious beats of his own heart. He built new Occlumency shields on top of the old ones, up, up, up, up until he could put on his mask without shaking, up until an artificial sort of calm came over him and he stopped feeling claws racking down his back, cold breath on his neck.

When Draco looked up, pushing from the wall, the Dark Lord looked back.

No, was the only thought streaking his mind, a soft whimper. His shields shuddered, strained, but held fast. Snape had trained him well. Draco watched with a detached sort of interest as thin lips curled into a soft, cruel smile. There were things moving in the shadows of the Dark Lord's throne, rotted things with long claws and crowing laughter. Something primal in Draco wanted to fall on its knees and beg for its life, but the clutch of fear was a cold, distant thing.

"My friends," Voldemort said, and instantly, the silence thickened, grew new weight. "Welcome. I have gathered you here to discuss some new developments. You need directions. I know some of you have questions. Uncertainties. You might even say, doubts."

He gave a delicate pause. At his feet, the audience held its collective breath. Beside him, Bellatrix shook her head, a look of adoration on her face. Behind him.

Draco did not look at what stirred behind him.

"Harry Potter," said the Dark Lord, and his voice rang clear, rang cold. "Has been presumed dead for many months. Recent research leads me to believe that he is not." He raised an indolent hand to quail the tittering that ensued. "However," he said, "I have some idea of where the boy is, and he is in no condition to oppose us."

Behind the safety of his mask, Draco closed his eyes. Harry bloody Potter. Never here when you needed him.

"In his absence, resistance has crumbled. A happy coincidence, you might say. We have been in control of the Ministry for months. Now, we shall hold it, and commence our advance on the Muggle filth. You may doubt that we have the numbers or power for such a coup, but I assure you." Voldemort raised his head, just enough to show the widening of his smile. "My new allies will make up for your weakness."

Over his shoulder, something old bared rows upon rows of serrated teeth.

{. . .}

"Snape's not here," Ginny muttered in his ear, barely audible over the clink of cutlery. "Colin says he saw him leave in a hurry. Headed right past the Apparition wards."

Careful not to react to the sudden uptick of his heart, Neville swallowed his last forkful. Reaching for the pumpkin juice, he sneaked a glance up the Head Table. The Headmaster's throne was, indeed, conspicuously empty. Beside it on the right, Amycus Carrow was saying something to Professor Sinistra, who nodded along with the pinched rictus women gave when indulging in a man's explanations. On the other side, McGonagall scowled at her food, looking for all intents and purposes as though it had just insulted her mother.

"And," Ginny said, voice dropping even lower, "Pansy told me a few of the older Slytherins left the common room right after him. She hasn't seen Nott since before dinner." She paused, and Neville felt, rather than heard, Seamus shuffle closer on the bench. "She thinks there's a meeting taking place."

"Tonight then," said Seamus. "About bloody time."

"Ernie and Terry are still in the Infirmary," Neville said softly. "We'll have to do without."

Ginny gave a vicious stab at her apple pie. "I wish Luna was here," she said, but though her voice was hard, she was ghost-pale under her dusting of freckles, showcasing the dark set of weariness under her eyes.

Neville ducked his head at the words. He throat ached as though he had swallowed a mouthful of glass shards. It had been long weeks since they had heard anything from Luna. She had not come back from Spring Break. They suspected Death Eaters kept her hostage to get her father marching to the Dark Lord's drums. Neville dreamt of her, in the few night where sleep would claim him. There were black-purple bruises on her pale skin. She looked at him with vacant washed-out eyes. Bellatrix Lestrange stood over her with a grin and her wand, and she laughed, and laughed, and laughed, and Neville woke himself panting.

He was helpless to save her, and that was a pain worse than any Cruciatus he'd had to endure.

"We have to try," he said softly, catching Ginny's eyes, the reflections of his own pain on her face. "The sooner the war ends, the sooner we go after her."

They went back to their meal by common accord. Neville picked at his food but didn't eat much. Apprehension was a barbed wire slicing his stomach. Ginny was first to go. She left the table along with a group of Hufflepuffs, sinking into the noise and out of sight. Seamus followed five minutes later, helping Colin out of the Hall, bearing most of the boy's weight as he limped heavily on a broken leg.

Neville breathed through the nausea, the anxious curl of anticipation. He fisted a sweaty hand against his leg, forced himself to stillness. He counted to a hundred in his head, once, then once more. He sneaked out, feeling as though the whole Hall were watching him.

"Mr Longbottom," someone said, and he froze two steps outside the doors.

"Professor McGonagall," he replied, turning toward his Head of House with a weak smile. Farther down the corridor, wreathed in shadows, Ginny and Seamus shook their heads, frantic. "I, uh – I need to go do some homework, professor," said Neville.

McGonagall grabbed his arm, long emerald robes switching at her heels. Her mouth was set in one thin, severe line.

"I've no doubt you take your education seriously, Mr Longbottom," she said dryly. "Will Miss Weasley and Mr Finnigan also be joining you in your academic endeavour?"

Neville stood straight in her grip, making himself taller in the vain hope to hide his friends from sight. McGonagall watched him, and for a moment, she seemed to shrink, looking all of her years with tiredness carved deep in the lines of her face. Neville fought down the urge to press a supportive hand to the curve of her back.

"We," he started, then stopped. He couldn't tell the truth. The Carrows had stocked up in Veritaserum, used it frequently on students and staff. The more she knew, the more at risk they would all be. "It might take us a while," he said. "Studying."

She gave a slow nod. "I will inform the Carrows that you are indisposed," she told him. "Should they ask."

"Thank you, Professor." He bowed to her, low and respectful. "See you in class."

"Be careful, Longbottom."

Neville left her behind, going to Ginny and Seamus at a jog.

"C'mon," he said. "We have to hurry."

The other two fell into steps with him, Ginny taking the lead. She took them through secret passages Neville had never seen before, swerving behind a tapestry that led to a tunnel sloping downward. Absurdly, the passage took them up two floors.

"Are we sure about the information?" Seamus asked, panting. "If we get caught up there, we're dead."

"Are you questioning my girlfriend, Finnigan?" Ginny slowed the pace, giving two hard taps to a blank wall. The stone obediently disappeared.

"I am certainly questioning your taste in them," Seamus muttered, then yelped as Ginny whacked him around the head.

Neville cast a cautious glance around. Staircases flitted between floors with the low grind of old stone, growing shadows in golden candle light. Portraits muttered grumpily in their frames, eyeing the three of them with the suspicion born of centuries spent around teenagers. Outside, night had just fallen in hues of deep purple, broken with heavy clouds.

"We have to run for it," said Neville.

Ginny set a firm hand on his shoulder. "Hope you've kept up with your cardio boys," she said, and grinned. "Go."

They tore up the stairs, jumping steps two at a time. There was a dull, lancing pain radiating from Neville's left side. The skin along his ribs was swelled, made ugly with bruising. He had taken a punch in his last Dark Arts class. Amycus Carrow had needed distracting from the Third Year Slytherin who had kept messing up her Cruciatus Curse. Every step hurt now, but Neville had long since learned to breathe through pain.

He cleared the gap between the next landing and a staircase that had started to scuffle away. There was his heart in his throat and a sheer drop beneath his feet, nothing to carry him forward but his own momentum. He looked, down at the five floors under him, and saw. Two huge, lamp-like eyes, staring up at him.

He touched down with a grunt, a scattering of stars across his vision. Seamus wedged an arm under his shoulder, hauled him up with a quick tug.

"C'mon mate," he said, his sandy hair sticking up with sweat. "Just two more to go, we're almost there."

"Miss Noris," Neville panted. "I saw – she – "

"Shit," said Ginny. "Run!"

Seamus yanked him forward, half-carrying him to the top of the stairs before Neville shook him off. Ahead, Ginny dove behind a suit of armour. A winding stairwell laid behind. The first step was tricked; Neville remembered to jump it just in time. He bit down a cough at the first mouthful of dust, stumbling after the bright flick of Ginny's hair in the semi-darkness.

His thighs burned as much as his lungs by the time they made it to the top of the great tower. Torches flared to life along the corridor. Out of the corner of his eyes, Neville glimpsed a faint shimmer of silver mist, but when he whipped his head around, there was nothing. More importantly, there was no time.

The Gargoyle to the Headmaster's office – Snape's office now – stood grim and snarling in its stone casing.

"Betony!" Seamus told it.

It did not move.

"Betony!" Seamus said again, to the same effect.

"Merlin's saggy buttocks," said Ginny. "He's changed it again." She kicked at the Gargoyle's paws. "Move, dammit – ow."

"Potion ingredients," said Seamus, with manic eyes and hands that trembled. "Snape always goes for potion stuff. We can – just list off everything you know, quick."

"No," said Neville. His sight swam with the crack of fractured bones and the slow spin of unconsciousness. He grabbed Seamus' arm, the back of Ginny's shirt. "We've got to go before – "

Carried by old stones and up a flight of stairs, came a voice, the rasp of limping footfalls.

"Where have they gone, my lovely?" asked Filch. Neville heard the wet hissing of his breaths, the rabid delight in his voice. "The filthy little beasts, we'll have them hung by the wrists for a week, won't we Mrs Noris?"

No, Neville thought, with Ginny's grip bruising his wrist, fear frozen in Seamus' eyes. Neville thought: the smooth-slick glide of Veritaserum down his throat, the bright-sharp pain of lashes on his back. They would be punished for this; they would be made to speak. Their families would suffer their disobedience. Harry would pay for their failure. Neville thought to run but it was too late, Filch was limping close, closer, they would not be fast enough and –

The Gargoyle came to life with the grind of stone. It stepped aside, its stern face unmoving and baring teeth. Neville stared, dumbfounded. No one had spoken a word, yet there it stood, still and stoic and out of the way.

"Well, hurry up then!" said a woman's voice, and with the raps of Filch's steps in his ears, Neville hauled Seamus and Ginny through the gap, up the turning staircase that led to the Headmaster's office. The moment their feet touched the first step, the Gargoyle rolled back into place, sealing the entrance.

"What," said Ginny blandly, "the Hell."

Seamus breathed in short gasps, both hands braced on his thighs. "Did you – did either of you say the password?"

"No," said Neville. Ginny shook her head.

They looked at each other in stunned silence as the staircase finished its slow revolution. They were left in the antechamber to Dumbledore's office, faced with its heavy wooden door and no other obstacle. Helpfully, the door swung open.

"Uh," said Neville.

They crept forward, hands white-knuckled around wand handles. Beyond the Headmaster's door, Neville heard the quiet whirring of instruments, the crackle of a fire. Inside the office, the lights were dim, moon-soft.

"Won't you get in?" said the woman's voice. It was warm with amusement, roughened with a Northern accent unfamiliar to Neville's ears. The three of them froze at the sound.

"Merlin's sake," Ginny muttered. Face set in an angry scowl, she pushed past Neville and entered the office, marching with a soldier's steps. "Where the bloody hell are you?"

"Over there," the woman said, and Neville watched Ginny whirl around with her expression drawn tight. He watched her eyes widen, her mouth go slack.

He hurried after her, taking up her left side, following her line of sight. Above their heads in a portrait frame, a woman gave him a cheery wave. She leaned on the edge of a desk, the headmaster behind her grumbling at the intrusion. She watched the three of them in turn, kind dark eyes glittering in candle flames. She stood wreathed in legend and golden light, and Neville felt his knees go weak in recognition.

"You're Helga Hufflepuff," Ginny said, sounding faint. Seamus set a supporting hand against her shoulder.

In her frame, the woman curtsied. "Just her portrait, dear," she said, looking down at them through a waterfall of honey-coloured hair. She tucked a wayward strand behind her ear. "And you must be Ginny Weasley."

"Yes?" said Ginny.

Helga Hufflepuff, Founder of Hogwarts, impossibly made alive in charcoal and canvas, gave a low hum. "It's a pleasure," she said. Then, quietly, to herself, "A redhead. Who'd have thought?"

"My Lady," said Neville. He bowed awkwardly when she turned to him, because being out of his depths would not save him from his Grandmother's wrath if he misstep on her etiquette lessons. "You," he said, and stopped. "I – How – "

"You can't be here," Seamus blurted. Neville barely refrained from slapping a hand over his mouth. "You died before animated portraits were a thing. Ernie's told me the copy of you in his common room barely even moves."

"Magic," the Lady Hufflepuff told them. She winked, and Neville started hyperventilating quietly. "I shed blood and broke bones in building this castle," Hufflepuff said, grown sombre with nameless weight and the stretch of centuries. "It is bound to me, and I to it. Each of us gave a part of ourselves to Hogwarts' stones. These things leave traces."

"Right," said Seamus wanly.

"I have questions," said Ginny. Neville cast her a wary glance. There was steel in her tone; she held herself like a knife. "Harry Potter," she said. "Do you know him?"

In her portrait, Helga Hufflepuff sat on the desk. She looked at Ginny with a tilted head and the nostalgic curl of a half-smile. "Helena told me you had found Salazar's study," she said. "You already know the answer to that question."

Between them, the implications sat like stones. Neville had heard the rumours concerning Harry's disappearance. He was dead. He had fled. He had turned to Voldemort's side. Ginny had told him, one quiet evening, about the room she had found beneath the Lake. It had the smell of dust and the gravity of relics long forgotten. It had, she told him, a green-bound book, and the green-bound book had Harry's name on it.

"What," said Seamus, "are you talking about?"

Ginny ignored him. She rarely talked about Harry to anyone, but Neville had been her friend for long years. He could read the clench of her jaw, the tightness in her shoulders. Love, Neville knew from every empty candy wrapper his mother had ever pressed into his hands, from every dead-eyed stare his father had ever given him, was a thing that trailed scars. Ginny carried her fair share of them.

"When is he coming back?" she asked, with trembling fists and a back that would not bow.

Hufflepuff's eyes were soft with sympathy. "I do not know," she said. "Only this: The memory of you carried him through his time with us. He will need your voice to walk out of the dark."

Neville thought about Harry, who had shown him a teacher's patience and a leader's trust. Harry, who understood Neville's pain, who would have been his brother in all but blood, had the world been a kinder place. The boy walked with a crown's weight and the echo of green lightning. He had gone to war, for them. He risked death, for them. He was Neville's friend.

"We'll be there," Neville said. He would never be the man his grandmother had wanted him to become, the kind that stood fearless in the face of torture, but he knew the price of loyalty. He knew he would never waver in this oath.

"You," said Helga Hufflepuff, "need to hurry. The caretaker is coming back, and Severus Snape just entered the castle's wards. There's only so long I can protect you here."

"I'll get the desk," said Seamus, wheeling around.

"I got the sword," said Ginny. She kicked over a chair, clambering up to reach Godric Gryffindor's sword in its glass casing. Rubies cast deep-red, faceted shadows over the surrounding walls as she set to work on the lock.

That left Neville with only one task to accomplish.

"Good evening, Professor," he told Albus Dumbledore, and bowed to the room's newest portrait.

{. . .}

Luna had walked bare-footed in starlight sweet with winter air. She knew the crunch of frost on skin, knew how to dance on the crackling ice of forest ponds. With her mother, she had chased after rare herbs and the lanterns of Hinkypunks, smiling at the bite of cold with numb hands and fogged up breaths.

This was a different sort of cold. It was not the pure, glass-clear kind that burned lungs into breathlessness, the kind her mother had shown her how to tame. This sort of cold had teeth. It was slick, and heavy, and it crooned cruel things in wisps of putrid air. Luna did not care for it very much.

"Stars," said Mr Ollivander. His voice was twig-thin, gnarled, much like the rest of him. The pale silver of his irises grew into the whites of his eyes, grew to fullness, shattered, then grew again, into endless circles of unseen horrors. "Stars, what has he done?"

"Foolish," said Griphook in a whisper, his lips curled over sharp teeth. "Foolish. You wand-wielders have always been so blind. We do not wake the beasts of the depths." If Luna looked at him long enough, she could hear the distant clang of hammers, taste hot metal and the glistening of gold on her tongue. His eyes were dark with fear and the shadows that lingered in deep caverns. "The madman will get us all killed."

"Do you know what he has summoned, Mr Griphook?" Luna asked, folding her arms over her knees. She wished for a heliopath. They drank the sun and burned with its fire. A bit of their warmth would be nice.

"I know he has lost what little sanity he had left if he thinks for a moment he is in control."

"Mm," said Luna. She handed him the last of the chicken legs. "It is very cold, isn't it?"

She wondered if Draco was with Him. The boy had seemed so tired, sickly-pale in the moist dungeon-gloom. There had been humming-bird fear strung beneath his skin as he leaned against her hand. He needed to get out of here before the Nargles ate out his brain.

Pensively, Luna closed her hand into a fist.

She was still pondering over freedom and the fragility of bird wings when she heard footsteps. Heart leaping, she stood up, lurched with dizziness, righted herself. Pulling Mr Ollivander with her, she hurried to the far end of the cell. It was not unusual for Lestrange to visit them late at night, after a meeting had gone poorly. Luna had learned to bear torture with vague smiles and muscles gone limp. She shrank inside herself, passed the time looking for moon frogs in the creeping gloom of distant trees. Thankfully, she had no information useful to You-Know-Who's cause, which had spared her the worst of Bellatrix's sadism. Mr Ollivander, on the other hand, was regularly taken upstairs. She bore his weight and felt him tremble like a leaf.

There was a sudden rattle against the door, the protesting groan of abused wood. Then, the low growl of a muffled voice.

"Open the door you bloody little ferret, or I swear to Merlin I will cut off your nose and feed it to the peacocks."

Luna heard the clinking of keys, a muttered reply. She couldn't make sense of the words, but it did not matter. She knew that voice; it came with the thought of red hair, dear friends and all things sweet.

The door swung on its hinges with the screech of rust, and wand-light flooded the dungeons.

"Hello Ron," said Luna, humming happily. She disentangled from Ollivander, murmuring reassurances to his soft moan of protest. She took half a step forward, dancing on cold feet. "Were you looking for me?"

"Luna!" Hermione rushed forward, running down the last steps. "God, I'm so glad you're here. Are you all right?"

Luna went to her, feeling like air bubbles darting up the surface of a dark lake. "I'm quite fine," she assured her friend. "Do you know, Blibbering Humdingers are very fond of the dark."

"Are they?" Hermione asked weakly.

"Yes," said Luna. "But Draco kept most of them away. They never came too close."

"Oh." Hermione blinked. She glanced over her shoulder. On the stairs, Ron stood scowling at Draco, wand jabbed between the boy's ribs. Draco regarded him with his arms crossed and a cool glare.

"Ron," Hermione hissed. "Come down here. We don't have long."

"Move," Ron said, shoving at Draco's shoulder. "Hi Luna," he said, casting her a wide grin. "It's good to see you again, mate."

"Unhand me, you big oaf," Draco snapped. He stumbled down the remaining steps, caught himself on a wall, muttering insults. He found Luna in the darkness, and some tension bled out of his face.

"Draco," said Luna, giving him a small wave. "Did you get away then?"

"Found him mulling about in a corridor," said Ron. He kept careful eyes trained on Draco, his stance ready for a fight. "Figured he could make himself useful. On that matter." He turned to Draco with a grin that showed teeth. "Get the cell open Malfoy, and maybe I won't break your jaw for kidnapping our friend."

"Oh, Draco didn't kidnap me," Luna told him. "He can leave here as easily as I can. It's Mr Greyback that came to our home."

"Right," said Ron, frowning. Luna peered at him curiously through the cell bars. The boy had sharpened, in the long months since they had last seen each other. He had new shadows playing on the slants of his face, but nothing that ran cold. Ron had always been incredibly kind, if a bit tactless. Luna liked that about him. "Well, in any case," he said, jerking his head at Draco. "Get working."

After one last sneer in his direction, Draco approached Luna, straightening his Death Eater robes. Cold sweat beaded his forehead. His hands trembled. He looked at her in quick glances, back, and forth, and back again. He could not seem to decide what to look at: Her, or the darkness that pressed against her back.

"Hello again," Luna told him. His attention was hers; she would not let it go. "Were your guests as awful as you thought?"

Draco gave a swift smile, something timid that flashed with warmth. "They're still here," he told her, setting hands against prison bars. He gave a sharp, vicious pull, and the door opened with the reluctant wail of breaking locks. Draco's voice dropped low, suffused with urgency. "You have to leave through the kitchen door," he said, spilling words like secrets. "Run past the gardens, beyond the wards, then go."

Humming to herself, Luna whirled past cage doors, arms spread out on either side, embracing the newness of free space. Even dungeon mould smelled sweeter with lungs stretched into freedom. Draco watched her with wide eyes and a look of wonder; Luna set fingers against his cheek, made Nargles shrank back.

"You should come with us," she told him, and felt him tremble.

"What?" said Ron.

"He could be useful," said Hermione.

"I can't," Draco said. "My family – "

"We can make it look like we forced you," Hermione told him, then paused, eyes narrowed with calculation. "Or we can really force you."

Draco scowled at her. "Listen here, Granger," he said, but his voice faltered. Luna looped a hand through his arm. He was skin and bones against her side. A breeze might carry him off. "I – " he said, glancing down at her, his face grown pale. "I think someone's coming."

"S'fine," Ron said brightly. He faced the door with his legs planted shoulder-wide, a bloody smile on his lips. "I locked us in."

"Wh – " said Draco. The door rattled; outside, someone shouted. "You bloody morons – Do you want to get us killed?"

"Oh, please," said Hermione, rolling her eyes. "We didn't stroll in here without an exit plan. Griphook, Mr Ollivander, gather round please. We should get going."

Luna slid her hand down Draco's arm, interlacing their fingers. Her heart beat double-time, left her breathless with something that was not quite fear. Draco's fingers went vice-tight around hers. He stood with the rigidity of a rope about to snap. Gently, Luna tugged on his hand.

"It's alright," she told him. "Hermione is very resourceful."

There was the charged, leaden feel of coiled spellwork, the mutter of voices. The air grew heavy, alive, and something banged against the door, once. Twice. On the third time, ancient wood gave an ominous crack.

"Dobby," Hermione called. She levelled her wand at Draco's temple, set a constraining hand on his shoulder, lips curled in obvious threat. "Now!"

The door burst open in a shower of splinters. Ron cursed, let out a spell. The dungeons were bathed blood-red, blinding Luna with tear-drop sparks. She felt searing hex-heat on her cheek; Draco shoved her aside. She heard shouts, the clobber of feet. A loud pop, followed by a yell of cold, blood-curdling rage.

"YOU!" and then –

A sharp, twisting whirlwind, like a hook in the belly. She was engulfed in darkness, an awful pressure tightening around her chest. It was like being forced down a rubber tube, or the oesophagus of some great beast. Her bones bent, were remade again. She heard the roar of blood in her ears and did not breathe. She –

Fell, knees first and onto grass.

The grass was cool, made damp with dew. Luna gasped in its rain-dirt scent, sharp and green. She wanted its taste forever coating her mouth. She planted fingers into the earth, and willed them to grow roots. The air was crystal-cold, clear from must. It hurt her lungs; she laughed with the ache.

Rolling on her back, she saw a night sky kissed with silver light. Dark, liquid blue mixed with bright grey. Stars winked down at her. She winked back through the faint ringing in her ears.

"Luna. Great Merlin, get off me, woman. Luna, you're bleeding."

There were gentle hands on her skin, pushing back her hair. Her cheek stung, ran warm with the stickiness of blood. Luna smiled up at Draco. His own hair was dirty, sweat-mated, spiking up in odd places. His eyes were wide, wild. He touched her like she touched the ground; with great reverence and the fear it might collapse into dreams.

"It doesn't hurt much," she told him. "Look, Draco. The moon is coming up."

"Is it," he said, never taking his eyes off her. Then, weak with relief, "It's a small cut. Bellatrix threw a knife at you."

He looked worried, shook with fine tremors. Luna squeezed his hand reassuringly, content to lie there, against the earth and facing the night. Dew soaked her clothes. She delighted in its shivers, but sat up slowly, carefully.

She knew that house. She knew those hills. She had spent long childhood days across their slopes, chasing fireflies. Backlit by moonlight and the receding of shadows, the Burrow stood, whole and crooked. A mellow candle glow spilt from its windows. Smoke rose in plumes from its red roof.

"We're home," she told Draco, and leaned against him.

The Burrow's front door flew open, splashing light on grass. From the distance, Luna heard gasps, cries of relief. People came pelting from the house, splattering dirt.

She rose, just long enough to be tackled back onto the ground.

"LUNA!" Ginny said, her arms tight around Luna's neck. "Thank Merlin, they found you. Told them they'd probably locked you up at Malfoy Manor, we found records in Snape's things but we weren't sure you'd still be there. It's been weeks. Bloody hell. You alright?"

Luna huffed a soft, delighted laugh against Ginny's hair. Getting her arms around the other girl took some wriggling, but she managed, squeezing Ginny to her with the relish of long weeks apart.

"I'm okay," she said, and wanted to stay here the whole night, with Ginny's weight to ground her, her warmth to chase away dungeon's stench.

Ginny pulled her to her feet. Luna leaned against the sinuous strength in her arms, let herself be towed toward the Burrow and all its light. She took Draco's hand, their fingers slotting neatly together. The boy followed her gentle tug, shoulders hunched up to his ears at Ginny's narrow-eyed glare.

Luna tried to keep an ear on Hermione's fast-spoken account of the night, but it was a lot. The wet-grass smell, the crisp bite of the air. The world slipped sideways into too much. She saw people with the gleam of teeth and sharp strokes of colours. They made a crowd, after weeks of isolation. They were waves, rushing to her ears.

Ginny squeezed her waist, spoke firm words in her ear. She gave Luna a point of focus, a lifeline to keep her head above water. She guided Luna into a living room overrun with thick, old-looking books. Rune-marked scrolls were pinned all over the foyer. If libraries were alive, Luna thought the inside of their mouths might look something like this.

There was a clear, diamond-pale stone sitting on a table, under a glass-dome. It gave the low-deep hum of great pressures, layers of earth stacked high and crushing. It had a song that warped the space around it, that curled in Luna's bones and made her ache, and propped beside it –

Luna blinked.

"Good evening Headmaster," she said politely.

Albus Dumbledore smiled at her, his eyes warm and deep-sea blue. "Miss Lovegood," he said, looking at her over the rim of half-moon glasses. "I am truly glad to see you well."

"You too, sir," Luna told him. She rocked back on her heels. "Did you need a change of air like me?"

"A bit of a stroll certainly never goes amiss," Dumbledore replied solemnly. "Miss Weasley was kind enough to invite me. It seems young Harry is in need of some help."

"Oh." Luna nodded. "That's nice. Though I wouldn't worry about Harry too much. He is quite good at landing on his feet."

Beside her, Ginny snorted. "He's an idiot who once thought he'd be fine facing off a dragon with nothing but a Quidditch broom," she said, before nodding at Dumbledore's portrait. "We snitched him from Snape's office with a few other things. Seamus is very good at making fakes. Had to come here with him before we got caught, but we'll sneak back in in the morning. Should be a while before Snape notices anything's missing."

"Aren't you staying?"

Ginny grimaced. "Can't. It's risky enough, staying tonight. My dad still works at the Ministry. Seamus' mother, too. Neville's grandma would be fine, but even then it's not worth the risk."

Luna's heart leaped rabbit-high. "The boys are here?" she asked, her grip tight on Ginny's shoulder, on Draco's hand. The boy shuffled closer.

"Upstairs," Ginny said with a wry smile. "Talking to their family over the Floo, I think. I'm surprised they didn't rush here already." Ginny glanced over Luna's shoulder, eyes narrowing with suspicion. "Speaking of boys. What the hell are you doing here, Malfoy?"

"Trust me, Weasley," Draco replied, wearing a deep scowl and bristling like a cat hosed-down. "This isn't a life-choice I made myself. The sooner I'm out of this hovel of a house – "

"Oh, cut the crap," Ginny told him, rolling her eyes. Her hair bled red in the firelight. "I've dealt with enough Slytherins lately to know you're not half the arseholes you like to think you are. Pansy's told me all about the thing you did for Nott, back in Third Year, and how you used to – "

"She did not," Draco sputtered, sounding vaguely horrified. "She would never –" He paused, eyes going wide. " You – Please, Weasley tell me you are not fucking Pansy Parkinson." Ginny's smile grew into a smirk. "Dear gods. How did – No, wait, I don't want to know. You're a Gryffindor, it's unnatural."

Luna patted his shoulder consolingly. "That's wonderful," she told Ginny.

"She's not half bad," Ginny said, and her smile softened into something rueful, awe-touched. "Stars, Luna, there's so much I have to tell you. We know what happened to Harry. There might be a way – "

"Luna," she heard, and was swept off her feet for the second time that day.

Neville smelled of soap and sweat and his arms held her safe against his chest. He buried his face in her throat; She rested her head against his hair. He bled warmth back into her limbs, and Luna laughed at him, laughed at herself, laughed in relief. She went boneless in his hold, let herself be carried, delighted by the strength in his back, by the solid reality of him. He shook faintly against her, so Luna soothed a hand down his flanks, muttered quiet reassurances into his ear.

"You're here," he said, muffled against the tender skin of her throat. "Merlin, we were so worried – "

"It is lovely to see you," Luna said. "I missed you very much."

Neville set her down on her feet with the gentleness of a man handling something precious. He did not step away, raised shaky fingers to her cheek. Luna gave a pleased hum as he traced the contours of her face, a soft caress from the jut of her cheekbone down to the peak of her chin. He looked down at her with dark, dark eyes and a reverent, wondering tilt in the bow of his lips. He tucked a stray strand of hair behind her ear. Luna suppressed a shiver.

"Right," Draco said loudly. "So this was awful, but I should really get going before anyone starts asking questions – "

Luna glanced up in time to see the boy take a step back. Ron moved behind him, blocked his path to the door.

"You're not going anywhere, mate," he said. His tone was cordial enough, Luna thought, but she did not much like the cold threat in his eyes.

Draco bristled. "Out of my way, Weasley, do you not know what you risk in keeping me here – "

Ron slid his wand at the ready. Draco's eyes widened, then narrowed with contempt. He drew himself up to his full height, sneering, and –

The kitchen door opened, pooling mellow light and the warm scents of food, fresh coffee and toasted bread.

Remus Lupin strode into the room. He wore shabby robes that hung limply on his emaciated frame, and tiredness set deep in the slope of his shoulders. Luna smiled at the wolf peering out of his amber eyes. The lamp-like, reflective colour stood stark against the dark bruises under them. Lupin froze at the sight of them, his head cocked to a side in a canine gesture. His nostril flared, but he eased his weight back from the ball of his feet, posture relaxing.

"Good evening," he told them all, giving a soft smile. "It's good to see you again, Luna. Mr Malfoy, how are you?"

"Pesky," Draco bit back. He turned his back on Ron, making the boy's lips curl up into a snarl. "Listen, Lupin. You need to send me back. They will come for me if you don't." He darted a glance at Luna, frantic and breaking into desperation. "I don't care what you think you know of our forces, but trust me, if they get to you they will burn this place to ashes."

"They would have to find us, first," Lupin said lightly. "Trust me Mr Malfoy, we do not deal lightly with our safety."

Luna made a soft, pensive noise. She had thought she had felt something peculiar about the Burrow's wards. It all became clearer now that she focused on it. "It's a Fidelius Charm, isn't it?" she asked, and felt something ease from the curve of her spine. Draco's mouth fell open.

Lupin inclined his head at her. "Layered with a few other things," he said. "As I said, you're safe here."

"Yeah," said Draco. "Because the Fidelius worked so well for the Potters last time you lot used it."

"We were not so foolish with our choice of Secret Keeper this time."

"You bloody Gryffindors, you're too damn trusting. Who in Merlin's name can you trust with something like this?"

"We're not telling you now, are we Malfoy?" Ron said. "We're not that trusting."