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lomonaaerenTitle: Shadows of Ambition
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Rating: R
Content Notes: AU (Harry has shadow magic), amoral Harry, gore, torture, violence, homophobia, angst, drama, present tense
Pairings: Established Harry Potter/Theo Nott and Susan Bones/Padma Patil
Wordcount: This part 4000
Summary: Harry Potter has no ambitions other than being left alone and protecting his vassals. But now Sirius Black is asking to come off godfather probation, and Susan and Padma are facing opposition to their relationship from Padma’s employer. Plus some people need it made obvious that Theodore Nott is off limits. It seems Harry will have to Do Something.
Author’s Notes: This is one of my “Litha to Lammas” fics, chaptered stories being posted between the summer solstice and the first of August. It is a sequel to the others in the Shadow Magic series (Shadow Magic, “Shadows After War,” “Hermione Granger and the Non-Conquering Dark Lord,” and “Shadows Darken to Night”) and will make no sense without them. The second part will be posted tomorrow.
Shadows of Ambition
“I think it’s been long enough, hasn’t it, pup?”
Harry props one foot up on the arm of the couch and eyes Sirius thoughtfully. His head is hovering in the flames. It’s true that he hasn’t made any mistakes lately, like trying to tell Harry that he should marry a red-haired girl or comparing him to his father.
“And you liked the broom?”
“I did,” Harry says slowly. He doesn’t play Quidditch, but he does like flying, and the Firebolt lets him zip around the Nott pitch even faster than if he was riding a Granian.
“So can I come off probation?”
Harry nibbles his thumb. “I do have to ask you one more question before I can let you do that,” he says.
Sirius sits up with such speed that he bangs his head on the hearth on his side of the fire. Harry closes his eyes over the pained noises. Yes, having a godfather would be fine in some ways, but did his parents have to choose the—the most impetuous one in the history of magical Britain?
Sirius gets his head back in position and looks at him attentively. “Tell me.”
“Are you going to say anything else about my relationship with Theodore? Because I’ll simply push you out of my life if you do.”
Sirius sighs, long and deep. “No. I accept that even if this is a mistake, it’s your mistake to make.” His voice is heavily certain that it’s a mistake, but Harry ignores that. No one who’s not him can possibly understand what Harry feels for Theodore, so Sirius gets forgiven. “And I accept that you’re not your dad. James would never have put me on bloody probation.”
If he were the kind of person who did, then perhaps he’d still be alive. But that’s cruel enough (to Sirius) that Harry won’t say it. He nods. “All right, then. Come to dinner on Sunday night. Do you need Apparition coordinates for the Nott house?”
Sirius whoops. “Trust me, kiddo, you won’t regret it!”
“That’s another condition.”
“What is?”
“No calling me kiddo. I’m not a kid.”
Sirius blinks at him for a second. Then he tries out, “Pup?” His eyes are wide and hopeful, really making him look like a dog.
Harry gives him a withering glance.
“I have to have a nickname to call you!” Sirius complains, and the only person who could give him any competition for whinging is Malfoy. “It’s Marauder tradition! And I know you aren’t an Animagus, so I have to give you a name based on what you are!”
It would be entertaining to see Sirius’s eyes bug out if Harry told Sirius to call him Shadow Lord, but he doesn’t care much for titles from people who aren’t his vassals, so he just says, “We barely know each other, still. Just call me Harry, all right? And I’ll call you Sirius.”
Sirius sighs as if someone has wounded him, but agrees. And then agrees to come over for Sunday dinner, when Theodore will be there, too.
Harry is willing to give Sirius a chance, since it isn’t his fault that he went to Azkaban and was therefore unavailable to take Harry away from the Dursleys for twelve years (although it is his fault that he lost Pettigrew after Harry hand-delivered him). But if Sirius can’t accept Theodore, this relationship is doomed to die stillborn.
*
“My lord.”
Harry blinks and looks up from the book he was reading on the history of the Native cultures of the Americas. It’s pretty good, although Harry thinks the author could use more illustrations of what she’s talking about. “Yes, Susan?” he asks, when he recognizes his vassal kneeling next to his couch. He didn’t know she was coming over, but as one of his first vassals and in the circle of his most trusted, she has free passage to the Nott Floo at any time. He nods. “What can I do for you?” She would be standing up if she just came over to talk instead of make a request.
Susan leans back on her heels and wipes what look like tears away from her eyes. Harry sits up. It probably has something to do with Padma. When Susan’s aunt Amelia died during the war, her last family passed away, too.
“I—you know Padma and I told a lot of people that we were together,” Susan whispers. “She told her boss, Arnold Flourish.”
Harry nods. He knows they avoided doing so for a long time for, well, some reason he rather forgets. “It didn’t go well?”
Susan shakes her head miserably. Harry gestures, and she gets up and sits on one of the old grey chairs that are still ridiculously comfortable across from him. “Mr. Blotts seemed like he would accept us, but Mr. Flourish got angry and started yelling at Padma that she should break up with me so she can have children.”
“And Padma is upset?”
“Yes. She’s been crying all day. She’s started feeling really close to him since she told him her dream of opening up her own bookshop someday.” Privately, Harry doubts that’s true, since as far as he knows Padma is still keeping her status as his vassal from most people, but it’s not his problem unless his vassals’ employers and friends start making it so. “And I don’t know what to do. I tried Flooing the shop to talk to Mr. Flourish, but he called me a whore and told me not to contact them again.”
Harry’s eyes narrow, and his shadows surge on the floor around him. “I could tear him apart.”
“That wouldn’t make Padma happy.”
“No,” Harry agrees with a sigh. It’s a simple solution, which is honestly the kind he’s best at, but it won’t work in this instance. “All right. Do you want me to talk to Padma? Mr. Flourish? Parvati?” Padma’s twin sister is also marked, but it was recent, so she doesn’t stand as high in his counsels as Padma. Harry also isn’t sure she’s aware that Padma and Susan have been dating for two years.
“Padma, to begin with. Please? I haven’t been able to get through to her or get her to stop crying at all.”
Harry has his doubts about what he can do, when Susan’s failed. He knows that he’s not normal, compared to most of the people who follow him. Theodore complements him perfectly, but Susan, Padma, Justin, and most of the others follow him for protection and out of loyalty rather than because they share his worldview completely. “I’ll try.”
*
Padma is crying. A lot.
Harry sits beside her and doesn’t know what to do. Emotions aren’t something he’s very good at, except when he can be angry and protect someone, or alone with Theodore. He can’t force Padma’s boss to change his mind. He can’t calm Padma down.
He settles for sitting next to Padma and making shadows caper and run in circles around her. They form into winged lions that chase each other, wolves that howl and then chase their tails, dragons that try to breathe fire and go through increasingly silly contortions when nothing comes out of their mouths. Harry is glad that he can at least amuse himself.
And, in time, Padma’s tears slow and then stop, and she gives a watery laugh. “You are a terrible comforter,” she says.
“It worked,” Harry says. “And I know what your answer is probably going to be, but you don’t want me to hurt Flourish.”
“No.” Padma sits up on the couch and wipes at her eyes, her face raw with crying. She tosses her black hair behind her shoulder and laughs a little as Harry’s latest shadow creation, a small cat, runs across the room and leaps onto the couch, curling around her and trembling in a silent approximation of a purr.
“Or blind him and leave him somewhere to find his way home.”
“No, Harry.” Padma bites her lip a moment later. “I mean, my lord.”
“It’s fine.” Harry lounges back in his chair and wonders for a moment why Susan did think he could help. But it might have been as instinctive as her reaching out to the lord who promised to care for her, and did help her once before, with avenging her aunt. “I don’t know for sure what I can do.”
“I don’t know, either.” Padma sags back against the pillow she was lying against to cry a few minutes ago. “Mr. Flourish has always liked Parvati and me, since we met him when we were kids, and he didn’t react badly when Parvati told him a year ago she didn’t want children.” There’s an old, slight bitterness in Padma’s voice. Harry is suddenly glad that Parvati hasn’t shown an interest in working closely with her sister on any vassal projects. “But I must have some, right now, apparently, so my parents can have grandchildren. And when I told him about Susan, it went badly.”
“Did he call her a whore?”
“Yes.”
Harry nods. He can’t make Padma’s boss accept her or be less homophobic, and he can’t tear him apart or leave him blind and wandering in shadows forever, but he can make him pay for the insult. “Is he threatening your job if you don’t break up with her?”
“Not in so many words. He looked at me and told me I would know the right thing to do. And he just kept talking about my having children and how my father needed grandchildren before he died.”
“I thought your father wasn’t that old.” Harry doesn’t bother to keep with details of his vassals’ families that don’t interest him, admittedly.
“He’s not.”
That’s a particular type of irrationality that Harry associates with Vernon Dursley. He finds himself smiling coldly. Padma turns around and reaches out to him. Harry takes her hand.
“Don’t hurt him, please,” Padma says wearily. “It means a lot to me that you care so much, but he’s still my boss and an old family friend. I don’t want him injured. He wouldn’t take any lesson from it. He would just decide that he was right and double down on what he thinks. Someone opposing him means he must be right.”
Well, damn. That means that Harry can’t right the insult to Susan by sending shadows to Mr. Flourish that will make him think he’s having extremely vivid nightmares. Never before have two of his vassals’ needs conflicted like this.
For now, at least he can sit with Padma and show her more shadow-animals, and leave the shadow-kitten with her when she falls asleep, still clutching his hand.
*
Theodore walks into the room, and Harry feels himself going tense and cold all over. Theodore is wearing the short-sleeved robes that are appropriate for a casual dinner with family, as he’s patiently taught Harry, and this dinner with Sirius is going to be like that.
But he also has a bruise on his left forearm, and Harry didn’t put it there. He sends shadows flowing over to Theodore and dancing around him. He’s been leaving them at home lately when Theodore goes shopping or to his Runes apprenticeship with Bathsheda Babbling, who retired from Hogwarts a few years ago. That was a mistake, clearly.
“It’s all right, my lord,” Theodore says quietly. “Someone in the market in Knockturn Alley mistook me for someone else he was having an argument with. He grabbed my arm and yanked me around, yelling. He let me go the minute he got a good glimpse of my face.”
“Why didn’t you heal the bruise?”
Theodore hesitates, and Harry’s shadows form into the semblance of a scorpion’s tail on the wall behind him.
Theodore gives a low laugh, which at least reassures Harry that he isn’t in a lot of pain or danger. “All right. I should have known that you would find out. The man who accosted me is Roger Holbrook, an enemy of my father’s. We really did run into each other by chance, but he threatened me. And he cursed the bruise not to heal, as well as any others that he wants to give me.”
Harry feels the ice descending across his brain. It’s been a while since it was this way. But then, it’s been longer than that since Theodore was hurt. “And he didn’t know about the Shadow Lord?”
Theodore looks steadily at him. “Your vassals respect you, of course, and there are some people who know that crossing your directly isn’t a good idea. But this man is a contemporary of my father’s, long out of Hogwarts by the time you demonstrated there how much I matter to you. And I don’t go around advertising what I am to you. And you haven’t told a whole lot of people in Knockturn Alley what you are.”
That’s always been Harry’s policy. People who don’t know who he is or what kind of power he wields can’t ask him for favors. He has enough people who bothered him into becoming vassals, enough people whose safety and happiness he has to worry about. There would never be an end to it if he advertised what he can do in Knockturn Alley or similar environs.
He sighs when he sees the look on Theodore’s face. “And now you’re about to tell me why it isn’t a good idea to simply make him disappear.”
“He’s well-connected. He has warlocks and hags on his side in the alley, and Father always said that he supplied a lot of Potions brewers on the Continent with ingredients. If he just disappears, other people won’t take it as a warning, but something they should investigate. And as powerful as you are, my lord, I don’t think you could stand up to the anger of an international group of brewers.”
Harry scowls. That’s true enough. His shadows protect him and his vassals all the time, and better every year, but they can’t do something like sense poison in his food. Or even just an ordinary potion, one that wouldn’t be categorized as malicious but might be tailored to destroying him alone. He knows certain brewers could create something like that.
“Then we’ll have to figure out how to destroy him,” he says. Theodore nods. “In the meantime, no going to Knockturn Alley by yourself.”
Theodore’s eyes flash, where he would usually bow his head and give in. “Taking shadows with me into that place could expose you, my lord. I thought you didn’t want to be exposed.”
Harry reaches out and draws Theodore towards him. Theodore comes, and rests his head on Harry’s shoulder while Harry strokes his hair. “I’m sorry if I ever gave you the impression that my desire for secrecy outweighs my desire to keep you safe,” he whispers into Theodore’s ear. “It doesn’t.”
Theodore leans towards him, almost swaying on his feet. Harry allows him that for a moment, and then smooths his hands down Theodore’s arms and steps back, twitching his head towards the fireplace. It’s a reminder that Sirius is coming. Theodore won’t want to be so open in front of him.
“We once kissed in his house,” Theodore mutters.
Harry laughs softly as the flames turn green. “Of course, but that was at least partially flaunting our relationship because he wanted me to marry someone else.”
“Does he still want that?”
“He might. He agreed not to talk about it.”
Theodore grunts his doubt of that as Sirius appears. Harry has to admit that he has some doubt himself how well Sirius is going to handle this, but he agreed to give him the chance. He moves forwards and shakes hands with his godfather, noticing in amusement that a wrapped package of some kind is under Sirius’s arm. “What’s that?” he asks, nodding to it.
“It’s proper for a guest to give his host a gift the first time he comes over,” Sirius says in a snotty voice, and holds out the package for Harry to take. Harry turns it over and studies it for a second before he shrugs and undoes the twine holding the golden paper on.
It turns out to be a silver mirror set in a heavy wooden frame, so it looks more like a plaque than anything else. Harry’s shadows dart over to his side as he examines it, making Sirius jump and swear.
“You knew about them,” Harry says absently, and continues to turn the mirror over in his hands. “What does it do?”
“It gives you the answer to any question you ask it.”
“Uh-huh. What does it really do?”
Sirius is pouting when Harry looks up—and conspicuously ignoring Theodore, who leans against the wall and watches them. “It does,” Sirius grumbles. “I based it on a Muggle toy. You can ask it a question and look into the mirror, and it’ll show you something.” He takes an ostentatious breath, rubs the mirror with his sleeve, and says, “Are Harry and I going to have a good time tonight?”
Harry glances at the surface of the mirror. It turns grey for a second, filled with an image of roiling clouds, and then a white bubble that reminds him of nothing so much as the kind in the comics that Dudley used to read pops up, filled with black letters.
What about the third?
Sirius scowls at the mirror. “It has a mind of its own. Anyway!” He claps his hands. “I hope you like it.”
Maybe the mirror is cleverer than it appears. Sometimes enchanted objects can take on a personality of their own, as Harry well knows, being a Horcrux and thus a sort of enchanted object himself. He smiles at Sirius and tucks the mirror into a shadow that will transport it to the sitting room. “Thanks, Sirius. Come through and have dinner.”
Theodore glides up to Harry’s side as they walk into the dining room. Sirius glances at him and scowls. Theodore shows no reaction.
Harry sends a shadow to flow up behind Sirius and briefly cover his eyes.
“Pup!”
“We talked about the nicknames,” Harry says softly, taking the shadow away again. “And we talked about you respecting Theodore.”
Sirius sighs, long and loud and hard. “It’s just…so different from what your parents would have wanted for you.”
“Then maybe they should have stayed alive, so they could have an opinion.”
Sirius flinches, and doesn’t say another word until after they’ve begun to eat.
*
It was probably not a good idea to serve Firewhisky with dinner. Harry did it because he and Theodore both like it, and he thinks they could use some relaxation after what the wanker Theodore met in Knockturn Alley did to his wrist. But it’s turned into Sirius leaning back in his chair with a huge, loopy smile.
“So,” Sirius says, and points his glass at Harry. Theodore tenses. Harry glances at him. Theodore calms down, obviously remembering exactly how many ways Harry has to protect himself. “I know you did something to get rid of Albus and tame Snivellus. What was it?”
It takes Harry a minute to realize that “Snivellus” is probably Sirius’s nickname for Snape. Merlin, the man is addicted to nicknames. Harry shrugs. “I used an enchantment that means he can’t bully students anymore. I’m a little surprised he’s still at Hogwarts.”
“Oh, Minerva moved him into a pure research position. And there’s still the little problem of his Dark Mark denying him employment anywhere else.”
Harry nods and lounges back in his chair. That would make sense. He reaches out and curls his hand around Theodore’s fingers. Theodore relaxes completely and settles back to nurse his own glass of Firewhisky.
“And Albus?” Sirius swallows the rest of what’s in his glass and points at Harry with one finger. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you avoiding the question.”
“I did something to make sure that he couldn’t interfere again.”
“What did you do?”
Harry looks calmly at Sirius. “You haven’t earned that knowledge yet. When you do, then I’ll be happy to tell you.”
Sirius pouts. Harry ignores that. Sirius sighs and goes back to something they were discussing earlier. “And you don’t have any particular plans for your future other than to lie around the house and drink Firewhisky?”
“It’s good Firewhisky,” Harry points out, holding up his glass so the drink sparkles in the light of the torches around the dining room.
“Oh, yeah, I grant you. But—I mean, your dad was an Auror. Your mum was a Potions researcher, although she put that aside when she found out she was pregnant with you. You really don’t want to do something like that?”
“Well, I’m sort of like my mum.”
“Oh? Interested in Potions?” Sirius leans forwards like he’s on point.
“Sort of pregnant,” Harry says, and enjoys watching Sirius’s eyes bulge and his struggle to contain the Firewhisky that wants to escape his throat. Theodore chuckles at his side, and Harry leans over so that he can feel his lover’s warmth against his arm.
“Stop it!” Sirius whines when he has his jaw muscles under control. “Come on, what do you mean?”
“I have vassals who need my help, the way I needed my mum’s help when I was young,” Harry says. He does sort of wish he could remember her better other than as a voice screaming at Voldemort in his Dementor memory. But he can’t, and that’s that. “I need to make sure that all my other concerns can be put aside at a moment’s notice, so I can attend to them when they need me.”
“That’s not like being pregnant at all!”
“That’s why I said ‘sort of.’”
Sirius pauses, and then changes the conversation entirely, to the Falmouth Falcons Quidditch team. Harry conceals another smile in his goblet.
*
“You puzzle him.”
Theodore’s voice is still scratchy from the extremely satisfying screaming he did during the blowjob Harry gave him. Harry stretches, and smiles at the way Theodore’s eyes go automatically to his chest. He shrugs and scrambles up the bed. “He’ll get used to the way we interact, or he can back off again.”
“True enough.” Theodore rolls over and nuzzles close to Harry, one hand sliding down his hip. Harry spreads his legs, precisely so Theodore’s fingers can encounter the softness and the slickness that means Harry has already come. Theodore pauses. “How, my lord?”
“Watching you.”
Theodore doesn’t blush often, but when he does, a high tide of crimson color rolls across his face and down his chest in the most delightful wave. Harry touches his chest and sighs at the warmth under his fingers. Always his favorite, better than Firewhisky.
“I—”
Harry presses his fingers gently to Theodore’s lips. “It’s all right.” Theodore told Harry once that he isn’t confident with words. Harry expects to keep up his half of the relationship, including protecting Theodore and speaking when he can’t., And in the meantime, Theodore brings him joy.
Theodore sighs, his eyes drooping. But he does murmur, “What are you going to do about Padma’s boss?”
“Something.”
Theodore accepts that easily, sliding into sleep. Harry remains alert as he watches Theodore, one hand smoothing over his tumbled black curls, tracing the edges of his eyelids.
This is one reason why he has to find the bastard who threatened Theodore in Knockturn Alley and put an end to him. No one is allowed to harm Harry’s joy in life. It’s a promise he made to himself at the time he first took Theodore as his vassal, and it’s one reason Voldemort’s spirit is now trapped eternally in a small box. Harry might have been content to leave him alone if Voldemort hadn’t claimed dominion over the Death Eaters’ children.
This bloke can count himself lucky if he ends up like Voldemort, Harry thinks drowsily, and wraps both himself and Theodore in a blanket of shadows that will wake him in an instant if someone comes into the room, before going to sleep.
Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters. I am writing this story for fun and not profit.
Rating: R
Content Notes: AU (Harry has shadow magic), amoral Harry, gore, torture, violence, homophobia, angst, drama, present tense
Pairings: Established Harry Potter/Theo Nott and Susan Bones/Padma Patil
Wordcount: This part 4000
Summary: Harry Potter has no ambitions other than being left alone and protecting his vassals. But now Sirius Black is asking to come off godfather probation, and Susan and Padma are facing opposition to their relationship from Padma’s employer. Plus some people need it made obvious that Theodore Nott is off limits. It seems Harry will have to Do Something.
Author’s Notes: This is one of my “Litha to Lammas” fics, chaptered stories being posted between the summer solstice and the first of August. It is a sequel to the others in the Shadow Magic series (Shadow Magic, “Shadows After War,” “Hermione Granger and the Non-Conquering Dark Lord,” and “Shadows Darken to Night”) and will make no sense without them. The second part will be posted tomorrow.
Shadows of Ambition
“I think it’s been long enough, hasn’t it, pup?”
Harry props one foot up on the arm of the couch and eyes Sirius thoughtfully. His head is hovering in the flames. It’s true that he hasn’t made any mistakes lately, like trying to tell Harry that he should marry a red-haired girl or comparing him to his father.
“And you liked the broom?”
“I did,” Harry says slowly. He doesn’t play Quidditch, but he does like flying, and the Firebolt lets him zip around the Nott pitch even faster than if he was riding a Granian.
“So can I come off probation?”
Harry nibbles his thumb. “I do have to ask you one more question before I can let you do that,” he says.
Sirius sits up with such speed that he bangs his head on the hearth on his side of the fire. Harry closes his eyes over the pained noises. Yes, having a godfather would be fine in some ways, but did his parents have to choose the—the most impetuous one in the history of magical Britain?
Sirius gets his head back in position and looks at him attentively. “Tell me.”
“Are you going to say anything else about my relationship with Theodore? Because I’ll simply push you out of my life if you do.”
Sirius sighs, long and deep. “No. I accept that even if this is a mistake, it’s your mistake to make.” His voice is heavily certain that it’s a mistake, but Harry ignores that. No one who’s not him can possibly understand what Harry feels for Theodore, so Sirius gets forgiven. “And I accept that you’re not your dad. James would never have put me on bloody probation.”
If he were the kind of person who did, then perhaps he’d still be alive. But that’s cruel enough (to Sirius) that Harry won’t say it. He nods. “All right, then. Come to dinner on Sunday night. Do you need Apparition coordinates for the Nott house?”
Sirius whoops. “Trust me, kiddo, you won’t regret it!”
“That’s another condition.”
“What is?”
“No calling me kiddo. I’m not a kid.”
Sirius blinks at him for a second. Then he tries out, “Pup?” His eyes are wide and hopeful, really making him look like a dog.
Harry gives him a withering glance.
“I have to have a nickname to call you!” Sirius complains, and the only person who could give him any competition for whinging is Malfoy. “It’s Marauder tradition! And I know you aren’t an Animagus, so I have to give you a name based on what you are!”
It would be entertaining to see Sirius’s eyes bug out if Harry told Sirius to call him Shadow Lord, but he doesn’t care much for titles from people who aren’t his vassals, so he just says, “We barely know each other, still. Just call me Harry, all right? And I’ll call you Sirius.”
Sirius sighs as if someone has wounded him, but agrees. And then agrees to come over for Sunday dinner, when Theodore will be there, too.
Harry is willing to give Sirius a chance, since it isn’t his fault that he went to Azkaban and was therefore unavailable to take Harry away from the Dursleys for twelve years (although it is his fault that he lost Pettigrew after Harry hand-delivered him). But if Sirius can’t accept Theodore, this relationship is doomed to die stillborn.
*
“My lord.”
Harry blinks and looks up from the book he was reading on the history of the Native cultures of the Americas. It’s pretty good, although Harry thinks the author could use more illustrations of what she’s talking about. “Yes, Susan?” he asks, when he recognizes his vassal kneeling next to his couch. He didn’t know she was coming over, but as one of his first vassals and in the circle of his most trusted, she has free passage to the Nott Floo at any time. He nods. “What can I do for you?” She would be standing up if she just came over to talk instead of make a request.
Susan leans back on her heels and wipes what look like tears away from her eyes. Harry sits up. It probably has something to do with Padma. When Susan’s aunt Amelia died during the war, her last family passed away, too.
“I—you know Padma and I told a lot of people that we were together,” Susan whispers. “She told her boss, Arnold Flourish.”
Harry nods. He knows they avoided doing so for a long time for, well, some reason he rather forgets. “It didn’t go well?”
Susan shakes her head miserably. Harry gestures, and she gets up and sits on one of the old grey chairs that are still ridiculously comfortable across from him. “Mr. Blotts seemed like he would accept us, but Mr. Flourish got angry and started yelling at Padma that she should break up with me so she can have children.”
“And Padma is upset?”
“Yes. She’s been crying all day. She’s started feeling really close to him since she told him her dream of opening up her own bookshop someday.” Privately, Harry doubts that’s true, since as far as he knows Padma is still keeping her status as his vassal from most people, but it’s not his problem unless his vassals’ employers and friends start making it so. “And I don’t know what to do. I tried Flooing the shop to talk to Mr. Flourish, but he called me a whore and told me not to contact them again.”
Harry’s eyes narrow, and his shadows surge on the floor around him. “I could tear him apart.”
“That wouldn’t make Padma happy.”
“No,” Harry agrees with a sigh. It’s a simple solution, which is honestly the kind he’s best at, but it won’t work in this instance. “All right. Do you want me to talk to Padma? Mr. Flourish? Parvati?” Padma’s twin sister is also marked, but it was recent, so she doesn’t stand as high in his counsels as Padma. Harry also isn’t sure she’s aware that Padma and Susan have been dating for two years.
“Padma, to begin with. Please? I haven’t been able to get through to her or get her to stop crying at all.”
Harry has his doubts about what he can do, when Susan’s failed. He knows that he’s not normal, compared to most of the people who follow him. Theodore complements him perfectly, but Susan, Padma, Justin, and most of the others follow him for protection and out of loyalty rather than because they share his worldview completely. “I’ll try.”
*
Padma is crying. A lot.
Harry sits beside her and doesn’t know what to do. Emotions aren’t something he’s very good at, except when he can be angry and protect someone, or alone with Theodore. He can’t force Padma’s boss to change his mind. He can’t calm Padma down.
He settles for sitting next to Padma and making shadows caper and run in circles around her. They form into winged lions that chase each other, wolves that howl and then chase their tails, dragons that try to breathe fire and go through increasingly silly contortions when nothing comes out of their mouths. Harry is glad that he can at least amuse himself.
And, in time, Padma’s tears slow and then stop, and she gives a watery laugh. “You are a terrible comforter,” she says.
“It worked,” Harry says. “And I know what your answer is probably going to be, but you don’t want me to hurt Flourish.”
“No.” Padma sits up on the couch and wipes at her eyes, her face raw with crying. She tosses her black hair behind her shoulder and laughs a little as Harry’s latest shadow creation, a small cat, runs across the room and leaps onto the couch, curling around her and trembling in a silent approximation of a purr.
“Or blind him and leave him somewhere to find his way home.”
“No, Harry.” Padma bites her lip a moment later. “I mean, my lord.”
“It’s fine.” Harry lounges back in his chair and wonders for a moment why Susan did think he could help. But it might have been as instinctive as her reaching out to the lord who promised to care for her, and did help her once before, with avenging her aunt. “I don’t know for sure what I can do.”
“I don’t know, either.” Padma sags back against the pillow she was lying against to cry a few minutes ago. “Mr. Flourish has always liked Parvati and me, since we met him when we were kids, and he didn’t react badly when Parvati told him a year ago she didn’t want children.” There’s an old, slight bitterness in Padma’s voice. Harry is suddenly glad that Parvati hasn’t shown an interest in working closely with her sister on any vassal projects. “But I must have some, right now, apparently, so my parents can have grandchildren. And when I told him about Susan, it went badly.”
“Did he call her a whore?”
“Yes.”
Harry nods. He can’t make Padma’s boss accept her or be less homophobic, and he can’t tear him apart or leave him blind and wandering in shadows forever, but he can make him pay for the insult. “Is he threatening your job if you don’t break up with her?”
“Not in so many words. He looked at me and told me I would know the right thing to do. And he just kept talking about my having children and how my father needed grandchildren before he died.”
“I thought your father wasn’t that old.” Harry doesn’t bother to keep with details of his vassals’ families that don’t interest him, admittedly.
“He’s not.”
That’s a particular type of irrationality that Harry associates with Vernon Dursley. He finds himself smiling coldly. Padma turns around and reaches out to him. Harry takes her hand.
“Don’t hurt him, please,” Padma says wearily. “It means a lot to me that you care so much, but he’s still my boss and an old family friend. I don’t want him injured. He wouldn’t take any lesson from it. He would just decide that he was right and double down on what he thinks. Someone opposing him means he must be right.”
Well, damn. That means that Harry can’t right the insult to Susan by sending shadows to Mr. Flourish that will make him think he’s having extremely vivid nightmares. Never before have two of his vassals’ needs conflicted like this.
For now, at least he can sit with Padma and show her more shadow-animals, and leave the shadow-kitten with her when she falls asleep, still clutching his hand.
*
Theodore walks into the room, and Harry feels himself going tense and cold all over. Theodore is wearing the short-sleeved robes that are appropriate for a casual dinner with family, as he’s patiently taught Harry, and this dinner with Sirius is going to be like that.
But he also has a bruise on his left forearm, and Harry didn’t put it there. He sends shadows flowing over to Theodore and dancing around him. He’s been leaving them at home lately when Theodore goes shopping or to his Runes apprenticeship with Bathsheda Babbling, who retired from Hogwarts a few years ago. That was a mistake, clearly.
“It’s all right, my lord,” Theodore says quietly. “Someone in the market in Knockturn Alley mistook me for someone else he was having an argument with. He grabbed my arm and yanked me around, yelling. He let me go the minute he got a good glimpse of my face.”
“Why didn’t you heal the bruise?”
Theodore hesitates, and Harry’s shadows form into the semblance of a scorpion’s tail on the wall behind him.
Theodore gives a low laugh, which at least reassures Harry that he isn’t in a lot of pain or danger. “All right. I should have known that you would find out. The man who accosted me is Roger Holbrook, an enemy of my father’s. We really did run into each other by chance, but he threatened me. And he cursed the bruise not to heal, as well as any others that he wants to give me.”
Harry feels the ice descending across his brain. It’s been a while since it was this way. But then, it’s been longer than that since Theodore was hurt. “And he didn’t know about the Shadow Lord?”
Theodore looks steadily at him. “Your vassals respect you, of course, and there are some people who know that crossing your directly isn’t a good idea. But this man is a contemporary of my father’s, long out of Hogwarts by the time you demonstrated there how much I matter to you. And I don’t go around advertising what I am to you. And you haven’t told a whole lot of people in Knockturn Alley what you are.”
That’s always been Harry’s policy. People who don’t know who he is or what kind of power he wields can’t ask him for favors. He has enough people who bothered him into becoming vassals, enough people whose safety and happiness he has to worry about. There would never be an end to it if he advertised what he can do in Knockturn Alley or similar environs.
He sighs when he sees the look on Theodore’s face. “And now you’re about to tell me why it isn’t a good idea to simply make him disappear.”
“He’s well-connected. He has warlocks and hags on his side in the alley, and Father always said that he supplied a lot of Potions brewers on the Continent with ingredients. If he just disappears, other people won’t take it as a warning, but something they should investigate. And as powerful as you are, my lord, I don’t think you could stand up to the anger of an international group of brewers.”
Harry scowls. That’s true enough. His shadows protect him and his vassals all the time, and better every year, but they can’t do something like sense poison in his food. Or even just an ordinary potion, one that wouldn’t be categorized as malicious but might be tailored to destroying him alone. He knows certain brewers could create something like that.
“Then we’ll have to figure out how to destroy him,” he says. Theodore nods. “In the meantime, no going to Knockturn Alley by yourself.”
Theodore’s eyes flash, where he would usually bow his head and give in. “Taking shadows with me into that place could expose you, my lord. I thought you didn’t want to be exposed.”
Harry reaches out and draws Theodore towards him. Theodore comes, and rests his head on Harry’s shoulder while Harry strokes his hair. “I’m sorry if I ever gave you the impression that my desire for secrecy outweighs my desire to keep you safe,” he whispers into Theodore’s ear. “It doesn’t.”
Theodore leans towards him, almost swaying on his feet. Harry allows him that for a moment, and then smooths his hands down Theodore’s arms and steps back, twitching his head towards the fireplace. It’s a reminder that Sirius is coming. Theodore won’t want to be so open in front of him.
“We once kissed in his house,” Theodore mutters.
Harry laughs softly as the flames turn green. “Of course, but that was at least partially flaunting our relationship because he wanted me to marry someone else.”
“Does he still want that?”
“He might. He agreed not to talk about it.”
Theodore grunts his doubt of that as Sirius appears. Harry has to admit that he has some doubt himself how well Sirius is going to handle this, but he agreed to give him the chance. He moves forwards and shakes hands with his godfather, noticing in amusement that a wrapped package of some kind is under Sirius’s arm. “What’s that?” he asks, nodding to it.
“It’s proper for a guest to give his host a gift the first time he comes over,” Sirius says in a snotty voice, and holds out the package for Harry to take. Harry turns it over and studies it for a second before he shrugs and undoes the twine holding the golden paper on.
It turns out to be a silver mirror set in a heavy wooden frame, so it looks more like a plaque than anything else. Harry’s shadows dart over to his side as he examines it, making Sirius jump and swear.
“You knew about them,” Harry says absently, and continues to turn the mirror over in his hands. “What does it do?”
“It gives you the answer to any question you ask it.”
“Uh-huh. What does it really do?”
Sirius is pouting when Harry looks up—and conspicuously ignoring Theodore, who leans against the wall and watches them. “It does,” Sirius grumbles. “I based it on a Muggle toy. You can ask it a question and look into the mirror, and it’ll show you something.” He takes an ostentatious breath, rubs the mirror with his sleeve, and says, “Are Harry and I going to have a good time tonight?”
Harry glances at the surface of the mirror. It turns grey for a second, filled with an image of roiling clouds, and then a white bubble that reminds him of nothing so much as the kind in the comics that Dudley used to read pops up, filled with black letters.
What about the third?
Sirius scowls at the mirror. “It has a mind of its own. Anyway!” He claps his hands. “I hope you like it.”
Maybe the mirror is cleverer than it appears. Sometimes enchanted objects can take on a personality of their own, as Harry well knows, being a Horcrux and thus a sort of enchanted object himself. He smiles at Sirius and tucks the mirror into a shadow that will transport it to the sitting room. “Thanks, Sirius. Come through and have dinner.”
Theodore glides up to Harry’s side as they walk into the dining room. Sirius glances at him and scowls. Theodore shows no reaction.
Harry sends a shadow to flow up behind Sirius and briefly cover his eyes.
“Pup!”
“We talked about the nicknames,” Harry says softly, taking the shadow away again. “And we talked about you respecting Theodore.”
Sirius sighs, long and loud and hard. “It’s just…so different from what your parents would have wanted for you.”
“Then maybe they should have stayed alive, so they could have an opinion.”
Sirius flinches, and doesn’t say another word until after they’ve begun to eat.
*
It was probably not a good idea to serve Firewhisky with dinner. Harry did it because he and Theodore both like it, and he thinks they could use some relaxation after what the wanker Theodore met in Knockturn Alley did to his wrist. But it’s turned into Sirius leaning back in his chair with a huge, loopy smile.
“So,” Sirius says, and points his glass at Harry. Theodore tenses. Harry glances at him. Theodore calms down, obviously remembering exactly how many ways Harry has to protect himself. “I know you did something to get rid of Albus and tame Snivellus. What was it?”
It takes Harry a minute to realize that “Snivellus” is probably Sirius’s nickname for Snape. Merlin, the man is addicted to nicknames. Harry shrugs. “I used an enchantment that means he can’t bully students anymore. I’m a little surprised he’s still at Hogwarts.”
“Oh, Minerva moved him into a pure research position. And there’s still the little problem of his Dark Mark denying him employment anywhere else.”
Harry nods and lounges back in his chair. That would make sense. He reaches out and curls his hand around Theodore’s fingers. Theodore relaxes completely and settles back to nurse his own glass of Firewhisky.
“And Albus?” Sirius swallows the rest of what’s in his glass and points at Harry with one finger. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you avoiding the question.”
“I did something to make sure that he couldn’t interfere again.”
“What did you do?”
Harry looks calmly at Sirius. “You haven’t earned that knowledge yet. When you do, then I’ll be happy to tell you.”
Sirius pouts. Harry ignores that. Sirius sighs and goes back to something they were discussing earlier. “And you don’t have any particular plans for your future other than to lie around the house and drink Firewhisky?”
“It’s good Firewhisky,” Harry points out, holding up his glass so the drink sparkles in the light of the torches around the dining room.
“Oh, yeah, I grant you. But—I mean, your dad was an Auror. Your mum was a Potions researcher, although she put that aside when she found out she was pregnant with you. You really don’t want to do something like that?”
“Well, I’m sort of like my mum.”
“Oh? Interested in Potions?” Sirius leans forwards like he’s on point.
“Sort of pregnant,” Harry says, and enjoys watching Sirius’s eyes bulge and his struggle to contain the Firewhisky that wants to escape his throat. Theodore chuckles at his side, and Harry leans over so that he can feel his lover’s warmth against his arm.
“Stop it!” Sirius whines when he has his jaw muscles under control. “Come on, what do you mean?”
“I have vassals who need my help, the way I needed my mum’s help when I was young,” Harry says. He does sort of wish he could remember her better other than as a voice screaming at Voldemort in his Dementor memory. But he can’t, and that’s that. “I need to make sure that all my other concerns can be put aside at a moment’s notice, so I can attend to them when they need me.”
“That’s not like being pregnant at all!”
“That’s why I said ‘sort of.’”
Sirius pauses, and then changes the conversation entirely, to the Falmouth Falcons Quidditch team. Harry conceals another smile in his goblet.
*
“You puzzle him.”
Theodore’s voice is still scratchy from the extremely satisfying screaming he did during the blowjob Harry gave him. Harry stretches, and smiles at the way Theodore’s eyes go automatically to his chest. He shrugs and scrambles up the bed. “He’ll get used to the way we interact, or he can back off again.”
“True enough.” Theodore rolls over and nuzzles close to Harry, one hand sliding down his hip. Harry spreads his legs, precisely so Theodore’s fingers can encounter the softness and the slickness that means Harry has already come. Theodore pauses. “How, my lord?”
“Watching you.”
Theodore doesn’t blush often, but when he does, a high tide of crimson color rolls across his face and down his chest in the most delightful wave. Harry touches his chest and sighs at the warmth under his fingers. Always his favorite, better than Firewhisky.
“I—”
Harry presses his fingers gently to Theodore’s lips. “It’s all right.” Theodore told Harry once that he isn’t confident with words. Harry expects to keep up his half of the relationship, including protecting Theodore and speaking when he can’t., And in the meantime, Theodore brings him joy.
Theodore sighs, his eyes drooping. But he does murmur, “What are you going to do about Padma’s boss?”
“Something.”
Theodore accepts that easily, sliding into sleep. Harry remains alert as he watches Theodore, one hand smoothing over his tumbled black curls, tracing the edges of his eyelids.
This is one reason why he has to find the bastard who threatened Theodore in Knockturn Alley and put an end to him. No one is allowed to harm Harry’s joy in life. It’s a promise he made to himself at the time he first took Theodore as his vassal, and it’s one reason Voldemort’s spirit is now trapped eternally in a small box. Harry might have been content to leave him alone if Voldemort hadn’t claimed dominion over the Death Eaters’ children.
This bloke can count himself lucky if he ends up like Voldemort, Harry thinks drowsily, and wraps both himself and Theodore in a blanket of shadows that will wake him in an instant if someone comes into the room, before going to sleep.
