lomonaaeren

Harry ended up calling Sirius through the Floo in the Gryffindor common room, despite the risk of someone coming down the stairs or Umbridge finding out, because he had no idea what to do.

Sirius went very still when he saw Wormtail. Then he said in a clipped voice, “Can you get to the Shrieking Shack?”

“Yes. I’ve got the Cloak.”

“Then do it. By two.”

The fire flared out, and Harry snatched the Cloak from the floor beside him and ran towards the Shack. In a way, it was a miracle that he’d managed to contact Sirius without Umbridge finding out, and also that Sirius was able to sneak out of Grimmauld Place and meet him right away.

But miracles seemed to be the order of the night. Harry could still feel the tingle of Nott’s lips on the back of his hand if he thought about it.

He arrived in the Shack panting from the speed of his run, but Sirius was already there. He stared at the silk-wrapped bundle of Pettigrew in silence, without moving, even when Wormtail began squeaking and thrashing around in fear.

“I need to take him from you, Harry.”

“But you aren’t going to kill him?”

Sirius dragged huge black eyes up from Wormtail to Harry, and Harry went breathless at the sight of the pain in them. “You have no idea how badly I want to.”

“But you aren’t going to kill him,” Harry repeated, a little more insistently. His mind was already working over what it meant, what kind of gift Nott had given him. (Because he wanted Harry? That part was still strange). Sirius could get proven innocent. He could come out of Grimmauld Place. Harry could live with him.

Sirius bit his lip with teeth that looked like fangs for a long moment, and then nodded. “If you want me to, I’ll give him to the Ministry.”

“Take a few members of the Order with you when you do. Like Tonks and Shacklebolt. Then it’ll look like you were captured fairly, but also that they trust you enough to turn Wormtail over to the right people.”

Sirius blinked a few times, then gave him a faint smile. “That was practically Slytherin of you.”

Harry shrugged. “A Slytherin gave him to me.”

“Yeah, you said. Why?”

“I told you everything that he said to me. It doesn’t make much sense.”

And it was true, Harry had told Sirius everything Nott had said to him. He just hadn’t talked about the kiss, or the expression on Nott’s face when he’d dumped the silk-wrapped Pettigrew on the stone floor.

It was—

Some things were just private, after all. Actions more than words.

Sirius nodded and then stared at Wormtail again. “All right. I’m going to go back to Grimmauld and tell Tonks and Shacklebolt about this. I think—I think I’ll tell them that I caught him sneaking into the house.”

“How, with the Fidelius?”

“Obviously, we have a traitor in the Order. I think we need to look out for that!”

Harry laughed a little. Sirius’s plan would cause chaos, but after the way the Order had left Harry alone all summer and watched him without telling him anything, and then almost let him get his soul eaten by Dementors, he wasn’t feeling that charitable towards them.

“All right.” He hesitated, then lunged forwards and hugged Sirius. “I want this to work out,” he whispered. “You have no idea how much.”

“I think I might know how much just from the way you hug me.”

Harry pulled back and wiped at a few tears on his face, then watched as Sirius conjured a small cage to hold Pettigrew. He added a number of enchantments that Harry supposed were probably meant to keep Pettigrew from transforming, then added a rope, transformed into a dog, and hung the cage around his neck.

Sirius stood looking at Harry for long minutes before he turned and slipped out of the tunnel, away to the edge of the wards.

Harry half-smiled. Sirius could have just carried Pettigrew in his hand or robe pocket, but apparently he’d really wanted to make sure that Wormtail didn’t escape.

And Harry could understand that. As he turned away with hope throbbing in his heart, he tried not to picture the future where he lived with Sirius too much. It might never arrive.

But it might.

And it was due to Theodore Nott, of all people.

Harry would have to think about that.

*

SIRIUS BLACK DECLARED INNOCENT!

Harry swallowed when he saw the headline. It felt as though a burden he had been carrying for years and years had cracked and fallen off his shoulders. He ate with one hand while he held up the paper with the other and people chattered and cast him looks stranger than ever.

The article said nothing that Harry didn’t already know, but that was fine. For once, it was good news for him and people he loved.

He looked up and caught Nott’s gaze for a second across the Great Hall before Ron and Hermione swept him out of it. Nott looked smug, Harry thought. Well, honestly, he had every right to.

“Harry, did you know?”

Harry shook his head as his friends cornered him against a wall near the stairs down to the Hufflepuff dormitories. “No way! You know I don’t get to talk to Sirius much now that we’re here and you-know-who is watching the Floo.” He rolled his eyes when Ron and Hermione continued to look skeptical. “Do you really think I would be able to keep something like that secret? You know how awful I am about lying.”

Hermione nodded and bit her lip. “Well, yes, since you haven’t been able to keep quiet in the face of Umbridge or our classmates’ taunting, either…”

Harry held his tongue. At least she referred to it as “taunting,” now, instead of reasonable curiosity or something like that.

“Do you know what this means, mate?” Ron demanded.

“I hope it means that I get to live with Sirius. But the Ministry has been awful about so many things so much of the time that I won’t be counting on that until it actually happens.”

“No. More than that.”

“Er, okay? What else does it mean?”

“That there’s a traitor in the Death Eaters! Someone had to tell Pettigrew to go spy on the Order! And there were so few people who even believed he was alive!” Ron looked as if his hair might bristle like a hedgehog’s spines with excitement. “That means there might be someone we can convince to help us and betray You-Know-Who!”

Harry concealed a laugh. If only they knew how close it was to the other way around. “Yeah, maybe that’s the case.”

“Of course it is!”

And Ron and Hermione started planning how they could find out who had turned Pettigrew over and get them to agree to do even more, while Harry turned his head to the side. Somehow, he knew what he would see even though there was no logical reason for him to suspect it.

Nott was standing in the doorway of the Great Hall, one among the many people who had spilled forth to stare at Harry, but somehow separate and apart. When he met Harry’s eyes, he inclined his head.

His smile flashed with something like hope before he turned around and took off down the corridor.

“Harry? Who are you looking at?”

Harry shook his head as he turned back to his friends. “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”

“Huh?”

“Oh, what does it matter?” Hermione said, a little impatiently. “We have to figure out what’s going to happen! Can Umbridge still prevent you from communicating with Sirius if he’s going to have a trial, Harry?”

“I mean, I assume she can. If she’s watching the Floos and the owl post, she’s getting in the way of other people talking to their parents.”

Parents. Harry savored the word. Sirius might be his godfather instead of his father, might not be exactly the kind of person Harry had once dreamed would come and rescue him from the Dursleys, but he was going to live with him anyway. Nothing was going to get in the way of that.

And Harry had Nott to thank for it.

I will thank him for it.

*

“I’m here, Potter.”

“Thanks for coming, Nott.”

Nott was standing in the darkness by the statue of the humpbacked witch that let out onto the Honeydukes tunnel, his arms folded across his chest. He looked a lot less confident than he had during the other times he’d spoken with Harry. Harry wondered idly if that was because he didn’t know why Harry had wanted to meet him, or because he thought Harry might not want to speak to him at all now that Sirius was free, and then put it out of his head.

“I wanted to say thank you.”

“You’re welcome.”

Nott’s words were clipped. Yeah, Harry might not know the reason, but he did know that Nott’s confidence was diminished now. He took a deep breath and spoke the words that felt like inching out onto a thin bridge over an abyss. “I’d—like to hear more about what you meant when it came to your side not being the same as Voldemort’s side.”

Nott still flinched at the name, but his eyes were bright now, intent, and fastened on Harry. “You do?”

“Yeah.”

“Why now?”

“Because you did a pretty big thing for me. I don’t—know exactly what you want, what you mean by starting some kind of other side, but I’m sure now that you’re serious and this isn’t something minor for you.”

Nott’s smile was bright and cold as winter wind. Harry shivered, watching it. “I meant what I said about wishing to study magic free of the Ministry’s control. You should be able to see, yourself, how pernicious that control is at the moment.”

Harry took a deep breath. He could do this. He could. “And you said that Pettigrew was—a courting gift.”

“I did. I meant it.”

Harry had to put aside the strangeness of someone wanting him, and not his fame or to date a Tri-Wizard Champion or something like that, before he could continue. “Voldemort just—gave him to you?”

“Not just. But I did say I could make the case for taking you out of the war better with such a gift. He was willing to try it.”

“Take me out of the war.”

“You would take a vow not to stand against him. That’s all he asks for. Isn’t it small, compared to what he could have asked from both of us? And you have Pettigrew, and you have the freedom to live in the magical world always.”

Harry had to clear his throat before he could say it. “You know about the Dursleys.”

“Not all the details. Enough to know the way you react to food, and the clothes you wear, and the way you flinch away from some people, are all connected.”

Harry closed his eyes, overwhelmed. Not even people on his side knew that much about him.

“You could promise me—what? A safe haven? And I don’t think it’s great that Voldemort plans to kill all the Muggleborns, you know.”

“You wouldn’t have to swear to be a Death Eater. You wouldn’t have to take the Mark. Yes, I could promise you a safe haven. A home of your own, a place where you would never be mistreated and could always have food and comfort and freedom. And as for the Dark Lord’s political goals…do you fight for your own goals, Harry? Or to keep him from killing you?”

Nott saying his name felt like a hand sweeping down his chest. Harry shivered violently and glanced away. “I don’t think he would ever swear not to kill me. Haven’t I made him look foolish enough?”

“Are you not the one looking foolish right now, with all the people who hate you think and think you’re a liar? With every article in the Prophet? With the Ministry campaign against you? The Dark Lord seems content with that.”

“Seems.”

“Of course. This is conditional. If I fail to secure you, then he’ll continue the war as he always has. But he’s willing to swear an oath of neutrality with you and let you come with me and ensure safety for certain people you designate, because he knows what a blow it will be to Dumbledore’s side if you defect.”

“Dumbledore’s side.”

“Is it yours? Full of people who think you’re a liar this year, a cheater last year, the Heir of Slytherin two years before that? Is it, Harry?”

“Don’t call me that.”

“Why not?”

“I—it feels like you’re touching me.”

Nott’s eyes widened, and Harry didn’t think he was imagining the flare of triumph in them. He came a step closer and lowered his voice to a purr. “That’s exactly the way I want you to feel.”

It was like Harry’s head were spinning, as if someone had cast Imperius on him again or he was walking through a field of heavily-scented flowers. He turned and ran away before he could convince himself if that was what he really wanted or not.

Nott’s soft laughter followed him.

*

It was a night when none of the students had Astronomy. Harry sat up on the Astronomy Tower and rubbed his right hand absently. He hadn’t had detention with Umbridge in over a week, and his hand was finally healing, but it did itch.

Right now, he was staring up at the vastness of the stars overhead and not really thinking about Umbridge. Or even about Sirius, who had owled him that the Ministry had had to accept Pettigrew was really still alive and would give him a trial.

He was trying to figure out what he wanted.

Of course he had wanted to live with Sirius, and that seemed like it would finally come true. And he had wanted to kill Voldemort—or, well, he had wanted Voldemort to stop coming after him. To stop bothering him. He hadn’t particularly wanted Voldemort to die in first year, just to stop bothering him. And he had only wanted the basilisk and the diary to die in second year because otherwise, Harry and Ginny would have died.

But other than that, what did he know about the wider political scene?

Only that people hate me. And if one person stopped hating me or coming after me, that might be better.

Harry closed his eyes. It hurt to think this way. After all, Voldemort also wanted some things that Harry hated. To kill Muggleborns and Muggles. To torture people. Could Harry just abandon all the ones who needed him and walk away?

Could I let him just kill Hermione? The Weasleys?

Ensure safety for certain people you designate, said Nott’s voice in his memory.

Harry bowed his head and shuddered into his arms. Hermione and the Weasleys would hate being protected this way. They would hate him for allying with Voldemort.

But…

Harry was starting to think it didn’t really matter. He definitely didn’t have the level of power and knowledge that Voldemort did. He didn’t even have some of the knowledge that the people around him did. He didn’t know what the Order was doing. He didn’t know why Dumbledore wouldn’t meet his eyes. He didn’t know why Dumbledore and the other professors were just letting Umbridge ruin Hogwarts.

Maybe there were good reasons. But Harry didn’t know what they were, and he would have to act without that knowledge.

What do I want?

At the core of him, in his heart that was still the heart of the little boy who had hidden away in his cupboard when Dudley was too terrible, Harry knew he wanted what Nott had promised. Safety. A home of his own. The freedom to do what he liked.

He had never wanted his fame, or the attention that made him into a hero or a villain or a crazy person whenever the public wanted it that way.

And he wanted people safe, but he—didn’t want to fight and die to save them. Not if he didn’t have to. Not when there were other people, like Dumbledore, the only one Voldemort had ever feared, who could do it, instead.

If his friends were safe, and Harry could be happy, he wouldn’t actually want to fight Voldemort.

There was the question, of course, of whether Nott could actually give Harry the things he was saying. But he had given Harry Pettigrew. There was the chance that he could give Harry other things, as well.

Harry opened his eyes with a long sigh and stared up at the stars.

He had made his decision.

*

“Are you all right, Harry?”

Harry laughed a little and turned his head to look at Hermione. “Actually, I feel better than I have in a long time. Why do you ask?”

“Well—it’s just that you’ve stopped glaring at people and acting like an idiot in Umbridge’s class. I wondered.”

So if I act that way, I’m doing something wrong, and if I act more calmly, I’m doing something wrong?

But Harry could feel a deep pool of calm underneath his breastbone. He had made his decision, and he had seen no reason to go back on it yet. He still wanted Ron and Hermione safe, and he would make that a condition of any pact or truce or oath that he swore.

But something had cracked between them irreparably over the summer when they didn’t write to him, and they were together, living with his godfather, which Harry would have killed to do. He had forgiven them now that he was going to be able to do it, but it wasn’t a road that could lead back to the friendship they’d had.

He shrugged. “Just, I’ve been thinking about the way that Pettigrew got arrested and now I can live with Sirius. It makes certain things matter more than they did. So I’m thinking differently about them.”

Hermione looked at him with wide, solemn eyes. They were in the corridor outside the Gryffindor common room, where she had stopped Harry as he was leaving. Harry still had some time before he had to meet Nott, so he didn’t mind that.

“You know you might have to stay with the Dursleys?”

“Why?”

“Because Sirius’s house is being used by—” Hermione lowered her voice and looked over her shoulder. “The Order. So it might be safer for you to stay with your relatives instead of there.”

“Hermione, how much do you know about how my relatives treat me?”

She winced, which was an answer in and of itself. Harry nodded. “They would put me outside those blood protections and give me to any Death Eater who wanted me, even without—all the rest of it. I think a house under the Fidelius is pretty bloody safe.”

“I mean—it’s just—”

“Yeah?”

“Dumbledore might not like it,” Hermione whispered, and then held her breath.

Harry knew they had come to the real center of her objections. He looked her in the eye for a moment, and Hermione swallowed, but held her ground. Harry was the one who said at last, “If Dumbledore would keep me from living with Sirius because of some misguided idea about blood protections, then I would consider him my enemy.”

She sucked in her breath again. Harry turned and left.

He wondered idly if she would carry that conversation back to Dumbledore. He found that he didn’t care much if she did.

Perhaps that was silly of him, stupid of him. But it was the truth.

*

“Potter.”

Harry shivered all over as Nott stepped towards him and let his hands rest on Harry’s shoulders. They were in the shadow of the staircase down to the Great Hall, and anyone could come along and find them.

But it was the risk that heated Harry’s blood. Although not as much as the way Nott looked at him, as the way Nott’s hands rested on his shoulders.

“I think we’ve come to a certain point.”

“Yes?”

“The point where you could call me Harry.”

Nott’s eyes warmed and shone. He bent down, and Harry had the time to realize that Nott wanted to kiss him and was angling for it. But he stopped a breath from Harry’s lips, meaning the final choice rested with him.

Harry surged up and met him.

Nott hummed against his lips, drawing Harry closer. Harry had never kissed someone before, and he was glad his first kiss was like this one, so firm and warm and with Nott’s hands sliding down from his shoulders to rest on his hips.

“Harry,” Nott breathed as he pulled back.

The sound was full of wonder. Harry smiled at him, then said, “And can I call you Theodore?”

“Theo.”

The quickness of the answer made Harry think there was a story there, but he had all the time in the world to learn about it. So he nodded and whispered, “Theo,” for the pleasure of seeing him shiver.

“What made you decide for me?”

“Because you gave me Pettigrew.”

“Just that?”

“It’s the kind of gift no one else could have given me. And if Voldemort agreed to that and would also agree to the kind of pact you talked about, well, honestly, I don’t—care as much as I would have once about the rest of them. Maybe if it wasn’t for this year, I would. But I don’t.”

Theo’s smile was approaching unholy. “Nor should you have to,” he agreed. “And I promise, Harry, the Dark Lord will swear this pact of neutrality with you, and promise to keep your friends safe. I don’t understand everything about why he’s so reluctant to confront you, but I promise that he is.”

“If—well, if I get to that point and find out that you betrayed me, I’d still do my best to kill him. You know that, right?”

Theo was shaking his head even before Harry finished the sentence. “I swear by my magic, he isn’t betraying you,” Theo soothed him as he ran his fingers up Harry’s arm and made the little hairs there stand on end. “He knows I would destroy him if that was the case.”

“Why would you?”

“Because you’re mine.”

Harry shivered. If Theo saying his name had been like a touch, it was nothing compared to this. But he did manage to get out, “Your father would be angry with you.”

“I would strike at the Dark Lord by destroying my father.”

“What?”

Theo leaned closer and pressed his lips against the shell of Harry’s ear as he whispered, “There is a connection between my father and the Dark Lord that isn’t present with most of the other Death Eaters. Father is much older than Draco’s father; he was one of the Dark Lord’s original followers. And that means that the Dark Lord embedded a piece of magic in his Mark that is meant to bind my father closer to him. Destroy that magic, it would destroy the Dark Lord.”

“I don’t—think he would die.”

“No. But his current body would be destroyed, and look at how long it took him to come back last time. He won’t risk it.”

Harry swallowed and blinked. Yes, that was true. Voldemort had gone thirteen years before he was able to come back from the defeat at Godric’s Hollow. And even if he had more people who might be able to help him get a body this time, he probably didn’t want to risk it.

“I—you would use this knowledge for me?”

“I told you why.”

Harry looked up at Theo. Theo’s eyes were wide and very bright, and Harry had the distinct feeling that he wanted Harry to respond in a certain way. So Harry licked his lips and said the first thing that came into his mind.

“Because I’m yours.”

Theo swore shakily and gripped him harder, leaning nearer to kiss him again. Harry leaned up and put his hands behind Theo’s neck, on his shoulders, pressing down again. He waited until the heat of the kiss faded a little and asked softly, “And does that mean you’re mine, as well?”

Theo made a noise that sounded as if he were choking and kissed Harry, leaning into him. They swayed together. Harry felt as though they were dancing, as though the foundations of his world were trembling.

He didn’t know if he wanted it to ever stop.