Chapter 1: Tough ol' codger

Note from BrailleErin: I tried to link to Hegemone's page but it didn't work. So I'm putting the whole story here.

Note from the Authors: BrailleErin and Hegemone collaborated on this continuation of her series of Blind Harry Potter stories - if you haven't read them, read them first: 1. Harry Potter and the Sword of Gryffindor and 2. Harry Potter and the Blind Seer by Braille Erin on ffnet. Some characters and aspects of Hegemone's story, Basilisk Eyes will be incorporated into this story.

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Harry pulled on Sirius's arm to get him to stop.

"What is it, Harry?" Sirius said impatiently as he turned toward him—the echo of their footsteps in the corridor continued on for a second after they stopped walking.

"I'm… well, do you think he's going to be okay?" Harry asked.

"I dunno. Let's go see. He's a tough ol' codger, isn't he? Come on, we're here," Sirius said starting to walk forward again. "Door's right here. Number 102."

Harry drew in a deep breath—St. Mungo's odors of pepper-up potion and the peppermint used to vanish the smell of vomit and other bodily fluids pulled deep into his lungs and he coughed a little.

"You all right?"

"Yeah, just… well, worried," Harry admitted as the elevator at the end of the corridor opened and voices and footsteps started down the corridor toward them—reverberating off the corridor walls.

"I'm telling you… it'll take a lot more than a few Death Eaters to take him down," Sirius reassured.

"All right… yeah, let's go see him," Harry sighed and shifted the pot of lavender they'd brought as a gift so that leaves brushed against his hand and a bit of the fragrance was released into the air.

Sirius turned and they went through the door. Sirius was muttering, "… said he'd be in the third bed on the right…" There was coughing from a patient farther down the ward and quiet mutterings of people talking in hushed tones from other areas of the room.

"Professor O'Carolan?" Sirius asked as he pushed aside curtains—the metal rings singing discordantly as they moved along a pole, "It's Sirius Black, sir, and Harry Potter is here, too. Dumbledore said that you were recovering and that your release from St. Mungo's is imminent."

"Oh, well, hullo!" Professor O'Carolan's voice was stronger than the last time Harry had heard it and some of his worries fell away. He could hear the rustling of linens and the squeaking of bed springs as he sat up. "I had a feeling I was going to have visitors today. How grand!"

"Hello, Professor. We brought you a potted lavender plant," Harry said as he stepped forward, holding the pot out. "Thought you might want to plant it later. When you are out of the hospital."

Sirius stepped around him and took the pot out of his hands and set it on a table nearby.

"Harry, my boy. Why do you sound so nervous?" Professor O'Carolan asked, laughing. "Were you expecting a corpse?"

"Er, well. I've been worried about you, sir," Harry said. "The last time we talked … well, it felt like you were saying good-bye."

"Well, I've definitely had better months than this one, I can assure you! But I'm fine. Expected to make a full recovery. And at my age, that's saying something!" the old man chuckled. "So, where is this lavender? Hand it to me. I want to take a look at it. Makes an excellent healing salve. Great for healing burns and bug bites. If only I had a garden… of course, with a garden, I'd be more likely to suffer bug bites!"

"Well, actually, that's the thing," Sirius said as he scraped the pot across the table. "We've come with a proposal. Here you go. Would you consider living with us at Grimmauld place while you recover and when you're feeling up to it, continue your tutoring of Harry? We understand that you're not wanting to return to Durmstrang and well, we have a need for a tutor. In addition to that, we have a potions garden plot that needs tending."

"Oh, my. Well, this is unexpected. Let me think," Professor O'Carolan said. "You want me to come live with you and train Harry? For how long?"

"Well, until Hogwarts starts for the training—but I think Professor Dumbledore has ideas for engaging your talents after that—and the offer to stay with us is open for as long as you want it—for as long as you can tolerate us…" Sirius stated with a laugh. "And I should mention that us includes my friend, Remus Lupin."

"Oh, well, are you that hard to live with?" Professor O'Carolan asked.

"Ha! Well, I guess that depends on who you're asking," Sirius quipped.

"He's fine when he remembers to pick up his towel and clothes and put things back where they belong," Harry teased. "And to not leave doors ajar."

"Yeah, I'm learning…" Sirius conceded as he nudged Harry congenially on the arm. "Figures that I'm being schooled on picking up after myself by a teenage boy! James would be taking the mickey out of me if he were here!"

"Well, you'll have to learn if you're going to have two blind housemates!" Professor O'Carolan said. "So, Harry, what do you want to learn from me? What kind of training are you needing?"

"Well, I was thinking some more O&M stuff…" Harry said.

"Stuff?" Professor O'Carolan seemed amused.

"The lessons were interrupted…" Harry went on, glad that the old professor couldn't see the color rising in his cheeks.

"True. I suppose we could carry on where we left off."

"And some of the ...er… others, you know, were saying that you had a unique way of dueling… you know, when… we met them… and you came," Harry stumbled through trying to find ways to talk about the Order's confrontation with the Death Eaters and Voldemort without actually saying it. He had no idea who was in the ward with the professor. "Maybe you could teach me how to duel blind?"

"Yes, that is a unique and hard-won skill I have… it's true. Though my latest escapade wasn't the best advertisement for those skills! Well, but you've convinced me. I will gladly accept your offer, provided that we can reach an agreement about my fees. And for that, I'd like to speak to Mr. Black privately—not in a ward with so many ears about."

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Harry, Sirius, and Remus with Kreacher's reluctant help had been working on clearing room in Grimmauld Place for the Professor. It was a room that Sirius loathed—but Harry thought the Professor would like it quite a bit. It was a bit removed from the hub-bub of the rest of the house—in the back on the ground floor—and it had French doors that opened up onto a secluded enclosed garden—the potions garden that had been cleared already of the more dangerous and suspect herbs by Professor Sprout who agreed to take them off their hands.

In addition to the easy access to the garden, there was a large fireplace that would keep the room warm in the winter and a number of bookshelves for the Professor's tomes. There was plenty of room for plush chairs by the fireplace and Sirius had managed to enchant an old sofa to transform easily into a comfortable bed with fresh linens on command.

It had been Sirius's mother's day room—and held a lot of black memories for Sirius—when pressed about them, he muttered and stormed off to brood for a while—so Harry learned to stop pressing.

The room apparently held a lot of memories for Kreacher as well as he was prone to uncover some precious trinket, start wailing, and disappear into his hovel in the kitchen until Sirius demanded that he come out again.

Harry wondered if there was a way to clear the room of those lingering spirits… he didn't want Sirius to start associating them with Professor O'Carolan. He mentioned it to Remus while they were carefully clearing the bookshelves of Walburga's collection of dark arts books and pureblood histories.

"Hmmm. That's a good question, Harry," Remus replied. "Maybe Andromeda has some ideas. Tonks is always saying that her mum is a wiz at household spells… I'll ask her the next time I see her."

Harry turned back to the bookshelf to hide his smile—running his fingers over the dusty and tattered books. He'd noticed that Professor Lupin seemed to be mentioning Tonks quite a lot lately.

Remus. He asked me to call him Remus now that we're roommates.

Harry grabbed a handful of books off the shelf and accidentally knocked another one off—it fell to the floor in a poof of dust and then an ancient voice started speaking from the same spot on the floor. Harry started, almost dropping the stack of books he was holding.

"... pulverize the bat wings in a black onyx bowl with only counter-clockwise twists of the wrist during the final phase of the full moon…"

Harry felt Remus reaching around him to grab the book.

"Hmmm. It must be charmed to speak the instructions so that the wizard can work hands-free—without having to stop to read," Remus said.

"That could be useful for me, too," Harry said setting the stack of books in the trunk they had levitated from the attic to store the books in. He held his hand out—wanting to examine it.

"Right you are," Remus agreed absently and turned another page. The ancient voice continued to list ingredients and directions for another potion recipe. It sounded like something from an old movie. Harry was imagining the narrator to be Vincent Price from the haunting shows that Dudley would watch when his parents were out because they never let him watch anything that remotely alluded to magic.

"Can I take a look at it?" Harry asked.

"Oh, right. So sorry, Harry. Here you go," Remus said as he placed the small volume in Harry's waiting hand.

As he felt the book (it had a thin leather cover), then turned the pages, he realized that it was responsive to his fingertips and would start over when he touched the page or speed ahead to a spot if he touched farther down in the text (that he couldn't see, but he could feel the slight texture of the embossed words—it was an old publication that used a thick ink).

"This is a really cool charm. How do we find out how to do it?" Harry wondered.

"Hmmm. I don't know. I guess we'll have to research it—maybe ask Professor Flitwick or Hermione…"

Harry's fingers were skimming over the text as he mused and he heard a word that caught his attention. He went back to it. "Caeco."

Harry gasped.

"What is it?"

"That's the curse… that's the curse that Riddle used to blind me." Harry was barely able to utter the words… he was suddenly in that dank room again, his mind racing, trying to figure out how to evade Voldemort's mind.

Harry realized he was taking short, shallow breaths and he drew in a deep breath and tried to steady himself. His hands trembled as they held the book, his finger hovering over the spot so that the text kept repeating the word over and over again, "Caeco, Caeco, Caeco."

Maybe this book also has the counter curse, maybe there was a way to undo it. Merlin, to get back what I had! Harry thought.

He willed his hand to still and found the spot in the book where his finger had landed first.

He listened with bated breath; Remus sat motionless beside him as the book read through the curse and what it did. It was hard to hear it stated so impassionately… "remove all light from your foe's sight… plunge them into the depths of darkness."

It went on to describe in poetic monotony how the enemy would not only flounder and fumble and be unable to cast any curse without vision, but that they'd give up and offer themselves—completely surrender in despair.

Harry gritted his teeth and kept listening, trying not to hope too much.

There's not going to be a counter-curse, he thought.

Then there it was and Harry and Remus gasped simultaneously. Harry sat down hard on the floor—he realized that he had been hovering in a half-crouch while listening to the book and his hamstrings were cramping.

"That's it! There's a counter curse!" Harry jumped up and closed the book with his finger still on the spot—not wanting to lose it.

"Harry, this is incredible! It'll take time and preparation, but we can do it!"

"Do you think Professor Snape might help us?" Harry was reaching for his white cane that was leaning against the wall by the bookshelf.

"I dunno—but it's worth asking. Why don't we talk to Professor Dumbledore and see if he can talk to Severus for us? Yes—that might be the way to approach it. Also, Professor Dumbledore would like to speak to you… I've been meaning to talk to you about it. He wants you to return to the Dursleys for a short stint this summer."

"What!?" Harry stopped and turned slowly to face Remus.

"Now, Harry. I know it isn't ideal—but there's something about the blood protection from Lily that is connected to their home. Professor Dumbledore says that it needs to be renewed each year."

"Ugh. I don't want to go back there." His shoulders dropped and he hung his head.

"I know. Sirius has offered to go with you—as Padfoot. He even said that he'd pretend to be your guide dog so that they have no excuse but to let him stay with you the whole time."

"Really? He'd do that? Wouldn't it drive him nuts to be in a harness?"

"I think it might, but he's willing to do it for you."

"He'd never be able to control himself around Uncle Vernon… I don't know."

"Well, let's finish up here—we're almost done, and then we can go talk to Sirius—where is he? Is he sulking again?—and then floo to Hogwarts to talk to Professor Dumbledore. We should have him look at this book anyway—he'll want to assure that it is reliable information before we start working on the countercurse."

Harry walked back to the bookshelf and stashed his cane, kneeling back down where he had been sitting before. His initial excitement at finding the countercurse dampened by the thought of enduring the Dursleys again.

Maybe I'll be at least able to see shadows again, though, that could make it easier to be with them… he reassured himself.