Author's note: For the purposes of this story, the events of Half-Blood Prince did not happen. For one thing, I've only read the book once and don't really remember details, for another, it sucked. I haven't really decided what did happen in Harry's sixth year, but I'm sure that will make itself apparent as the story goes on.
Disclaimer: If you recognize it, I don't own it. Potterverse belongs to Rowling and Buffyverse belongs to Whedon. And that's that. I doubt I can even lay claim to the plot – there are no original ideas anymore.
Cross-posted to Twisting the Hellmouth.
Chapter 1 – Stuck in the Middle
Clowns to the left of me
Jokers to the right
Here I am
Stuck in the middle with you
-Steve Miller
It was the summer before seventh year. Harry and the Weasleys were just finishing breakfast when a large black owl swooped in through the open window and dropped a letter onto Harry's plate. The bird was gone as quickly and as silently as it had come, not even stopping to rest its wings.
Ron frowned at his best friend. "Who's it from, Harry?" he asked. Harry shrugged, turning the letter over.
"There's no return address. Just this seal." He indicated the ornate dragon stamped into the emerald green wax. Arthur, who was gathering his things to go to work, glanced over Harry's shoulder and gave a little gasp.
"Harry, that's Draco Malfoy's seal."
Harry turned around quickly, his brows knitted. "Malfoy's?"
The head of the Weasley house nodded. "He took on that seal when he took over the Malfoy estate this summer. He's been corresponding heavily with the Ministry in order to set all the paperwork straight."
Harry nodded. Narcissa Malfoy had taken ill soon after her husband had been sent to Azkaban, and had died near the end of June, about three weeks before. It made sense that Draco was probably very busy getting his inheritance under control.
Gingerly, as if expecting the letter to explode (which, knowing Malfoy, was a possibility), he slid his finger under the seal and popped it open, unfolding the parchment. The script on the page was neat and precise, in emerald green ink. He began reading aloud.
Potter,
I know it probably comes as a shock that I, of all people, would be writing you. Rest assured that I still hate you as much as ever, and only under these very unusual circumstances would I degrade myself by communicating with you.
Ron snorted. "Good to know he hasn't changed."
As you most likely already know, my mother is dead and my father...incapacitated. As a result, I am the sole heir of the Malfoy estate, and as such, have been very busy these past few weeks doing paperwork, closing my parent's accounts at various establishments, and sorting through their things. While doing so, I happened to come across my mother's journal. Naturally, I read it. What I found shocked me.
Your father had an affair with my mother.
There were gasps all around. Harry's eyes went wide, reading the statement over and over again. It just wasn't possible that his father would do such a thing to his mother, not in a hundred years.
Ginny nudged him slightly, indicating he should keep reading. Harry did so, numb.
I can just see your face. I know, I was upset as well. But I couldn't just stop reading there.
It would seem that several years before either you or I were born, during their seventh year, my mother met your father in a pub. Both had been drinking heavily. One thing led to another – I won't bore you with the details – and in the morning both woke up with hangovers, barely remembering what had happened. They were so disgusted with each other that they vowed never to speak of it to a living soul, sealed it in blood, and never saw each other again.
I would not have bothered to inform you of this...indiscretion, except that the story does not end there.
What your father – and of course, my father – never knew was that my mother became pregnant by your father.
Harry stopped again, soaking in the implications of that statement, before Ginny's comforting hand again prompted him to keep going.
Mother was still in school, of course, so she used a very advanced potion to disguise her pregnancy. Professor Snape was one of her best friends, and the only one outside of Dumbledore who knew of her condition. She couldn't tell him who the father was, as the blood magic would have killed her, but he helped her nevertheless, protecting her from my father's wrath and the ridicule of the Wizarding world.
She gave birth to a baby boy at the beginning of summer, just before she married my father. Snape took the baby and placed him in a Muggle orphanage in America, as far away as he could take him. No one ever spoke of it again, but the blood magic did not prevent her from writing about it.
In case you missed the full implications of all this, Potter, you and I share a half-brother, a pureblood Wizard who is probably very powerful. All I know about him is that he was adopted somewhere in America, his name is Alexander, and he would be 21 now.
I intend to find him. You may or may not wish to help me.
-Malfoy
Harry set down the letter with shaking fingers, looking around the table at Ron, Ginny, Arthur, Molly, and the twins, who were all staring at him with wide eyes and slack jaws.
"Blimey," Ron whispered.
Ginny jumped up and retrieved a quill, ink and a parchment. She set them in front of Harry, who looked up at her in surprise.
"Ginny...?"
"Harry, you've got to write him back. Tell him you'll help him find your brother."
"Gin, it's probably a trap!" Fred exclaimed. "What if it's just some plot Malfoy cooked up to get Harry to lower his defenses?"
"What if it's not?" Ginny challenged. "What if everything was true, and Harry ignored Malfoy, and Malfoy found Alexander? One brother would have come after him, and one would have ignored his existence! Malfoy would have no trouble turning him against Harry!"
"Ginny's right." Harry said softly. "If he's as powerful as Malfoy thinks...and Malfoy gets to him first..." He trailed off as the implications set in.
Dipping the quill into the ink, Harry began to write.