AN:/ So guess whose email decided that the review notifications weren't important to get? Whoops, sorry about that. Thought this story was more dead, and then lo and behold it's alive and kicking! I have changed settings so that I will now see your precious reviews again, since they are a large force in driving me to write new chapters. (Not as in a holding-things-back-unless-i-get-x-reviews, but more of a how-many-people-are-reading-this-trainwreck-anyway kind of thing.) As always, love y'all! Please let me know what you think! But most of all, enjoy! I really do write for people to have fun and enjoy reading, so best of luck! :)

Harry sat in the hard uncomfortable benches the ministry provided for those who wished to observe a wizengamot meeting and tried not to fidget. His robes itched on his neck and he felt so out of place. Andromeda had been teaching him non-stop for the past week and a half, but Harry knew he still had so much to learn. Andromeda herself sat next to him, looking not at all out of place and quite like she belonged. Minister Fudge was going through the opening motions of welcoming the wizards to the meeting, and calling for the blessings of magic to guide them.

"It's mostly useless pontificating," Andromeda leans over and whispers, "Since magic hasn't spoken to them in decades. But, they'll soon know there's something off."

"Let magic herself welcome us all to another successful year, and productive meeting."Fudge finishes, throwing up his arms as a wave a magic crawls through the seats. They're arranged in rows, a staggered half circle descending to the central podium where Fudge stood. As the magic passed, the orbs in front of their seats lit up. It was fascinating to watch as Harry knew this was far past Fudge's ability to conjure, or even Dumbledore's. He wasn't sure how he knew, but he knew it like he knew his bones. As the wave crashed over the back wall, gently dissipating, there grew a low murmur that quickly rose in volume.

"Silence!" Fudge shouted his face turning plum as he was ignored. He turned to Dumbledore after a few more attempts to quell the chatter. Dumbledore rose smoothly, and the whispers and questions fell silent at once.

"What appears to be- I see." Dumbledore says, eyes alighting on the empty seats. There were two of them, one on the second row and the other about halfway back. "There must be a mistake." He says, his wind whirling. He knows which seats these are. He knows them just as well as he knew the wizards who sat in them. Pollux, Orion, and Alphard. Fleamont, Charlus, and James.

"Minister, there appears to have been a malfunction. If you could please invoke the magics again." Dumbledore says, nodding his head at the Minister who is still returning to normal color.

Harry watches from the back as Fudge does so, sweat visibly rolling off of his forehead as he calls them again. But Harry can see it in his face that he knows, and he can see it in Dumbledore's too. They both know that there is no malfunction, there is no mistake. Magic has spoken, quietly but with force.

Fudge finishes the invocation, and has bought Dumbledore time, but the result is the same, two empty seats, orbs blinking. "Perhaps we can go along with business and ignore them." Fudge offers lightly, shrinking from the immediate hostile reaction of much of the chamber.

"You ask us to violate the terms of this august body, sworn to Merlin himself when he chartered us to this duty?" A man sneers from his seat on the front row.

"Of- of course not. " Fudge stutters, shrinking back.

"If I may," Lucius Malfoy says, climbing to his feet and tugging his son with him, "Perhaps I can sole one of these empty seats. My son Draco is of course the Heir to house Black. It may be that her magic's have recognized his claim and granted him early headship."

Malfoy Senior and his son walk slowly down to the center, where there stands a cauldron of swirling white magics.

"Isn't it bad that he's up there, swearing to the house you're asking me to take up?" Harry whispers, leaning over to Andromeda as the two pick their way down.

"Not particularly. If anything, it's good for us. Cousin Lucy is making a mistake- not only does Draco not have a valid claim anymore, but he doesn't even really want it. Look at his feet." Andromeda replies. Harry takes a moment to focus on the young Malfoy heir and notices what Andy already picked out- he doesn't want to be here.

From every other interaction Harry has had with the boy, he knows Draco Malfoy. He knows how the boy struts, how he preens, how he breathes- it's saved Harry from a nasty hex once or twice in the halls. But now, Malfoy has none of that strutting. His feet drag the steps, ever so slightly, his elbows are tucked in and shoulders hunched, his steps are light and cautious, not the firm and solid tromping of his normal dragonhide boots. His entire posture reeks uncomfortability, and though Harry can't tell given the boy's normal coloring, he seems ever so slightly more chalky.

"Go on, boy." Lucius orders, prodding his son forward with the end of his cane. Draco steps forward and begins the inheritance ritual, swearing to the magics and slicing his palm to drip blood in the cauldron. The room holds its breath, ready to welcome a new head, but nothing happens.

"Do it again, Draco." Lucius snaps, and Draco goes through the ritual again, swearing and invoking, and bleeding and—nothing. It ends the same as before, hand resting over the bowl, blood dripping and nothing. Harry winces inside, seeing the minute quiver in Draco's hand, and the nervous glint in his eyes.

"Foolish boy!" Lucius grabs the blade and his son's wrist. He ignores the cry of pain at the grab, and the louder yelp as he slices his son's palm from one end to the other and thrusts it back over the bowl. Drops of blood go flying over the bowl and spatter across the podium. Draco's hand is less dripping and more gushing blood, the white swirling smoke in the bowl looking more and more pink with every passing moment. Draco shakes over the bowl, one lip caught in his teeth as he tries not to cry out. Lucius shakes the hand again, fingers reaching over and prying the ends of the cut apart and-

"Stop!" Harry jumps to his feet and marches toward the center, wondering what he's doing even as he does it. He can't stand the ferret, but no one should go through this. No one.

As he strides forward his eyes pick out more and more of the scene- Draco's boots quivering almost imperceptibly, Dumbledore's look of dismay and sadness, the curl of Lucius lip and the white knuckled grip he has on his son's arm.

"Just who do you think you are?" Lucius snarls, fingering his wand and not recognizing Harry in the fine, heavy robes he has on.

"Mistress Magic, I give thanks for the gifts you bestowed." Harry finds himself saying as he stands behind the cauldron of magics, flipping his hood back. The room, which had set to whispers, goes silent as the air grows even thicker.

"To our forbearers, who carved out the space and time for the aether and for our homes. And to my progenitors, whose blood flows in my veins, whose magic sings though my skin." Harry says sharply, a tingling sweeping up from underneath his feet.

"Foolish boy-" Lucius scowls, but Harry turns, and the man falls silent, as the boy's eyes are not his normal, killing-curse green. He does not see the eyes of the boy who defied him-no, Lucius stares into an abyss, a swirling void of thunder and magic, the ritual having swept the boy fully into its thrall. He realizes that Harry doesn't even recognize him or his defiance- he's purely subsumed by the ritual call.

"I swear to my blood, to my bones, and to the world- I will uphold the honors of my home. I will protect and defend the traditions of my heritage. I will not fall to another's way, nor will I seek to sway another to my own. I will stand firm with my brothers in oath, to guide and defend our way against all who challenge. This I swear to the audience before me, to the goddess above me, and to the magics I stand before." Raw condensed magic hovers over him, snuffing torches and blowing away papers as it seeps away. Harry blinks and the presence of something far greater than any of them vanishes, but not without leaving him with a feeling of acceptance. Harry steps down from the raised podium and claps Draco on the shoulder, "Better luck next time." The blond stands bewildered, his bleeding hand clutched close as his nemesis walks away to take his seat.

"Order!" Fudge shouts as Harry approaches one of the empty seats. "While that satisfies one of our mystery missing members, that still leaves one."

"Minster, I'm afraid I can answer that one." Harry says, turning to face the man again, "I am head of house Potter, but I am also head of house Black."

When the pandemonium of the chamber is finally silenced again, Fudge looks at Harry with narrowed eyes. "By what claim would you inherit the house?"

"Aside from retribution at the attempted assassination," the chamber goes pale as old protocols, from before the time of this council are referenced, "by means of blood. My Grandmother was Dorea Black, of the main line. My friend Draco claims by blood of his mother, Narcissa, of the branch line. It is close, but my claim was judged stronger by the Black Guardian."

The quiet tumult in the chamber goes quiet once again.

"You spoke with the Black Guardian?" A man asks from across the chamber, dressed in fine robes. "I beg your pardon, Thelonoius Nott, but you spoke with it and lived?"

"I did." Harry replies evenly, remembering the obsidian bird, dark and jagged and sharp and bloodthirsty. It had been in the Black Vaults, had stood judgment over his claim to the magics. Harry had paid a price for his new station, but here he was.

"Sweet Merlin. Orion introduced us once and she almost took my eye." The man says reverently.

"She is formidable, but after the basilisk I am not easily frightened." Harry replies, bowing to the man before turning to face Dumbledore, who he knows is about to say something. Andromeda knew that Dumbledore was going to try and interfere, and thus they were ready.

True to their predictions, "Are we truly to allow a child to be forced to take on this burden?"Dumbledore thunders.

"Well, you had no problem with it when it was young Draco who was up there." Tiberius Ogden responds, cutting off Harry's reply.

"Draco has his father and his mother to guide him. Young Harry lacks them both." Dumbledore adds, only to be hit from another direction.

"If my eyes aren't going, that's Miss Black sitting next to where he was. If that is her, then he is in fine hands." Griselda Marchbanks says primly, looking to Harry. "That is how you are going to address your case, is it not? You'll have Lady Tonks nee Black swear to you and take the seat for you?"

"Lady Black will hold the seat for me, yes." Harry says, smirking inwardly at how many feathers that is going to ruffle.

"Well, this is all fun, but we have a meeting to get through, and I'd rather not miss the Wasps performance tonight. If they lose, Ireland has a shot at the cup!" One of the wizards sitting in the front row says, and after some unflattering comments, they get started.

Later, once the meeting is over, Harry and Andromeda sit in her home over tea.

"We've come a long way." She says, sipping from her cup and eyeing the new lord of her house. She had it planned, and got a feel for his character, and he had technically been her lord since Gringotts, but now it was public.

"We have, but I still have so much to go." Harry groans, waving toward the side table which is stacked high with books he is slowly working through with her help.

"You're doing great, I have to admit. One of the best student's I've ever taught." She praises lightly.

"One of the best? How many have you taught?" Harry teases.

"You are my fourth pupil. Fifth is you count the remedial lessons I inflicted on cousin Siri. I taught Sirius and Reggie both some, and then of course my Ted. Nymphadora was my second official pupil, and then there was Severus before you." Andromeda says.

"You taught Snape?" Harry says. She can read the anger and light betrayal behind his eyes, but approves of how much he's shielding and swallowing down.

"It was one of Dumbledore's ploys for his innocence. I was a known neutral in the war, and no one in their right mind attacks a potions mistress. But, Ted was struggling to get his firm off the ground in the early days after the war, so when Dumbledore offered an incentive to take on a new student and teach them their mastery, I didn't refuse." She says primly.

"He bribed you." Harry says, reading between the lines, "and you took it."

"It was for good reasons that I agreed, but even I did not imagine who he would send to me. I was expecting some shy muggleborn, or the product of one of the carrows or the flints, someone from a decidedly dark family who would be scared of someone having power over their child. Yet, on the day it was to be agreed that we would begin, who should show up but Severus Snape. If you think he is surly in class, imagine how he would have acted when he thought he knew everything and I was wasting his time. "

"He fought me every step of the way and I had to justify every single trial I made him go through. He is brilliant at potions, no doubt about that. One of the fastest masteries I have ever heard of, but his attitude was deplorable. I got rid of him as fast as I could, giving up on extracting my revenge when he started nosing around little Nymphadora. It was nothing untoward, but still, he has no place around a child." She says.

"Wow." Harry says, finding no other words.

"As your sworn representative of house Black, let me advise you this: if you are on his side or he is obliged to you, his potions are some of the best. But if you and he are opposed, trust nothing he gives you. The man is blindingly smart with potions, and he has nigh unlimited resources and time working at Hogwarts. I wouldn't put it past him to have advanced potion making tenfold, though the asshole will never share his secrets." Andromeda says.

"Thank you." Harry says.

"Just doing my job." She replies easily, leaning back. "Still can't believe you carried around a wardstone for a week and a half."

"It's not like I knew what to do with it!" Harry replies, the same excuse he'd given the past three times she'd brought it up.

"Everyone knows to break a ward you break the anchor." She says.

"No one told me! I was afraid I'd hurt it or something." Harry says.

"Hurting a magical ward-" Andromeda scoffs. She'd found out about Harry carrying round the ward stone about that third time he visited her. Once she finagled out of him what it was, she quickly banished it into the wall and summoned a book to explain it. Harry, once his magics settled out again, had felt very foolish when he learned. The ward, without the anchors, fell back to him as it had been originally. All he had been doing, carrying around the stone, was providing a source of light and a slight weakening of the wards.

They had also gone through some of the things he had found of his parents, as well as the state of his school supplies. Androemda was a quick teacher, adept at tossing out lessons at the drop of a hat, or the appearance of an ashwinder. (The fire-snake was quite polite, if tired, and was overjoyed to move into a more consistently heated home.) Harry learned about the magical world in leaps and bounds, carefully supervised lessons on why certain things didn't work- like space compression fields inside of other space compression fields. (The effects magnified, and whatever was inside the second compression field kept shrinking until it vanished.)

The pair talked a little longer before Harry bade her goodbye. Lying in bed that night, Harry pulled out the letter from his grandfather that they had found in the Potter Vault. The contents of his gift vault had been lost in the invasion, which Harry was of mixed feelings about. He was sad to have lost so much, but it was things he hadn't ever truly had, so had he really lost anything? Andromeda assured him that losing a vault like he had was not unheard of, and was simply a risk of storing things with Gringotts. Harry still wasn't sure what to feel about that, but pushed it aside in favor of rereading the letter.

Dear Harry,

I am afraid you are never going to meet me in person. I write this from the bedside of your grandmother, who is in her final days. I am not much better. Our last adventure, we contracted a strain of Dragon Pox, and the healers are not optimistic. I am thankful for the many years together we have shared, but this is not about us. Or rather, not just about us.

You are James' pride and joy, even now. Lily may curse you from time to time as you push her around, but they both love you so dearly. Your grandmother and I do as well, but looking at them, I am not sure anyone could love you as much as they do. I'm sure you are aware, that as of this time, we are at war. Magical Britain is in civil unrest, the traditionalists and the progressives clashing in the streets. Your father grew up after the war, in the peace times between the dark lords. You, I fear, will grow up in the midst of one, like I did. I graduated Hogwarts shortly before the war with Grindelwald broke out in earnest. It was in the midst of the fighting that I met your grandmother, who was on vacation, and not happy at all to have her time disrupted. She was tearing through a squad of Acolytes and doing quite well. Our romance was wild and passionate as we were thrown together time and time again. (She, a Slytherin, and I, a Gryffindor, did not have a good relationship prior to the war.)

Toward the end of the war, a dreadful attack occurred at home, and my parents were killed. I was now Lord Potter. No son wants to inherit his house in his 20s. But I had a duty- and much to my surprise Dorea followed me. While we could no longer skirmish on the front lines, instead we devoted ourselves to supporting the various resistances across Europe. In particular, a man in France named Sebastien Delacour and I forged a strong friendship over smuggling soldiers and supplies- even some non-magical ones. After some time spent in various careers once Dumbledore finally ended the war, I tried my hand at teaching charms and shipping, while Dorea focused on becoming a Healer, James was born. He can pick up the story there, so I'll leave it off.

Harry, there are some things I'd like to say to you. Some lessons and words of wisdom I feel I should pass down.

For a start, know that you are loved. By your parents, by Dorea and I, by all of your parents friends as well as our own. You are a light in this dark time, and I hope that this mess is long over by the time you are old enough to read this.

Never forget who you are. You are a Potter, and if James and Sirius go through with this reckless plan of theirs, you'll be a Black as well. You have a legacy to uphold, of honor and bravery. Of doing the right thing, no matter what the consequences are. To fight injustice, no matter what cloak of lies it may be wearing. There is never an excuse to turn your back on someone who is hurting, and no remorse for anyone who thinks they are better than another- it doesn't matter. Magical or muggle, male or female, old or young, we all have a responsibility and a duty to be the best person we can be and to support one another. In death, we are all equals.

Find you friends who support you, who cherish you, and who challenge you. Dorea has been by my side for most of my life, and she has been both a constant thorn and cheerleader. She never let me rest on my laurels. Find you someone like her, who will push you to be better every day. Trust people unless given reason not to. The American's had a saying that I approve of; innocent until proven guilty. Treat people that way, and you shall be judged that way as well.

Be honest, Harry. With your friends, your family, and most of all yourself. Never pretend to be someone you are not- it only leads to pain and disappointment.

My last piece of advice to you is to have fun. It seems trivial, but do not get so caught up in tomorrow that you cannot enjoy today. The same goes for yesterday- the past and the future are great places to learn, but to reside there is foolhardy. Enjoy every moment that you can and be comfortable with who you are. I know I've dropped a lot of weight on your shoulders but know this: I am and always will be proud of you. You are my grandson, the greatest joy I have ever had, and a fine boy.

Here's to you kid,

Charlus

AN:/ P.S. I'm, like, 900 word shy of 50k. What chapter in your opinion could use some more spice?