Lost Boy 15

<<

Index

>>

Lost Boy

Part the Fifteenth

“Who was that?  Last night?” James asked carefully as they walked toward the floo in nice day robes.  Harry’s were a deep crimson and James’s were a royal blue with a deep green and blue cloak.

Harry had taken his hereditary parchment off the wall and had it rolled up with a ribbon. 

“That was Lucius Malfoy.  He’s my paramour.—He’s more than that.  We’re deeply in love.”

“Won’t he have to marry or is he a second son?” James asked carefully.

“Watch and learn, little cousin,” Harry told him as he took some floo powder in his hand.  “We’re changing the world.”

They were going to The Wicked Stepmother through the floo because of recent Death Eater activity. 

James was in awe of the interior of the wizarding club.  The oak floor shone brilliantly and Harry could hear the murmuring of conversation down the hallway.  They walked up to the maître d’ and Harry presented the hereditary parchment. 

“You remember James Potter, he recently woke up from the Living Death,” Harry explained, pointing him out on the parchment.  “He is at least five generations.  We have reason to believe that his ancestor Elphias Potter might have been a pureblood squib as he was cast off and forced to change his name to ‘Potter.’  We would like to apply for membership.”

“Ah, yes, I remember your case, Mr. Potter,” the maître d’ murmured.  “Yes, the Black line.  I remember when Miss Black came in over Winter holidays.  She did not know she was a Black, then.  She was carrying the Muggle name ‘Evans’, but she successfully proved her lineage.  Let us see if Mr. Potter can do the same.”  He rolled up the parchment, secured it, and returned it back to Harry.  “Come, young sir,” he said to James.  “Come, come.”

James looked slightly confused as he was led to the wood cone.

“If you would just produce your wand.”

James was prompted to put it in the cone and they waited over three minutes, but nothing happened.  Harry felt a sinking feeling in his chest, but the maître d’ held up his hand, “Wait.  If it is just six generations, it takes a little while longer.” 

They waited a good minute longer and then the cone creaked clockwise and then zipped counterclockwise, spinning quickly.  Soon it was spinning so quickly that Harry could barely tell that it was moving except for an imperfection in the wood that he could see go around and around and around.

James was holding his breath. 

As quickly as it was spinning, it stopped and James’s wand quivered before it fell out of the cone onto the oak burnished floor.

James ducked and picked it up.

A tickertape escaped the bottom of the cone and the maître d’ was reading it until he tore it off and smiled at them.  “Indeed, six generations, at the least, quite very well eight or nine.  Into the silvers, like yours, Mr. Potter.  A shade or two lighter, but very respectable.  Congratulations, Mr. Potter, and welcome to The Wicked Stepmother.”

“I have a letter from Uncle Fleamont for an account to be set up for Cousin James,” Harry told the maître d’ as they walked back to the podium.  He took it out and passed it over.

Looking it over, the maître d’ made humming noises.  “This all seems to be in order.”  He put it aside.  “If you will like to go through?  The card will be ready when you come back through.”

Harry and James followed magenta sparks down into the tearoom and were settled at a table where they could take tea.

“Would you like to choose or should I?”

“Do you come here often?” James asked, looking over the menu.

“With Lucius,” Harry agreed.  “We don’t just sneak into each other’s bedrooms at night.”

“Why do you do that?” James asked.

“He was engaged to Narcissa Black when we met.  He wanted to see me and didn’t know how to apply to Aunt Euphemia given his engagement, so he snuck through my window the day we met.  He never stopped.”

James blinked.  “He gave up an engagement for you?”

“Yes,” Harry agreed.  “Shall we have Organic London Fog?”

James made a motion that he didn’t care.  Harry touched his wand to the teapot and set his menu to the side. 

“Have you been here with Stephagenia?”

“Of course not,” Harry told him.  “I wouldn’t want her to get ideas.  She’s always getting ideas.”

“She said it was your idea that she marry Sirius.”

“Did she tell you who she was going to marry instead?” Harry asked, incredulous.

“No—”

“Maybe you should,” Harry insisted.  “I don’t think she’ll tell you, but trust me, it was a desperate attempt to keep her away from someone much worse.”

“What can be worse than being controlled?”

Harry just stared at James.  When he had first time traveled to 1973, he had been only peripherally aware of the Takeover.  He supposed it would have been the same when James had gotten the plague in December of 1971.  He probably heard murmurings, but he wasn’t aware of how serious it was.

“There is worse,” Harry promised.

“I’m eighteen—”

Harry just looked at him.

James had puffed up, but he deflated when the teapot whistled.  Harry snapped his fingers and the tea began to pour itself. 

“You can’t save her even if you might want to.  You don’t have the education and you are barely aware of the nuances of the entire situation.  There’s the fact that Stephagenia is in love with me, there are the reasons why I wouldn’t even look at her, there’s the other man Stephagenia was considering marrying (I don’t even think Sirius is aware of any of that)—”

“Why don’t you tell me?”

“You just woke up—”

James slumped in his chair as milk poured itself in his tea.  “I’m sick and tired—”

“Of course you are,” Harry agreed.  “You just have a lot of catching up to do.”  He tried to look at James encouragingly.  “We’re still getting used to you being with us.”

“You have no idea what it’s like,” James grumbled.

“No, I probably don’t.”  How could Harry ever know what it’s like to fall asleep, sick, shivering, an eleven year old, and wake up an eighteen year old with the world having passed you by?  “Why don’t you invite Millie over?”

“Do you think I should?” James asked hopefully.

“Why not?” Harry posited.  “You’re writing her, she’s writing you.  It only makes sense.”

They relaxed into the normal subject of girls and the tea passed pleasantly enough. 

They picked up James’s membership card on the way out.  It was a light silver.  James’s name, in white, blended in with the silver so that it was barely readable, but Harry told him to keep it close and not to lose it.

“Do you think I should get a vined ring?” James wondered after they got home.

“I think that’s something you should discuss with your parents,” Harry decided.  “You didn’t grow up with the expectation of one.”  He ruffled James’s hair and James playfully pushed him away.  Harry had the advantage of several inches on James.

With the end of July came Hogwarts letters, and Harry received an owl from Maia.  She had been made Head Girl.  They didn’t know who had made Head Boy. 

Harry’s birthday passed with much celebration.  Maia wanted to go Muggle baiting, but Harry pointed out that James couldn’t possibly come, so that was tabled for a date later in August.  Harry wasn’t looking forward to it.

On August the first, Lucius escorted Harry to The Pumpkin Carriage and they were taken to the back where there were mostly vined rings on display.  Alexandros Greengrass, who was the owner of the store, took them to a back room, where Lucius performed the Unbreakable Oath after Harry revealed he was a metamorphmagus by changing into the form of the underfed Harry Potter and then shifting back.

Then they were presented with several thick bands, some inlaid with gems.

“You want a stone,” Harry realized.

Lucius leaned over beside him.  “I want everyone to realize you’re mine.”

“All of wizarding England knows that already.”

“You are to be my husband.”  Lucius pointed to one with an emerald.  “It matches your eyes and it will catch the light.”  The jewel was also inlaid in white gold, so it would match his simple vined ring.

Mr. Greengrass brought it out and, with magic, it was slipped under Harry’s vined ring.

“There, do you like it?” Lucius asked.  “Or would you rather sapphire?”

“If you want an emerald, we will get an emerald,” Harry decided.  “Do you like it?”

“I like it well,” Lucius agreed, running his finger over it.  “It is simple, elegant, masculine.  It is everything that you are.”  They looked at each other for a long moment.  Then, Lucius decided, “We’d like this one sung on.”

The process of singing on a ring was a short but slightly painful process.  The ring connected to the bone beneath it.  For an engagement ring to be sung on, the vined ring had to be lifted from the bone and shifted upward before being replaced in the bone.  It was over in twenty minutes, but it certainly wasn’t pleasant.

Lucius kissed the back of his hand when it was finished and Harry smiled at him.  Lucius was well worth a little pain.

They walked out of The Pumpkin Carriage hand in hand.  Harry had no doubt that there would be photographers at Platform 9¾ to capture a high resolution image of his hand. 

The summer passed quickly.

James and Black had had a clear falling out.  Black did not come to Potter Abbey and James did not go to the cottage in Godric’s Hollow.  He didn’t even walk there.

Harry knew from Lupin who was not an infrequent guest at Potter Abbey that Black was still living there despite the fact that divorce proceedings had begun.  Someone seemed to have paid The Daily Prophet to look the other way because it was not reporting on the biggest scandal of the century. 

James, it seemed, was also not sneaking out at night to see Evans anymore.  Harry had extracted a promise from her.  He was certain they were still exchanging owls, James seemed like he would be loyal to his friends, but it appeared like Evans was living with her father and engaged in whatever employment she had from the Ministry.

Maia blew bubbles from the tip of her wand.  They had congregated at Number Twelve Grimmauld Place to go Muggle baiting but it was raining.  “I am so bored!”

Harry breathed out and stared at the ceiling.  “How’s your brother, Regulus?” Harry asked.  “He’s no longer coming to Potter Abbey.”

“How am I supposed to know?  He’s living in wedded bliss with Stephagenia as far as I can tell.”

Harry looked over at Regulus, completely surprised.  How could he not know?  He glanced between Maia and Regulus.

“Has Stephagenia been at Riddle House?” he asked carefully, looking over at Maia.

She finished blowing bubbles out of her wand and blinked.  “Yes, actually.  I think she’s a spy.”

“For which side?” Regulus asked.  “Is she spying for the Dark Lord or is she spying on the Dark Lord?”

“I trust Uncle Marvolo to know.”  Maia sighed.  “He hasn’t started to plan his wedding to Aloysia yet and it’s only a year away.”

This made Harry think for a moment.  “Does it take a year to plan a wedding?”

“It can take two or three,” Maia told him as if he should know.  “Aloysia is a seventh year like me.  She’s marriageable now, but Uncle Marvolo agreed years ago to wait until she graduated Hogwarts so they could begin their married life together with a clean slate.”  She picked up her wand and blew more bubbles out the end of it.  These were yellow and orange.  “You would think preparations would have begun.  With Stephagenia out of the way—”

But she wasn’t out of the way.  She was divorcing Black, and if she was at Riddle House then surely the Dark Lord knew this. 

He weighed the wands for a moment before he blurted out, “They’re getting a wizarding divorce.”

Maia dropped her wand and Regulus stared at him as if he had just stated he was a Muggleborn.

“No,” Maia breathed.

“Stephagenia ran away while James was at their cottage.  She told me she was going back to her father’s house.  She’s been writing James, and, yes, the divorce parchments have been served.”

“How do we not know about this?”

“We?  How do I not know about this?” Regulus demanded.  “Sirius is my brother!  Mother and Father don’t know about this, I swear!”

“Alphard Black must know about it,” Harry realized.  “She escaped home to him.—The Dark Lord must know about it.  She’s been visiting him.”

“She cannot mean to remarry,” Maia breathed out.  “She’s a ruined woman.”  She shared a look with Regulus.

Harry took a deep breath.  “How badly does he want her?” he asked. 

Maia looked at him.

“How badly does he want her?” he repeated.  “If he wants her, he can take her.  Stephagenia mentioned getting her ring removed.  If she removes her ring, she is certainly ruined, but she can touch any wizard she wants, including a second husband.”

Maia’s eyes went so wide, they were nearly completely white.  The dark blue was lost in the pupil.  “Do you think he can bear to be second?”

Harry had no idea.  “I don’t blame her,” he admitted, “and you know how much I dislike her.  He was controlling her.  He wouldn’t let her talk.  He was berating her for not using magic.  He yelled at her for not including milk with the tea.”

Regulus shrugged.  “Sounds like Sirius.  But you said she’s talking with James.  Are you sure, Hartwig?”

“It’s not like James to abandon his friends, and James even snuck out one night to see her.  I caught him at it.”

Maia looked pensive.  “You don’t think he—and she—”

In another world Harry did think he and she, but not now.  At least he certainly hoped not.  He didn’t want to know how Evans would raise a young Hartwig.  James also was not prepared to have a child in just two years.  He was still very much a child himself.

“James is sweet on Millie Flint.”

“Little Millie?” Regulus asked in interest.  “Well, at least one Potter has sense.”

Harry picked up a pillow and threw it at him.  It caught him in the face, but he only laughed and threw it back at Harry.

“But how is this secret?” Maia asked.  “How is this secret?”

“Well, no one knows,” Harry said.  “Sirius knows.  Stephagenia knows.  Alphard knows.  And James knows.  No one is talking.  I’m the first person to talk and I’m only telling the two of you.  Regulus is not likely to go to the papers.”

“Yes, but if this gets into the Death Eater network,” Maia observed, “it will get to The Prophet.”

“We can’t let that happen,” Regulus begged.  “First Lucius Malfoy canceled his August wedding to Narcissa, then Sirius and Stephagenia eloped, and now a divorce?”  He looked between them.  “This cannot get out.”

“If she marries again, it will get out,” Harry observed.  “If she manages to take off her vined ring, it will get out.”

“But that hasn’t happened yet,” Regulus pointed out desperately.  “No one knows yet.”

“Yet,” Harry said, as ‘yet’ was the magical word.

Regulus groaned.

“At least,” Maia murmured carefully, “they’re no longer at Hogwarts, so the entire school will not be analyzing their behavior.”

“True,” Regulus agreed.

“Does Hogwarts have married apartments?” Harry wondered.

“Neither here nor there, Hartwig.”  Maia kicked in his general direction.

Harry blew angry green bubbles off the end of his wand back at her.

She stuck out her tongue at him, which was very unladylike of her.

Regulus didn’t seem to notice the exchange.  He was thinking.  “Mother will curse me if I’m the one to tell her.”

“Then don’t tell her,” Harry told him plainly.  “Sirius will eventually have to admit to it.”

“Good point,” Maia agreed.  “He’s going to have to admit he’s at fault.  He’s the one who couldn’t keep his wife for three months.”

“Three months,” Regulus moaned into his hands.  “Mother is going to be livid.”

“But she won’t be hearing it from you,” Maia soothed him, touching the hem of his cloak.  “You just have to make sure you’re suitably surprised and horrified when it’s revealed to you in a couple of weeks or months.  This is good practice.”

He looked up at her, one eye open and the other shut.  It was not a good look on him.

Harry had to hold in a chuckle.

“I shall keep you informed,” he promised.

“Nothing in writing,” Regulus demanded.  “I don’t want anyone to find the letters.”

“Fine,” he agreed, crossing his arms and tapping his right fingers on his left elbow.  “Nothing in writing.

Maia looked at him oddly.  “Doesn’t Stephagenia do that with her fingers?”

“Do what?” Harry asked, quickly uncrossing his arms.

Shaking her head, Maia whispered, “Nothing,” and turned her attention back to Regulus.  “The point, Regulus, is that our marriage will be even more eligible than a marriage between two Blacks and will last longer than three months.”

Regulus didn’t seem to hear what she had said.

Harry smacked the back of his head.

“Ow!  Hartwig!” Regulus yelled, rubbing the back of his head, before looking around.  Maia and Harry were staring at him.  “What did I miss?”

Maia sighed and looked away.

“Only an indirect proposal of marriage,” Harry told him.

“I—what?—Oh, Maia.”

She gave him a small smile.

“It’s just—Sirius—”

She reached for his sleeve.  “I quite understand.”  She gave a long suffering sigh.  “There will be a better time when you actually propose to me when you’re not in a state of panic.”

“State of panic,” Regulus repeated.  “Right.”  Regulus seemed out of his depth.  He looked around, as if looking for something to say, and Harry only shook his head.  Regulus could be extremely clueless at times.  His broken quills just proved it.

It was then that Maia seemed to notice Harry’s hand.  She grabbed his cuff and stared.  “Hartwig!  What is that?”  There was a twinge in Harry’s hand and they both quickly let go.

“What was what?” Regulus asked.

“My engagement ring,” Harry told them, showing it off.  “I’m engaged to be married.”

“But what about Lucius?” Regulus asked just as Maia demanded, “but wizards don’t wear engagement rings!”

“It is Lucius,” Harry answered, “and Lucius gave it to me.”

Maia blinked at him.  “I don’t understand.”

“It is not for you to understand.  The Dark Lord knows and approves.  It is all taken care of.”

“But only witches and female beings or creatures—”

Regulus put up a hand to stop her—‘witches and ‘wombed persons.’’  The law was changed.  Hartwig, are you ‘wombed’?”

Harry looked into his gray eyes, not answering.

“Christ’s blood,” Maia whispered.  “Hartwig!  Are you going to bear Lucius Malfoy’s heirs?”

“What if I were?” he asked, picking at the pillow Regulus had thrown at him.  “What would be so wrong with that?”

Regulus squeaked.

Maia looked over at Regulus and made a movement for him to be silent.  Turning back to Harry, her face softened, “Absolutely nothing is wrong with that.  I’m so happy for you, Hartwig.  We both are.—Aren’t we, Regulus?”

Regulus didn’t say anything at first.

Maia looked over at Regulus, her dark blue eyes blazing.  Harry looked up.

Regulus seemed to be in shock.  “How long have you known?”

“Since I was eleven,” he murmured, referencing his metamorphmagus abilities.  He hadn’t known about the womb possibility then, but he wasn’t going to reveal all his exploding cards.  He wasn’t going to tell them he could shift into just anyone he wanted.  He wasn’t going to tell them he could shift at all.  He was going to let them assume incorrectly.  “You can see now why Lucius broke off his engagement with your cousin Narcissa.”

Regulus squeaked again.  “Yes,” he answered carefully.  “Yes, I can see why now.  We all wondered why he would as most wizards just keep their paramours separate from their marriages.”

“Well, I’m the marriage and the paramour,” Harry stated importantly.  “I’m the complete package.”

Regulus swallowed nervously.  He then grabbed Harry’s hand and shook it.  “Congratulations, Hartwig.  I’m so pleased for you.  I hope you’ll consider me for godfather.”

“Yes,” Maia agreed, looking back at Harry.  “I hope you’ll consider me for godmother.”

“Of course,” Harry agreed, taking his hand back.  “I can’t just promise without consulting with Lucius.  I’m not even married yet, just engaged.”

“Of course, of course,” Regulus agreed.  “But we are your closest friends.  More so than Barty and Apricot.”

“We would never invite Apricot Muggle baiting even though she’s a Selwyn,” Maia agreed.  “She has too gentle a constitution.”  As if that were a bad thing, Harry thought.  “And if Mr. Crouch found out we were inviting Barty along, we’d get in such trouble.  Our future career prospects could be affected.”  Maia shivered.

“Quite,” Regulus agreed, nodding enthusiastically.

It was done then.  The first rumors had been started.

Harry did get an owl from Evans one morning.  It seemed like James recognized the owl and was surprised when it delivered a letter to Harry. 

Harry gave James a kind smile and opened the letter and saw that Evans wanted to meet with him at The Wicked Stepmother that afternoon.  He wondered what she could possibly have to say.

“Is it all right, Aunt Euphemia, if I don’t chaperone James with Lupin this afternoon?  Lupin has never tried to sneak anything in.  Stephagenia Black wants to see me about the new Head Boy and Girl.”

Euphemia looked up and then over at James.

“I suppose Fleamont can check over the Lupin boy.  He’s not completely senile.  I’ll be working on that potion of mine.”  She shared a look with Fleamont.  It must be the Gnascum Potion then.  They hadn’t shared with James what their current potions project was, giving Harry his privacy.

Fleamont chuckled, his belly gurgling.  His hair was now a pure white.  When Harry had first arrived at Potter Abbey there had been one or two stripes of grey in his beard. 

“Of course, of course!  Happy to help.”  He looked over at Harry.  “Who are the new Head Boy and Girl?”

“I don’t know who’s Head Boy yet.  Maia Gaunt has been made Head Girl.”

“I’d expect nothing less from that witch.”  He chuckled and then puffed his pipe.  His tobacco was soaked in a patented potion he’d never released to the public.  It kept him at the perfect buzz for excellence in performance.  “Clever girl.”

“I’ll pass on the compliment.”

James trapped Harry in his room when he was picking out robes just after lunch.

“What does Stephagenia really want, Hartwig?” he asked.

“I honestly don’t know,” Harry answered.  “You can read the owl if you want.”

James looked tempted, but he didn’t move toward Harry’s pile of correspondence on his desk.  “She’s very fragile right now.”

Fragile.  Harry doubted Evans was ever fragile, but then he remembered her crying when he had first told her he would never go with her because she was a Muggleborn. 

“I would never hurt her on purpose,” Harry promised.  She was his mother after all.  “You have my word on that, James.”

“I don’t think Sirius was ever kind, even in private,” James told him.  “I—I don’t know what happens in a marriage.  No one has told me.  I know you kiss, but—”

Harry grimaced.  “I will tell you before I leave for Hogwarts,” Harry promised.  “It will probably be less traumatizing coming from me than from your dad.  If you ever want to know what happens between two wizards, I can tell you that, too—” although Harry only knew the theory of that, never going beyond kissing and gentle kisses above the waist with Lucius. 

“I don’t think I need to know that,” James admitted.

“Well, then,” Harry told him carefully.  “How about Sunday after church when you don’t have lessons?  I can find the book they give out at Hogwarts.  It’s a bit dated but it gets the job done.”  He walked over to James and ruffled his hair, thinking of him more as a younger brother than as a dad.  “Now let me get changed.  Only Stephagenia is going to see me, but I don’t want to make a poor showing.”

“Wear the dark green,” James suggested, “with the gold stitching.  It matches your eyes,” and with that he was gone.