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Title: Nose to the Wind
Series: Like a Ghost in My Town
Fandom: Harry Potter
Author: Batsutousai
Rating: Teen
Pairing: Harry Potter/Lord Voldemort, James Potter/Lily Potter
Warnings: AU, violence, universe hopping/rebirth, Dark!Harry, werewolf!Harry, underage relationship (ish)
Summary: While Harry had been content with his second chance, that didn't keep him from thinking what he could have done different, how many people could have survived if he hadn't been set on the very specific path he'd walked. Third time is the charm, though, right?

A/N: To anyone with thoughts to cite canon at me, I have only this to say: I’ve been rewriting Jo's world for 14yrs now to suit my whims, and damned if I’m going to stop any time soon. (Especially in regard to ‘canon’ that’s only a couple years old, such as the Sacred 28.)

For ages at the start of this chapter, Harry is 12. (Hermione is 12, Will is 10, and Chris is 8.)

Cross-posted to Archive of Our Own and LiveJournal.

-0-
Chapter Fourteen – Camouflage Denial
-0-

While sending Hermione back to Hogwarts that September was hard, Harry felt far better about it than he had after the winter holiday. For one thing, he knew she had friends now – even if he had bought some of them with sweets – and a prefect in her own house who was determined to look out for her. Too, she'd become good friends with Ginny over the summer, who was starting that year with Luna.

Luna and Hermione had made each other's acquaintance a few times – she was a not-uncommon feature in the Burrow, since her mother's death – but Harry knew his best friend had some...concerns, regarding the blonde.

"She's a bit...not all there," Hermione had commented in response to Harry's inquiry, while he was helping her pack the night before the train.

Harry didn't bother suppressing a smile. "She has a habit of living in her head, rather than the physical world."

"And here I thought she was away on Mars," Hermione muttered.

Harry laughed.

Hermione moaned and covered her face with her hands. "Oh my God. I'm turning into a bigot."

"A little bit," Harry admitted and she moaned again. He rolled his eyes and gently pulled her hands away from her face. "Hey, you put up with my particular brand of insanity–"

"Please don't remind me," Hermione complained, though Harry knew she was mostly resigned to his friendship with Voldemort, any more.

"–I think you can play friendly with Luna while you're at Hogwarts," Harry finished, ignoring her complaining. Then he sighed and rubbed his thumbs against the backs of her hands, where he still held them. "You don't need to be best friends, Hermione, but I think Luna could use someone who's watching out for her, especially at first."

"What, you're not going to bribe Fred and George to keep tabs on her?" Hermione muttered, but her expression said she knew exactly what abuse awaited Luna at the castle.

Harry pressed his lips together and shook his head. "They already know she's going to have trouble, I don't need to tell them that, but they weren't the only thing that got you through second term, and you know it." Because that had been Hermione's boosted confidence and Ron and Penelope Clearwater, as much as it was the twins serving as a deterrent against people thinking her easy prey.

Hermione sighed. "I'll try," she offered, and Harry nodded. "I don't suppose there's much chance of her ending anywhere but Ravenclaw, the way she is," she added, her tone resigned.

Harry snorted, ever unable to imagine Luna in any house other than Ravenclaw. "Not a chance."

Hermione stared at Harry for a long moment, her eyes seeming almost to see through him, and Harry forced himself not to tense as he cautiously asked, "Hermione?

Hermione shook her head. "I still can't see it, you being a Slytherin."

Harry blinked. "No?" he asked. "And what house do you see me in, then?"

Hermione frowned and she turned away, back toward her packing. "I don't–" She curled her hand over the spine of a book, not picking it up, just holding it. She glanced back at him, her expression troubled. "I don't know. But not Slytherin. They're always so...mean."

"Cunning and ambition," Harry returned quietly. "The drive to come out ahead, no matter what it takes." He snorted, remembering something Albus had told him in his first reality. "A certain disregard for the rules. They might come across as mean, and they're too oft painted with shades of cruelty, simply because they don't baulk at being in the wrong to get what they want."

Hermione swallowed. "Maybe..." She allowed quietly, before shaking her head again. "No. You're...you like your secrets–" Harry couldn't help an amused smile at the disgusted look she shot him "–and you... Well, there's the...the dark lord, but you're not–" She let out an irritated sound. "You don't care," she settled on. "About being the best, about being at the top of everything, of everyone. Will told me, that you were happy to let him be the best skier."

"There are different sorts of ambition, Hermione," Harry pointed out drily. "Some people want to rule the country, like Voldemort, others want to bring home the best marks at the end of the year. I–" just want Tom back and my family safe "–have other goals in mind."

Hermione sighed and let go of the book to rub at her face. "Fine. Whatever." She grabbed the book again and dropped it carelessly into the section of her trunk meant to hold books.

Harry helped her pack for a few minutes more, before leaving under the onslaught of her irritated silence. "I think," he told his brothers when they both looked up from the racetrack they were building in the middle of their bedroom, "that Hermione is cross with me."

They traded looks, then Will pointed out, "You could just...tell her?"

Harry smiled and shook his head. "Can I join you two?" he asked instead of continuing the topic.

"Yeah," Chris agreed, holding out a handful of track pieces, one of them melting into another shape in his hand, because magical track pieces did that.

"You've got that side," Will added as Harry accepted the track, motioning at where he and Chris had largely trapped themselves in their corners of the room.

"If you're trying to break some sort of longest road record, Mum's going to ground all of us," Harry pointed out as he knelt to reshape the track at his feet.

His brothers both laughed and they set about finishing up the track and racing a few cars until Lily came to make them clean it all up.

In the morning, Hermione hugged Harry tightly at breakfast. "I'm sorry," she whispered as she slid into the seat next to him.

"For what, the silent treatment?" Harry returned with a knowing smile. "Please, I know that's just my karma coming back to me." When he spotted Will and Chris trading grins, he narrowed his eyes at them. "No. Whatever that just was–"

"Did you hear something?" Will asked Chris, frowning a bit.

Chris shook his head, struggling to keep a solemn look on his face. "Nu-uh. Must've been the wind."

James snorted from behind the Prophet. "Karma," he said.

Harry rubbed at his eyes while Hermione muffled a giggle. "How is this my life?" he wondered, and Hermione gave up on muffling her laughter.

"Crickets?" Will suggested and Chris had to cover his face as his grin broke through.

Harry rolled his eyes and turned his attention back towards his breakfast, silently debating ways to get his brothers back.

-0-

Hermione's first letter reached them two days into term, and included a report on the number of muggleborn students who had returned to Hogwarts before classes started back up. Every one of the eight students had suffered some form of abuse at the hands of their magical guardians, and those guardians had suffered Voldemort's displeasure when Harry passed names on.

Harry smirked at the list, not even bothering to hide his knowledge from his family, and the Potters, wisely, didn't ask for specifics.

-0-

Term went by quickly, with Hermione sending bi-weekly letters to the whole family. Luna had, indeed, ended up in Ravenclaw. And while Hermione would probably always struggle with her oddities, she took up the duty of being a buffer between Luna and the rest of the school quite seriously, and had stopped a couple different instances of other students thinking the younger girl an easy target.

"She's still weird," Hermione told Harry her first night back, without prompting, while they were sharing a book Harry had picked up from the public library, "but she's not too bad, once you get her to stop talking about imaginary creatures."

Harry laughed and nudged her shoulder with his. "Sceptic."

"Realist."

Harry wiggled fingers over the book, turning his hand into a claw. "Magic."

"Magical realist," Hermione corrected.

Harry raised an eyebrow at her, disbelieving, and she broke out into helpless giggles. "I can't believe you just said that," he said, shaking his head. "Can I quote you later?"

"I think I hate you," Hermione decided once she'd got her amusement under control.

"Only think?" Harry mused, turning the page. "I'm failing somewhere."

Hermione elbowed him. "I'll tell your mum you're being mean to me," she threatened.

Harry grinned, but obediently stopped teasing her.

-0-

When Harry slipped into Voldemort's rooms on his birthday, a copy of Homer's Margites held in one hand, he found the dark lord sleeping at his desk, paperwork spread out under him. Harry couldn't help a fond smile, even as he cast a silent spell to check that the dark lord was really asleep.

His spies hadn't let on to any brewing trouble, beyond the shuffling of those muggleborns who'd lost their host families, and rushing to find families to take both them and the new class on, so Harry suspected this was a simple case of the dark lord refusing to delegate.

"Paranoid bastard," Harry said fondly as he cast a sleeping spell on Voldemort, aware of how light a sleeper he was. Then he carefully shifted the dark lord to his bed and tucked him in.

Harry caught himself gently brushing his knuckles against Voldemort's cheek and quickly pulled away, closing his eyes to berate himself; just because Voldemort was asleep, didn't give Harry the right to touch.

He sighed and tied the sleep spell to the room door, so Voldemort would wake if someone started pounding on it, or burst inside, but would remain unbothered if there was noise out in the hallway. "Sleep well, Tom," Harry whispered before stepping back into the Realm of Death, the book left behind on the dark lord's desk.

Merope was waiting for him, a fond smile twisting her lips. "Thank you," she offered as Harry sat on the ground next to her. "He's working too hard."

"Mm. Refusal to delegate tasks that can be handled by other people," Harry agreed, nodding. "It's a failing of his. If I need to start coming by to tuck him in–" Harry couldn't resist a smirk, imagining Voldemort's reaction to Harry making it a habit "–let me know."

Merope covered a grin that was so close to one Harry had often seen on his Tom's face when he was up to no good, it was sort of terrifying. "I'll keep that in mind."

Harry snorted. "Yeah, but also keep in mind that I am going to hide behind you when he finally blows up at me."

Merope laughed. "You could bring your own mother to hide behind," she suggested, her crossed eyes sparkling.

Harry took a moment to consider that idea, then groaned and covered his eyes. "Merlin, no. Mum'd be as likely to hand me over to him for getting her involved, as she would protect me."

Merope was silent for a moment, and Harry lowered his hand to shoot her a worried look. She pressed her hands together in front of herself, then offered, "Speaking of getting your mother involved..."

Harry felt himself tense, uncertain where this was going, but knowing he wasn't going to like it. "What?" he asked, suspicion making the word come out sharp.

Merope didn't react to the change in tone, beyond folding her fingers together. "You should tell her, and your father, that you're courting Tom."

Harry stared at the spirit, disbelieving. "Excuse me?" he managed after a moment of moving his mouth and getting no sound out. "What are– Are you– I can't–" Harry shook his head roughly. "In what reality is that even a passingly good idea?" he demanded.

Merope stared at her hands for a long moment, twisting her fingers together in some sort of pattern that only made sense to her, before she took a deep breath and met Harry's eyes. "Would you rather they found out some other way?"

The words fell like a physical blow, knocking the air from Harry's lungs and making him cough, even as images flashed in his mind, of the sort of terrible reactions his parents would have if someone else – if Peter or Severus – were to let it slip that the dark lord had a...

A what? There was nothing between Harry and Voldemort, save some birthday presents and Harry's own twisted attachment.

Isn't there? a traitorous corner of his mind asked, and it sounded worryingly like his mum.

There were touches in the back garden, greeting the dark lord with a hug because he could and not getting cursed for it, half-teasing comments in another language; Tom's bumbling, uncertain responses to Harry's love. Careless, walking the edge of discovery with every smile.

Oh, damn it all. Harry rubbed angrily at his face. He needed to warn his parents, before one of them jumped to the wrong conclusion. Or the right one, even.

A gentle, too-cold hand rested gently on his arm, and Harry forced a helpless smile for Merope. "Should I warn him first?" he asked a bit helplessly. "In case Mum–" flies off the handle "–comes here to–"

"Ask his intentions?" Merope suggested with a knowing look, and Harry grimaced. "Do you think she'd really come to him for that?"

"I don't–" Harry closed his eyes and forced himself to take a breath, tried to imagine how his parents would react to this truth. "No," he decided. "No, Mum only came because he was her last resort, last time. She wouldn't call him out on his own territory, not about this. If he–" If he hurt Harry, if something he did left Harry fighting tears on the edge of his bed, then Lily would come. "She's afraid of him, just enough," Harry settled on, making a silent promise to himself that he would never let his mum find out when Voldemort was being an arse, unless he didn't have any other choice.

Merope smiled, like she knew exactly what Harry wasn't saying. "Then you shouldn't have to, though you may want to warn him before your birthday."

Harry shot her a sharp look. "You think he's intending to come by my house again? After last time, I'm not sure Mum won't kill him the moment he shows his face."

Merope snorted. "If he promises not to try duelling you again–"

"Merlin's beard, no, please stop," Harry pleaded, covering his eyes and trying not to imagine the line of inquiry the dark lord would be faced with before he'd be let into the house. "I'm going to tell him not to come by again. Ever."

Merope laughed.

Harry pushed himself to his feet, shaking his head. "I am going home and crawling into bed and forgetting we ever had this conversation." He turned away, moaning, "I'm going to have so many nightmares."

Merope's hand on his shoulder stopped him from going more than a couple steps, and Harry glanced back at her, frowning at the hard lines of her expression. "Tell them," she ordered.

Harry closed his eyes, felt himself droop. "I will," he whispered, a promise that he knew he would keep, if only because the alternative was...

He pulled away and started back towards home, trying to figure out timing. Not when Hermione was there, and probably best at night, when his brothers were sleeping, because Chris and Will didn't need to be a part of this conversation, didn't need to be in spell range if Lily or James reacted poorly.

Harry stopped just outside the access point to his bedroom, staring into the endless darkness around him and feeling like a stone had sunk in his belly.

Dear Merlin, he was actually going to tell his parents that he wanted to sleep with Voldemort.

"I'm doomed," Harry breathed before letting out a helpless little laugh, half-mad in a way that only the truly insane could manage.

-0-

Harry waited a couple of days into the start of the new term, letting his brothers get back into the swing of things, go to bed earlier and earlier because they had to get up for school in the morning.

With a bonus spell to ensure his brothers would remain peacefully asleep, Harry crept downstairs, to where his parents were sitting in the dining room. Lily had a cup of tea – one of the herbal mixes a neighbour had taken to supplying her with from their own garden – at her elbow, a couple of objects in need of charming in front of her, while James sat hunched over paperwork that Harry recognised as an incident report form that all aurors had to fill out when someone got hurt, whether the hurt party was the auror or the person they were bringing in. Harry raised an eyebrow at that, intrigued.

Then he shook his head, allowing himself a smile; he wasn't here to wonder after his father's day, nor comment on the fact that James wasn't, actually, supposed to bring that paperwork home, even if plenty of aurors did.

"Mum? Dad?" Harry called, stepping into the light glaring down from the overhead.

James twitched, hands trying futility to cover his paperwork, while Lily turned to Harry with a concerned smile. "What's wrong, Harry?" she asked over the sounds of James turning his papers over.

Harry swallowed, trying to remember the carefully constructed conversation that he'd been turning over in his head since Voldemort's birthday. "Can we...talk?" he requested, and he didn't sound nearly as calm as he'd been aiming for, but he also didn't sound like he wanted to run for it; it would do.

"Always," James promised, his 'I'm your dad and nothing you say or do could ever make me not love you' look on, which Harry was pretty sure hadn't been quite so good before he'd come clean about his death magic.

"Do you want tea?" Lily asked as Harry came over to the table, half standing from her chair.

Harry blinked, unexpectedly thrown. Did he want–? No. No, he really didn't want tea right–

Harry took a deep breath, clenched his fingers around the back of the chair that he'd grabbed for because he needed something to hold onto, same as he had in Toledo. "Yeah," he decided, forcing himself to pull the chair out from under the table. "Yes, please," he added, because politeness was good.

James' mouth quirked while Lily went to get Harry tea. "You're making me nervous, pup," he commented, voice light. "Did you kill someone?"

Harry coughed on a laugh, letting himself drop into the chair he hadn't quite settled into yet. Because admitting to killing someone was about a dozen times less stressful than admitting–

Harry rubbed roughly at his face. "It is entirely possible," he mused, half to himself, "that I'm on the verge of a panic attack." Because he'd never done this. He'd never had to tell anyone about his relationships, not in either of his last two realities, because he'd had no one to answer to, with Ginny, and he'd got together with Tom in the middle of a war, and then he'd died.

He could tell people all year long about how he had no qualms about killing in cold blood, that he would do anything to keep his family safe, no matter how horrific, but Tom...Voldemort...

"Breathe," Lily ordered, firm hands resting on his shoulders.

Harry took a shaky breath and caught the scent of lavender. He glanced towards the table and found a cup of tea waiting for him, smelling strongly of lavender. Naturally calming. He took a deep breath, letting the scent fill him for a moment.

"Better?" Lily asked when he let out his breath.

Harry blinked towards her and nodded. "Yeah. Thanks."

Lily smiled and kissed his forehead before she moved back into her own chair.

"What's worse than killing someone?" James asked Lily as Harry folded his hands around the small cup set out for him.

Lily sighed and turned her attention to Harry. "Sweetheart?"

Harry closed his eyes, nothing to do but jump in head first. "I sort of have–" was there a good way to put this that didn't make him sound like a sappy teenager? "–feelings for Voldemort."

"I know," Lily replied.

Harry's eyes snapped open and he turned to stare at his mum. "I– You– What?"

Lily smiled at him and reached out a hand, which Harry grabbed with a sort of desperation that he couldn't explain. "I've known since your eleventh birthday," she offered.

Eleventh birthday, no present from Voldemort, Harry was so fucking upset, even though he'd known... And then Voldemort – Tom – had shown up, and he'd...

"...I'm an idiot," Harry decided, dropping his head to rest against his outstretched arm.

James cleared his throat, and when Harry peeked out at him, he found his father looking so utterly uncomfortable. "So, Mum says these...feelings are the sort of...romantic–"

"Love," Harry offered quietly, and James squeezed his eyes shut. "Yeah, that sort."

"I need a drink," James muttered, tugging off his glasses and pressing his fingertips against his eyelids.

Lily sighed and squeezed Harry's hand until he looked at her. "Does he know?"

Harry frowned. "He...?"

"Voldemort."

James shifted, coming to attention in his chair, Harry saw with a glance. "Yes," he offered.

"You told him?" James exclaimed, and even Lily looked surprised.

Harry shook his head. "Are you kidding? Merlin, no. Despite all evidence to the contrary, I do not, in fact, have a death wish." James let out a strained laugh. "No, his mum told him. He told me he knew just to watch me freak out."

"Did you?" James asked.

"Freak out?" Harry replied drily, and his father offered a shaky grin. "Absolutely. He thought it was hysterical."

James let out a choked sound that could have been a laugh.

Lily squeezed his hand and Harry looked back towards her serious stare. "Does he love you?" she asked, and James drew in a sharp breath.

Harry closed his eyes, touched the answer that he couldn't even bring himself to believe, not yet, and flinched away from it. "I don't think any of us are ready to delve into Voldemort's psychological profile, right now," he offered, keeping his tone dry.

"In other words," James suggested, and there was a hint of strain in his voice, uncomfortable with the topic, but gamely keeping on, "he hasn't told you."

Harry choked out his own laugh and shot his father a look that he knew was a little wild. "Voldemort doesn't do feelings, only talks about them when it'll make someone else more uncomfortable than he is; there is nothing in the universe that will get me to poke that dragon."

"So," Lily said quietly, "you'll never know."

Harry looked down at where his mum was holding his hand, wrapped tight like a hug, and he shook his head. "It's complicated, he's complicated," he admitted just as quietly. "But it's not–"

No, he couldn't think about it, couldn't go down this mental pathway.

Harry drew his hand away from his mum, wrapped it back around his tea. "It's hardly my first broken heart, if it comes to it," he finished, tone dry and leaning towards uncaring, as though his love for the dark lord wasn't one of the few supports he used to hold everything up.

"Harry," Lily whispered, and she sounded as broken as Harry couldn't let himself be.

Harry took a long sip of his tea, unwilling to leave it completely untouched, then stood with a smile that felt a little too sharp. "Good talk, thanks for not completely freaking out on me." He turned away, tried not to see the sorrow in his father's eyes, too close a match for Lily's heartbreak. "I'll leave you to your charming and illegal paperwork."

James twitched and paper rustled. "It's not illegal!" he insisted, and he sounded strained, like he knew he should have laughed, but couldn't.

Harry offered him a knowing smile over one shoulder when he reached the doorway, needing it to feel more real. "So you're saying there isn't a note on the top sheet that says something like, 'Do not, under any circumstances, remove this paperwork from the ministry building'?"

He left his father to sputter behind him and returned to his room to, with any luck, get some sleep.

-0-

"Master," Death called when Harry climbed into bed about a week after he'd told his parents that he loved Voldemort, "he's asking for you."

Death's voice was odd, and Harry frowned at that, even as he looked over his brothers and cast a couple silent spells to make sure they'd sleep through him leaving. A good sort of asking, or a bad one? he had to ask, even as he opened a doorway for himself.

Death didn't respond, and Harry's frown deepened.

Merope wasn't in sight when Harry reached the access to Voldemort's rooms, and he wondered at that, even as he opened a doorway; it wasn't that Merope was never off doing something else, but she was usually there when the dark lord started asking for Harry, if only because she was the one who passed on the message.

"Voldemort?" Harry called cautiously, peeking into the room and not quite stepping through his doorway.

Voldemort was sitting at his desk, posture stiff and face bent to shadow itself in a way that didn't bode well. He held out a piece of parchment towards Harry without looking up from whatever he was writing on another piece of parchment and demanded, "Explain this."

Harry sighed and stepped through to the mortal realm, letting his doorway fall shut behind him as he came close enough to take the parchment. Voldemort didn't react, beyond dropping his hand back to his desk, so Harry turned his attention to the parchment and had to bite back a groan, because there was no way that Voldemort having a letter, even as short as this one looked to be, in Lily's handwriting was a good thing.

'You need to figure out how you feel about my son and make your intentions clear to him.
'Lily Potter'

Well, so, that explained why Merope had made herself scarce, and the air of uncertainty that he almost hadn't noticed around his parents for the last day and a half or so. He couldn't believe–

Okay, actually, yeah, he totally could. At least Lily hadn't come over to talk to Voldemort in person?

"I'm sorry," he managed, and he only sounded a little strained. "This is–" He cut himself off, uncertain how to explain what had possessed his mother to start demanding things of the dark lord.

Parchment shifted and Voldemort said, "You told your parents about–"

Harry glanced up at the dark lord and bit the inside of his cheek to keep from smiling at the vaguely constipated look on Voldemort's face as he stumbled over how to describe Harry's romantic aspirations. "Your mother bullied me into it."

Voldemort closed his eyes, the picture of a long-suffering son (and Harry absolutely was not wishing for a camera). "Of course she did," the dark lord muttered.

Harry looked back down at the letter in his hand and crumpled it in a tight fist, too-sharp nails tearing into the parchment. "I will attempt, again," Harry said, feeling irritation bubbling in his stomach, "to tell her to back off. I'm sorry that–"

"Scythe," Voldemort interrupted, amusement in his voice, and Harry closed his mouth, turning his eyes to the dark lord. Voldemort was leaning back in his chair, watching Harry with something almost like fondness in slit-pupiled eyes. "I'm not cross."

Harry took a moment to look at the dark lord, taking in the hint of tenseness at the corners of his eyes, the way his hand was sprawled too-casually over the papers he'd been working on when Harry had come in. No, Voldemort wasn't angry, but he wasn't comfortable with the topic, either.

And he was getting more and more uncomfortable the longer Harry stared at him.

Harry turned away, looking towards the grandfather clock in the far corner. "What you may or may not feel towards me is hardly Mum's concern," he replied, keeping his tone bland.

"She is...worried for you," Voldemort replied, the words sounding like they hurt to say.

Harry clenched his fist tighter around the crumpled letter, let his too-sharp nails bite into his palm to keep from laughing because Voldemort was siding with his mum.

Tell me I didn't just skip realities again without noticing, he sent to Death.

"You remain in the same reality as you have been in for the past twelve years," Death obediently replied.

Did Tom just skip realities? Harry couldn't help but ask.

"Master," Death replied, a clear note of amusement in its voice.

"Scythe," Voldemort called, and Harry realised he'd been silent for too long.

"Alien abduction," Harry muttered to himself, and Death's bone-rattle laughter rang in his mind. He turned to look back at Voldemort, hiding himself behind the blank mask that had got him through cleaning up his last reality after Tom's death. "Contrary to all appearances, I am a grown man capable of managing my own interpersonal relationships, and I will make that point to both our mothers; you may be willing to tolerate their matchmaking, but I am quite through with following stage directions." He met Voldemort's startled gaze coolly. "Was there anything else?"

"...No," Voldemort allowed.

Harry nodded. "Good night," he offered before stepping through the doorway that opened for him. As soon as it had closed behind him, Harry called, "Merope! Do not make me force you!"

Merope sighed from behind him and Harry turned to stare at her. "I'm done," she promised, holding her hands up in a sign of surrender.

Harry watched her for a moment before turning away, looking towards the access to his home. "Good," he replied before heading home.

Albus was sitting near his house, and the smile he offered Harry faltered quickly when Harry just stared back at him. "Bad night?" the former headmaster asked, his tone one of forced humour.

"Are Mum and Dad in the dining room again?" Harry asked, and his tone came out completely flat.

Albus flinched. "Yes. Alone."

"Thank you." Harry stepped forward, through the doorway that appeared for him, and into the dining room.

Harry stepped out to find both of his parents half out of their seats, wands drawn, and offered them a cold smile before setting the torn and crumpled letter, stained with his own blood, on the table. "If you want to call him out for duelling a squib, or just being a general unmitigated bastard, that's your prerogative, but this–" he pointed at the letter, dropping his smile and focussing on Lily "–you are going to drop this. Right now."

"Harry," Lily tried, looking like he'd cursed her.

"No," Harry interrupted, buried deep enough under the persona that had kept him going through the worst months of his previous life, that her expression didn't move him. "I am older than both of you combined, and while I appreciate that you want me happy, I am going to respectfully request that you keep yourselves out of my relationship with Voldemort, whatever form it takes." He turned away and offered over his shoulder, "Good night," before leaving the dining room and kitchen.

Harry stopped at the bottom of the stairs and leant back against the wall, distantly curious to see what sort of reaction his words would birth.

"I told you not to send that," James finally said, sounding strained. "I told you it was only going to–"

"I had to try, James," Lily snapped, and Harry could hear the sound of the crumpled parchment being smoothed out. "I couldn't just sit back and watch him–" She let out a shuddering breath and they were both quiet for a long moment.

"Older than both of us combined," James finally said.

Lily let out a watery laugh. "No wonder he doesn't want me involved. Merlin, I always forget he's–"

"Not a child," James supplied when Lily didn't immediately continue.

"Yes." Lily sighed. "I've never seen him so cold before. What did Voldemort say to him?"

"And how much of that was Voldemort's reaction and how much was Harry's," James added, and Lily let out a quiet, broken sound. "You need to let this go, Lils. If he needs– When he needs us," James corrected, his voice firming, "he'll come to us. He's got the quaffle, right now."

Lily let out a shuddery laugh. "Please stop using quidditch analogies."

"I like quidditch analogies," James insisted.

Harry finally made his way upstairs, sensing the conversation was over. In his room, he took a moment to check on his brothers, then settled down on the edge of his bed, feeling...hollow.

Bone fingers cupped his face and Harry leant forwards, pressing past Death's touch and letting his forehead rest against the black cloak over where the apparition's stomach would be, were it human. "This would be so much easier if I was angry," he whispered, because then he could just find criminals to kill or somewhere secluded to blow up boulders. Something. There was nothing he could do when he let himself feel nothing.

Death was quiet for a long moment, bone fingers carding gently through Harry's hair. Finally, it pulled away, slowly enough that Harry had time to straighten before he tumbled out of bed. "Death?" he requested as the apparition moved away, towards his brothers' beds. "What are–?"

Death gently shook first Will, then Chris awake. "Your brother needs a hug," it said to their confused expressions.

Harry's brothers were scrambling out of their beds and hurrying over to Harry before he really had time to wrap his head around what his eternal servant was up to. And then arms were wrapping around him, sleep-warm and every bit alive.

"Oh," Harry whispered as the hollow feeling vanished, and he wrapped his brothers in a hug, squeezing his eyes shut against the ache of his chest, which he'd managed to bury under that cold persona. "Thank you," he breathed, to his brothers and to Death, who had known exactly what Harry needed.

"Okay?" Chris asked, concern in his voice.

"Yeah," Harry promised. "I'm better, now. I just had a bad dream."

Will let out a yawn in his ear and leant comfortably against Harry. "No more bad dreams," he mumbled. "Me and Chris'll stay here and keep them away."

"Lazy," Harry replied fondly, but he still shifted all three of them back onto his bed, letting his brothers curl up with him.

Bone fingers brushed against his cheek and Harry smiled up at the dark form as Death vanished back to its own realm.

-0-

Things were a little strained between Harry and his parents for the next couple of days, Lily and James walking on pins and needles while Harry put on a brave front, pretending nothing was wrong.

"I'm sorry," Lily finally said after dinner the second night, cornering Harry while James distracted his brothers with sweets.

Harry sighed and let his smile slide away, turning a tired stare on his mother. "I'm touched that you care," he commented quietly, "but I think you can understand why there are some parts of my life that I would rather you not involve yourselves in."

Lily sighed. "I know," she admitted and rested a cautious hand on Harry's shoulder, like she wasn't certain she was actually allowed to touch him.

Harry sighed and made a point of leaning against her, making her wrap her arm around his shoulders so she could support his weight. "Like I said," he remarked at her quiet noise of surprise, "I'm touched. Not angry."

Lily squeezed his shoulders. "You seemed angry, when you..." She cleared her throat.

Harry hummed. "If you say so." He shook his head and closed his eyes. "No. You'll know when I'm angry, I think. Voldemort and I...we have very similar ways of showing when we've lost our temper."

"Killing people?" Lily suggested, tone dry.

Harry couldn't help but smile at how his parents had resigned themselves to his careless disregard for the lives of those outside his family and friends. "Sometimes," he admitted quietly. "But more... I don't really do cold anger, I explode." He snorted and glanced up at her through his bangs. "Maybe I should say, more, that I have your temper, Mum."

"Oh, that's promising," Lily muttered.

Harry snorted again and returned his head to resting comfortably on her shoulder. "Pretty sure your fuse is shorter."

Harry got jabbed in the side for his comment and laughed. When he looked back up at Lily, she was smiling a bit helplessly, shaking her head at him.

They both looked towards the other three males when Will let out a gleeful shout and then proceeded to chase James into the living room, shouting about his father being a thief. Chris looked a bit helplessly towards Harry and Lily, his expression one that Harry himself often wore when their father started acting like the youngest of the lot of them. Harry responded with a knowing grin while Lily laughed and shook her head.

After Will had run back in and managed to recruit Chris in hunting down James – who had apparently taken off with the container of biscuits that Molly had sent home with the brothers that afternoon – Lily asked, "If you weren't angry, then...?"

Harry frowned, trying to think of a good way to explain the way he sort of shut himself away from his emotions. He closed his eyes, giving in to the inevitable, and quietly explained, "Before, when I was in–" how to explain that whole fucking mess of a war? "–a difficult position, my lover committed suicide to save me."

Lily let out a broken noise. "Harry..."

Harry shook his head, unable to bring himself to look up at her. "I didn't have time to mourn him, so I learnt to sort of..." He sighed. "Merlin, that sounds cold, doesn't it? I had to cut myself off from...I don't know, everything, to function. So I–"

Lily wrapped him in a tight hug. "Oh, baby," she whispered, and she sounded like the old ache in Harry's chest had broken open anew in hers.

Harry hugged her back, as tight as he dared, for just long enough that she wouldn't think she'd reacted the wrong way, then he carefully pulled away from her, meeting her heartbroken gaze with a helpless smile. "It was a long time ago."

Lily shook her head and swallowed. "That doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt."

Harry shrugged and nodded. "I know. But, no, I wasn't angry. I was..." He sighed and rubbed a hand over his face, looking towards where he could hear his brothers and father laughing from upstairs. "I was in a place where nothing you said or did could have touched me. I'm sorry I had to do that to you, but I wasn't going to get you to stop poking at things any other way."

"And...Voldemort?" Lily asked. When Harry shot her a curious look, she explained, "There was blood, on the letter."

"Ah." Harry shook his head. "No. If he was angry, I didn't see it." He snorted, remembering how the dark lord had been amused at Harry's apologies. "If anything, I think he was impressed by your gall. Which, please, on account of my already shaky sanity, don't take that as a challenge."

Lily coughed out a laugh and pulled Harry into a quick hug. "I promise to leave dealing with Voldemort in your hands, from now on," she promised.

Harry nodded, then shot her a knowing smile. "Unless he decides it's a brilliant idea to start duelling me in the back garden again?"

Lily pinned him with a flat look. "Don't remind me."

Harry couldn't help but laugh, so much lighter for having cleared the air.

Like a Ghost in My Town Series:
Stand Against the Moon Chapters:
Pro | 01 | 02 | 03 | 04 | 05
06 | 07 | 08 | 09 | 10 | 11 | 12
Nose to the Wind Chapters:
1 - Death Once Again || 2 - Bring Out All the Good Inside Me || 3 - Death and Living Reconciled
4 - Orphan Man || 5 - Using Gentle Words to Shelter Me || 6 - Living on Your Breath
7 - You Just Might Get it All || 8 - Never Want to Come Down || 9 - Only the Silence Remains
10 - Love is a Doing Word || 11 - Nothing Sacred || 12 - The Heart Yearns
13 - Mirrored in Your Stare || 14 - Camouflage Denial || 15 - Precious and Fragile Things
16 - Perfectly Reckless || 17 - Your Arms Feel Like Home || 18 - The Sun Will Set For You
19 - Your Love Has Always Been Enough || 20 - Keep Up This Charade || 21 - Truth Like a Blazing Fire
22 - Give Yourself a Try || 23 - Done Pleading Ignorance || 24 - Your Razorblade Caress of Love
25 - Summer's Scent Still Lingers || 26 - Burn Out the Stain || 27 - Final Masquerade

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