Never Again Victimized

Disclaimer: I solemnly swear I do not own the published masterpiece of Harry Potter. I also do not write and publish this story to earn any sort of profit. I simply do it because I need to.

Claimer: I do, however, own and take full responsibility for this twisted story.

Beta read by Arithmancy Master.

Chapter One

I'll Be Gone

A deep dong sounded through the heavy, still air in the quiet little town Lóng cháo. It rang softly, blending with the chirping of crickets and the twittering of birds. It sounded again, flowing through the open doors, into the room and over the shiny, wooden floor. The small, square space was still and very quiet, but warm from the boiling mixture in the cauldron in one corner of it.

In the middle, lying on the sleek floorboards, was an old man with a balding head and an impressively long, silvery moustache, which was creating two thick tails that reached down to rest on his shrunken chest. He was seemingly asleep, holding his wrinkled eyelids closed, and his breathing was slow. Beneath the hems of his thick, kimono styled robes, whose fabric was cluttered with rich embellishments, a pair of scrawny, pale feet peeked out. They looked like they hadn't been used for quite a while, if ever, for they were unnaturally small and crumpled.

Around the old man, a dark haired wizard paced in circuits, murmuring soft, magical words in Latin. Held in one of his weathered hands was a brass censer, swinging from side to side on its thin chain, spreading sweet scenting incense through the entire room. He padded on, bare foot, watching the results of his chanting through a pair of dark, wine coloured eyes.

Golden swirls of magic surrounded the old man's feet, making them glow. Knowing it was his cue, the wizard stopped right in front of them and stretched his free hand out in a clawing gesture. On one of his fingers sat golden band that was gleaming with tiny flickers of ever present magic.

The wizard turned the palm of his hand to face the ceiling and brought it up, up, up, and then clenched. The old man's feet lit up with an inner glow, and as the fingers on the hand uncurled and started to make shifting movements towards the palm, the feet themselves started to grow. Ever so slowly, they fattened, swelled and turned a healthy hue of red as blood started to flow into them.

The old man gasped suddenly and opened his almond shaped, brown eyes with a look of wonder. He ran them down his wizened body and looked positively awestruck when they took in the look of the healed feet, that started to flex experimentally. As an immediate result, fat tears started to fall down the man's wrinkled cheeks.

The younger wizard lowered his hands, put the censer down onto a low table and took a seat in a comfortable position on his knees, right where he stood on the floor. The old man hurriedly scrambled to imitate his posture, and then flung himself forward into a full bow with his hands and forehead flat on the ground.

His stumbling ramblings of praise and gratitude went on for quite a while, until he finally let himself be interrupted by the more and more urgent clearing of a throat that sounded in the still room. He sat up again, his palms still pressed onto the floor, as he looked up at the man in front of him with deepest gratitude. "Shénqí yīzhì zhě Potter," he started in a weakly shivery voice, addressing the foreign Healer with deepest respect. He opened his mouth to start on another tirade, but he was halted by a held up palm.

"Lǎo Xu," Harry addressed the man with a warm smile. "Zhè shì wǒ de gōngzuò." Most of the people Harry healed would insist he must be treated with such respect he might as well be a divinity. Every time, he had to insist it was only a job for him.

Before the old man could start anew to insist it was not merely a job but a life altering experience that was the answers to his dreams, of how no one else had succeeded in healing him and so forth, Harry got to his feet and walked over to the gleaming, creamy liquid in the steaming hot cauldron. He picked a crystal vial out of one of his deep cloak pockets, and filled it to the rim with the potion, whereafter he put the stopper into its throat and handed it over to the ancient, Chinese wizard.

"Zài yīgè xīngqí měitiān liǎng cì. Èr liǎng dī," he told his patient in his stern I-am-a-professional-so-you-should-listen-closely voice.

He got a couple of eager bows of the head in response, telling him the obedient man would indeed take two drops of the potion twice a day for one week. "Shénqí yīzhì zhě Potter. Xièxiè! Xièxiè!"

When the old wizard had finally left, after forcing his Healer to reluctantly accept a basket of ripe plums, Harry let out a deep sigh in relief and toed into a pair of Geta. He wrapped his crimson cloak in soft silk closer around his body, covering up his pearl white working robes a bit better, before stepping out of his infirmary and locking the doors behind him. He took a deep breath from the fresh evening air to clear his nostrils from the calming incense that was clogging up his mind.

Once he could think clearly again, he walked down the neat stone road, hearing the clicking of his wooden shoes as they hit the hard surface beneath. The houses to the left side of the road were painted white, with wooden windows in red, and their black roofs were worn and sloping down towards him. On the other side of the road lay a lazy river with murky, green water in it. It was lined by thick, stone railings, and across it not too far away was a vaulted stone bridge.

Harry crossed it in calm strides, spying a fat frog on one of the knotted branches in the willow tree on the other side of the waters as he walked past it, and then he made his way along one of the wider streets in the north part of town. There was nearly no one out on the streets of this magical village at this late hour, as it was a mid-week evening. Only a couple of wild-eyed hags, a few hurrying wizards and witches, as well as a group of solemn looking goblins, that were murmuring to each other in quick Chinese, could be seen.

Harry turned right and stopped in front of a pair of high, darkly wooden gates. The small, golden sign over the handle read: T. M. Riddle. H. J. Potter.

He plucked out a golden key out of his cloak pocket and unlocked the gates, stepped into a calm little garden and turned around to re-close and relock the entrance to his home. He trekked up a snaking, gravel path towards the patio of the traditionally styled Chinese house and mock bowed once to the golden dragon over the door before entering.

"You are late," his partner immediately called out to him once he was inside, and Harry couldn't help but smile at the predictability of the reaction as he toed out of his clogs and padded through the hallway and into the living room. He shrugged out of his cloak and lazily tossed it into the air, where it hovered for a moment before a wooden hanger zoomed up to it and took it back to the wardrobe by the front door.

" 'A wizard is never late, nor is he early. He arrives precisely when he means to,' " he quoted with a smirk as he crossed the room to the slim writing desk to put the plums down, and earned himself a deep sigh from the handsome man seated in the plush sofa by the fireplace. A pair of gleaming red eyes turned away from the Chinese illustrated magazine about the most recent science on the subject of body-altering potions. They glared at him.

"You meant to arrive precisely at eleven thirty three? My mistake," Tom said quietly, as if to himself.

"It is a quote," Harry informed in good-humour, "from the Muggle fantasy novel I'm currently reading – well, re-reading actually... Surely, you've heard of Tolkien?"

"No," the other answered with a long-suffering sigh, flipping a page in his magazine. "Unlike you, I do not interest myself with silly Muggle nonsense about a world that does not exist."

"Well, some of them aren't too far from the truth. It's amusing to compare, and they're exciting to read."

"I doubt it," Tom concluded without looking up from the paper.

Harry snorted softly with a fond smile as he walked over to the sofa group and sat down in his favourite armchair, right next to Tom's preferred seat on the right side of the smallest sofa. A short wave of his ivy wand made a magazine of his own zoom into his hands, and he opened it up with a contented sigh, leafing through the pages of Flamboyant Fashion for the Fancy. Twenty pages in, he reached the part he had bought the magazine for: a spread about the very popular and world wide brand Silsel: his best friend Silas Selwyn's fashion line.

"How was your day?" he asked in a barely audible voice, knowing full well that lines like such, which were hinting at a domestic life, rarely were answered by the love of his life, who detested everything that had any form of resemblance to normalcy.

Remarkably, this evening turned out to be an exception to the rule. "Horribly disappointing."

"Oh?" Harry tore his eyes away from the, let's say interesting, mixture of lime green, stark yellow and shimmering silver, and met eyes with his paramour. "How so?"

Tom put his paper down onto the low coffee table with a deep sigh and leaned back fully against the plush backrest, rubbing his temples as if battling a headache. Harry responded by picking up his wand again, casting a chain of spells that would make the gadgets in the kitchen prepare a pot of steaming hot oolong tea, while studying the other closely.

"Did something happen at work?" he questioned carefully, gaining himself a weak glare.

Tom had occupied himself with an array of different occupations over the years. Jumping from one thing to another restlessly, never settling down. He'd been a student, he'd been a teacher. He'd tiptoed through the political arena and he'd made great success as a professional artist, although he'd claimed to hate the very concept of splattering a little paint onto a canvas and then selling it to the highest bidder. Harry knew it was false, for as much as he loved to read Muggle fantasy novels, Tom loved to paint, just for the fun of it and nothing else.

At the moment, Harry's 43 year old lover was holding lectures in the Chinese magical school Xiāo tīzi on top of the mountain Bùzhōu Shān, whose insides were the home of the majority of the world's goblins, and whose outside was covered with wild dragons in a magical wildlife sanctuary. Some of the world's most prominent scholars travelled there for Tom's, among others', lectures on ground-breaking new theories and inventions. Harry also held lectures there, from time to time, whenever he'd discovered something new in the line of Healing. But Tom worked out new solutions and concepts in all kinds of magic, all the time, so he had enough material to be employed at the institution of magical research as an Alchemist, which against popular belief had less to do with creating gold out of metal and more to do with being a magical scientist.

From time to time, the two of them worked on projects together. It often started with one of them taking work home, having to go into details with the other who became more and more involved. It always ended in a fierce argument that lasted for hours, before they could come to a mutual understanding and finally complete the work together. Amazingly enough, it was always the work they did together they got the most publicity for. It seemed that when it came to theoretical practice, they completed each other almost to perfection.

At the moment though, the two of them worked on separate projects, Harry being very involved with his work in messing with Necromancy techniques in the line of Healing. He had started to involve himself with the mystery of magic loss, which could either show up as a symptom of depression, or be a condition one was born with, such as a Squib.

Tom, on the other hand, had become more and more obsessed with the mystery the Crystal of Parseltongue had presented them with in their final year at Hogwarts. Now, he was restlessly searching for additional Parselmouths all over the world, which was what had taken them to China in the first place, even if it had been work which had kept them there.

Tom straightened up in his seat as the ceramic tea set swooshed into the room and instantly started to pour the scalding liquid into a pair of simple, brown teacups. He plucked his cup out of the air, which he easily distinguished from Harry's cup whose rim was chipped in a couple of places from a few too many accidents against the floor, and took a careful sip out of it.

"I trust you recall I met with a man who claimed he knew this woman, who could lead me to 'the last Parselmouths in the world'. Well, I found the woman, a very old witch by the name Kwan Cōng Li."

Harry leaned forward in his seat in excitement. "And?"

A deep sigh sounded. "And, she told me of a mysterious legend about 'The White Lady'. Then, at long last, she gave me names. Two names. It was near impossible to make any progress from there, as they had no interest in being found. Very secretive people. But I did find them, today." Tom scrunched up his face to make an expression similar to the one he made every time he smelt something far from pleasant. "They weren't Parselmouths. They were Animagi. Pit vipers, a green one and a white one." Tom's mouth twisted into a bitter sneer before he took another sip out of his steaming tea cup. "All that work for nothing. I'd wager there aren't any Parselmouths at all in this part of the world either. But if they aren't here, where? We've already searched the rest of the planet."

Harry couldn't disagree with that; they had travelled to every part of the world by now. 25 years on foot, jumping from place to place. They had wandered the northern parts of Canada, snaked their way up Africa, and had lived in most of the European countries one time or the other. They had been to Australia, to the United States, to Chile and Argentina. They'd spent a lot of time in Iraq, in Congo, and in Indonesia. The longest time they'd stuck to one place had been in Norway, where they had lived for five years during which Harry had taught Necromancy and Tom Alchemy at Durmstrang Institute. Now, they had been in China for six months, and where they were going next, Harry could only guess. Tom was the one who dictated all their trips, which suited him just fine. In fact, he found it a very exciting surprise every time they were to uproot and settle down somewhere else.

But so far, just like Tom said, there had been few, if any, signs of additional Parselmouths. So far, it looked like they were alone. Harry had become quite good at both speaking and understanding the snake language, although his skills were far from perfect. Tom kept telling him he was doing little nuances of sounds wrongly, pointing out he should place his tongue further back in his mouth, or he should push it more firmly against his teeth, or he should just let it lie flat to make a sound similar to that of a pissed off cat.

Fully aware his teacher was a manic perfectionist, Harry tried his best but didn't take it all too seriously. He did alright, according to his own standards.

To help things along, they had conducted a simplistic alphabet for the language, so that they could write words and sounds down. Parseltongue was well on its way to becoming a written language, although they still had a few kinks to work out, such as Tom's infernal insistence of making sure all sounds sounded exactly like they did when snakes spoke. It complicated things severely as, honestly, Harry couldn't tell the difference at all. But that was Tom for you, he would never settle for anything but the best, and his standards were sky high.

"Well, to hell with that, then," Harry dictated, dropped his magazine onto the table and got up from the chair. "We're uncorking that outrageously fancy wine bottle Aby gave us last year, and we're going for a picnic."

"A picnic?" Tom questioned with open dislike. "I hate to remind you it's the middle of the night, and I have work tomorrow."

"I don't," Harry answered as he pelted through the hallway and into the kitchen, pulling out the bottle with wary hands and grabbing a couple of footed glass tumblers before returning to the living room. "And it's not night; it's late evening." He smiled brilliantly at the scowl his partner shot at him. "Come on, we'll sit on the patio in the garden, and I'll give you a massage. How about it?"

Tom sighed deeply, but got up nonetheless and opened up the glassed patio doors before crossing the threshold. "Very well, if I end up slurring through my lecture tomorrow, the entire blame is on you."

Harry snickered quietly and followed his lover out into the garden. "Sounds like fun – can I watch?"

He didn't get an answer. The two of them sat down on the edge of the wooden floorboards letting their naked feet rest softly on the green grass of the small, enclosed garden with a little pond full of pale pink water lilies. Harry snapped his fingers, making the cork stopper pop out in one go; a party trick he'd learned from Silas. The wine of the brand Superior Red was the exact shade of Harry's eyes, and it murmured quietly as it filled up first one, then two glasses half way.

A sharp clink sounded in the still evening as the two wizards toasted and then sipped carefully on the burgundy liquid. Harry looked up to the starlit sky and couldn't help his habit of tracing the shapes and reading the secrets hidden in them.

"Why are you so insistent on finding them anyway?" he asked after a moment of silence. "What are you planning to do when you find them?"

Tom seemed a bit cheered up as he noticed his partner had chosen the word when rather than if. "I'm not sure," he confessed lightly. "It's just that kind of thing that keeps nagging me to madness until I solve the mystery and can move on. Perhaps I'll make contact, perhaps together we can use our powers for something productive, but I do not have a plan per se."

"That's unlike you," Harry judged carefully and took another sip out of his tumbler. A star in particular caught his interest, and he kept his focus on it while opening his mind for the images and solutions to start flooding in.

"Perhaps," he got as a non-committal reply before Tom drained his glass and arose from his seat. "Well, this was fun."

Harry snorted softly but didn't avert his gaze. "Ever the romantic, Tom."

"I never claimed to be a romantic." Harry listened with half an ear as his lover seemed to hesitate between going back inside or extracting the massage he was promised, he guessed. He guessed wrongly. "You're seeing something, aren't you?"

"Yes," he confessed and squinted slightly while putting his half empty tumbler down onto the wooden seat. "Something's wrong. I just don't know what yet..."

As if hesitant to do so, Tom sat back down and watched the stars at well, even though he had no clue as to how one could read their signals. Harry did though, and he didn't like what was revealed. He double-checked just to be sure, but the signs were quite clear. He would have to check his crystal ball to see exactly what was happening, but he felt quite certain he didn't have time for that.

"I must get back to Britain," he stated, tearing his frantic eyes away from the sky to meet those of his beloved. "At once!"

Harry had packed in a flurry, probably forgetting to take many paraphernalia he would miss after a handful of days away from home. But he hardly cared about that. Something was wrong with his family, and he had to hurry. The readings of chance were shifting very quickly, far more quickly than was normal, which often meant fate was involved. Now, as he was quite certain no one was about to give birth, although he couldn't know for sure as he hadn't been in touch with his people in a while, he was very frightened death had something to do with it.

So he hurried.

Now, he had very few options as for how to travel from one continent to another. Harry was a very powerful wizard, one of the few in the world who had had a change in eye colour, but even he did not have enough strength to Apparate across the globe. He could use Apparition to jump from country to country, but it would get him very worn out in the end, and it would probably take the entire night. However, the other option would take even longer as he would have to travel to the Chinese Ministry of Magic to buy a Portkey, and even then he would only get as far as Tehran in Iran, or possibly Moscow in Russia, as Portkeys could only take you so far before their magic ran out. And then, he'd be forced to go through the process at least one more time to make it to Britain – it just wasn't worth it. As that not only could but would take hours with all the bureaucracy, which didn't leave him much choice but to use Apparition. Unless he wanted to fly on a broomstick the entire way – a ridiculous notion as it wouldn't only be lethally cold but also extremely time-consuming.

So he Apparated.

By five a.m. the 13th of August 1970 he arrived in Godric's Hollow. He had hurried as best he could, taking as few breaks to rest as possible, making the biggest leaps he could subject to the restriction of only being able to go where he had already been before, as he didn't have the time to gather photographs which would have been able to make him travel via a more direct route.

But even though he did his best, everything that he could to make it, it wasn't enough. He was too late.

His deep red travelling cloak, which was much thicker than the silk one he favoured in the hot climates of China, billowed behind him over his black slacks, dragon-hide boots and dark blue cardigan. The gravel under his soles crunched as he walked up the short path up to the front door of the familiar old Potters' Cottage. He rapped on the door, but just walked in after a couple of breathless seconds.

"Mum! Dad!" he called out and pedalled restlessly on the doormat just inside the doorway. "Anybody home?" he shouted in a louder voice when he didn't get an immediate answer, whereafter he kicked off his boots, tossed his cloak over a lone Windsor chair in the corner of the hall and started to ascend the staircase before he was interrupted by a quiet call from behind him.

"Harry? What are you doing here?"

The younger man whipped around and pelted down the steps to grab a hold of his father's very stiff shoulders. His curly, black and grey hair was thinning out, his pale skin was deeply wrinkled and his square glasses, who had been through so much in both wartime and peacetime, had seen better days. But the man who wore them still had a proud posture, and his cheeks were completely clear of stubble. His once so brilliantly sparkling, dark blue eyes were, however, not very focused and a bit blurry with moisture.

"Dad, what's wrong? Are you alright?" Harry demanded while looking very intently into the eyes of his father, which were looking back but almost through him, as if they didn't see him properly.

"Oh, me? Fine, just fine."

"And Mum?" Harry insisted, instantly catching the twitch the older man did at the mention of his wife. "What is it, where is she?"

Walter cast a quick glance to the staircase, and Harry immediately caught on, taking the steps two at a time as he flew upstairs with his father thundering on behind him, trying to stop him.

Without pause, he flung the door of his parents' bedroom open and swept into the shaded room, and completely choked up once he reached the bedside and took in the sight before him.

"Harry no, wait! You can't just rush in! Don't disturb her!"

"Mum?" Harry leaned in towards his mother's puffy face, noting the sickly shade of green to her pockmarked skin, as well as the purplish bruises all the way along her neck. "She's not breathing," he whispered brokenly, reaching out a hand towards her to feel for a pulse, but his hand was snatched away by his frantic looking father.

"STOP! You are not allowed, you must wait! They said so! The Healers are on their way, they told us to wait!"

Harry tried to break free with gentle movements, his eyes never leaving the still form of his mother. "This is Dragon Pox, Dad, there must be something I can do to stop it. Has she taken potions? Has she received help? Why is she..." He noticed a flask on the bedside table, the label reading: Dragon Pox cure. It was nearly empty – only a little splatter of clear purple in the bottom of it. "She's not immune to it, is she? I mean, it's nearly impossible, but... Why didn't anyone check? Didn't you see the signs? Why didn't anybody do anything? Why... There must be something I could do!"

Walter did his best to pull his youngest son away from Nicole's still body, but with little success. "Harry, we can't be here. She's contagious. The Healers told me we have to stay away from the body."

"The body?" Harry echoed in a childishly uncomprehending tone, backing away slowly as the realisation finally sunk in. She wasn't breathing. She wasn't waking up.

The hands pulling at him sunk away as Walter broke down in desperate sobs. The two of them stood like that for a long moment, just watching the lifeless body in the soft covers, letting tears run freely down their cheeks without even noticing.

The stillness was broken when, before Harry could stop him, his father flung himself onto the bed and crawled up to his wife, shaking her shoulders violently. "Nicky? Nicky, honey?... Please, please! You need to wake up!" He was crying openly, snot was running freely from his nostrils and his voice was shivering so much it was difficult making out what he mumbled about. But soon enough, the tone got louder, and he screamed. "Please! Please, wake up! Nicky, Nick, don't leave me here... no, please, no, no, no!"

Forcing himself out of his wretched stupor, Harry sprang forwards and forcefully pulled his father away from his dead wife and out of the room. He didn't stop there, but dragged him down the stairs and into the living room, where he firmly pushed him down into one of the old, wine-red couches.

The 75 year old wizard was hysterical, sobbing and shaking, pulling at his hair and rocking back and forwards. All Harry could do was put his arms around him, comfort him as best as he could while they waited for the appointed Healers to arrive, so that they could clear up what he already knew.

That he had been too late. That there was nothing to be done.

That Nicole Potter was dead.

Silence. Stillness. Solemnity.

Harry lay in his childhood room, in his small bed, and stared into the moonlit wall. The day had passed in a blur, full of tearful moments with his father and brother, long hours at the hospital, a quiet dinner in the kitchen downstairs.

But now, Harry was alone. The other two had fled. But he had stayed.

The empty house rang of oppressive silence.

Despite being warned by a soft, golden glow around the ring on his left hand, Harry started violently when there was a sudden, muffled crack next to the bed. Clad in heavy, black robes stood Tom, who looked around with open surprise. He put his trunk down and stared down at his partner's lying form with dawning realisation.

"Who?" he murmured while shrugging out of his cloak, and then his robes. He kicked off his boots and started to unbutton his shirt as Harry struggled to make his dry throat work.

"Mum," he croaked out, and Tom momentarily halted in his movements, before continuing to undress. Then, he waved his wand to enlarge the bed. Harry felt it shift but didn't move an inch. He felt Tom's chilled body crawl up against his back before a couple of strong arms wrapped themselves around him. He still didn't move, but his throat was clenching painfully, his heart was stinging, and his breathing became laboured.

A pair of warm, soft lips pressed down on the side of his neck, just below his ear. After a still moment, more feather-light kisses followed suit, and Harry lost all control. He crumbled together in deep sorrow and wept, safe in the knowledge he didn't have to be strong any more. He wasn't alone. Tom would take care of him.

"... I can't... I can't wear this... It's not right... I'll change."

"Harry," Tom said with a long suffering sigh from his seated position on the enlarged bed of Harry's childhood bedroom. "You look fine, you don't have to change again."

"No, no, it's alright, I'll just..." He ripped through the travelling trunk placed next to his wardrobe, searching for that right garment that would be proper. "... I can't wear a green tie to a funeral. I'm supposed to be in black, right? It's got to be black... why didn't I bring my tie? I'm so stupid!"

Spotting a silky, black fabric, he hastily pulled it loose and sighed deeply when he recognised it.

"There you go," said Tom, standing up to brush off his black trousers and then reaching out a beckoning hand towards his partner. "Come here, let me help you with that."

"This is a bow-tie," Harry whispered. "I can't wear a bow-tie to my mum's funeral. It's like saying it's a silly matter. I need to be serious, grown up. I can't have a bow around my neck."

Tom sighed, very deeply, and then loosened his own black tie and slung it around Harry's neck instead. "Here, you can have mine. I'll wear the bow-tie."

Harry fumbled with the tie nervously, sniffing against the thickness in his nose and wiping at his endlessly moist eyes.

"Come on."

They moved slowly through the otherwise empty home and toed into their carefully polished dress shoes before exiting through the front door and down the short gravel path towards the streets. Harry felt his right hand being grasped in a firm grip, and he was being led towards their destination, which was good because he could barely see anything through his blurred vision.

The sound their shoes made against the ground changed into a more poignant crunch, and Harry realised they'd arrived at the small church of Godric's Hollow. In front of its porch stood a small gathering of people, all clad in sombre black. When they got closer, and after he had wiped at his eyes again, he recognised most of them as his relatives.

They greeted him carefully and he greeted them back, quietly. The first ones to come up to him were his cousin Charlus and his wife Dorea, both of them just as healthy and handsome as they had been 25 years ago. Harry was held in a warm embrace by Charlus, and felt himself choke up in shivering misery once the comfort of a kind presence pressed itself onto him. He hugged back briefly before straightening and, once more, wiping at his leaking eyes.

"How are you?" Dorea asked with a worried frown, and Harry couldn't help but laugh a little.

"No, no I'm fine, considering." They all nodded in uncomfortable understanding. "How are things with you?"

"Oh, we're fine. Just fine," Charlus assured him, as if he didn't want to draw too much attention to himself. "You... where was it that you lived now, I've lost track."

"China, we've been living in Lóng cháo for... for about six months now..." Harry shot an uncertain look at Tom, who nodded encouragingly at him. "I've been working as a full-time Healer... It's a lot of work."

"Yes I've heard," Charlus said in toned down excitement. "You've made quite a name for yourself – well, both of you. What is it, you're combining traditional healing techniques with... Necromancy, was it?"

"Yes," Harry confirmed, so distracted by the conversation his eyes had finally stopped watering. "Well, last Wednesday, I resurrected a couple of feet."

"Feet?" Dorea asked in humoured surprise.

Harry smiled shakily, but was interrupted from continuing by the arrival of more people. Charlus and Dorea's son, Daniel. Behind him came his sweet, dark eyed wife Bonnie Potter, nee Applebee, leading the newest addition to the family by the hand: four year old Lora Potter.

They all exchanged their pleasantries, before Harry hunched down in front of the shy little girl, who tried her best to hide behind her mother's robes. "Hello Lora," he said and smiled a smile that he hoped was friendly and not simpering. "You've grown so much. How old are you now, three?"

The little girl shook her head violently, making her shoulder-length, black locks of hair bounce around her. Harry was almost floored by how similar to her namesake she was at that moment, although she had her mother's dark eyes and skin, rather than the fair complexion and blue eyes of Charlus' sister. She was utterly adorable.

"I'm four," she chirped in outrage and crinkled her eyebrows, making Harry hold his hands up in defeat.

"I'm so sorry, four, of course. Wow, four years already, huh?" He stood up to address her parents instead. "They grow up fast, don't they?"

Time passed as he greeted the tearful friends of his mother, some of them from work, others from the sewing circle she had been a faithful member of. He also greeted his mother's Muggle brother, Louis Bird, with wife, children and grandchildren. Then, there were few inhabitants of Godric's Hollow who had come to pay their respects as well: old Miss Bagshot, Mr and Mrs McGonagall and the oldest in the Linwood family. Thankfully, in Harry's opinion, his strange second cousin Lambert had refrained from showing up.

Closest to the church doors stood his father and old Aunt Katherine, who now lived in Harry's late Grandmother Arabella Potter's old home in Godric's Hollow, which was also where Walter had stayed for the last couple of days to escape his own home. Charlus and Dorea had taken over the old house in Little Hangleton, and Daniel and his family had bought a new house close by in the same village. Harold, on the other hand, still lived in Godric's Hollow with his own family, also in a new house that he had mostly built himself.

The two elders stood close together, the witch supporting the openly miserable wizard, and exchanged pleasantries with Harry and Tom for a short while. Then, the late arrivals showed up.

Harold pushed through the crowd and came straight towards them, wrapping Harry into a crushing embrace once he reached them. All control immediately slipped away for the both of them, and their emotions were flooding over, making them weep on each other's shoulders like a couple of small children. When they finally pulled away, they were both reluctant to let go of each other's shoulders.

"Tom," Harold said in a very thick voice and twisted his lips into a grimace that was probably supposed to be a smile.

Tom nodded once at him with a stony expression. "Harold, my condolences."

The older wizard nodded back and breathed out shakily. "Thank you."

Harry was once again embraced, this time by his sister-in-law: Keylee Potter, nee Emmett. Little had he suspected that the kind and supporting Quidditch Captain from his youth would one day become the wife of his brother – or, more accurately, his own grandmother.

From behind her, Harry caught sight of his hazel eyed little nephew. "Uncle Harry!" ten year old James Potter exclaimed and attached himself onto his right side in a fierce hug. "Are you sad too? Dad's been crying all night."

Harry smiled weakly and ruffled the already messy hair affectionately. "We're all sad, kiddo. Aren't you?"

The young boy hid his face in the black robes in front of him, but nodded his agreement.

Once everyone had arrived, they all moved to the appointed burial spot in the graveyard and came to a stop in a circle around the polished, walnut coffin on front of the tombstone. Engraved in it, below the symbol of a small bird, stood in curled letters:

Nicole Potter

Born: 1897

Died: 1970

They all stretched out their lit up wands towards the walnut chest, the children and Muggles their naked hands, and the ceremony started. Harry watched through blurry eyes as golden magic swirled through the air around the coffin as their Latin murmurings mixed into a quiet hymn. One by one, they stepped forwards and placed one white rose each onto the lid of life's last bed. When all of them were done, the chest started hovering before descending through the grass and into the ground. As it disappeared from sight, the lazy swirls of magic sped up into a miniature tornado, before fading away into the air.

The only ones powerful enough to have seen the spectacular sight were Harry and Tom, but every grown up sorcerer in attendance knew that the magic had been present, blessing the grave and Nicole's body from all potential harm. It would be left in peace.

The lights of the wands went out, and the ceremony was over.

A/N: Hope you enjoyed the first chapter, although it was a bit sad. I realise the Potter family connections can be a little confusing, so I will publish a family tree on my author's page if you want to have a look.

On a much, much happier note, the wonderful and sweet smilingcrescent has painted an amazing piece for By Your Side. It is a beautiful painting of Tom, Harry and Mort. Check it out on my author's page and give our sweet artist lots and lots of love.

Thank you for reading!

Mischief managed!

(P.S. To BlueAnchor: Once again, you've managed to write an outstanding review that made me laugh and grin and laugh and grin. Yes, I do get the tingly magical feeling, right before posting the chapters. I'm pretty sure condoms have existed for a very long time, although not in plastic but other more or less convenient materials. I liked the new RST, like you said, the lyrics rang well with Tom's feelings. I feel really privileged to have a friend like you (although I can still not contact you privately and shower you with love *grumbles bitterly* One day!) If you ever decide to publish something, please, let me know. I'll be waiting! :) *returns your huge squishing hug* Fairfarren! Oh yeah, about the "break a leg": it's considered bad luck for actors to wish each other good luck before entering the stage, so they started to wish each other bad luck instead, not to jinx each other. That's why it's called "break a leg".)