lomonaaeren

Thank you again for all the reviews! This is the end of this particular arc of the story, but it will continue in the next arc, to be called Winged Victory.

Chapter Thirteen—Echoes

For a moment, there seems to be nothing but the soaring echoes inside Theo’s head and heart, the rasping breaths that he can’t help escaping him. The next moment, the hearing turns into chaos.

The woman in pink was already screaming, but now she’s on her feet and aiming her wand at Theo. Theo immediately has his in hand beneath the table. Does he want to curse an important Ministry official in the middle of a hearing? No. Will he do it to escape her being able to hit him with something worse? Yes.

“I demand the arrest of this miscreant!” the woman thunders.

“Shut up, Dolores,” Amelia Bones snaps, and turns to face Theo. “Mr. Nott, did you know that Mr. Potter was going to do this?”

“No,” Theo says, with perfect honesty. He notices a face or two tighten around the table. If either of them is a Legilimens, they’ll be able to sense that he’s telling the truth. “I had memories of the graveyard, but I never thought Harry would share them.”

“This is not real!”

“Yes, it is, Dolores,” Madam Bones says, just as someone else dashes in through the door. Theo sees the color-changing hair and decides it’s the trainee Auror he met the other day, despite how different she looks at the moment. “Yes, Auror Tonks?’

“I have a paper, Madam Bones,” Auror Tonks says breathlessly, holding it out.

Theo cranes his neck as the Prophet sweeps past him and just manages to make out an image of Voldemort’s wraith fleeing across the sky before Madam Bones snatches it and begins to read. Her face grows grimmer and grimmer.

“You knew all about this, Mr. Nott?” she asks a moment later. Theo can only hear her because most of the gasping, shouting, gesticulating lot have shut up and are trying to read the article or look at the headline from across the table.

“I already told you I didn’t know Harry was going to—”

“No. I meant the events in the graveyard.” Madam Bones turns the paper around, and now Theo can see the photograph of Voldemort’s wraith fleeing that he only glimpsed before. He swallows, feeling ill.

“Yes, Madam Bones. I was there after my father brought me. I can’t speak to anything that happened before that, but for most of the action…”

“You were there.” Madam Bones stares at the paper in her hands and releases a long sigh.

The witch with grey hair clears her throat. “This is all very exciting, of course, Amelia, but I thought we were here to ask this young man more questions and try to find a suitable guardian for him?”

Madam Bones looks up and meets Theo’s eyes. Theo stares back. All he can do is be himself, as hard as he can, and try to keep anything out of his gaze about how he would like to wring Harry’s stupid neck.

“I don’t think this young man needs a guardian.”

“Amelia! You were the one who said that we should review that gap in the laws that allow some children to simply—”

“I was the one who said that,” Madam Bones agrees, with a little nod of her head. “And now I think that I should have questioned why this was the first case everyone agreed to bring up.” She straightens. “Not to mention, honored ladies and gentlemen of the Wizengamot, Minister, Undersecretary, the Department of Magical Law Enforcement is going to be busy dealing with the resurrection of the wizard known as Voldemort.”

“This is not happening!”

“Do be quiet, Madam Umbridge,” Madam Bones snaps, and Theo commits Umbridge’s name to memory. “If you think that this is the most important thing we could be dealing with, instead of the panic that’s going to ensure in the next few hours, you’re stupider than I thought you were.”

Umbridge has things to say about that, but Auror Tonks catches Theo’s eye. He did see the signal that passed from Madam Bones to her, but it was subtle enough that most people in the room won’t have. Tonks smiles at him, and Theo slips out of his seat at the table and away to her side.

Tonks gives an explosive sigh when the door of the courtroom closes behind them. “So glad we’re out of there,” she confesses, while her hair turns almost as red as a Weasley’s. “Some excitement, eh?”

“Yes. Could you escort me back to one of the fireplaces in the Atrium, please?”

“Sure thing, kid.” Theo keeps the roll of his eyes to himself. Tonks is only a few years older than he is at the most. “And would you mind passing along a message to Sirius Black for me?”

“Why him?” If Tonks is the kind of person Sirius met in the Mind-Healer’s office, Theo will eat his own hand.

“He’s my cousin. My mum—she was Andromeda Black, before she became Andromeda Tonks. Ran away from the family when she was disowned for marrying my dad because he’s a Muggleborn. I don’t even know if Sirius knows who I am.”

“I’ll do it,” Theo says, considering Tonks in a new light. It’s hard to see anything like Black in her face, but then again, she’s a Metamorphmagus, so it might only be there in her neutral form. And Theo does remember his dad saying that the Black family used to be known for their Metamorphmagus talent.

“Really?” They’re in a lift now, riding up to the Atrium, and Tonks shoots him a look of surprise as sudden as a falling star. “No—you don’t want some kind of payment? Some kind of favor?”

“Because Slytherins always want that kind of thing?”

“I wasn’t thinking about you as a Slytherin. More the sort of kid who managed to sneak Harry Potter out of Hogwarts and get my cousin a trial and defy Mrs. Longbottom, who attacked Aurors.”

Theo smiles because he can’t help himself. Auror Tonks is someone he doesn’t really know and might never see again—although knowing Black, he’ll want to catch up with a cousin—but her praise feels good. “Thanks.”

“But you don’t want a favor?” Tonks is giving him a shrewder look than Theo thought her capable of as the lift comes to a stop in the Atrium.

“That you don’t attack Harry or Neville or any of the other people living with me. Or Black, for that matter.” Theo doesn’t really think she would, but then again, the feuds the Black family has against its own members are pretty famous in pureblood circles.

Tonks looks offended. “That’s not a favor, that’s bloody common sense. Making the Nott and the Boy-Who-Lived my enemies? No bloody way.”

The Nott. Theo turns over the title in his mind as he walks to the fireplace with Tonks right behind him. It’s not one that he would have chosen for himself, given the way it emphasizes a heritage that belonged to his father first and which Father never expected Theo to live up to.

But if people have given him a title, of any kind, he will use that in defense of Harry and himself. And the others who are inexplicably coming under the shelter of his protection as well.

*

“What did you think?”

Theo didn’t get a chance to speak with Harry alone until now, nearly an hour after he came home. Neville and Luna ambushed him the minute he stepped through the fireplace demanding to know how the hearing went and if all the details about the graveyard confrontation with Voldemort were true and how many nargles his hair collected in the Ministry. Then Lupin showed up to express reservations about everything. Then Black bounded into the drawing room and demanded to be praised.

Harry was there, hovering in the background, but now he’s lifting his head with a strained smile on his lips, and Theo realizes abruptly that Harry is afraid of his judgment.

“I think it was brilliant.”

Harry blinks a little. His lips part. A blush creeps up his cheeks, and he spends a moment trying to find words. Theo watches him in amusement and the kind of tenderness he once thought he would never feel for a living person.

“I—you did?”

“Did you do it thinking that I would hate you for it?” Theo shakes his head and takes a step nearer. “You did what you had to to protect me, and you put your whole heart into it. It was dramatic, but it made its point. Madam Bones decided that the DMLE had better things to do than hold a hearing for one teenager without a guardian.”

“I’m glad,” Harry whispers. He’s staring at Theo’s mouth, and it occurs to Theo that it’s really been too long since they had a proper snog.

He holds his arms open.

Harry dashes into them, slamming his arms into place around Theo and his mouth on Theo’s. Theo staggers, but then turns and presses Harry against the wall of his bedroom, tongue sliding between his lips.

Harry makes an excited, enthusiastic noise, and Theo loses himself in the kiss. This is everything. He will risk more than he’s risked so far, make nice with Harry’s friends, shelter stray Gryffindors and Ravenclaws, pretend to like Black, do anything to keep holding this warmth and feeling this peace.

Harry finally steps back from him, panting a little and raising his hand to touch his lips, which probably feel swollen. Theo would like to go back and swell them some more, but Harry says, “I got a letter from Ron.”

Theo sighs. That’s an effective bucket of cold water thrown on his desire, anyway. He takes a step back and leans against the nearest bookshelf, ignoring the lingering thoughts about what he’d like to do to Harry. “Do you think that he wrote to you with Dumbledore’s consent or against it?”

“He doesn’t say one way or the other.” Harry digs in a pocket of his robe for the letter, and Theo lets his eyes linger on the line of Harry’s shoulders, how his robes fall around his legs. “He just says that he saw the article and he was worried about me.”

Theo nods and accepts the letter from Harry. It’s exactly what Harry says, although Theo has to squint to make that out. Someone should take Weasley aside and explain, nicely, that he’s not competing with chickens to make his writing scratch-like.

But there’s a postscript at the end, in neater handwriting and with Granger’s name underneath it, that sparks Theo’s concern.

Professor Dumbledore says that there’s been some Death Eater activity around the Ministry. I know that you thought you had to release the truth, Harry, but it might not have been the best action.

“I haven’t heard of any Death Eater activity in the Ministry.”

“I haven’t, and neither have Sirius and Remus.” Harry shakes his head. “I suppose I’ll wait until we’re face-to-face for her to tell me about it.”

Theo folds up the letter and hands it back. “How do you feel about—them right now?”

“I understand them better. They don’t—they don’t have to deal with the level of shit that you and I do, you know? It’s hard to understand that from the outside. Ron’s anger was more important to him than anything else, and so was not apologizing, because he hadn’t been the one having to outfly a dragon or dealing with a Death Eater father. And our friendship is one of the most important things in her life to Hermione. Of course she thought her world was falling apart when she thought the friendship was.”

Theo reluctantly nods. For all that he would dance (in private) if Harry cut off his friendship with Weasley and Granger, he understands the importance they hold in Harry’s life, and Harry wouldn’t be Harry if he wasn’t this damn selfless and forgiving.

“That doesn’t mean,” Harry adds, “that I would let them get away with insulting you or treating you badly. You’ll have to get along with them, but they’ll also have to get along with you. I promise, Theo.” He holds out his hand, and Theo reaches out and grasps it, feeling as though Harry’s promise is sinking through his body into his bones. “I won’t be torn in half, or torn away from—from you.”

Theo smiles, and leans forwards to kiss Harry. Harry turns towards him, lifting his hands, letting them frame Theo’s face as he smiles into his eyes.

Someone bangs on the door.

Theo sighs a little and steps away from Harry. At least they got as much time alone together as they did. And Harry gives him a look full of regret as he goes to open the door and let Black in, which is all Theo needs to keep him going.

“Har—oh, right, you’re here, too,” Black says, giving Theo a look for a moment as though he was hoping Theo would dissolve like snow with sunshine sprayed on it. “Anyway, Madam Bones wants to talk to you.”

“Me?”

“Us.” Black is all but dancing as he pulls Harry out of the room, although Theo thinks that doesn’t come from impatience as much as wanting to rub this great “prank” in Madam Bones’s face. “And she wants to know if we can use the camera—”

Theo smiles a bit as the door swings shut behind Harry. He’ll see his boyfriend again this evening, he’s sure. And Black will be elsewhere.

A soft hoot comes from behind him. Theo turns around, thinking that he might see an owl from Mrs. Zabini there. It wouldn’t be a surprise if she heard about what Harry did and wants to know how it will affect Theo’s next steps.

Instead, there’s a black owl with silver fringes to its feathers perched on his windowsill that Theo has seen before. He’s sure Lucius Malfoy charmed the silver on to make the bird more impressive. With steady steps, Theo walks over and loosens the letter bound to its leg.

He often saw this owl making deliveries to his father. But owls won’t deliver post to the dead. The letter is meant for Theo and only Theo now.

Theo takes the letter and opens it, although not before he flicks his wand through half a dozen motions meant to detect and disarm any curses. There are none. Theo takes a deep breath and lets himself look at the actual words with some mild curiosity.

Mr. Nott,

My congratulations for surviving a situation that I doubt many others your age could survive. I know that my own son could not. You should be aware, however, that your claiming of your father’s allies and wards is not complete.

Tell me one reason that I should go along with you and be your ally, when you oppose my Lord and my principles alike.

Lucius Malfoy.

Theo puts the letter on the table and eyes the owl for a moment. The bird looks at him, vast and immovable save for a little shudder in its wings. It obviously won’t leave without a reply.

Theo sighs. He wishes he and Harry had more time to be normal, to treat the summer as a simple holiday of playing Quidditch and complaining more about summer homework than actually doing it. But that would leave Harry vulnerable to Lucius Malfoy and his ilk. It might have led to Voldemort coming back in the graveyard.

What Theo is, he didn’t choose. He didn’t choose to lose his mother when he was so young, or to learn the kinds of Dark curses that Father forced him to learn. But he is alive because of it, and he doesn’t intend to turn his back on Harry and the politics of the moment, either.

He draws out parchment and ink and a quill. He spends a few minutes thinking of what he will say to Lucius, but only a few. After all, the one thing Theo did choose, the thing that he feels more steadily about than anything else in his life, is the boy who is probably listening to his godfather plotting more pranks right now.

Theo finally dips the quill in the ink.

Mr. Malfoy,

You should know that my father raised me in his image, or did his best to. He intended to slaughter me the moment I had a child safely born, so that he could mold the child, because he thought me weak. Consider what it means that I killed him instead.

I know that you would want to use me. You wouldn’t be able to help yourself. I do not need you to ally with me, but if you try to become my ally and then follow my father’s path: think how the knife turned in his hand.

Theo Nott.

Theo waits for the letter to dry, considering it. In the end, he shakes his head and forbears to add anything else. Lucius should know what he’s getting into.

Theo turns to the owl, which is already extending an eager leg. Probably it doesn’t want to be in the house any more than Theo wants it to stay here. Theo ties the letter firmly on and opens the window when the bird flaps over to it.

Theo watches it fly out of sight, and then glances down at a shout of laughter from the gardens. Harry is standing there, arms folded and shaking his head, while Black rolls on the ground in a fit of near hysteria.

Harry glances up as if he can feel Theo’s gaze. The moment their eyes connect, a brilliant smile breaks across Harry’s face, sweeter than anything Theo has ever seen, ever eaten, ever touched.

Theo smiles back, and thinks about who he will kill in defense of that smile, if he needs to. Then he shuts the window, and goes to join Harry.

The End.