Chapter Text
The adults were angry again. Harry had never liked it when the adults around him were spitting and shouting, turning various colours of bruised flesh in the face. If his dementor friend hadn't been nesting in his lap in the form of a valraven this whole time, Harry was sure he would have balled up to escape the noise.
"Absolutely not!" fumed a round man in a lime green boiler hat, called Muffin or something like that. "The Boy Saviour's guardian will need to be carefully selected and without your undue input, Albus!"
The old man in the weird robes, apparently called Albus, was stern faced but unlike the other adults, he merely raised his voice instead of outright shouting. Harry liked him and the woman who sat with him at the Dursley's house the most. Even now, Elaine, and old man Albus, were standing on each side of Harry's chair. They hadn't left his side for even a minute the whole way to this place. The Ministry of Magic they called it.
Most of the argument went right over Harry's head. He didn't even know why he had to be there. None of the adults actually addressed him at all. They kept talking about him, sure, but apart from Elaine who every now and then squeezed his shoulder or carded her fingers through his hair, or Albus who sent him comforting smiles and twinkled his sky blue eyes at him, none of the other adults so much as looked at him.
"Where are those wills, then?" someone interrupted.
"The godfather bond could not have taken, or the traitor would be dead!" said another harshly.
Harry was almost sure that the numerous adults in the room were having far too many conversations all at once.
"Finally!" cried the brownie man and hastened to the door with such excitement, his bowler hat almost got knocked off his head in all the excitement.
Harry craned his body backwards to see what was going on. His jaw fell. In the door, arms laden with scrolls and feathers and other things, stood a small green man with massive pointed ears, sharp teeth and a rather disgruntled expression. He marched into the middle of the room, only grunting at whatever Mr. Spongecake was spouting at him.
"A goblin," Elaine whispered to Harry. "Better show him respect."
Harry nodded. That much was obvious. No one would disrespect such an angry looking bloke wearing full armour and carrying both a sword at his hip and two axes in a holster on his back.
The goblin cleared his throat and finally, the adults started shushing one another until blessed silence reigned at long last.
The goblin held out a small, intricate looking knife toward Harry. "Seven drops of blood, to prove the identity of the child."
Albus took the knife and knelt by Harry's side. Harry thought he was rather limber for such an ancient looking man. Their eyes met over half-moon glasses.
"No need to fear, my boy," Albus said jovially, eyes twinkling madly. "It will only sting for a moment, then I'll heal the wound immediately."
Harry, who was used to being dealt pain from adults, thought it was rather neat that he was both being given a warning and a promise of healing after. He quickly nodded his head, feeling too shy under all the eyes on him to speak.
A parchment, as Elaine had told him the odd paper was called, was placed in Harry's lap as Albus gently took his left hand and pricked his index finger lightly with the knife. They all watched as seven drops fell on the parchment, then Harry felt rather than saw the wound close itself, but paid it no mind. His eyes were glued to where his blood had seeped into the parchment and blood red words were now rapidly filling it up.
"Hadrian James Potter-Peverell," he mouthed. He'd never seen his full name written out like this. Hell, he'd never even known that he had a middle name, and two last names, much less that Harry was just a nickname!
He should have known Aunt Petunia lied about Potter. Sure, it wasn't his real last name, but she must have picked it because it was one of his real last names. He was sure he'd never like it, though, after years associating it with rejection and loneliness. Peverell, he was Harry Peverell, a deathmage with a dementor for a familiar who sometimes turned into a weird raven.
Eyes roving the parchment, Harry felt his heart clench in his chest. His parents names were written above his own, and then his grandparents and ancestors as far up as 7 generations. On his dad's side, all the men were called Potter. Maybe...? Harry felt confused. He saw no Peverell on the parchment at all. Was it wrong?
Scanning quickly over the parchment, Harry did his best to memorize as much as he could while he looked for the word Peverell. To the right side of his family tree, two pictures slowly appeared, and beneath them a bunch of words, but Harry didn't manage to read them before the goblin had snatched the parchment from his lap.
"Hey!" Harry protested. He shrank back when the goblin sneered at him. Elaine patted his shoulder and slightly shook her head. Harry hugged his familiar closer to his chest. He tried not to pout, but it was hard, since the goblin was reading all about Harry and his family, and so were the cake man and Albus over the goblin's short stature, but Harry didn't even get to memorize his parents' and grandparents' names.
Bowler hat man was turning light pink. He grabbed his hat from his head and nervously spun it in his hands like a little steering wheel. "Bu- but how?! How can this be?!" he sputtered.
Albus stroaked his long beard and sighed. "Indeed," he said. His twinkle had died and he slumped, looking much more his age.
The other adults, who hadn't gotten a look at Harry's parchment, exchanged bemused looks. Elaine knelt next to Harry and put her arm around the back of his chair, as if to protect him physically against whatever revelation was coming.
The only one who seemed completely nonperturbed was the goblin. He grinned sharply, flashing his long, sharp teeth at the two men hovering over him and brandished the parchment at them.
"Gringotts takes no responsibility," he growled at them. "We have been calling for a reading of the Potters' will for years now. That the child's godfather has been accepted by Magic and remains as such could have been discovered if the child had been placed with his new guardians through legal routes and with full cooperation with his parents' account manager!"
Hushed gasps sounded through the room. Harry didn't know what the adults found so shocking, but he heard the word 'godfather' and had to fight the hope that threatened to bloom in his chest.
"But the trial!" cried Fudgeman. "He was found guilty! He's been in Azkaban for seven years for betraying the poor boy's parents. Not to mention the murders."
Albus glared harshly at the man. "Let us perhaps not speak of such things in the presence of a child, Cornelius," he said sternly. He then turned to the gathered adults, in particular a group in red military looking robes like the ones Elaine wore. "Fetch Sirius Black from his cell in Azkaban. When he is well enough for veritaserum, we will have our answers."
As one, the red-robes turned to Cornelius Cake-person. The man in question spluttered some more, complained a bit, but ultimately confirmed Albus' orders. Two of the red-robes left the room.
The goblin levelled a glare at Albus. "May the wills finally be read?" he asked snidely.
Albus seemed to shrink unter the goblin's hateful eyes. "Ah, yes," he mumbled. "I think we must."
•《¤》•
The following days passed quickly. The adults couldn't decide where to put Harry while they waited for his godfather, so Harry stayed with the red-robes, who were apparently called aurors and were the magical version of police.
Elaine took Harry to her office and made him a bed out of a ratty old couch next to her desk. Then she turned a chair into a bed for herself against the opposite wall. Another wave of her magic wand made the cramped space larger, and the walls and ceiling became a star-filled night sky, and an empty binder turned into a stuffed bear that Harry took gratefully. He could hug it as hard as he wanted and not be afraid of crushing it, unlike his dementor friend.
Elaine and the other aurors took turns reading to Harry and showing him magic and telling him all kinds of things about the magical world. They took him on a tour of the ministry and even let him drop a few knuts into the massive golden fountain at the atrium. He got to see a bunch of witches and wizards appear in green fire in a row of fireplaces, and go on a marvellously exciting ride in the magical lifts, sharing the small cabin with flying paper airplanes.
In all the excitement, Harry had little opportunity to talk to his dementor friend, and to be honest, he was rather glad for it. He didn't really know what to say or even what to ask, and even if he did, he wasn't sure he wanted to know the answer.
Deep down, he already knew. Albus said the Dursleys were attacked by a dementor. Harry petted the soft, black feathers of his dementor friend and joked with the aurors and marvelled at magic. He forcibly pushed down any thoughts about what it all meant for him and his friend. At night, he squeezed his eyes shut and hugged his teddy while the valraven roosted on the headboard of his bed, and if a few tears ran down his cheeks, no one knew.
No one but Harry.
•《¤》•
The first night, when Elaine handed Harry a soft pair of red and gold pyjamas with a winged ball zooming around the fabric, and directed him to a bathroom to change, Harry let his cloak, his deathshroud, melt into his skin before dressing for bed. At his dementor's behest, he pretended not to know where his cloak was when he was asked, so after a stressful encounter with a magical measuring tape, he was given his own wizarding clothes. He didn't know why the dementor wanted him to keep his cloak hidden, but it had been a pretty awesome gift and it kept him warm and protected even when it was under his skin, so Harry didn't object.
Harry's favourite outift was a child-sized auror's robe in white. The real aurors wore red, and their commanders wore the same uniform in black, but as an inhabitant of the auror department for the time being, Harry was allowed his own uniform in the same colour as the recruits at the auror's academy.
It was always funny when a new person spotted him among the red and black and blanched at how small and young he was. And again when they heard his name, although Harry wasn't sure why people made such a big deal out of it. Everyone used Potter and looked funny when he tried to correct them. In the end, Elaine suggested he think of Peverell as his private name, the one his friends could use, and Potter as his public name. It felt a bit silly, but secretly, he liked having something that was his, even if it was just his name.
In the days since he left the Dursley's, Harry had shaken more hands and accepted more tearfelt thanks than he had before in his entire life. The aurors were always quick to gather around him and lead him away from the commotion, for which he was thankful.
He found out his dad used to be an auror. The strange grizzly man, called Mad-Eye, was an auror as well, and although he had a habit of scaring the life out of people by yelling random words and slamming his hands down on tables, he was well respected. After sitting with the man and hearing a few heart-racing stories about his adventures hunting dark wizards, Harry began to tentatively like him.
•《¤》•
The next time Harry saw old man Albus, he was sitting in a small room with a gaunt looking man with long black hair and silver eyes and high, aristocratic cheek bones. The man was well groomed and dressed in fine robes. The moment he spotted Harry hiding behind Elaine, dressed in his little auror robes, the man jumped to his feet, took a single step forward and then collapsed into tears while holding his arms open toward Harry.
"Prongslet! My pup, I'm so sorry!"
Elaine gently pushed Harry forward, whispering: "It's your godfather."
Harry stopped just out of the crying man's reach. "Um, hello?" he whispered.
The man wiped his face with the sleaves of his fancy robes. "Harry, do you remember me? I used to visit all the time when you were a little baby. It's your godfather, Padfoot!"
He looked at Harry with so much hope, Harry felt bad for the man. He closed his eyes and tried to remember anything at all. For some reason, he thought of a black dog, and a flying broom and paint splattered everywhere.
He opened his eyes wide. "Pafoo?"
His godfather lunged. Before Harry knew it, he was encased in warm arms with a head on his shoulder, wetting the fabric of his robes in tears.
"You remember me! Oh, Harry, I will never leave you again. I'll take care of you, just like Lily and James wanted. Your parents would kick my ass if they knew I had been away for so long!"
Harry awkwardly patted the man's back and looked questioningly at Albus and Elaine. The two just wiped happy tears from the corners of their eyes and smiled at him.
•《¤》•
The very same day, Harry bid farewell to the aurors at the ministry and followed his godfather to one of the fireplaces in the atrium. His godfather, Sirius, held him tight while they spun through green fire toward their new home.
Sirius kept him from falling on his face as they landed. Harry coughed up ash and looked around.
They were in a bright room with large french windows and deep red window drapes. The hardwood floors were covered in carpets and the wallpaper glittered all kinds of patterns in the sun.
Three strange creatures, much smaller than goblins and with bigger ears and eyes, bowed reverently at their entrance. They were dressed in golden silk, gathered at one shoulder and loosely draped around their little bodies.
"Masters Black and Potter-Peverell," the middle one squeaked. "We is being so happy to serves you, yes we is! Yous is being most welcome home to Potter Manor!"
The first little creature to look up nearly fainted when it spotted the massive valraven balancing on Harry's shoulders.
"The Young Master Peverell is bringing honour to his house!" it declared, causing the other two to look up, gobsmacked. "A deathbird familiar! Mistress Iolanthe will be beings proud, oh, yes! She is being cryings with joy!"
Harry and Sirius shared a stunned look. Sirius shrugged. Harry smiled. His dementor friend flapped his wings and cawed, happy with the attention. It seemed as if he liked the little critters already.
A brand new feeling grew and spread through Harry's chest:
Home.