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Chapter Text

Renato has just turned thirteen and his name is finally gaining weight in the underworld. He is thirteen and his hands are already tainted with blood. He doesn’t really care, even though he sometimes thinks he should.

(His mama would have wanted him to.)

Renato is thirteen, four feet nine, and his eyes are cold even though they are brown. His life has not been kind to him, but he’s stubborn; he’s determined. His life is his, and no matter what it throws at him, he will raise up to the challenge and win.

Renato is thirteen, and one night he awakens in a different mindscape for the first time.

The muscles in his back tense for a second before relaxing, fluid and graceful, and his hand closes over his Glock. He barely moves as he analyzes the undefined space with eyes hidden in the shadows of his hat.

What is this? Mist Flames? He can’t sense them, not even after opening up his senses and reaching.

There’s a tug on his pants and he doesn’t jump. His muscles obey his training, so before his conscious mind registers there is a threat, his Glock is already turned down, pointed directly between the eyes of the offender who has evaded all his senses.

Huge, innocent green eyes peer up at him, shining with undisguised curiosity, and Renato freezes. The owner of the eyes blinks and crosses them a bit, trying to focus on the weapon, and it is then that Renato realizes what he’s doing. He quickly secures his weapon in the holster strapped to the small of his back and takes a hasty step away from the goddamn baby.

Then it clicks.

A baby. His soulmate is a baby.

Renato doesn’t know if he should laugh, cry, or shoot something. Because of course.

The child gurgles and claps his hands in a careless show of happiness, and Renato can only manage a glower in response, not that the brat seems to care. Instead, it squeals and lifts demanding arms, completely disregarding Renato’s dark scowl.

Narrowing his eyes, Renato studies the tiny thing, but does not approach.

One year old. Happy. A mop of dark hair and soft, tanned skin. Chubby. A pair of startlingly green eyes that are becoming brighter and bigger and… is that a pout?

Alarms blare in his mind. He doesn’t want to deal with a bawling baby, thank you very much, and if bending to the little creature’s demands and lifting it awkwardly in his arms is the only way to avoid the waterworks, then he’d gladly forsake his pride and carry the thing. It’s not that there’s anyone else there to be a witness.

The baby is heavier and lighter than he thought, and it giggles the moment Renato perches it on his bony hip, all sadness forgotten. He hadn’t thought much about his sideburns until the tiny monster has access to them, but if letting it play with them makes the crying stop, then—

“Argh, no! Don’t do that!” He’s way too old to whine, so he’s not. He’s not. He’s just complaining vehemently against the baby’s decision to suck on his goddamn hair. Why is this his life? “Let go, bad baby.”

And it seems that the little being understood, or at least got the meaning of Renato’s tone, because he slowly releases the now soggy curl, eyes filling with fresh tears.

Oh, no, Renato thinks, and then he’s mentally and crudely swearing before trying to calm down and summon some kind of smile to his face. It felt… stiff and terribly awkward and almost foreign, pulling muscles that he’s almost forgotten how to use. (How long has it been since he last smiled? Truly smiled. Not a smirk, a smile. Probably when his mama was still alive, before… Before.)

“It’s fine, bambino,” he says, trying to make the words soft, like he remembers listening from his mama when he was a kid himself. (He’s thirteen now, but he hasn’t been a kid for years.) Like the smile, it doesn’t feel quite right, but it seems to help. “I’m not mad at you.”

The baby sniffles once, then peers at him beneath wet eyelashes, and Renato’s heart constricts in his chest. He smiles again, more genuine, and the baby answers with a truly breathtaking, beaming smile.

Ugh. Damn, his soulmate is the cutest little thing ever.

Chapter Text

Six months pass before the next dream, and when it comes, Renato is immediately on guard.

Something is wrong. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

He takes out his gun and squints at the darkness, senses keyed up and alert, ready for any kind of attack. The dream feels strangely different and it takes a moment for Renato to pinpoint the source. (Don’t blame him; he’s not yet used to how the dreams work, after all, it’s only his second time.)

A startled gasp makes him turn on his feet, looking around in the darkness and—that’s it. The difference.

Last time they were in a large space, airy and warm. He had felt safe there, embraced by a sense of comfort and love. Soft blues, crèmes and yellow golds had mixed indistinctly as they swirled and danced around them, undisturbed and unassuming as they interacted, slow enough to not result dizzying.

Now, however, the place is dark, damp and oppressive, as if they were cramped inside a minuscule space, even though there are no discernible walls. Renato’s alarm grows, because he knows that mindscapes are a reflection of the state of mind and living conditions of their owners and he recognizes instinctively that this one is not his. (Not at this point in time.)

“Bambino?” he calls softly, lowering the gun but not putting it away just yet. Being cautious has saved his life many times already, and therefore it’s an instinct that’s worth cultivating, even if he knows he’s safe. Even more so now that he has discovered his soulmate’s existence, who would become an immediate target if it ever got out that ‘Reborn’ has such a big weak point.

(He may be rather young and may still be considered rather new to the workings of the Mafia, but Renato is cunning and sly and adaptable, not to mention pretty deft at handling guns and using his Flames. He’s rapidly making a name for himself in the underworld, and his life will continue in that venue in the foreseeable future because hitmen simply do not quit. Cannot quit. Not if they become as famous as Renato is becoming. It is too late to pull out now, and the only viable way to secure his little soulmate’s safety is by reaching the very top. Only when he is feared enough that nobody would dare try anything against him will he dare to seek his soulmate in real life. Until then, the dreams will have to be enough.)

At the sound of his voice, the darkness shudders, wavers, as if was something tangible about to break. A spot of light appears, dim and barely there, but bright enough for Renato to distinguish his soulmate’s small silhouette.

He’s sitting on the floor, curled around himself in a way that Renato is intimately familiar with, which fills his stomach with lead.

A small step forward and the boy flinches away, and Renato… Renato is going to murder someone. Because someone has dared to harm what was his, and such thing will not—can not—go unpunished.

It’s a struggle to get himself under control, to get his breathing even, but he forces himself to do so because the kid is already scared and seeing Renato slip into a murdering rage is not going to help. So he breathes deeply through the nose once, twice, three times, and once he reigns in his temper he secures the gun behind his back.

He looks around again. Scowls. The place is still gloomy and dark, and not at all conducive to coax his little one into a calmer state. The easiest solution would be for Renato to create some light himself, though he doesn’t know how to go about it, or if it is even possible. His Flames, perhaps? Do they even work inside dreams?

Shrugging mentally, he figures there’s nothing to lose if he tries and extends his right hand in front of him, palm up and fingers barely closed. Bright yellow surges in a lick of flame, easy as breathing, as if they were alive and eager to obey their master.

The crackling sound and the sudden brightness get an immediate response from the toddler. Renato watches from the corner of his eye as the boy slowly uncurls and bright green eyes focus on him with a sort of curious wariness.

Meanwhile, Renato inspects him right back, and the anger he had so carefully caged in before threatens to resurface with a vengeance now that he can see the state his soulmate is in. Dressed in clothes way too big for him, too dirty to be the result of a happy day playing outside, the little boy looks worse-for-wear. The hollowness of his cheeks results jarring when compared with Renato’s memory of a chubby, smiling baby. The expression in his eyes does not belong to a two-year-old, either.

Murder. Definitely.

Someone, someday, is going to die.

Not letting his rage show on his face is harder than ever, but he manages. Cautiously, as if he were approaching a hurt wild animal, he approaches the boy and slowly crouches down in order to get closer to his level and seem less of a threat. He still leaves enough space between them for the boy not to feel trapped.

The little one regards him for a minute, tense, before he hesitantly relaxes as it becomes clear that Renato is not going to hurt him in any way. Green eyes stop focusing on Renato’s face to look down curiously towards his hands and, particularly, the bright yellow Flames dancing on them. Renato smiles—he’s practiced, okay? He’s had six months since the first dream to do so, and now it almost, almost comes naturally—and extends his left hand towards him to inspect. He passively observes as the boy tips his body a little towards him, but doesn’t move. The boy waits a moment, little hand hovering in the air towards the Flames but not quite reaching yet, and Renato makes a small gesture of encouragement.

“Go on,” he says, gently. It’s all that’s needed for the boy to approach.

He reaches with a single small finger and quickly tries to touch the Flames, before snatching his hand back and cradling it close to his chest. He frowns and looks down at it, then wiggles all five fingers. His eyes grow in surprise and his face brightens in amazement as he looks at Renato’s face, then his Flames, then back to his face.

“Pwetty,” he says, almost reverently and with a small lisp, and with that single word Renato now knows that his soulmate’s native language is English, not Italian. He’s really glad now that he already knows the basics and can have a basic conversation in it, or communication might have become complicated between them in the near future. “Touch?”

Renato will make sure to instill the ‘no touching’ rule for fire soon, because he doesn’t want his little soulmate getting hurt because he thought all fire was the same as his Flames when he’s controlling them, but that’s going to be later, when he has gained the little one’s trust. For now, he will let him play with his Flames, safe in the knowledge that they won’t hurt him.

He smiles and nods his head, and the boy brightens. The smile he gives is smaller, shier than the one he got six months before, but sincere and heartfelt, and Renato swears that he’s going to do everything in his power to protect that smile from now on.

Chapter Text

They meet with increasing frequency after that. Renato knows that it is not a common occurrence, not really. From all the stories he’s heard, all the literature he’s read about soulmate bonds, he’s only been able to figure out that it’s not common at all to have met when one of them is still so young, nor that they see each other in dreams so frequently.

However, even if it is a little bit preoccupying, Renato is thankful.

The bond helps to make the boy grow comfortable with him rather quickly, and he starts asking lots of questions and politely requesting to play with Renato’s Flames every time they meet, his green eyes bright with curiosity and excitement.

He’s glad.

He’s glad to provide a safe place for his soulmate to be a kid, to be himself without fear of repercussion.

Not like his relatives.

Renato can say with utmost sincerity that he loathes his little soulmate’s relatives with a passion.

It doesn’t take much to coax the bambino into telling him how he’s treated at home, and Renato isn’t even partially placated by the knowledge that his Aunt and Uncle don’t beat him up. He knows from first-hand experience that while being physically abused hurts, it is the emotional and psychological abuse inflicted which causes the most durable and worst damage. Broken ribs heal, bloody noses stop leaking, purple bruises disappear. Being constantly and systematically put down and ordered around without any kind of reward? That has serious repercussions in the development of a child’s personality. Being starved? Slow torture, cruel and barbaric. Especially when there are resources available to cover all necessities and, judging from the comments the little one makes about ‘Dudley’, Renato knows that the family has enough money to raise both children properly.

So for him, it is obvious that they, for some reason, hate his little soulmate.

(In turn, Renato hates them right back—with a vengeance. And the hate of a hitman is not something that anyone should be keen on inspiring towards themselves.

Those pigs don’t know it, but that doesn’t mean that Reborn is going to go easy on them once he has the chance to do so.

No way in hell.)

The only reason he hasn’t yet stormed off to take the little one away is the fact that he doesn’t know where he is. Sure, he speaks English, and with a British accent, if Renato’s not wrong, but that doesn’t exactly make things easier for him. He also knows that the little one lives with three people: Aunt, Uncle and Dudley, which Renato assumes is the couple’s kid, and thus his soulmate’s cousin.

But that is it.

He doesn’t even know his soulmate’s name.

(His teeth clench and Renato feels his blood boil calling for murder whenever he remembers the night in which he had asked for it, and the only answer he received was an innocent “Boy.”)

It hasn’t helped at all that he still doesn’t have a steady position in the Mafia, and thus has to be really careful in his movements. He doesn’t want to make a mistake—just a single wrong move can spell his demise, and where would that leave his soulmate? With the only emotional support in his life absent, Renato dreads to imagine what could become of him. The boy may self-destruct.

So he’s doing what little he can. He listens to the chatter, answers every question he can, promises to look up the answers he cannot give. He comforts the little one when he has nightmares, rebuts his relatives’ claims about his worth, teaches him how to be sneaky enough to avoid punishments and get enough food. He teaches him English and Italian and when he eventually starts learning French, the little boy learns it right on par with him.

Three years pass in this rhythm, and slowly things start to look up for them both.

He might not have had permission, but the little boy still ate, regaining most of the baby fat he shouldn’t have lost in the first place. That doesn’t mean that he’s fat in any way; rather he’s still rather skinny and small, and will probably forever be short, but it’s better than what it could have been. Renato teaches him how to ignore his relatives' taunts and trains him to take everything they say with a grain of salt, because they thrive on lying to him, so it’s better to not take anything they say to heart.

Renato teaches him to be true to himself, and that the only people worthy to be his friends are the ones who will like him just as he is.

On the other hand, Renato himself has grown. He’s now almost eighteen, with barely a month to go before he becomes an adult in his home country, and has become a freelance hitman who’s frequently commissioned to do big jobs. His name is becoming known; there are whispers that spread with growing awe retelling some of his best marks, and there’s a buzzing sense of curiosity about this new player and just who he is. These things are both good and bad. Good, because they mean more money and fame (which put him in a better position to care for his little one), and bad, because it creates a higher risk of death. Not to say that Renato is ever careless or sloppy—he’s not about to die that easily, not when he has something so important to protect—but it is riskier, nonetheless.

Then, one particular night in September, Renato awakes in the familiar shared dreamscape only to be immediately attacked. The small body flings itself at him, babbling excitedly in an eclectic mix of English and Italian with a little hint of French, and Renato catches him only because he has fast reflexes. He laughs at the boy’s enthusiasm and twirls him around, and the boy laughs in delight.

Renato sits on the ground with his boy perched in his lap, facing him, and smiles.

“What has you so excited?” he asks teasingly, with just a hint of curiosity shining in his dark eyes. “I didn’t understand a word of what you just said. You need to breathe, sometimes, you know?”

The boy pouts petulantly for about a second, then beams.

“I started school today!” he chirps, focusing even more of Renato’s attention on him. The boy only grins, and it’s not until Renato makes a questioning sound in the back of his throat that he keeps going. “Guess, guess! Miss Turner told me my name! It’s Harry!”

Renato is elated. Finally, finally he has a proper name to call his bambino!

His boy—his Harry—laughs in delight and Renato can’t help but join in, letting the laugh rumble in his chest and flow freely, just as happy. Harry throws small arms around Renato’s neck and Renato hugs him back, until their laughs calm down. They stay that way for a long, comfortable moment before Harry (and oh, how good it feels to say it, how right) wiggles and moves until he’s free from Renato’s embrace.

Renato lifts a brow in question when Harry stands in front of him, face serious, and sticks out his little hand towards him.

“It’s nice to meet you, Mr. Ren,” he says. “My name is Harry, Harry Potter.”

Renato smirks and indulges the boy, adopting an air of solemnity as he clasps the offered hand firmly. It must look a bit ridiculous, seeing as he is still sitting on the floor with his legs crossed, but it puts them roughly at the same height, so it works.

“The pleasure is all mine, Mr. Potter. I am Renato Sinclair, at your service.”

Chapter Text

Renato has known since the very beginning that Harry is special. It still amazes him, however, when he one day discovers that he’s even more special than the two of them would have ever imagined.

There had always been signs of it, and at the beginning, Renato believed it to be an unconscious use of Harry’s Flames. Perhaps Mist Flames, if the descriptions Harry made were accurate.

(Like the time he turned one of his teacher’s wig blue, or the times when small things he wished for were suddenly in his hands, or the time Petunia had tried to force him into a particularly ugly old sweater of Dudley and it kept shrinking and shrinking until it was the ideal size for a doll.)

But… Mist Flames don’t act like that, not really. They definitely don’t make hair grow overnight, and they don’t let people talk to snakes. Sun Flames could do the first one, though they’d require active flames and precise control, neither of which Harry has. And the second, well. The incident at the zoo during Dudley’s birthday convinces Renato it can’t be Flames, because if there is any kind of Flame that gives their users the ability to talk to animals—or snakes, whatever—the fact would be already widely known in the underworld.

So Renato is pretty sure that Harry’s abilities did not rely on Dying Will Flames at all, and had accepted that fact long before the boy’s birthday arrived.

That’s probably the only reason why he isn’t overly surprised when Harry lets him know one night, barely a week before the thirty-first of July, that a suspicious letter had arrived for him that morning, claiming that he is a wizard and that he has been enrolled in a school for magic.

Magic, of all things.

“And what did you do?” he asks, curious about the way Harry handled the situation.

“Um,” Harry says sheepishly. “Well, I waited to open the letter until after I was locked back in my cupboard for the night, because I knew it would be stupid to read it in front of the Dursleys, so I haven’t done anything yet. I just—” He scratches his head with a finger and looks hopefully at Renato. “What do you think?”

Renato purses his lips and raises an eyebrow. Harry smiles, the picture of innocence, but Renato is not fooled.

“What were you planning to do?” he prods, crossing his arms and absently tapping a rhythm with his index finger against his bicep. “Walk me through it.”

Harry huffs, predictably. Renato likes to challenge him, to make him think for himself and make his own decisions. Harry doesn’t particularly like it, especially because Renato is also fond of letting him shoulder the consequences of his actions, good or bad.

(How else is he going to learn to be independent, otherwise? He’s Renato’s soulmate, and as such, he’ll sooner or later enter the world of the Mafia. He needs to learn to think on his feet and make snap-shot decisions that will keep him alive, as well as come up with thought-out plans that will keep him on top. Renato can’t afford to let him be clueless; he won’t lose his soulmate for something as petty as coddling.

Of course, if Harry starts biting more than he can chew, then Renato will cut in and stir him away towards other, more favorable options.)

“I’ll write back,” Harry says, after a moment of thinking it over. He hesitates a bit before elaborating: “It says there that they await my owl, whatever that means. Maybe an actual owl? The letter does mention that we can take a cat, a toad or an owl to school, so… maybe they use them to carry mail?”

Renato nods, encouragingly. Harry shifts from foot to foot and grins.

“So I write back and say I want to go, and ask for more information. Ask them to send a teacher? So that they can explain what all of this means, because half of the things in that letter are gibberish to me and where do I even go to buy my things? It’s as if they expected for me to already know all that!” he exclaims, upset. He frowns and looks down, mulling it over. “Maybe I should? Maybe… maybe Vernon and Petunia know and they should have told me… but of course, they didn’t.”

Renato is so proud. Harry may not like to have to think things out by himself, but once he tries he does so marvelously.

“Good. That’s a pretty valid deduction and a solid plan,” he praises, and Harry beams. “However,” Renato stresses, and Harry deflates a bit, “you can’t forget the possibility that this might be just a prank. The number of details makes it sound too elaborate, true, but you shouldn’t just discard it.”

Harry nods, accepting the point even when both of them are pretty sure that the letter is more than likely genuine. After all, if Renato can harness the power of his soul via Dying Will Flames, then why shouldn’t Harry be able to wield magic?

Chapter Text

“… and then I got an owl! She’s white like snow, so I guess that’s why her species is called ‘Snowy.’ I saw her as we passed Eeylops Owl Emporium and it was like, like a call, you know? Like if something was guiding me to her, so I bought her. She’s so beautiful.”

“And what did you name her?”

“Hedwig. Her name’s Hedwig. She seemed to like it. She’s very intelligent! I really want you to meet her,” Harry adds wistfully.

“And Professor McGonagall didn’t protest?”

“Not at all! She said that it was well within the regulations to own one, and then she said that I had chosen a ‘very fine specimen, Mr. Potter, I’m sure she’ll be a most delightful companion’,” he says, trying to imitate his new professor’s speech patterns and tone.

Harry’s gamble worked out. The morning after they talked, he carefully composed a response in a piece of paper he tore from an old notebook. In it, he thanked the Deputy Headmistress and politely asked for a representative to be sent to his house at their earliest convenience to explain the magical world to him. He then dubiously looked outside for the owl he’d theorized would be taking his letter, and to his great surprise, an actual owl dropped in front of him, leg already extended in an imperious gesture of clear invitation. Harry attached the letter to the bird’s leg with wary curiosity, and then watched in amazement and wonder as it flew away, disappearing into the horizon.

The next day, the Deputy Headmistress herself knocked on Number Four’s door and was almost thrown out on her behind by Harry’s Aunt Petunia.

Apparently, Professor McGonagall is one of those no-nonsense types of woman who would not accept such treatment and had both the ability and the confidence necessary to stand her ground. She barged right in in the politest way Harry has ever seen and immediately commanded the use of the sitting room with only a flick of her wand.

(An actual wand!)

She sat Harry down and explained, succinctly and to the point, that yes, magic exists and that there’s a hidden society that is filled with wizards and witches who have their own government, and that yes, he’s a wizard and as such he belongs in that world. She also explained that he was born in that world, that both his parents were magical and that they had attended Hogwarts, and that they had already paid for his tuition before they died.

She then invited him to ask questions and, being the little information hoarder that he is (and knowing that Renato was going to squeeze him dry for information once they shared another dream), Harry took full advantage of the kind offer.

He learned more than a lot.

For starters,  he is apparently a very famous figure in the Wizarding World. The reason? He survived a murder attempt when he was a baby when his parents did not. Because they were murdered. By a dark wizard with the ridiculous name of Voldemort. Who killed Harry’s parents and tried to kill Harry but couldn’t and then disappeared. Oh, and there’s the scar on his forehead. It’s apparently a curse scar, and it was enough to make him famous.

McGonagall looked sad and angry as she explained all this (after lashing out furiously at the Dursleys for not having told Harry anything), and Harry was certainly not impressed. He was right when he thought Renato wouldn’t be, either.

(“Your family was targeted by a crazy murdering wizard and your parents were killed. Right in front of you, a baby. You were left an orphan after surviving a terrible experience with head trauma and then immediately shipped to your horrible relatives. And instead of wondering about your well being all the wizards managed to do was celebrate the end of the war and put you in some kind of a pedestal? Without your knowledge? And then they dare use your name and image to commercialize a huge range of products and books without your consent or your guardian’s? Yeah, no. We’re filling a lawsuit. They won’t get another penny—knut—whatever it’s called. Lawyers. Do they have lawyers? Or does everything run through those wicked goblins you told me about?)

After two hours of continuous interrogation over biscuits and tea, McGonagall finally convinced Harry to let her take him to Diagon Alley to buy his textbooks and the rest of the materials he would need for the start of his schooling. Harry tried to protest—he still had many questions he wanted answered!—but the woman promised to keep answering as they went, so Harry relented.

Harry memorized the way to the Alley—Always know where you are and how you got there. You never know when that information will be useful—and the pattern that revealed its hidden entrance. Then he was momentarily amazed by the magic he could almost feel emanating from all the different, colorful shops.

After a visit to Gringotts and a small chat with the goblins, Harry went all out. He had money to spend, now, so he was going to use it.

He bought clothes for school and some for daily wear, and planned to convert some of his gold into pounds to buy a sensible non-magical wardrobe afterward. He also bought the standard potions kit and replacements for all his ingredients. He used quite a big sum of gold to buy a nice, sturdy trunk with two compartments with extension charms built in, to which he added two extra features for an extra galleon: a shrinking charm and a voice-commanded password. The seller was very accommodating and gave Harry a discount of two sickles when he eyed a backpack with similar enchantments and added it to his list of purchases.

It was only after he finished with all the small, necessary things that Harry went for the books. Professor McGonagall was terribly amused as she witnessed the boy create three piles of books on the counter, at least triple the amount of the books requested for the first year.

(“Well, Mr. Potter. I believe I won’t be seeing you in Gryffindor come September, after all. It’s a pity, as I was quite looking forward to having you in my House, but I’m sure you will have an excellent time in Ravenclaw.”)

The wand (eleven inches, holly, with a phoenix feather core and “curious,” according to Mr. Ollivander) and Hedwig were the very last stops before the Professor accompanied him back to the Durlseys’.

She didn’t leave him immediately, however. Instead, she insisted in helping Harry unpack his new things, forcing Petunia to show them to the guest’s room as she didn’t want to lose even more face and risk provoking the wrath of an armed and powerful witch.

Saying that McGonagall was not the least bit impressed with the obviously unused room was a severe understatement. She rounded up on Petunia and stated in a calm yet predatory tone that she was going to make some slight changes to Harry’s room, since he now has so many new things, you understand, Mrs. Dursley, and that she was quite hopeful that they would stay there from now on. Petunia hastily agreed, looking ghostly pale, and McGonagall was generous enough to inform her that she was going to be personally talking with Mr Dursley about the matter at hand, so she was now free to go and do whatever she normally did on Thursday nights.

Once they were left alone, the witch kindly asked Harry what he wanted done and Harry enthusiastically started making suggestions, giddy with the knowledge that he now had a proper room and that the Dursleys were not going to kick him out and lock him in the cupboard the moment McGonagall left the house.

In that moment, Minerva McGonagall became both a little boy’s and a hitman’s second favorite person in the whole world. (The first being each other, of course.)

Chapter Text

Harry is glad for the extra enchantments he asked for when he bought his trunk.

Hedwig’s cage alone is doing enough work of calling attention to himself, and Harry honestly didn’t like it one bit. With his trunk shrunk and inside his backpack, he has a relatively easy time waving through the masses on King’s Cross, but he doesn’t want to imagine the nightmare it would have been if he had to push around a cart.

He finally arrives at the barrier between platforms 9 and 10, stops, and takes a deep breath. It’s only an illusion, he tells himself, and breathes out. Squaring his shoulders and trying to not look too suspicious, Harry calmly walks until he’s going through the seemingly solid wall. He can’t help but close his eyes, though—it’s easier if he doesn’t see it coming. One, two, three steps. He takes two more just in case, and then half-opens one eye to check. A huge, bright scarlet train looms in front of him, and Harry exhales loudly in relief. He’s done it!

He smiles, posture relaxing, and adjusts the straps of his backpack over his thin shoulders. He looks around with curious eyes, but there doesn’t seem to be any people around quite yet.

It’s early—barely nine-thirty, and the train parts at eleven o’clock—but Harry is following Ren’s request to inspect both the platform and the train before the place becomes full to the brim. Harry certainly doesn’t mind. Sure, he doesn’t have it that bad at his relatives’, and it has even improved since Professor McGonagall’s visit in July (he now has his own bedroom!), but he had been rather eager to remove himself from the house and get as far away from its inhabitants as he could, anyway. It’ll be nine whole months before Harry has to see them again, and he couldn’t be happier.

Well, no. Actually, he could be.

It would be nice to have Ren here to see him off, but Harry understands that it is not possible.

He might be eleven now, but Harry still doesn’t know what Ren does for a living. He knows, however, that it’s really dangerous, and that it sometimes requires for Ren to leave Italy altogether and hide for a while.

(Harry suspects he’s some kind of super-secret-spy, like those in the movies or shows he sometimes catches glimpses of when Dudley is watching them on the living room. It fits! The man is always dressed in black and very nicely, and when he wears his hat—a fedora, kid. A fedora, not a hat—he looks really mysterious and cool.

Oh, and the gun. Harry shouldn’t forget the gun.)

When Ren told him that he was not going to be able to make it in time, Harry was understandably upset, but accepted it as a fact of life. Ren has sworn that they will meet one day and that after that day they will not be separated again, and Harry believes him. He can be patient.

(Which doesn’t mean he can’t be sad about it, anyway.)

Harry looks around the platform for about five minutes and, after surmising that there’s nothing particularly interesting about it (except for the row of fireplaces, which he believes are meant for what he’s read is called ‘Floo travel’), he decides to scout the train and select a compartment.

At eleven o’clock, he’s glad he chose to do so.

There are hundreds of Hogwarts students crossing the barrier, many of them with their whole families, with only fifteen minutes left before the train departs. The crowd is a bit frantic as children hug their parents goodbye and friends find each other after months of vacation. Smaller kids struggle to walk around their older classmates to get inside the train. Harry grimaces in sympathy when he sees a chubby blond boy trip and let go of his toad. He won’t have an easy time finding it again, Harry thinks.

Well-wishes and last minute warnings resonate as the train lets out the last whine making people hurry up and board. There are some tearful goodbyes as the train starts moving, and Harry looks at the crowd of families watching them go with a pang of want. A little redhead girl runs alongside the train for some minutes, but then she’s quickly left behind as it picks up speed.

When the station is completely out of sight, Harry lets himself slump back onto his seat and sighs.

Then, the door of his compartment opens and a voice says, “Hey, sorry, do you mind if we sit here?”

It’s an older boy with dark skin and messy curls, who’s holding a cardboard box with great care. He’s smiling cheerfully, eyes sparkling with mischief. Harry likes him immediately.

“I don’t,” he says sincerely, motioning to the empty seats with a hand. “Be my guests.”

“Are you sure?” another voice questions from behind the first boy. A redhead teen with a wicked grin pokes his head over the first boy’s left shoulder. “We wouldn’t want to impose, you see.”

“Yes, we wouldn’t, as you’re obviously an ickle little first year—”

“—and we have a big scary spider right there—”

“—in that box.”

“So we wouldn’t want to spook you, you see.”

Harry blinks, a little bemused, at the second redhead that has appeared behind the first boy’s right shoulder and looks exactly the same as the other redhead. He would be lying if he said he was expecting the weird and slightly confusing twin-speak, but Harry can’t say it isn’t interesting—fun, even.

The three boys are waiting expectantly for Harry’s reaction, but if they think he’s going to bolt at the mention of a simple spider, they have another thing coming.

Harry grins and moves until he’s at the very edge of the seat. “Oooh, a spider!” he says, clapping his hands together. “Is it a tarantula? My Hedwig loves them! Well, loves snacking on them, I mean. I imagine all owls are the same, so you’ll have to be careful with it in Hogwarts if you don’t want it to get eaten. I heard there’s an owlery full of them, there.” His smile is like a shark’s, full of teeth.

The three boys are stunned into silence, blinking uncomprehendingly while Harry keeps smiling brightly at them. Then the words seem to sink, and Harry’s the one surprised now to find himself at the other end of three eerily similar and dangerously devious broad smiles.

“Oooh, I like you,” redhead number two declares grandly as he fully enters the compartment, dragging his trunk behind himself. “I guess you’re not just a regular ickle little firstie, I judged you too quickly.” He looks Harry over and taps his chin with a finger. “Mmm… no. Not regular at all. Gred?”

“Yes, my dear Forge?”

“I think this firstie has it. You know? The aura.”

“The aura?” redhead number one asks as he helps the boy with the box with his trunk. Redhead number two helps him then, and together they are able to lift the three trunks on the racks over their heads. Redhead number one then eyes Harry critically for a second, while his twin and their friend sit across from Harry. “Yeah, yeah, I see it. He has it.”

“The aura.”

“Mhm, the aura.”

Quirking an eyebrow, Harry looks questioningly at the only non-redhead apart from him, but he doesn’t help. The only answer Harry gets is an amused little smile and an annoyingly knowing wink. The twins share a speaking glance and nod, certain, before turning intense gazes onto Harry, who is suddenly hit with the urge to run.

“It’s been decided,” they say together, oddly serious.

“You, my friend, have been declared eligible to become the fourth heir to the legacy of the marvelous—”

“—amazing—”

“—genius—”

“—incomparable—”

“—inspiring—”

“—troublemakers of all times!”

“My friend, you’ve just proved yourself worthy to inherit, together with my twin George here and my good friend Lee there, not to forget my most distinguished self, one of Hogwarts’ most sought-after legacies!”

“One of the most coveted!”

“You’ve been chosen to become one of the heirs of the Marauders!” they finish together, crying dramatically in unison, and Harry can almost picture the chaos that will befall the castle once the term starts.

… He can’t wait.

Chapter Text

“Oh, there he is.”

“The betrayer.”

“Broke my heart, he did.”

“I didn’t think he could be so cruel!”

“He must have done it on purpose, he’s devious like that.”

“I knew it. I knew we shouldn’t have trusted those sparkling green eyes!”

The morning of September second finds Harry, new and proud member of the House of Ravenclaw, blinking owlishly as he is suddenly ambushed outside the great hall where he’s going for breakfast. His assailants are none other than two melodramatic and much too energetic redhead twins.

“Wha—?”

“But really, Gred. We should’ve known better. When the little lad introduced himself as Harry Potter, the Harry Potter, we should’ve realized we were looking for bowtruckles up the wrong tree.”

“I know, Forge, I know. But who would’ve imagined the Wizarding World’s Golden Boy was not to be sorted in Gryffindor?”

“I cry fraud! The Sorting Hat must have made a mistake!”

“That’s it!” Fred (Harry is pretty sure it’s Fred) pushes up his sleeves and turns away from them. “We must demand a resort!”

“Yeah!”

“Please, ignore the idiots,” Lee Jordan says as he deftly grabs the twins by the back of their school robes, stopping them from going who knows where to demand exactly what they preached. He gives Harry an apologetic smile that’s two shades too amused to be completely honest. “They are still smarting from the fact that their chosen heir is in another house. Don’t worry, they’ll get over it soon.”

“But Lee!” Fred whines, childishly. “You don’t get it! He had to be Gryffindor! He was supposed to be Gryffindor! How are we going to prank everyone if a quarter of the quartet is in another house?”

Harry blinks. “Isn’t it better this way, though?” At two scandalized looks and a surprised one, Harry elaborates. “I mean, aren’t we covering more bases this way? As I will now have insider information of my own house, and all. And I’m sure that if we work our way around our different timetables we’ll have even more options when it comes to alibis and that sort of thing.”

Stunned silence. Harry studies his friends with curiosity. Hadn’t they thought of that? The hat certainly had, when it was put on his head.

(Harry sits on the stool while the whole school holds his breath, curious about his sorting as they haven’t been with anyone else’s before his name was called. He knows why, but he still doesn’t like it. The rim goes over his eyes, and then there’s darkness.

“What do we have here?” a tiny voice says in his ear, and Harry almost jumps. He was not expecting that. “A brave child, sneaky, loyal. Mmmm…”

“Hello?” Harry asks tentatively. “Are you the Sorting Hat?”

“Why, yes, Mr. Potter. A curious, hungry mind, huh?”

“I guess?” Harry mentally shrugs. “Learning is interesting. And Renato loves knowing things.”

“And you love making your soulmate proud and happy.”

Harry coughs. “Well, yeah.”

“I see, I see… Loyal but not indiscriminately, only to those who deserve it and the ones you consider yours; cunning but not ambitious, you are sneaky because you have to but you don’t like lying, though you do have a heart for pranks; brave but not reckless, your soulmate has done well in making you stop and think things through, most times. Curious and intelligent, you look for knowledge and understanding because you want to get how things work for the sheer pleasure of it… Mmm... Well, Mr. Potter, you would be a great fit for any house, indeed, but I guess I’d better put you in… RAVENCLAW!” the hat says, shouting the last word aloud for all the hall to hear.)

The three boys’ eyes light up, suddenly glinting with unholy glee. Their smiles are utterly terrifying.

“I knew it!” George excitedly cries, pumping his hand in victory while Fred sways from side to side in a ridiculous parody of a victory dance. “I knew we had made the best decision in our lives!”

Lee rolls his eyes, visibly praying for patience, but there is a subtle smile at the corner of his lips.

Harry laughs.

(It’s going to be a great year.)

Chapter Text

“Potter,” a boy says, and Harry turns. It’s just after breakfast, and he is slowly walking towards his very first class while taking in the sights. He’d noticed the portraits the night before, of course, but now he has both the time and the curiosity to actually look at them closely, and he even stops to talk to some of them and introduce himself.

(You never know when you’ll need allies.)

“Hello,” Harry says with a polite smile. The boy is short like him, blond and pointy. His robes are embroidered with silver and green. A Slytherin, then.

He stops and blinks, and a tiny furrow of confusion appears between his eyebrows.

“Hello,” he says, though it almost sounds like a question. He clears his throat and his face smooths over. “My name is Draco. Draco Malfoy. I didn’t have time to introduce myself yesterday, so, here I am,” he says, and sticks out his hand.

“Harry Potter. Nice to meet you.” Harry accepts the hand and they shake once, then Malfoy quickly lets go. His cheeks are slightly pink.

“Well, yes. See you around, Potter.” Malfoy turns on his heels and practically runs away, leaving Harry blinking in puzzled curiosity.

He looks at the portrait of the three sisters he was talking to before Malfoy interrupted them and asked, “What was that?”

The witches titter, amused, but don’t answer him. He shrugs and tells them goodbye before he walks away, with a little bit more purpose this time, as he’s going to be late if he doesn’t hurry up.

All the Ravenclaws are already in the classroom when he arrives, but there’s only one Hufflepuff. The teacher is not there yet, though, and there are six minutes before the class is due to start. Harry selects a seat around the middle, sits, and takes out his materials as the classroom fills up.

At nine on the dot, their professor phases through the board.

(The first class of his first year of magical education should be mesmerizing. It should make him gape and stare and ‘oooh’ in the way learning about Flames had done. Harry was prepared to witness countless amazing feats of magic similar to those Professor McGonagall had shown him when she came for him at the Dursleys, so having to suffer through a double period of monotone warbling about Goblin Wars without any kind of introduction what-so-ever to the subject is not something Harry will ever consider even remotely interesting.

And the worst part is that Harry knows for sure that the subject is, indeed, very interesting. He read the textbook before coming to Hogwarts, and had Ren thoroughly quiz him on it just like he did in all his other subjects—Ren is a tyrant when it comes to Harry’s education, always has been.)

How can a professor be so boring so as to reduce a bloody, aggressive piece of history to something that resembled a lullaby? And the man is dead! He is a ghost, but not even that fact is enough to counter the terrible boredom he inflicts on his class. Harry is miffed.

The less-than-stellar start of his Hogwarts classes is mostly redeemed by his second class, at least. His class schedule says the second period is Transfigurations with the Hufflepuffs, and Harry is eager to see McGonagall in action again, and learn from her.

She doesn’t disappoint.

The class starts with a bang when the tabby cat on the desk suddenly jumps down, swiftly transforming into their Professor, giving the students sitting in the front row a scare. Ernie McMillan screams and falls from his chair, and other students scramble and make other noises of surprise.

(“She’s an Animagus,” Su Li says to him, impressed. “That’s very difficult,” she adds, and her eyes haven’t left McGonagall at all.)

Transfiguring a matchstick into a needle isn’t half as fun as turning into an animal, but Harry is determined to get it done perfectly well. If that’s the first step to become an Animagus in the future, he will make his best effort—and he will succeed. What kind of animal could he turn into? Does he even have a choice? Will he be able to prank Ren, if he manages the change? Oh, the possibilities!

The rest of the week passes by and he almost doesn’t notice it. Thankfully, no other class is as boring as History of Magic, so he is fairly happy to prove his first impression wrong.

Professor Snape is weird, though. The man doesn’t seem to like Harry very much, for whatever reason, and calls on him during their very first lesson. It’s the first time since classes began that Harry feels really, really glad that Ren is such a spartan teacher, because he very much doubts that he would have been able to answer any of the rapidly-fired questions correctly if he hadn’t pretty much memorized the book already.

Luckily, he has, so he answers Snape’s pointed and rather difficult questions with calm aplomb, which gains him a disdainful sneer but no more singling out in class, at least. He brews his Boil-Cure potion with much care, receiving no more than a bare ‘passable’ from the stern teacher after he finishes it, but Harry decides to take it as a compliment. Which it is, actually, if he compares it with the rather sharp comments and harsh reprimands most of the students receive, particularly if their ingredient preparation is poor.

(He leaves that class in a state of confusion. What has he done to deserve Snape’s dislike? He doesn’t think he did or said anything to bring any kind of attention to himself, positive or negative—he hasn’t even had his debut as a prankster with The Troublesome Three! And he had been polite, right?

Right?

…Harry will wait and see. Perhaps the Professor simply has a prickly personality and today it chose to focus on Harry. Maybe. It is too early to judge.)

For the record, though, he doesn’t think Snape is the weirdest of his Professors. No, that place Quirrel wins it single-handedly and without any real contestant. Harry hates how his curse scar hurts whenever he’s near the man, and being inside his classroom is pure torture.

He doesn’t like it one bit, and he’s definitely sharing his concerns with Ren whenever they share dreams again. He’s the only one he trusts to talk about it with.

(He has so many things to tell him.)

Chapter Text

“Are you sure he’s fine?”

“Uh, I guess. I mean, Madam Pomfrey checked him and said that there’s nothing wrong with him, though he should sleep more.”

“Yeah, well, he looks like a zombie. Is it really just lack of sleep?”

“Well, she—wait, what’s a, uh, a what?”

“A zombie. You know…? Dead brought back to life, rotten flesh, eats brains?”

“Ah, Inferi! But… Inferi don’t eat,” Terry Boot says, eyeing his companion with furrowed brows.

Justin Finch-Fletchley groans and covers his face with his hands. Harry is listening to them with half an ear from his own table in the library, and he is vaguely aware that they’re talking about him—Terry is the one who insisted on taking him to see the mediwitch this morning, after all—but he doesn’t really care. He’d normally find the turn in their conversation mildly amusing at least (honestly, that’s such a pureblood thing to say) but he’s not in the right state of mind, now.

To be completely frank, he’s worried sick.

It’s been a month since he started school, thirty-two days to be exact, and in that time there has not been a single shared dream with Ren.

They’ve never gone that long without seeing each other.

Harry is starting to panic.

It’s not normal, not really, having so many shared dreams with his soulmate. Harry knows this. Soulmate dream-sharing is a bit of a myth, for many people, and the ones who have lived through them never report more than five in the course of their lives—at least in official reports. That’s why is considered ‘romantic’ or ‘a sign’ and why there are so many movies with the cliché around.

Harry doesn’t think any of his classmates has had a shared dream with their soulmates yet, while Harry has lost count of how many he’s had. He’s an exception, an anomaly, and he’s never before been so glad for it, more thankful. He doesn’t like to even imagine what could have become of him if Ren hadn’t been there to hug him after a bad day or talk him through his problems, and he honestly wouldn’t like to find out.

True, the dreams can be spaced out—a week or two are rare but they happen from time to time. Three days is the norm.

Not being able to contact him for a month is—

Torture. Excruciating. Painful.

Terrifying.

(What if something happened to Renato? What if he’s hurt? What if he’s dead?)

(Harry can’t bear to think about it.)

(He can’t send Hedwig to him, either. Renato made him promise not to, because it would be dangerous not only for him but for her, too. Harry didn’t ask why, but he knows Renato’s right. Even though he really wants to break his promise and just do it, now.)

It took some time before he started to truly worry, and even more before it started to reflect in his appearance or mannerisms. He had learned from the best, after all, and while he’s in no way close to resembling the way Renato carries himself, the way he’s able to control every part of his body, Harry is proficient enough to deceive the eyes of his peers.

They are children, and untrained children, at that. They are not expecting this type of control or deceit from one of their own, so they don’t see what’s right in front of them—not immediately, at least. Fred and George and Lee are the first to notice, of course. For all their goofing around, the three of them are observant and sharp. They have to be in order to get away with as many pranks as they do. Once Harry’s mood took a turn for the obviously taciturn, they made it their goal to distract him as much as they could.

(They had even made him laugh, genuinely, a couple of times. He’s grateful to have them as friends.)

(Even Malfoy had tried, in his own awkward and snobby way.)

If only he could lie his fears to rest.

(If only tonight he’d dream of Ren.)

“—and, and I’d be grateful if you, if you do,” someone says, but there’s no answer. “Um.”

Oh, they’re talking to him.

Harry blinks and focuses his gaze on the boy in front of him. It’s Neville Longbottom, a first year Gryffindor Harry met in the train when the boy was looking for Trevor, the escapee toad, together with the bushy-haired Gryffindor Hermione Granger.

Longbottom fidgets and plays with the hem of his robe as he looks at Harry from the corner of his eye, and Harry realizes he’s been asked something. Ooops.

“Er, sorry, Longbottoom,” he apologizes sheepishly, trying to muster up a smile. The boy’s face crumples and Harry internally winces. “I wasn’t paying attention. What did you ask?”

“Oh.” He exhales, disappointment vanishing and replaced by a slight flush on chubby cheeks. He shifts his weight from foot to foot. “Okay. Um.”

Harry waits for Longbottom to gather his wits. The boy’s nervous so Harry knows it’s better not to push.

“Okay. I don’t. I don’t know if you’ve heard but—Potions. I’m not. I’m not good at them and, well, I,” he stutters out. Yes, Harry has heard. Ravenclaw has Potions with Hufflepuff on Fridays right after the double Slytherin-Gryffindor class, and it’s not unusual for Snape to warn them off with a sneer not to follow Longbottom’s example and melt their cauldrons. Longbottom takes a deep breath and continues, more firmly, “I heard that you’re good with them. And I’ve seen you here studying and I was wondering if, maybe, if you’d be willing to tutor me?” His tone is hopeful but a little strangled, and Harry can see it in his face that he’s expecting a quick turn-down.

Harry barely thinks about it for half a second before he shrugs. “Sure, why not? Sit.”

This might be just what he needs to distract himself from his worries. It wouldn’t hurt to try, at least.

Longbottom beams at him before hurrying away to gather his things. He almost trips as he makes his way back to Harry’s table, but manages not to fall and in a heartbeat, he’s sitting right in front of him. He looks so eager that Harry feels a little bad for not warning him about his methods.

(He’s been taught by Renato, after all, so Harry’s bound to recreate at least some of his tortu—tutoring methods.)

(Poor Neville doesn’t know what he’s just signed up for.)

Chapter Text

Harry blinks, and blinks again. His heart jumps as he turns sharply around, and his eyes grow wide as he recognizes the colorful swirls that surround him. Warmth bubbles up in his stomach and spreads through his whole body, and his cheeks hurt from the massive smile that blossoms on his face.

Finally!

“Ren?” His voice is weak, strangled; he’s out of breath and he hadn’t even noticed. He takes a desperate gulp of air and tries again, louder: “Ren? Ren! Are you here?!”

He can’t stay still. Adrenalin runs through his veins and his limbs thrum with the need to move, to search, to do something—so he does. He runs. He doesn’t know where he’s going or why, but he does because it feels good and nothing has felt good for a long time. Renato’s here. He has to be here, somewhere.

He just needs to find him.

So he runs.

“Ren?! REN?!”

“Harry!” The voice comes from behind, sharp and warm and familiar, and Harry stops. It’s so brusque that it’s a wonder he doesn’t fall on his face, but Harry doesn’t care. He turns around and he doesn’t have time to look at him before Renato lifts him off his feet and hugs him to his chest. Harry clings to him with both arms and legs, face hidden against the man’s neck.

“Ren!” he says, aware that it sounds a bit hysterical. Clutching the back of Renato’s shirt, Harry struggles to keep his tears at bay. “Ren. Ren. Ren.”

“Shh, I’m here. I’m here, Harry. We are here.” Ren’s voice is rougher than Harry’s ever heard it. “Thank God, we’re here.”

They don’t let go of each other for a solid ten minutes, nor they say anything else, soaking in each other’s presence. Then, Renato puts Harry down and eyes him up and down. His lips turn up at the corner.

“You’ve grown, bambino.”

Harry frowns and looks down at himself, evaluating. “Really?” he asks dubiously, then looks at Ren, who nods. “Huh. I don’t feel much different. Though there’s a lot more food here than at the Dursleys’ so maybe that’s it.”

Ren smiles, though the smile has the dark edge it tends to acquire when Harry’s relatives are mentioned. “How’s Hogwarts? What have you learned?” he asks, and Harry accepts the change in subject without complaint.

“Hogwarts is—it’s great, actually,” he says, perking up. Then he scrunches his nose. “I don’t like my History professor much. He’s a ghost and he makes Goblin Wars sound boring, Renato! Boring! But then there’s professor McGonagall who’s just as amazing as I thought. And there’s flying lessons! They are incredible! When I get a broom you have to fly with me, you have to. I know you’ll love it. Oh! And we had a Halloween Feast tonight and everyone panicked because apparently a mountain troll entered the castle and a Gryffindor girl would’ve been in trouble if I didn’t tell McGonagall she was missing and—I’m a Ravenclaw! I’m sure it was Quirrel who let the troll in, though. I don’t like him, he’s—”

A hand over his mouth cuts him off. Ren chuckles. “What have I told you about breathing when you talk, Harry? You’re babbling.”

Harry bats the offending appendage away and smiles, a little sheepish. “Sorry. I just—there is so much to tell you! I—” His throat closes and he blinks, his cheer dissipating. “I missed you.”

Ren runs his hand through Harry’s hair. “I know. I missed you, too. A lot.”

“Why do you—why do you think this happened? It never—It won’t happen again, will it?” Harry asks, suddenly dreading it with all the force of a thousand suns. He looks pleadingly up at Renato, and immediately misses the hand on his hair.

Renato sighs and tugs down his fedora, obscuring his eyes for a moment, then pulls it off.

“I don’t know, Harry,” he says grimly, apologetic. “I’ve got only half-baked theories right now, and none of them can be tested as there’s so little known about soulmate bonds,” he explains, and his tone is slightly bitter. Harry knows how much Ren hates not knowing things, so it really must be as he says.

Harry fights hard not to make his disappointment obvious. “Oh, that’s—I mean—everything at school was okay. I even made friends! You’ll like them, I think. But, well, I was scared something happened to you when I didn’t see you for so long.”

“It was the same for me, kiddo. You don’t have to worry, though. Nothing bad happened to me. There were just some routine missions, mostly. Though this last month I’ve started negotiating a new contract with a big employer—something a bit more stable. I hope it means that soon I’ll be able to take you away from the Dursleys for good.”

The sheer elation that rises inside Harry makes him feel like he’s about float away. His smile is massive and bright and he can’t help hugging Renato once again. “I can’t—Really?!”

Renato chuckles and pats Harry’s hair. “Really.”

“That’s so—I can’t wait!”

“Me neither, bambino. Me neither.”

They stay like that for a moment longer, and then Renato says, “Now, you mentioned friends and a professor you don’t like at all. And, if I heard correctly, a troll.” He gently pushes Harry away and looks pointedly down at him, with an eyebrow raised. “Care to elaborate?”

Harry grins like a loon and starts speaking about Fred and George Weasley, their friend Lee Jordan and his pet tarantula, and a whole lot of mischief their little group has been up to since the very day they met at the beginning of term until tonight’s quite strange Halloween Feast.

Chapter Text

The thing is, Harry knows there’s something strange going on in the school. He has known since the very first night in the castle, when the Headmaster made the announcement about the third-floor corridor.

(How could he not know? It only lacked the neon-color print claiming ‘Something Fishy is Going On Here!’)

But even though his curiosity is piqued, the cautiousness instilled by Ren keeps him away from the place, at least until he has a way to investigate it in a safer way. He thought he’d found it when, about a week after the Hat announced him a Ravenclaw, Fred and George and Lee showed him their most treasured possession: the Marauders Map.

(“What is so interesting about an old piece of parchment?” Harry asked, between amused and confused, to the twins’ mock offense and horror.

“What is so...? Oh, you poor sod,” Fred said, a hand on over his heart. “This is nothing else than the best idea anyone has ever had.”

“This is what gives us our name,” said George. “Haven’t you wondered about the ‘legacy of the Marauders’ thing?”

“Yes, of course.”

“It’s because of this ‘old piece of parchment’. It’s a map of Hogwarts, of every nook and cranny, made by the most talented pranksters in the history of the school,” said Lee. Then he nudged George. “Show him.”

And George said, “My pleasure,” and put the tip of his wand on the parchment. Then, with all the theatrics Harry’s learned his friends are full of, he said, “I solemnly swear that I’m up to no good.”

Before Harry’s wide eyes, lines of ink spread and crisscrossed over the yellowed parchment, becoming what his friends had said it was: a complete map of Hogwarts.)

But even though they had the Map, they soon realized that exploring that particular corridor would be too difficult, as the professors have more rounds closer to it than any other corridor. They did learn who are the ones that periodically access it: Dumbledore, McGonagall, Quirrel, Snape and curiously, Hagrid and Sprout, of all people. Still, the information they have isn’t enough, and they are no closer to knowing what the corridor holds than they were at the beginning of the term. The Map is amazing, but sneaking past the professors in that area has been impossible, even with its help.

The Map has been really useful in helping with their pranking efforts, however. Since his friends presented it to him, Harry has lost count of how many times he’s used it. The Map is always the instrumental piece needed for the more ambitious of their plans, because he is sure most of those would have failed if not for the little charmed dots with labels that give them warning notice of any approaching Professor, Prefect, or ghost. (Peeves, Harry has discovered, can be a great ally or a terrible snitch, so it’s best if they can avoid his notice, as they never know if he’s in the mood for being helpful or not.)

Keeping eyes on the Map has also given him valuable information about the students and the general movements of the castle. He knows that in Saturday afternoons the library is almost deserted, while on Sundays is full. He knows that there are small groups of Ravenclaws and Slytherins that get together on Mondays and Wednesdays, he guesses to study for a common subject. He knows the most common cliques of friends, though he makes a point of trying not to look too closely onto the labels in the House dormitories.

(Harry’s in the middle of keeping watch when his eyes catch something strange. Who’s this Peter Pettigrew who’s walking with Ron Weasley? Puzzled, he squints at the Map as he tries to remember, but he comes up blank. The twin’s little brother Ron, Neville, and two other boys—Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas—are the only Gryffindor firsties this year. Maybe an older student? Harry doesn’t think he’s seen Ron around any other people apart from his brothers or his roommates, but he might be wrong.

He scrutinizes the map again and then completely forgets about the mysterious Peter when he sees the label ‘Severus Snape’ quickly moving towards the twins’ location.

Muttering under his breath, Harry quickly makes the arranged sound to signal a quick retreat, and together the three of them disappear beneath a tapestry that hides the entry to a secret passage right before Snape makes his entrance, with his angry scowl and suspicious eyes sweeping around looking for mischief.)

So the mystery of the third-floor corridor is shelved, at least for some time.

Then it’s Christmas morning, and Harry discovers an anonymous present waiting for him at the bottom of his pile.

He pokes at the brown paper, cautious, trying to get a clue of what it contains. Whatever it is, is something soft. Maybe another sweater? (He loves the Weasley sweater he got, he put it on the moment he opened the present, right after reading Mrs. Weasley’s letter).

Nothing seems inherently suspicious, except for the fact that there isn’t a sender addressed, so Harry gently pries it open and then frowns when a sheer, water-like material is revealed. He takes it out, examining it with his eyes and—yes, it is a cloak. Strange colors, for a cloak. He hasn’t seen one like this around. He tiptoes to the mirror behind the door and puts the fabric around himself.

His jaw drops. His body’s gone!

It’s an Invisibility Cloak!, a voice his mind crows with relish, and Harry immediately starts making plans for new and improved pranks, for sneaking around, for—the door! Now they have the last element they need in order to see what’s behind the door on the third corridor, and Harry’s definitely going to use it.

Three days later, he’s on his way to the third-floor corridor under the Invisibility Cloak that apparently belonged to his father. Renato had marveled over it just the night before, when they shared their last dream and Harry had told him of his plans.

“Be cautious,” was Renato’s only warning, and Harry took it to heart. Even if there shouldn’t be any actually mortal danger (honestly, it’s a school full of children!) things could still get somewhat ugly, especially if he gets caught.

Luckily, he has his friends watching his back, and with his trusty wand on his hand, he reaches the forbidden corridor in one of the small windows of time between patrols, and peeks inside.

It’s only his training that lets him hold back his gasp of shock.

There is an enormous dog in there! And it has three heads! What is it doing inside a school?!

He closes the door quickly but quietly, and it’s then that he notices the trap door beneath the dog’s feet.

Ah, it’s a protection, then.

(What is it protecting?)

(A voice in his mind that sounds way too much like Ren whispers: ‘and is it worth it finding out?’)

He mulls it over while he walks back to his friends, who are waiting for him inside a cleverly disguised secret passage behind a tapestry close to the infamous corridor. Fred and George pull him in by grabbing handfuls of both his Invisibility cloak and his normal robes, with an accuracy that only those who are sure that there’s someone there can manage, even if they can’t see the person in question.

(Has he mentioned that the Map is a wonderful, terrifyingly clever invention yet?)

Lee checks the tapestry is in place before muttering a privacy spell while one of the twins takes Harry’s cloak off.

“And?” George prompts, practically vibrating out of his skin, eyes bright with curiosity and excitement. “What is it? An illegal liquor storage room?”

“Um.” Harry blinks, bemused.

Lee snorts. “It’s not a liquor room, dipshit. They wouldn’t keep alcohol around minors like that.”

“Well, they did tell us we’d die a painful death if we went there,” Fred points out, straight-faced. “And we know that a lot of kids can’t hold their liquor at all. It could end in a terrifyingly painful death.”

Harry and Lee share a commiserating glance, and Lee says, “Yes, Fred. Sure. It’s not a liquor room, though. Is it, Harry?”

Harry shakes his head. “No.” He frowns, thinking it over, then shakes his head again. They wouldn’t. “Unless they really don’t want people finding it, because the only way to access it would be going down a trap door after fighting off a three-headed dog.” He shrugs.

“… Damn,” Fred says. His eyes are wide.

“They keep a damn Cerberus in there?” Lee demands, pushing George away to stand in front of Harry and study him with focused intent.

Harry nods, and Lee curses.

“That’s…not good, is it?” George asks, looking sideways at Lee, who’s walking in tight circles and muttering angrily to himself. Of the four of them, Lee’s the one who knows more about animals, and obviously the one who has more of an idea of what it means.

Fred shifts from foot to foot and looks at the Map in his hands.

“No.” Lee stops pacing and looks at the three of them with a deadly serious expression that Harry has never seen before on him. Lee always looks cheerful, even when he’s calm. There’s always the glint in his eyes that reveals to the world that he’s silently laughing at everything and everyone. Seeing him so serious is unsettling. “And I’m not sure if we should keep digging into this. I think they are actually being honest with the threat level, this time.”

Fred and George exchange nervous glances and then look back at Lee, then at Harry. It’s when they look at him that something in their faces settles, and Harry knows they’ve decided.

“Well, we still have a castle full of people to prank,” George says, dismissively.

“Yeah, we don’t need a stinky corridor, anyway,” Fred adds, shrugging, and pointedly looks down at the map once again. “The coast is clear! We should go back to our dormitories now.”

Lee’s shoulders relax a bit after the proclamation. “Good, yes. It’s late. Why don’t you go with Harry and then come back for us?”

Fred nods. “Fine by me. Harry?”

“Sure,” he says. He’s not sure he agrees with his friends, but he doesn’t think this is the moment to bring it up. He’ll think on it later, and consult it with Ren before he decides on any course of action. “Let’s go.”

Chapter Text

In the end, they keep an eye on the map but don’t go near the third-floor corridor again. Harry is tempted, very tempted, but in the end, he listens to Ren and his friends and lets the mystery lie. If anything comes out of it, then he’ll probably know about it together with the rest of the school. Probably.

(They never do.)

Instead, they focus on their pranks and their schooling and, in the case of the twins, Quidditch.

(They are Beaters and have way too much fun smashing Bludgers around when they play. They are great, though—Harry really loves watching them play, and he can never stop his laughter whenever McGonagall has to yell at Lee for being too subjective in his commentary. It’s a shame that first years can’t join the teams or own brooms. Harry loves flying, and he thinks he’d be a good Seeker, or maybe Chaser. Ravenclaw’s team is very good, so he doesn’t mind not being able to play, though their Seeker and two of their Chasers are seventh years, so who knows—he might yet have a chance when it’s time to come back in September. He’ll be a second year. It’s mind-blowing.)

All in all, it’s a great year for Harry, and even though his shared dreams with Renato have been reduced to about one per month, he’s adjusted.

Quirrel disappears before the end of term. Harry can’t say he misses him, because he absolutely hated his classes (they were even worse than Snape’s, and Snape’s are eighty percent terrifying students, five percent sneering, and five percent teaching. All in all, terrible), but it is curious. The man is just gone from one day to the next, without giving any notice, not even staying until the final exams. It’s left up to their Heads of Houses, and it’s obvious they aren’t too happy to have to take over those duties.

(Harry’s glad that his head of house is Flitwick and not Snape, though. The man has been in an even worse than normal mood ever since April came around. It might have to do with the April’s Fools school-wide prank their quartet played in honor of the twins’ birthday, but Harry doesn’t think so.)

In any case, Slytherin wins the House Cup, followed by Ravenclaw (Harry’s pretty proud) and then Hufflepuff and Gryffindor. Slytherin also won the Quidditch cup, which makes them smugger than ever (Harry can see Malfoy celebrating with friends over at his table, cheeks pink). The lions are mostly a dejected lot, especially the Quidditch captain—Fred and George have talked a lot about Oliver Wood’s Quidditch Obsession and Harry doesn’t know who he pities more: Oliver or his team.

The twins don’t much care about the loss of the House Cup (they’d be terrible hypocrites if they did, seen as they are among those who lost the most points), but they do care about the Quidditch cup. They pout for about ten minutes about it and then they cheer up when dessert appears. Harry will miss them terribly.

The day after the last day feast, Harry speaks a little with Neville and Hermione (who at some point had joined their Potions—and other subjects—study sessions), wishes them nice Holidays, and then climbs into one of the carriages that will take them to Hogsmeade and the train station. Harry wonders if there’s an animal pulling the carriage or if they move because of a spell. Neither would surprise him. Something to research later on.

The four of them look for their trunks in the Gryffindor section of Hogsmeade station and then board the Express, dragging their possessions with them. They find a free compartment around the middle of the train and gratefully claim it for their own. Harry lets his friends help with getting his trunk on the racks while he puts Hedwig’s cage on the floor near the window. She doesn’t stir from where she has her head under her wing, and Harry chuckles, taking off his dark robe and putting it over her cage.

He looks back to his friends, who are bickering and laughing as they settle down, and he feels elation and sadness struggling inside of him at the sight. He’ll miss them so much. Two months without seeing them sounds terrible. And yeah, he can send mail—Hedwig will be glad to stretch her wings, as she hadn’t really had much to do during the school year since there was nobody Harry wanted to send mail to except for Renato, and he would never be so cruel as to send Hedwig over the Mediterranean. That’s too much for a bird, he knows, no matter how strong and stubborn and magical, especially when he is able to see his soulmate in their shared dreams.

“Cheer up, mate!” Fred says, startling Harry out of his thoughts. He throws an arm around Harry’s shoulders and messes up his hair even more than it already is. “Don’t look so gloomy. It’s not like we’re not gonna keep in contact.”

“Yeah!” George agrees from where he’s sprawled on the floor, playing Gobstones. He swears and throws himself back as the train lets out a parting whistle and starts moving, making one of the pieces explode way too close to his face. He coughs and waves a hand to dispel the smoke. “Just use the journal.”

Harry blinks. “What journal?” he asks, tilting his head to one side.

There’s a moment of silence, and then Lee groans. “You didn’t give him the journal?”

“Eh?” Fred and George say at the same time, and look at each other in puzzlement.

“I thought you gave it to him?” George says.

“I thought you gave it to him!” Fred scowls.

“It’s you who had it this morning!”

Harry snickers and interrupts. “Well, you didn’t. What journal?”

Fred slumps and Harry’s suddenly taking most of his weight. “What journal! The journal we bought and lovingly enchanted for you.”

“It cost us a pretty penny, not to mention the work on the protean charm,” George adds, nodding wisely. “We had to sync it with ours—”

“And Lee’s.”

“—so that was some tricky magic.”

“But we did it!”

“They are a lot cheaper and easier than using an owl to send post,” Lee comments, amused as ever at the twins’ dramatics. “Not to mention quicker and safer, at least if you are always writing to the same people. No offense to Hedwig, though.”

“What he said,” George says.

“They’re pretty great,” Fred agrees.

“Oh, that sounds nice.” Harry is already thinking of making a pair to share with Renato. What? The dreams are nice but they are not as recurrent as they were before he started school. He would love to have a way to talk to Ren that is a little more reliable. “So… when do I get it?”

Fred slaps his forehead and jumps out of the seat, then pulls down his trunk from the racks, making George sputter and hurriedly stand up to avoid being squashed. It thunks with a dull sound on the floor, and immediately Fred opens, rummaging around inside until he pulls out a small book in blue and bronze with a triumphant “Aha!”

“Here it is,” he says, presenting it to Harry with all the pomp of ceremony.

“Thank you,” Harry says as he accepts it, touched by the gesture.

“Now you don’t have any excuses not to write, eh?” George winks.

“Please do, or these two will definitely do something stupid,” Lee points out, but his eyes sparkle in delight.

“Shut up, Jordan!”

“Yeah, you’d probably help. Don’t lie.”

As the three bicker animatedly, Harry smiles. Yeah, he’s definitely going to be using the journal a lot.

Later, after getting off the train and meeting up with the twins’ family and being smothered in hugs, Harry says goodbye. Then, as he walks away and toward the hulking form of a visibly annoyed Vernon Dursley, he feels the warm weight of friend’s eyes on his back.

He’ll miss them, definitely. But it’s only for a while.

September can’t come soon enough.

Chapter Text

Summer is a quiet affair, mostly. The Dursleys ignore him and he ignores them right back, and his only chore is taking care of the garden. He usually does so in the morning, before the sun has had enough time to heat the air to the point of burning, and then he goes inside to spend the rest of the day inside his room. He either works on his school homework, or his extra Renato-related homework, or talks to Fred and George and Lee through the enchanted journal. The gift comes in handy, and he definitely plans on buying a new pair once it’s time to go buy supplies for the new school year. He’ll then ask his friends to teach him the charm to send one to Renato. Harry’s pretty sure that he’d be delighted to have one (he knows he is.)

The dreams come more closely together now that he’s out of school, but still, they aren’t as common as they were before. Harry and Renato have a few theories about the possible reasons, but there’s nothing definite they can say about it just yet. It’s not like there is much material about soulmates available to research, and what little there is either covers the basics (that is to say, they exist, you’ll share some dreams with them sometime, the end) or expand upon different theories that lead to nowhere as they can’t put anything to test. It’s all mostly conjecture, and some of it is contradictory to the point of being ridiculous.

Yes, Harry used some of his free time in Hogwarts to research soulmate bonds in the Library, and has also read many muggle books in the Surrey library whenever he had the time and drive to go there. He’s even contemplating going back, just to have something to do.

He’s bored.

Terribly, hauntingly bored.

It isn’t as if going to the park is an option—Dudley is still the neighborhood bully and Harry doesn’t much care for trying to make friends with kids that are too scared of his cousin to speak to him. And what else there is to do in the suburbs?

He’s started a notebook with prank plans for the new school year, but there’s only so much mischief planning he can do before getting bored of it, too. And he can’t practice his magic because of rules.

Booooring.

Summer seems to crawl and stretch, with no apparent hints to its end. Harry’s going nuts.

Then his birthday arrives, and he wakes up to his friend’s well wishes on his journal and promises of presents the moment their owls reach him. He’s happy, and his only wish is that the night will be a shared dream night again, as he misses Renato a lot and he wants to share his birthday with him.

And then the Dursleys remind him of the dinner with the Masons.

Harry’s hard-pressed not to roll his eyes in dismay as he goes outside after breakfast to take care of the garden. His relatives are in a state of busy worrying that makes them more unpleasant than they commonly are, and Harry has no wish to interact with them more than is needed.

He’s pruning the roses when he feels eyes on him. He frowns and discretely moves his head from side to side, as if working stiff muscles, while trying to identify the source. He can’t see anyone close. It’s not one of the Dursleys, nor a passerby, nor a nosy neighbor spying over the fence or through a parting in the curtains. But the feeling is still there, prickly and uncomfortable in the back of his neck, so what is it?

Harry tries to relax and keep on working, but starts paying more attention to his surroundings.

Nothing, for a minute or two. Then, a rustle—there! From the corner of his eyes, he can see them, a pair of big green eyes.

But when he turns, there’s nothing there.

...Curious.

Nine hours later, he finally meets his stalker.

Dobby the house-elf is a menace.

He first begs Harry not to go to Hogwarts, then confesses having stolen his mail (his mail! People apart from his best friends sent him mail!) and then threatens him!

He ruins Vernon’s important dinner and because of him Harry gets a letter of warning for underage use of magic, and because of that he’s now trapped inside the damn cupboard! He hasn’t seen the inside of the damn thing since McGonagall made the Dursleys give him his new room, and he can’t say he’s missed it at all.

At least he can count on the fact that they’re not going to keep him there; this is just punishment for the night. But Vernon’s probably doing something to his room—he heard him muttering and searching for the tools he bought but never used, and there have been strange sounds coming from upstairs ever since.

Harry sighs and curls his arms around his knees, wishing for sleep to come.

He wants to see Renato.

He needs him.

(He doesn’t dream of Renato that night, and not even the fact that he’s let out of the cupboard and told to go back to his room in the morning cheers him up.

When that night he dreams and Renato’s there, he cries all over the man, and doesn’t feel a hint of shame.

Renato hugs him and kisses his forehead, and it’s the best thing in the world.)

Chapter Text

It’s way-too-early in the morning when there’s a knock on the door. It sounds too polite and restrained for it to be some desperate drunk that lost their way in the suburbs (it happened once, and Aunt Petunia had screeched like a banshee and Uncle Vernon had threatened the poor soul with his meaty fists and purple face while spewing insults, all with his ridiculous night-cape still sitting on top of his sparse blond hair). Harry doesn’t know why it woke him up, not really, but there’s something inside him that’s suddenly wide-awake.

The knocking continues. One, two, three knocks, then around three minutes of silent wait before a new round begins. For half an hour, this pattern repeats, and Harry’s so wired up that he’s almost ready to jump down the stairs and open the door himself without any regard to the possible consequences. Then the knocking stops for at least ten minutes, and Harry feels irrationally disappointed by the thought that maybe the knocker has left.

He actually jumps out of bed with his heart in his throat when there’s a loud bang followed by several more, and the noise of glass smashing into pieces.

“WHAT IN THE SOGGY—WHO ARE YOU WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN HERE?!” Uncle Vernon’s voice comes—loud and booming and beyond angry—as he stomps down the stairs. “THIS IS BREAKING AND ENTERING, PET CALL THE POLICE, YOU’LL NOT GET—STOP, WHAT, DO NOT POINT THAT THING AT ME—”

Vernon’s tirade is cut short with another bang and a terrified scream. Harry hugs his pillow, standing just behind the door, not knowing when he got there and unsure about what to feel.

(Why isn’t he terrified out of his mind?)

He listens carefully, barely daring to breathe, but he can’t make out voices, if there’s any. 

(That was a gun, wasn’t it? Was Vernon shot? Is he dead?)

The door opens without any warning, and Harry yelps, takes a step back in surprise and trips. Instead of falling butt-first to the floor, he’s steadied by gentle hands that tug him into a warm, familiar hug.

He burrows his face in a finely-clothed middle, fingers seeking purchase on the familiar creases of the back of a suit, and his eyes suddenly prickle with tears as he sinks into the embrace of his most beloved soulmate.

“Ren?”

“Yes,” Ren says, and the tears that Harry’s been fighting win at the sound of his voice. It’s really him; he’s really here. A hand gently combs his hair in a familiar but never-before-experienced gesture and Harry sobs. Ren sighs, hugging him a little tighter, letting him cry.

It’s about five minutes later that there’s a small push, as Renato detaches himself from Harry. Harry’s whine of protest cuts off when the man crouches in front of him so that they are eye to eye. Renato’s are black, but warm, and Harry can’t help but marvel at the fact that he’s actually seeing them, this time. “We’re going home, Harry,” Renato says.

And Harry nods.

Harry has dreamed of this moment for years. It almost feels like he’s still dreaming now, as he packs up his trunk, knowing it’s the last time he’ll ever see this room with its magically painted walls. He’ll not miss the house and its inhabitants, but this room is something special, something that’s his, and there’s a part of him that’s reluctant to part with it.

It’s a minuscule part of him, granted, and he doesn’t mourn its loss for more than a few seconds after he closes the door for what it’ll likely be the last time forever. Going with Ren feels right in a way that nothing else has ever done, except maybe arriving at Hogwarts for the first time. Actually feeling Renato’s presence at his side, actually feeling his warmth is like nothing he’d ever imagined.

Plus, seeing the Dursleys’ faces as Renato carries Harry’s trunk on his shoulder with barely any effort as they leave will forever be imprinted in Harry’s memory, to revisit whenever he needs a good laugh.

Leaving Privet Drive behind is…liberating.

One of their first stops, after breakfast, is a Child Protection Agency. Harry’s a bit leery, but they are unusually quick in transferring Harry’s guardianship to Renato, even without going to court. Harry’s curious to know how he managed to do that, but when asked, Renato’s only answer is a devious little smile and a wink, to Harry’s irritation. It all but vanishes, however, when Renato takes him directly to the airport.

“Where are we going?” Harry asks, curious. Then he gasps. “We’re leaving England?!”

“For the summer, only,” Renato says. Harry relaxes. As much as he wants to leave, he doesn’t want to leave leave . He still has Hogwarts and his friends. “At least for a couple of weeks. You have a way to contact your friends, yes?”

Harry nods. “The journal,” he says, and absently pats the pocket of his coat. It’s big enough to carry his journal and his wand which, together with the Invisibility Cloak, are his most precious possessions. Then he remembers his stolen mail, and adds, “And Hedwig, too, for my other friends.”

“She’s able to find us, yes?” Renato asks.

“Yes, she is,” Harry says. He’d let Hedwig out the moment they were out of the Dursley’s and told her to go to the Weasleys’ or to Lee’s. Going about muggle areas with an owl in a cage calls too much attention for Harry to be comfortable. Plus, Hedwig deserves the opportunity to stretch her wings. “Though I don’t know if she’ll want to fly as far as…wherever we’re going, so…”

“That’s fine. She’s a smart owl.” Renato’s lips twitch up into a tiny smile. “We’re going to Italy. Don’t worry, we’ll be back soon. You’ll keep your friends updated with the journal so they’ll not raise any alarm. By the time your Hogwarts letter is due, we’ll have a place in England, all our papers in order, and nobody will dare take you away from me.”

Harry feels a weight leave him, and he can breathe easier. Impulsively, he takes Renato’s hand and smiles at him when Renato looks down, eyebrow raised. “Thank you.”

Renato tips his head and one corner of his lips twist upward. He doesn’t answer, but Harry doesn’t need one, not really.

He’s finally home.

Chapter Text

They arrive in Italy at three in the afternoon and a taxi is already waiting for them. It’s another half an hour before they arrive in front of a house in a quiet neighborhood, not too poor but not at all posh. There’s some dirt and rubbish on the street but there are flower pots in almost every window, and every building is different. Harry loves the place immediately. It has personality, which was sorely lacking in the cookie-cutter suburb that was Privet Drive.

He doesn’t waste any time in exploring every nook and cranny of the place, magnanimously ignoring Renato’s amused looks, and he almost tears up when the man shows him the room that’s going to be his.

“It’s not much,” Renato muses, looking over the small mattress, the dark wooden desk, and the wardrobe. It’s true, it’s very basic, but… “We’ll have to buy some things for you, but I wanted to wait to have your input.”

Harry hugs him tightly and croaks out a heartfelt “Thank you,” before they start unpacking the meager possessions from Harry’s trunk. Once they finish, it looks more lived-in, and Harry feels even more at home than he ever did in the room at the Durlseys’ that McGonagall had enchanted for him.

“I want a picture,” he says impulsively, pointing at the empty desk surface. “To put right there.”

“Okay?” Renato says, an eyebrow lifted. “That we can do. Tomorrow, though. Now it’s time for dinner.”

Harry startles. Already?

It’s true: the clock says that it’s after six, and only now Harry realizes he’s starving. They’d eaten on the plane, but plane food is…well, it’s not the worst Harry’s ever had, but it’s still hardly filling at all. So Renato makes a couple of sandwiches and they happily eat together, chatting about everything and nothing like they’ve always done in dreams.

Renato shoos him away when they finish as he goes to wash up the dishes, and Harry decides to use the time to take a shower. He enjoys the blissfully hot water for some long minutes and, when he comes out of the bathroom, he finds his pajamas neatly folded on top of his bed. He smiles and puts them on, and not too long after that he crashes—the excitement of the day catching up to him now that he’s clean and fed and warm in a way that’s both familiar and completely alien at the same time.

In the morning, after having a particularly delicious (if slightly weird, for Harry’s English tastes) breakfast, Renato takes Harry sightseeing. Well, they are actually going somewhere, not that Renato has told Harry where they’re going, but in the meanwhile, Harry learns a bit about the city. Renato is charming, particularly with older women who coo at him and (to his horror and Renato’s delight) at Harry, too. Harry babbles back in some slightly accented Italian (what?! He hasn’t had the time to practice too much during the school year!) which apparently is a tremendous miscalculation on his part as the ladies suddenly start cooing even more.

He gives Renato the cold shoulder for a while after that, as the man laughs at his misfortune. The bastard.

Still, it doesn’t last long as they soon arrive at a nondescript alley that’s adorned with the most wonderful flowers Harry has ever seen. On top of the archway, a nameplate proudly announces that it is the entrance to “Il Vicolo di Scintille”, but what calls Harry’s attention first is the image of a cat to the side of the name. It has a pointy hat. And it moves!

Harry gapes as the engraved cat yawns widely and turns on itself twice before settling down for a nap. “This is…!”

“Oh, good,” Renato says, and Harry turns to look at him. He gapes again as he finds the man dressed like any wizard Harry had seen back in Diagon during his first visit to the place, robes and pointy hat included. When did he have the time to change? And why does he have a fake mustache?! “Then my sources were accurate. What do you see, Harry?”

Harry shakes his head, frowns and looks back at the entryway. “There’s…well, there’s a nameplate with a cat engraving that moves,” he says in a small voice and looks sideways at the man, curiously. “It’s called, uh, Spark’s Alley, I think. You can’t see it?”

“Not quite,” Renato says. What does that mean? Renato hums, shakes his head. “Interesting. In any case, it doesn’t matter. You told me muggles can see magical places if they know where to look and have someone taking them there, right?”

Harry nods. “That’s what Hermione told me. Her parents are muggle, but they still went with her to Diagon.”

Renato nods and offers Harry his hand. Harry takes it without thinking. “Then let’s go.”

Harry stops him by tugging on his hand. Renato turns his head, eyebrow raised. 

“What’s wrong?” he asks.

Harry scrunches up his nose. “Take off the mustache. It’s really weird.”

Renato laughs but obliges.

Chapter Text

“Are we or are we not going, Mother?” Blaise asks, young voice pitched high in badly disguised impatience.

Florenzia laughs inside, but does not let the sound out. She adjusts her jade earring one last time and then looks her reflection over critically, ignoring the mirror's common platitudes. Judging her appearance to be perfect for a stroll in the good parts of Wizarding Italy, Florenzia raises from her spot in front of the vanity. She takes her purse and her wand, securing the last to the holster strapped to her arm, hidden by the wide sleeve of her silver robes, and glides out of the room.

“Mother!” Blaise insists, and Florenzia smiles at the childish whine that she's managed to coax out of her boy. It’s something that she hasn’t heard since he came back, as Blaise had adopted an air of maturity at school he wore like a cloak. She can admit that she misses the little mama's boy that he was before his first year at Hogwarts, at least a little. (Nine months away from home, away from her, surrounded by other boys and girls his age has made him grow up so fast that Florenzia feels she’s lost the pleasure of seeing him do so herself.)

Just a little, though. She's proud of the man her son is becoming.

“I'm coming, my darling,” she says, and can’t refrain herself from teasing him as she starts down the stairs. “You would believe the alley is going to disappear in a plume of smoke with how much you're making me hurry.”

Blaise is waiting for her at the bottom and he purses his lips but does not break eye contact. His eyes are a lot like hers in shape and color, but darker. He sniffs. “It might not, but at this rate, the tickets may be all sold out. It’s the opening night, Mother. I don't want to take that chance.”

Florenzia sighs in faked resignation. “Yes, yes. I know. If only they'd accept owl purchase. Things would be far easier that way.”

“I agree, Mother. But sadly, things are not that easy, so shall we?” He offers her his arm and Florenzia takes it, her lips curling in a restrained show of amusement.

“Certainly,” she says, and lets her son guide her to the Floo.

The travel is fast, as usual, and with noticeably less soot than whenever she uses the Floo in England. For some reason, Italian establishments take noticeably better care of their fireplaces. Florenzia thinks it might be due to the fact that fireplaces are mostly ornamental in Italy, as the climate is warmer and they are rarely properly used, so it makes sense to keep them in pristine condition.

She greets Signore Alberto with a gracious nod and lets Blaise take her out to the alley. Their first stop is, of course, the Theatre to buy the tickets for the new play that had Blaise so eager to go out. Once they finish with that business, they indulge in the simple pleasure of window shopping without the pressures of last-minute school madness or Yuletide.

It's in a small window of opportunity, a tiny moment of luck, that she looks up and her gaze falls over an intriguing view. A young-looking wizard and a child, both dark-haired. The man wears robes of a curious cut made of obviously fine material, and he moves like a predator. His gaze is sharp behind the projected air of vague curiosity, and the lines of his body are deceptively relaxed. He’s wary and vigilant, but not afraid. He does not look out of place. And he's handsome.

Color her intrigued.

“Blaise,” she says, and something in her tone must alert her child because he turns to her immediately with a frown. “Look there, doesn't he seem to be around your age?” She makes a gesture with her hand towards the dark-haired child with the man. “Should we introduce ourselves?”

Blaise looks, and his frown of worry turns into a scowl of irritation as he turns to her again. “No, Mother,” he says, deadpan. “You can’t use me as an excuse for—" he blinks, his face goes blank, and then whips his head back towards the duo. He sputters, “is that Potter?!”

Florenzia could explode in glee. “Oh, wonderful!” she exclaims, already making her way towards them. “You know him already, more the reason to go say hello!”

Blaise makes a pained noise behind her and immediately follows. “Mother. Mother, no. No. Wait. Mom!”

Florenzia completely ignores him as she approaches the mysterious gentleman and his charge in favor of paying attention to the way the man tenses for a second. He mutters something to the boy at his side, then his attention is back to the display in front of him. Or, rather—

He’s using the mirror-effect of the window shop to track her movements. Oh, Florenzia is intrigued. A hunt is always more interesting when her prey is a hunter, too.

“Please, excuse us,” she says, demure but daring, with her most honeyed tone of voice. She chooses English because if Blaise knows the boy, it must be from Hogwarts. Both man and boy turn towards her as she adds, “but my son here recognized his friend and we had to come to say hello.”

The boy blinks large green eyes at her, then at her long-suffering son, and his mouth drops open in surprise.

“Hello, Potter,” Blaise says, and Florenzia notes it barely sounds sullen. He’s getting better at covering up his emotions, her little snake.

“Zabini,” Potter nods back, polite enough though he’s noticeably bewildered, at least if you know how to look for it, and Florenzia does. Is this little slip of a boy the Harry Potter? He must be, she doesn’t think there was any other Potter at Hogwarts that Blaise has mentioned. Dark hair, green eyes, glasses… It’s probably him, she concludes.

“This is my mother,” Blaise presents her, and Florenzia smiles.

“Florenzia Zabini, it's a pleasure.”

“Um. Yes, madam. I mean. Harry Potter. My, uh, my pleasure.”

She turns towards the man, now, and her smile changes. She’s now in her element. “And this refined gentleman has a name, I'm sure?”

“Mom!” Blaise hisses, mortified, but Florenzia only has eyes for the man's reaction, and he's…calculating, curious, amused. A quick once-over, a spark of interest, but as soon as it appears, it dies.

More and more curious.

“Indeed I do, madam. Renato Sinclair, at your service,” he says, taking her hand and placing a kiss in the air right over her knuckles. She can’t place his accent, but it’s not purely British, like Potter’s. There’s a Romance language behind it, or maybe several.

“When Blaise recognized you this fine morning I couldn’t help but want to introduce myself, you see. It’s such a rare opportunity to meet any of Blaise’s friends, living all the way out here in Italy.”

She doesn’t fool him, she can see it in the slant of his eyes. Still, he smiles politely and says, “That’s understandable. I haven’t met any of Harry’s friends yet, myself. Nice to meet you, Blaise.”

Her son nods. His face is wary, and she feels a surge of pride for her clever little boy. He’s caught onto the fact that this man is not the same type as most of her beaus.

Florenzia asks, “Are you two traveling for the holidays, perhaps? Have you been here long?” She hasn’t seen this wizard before, and she’s sure that, with a face like that, she would have if he frequented the place.

Signore Sinclair tilts his head in a negative gesture and says, “Ah, no. We arrived just yesterday, in fact, and we’re exploring a little bit.”

Harry Potter shrugs and nods, then offers a tiny smile. It’s shyer than she’d have expected. Still, this is her chance, and she’s not about to squander it.

“We could show you around, if you like. After all, I’ve lived here my whole life and know all the... best parts.”

“Really?” Signore Sinclair drawls. One corner of his mouth is tilted upwards, and it’s incredibly attractive. “That would be marvelous, indeed. But first, we were thinking about eating lunch.”

Her smile is predatory. “Perfect. I know just the place.”

Chapter Text

Renato is, by all means, going to make the best use of the opportunity that has been so graciously presented before him. Madame Zabini is obviously what Harry has called a pureblood, and one that is intrigued enough in him that he might even get interesting and useful information from her. Oh, he doesn’t trust her, not really, because a predator recognizes another when they find each other, and this woman—beautiful and gracious and alluring—screams dangerous. In fact, Renato might have been tempted to play if it wasn’t for the fact that he has Harry with him.

And speaking about Harry, Renato knows he’ll have to cut off her flirtations soon because, as fun as it is, she’s visibly annoying his soulmate and that simply cannot stand.

(He can see it in the way Harry squints at her every time she gets a little too close as they wander through the alley. She notices, too. He can see it in the curious glances she takes at the kids from time to time, focusing on Harry in particular.)

They finally reach a small restaurant and Renato asks their guides to keep the lead, as they are new around these parts and they don’t want to commit a faux-pass. Madame Zabini seems delighted, if just slightly confused, and accepts without a protest. Renato takes a mental note—he needs to be wary of what he says and does, since he’s going for a particular image that, in the future, will make it a lot easier to get what he wants from the Wizarding World in general.

He has to work hard in not showing his surprise and his curiosity at the way ordering works—they have to tap their wands on their choice of food in the menu, and their plates would then appear on their table in a minute or two.

Luckily, Madame Zabini unknowingly saves him from having to work his way around his lack of wand.

“Oh, please let me order for both of you. If it’s your first time in Italy, you simply must get Giotto’s Special Ravioli—he’s the best at preparing the tomato sauce.”

Renato has to force his face not to twitch—he knows Giotto is not an uncommon name, but in his line of work it’s a rather famous one, and thinking about Vongola Primo being praised for his Ravioli is certainly an experience. He smiles, instead.

“We’d be delighted. Right, Harry?”

Harry looks from Madame Zabini to him with an uncertain furrow in his brow and a question in his eyes. Renato prompts him with a softer, more genuine smile, and the boy returns it.

“Yea—yes. That’d be fantastic, thank you,” he says.

And so Madame Zabini orders for the four of them. When the food comes, Renato has to admit the Ravioli does look fantastic. Everyone takes a minute to take a bite and appreciate the taste.

“So,” Madame Zabini interrupts, initiating the small talk once again, “may I ask what brings you two to this corner of the continent?”

“Ah, merely vacation time, I'm afraid,” Renato says after using the table napkin. “And getting to know each other, you see, as I've just acquired custody over my little soulmate here,” he adds, looking fondly at said boy, who startles a little but then beams at him.

From the corner of his eye, he can see that the information actually surprises her. She blinks twice and then straightens from the subtly seductive pose she had adopted, exchanging the borderline lascivious expression for a more friendly one, if still flirty. Ah, so she won’t push but she’ll keep playing. He can work with that.

“Oh, is that so? Congratulations!” she says, and it sounds completely honest. (Good acting, or truthfulness?)

Her son, Blaise, echoes her sentiment, though he sounds a lot more surprised.

“It must have been a pain going through all the tests and paperwork at the Center,” she continues, and oh—that’s interesting. And potentially very useful. “Or at least that’s what all the soulmates pairs or trios I’ve met have told me. I don’t know first hand, I haven’t found mine, yet, you see.”

Act as if what they’re saying is obvious. Act as if he knows what they’re talking about. Be assertive. Those are the tenants he’s always followed whenever he’s had to do infiltration work, and he applies them now, too. They usually work, and if he tweaks them enough he might even be able to get her to give him more information without it looking as if he wants or needs it.

“Ah. Yes, it was.” He sighs, closing his eyes for a moment as if remembering. Then he opens them and smiles wryly at her. “We’re glad that’s finished and over with, in fact. Luckily, Harry’s, ah, fame isn’t as crazy here so it went a lot more smoothly than it would have in Britain.”

“I imagine,” she says. There’s a little pity, a little disgust in her tone. Renato can’t be sure any of those are honest. “Are you doing something about the books and merchandise being sold in his name? I doubt half of it is even truthful. Or legal.”

Renato actually lets his annoyance show and he scowls. “No, it’s not. Not even half is true, and none is legal. Everything is bullshit, and nothing of the income is reaching Harry. I’ve lived my whole life abroad, however, and don’t know how to go about filing a lawsuit in England.”

She falls for it hook, line and sinker.

“I can certainly help you there, if you want,” she says, and this time her modesty is all fake. Renato isn’t bothered, mostly because he’s interested in what she has to say. “I’m Italian myself, but my third and sixth late husbands, may they rest in peace, were British and they certainly taught me a thing or two.”

A Black Widow, then? Huh.

“Really? We’d be very grateful for your help, truly. And,” he hesitates, selling the act, “if you had any suggestions about purchasing real estate there, that would be wonderful, too. I was thinking of going through the Goblins, but...”

“Oh, no. Those stingy little creatures could certainly help you, but they’d rob you blind. If only Britain would employ good witches and wizards like everyone in the continent does. Ah, more’s the pity. No, no, I know some people, I’ll let you know.”

“That’d be marvelous. Thank you so much. If you could send us an owl whenever you had the information, I’d appreciate it.”

“Think nothing of it,” she says. “I’m glad to help a fellow wizard. Now, we should finish eating our Ravioli before it gets cold. Eat up!”

Renato does as told, and he gives Harry a secretive little smile when he finds him almost gaping at him.

Chapter Text

The end of the meal with the Zabinis ends without much more fanfare, though Harry’s still reeling after everything he’s discovered, and not only about his classmate and his mother, but also about the wizarding world in general and his own soulmate in particular.

(The tilted, halting conversation he’d had going on with Blaise was cut short at the restaurant, especially once Ren let the two Zabinis know that they were soulmates. It didn’t rekindle after that, but as later Madam Zabini reminded Ren about keeping in contact via owl and made him promise that they would see them again for dinner soon, Blaise offered to write, too, and Harry accepted the awkward offer just as awkwardly as it had been delivered. Who knows, maybe he’ll actually get a new friend out of this.)

They watch the Zabinis’ backs as they leave them at the entrance of the restaurant, and only after they’ve completely disappeared around a corner Harry turns to Renato.

“You. How did you…?” Harry questions, and it’s both an accusation and a statement of admiration. Renato chuckles a bit, throwing his shoulders back as Harry says, “That was amazing.”

“Why, thank you.” Renato mimics the usual tilting of his fedora with the pointy wizard hat, humming. It's a little weird, but mostly funny. “That was actually fun, a bit of a challenge.” His eyes turn to Harry, serious. “And that, Harry, is what we call a dangerous woman. You should never anger one unless you don’t have a choice.”

Harry nods, warily. “That’s the vibe I got,” he says, then scowls. He fights the urge to cross his arms. “At least she stopped flirting with you so much. After she knew you were my soulmate.”

Renato starts walking and Harry promptly follows after him.

“Yes, that’s true. I got the impression that soulmates are something taken much more seriously in this world than in mine. And she did give us a lot of information. Useful information, at that.”

Harry mulls it over and nods. “True.” He frowns, looking around the people and the open stores. “I didn’t know bonds could be tested for and registered. Muggles can’t do it. You’d think they’d tell us about it at Hogwarts.”

Renato shrugs one shoulder, but he doesn’t look at him. He’s also busy scanning their surroundings. “Who knows. Maybe it’s something all wizardkind is expected to know,” he offers. “Or it usually doesn’t matter because few people have dreams when they are still at school. Or, maybe, they’ll explain more about it in the last years of school.”

Harry really doesn’t like it. He knows his bond with Renato is strange, in a sense, because it’s so strong and so old. But that doesn’t mean that it is unique. More people could be going through something similar.

“It’s still stupid. Even if most people don’t, some could! And not everyone has a magical background, so they should still teach it. Among other things.” He pauses, and his steps falter as he actually thinks about it. Renato stops and turns to look at him, an eyebrow raised. “In fact,” Harry says, hesitantly, “I don’t know much about the wizarding world even after a year living in it, not really. Most I know by reading books, but… there should be some, I don’t know, some program or something like that to help muggle-raised kids understand their rights and what’s going on around them. I know Hermione broke a lot of social norms and offended people during the year, but nobody actually explained that to her. Lee helped me a lot with that, actually.”

“No society is perfect,” Ren muses, shaking his head. “Not even a magical one, it seems. But we knew that, didn’t we, after the year you’ve had?” he asks pointedly, and Harry has to admit that he’s right.

“Where are we going?” Harry asks, deliberately changing the subject. He has new things to think about, and he will, but for now, he decides he’d rather focus on something less introspective.

Ren doesn’t even blink, rolling with it with the ease of knowing Harry for years. “The Bonding Center,” he says, cheery. “We should go look through all that paperwork of doom dear Florenzia so graciously pointed out so that we can get the ball rolling on that now, yes?”

“So that it doesn’t seem like you lied to her?”

Dramatically, Renato puts a hand over his heart. “Do you think I’d care about that? You wound me, Harry.”

Harry elbows him on the side and Renato chuckles.

“Then why?” Harry prompts.

“Mm? Well, mostly because this will give me more credit in your world, won’t it? We have the normal paperwork that puts you legally in my charge, but like this…we’re covering more bases. I told you—I’m not letting anyone take you away from me.”

Harry looks down, biting down a smile as his chest fills with warmth and happiness at Renato’s matter-of-fact yet protective tone.

“Do you think it won’t matter if we do it here instead of home?” Harry asks, curious. “In England, I mean.”

Renato looks at him from the corner of his eye, then shrugs one shoulder. He grabs Harry’s elbow and pulls him a step towards himself, and just in time—half a second after that, a witch with numerous bags that must have lightweight charms on them passes right by Harry in a hurry of robes and disregard for where she’s going. Had Ren not acted, she’d have run into him.

“Thanks.”

Ren smiles. “I don’t think it’ll matter,” he says, answering Harry’s previous question. “And if it does, at least we’ll know what we have to do once we get back, and what kind of paperwork we’ll need to file. So it’s worth a try, don’t you think?”

Harry considers it then nods, accepting.

They keep walking through the alley, the colorful displays offering the different shops’ wares catching his eye every time, and he mentally compares it with Diagon as they go. He’s content to make a mental list of shops he’s interested in coming back to, but he gets bored after an hour has passed and they have done nothing but walk. Then, a sudden thought appears in his mind and he stops on his tracks.

“Harry?”

Harry narrows his eyes up at his soulmate and crosses his arms over his chest. “You don’t have any idea where we’re going, do you?”

Renato’s face is annoyingly blank and expressionless for a whole twenty seconds (Harry counts them) and then he says, robotically. “Yes, I do.”

Harry looks at him incredulously, one eyebrow raised. They stay like that for a long time, just standing in silence looking at each other without moving a muscle, and the other shoppers have to awkwardly go around them. Harry feels the prickle of some curious gazes, but he easily ignores them, keeping his eyes on Renato’s dark ones.

Finally, Renato presses his lips together, then sighs, deflating a bit. “No,” he admits as if it pains him. Actually, Harry’s pretty sure it does, as Renato’s always prided himself in being confident and knowing things. But, really? After the masterful display of his lying and manipulating with Madam Zabini, Harry hadn’t expected such a blatant, obvious lie.

“Really,” he asks, so blandly that it doesn’t even sound like a question. “You could have said something from the start. We could have looked something up in, I don’t know, one of the two libraries we passed by in the last half an hour. Or maybe in one of the three bookshops.”

Renato huffs, barely loud enough for Harry to hear, and scowls. Harry blinks. It—it almost looks like Renato is pouting, and Harry has a moment of complete discombobulation in which he wonders if he’s fallen into a different dimension or something. He blinks again, and Renato’s back to normal. Thank Merlin.

“I was making a mental map of the Alley,” Renato offers, but it sounds like an excuse. Harry still doesn’t know what to think, but he lets his soulmate off the hook. This time. However, there is no way this particular incident won’t be brought up again in the future, either to remind Ren whenever he gets too cocky (which happens. Really. You’d think a grown man wouldn’t be so childish, and mostly Ren is not, but he has his moments) or for teasing material. Definitely.

“Sure,” Harry says, though his tone is too light to be completely convincing, and Renato squints at him. Harry turns and starts walking towards the last library they passed. “Let’s go to a library, then. C’mon.”

He can feel Renato walking after him, and then the man appears at his side, hands in the pockets of his robe. Harry shakes his head in wonder.

After they check the library—coming out of it with not only information about the Italian Bonding Center but also recommendations to buy a good haul of books about Wizarding practices and customs (something that Harry had rather neglected before, he can admit, in his excitement of learning about his actual magic subjects)—, they decide to go back to the house immediately after the bookshop. Apparently, the Bonding Center is, in fact, dependent on the Ministry of Magic, and it is therefore located near it in Rome. At least they’ve found a book about soulmates in the bookshop, and Harry hopes that it’ll have enough information to tell them whether they should bother to make the trip there or just wait and register once they go back to England.

Back at the house, they work on dinner together and only after they’ve eaten they each take a book and start reading.

It’s cozy and pleasant, and Harry immediately relaxes. It’s strange—he’s never felt quite comfortable just sitting down and reading in complete silence, not even back in Hogwarts’ library. (Though, to be fair, the library is never completely silent. There’s always the whisper of students, the scratching of their quills as they work on their homework, and the quiet rustle of turning pages. The occasional loud conversation or fallen book followed by Madam Pince’s glare of doom also disrupts the silence from time to time. And he can’t forget the time one of their pranks reached even the library, even if it was unintentional—Peeves’ fault, really.) But here, with only Ren for company, Harry feels completely grounded. Safe.

Is this what a home is supposed to feel like?

(If it is, Harry refuses to ever let this feeling go. No matter what, he will fight tooth and nail against getting separated from his soulmate ever again. The bond being officially recognized can only help—and so he reads.)

Chapter Text

Hey Harry! How’s your vacation going? Italy must be really nice right now...though maybe too hot for us. Fred says that we’d probably end up looking like tomatoes if we went, we’d burn so easily. He’s probably right, but don’t tell him I said that.

He doesn’t have to tell me anything you idiot I can read it myself

ANYWAY SOME PEOPLE SHOULD LEARN TO respect their siblings beloved sibling’s privacy when they are writing a letter to their favorite little brother who’s so far away and not take the book under their quill like a SAVAGE, mum would be so offended, Fred, really!

Harry snorts as he comes across the next couple of lines which are completely illegible. He can imagine the twins fighting over the journal and scratching at it with their quills, leaving horrible inkblots all over the page (and, probably, the desk. Or the kitchen table. Or their beds. Any option doesn’t bode well for their health as their mother would certainly take exception).

HA! I WON! Hello Harry it’s Fred. I holed myself up in the broom closet and I can hear George yelling for me, but it’s gonna be a couple of minutes until he finds me, so here I go. Do you want to come with us to Diagon the week before classes start? That’s when our family’s going to buy our things—did you get your list? Was the poor owl tired once it reached you? Honestly I never thought much about mailing out of the isles but it sounds kind of really tiring doesn’t it? Ah, but I digress. You will be back to Britain by then, right? If so, you totally should come. It’s been ages since we teased saw you in person. George’s been moping. It’s true, he’ll tell you it’s not but it is. And speaking of the grim, I can hear him coming so I’ll make this short. Tell us if you can come and we’ll tell you where we’ll be!

See you

xoxo

Fred

Harry laughs as immediately after that there’s George’s handwriting.

Fred is a lying liar who lies and you should never trust a word he says. Or writes. Ever. Except for the invitation to come to the Alley. That’s true. We’ll be waiting for you! Also, Fred forgot to tell you that you’re invited to spend the week at home, if you want to, and we can all go together to school!

George

And, with much better calligraphy and an intrinsic air of amusement, there’s a last addition by Lee at the very end.

Harry,

As much as these two idiots have mangled the invitation, it’s quite clear that they both want to see you before we’re all aboard the Hogwarts’ Express. I admit it’d be nice to get the four of us together once again, since I’ve missed us. They’ve missed you, too, you know—only they don’t have the emotional capacity to recognize or admit it yet, the babies.

Lee

PS: Did you also get the full bibliography of that clown Lockhart? What kind of teacher is a fan of his to this degree? Ridiculous.

Harry’s cheeks hurt from smiling so much, and he immediately takes up his own quill, ready to dip it in the ink to write his response, when he falters. They are going to be back in Britain by the last week of August, won’t they? That’s only next week. He hasn’t asked Renato, but he’s pretty sure that they will. But, just in case…

He darts outside his room and down the stairs to where Renato is making dinner.

“Ren! Ren, when are we going back to England?”

“Why, Harry, I didn’t think you hated it that much over here.”

Harry scowls. “That’s not it and you know it,” he accuses, rolling his eyes. “I love it here, but school isn’t that far off and I still have to buy all my things, and—”

Renato chuckles, wiping his hands on a towel. “Yes, yes. I know, I was just teasing you. Why do you want to know, exactly?”

Harry sticks his tongue out, but then adopts an air of maturity as he explains, “My friends invited me to shop with them a week before the first. And to stay at their home until it’s time for school. So I was just wondering if we’re gonna be back by then or not.” He bites his lip, then adds, “And if you’ll let me go with them.”

Ren looks to the calendar on the wall of the kitchen, expression distant and concentrated, while Harry tries very hard not to fidget.

“Mmm, the end of August…” he says to himself, and then looks at Harry with a tiny smile. “Yes, we can do that. In fact, that works perfect for me, too. You know I have to go back to work, yes? And I still haven’t been able to acquire any suitable property in England. Plus, I don’t want to leave you alone if work takes me far away again, which is a possibility.”

Harry’s eyes sparkle at the idea of having a sleepover with friends. He’s never been invited to a friend’s house before! Then his brain registers the rest of what his soulmate said.

“What?” Harry asks, eyes wide. “You don’t have to do that! I mean, I can always come here during breaks, can’t I? You don’t need to move for me, not if I’m gonna be at school for months!”

Renato sighs and messes up Harry’s hair. “Dummy,” he says, with a note of amused exasperation. “Of course I have to. Italy’s only secure as long as they don’t know where you are and aren’t thinking about looking for you. But that’ll change—there’s no way it won’t come out that you’re no longer living with the Dursleys, not when I have custody of you. Establishing myself in Britain, making contacts, setting up a house and a couple of safe-houses… It’s necessary.”

Subdued, Harry drops his gaze. “Oh. I don’t want to be a burden.”

Renato sighs. “You’re not. You never can be. This is for my own peace of mind as well, you know? And I can always just connect the houses via your Floo travel. So if anything at all happens it’ll be much easier to find you.”

“Oh. Okay,” Harry says, trying unsuccessfully to hide a smile. Then, impulsively, he gives Renato a quick hug around the waist and goes running up the stairs, with Renato’s warm, surprised laugh as a background sound. 

He takes his quill from its place in his desk, smiles widely at the (moving!) portrait of him and Renato making silly faces that they got done when they were in Rome, and then quickly scratches a reply after Lee’s entry:

Hi guys!

Italy is amazing, I have pictures and a lot of things to tell you once I see you in person! I asked Ren if I could go and he say yes! I dunno yet when we’re coming back but I’ll definitely see you at Diagon. And yes, I can go stay at your house, too. It’s going to be so great!

I miss you guys too, a lot.

And Lee, yes, I also have to buy like twenty books from that man. I never heard about him, why do you call him a clown?

See you soon!

Harry

Chapter Text

Harry blinks at the entrance of the Leaky Cauldron and frowns. He didn’t remember it being so…lackluster. Dirty is a more honest description, maybe even decrepit. How is this the entrance to the famous Diagon Alley?

“Going by your scrunched up nose, the entry to Spark Alley was prettier?” Ren says at his side, tone amused.

“Yeah, definitely.” Harry hesitates a moment, then takes Ren by the hem of his robe—a proper wizard robe, this time, bought in Spark Alley during one of the many visits to it—and then leads him into the pub.

It’s Ren’s turn to blink once he’s crossed the protections, and his eyebrow twitches as he takes in their new surroundings.

“No kidding,” he murmurs, eyeing everything with poorly-contained distaste. “Please, lead the way. The sooner we are out of here, the better.”

Harry can’t agree more, especially when the hairs on the back of his neck alert him that they’re starting to attract the eyes of the clientele. There aren’t many people inside the pub yet, but he has the feeling that many would flood into it if it is revealed that the Harry Potter is now inside. He hadn’t realized how much his introduction to the Wizarding World had been lucky for him in the sense that McGonagall didn’t let it out that she was with him—not that McGonagall would have tolerated people hounding Harry and trying to shake his hand—but he’s now much more aware of his stupid fame. People know that he’s started school already, so there might be some trying to get a good look at him this time, and he doesn’t particularly want them to find him.

“Through here,” he mutters, guiding Ren to the back and to the small patio, then touching the sequence of bricks McGonagall had taught him with his wand.

It’s still awe-inspiring, the way in which the wall twitches and then starts folding into itself, creating an archway that reveals the Alley.

Renato whistles in appreciation. “That’s nice.”

“Right?!”

“What time did your friends told you they’ll meet you?”

“Eleven,” Harry says. “So we have about an hour to explore and buy things, or—”

“Gringotts can wait,” Renato says dismissively, then grins at Harry. “I can do that while you have fun with your friends later. It’s not like the Goblins are about to intimidate me in any way.”

Harry snorts. Of course not. Even if Harry himself is, a bit, the simple idea of Ren being intimidated by anything, even the fierce-looking race, is rather laughable.

“Okay,” Harry says. “Let’s explore, then.”

They do so, going into all the stores that catch their attention and buying numerous trinkets that have very little to do with his school materials, except for the ingredients to replenish his potions kit that Ren insisted on buying.

“But I have my own money!” Harry protests. “I can buy my things.”

Renato tsks, completely ignoring him as he pays for his wares. He’d opened an account in the Italian branch of Gringotts when they were in Rome for the Bond testing, and converted some of his own muggle money to wizarding currency, but Harry still thinks it was unnecessary.

“Ren!” he hisses, irritated at the dismissal.

He does not accept the bag of ingredients once Renato offers it to him, stubbornly crossing his arms. 

Renato sighs. “Harry,” he starts, and Harry starts at his serious tone. He peers at him warily under his eyelashes and is taken aback at the almost sad expression on his face. “I know you have the money, but that’s just it—it’s your money, and you are a child. Children shouldn’t have to pay for their own school supplies, or their own furniture, or their food—unless they are buying snacks, and even then. That’s an adult’s job. A guardian’s job. And I’m both of those things.”

Harry blinks; there’s something in his eye, he’s sure.

Ren’s smile is gentle as he adds, “Last year I couldn’t do this for you because I was so far away, so let me do it from now on, okay? You can buy treats for yourself, if you want. But necessities are on me.”

There’s a lump on Harry’s throat that he has some difficulty swallowing down, but once he finally manages he says, “Okay.” He accepts the bag and puts it inside his backpack (the one he bought himself last year, with the wizarding space and the featherlight charms).

And if his chest has expanded three sizes and has filled with golden warmth, nobody has to know.

“Harry!” a voice calls the moment they get out of the apothecary.

Harry turns, then brightens. “Lee!” He throws his arms around the taller teen. “Hello!”

Lee chuckles. “Hi, you. You’ve seen the twins yet?”

“No.” Harry shakes his head. “We were going to the meeting point, though,” he adds, pointing to Ren with a broad gesture of the hand. “This is Ren,” Harry says, happily. He’s not yet told them Ren’s his soulmate, and he’s not about to tell them in the open like this in Britain—Italy was safe, in comparison, because nobody was looking for him there, but here…better if they contain the truth as much as they can in order to have a safe stay for now.

“Oh,” Lee says, and looks Renato up and down with narrowed eyes full of suspicion. Harry feels rather offended in his soulmate’s behalf and elbows his friend in the ribs.

“Lee!” he hisses. “Stop that!”

“Stop what?” Lee says, feigning innocence. “Good morning, mister Ren,” he says pointedly as he offers Ren a hand. “I’ve heard things about you.”

Ren raises a questioning eyebrow but smirks, accepting Lee’s hand and shaking it firmly. “I can say the same. You and the other two red-headed pranksters—Harry’s had so many things to tell me about you. Let me congratulate you on being such good envoys of chaos.”

Lee looks now honestly bewildered, but then the smile that blooms in his face is wide and full of sharp teeth. “Why, thank you. I daresay the twins will like you, too, even if we know barely anything about you except that you suddenly appeared and took Harry away to Italy.”

Ren shrugs, but is unapologetic. “He needed the time away,” he says. “I’m sure he’ll gladly tell you all about it once you have the time.”

Harry knows he’s referring to the fact that he’ll tell them about their soulmate status once they are in a more private setting, and he nods in agreement with his words once Lee looks at him questioningly.

“Is that so?” Lee mulls it over, then tilts his head in acceptance. “Okay, then. Shall we go look for the two missing, mmh, envoys of chaos?”

Harry snickers at the term. It’s a good one, really. “Sure. Let’s go!”

The three of them start towards the meeting point in front of Ollivanders’, and Harry asks Lee, “Hey, where are your mums? You’re here alone?”

Lee shakes his head. “Of course not,” he says, then rolls his eyes but his lips are turned up at the corners in a much softer smile than the one he usually wears. “Mum brought me, but she’s now obsessing over the botany store. I know she’s going to be inside it for at least another hour so I told her I was going to meet with you guys and she sent me away,” he explains. “It’s not like she’s too worried, either, since I’m almost fifteen and all, but mother does worry and as she couldn’t come today since she had work, so mum agreed to do it instead. You know how she is.”

Harry chuckles, nodding. He hasn’t met Lee’s mums personally yet, but he has heard a lot of stories and complaints about them. Harry thinks they’re great, honestly. He silently wonders if they are soulmates, as they seem so well suited for each other, though he’s not asked.

“Have you seen your relatives since you left?” Lee asks deceptively disinterested.

“Nope,” Harry cheerfully answers, popping the p. “And I’ll never have to see them again, which is rather nice.”

Lee hums, but nods gamely. “I’m sure we’ll hear all about it later, right?”

“Uh-huh.”

“So, are you still going to try for the Quidditch team?” Lee asks curiously, then gives a quick glance back at Renato before looking at Harry again. “I know you were thinking about it last year, but you didn’t say anything during the holidays.”

Harry had, quite honestly, completely forgotten about it after everything that’s happened, but now that Lee’s reminded him of it he perks up in sudden excitement. “Yes!” he says. “I’d love to try out. Plus, there will be at least three spots open in the regular lineup since Edwards, Ponds, and O’Hara graduated already, so I may even get to play. Ren,” he turns to his soulmate, who’s walking some steps behind them and has obviously been following their conversation, “we should totally buy a broom, maybe even two brooms, we should—”

Ren chuckles, messing up Harry’s hair. Harry squawks in indignation and pushes his hand away, glaring.

“Okay, we’ll see to that later,” Ren promises, “but weren’t you going to buy school supplies with your friends, today?”

“Yes.” Harry does not pout as he tries—ineffectively—to flatten his hair with his hand. “But if I’m going to stay with them for the week and you’ll be gone then we won’t be able to do so before I go and then I’ll have to try out with one of the school brooms which are, uh, rather old and not that great and—”

Ren sighs, rather dramatically really, which is unfair. But he says, “All right, all right, we’ll look at some today,” and that’s good enough for Harry. “But only after you’ve bought everything else,” Renato adds, and Harry can live with that, so he nods happily and then turns back to Lee with a huge grin.

His friend has a peculiar expression showing: an eyebrow raised, a half-smile which for some reason feels slightly smug.

Harry frowns. “What?”

“Nothing,” Lee says, but the half-smile doesn’t disappear. “I think I see the twins.” He points with his head towards the front and Harry turns to look, too, and yeah—there’s a group of redheads up ahead, getting inside Ollivander’s, but two of them do not and Harry’s certain it must be their friends.

Harry smiles widely and starts walking a little faster, until he’s close enough that he’s sure he’ll be heard. “Fred! George!”

In unison, both of the teens turn around and identical grins spread on their faces as they exclaim together, “Harry!”

Harry reaches them and they engulf him in a hug that takes his feet off the ground. He laughs as he hugs them back, and after a moment they put him back down.

“It’s so good to see you, buddy!” Fred says, messing up his hair, and Harry mentally gives up on trying to neaten it any. It’s a birds’ nest all the time either way, so it doesn’t really matter.

“Yeah! Look at you! You are even more tan than normal,” George adds, inspecting Harry’s face with bright blue eyes. “Italy did you good, huh?”

“Hi, hello, I’ve missed you too, it’s great to see you,” Lee drawls sarcastically from where he’s standing just behind Harry, though there’s amusement in his tone, too.

“Lee!” the twins exclaim, and they jump him similarly as they did Harry, though he’s annoyed to see that Lee’s feet do not leave the ground. He hadn’t really noticed before, but he’s suddenly struck with the realization that all three of his friends have shot up during the summer and are now at least a good head taller than him. The twins even more than that.

“Unfair!” he exclaims, crossing his arms in front of his chest and scowling.

His three friends turn to look back at him with similar befuddled expressions.

“What is?” George finally asks, confused.

“I’m surrounded by giants.” And now Harry is pouting, a little, but he’s justified! Why must every person he knows be so tall?

A familiar chuckle behind him reminds him that his soulmate is right there, so when a big hand comes down on top of his head he doesn’t startle, though he sees the twins tense.

“Your turn will come,” Ren says, obviously amused. “Don’t be so impatient.”

“Ugh, I know. I just hate being short,” he admits grudgingly, sparing a look to check Ren’s expression before turning back to his friends. “Fred, George, this is Ren. Ren, the one on Lee’s left is Fred, the one on his right is George.”

“So this is the mysterious Ren, huh,” George says, squinting at Ren in a way too similar to Lee’s when they met him.

Harry rolls his eyes. Who’d thought his friends would be this overprotective?

“Be nice,” Harry warns them. “Ren’s my favorite person in the world.”

The twins gasp in fake outrage, but the look they share is sharp and Harry knows that he will have to explain everything to them sooner rather than later or things will get out of hand.

Renato chuckles, amused, and extends a hand. “It’s nice to meet you, fellow agents of chaos. I know you don’t trust me, that’s okay,” he says as Fred and George warily accept the hand for a shake each. “I’m glad to see more people than me worrying about Harry’s safety.”

Harry’s cheeks feel hot and he makes a high-pitched noise he’s not proud of at all. His three friends hone immediately on his reaction and then smile—a wide smile full of mischief that sends warning signals to Harry’s brain.

“Oh, no,” George says, darkly amused. “I’m starting to think that the pleasure is all ours.”

Oh, but what has he done? Why did he think that letting Renato and his three troublesome friends meet was in any way a good idea?

Harry is going to die of embarrassment. He just knows it.

Chapter Text

“Fred! George!” a voice calls, loud, making the four boys startle, not only the two redheads. Renato had already seen the plump redhead woman that can only be the twins’ mother coming, followed by three other children: one of them is older than the twins, serious, and wears glasses. The other two are about Harry’s age—a boy covered in freckles and a tiny slip of a girl who looks at their group with wide blue eyes and then meeps, hiding behind her mother’s skirts (well, robes) when the boys all turn their attention to them. “Ginny was so disappointed you weren’t there for her wand choosing! What are you even doing outside?”

“Mum,” the one with the slightly higher-pitched voice says, and Renato is pretty sure that’s Fred. “We told you we were going to meet our friends here. They just came when we were going inside.”

“Yeah, mum,” George added. “And Ginny had all three of you with her, she didn’t need us cramping the little store any—we knew she’d get a kick-ass wand, she’s our little sister of course.”

Ginny, the little girl, turns so red that Renato is pretty sure eggs could be cooked on her cheeks. He coughs softly to cover up a laugh.

“And we haven’t seen Harry for ages, you can’t be mad at us for that.”

“Yeah, being mad at us would make you have to be mad at Harry, and look at him!” George says, pushing a bewildered Harry in front of his mother, right between her and them. Harry blinks large, surprised eyes at her and she falters. Renato has to put a hand over his smile at the obvious but quite successful manipulation. “You can’t be mad at this cute lil’ face.”

Harry sputters a little, but the deed is done and the Weasley matriarch deflates from her righteous indignation.

“Why, no, of course not,” she says, then smiles down at Harry and adopts a much sweeter tone. “Hello, Harry, dear. We met some months ago, at King’s Cross. I hope you remember. My name’s Molly.”

Harry offers his own shy smile at her, pushing his new glasses up his nose as he dips his head a little in embarrassment.

“Hi, Mrs. Weasley,” he says, “thank you for inviting me over.”

Renato can see his soulmate winning over the woman completely in that exact second, and so can his friends—Fred and George are looking at Harry with slack mouths, obviously impressed. Lee, too, though he’s a little less obvious.

“Oh, no, it’s no trouble! No trouble at all!” she says, a little flustered and completely charmed. “Fred and George have talked a lot about you, you know, so I’m glad to have you over. Oh, but where are my manners? We never introduced ourselves at that time, you had to go so quickly. Percy, Ron, Ginny, come here. Children, this is Harry Potter—though you must already know him, no? From Hogwarts? Except you, dear. Harry, you know Ron and Percy, yes? Percy is a Prefect, and Ron’s in your year. And this is Ginny, she’s starting Hogwarts this September.”

Harry smiles at the three and waves his hand. Percy nods, looking bored, mostly, while Ron and Ginny both look a little embarrassed. Ginny barely looks at Harry before going even redder and hiding behind her mother once again. Harry’s eyebrows climb high onto his forehead at the display, and Renato wonders if he’s realized she has a huge celebrity crush on him. Now that’s going to be fun, he suspects.

“Where are your guardians, dear?” Mrs. Weasley wonders. “My boys told me you lived with your, ah, muggle relatives?”

Harry shakes his head and then looks back to where Renato is standing a few paces away, silent as he observed the scene playing in front of him without drawing any attention. Renato takes it as his cue and steps towards the group, and it’s highly amusing to see how every single person except for Harry suddenly tenses up, wary at his approach.

“No, I’m living with Ren now,” Harry says, purposely oblivious. “Renato, these are the Weasleys,” he says unnecessarily, but following basic social norms. “Mrs. Weasley, everyone, this is Renato, my guardian.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Renato says, charming. It amuses him a great deal that there is a long moment of silent examination before the woman says anything in return.

“Likewise,” she says, though her eyes are narrowed, taking in his classic but nice robe, his posture, his demeanor. Renato raises an eyebrow at her scrutiny and obvious mistrust. What must she see, he wonders, that she doesn’t like. It’s no matter, no really, because he’s always prided himself in making people think what he wants them to think about him, and that includes making them like him. So if they dislike him at first interaction, it becomes a challenge, and Renato is not about to back off from one of those. “Are you accompanying us for this trip, then, Mr…?”

“Sinclair, Madame,” he offers with a smile, “and yes, at least for a part of it, I will. I’ve only bought Harry’s potion ingredients so far, and while I know he could manage just fine without me, I’m interested in learning about the British Shop District.”

“And he promised to look at brooms with me,” Harry pipes up, smiling widely. “I’m trying for the Ravenclaw team this year,” he says, and the twins start cheering at that.

“Oh, that’s great!”

“Don’t think we’ll go easy on you just because we’re friends. Quidditch is Quidditch.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.” Harry laughs, trying to get away from his friends’ congratulatory pats.

Meanwhile, Renato takes in the reaction of the other Weasleys: Molly looks happy, but her smile is a little bit pained, a little bit wistful. Ron is a bit red, pouty. Jealous? Of what? Not of the attention Harry’s getting, not completely, but maybe… Ah. He remembers quite suddenly prior comments Harry’s made about his friends before and, after a quick assessing look at the redheaded family, he concludes that they aren’t well-off, financially. It doesn’t seem to be a major sore spot—but it pains them nonetheless, and Renato feels suddenly more empathetic with them. After all, having money at his disposal is something relatively new—he grew up poor, a bastard child in Italy with a sickly mother with a French surname and no other options but petty crime that later derived in his Mafia absorption. He understands the pains of poverty in a way that people who never lived through it could barely imagine.

Harry knows, too, but his perspective is a bit different. Still, he’ll make a point to talk to him about it so he can have it in mind during future interactions, as Renato knows one of the last things Harry would like to do is to unknowingly offend people he likes.

Their large group then starts moving together in order to get the children all their supplies, breaking up into smaller groups whenever Mrs Weasley deems it the most practical to do so, with Renato gamely bowing to her superior knowledge of the way this world works. He mostly sticks to his soulmate and his friends, amused at their conversations and antics, and finding himself liking them even more than he did when he only knew about them through Harry’s stories (and, seeing as he quite liked them before, it means a lot).

Renato takes notice of many a building which he will take his time to explore in the future, including the realtor’s that Florenzia had recommended.

The bookshop is the last stop of compulsive school material, and Harry is almost vibrating outside his skin. Renato chuckles internally at his display of excitement for what he knows is the prospect of looking at brooms after this last stop is done, and Renato mindlessly muses what must feel like to fly in one of them—he can’t really imagine it, though it’d be interesting to see if he can use one by himself, too.

(He’d noticed that he has a certain sensitivity to magic, first in Spark’s Alley back in Florence and then later on in Rome. He’s experimented with Floo—which is a horrible mode of transport, if quite useful—and he believes he can make use of most enchanted tools, though he’s incapable of using any kind of spell. He hasn’t tried to make a potion, yet—hasn’t had the time or the inclination to do so, to be honest—but that’s another thing he could try, someday.)

It takes him a moment to notice the buzzing excitement is not confined to his soulmate, but spread among a large group of people, mostly witches, who are murmuring and giggling as they congregate together towards the back of the building.

“Oh, good, it’s just about to start,” Mrs. Weasley says, absent-minded, as she combs her hair with her fingers. She looks as excited as the rest of the people in here, and Renato raises an eyebrow.

He exchanges a curious look with Harry, who seems just as lost, and then looks around for some kind of clue—there. A moving poster of a handsome blond man smiles a rather blinding smile down at them and winks, showing off a book in his hands. Apparently, Gilderoy Lockhart is signing books today.

“Isn’t that the name on half your school list?” Renato asks Harry.

Harry looks, then grimaces as he finds the poster, which at that particular moment is sending a kiss.

“...Unfortunately,” he says, frowning at the display.

“Mum loves him,” Ron says with a groan. “I think she said to come today because she wanted to see him in person.”

“Yeah,” George agrees. “Usually we make our trip here much earlier—we were surprised when she told us we’d come so close to September.”

“I think he’s full of hot air,” Fred points out, looking around with disdain. “Always speaking about himself and his accomplishments and stupid things like his favorite color.”

“Or his favorite shampoo.”

“Or his favorite blend of tea.”

The twins snort with disdain at the same time, then say, “Ridiculous.”

“Children! What are you doing? Come, come, don’t be disrespectful. Oh, we’ll be able to see him in a minute,” Mrs. Weasley says, making their group get closer to the front of the makeshift platform where the same man of the poster, in forget-me-not blue robes, is sitting at a desk surrounded by copies of his last book and smiling the same white, dazzling smile the poster had.

A short, irritable looking man is fluttering around him and taking photos with a huge camera that let out puffs of purple smoke with every blinding flash. Renato took it in with bemused curiosity; he’d noticed that the Wizarding World was somehow behind the times in what respects technological advances, but it still surprises him every time he finds another piece of evidence.

“Out of the way!” the photographer snarls at someone in their group, moving back to get a better shot. “This is for the Daily Prophet.”

“Big deal,” says Ron, rubbing his foot where the man had stepped on it. Harry grimaces at his side, looking sympathetic, while Ron’s twin brothers snicker behind them.

“It can’t be Harry Potter?” a voice cries, loud and ringing in the sudden silence.

Renato looks towards it with narrowed eyes beneath his wizard hat, finding an excited-looking Gilderoy Lockhart diving forward as the crowd makes space for him, whispering behind their hands and craning their necks. Harry’s eyes grow huge as the man seizes his arm and Renato reacts .

Before the man can take even one step towards the front, Renato’s there, grabbing his arm by the wrist and applying just enough force into the joint to make him let go. The man hisses in surprise and turns, bringing his hand to his chest with a hilarious look of betrayed surprise. Renato smiles disarmingly at him, though it’s full of teeth. Harry takes the hint and hides more firmly behind Renato’s body.

“What were you trying to pull?” Renato asks in his politest tone. The one that hides knives behind it.

Lockhart opens and closes his mouth, blue eyes wide as he stares at Renato for a heartbeat or two. Then, he clears his throat and smiles widely—a celebrity smile. It’d be warm if it wasn’t so fake. “Ah, my dear friend,” he says while trying to look behind him. “I was just elated to greet our dear Harry—he’s almost as famous as me, after all—and I’d thought—”

“Well,” Renato interrupts without remorse, “you thought wrong. Harry’s here to buy his school books, and nothing more.”

Lockhart blinks owlishly, his smile looking forced. “Ah, but surely...” He trails off after getting the full brunt of Renato’s low-level killing intent. He gulps, then clears his throat. “Yes, yes, you’re right. I’m sorry that, in my excitement, I forgot the true reason I was here today,” he says, pitching his voice louder at the end, obviously directing his words to the public more than Renato himself. Renato can admit to being slightly impressed by the man’s quick thinking and adaptability. He makes a mental note to speak to Harry about that later on—the man is not as dim as he portrays himself to be, and that could be dangerous.

“Our children are our future,” Lockart continues, infusing his voice with deep passion as he moves back to the desk. “And as our future, their education is of utmost importance!” His blue tunic swishes dramatically behind him as he turns to address the public, but his hat stays perfectly perched on top of his blond curls. “Ladies and gentlemen, you know that for years I’ve striven to collaborate to our society by bringing in knowledge about a wide variety of dark creatures and long-lost magic. It’s one of the many reasons explored in Magical Me, my autobiography. However, lately I’ve felt that this isn’t enough, and that I could contribute much more to our society by taking a different path—and seeing young Harry here just brought everything back into focus, and thus my excited moment of forgetfulness. Oh, I can almost hear you wondering, so I will go directly into the heart of it. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I have great pleasure and pride in announcing that, this September, I will be taking up the post of Defence against the Dark Arts teacher at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry!”

The crowd cheers and claps and Renato finds himself exchanging an incredulous gaze with his soulmate.

This...this buffoon will be in charge of Harry’s education? Renato wouldn’t trust the man with a plant, much less hundreds of students’ lives, and he only has this brief interaction and his gut instinct to guide him into that conclusion. How could anybody think of hiring him to be a teacher?

(He will write about this in his next letter to Florenzia. The witch may live in Italy, but she’s obviously very involved in her son’s education—she might have an insight he’s lacking.)

“And for that reason,” Lockhart adds, preening and dazzling the multitude with his too-bright teeth, “all Hogwarts students present here today will get a free copy of all of my books, signed!”

The crowd goes crazy, and it’s all Renato can do to stick to Harry and keep an eye for trouble as they are jostled this way and the other until the children had all gotten a copy of the promised books and they make their way outside the overcrowded building, finally able to breathe.

“Oh, wow,” Lee says between gasps, “that was fun. Not.”

“I think I know who’s gonna get our first itching powder prank, don’t you think so?” Fred says beneath his breath, probably out of his mother’s hearing range but not Renato’s.

“Arthur? Ginny?” Mrs Weasley calls, frowning as she scans their surroundings. She looks like she just came out of a fight with a mob—her hat is askew and her robes are all wrinkled. To be completely honest, most of them look the same. “Fred, George, have you seen your—? Ah, no matter, there they are.”

Indeed, Arthur Weasley—who joined them just before they entered Flourish and Blotts—is coming towards their group, his hand holding Ginny’s. His jovial face is nowhere to be seen, however. He is as red as his hair and tense all over, almost bristling in obvious anger. For her part, Ginny’s clutching the cauldron with her new books with her free hand, and her eyes are teary.

“Arthur! What happened?” Mrs Weasley asks, aghast as she worriedly flutters around them. Ginny ducks her head to hide behind her ginger hair.

Mr Weasley grits his teeth and then breathes in and out, deeply. “Nothing big, dear. Just an unpleasant encounter with Mr Malfoy, ” he says, spitting the name with barely controlled disgust. “But it’s no matter, no matter. I think with this we’re done with the shopping, then?”

Harry tugs on Renato’s wide sleeve, and Renato fights the urge to snort. “Not quite, Mr Weasley. Harry wanted to look at brooms.”

Mr Weasley squints in their direction, possibly trying to puzzle out who they are, then brightens. “Ah, of course! Shall we all go, or…?”

“What do you think, Harry?”

“Ah, sure? If you want. Or we could separate?”

“I’ll pass,” says Percy. “I have to find someone, so if you excuse me...” He waits for his mother to nod and then he’s off.

“I bet it’s Penelope,” George whispers, and the other kids nod, holding back juvenile snickering.

“Well, then,” Mrs Weasley says, “I think we’d better separate for now. Arthur, go with Mr Sinclair and the boys. Ginny, you’re with me.”

“But, mum,” Ginny complains, and it’s the first time she’s spoken in front of Renato. And Harry, Renato is pretty sure. “I want to look at brooms, too.”

“Another day, dear. We have to find a couple more things before it’s time to go back and prepare dinner—oh, I almost forgot.” She turns to Renato and smiles. It’s tentative, but much more honest than before, when they had just been introduced. “Would you like to have dinner with us, today? I’d love to have you over as a thank you for taking care of Harry. And so you can see where he’s going to be staying during this last week before Hogwarts.”

Renato tilts his head and smiles. “I’d be honored. Thank you.”

Chapter Text

Renato leaves the Weasley’s home with the quiet certainty that Harry will be more than fine. It’s obvious that his friends adore him, and the rest of the family seems to be quite taken with him, too, once dinner is over. The evening was a noisy but cheerful affair, the food was delicious, and both Harry and Renato marveled over the obvious magic at play in every corner of the house.

It definitely helped Renato with his plans for their own house in England. As he told Harry before, he is not about to uproot his soulmate completely, and none of the multiple small safe-houses he owns in the Isles are suitable for living full time. Furthermore, Harry will need the familiarity of magic and the protection of wards—things Renato spoke about at length with both Florenzia and the man who attended to him the day after the dinner at the realtor’s. He looked at several options and heard different sales pitches until he decided upon a particular house just in the outsides of London. The man extolled the building’s many charming qualities but politely pointed out that the protection was quite basic, and that he should think about contracting with a warding company.

Renato was aware of that, of course, since it was one of the many pieces of advice Florenzia gave him about this particular business.

“You’d want basic wards in place,” she’d said, honest, “but do not accept their offer to use their own contractors. They make passable wards, but you will need excellent ones. In this case, I’m afraid, going to the Goblins is your best option. Their curse breakers are fantastic at dismantling and setting up wards. It’ll be pricey, of course, but well worth your Galleons.”

Renato bowed to her superior knowledge, and so after buying the property he’d made a visit to Gringotts’ English branch. As Florenzia had predicted, it cost him a good amount of Galleons, but luckily Renato’s been saving up for years and has more than enough, especially considering the well-paid missions he’s been doing in the last half a year.

(Which, he reasons, is something he has to work upon soon. He remembers the curt way in which he informed Luce of his absence, and he knows he’s missed at least one mission debrief. She’s not going to be happy with him, but it’s not like he’s going to be fired. Renato’s worked hard on Reborn’s persona and reputation, and he knows he’s one of the very best hitmen the Mafia has to offer. He has to do something much worse than disappearing for a month before he fears a replacement.)

It’s mid-morning when the contractor he hired the day before with the goblins as intermediaries come, ringing the bell politely at exactly 10 o’clock. Renato arrived at the new house at five am and has since then explored every single nook and cranny, and added a good part of his own security measures without going too overboard—he needs to know first how exactly the magic part of the protections will work, in fact, before he can complete the more mundane (but still necessary for his state of mind) preparations.

Renato opens the front door with a polite smile etched onto his face and his left hand over the handle of the Glock on the small of his back, ready to act in case the short, bubble-gum pink-haired woman with the thick violet-framed glasses is not, in fact, the person he is waiting for.

“Mister Sinclair, right?” she asks, not blinking at all. The effect is a bit disturbing with her blue eyes magnified as they are behind the lenses. “I’m Mia Turner, Curse Breaker. You booked a date with me at ten a.m. today, August the 28th, correct?”

Renato blinks, a little thrown by her serious monotone, which is a heavy and unexpected contrast to her overall appearance. “Yes, I did. Thank you for coming,” he says, opening the door wider and taking a step to the side. “Please, come in.”

She adjusts her glasses and nods. “With your permission.”

The woman power walks inside, and before Renato finishes turning after closing the door she is already looking around the foyer and making notes in a clipboard that floats beside her—or well, actually, she’s dictating murmured observations to the floating quill as it takes her notes for her.

“You acquired this property recently,” she notes absently. “There are already bases for magic wards, a good sets of anchoring stones for what I can feel and see, plus,” she moves a hand and the clipboard floats down to it, then she squints at it, “you have two fireplaces that are not connected to the floo. I guess you want at least one floo connection and a set of common wards, right?” she asks him, and her eyes pierce him in a way Renato is rather not accustomed to by people who look as innocuous as she does.

He doesn’t let his surprise cross his face. Instead, he tilts his head at an angle that lets him keep his eyes on Miss Turner, and says, “Yes, that’s the basic idea. Though I wanted to discuss the warding scheme with you in case I’d prefer a more complex system, and after that I will consider doing the second fireplace connection, too.”

She hums, curiously contemplating him without blinking for much longer than Renato thinks his words merited contemplation. She says then, “that’s acceptable. Show me the whole house plan and the fireplace you want first connected, and I will inform you of your options once I have a clear idea of what I’m working with. And tell me about your necessities so I can tailor my suggestions accordingly.”

Renato accepts her terms without trouble, pleasantly surprised that he’s dealing with someone who seems to be honestly competent in her area of work. Not that he’d doubted that she would be, not when the firm she works for is the one Florenzia Zabini recommended the most, but it is always pleasant to make business with people who know what they are doing and don’t try to rip you off for a half-assed job.

He guides her through the house, making note of every place she pays particular attention to. It’s interesting to see what the differences are with what he considered of note when he was doing his own reconnaissance. She keeps on muttering things from time to time to her floating clipboard, but she also listens carefully to every answer he gives to her questions.

“Alright,” she says once the tour is done and the fireplace in the sitting room has been closely examined. “From what I’ve seen and what you’ve told me, there are four different basic ward matrixes that would work the best in this building, and upon them you can add extra protections depending on what you weight as the most important aspects to the protection. We can go over them right now and cast the basic matrix you choose, then I can connect the floo, and depending on the extra wards you decide upon, I can finish casting today or I can come back tomorrow in the case they require more than one caster to complete.”

“That sounds more than agreeable,” Renato says. “Would you care for something to eat as we discuss the options?”

“Tea would be lovely,” she says, and it’s the first time she loses the professional tone since she rung the bell. “Thank you.”

So Renato guides her to the kitchen, where he puts on a kettle and then takes a couple of sandwiches that he’d prepared earlier from the fridge. It’s a good thing that he decided to buy a house with the basic furniture already installed, because even though he’d love to spend the time and the effort to find the perfect furniture and maybe bring Harry with him so he can have a choice, too, it is not something he can realistically do within the timeframe he has before he needs to go back to work. And after he does...well, he doesn’t think he’d have the time, either. And he wants to have a house prepared for Harry by Christmas break; a house that could hopefully become a home to the boy, since he hasn’t had one in way too long.

They sit companionably at the table and, once the tea is ready, they start discussing wards as they eat.

“So this two are the more useful for the protections you want,” she says, showing him two of the four matrices they’d been studying. “This one,” she taps her finger over one of them, “will let you add the anti-elves ward, which is rather uncommon, plus everything else you asked for, though I will need to bring at least two more people to set them up. This one,” she moves her hand to the other piece of parchment, “is also good for layering protections, and will permit you to add even more afterward even by yourself, but will not support the anti-elves ward.”

“The first one,” Renato says immediately, remembering Harry’s concern with Dobby the elf—who was the reason why he asked if there was even a possibility of blocking an house elves from appearing in their house in the first place. “It will let us set permissions for certain elves to enter, though, if it is needed in the future?” Not that it is likely to happen, but Renato doesn’t want to cut off that possibility if he doesn’t have to, since you never know what can happen in the future.

“Yes, certainly,” she answers, taking away the second parchment and leaving only the ward matrix he’s selected. “It works much similar to the blood wards—you have to let the particular elf in via explicit permission the first time, and then link them to the wardstone that will be keeping that particular ward in place.”

Renato nods, then stands up. “Then, that’s decided. It’s no trouble for me to let you bring the people you need tomorrow, as long as they also sign the contract you already signed,” he says, retiring the empty plates and teacups.

“That’s the idea,” she says, also getting up. “That’s for the extra wards, but I can cast the matrix today, as I said. Would you like both fireplaces connected to the floo?”

Reborn rinses the plates and the cups as he mulls it over. Is it worth it? They won’t live here full time, after all, only during Harry’s school holidays, so… “No, just the one on this floor will be fine, thank you.”

“Right, alright.”

She waits for him to finish before going towards the main wardstone, where she will begin the waving of the matrix. It’s an interesting but time-consuming process. Even so, Renato follows her every step as she chants and moves around the house. It takes almost two hours until she’s finished, but once she does Renato is grateful. He’s not magical, not like Harry is, but there’s something intrinsic in his Flames that lets him not-quite interact with the bright feeling that is magic, like a prickling sensation that’s easy to miss if you’re not concentrating on it. However, since his first visit to Sparks Alley Renato’s been noticing and becoming more adept at perceiving concentrations of magic, and he can now feel it—the warmth and weight of it upon the house, like a blanket of protection, and he’s glad.

He uses six drops of fresh blood on the main wardstone—three from Renato, six from Harry that he’d gotten the day before in a brief pit-stop at the Weasley’s—and with that the main wards settle in place.

“Now the Floo,” she says, and she looks a little tired, but not overly so.

“You can do it tomorrow, if you want,” Renato offers, because she’s been working steadily for hours already and he does not require the floo to be connected so soon, in any case.

She shakes her head and pushes her glasses up her nose. “No, no. The difficult part is done, connecting the floo is rather simple, in fact,” she says. “The privacy settings you wanted depend upon the wards being cast first, so that’s why I didn’t do it fist.”

As she said, it barely takes her a handful of minutes to work on the fireplace. She then tests it by conjuring a bit of fire and then taking a pinch of green powder from a bag in her robe pocket and throwing it to the flames. They grow, crackling emerald green, and she nods in satisfaction, putting the little bag away.

“Well, that’s done,” Miss Turner says, taking her clipboard and making a couple of final notes before stuffing it together with her quill in the other pocket of her robe. An extension charm, Renato’s mind decides, interested, before she distracts him again. “The final price will be settled tomorrow after the casting of the rest of the wards, so, for now, I’ll take my leave.”

“It’s been a pleasure to work with you,” Renato says, honestly, as he accompanies her to the door.

Miss Turner’s mouth twitches upwards in a very slight but real smile, and she inclines her head, pink hair following the movement. “The feedback is appreciated,” she says, “and, for the record, you’ve been one of my most agreeable clients so far. It won’t be a bother to come again.”

It surprises a laugh out of him. “Many tough clients, then?”

“Like you wouldn’t believe,” she says, voice wry, and if Renato hadn’t liked her before, that’d have done it. “I’ll come back tomorrow, then. Have a nice day, Mr. Sinclair.”

“Same to you, Miss Turner.”

And with that, she walks away, leaving Renato alone in his new house once again.

A screech from the window makes him reconsider his phrasing, and he laughs as he goes to open the window for Harry’s beautiful snowy owl.

“Hello, girl,” he says, offering his arm to the bird. She takes it with grace and extends her leg in a clear demand for him to take the letter attached to it. “Harry’s already writing, huh? How is he?”

She barks twice, and Renato decides to take that as a good sign. He takes Hedwig to the perch he put on the living room, across from the fireplace, and leaves her there with a scratch on the head and a treat that she happily gobbles up.

Mail by owl—not something Renato has done, ever, since sending Hedwig from England to Italy is too much of a journey when they had soulmate dreams to talk, but he can’t say he’s not happy to have this now, as short as it’ll be until he’s back to Italy.

He smiles at the messy scrawl as he opens the letter, and then goes to the study to read it—after all, it’s there where he has the necessary supplies to answer it.

It’s been a good day, if a little strange after three weeks of seeing his soulmate daily, but he’s glad to have news about him, even if it’s not even been a day since he last saw him.

He sighs a little—it’s going to be a long couple of months, he fears, if he misses his presence this much already, but he’ll have to deal.

They’ll see each other in person again in December.

He can wait.

Chapter Text

Luce hums as she looks out of the window, phone in hand. The call’s already disconnected and it was just as short as every single one of the Sun’s communications. Reborn was quick to the point and dry as a desert, polite but disinterested in doing more than he has to.

I’m once again available, he said. I’ll be there next meeting.

He’s missed three so far, and only one of them was before August—and he had had a good explanation back then, as he was on a solo mission sent out by Luce herself. Well, by the man behind Luce, if she’s being honest, which she only can be to herself. The others don’t know anything about their benefactor aside from the fact that he exists, and she knows she must keep the secret until it’s out by itself, when there exists no possibility of them getting away.

It’s an awful thing to do, she knows. But the fate of the world is more important than the lives of seven people, it’s always been. Her Family has been carrying the weight of the Sky Pacifier for generations, so she’s grown up knowing about her fate since she learned how to speak. She’s learned to accept it long before the pacifier became hers, and she’s grown almost comfortable with the knowledge of her premature death. Her visions have only helped her embrace the future, which has been crystal clear to her for years, at least in which respects to herself.

She knows that the time of change is rapidly approaching. Their group is not four months old, but she’s learned to like them, even though she doesn’t have more than partial bonds with four of them. She’s glad about that, actually, because her own guardians will suffer enough once she dies, and even though she’s accepted her part in this overall scheme, she still doesn’t wish to make them suffer more than they will once the curse settles. She likes to think of herself as a practical woman, and not a cruel one.

Aria moves inside her, kicking at her bladder and shaking her out of her reveries with the jolt. Luce chuckles gently at the antics of her unborn daughter and gently rubs at the distended skin of her stomach, smiling slightly. Then, she sighs and puts the phone down on the receiver with a soft clack.

Like her, Aria will bear the burden of the curse after Luce dies, and out of everything else that’s what Luce regrets the most. She will still do it, even as her heart hurts at the mere prospect, because it is what is needed and there is no one else that can bear the burden.

Destiny is both a friend and a foe that has always been present in her life, and will always be. Even if it eludes her sometimes, rare as the visions are.

She pensively looks at the phone, thinking back to Reborn’s words, and the fact that he all but dropped out the face of the earth for a whole month.

She can’t say that she saw that coming, and it’s quite uncomfortable in ways she cannot express, because it has never happened like this. Luce doesn’t make a habit of checking everyone’s futures, since it’s taxing and the results mostly irrelevant to her, but she does look for clues about things she doesn’t understand about people that are important. And while she’s seen things about every single one of the future Arcobaleno, her visions about Reborn have always been—different. Fuzzy. Not as clear or as precise as with the others, sporadic, sometimes completely unreachable.

And it bothers her. It has been like that since the very beginning, and she doesn’t know why they don’t work as they normally would. She’s tried regularly, but there have been more failures than successes, which makes her feel awkward and uncomfortable. The anxious feeling is bad for Aria, so after the first month, Luce stopped putting so much effort into it. She convinced herself that it didn’t really matter. Reborn was polite, after all, if a bit more distant and wary than she was expecting. But he was always early to meetings, and he always finished his missions in the allotted time and with stellar results, so she let him be.

But then, just at the beginning of August, he called. He said he was taking time off and would not be available for an indefinite amount of time, and before Luce could demand an explanation, the call cut off. And when she immediately tried to call back, the line was dead. She tried finding answers through her visions, of course she did, and caught an image of him at the airport, but...that was it. The next thing Luce saw was of him making the call he just finished, and thus she had known he’d come back—but not when, nor a single reason of why or where he’d gone.

Destiny has always been clear to her, the future set not in stone, because things can change and have done so many times before, but rather in a more malleable substance that, nonetheless, still keeps its form mostly the same. But Reborn is a mystery she cannot solve, a blind spot in her all-seeing eyes, and it frustrates her more than she can voice, more than she’s comfortable admitting even to herself.

Well, she thinks with a huff, he’s coming to the next meeting, which is barely two days away . Maybe she can glean some kind of truth from him once they are face-to-face once again.

With barely more than a year to go before the curse comes into effect, she cannot afford to let things go without question, as there needs to be some kind of trust for the group to accept the mission together. Their collaborations and the subterfuge of the true nature of this group is for the sake of cooperation, for covert training and assessment before the inevitable comes to pass, and the less inter-group problems and true secrets there are, the easier they’ll reach that point.

She doesn’t know what Reborn has been up to this past month, and she fears it will impact negatively on the group, so she has to investigate in order to see if she has to intervene. It will not do to have the group break so soon, compromising the timeline, if she can do something to prevent it.

“Luce,” Jerome says, entering her office after a polite knock. She looks at him with a tired smile, and he tuts, a worried frown forming on his forehead. “You look tired. It’s late, and the cooks told me you haven’t been down to dinner yet.”

Luce laughs, amused at his mother-henning. “I was just having one last call,” she says honestly, offering her guardian a hand that he promptly takes to help her stand. “Then I got lost in thought for a while, I fear. But I was just going to dinner, I promise.”

Jerome grunts, unconvinced. “So you say, but you have the terrible habit of overworking yourself. And while normally that wouldn’t be a major problem, you are now in the late stages of pregnancy, so you should be more careful of your health.”

“I have you to take care of me, don’t I?” Luce says, teasing, and accepts the arm he offers after she stands. “So I why should I worry?”

His eyes go wide, pained and pleading. “My Luce, please.”

She giggles, then pats his cheek lovingly with her free hand. “I’ll try to be more conscious of the time, if that will make your worries less dire,” she offers, with a kind, honest smile of appreciation.

“That would be ideal, indeed,” he says, shoulders relaxing a bit from their tense position. “There’s barely a month left before little Aria is here, after all.”

Luce gingerly rubs her belly again, where she can feel her daughter moving. “Yes, maybe even less,” she admits, then can’t help but laugh at Jerome’s immediate panicked spluttering.

Time is ticking. She’s perfectly, painfully aware of it, and there are so many things Luce still has to do—but she will start with unraveling Reborn’s mystery in two days, and then she’ll go from there.

Even if the first couple of steps are blurry, the path to the future is clear, so she’ll walk it without fear and without doubt, as she’s always done.

She’s Luce Giglio Nero, future Sky Arcobaleno, after all.

And she has the weight of the world on her shoulders.

Chapter Text

The week with the Weasleys goes by in a flash.

In fact, Harry thinks rather morosely, the whole summer vacations went by in a flash. He never thought he’d be lamenting the start of the school year—it was unimaginable when he still lived with the Dursleys. When he learned last year that he was going to Hogwarts, a boarding school, and that he wouldn’t have to be “home” in months he had been so ecstatic. 

Now it is a completely different thing. Now he has an actual home (though he won’t be able to see the new house Renato bought until Christmas, he’s really looking forward to it!) and friends and family, and he actually got to enjoy his vacation in a way that he never did before. He will miss the warmth of caring adults as he goes back to school. It’s a new experience.

Still, when the time comes to pack all his things in preparation, Harry feels the spark of excitement growing. He’ll be a second year! He can try for Quidditch! They’ve already devised at least twelve different pranks to play on the Shiny Menace Lockhart! 

He’s gleefully looking forwards to the chaos.

(Harry was already concerned and unimpressed with the idiot after the scene in Flourish and Blotts. After getting a quick look over the content of his new books, his concerns only grew. The man seems to be way too full of himself to be as proficient in what he does as he claims in his books. Harry doubts he’s done even half of the things written there. Still, he will keep in mind Renato’s warning about him—idiot or not, somehow the man got most wizardkind to believe him, since his books sell. And he can’t forget that he’s been hired as a professor at Hogwarts, too. Harry doesn’t know how that happened. The selection should be very strict, since Hogwarts is supposed to be one of the bests schools of magic, but he’s starting to doubt it. No, truly. Take Binns, for example. And Quirrell. Now Lockhart? Harry’s not amused. What’s wrong with Hogwarts? And what’s wrong with the wizards? He doesn’t get how there aren’t more complaints.)

“Do you want to travel with me, or will you fly to school?” he asks Hedwig the morning they have to take the Express. Hedwig cocks her head and slowly blinks at him, then hides her head beneath her wing. Harry chuckles. “With me, then.”

“Are you packed?” Ron asks peeking into the room, his expression full of wariness. And he has a good reason for it, since the twins had been inside until a couple of minutes ago, and their younger brother is one of their favourite targets of brotherly ribbing. They don’t even care if they did it in said younger brother’s room.

“Yeah,” Harry answers with a smile. He’d gotten a lot closer to Ron in the last week. Sharing a room and a house will do that to you. Before, he’d only known him as Fred and George’s little brother and not much more than that, since they didn’t share many classes together. And Ron wasn’t the studious type, either, so he never joined any of Harry’s study slash tutoring sessions with Neville and Hermione. “And the lady is coming with us, not flying,” he adds, gesturing towards the sleepy owl.

“Cool,” Ron says, eyeing around the room with slight mistrust. “Hey, you would tell me if those menaces did something, uh, weird to my room, wouldn’t you?”

Harry’s smile in response is beatific, and Ron’s eye twitches.

“Nevermind,” he says quickly. “I didn’t even want to know, really.”

Harry snickers. “Don’t worry,” he says, knowing perfectly well that the twins hadn’t done anything to the room. “It’s nothing nefarious.”

Ron pales a little, then grimaces. “Urgh. Alright, whatever. It can’t be worse than the teddy bear incident.”

“The teddy bear incident?” Harry asks, curious, as they walk together out of the room, carrying their luggage. Well, Harry’s luggage is in his backpack. Ron is dragging his trunk while Harry carefully carries Hedwig’s cage. There’s a slight commotion downstairs, but Harry’s gotten accustomed to the Weasleys’ noise after so many days living with them, so he doesn’t pay much attention to it. “What’s that?”

“Well, when I was four...” Ron starts, and then tells him the whole thing. Harry can’t help but laugh a little, even if he thinks the prank was a little too vicious. His friends totally deserved that scolding.

Fred and George are helping Mr. Weasley put all their luggage in the trunk of a small blue Ford Anglia, and Harry squints at it, momentarily surprised. Then he remembers the existence of expanding charms. He’s still slightly curious since he’s heard the Weasleys talking about the misuse of muggle artifacts and the laws against enchanting them. Doesn’t this count as such?

Whatever, it’s cool—Harry’s not about to go babbling about something as small as this.

They end up being late because Ginny forgot something and they had to turn back for it, but they make it. The procession of seven Weasleys and a Potter hurries through the barrier and they quickly get on the train. The only one who is smothered in hugs before boarding is Ginny, whose cheeks are a brilliant tomato red, but the rest all get a warm farewell before the whistle blows and they have to go inside to find compartments.

Harry wishes Renato could’ve been there, too, but he had gone back to Italy the day before yesterday for his job. He misses him.

“Hey! Harry! George! Fred!” a boy calls them after a few minutes of walking down the carriages and finding only full compartments. It’s Lee, waving from the door with a wide smile.

“Hi, Lee.” Harry grins and hugs his friend. “How are you?” he asks, getting inside and softly putting Hedwig’s cage down on the seat near the window. He’d put one of his dark robes on top so that she isn’t bothered by the light.

“I thought you weren’t going to make it,” Lee says, grunting a little as George gives him an over-enthusiastic slap on the back. “You’re cutting it pretty close, eh?”

Fred rolls his eyes. “Yeah, well. It was Ginny’s fault.”

Ginny, who is hovering at the door together with Ron, sputters. “It was not my—If you hadn’t made a mess of—”

“Yeah, yeah,” Fred interrupts her without even looking at her. “But we had to go back because of you, didn’t we?”

Ginny huffs, crosses her arms, and turns away. “Fine, if you’re going to be like this, I’m gone.”

“Say hi to other firsties,” George chimes, waving daintily with his fingers in an obvious mocking gesture.

Ginny sticks her tongue out at him, then at Fred, and then waves at the rest. “Bye. See you around.”

“Man, I’m glad she snapped out of her weird mood,” Ron says, shaking his head. “She’s been acting bloody strange, lately. This is almost normal,” he confides to Harry, whose lips turn up at the corners as he tries to suppress his laughter. “Okay, I’m going, too. Have to say hi to Seamus and Dean. Uh,” he hesitates for a moment, “we should hang out sometime, yeah?”

Harry beams. “Sure! I have to beat you at chess one day.”

“In your dreams.”

“Ha, ha. Well, get going. Chop chop. Leave our best friend and go find yours, shoo,” George says.

Ron snorts. “I’m going, I’m going. Morons.”

“You’re the moron!” Fred retorts. Ron doesn’t say anything else but waves over his shoulder as he keeps walking in search of his friends. “He was hogging our Harrykins attention,” he says, pouting.

“He’s a friend stealer.”

Harry shakes his head at the twins’ antics and turns to Lee. “They’ve been like this the whole week,” he confides, drily.

“Believe me, I know.” Lee laughs. “They’ve whined a lot in the journal.”

“It’s not whining,” George protests.

“Yeah! We were simply complaining.”

“Rightfully.”

“Uh-huh. Anyway, what else did you do this week?” Lee asks, changing the subject completely. Harry gladly takes the offer and starts telling him, in more detail, what they’ve been up to since they last saw the boy in person. Degnomizing the garden, quidditch matches, prank pulling, prank designing…

They take the carriages this time, not the boats. The boats are for the first years. Harry hears Hagrid calling for them once he’s stepping off the train, and he can see Ginny’s bright hair in the middle of the slowly growing group around the man.

The carriages are not far away. Some of them are already making their way towards the castle.

Harry completely forgot to research about them and the mysterious force that moves them. He asks his friends after they get on, but they don’t know, either. They pass the short drive time theorizing about it, but soon enough they reach Hogwarts and have to hurry into the Great Hall to get to their seats before the Sorting can start.

Harry waves at Hermione and Neville when he sees them, and they greet him back with smiles. He’d written to them explaining that he’d had trouble with his mail, and then he’d kept talking to them about different things: plants and other subjects with Neville, and house-elves and other wizarding things with Hermione. He thinks he’s lit a fire there that he doesn’t know how the wizarding world will contain—though he doesn’t know if he wants it to do so. They’ll probably all be better off if he let it spread. Hermione has excellent insights and interesting ideas, even if some are way too radical to be feasible in the short term.

He exchanges polite nods with Zabini and Malfoy (and the latter looks relieved when he does, though Harry isn’t sure what’s that about) and then he starts a lively conversation about the summer with his housemates while they wait.

It doesn’t take long, and soon McGonagall leads the group of first years to the Sorting Hat. Harry claps politely for every kid sorted, and a bit more enthusiastically for the ones sorted to Ravenclaw. He’s a bit surprised when the recently sorted Luna Lovegood sits beside him, but nonetheless he gives her a smile that she returns.

Soon it’s Ginny’s turn, and the Sorting Hat shouts, “Gryffindor!”

Harry claps as Ginny Weasley gets up, returns the hat to McGonagall, and quickly makes her way to the lion’s table where her brothers are all congratulating her and whistling loudly.

She looks in his direction and they make eye contact for a second. She goes redder than she was before, but smiles at him and waves. Harry’s glad for the progress. It seems that she’s not as scared of him anymore.

Two more kids are sorted—a Hufflepuff and another Gryffindor—and, after a couple of words from the headmaster, the banquet begins.

It’s the beginning of his second year.

Chapter Text

“Don’t you think this mission is rather pointless?” Lal asks, lowering her binoculars and regarding him from the corner of the eyes.

Reborn does the same thing, but turns his head completely to deliver his patented almost-blank expression. There’s the barest hint of a smug smile curving his lips upward, and he knows it’s incredibly annoying. That’s why he favors it. “What do you mean?” he asks guilelessly.

Lal snorts and rolls her eyes. “Don’t insult my intelligence. I’ve noticed that you’ve been sent to lots of small, mind-numbingly boring missions for weeks,” she says pointedly, and Reborn agrees internally but doesn’t say so. He’s somehow still surprised that Luce can be so vindictive. And for something as small as completely disappearing for a month! “This has something to do with you missing that couple of mission debriefs in August, doesn’t it?”

Reborn shrugs delicately and turns his focus back to their mission objective—an emptying building they need to infiltrate in the next couple of days in order to take out a rat and steal some documents pertinent to an extraneous contractor. As Lal said, it’s extremely boring work and completely beneath his skills. Actually, Lal could have worked on it solo and aced it without any need for Reborn to get involved at all, but Luce had explicitly given them the parameters of the mission and he’s not about to back down.

Lal sighs, but she drops the matter. Reborn is mildly grateful—he’s not interested in discussing the petty silent war Luce had declared on him just because he’s refused to answer her questions. She’ll get over it soon, or she won’t, but Renato won’t give her the information she wants anyway.

(He refuses to reveal even a hint about Harry’s existence.)

Luce will learn to accept it, sooner or later. He hopes it’s the former, really, since he’s starting to really hate the stupid missions she’s sticking him with.

They wrap up their vigilance at around nine PM, and together they go back to their hotel. The room they booked is under the same last (fake) name, as one of the easiest ways to pass undercover is to pretend to be a married couple. Nobody looks twice when a young married couple goes out at strange hours of the night during their honeymoon.

Reborn is a great actor. His infiltration work is always top-notch. It’s no different here: he dutifully acts the besotted husband while Lal pretends to be a dainty, ditzy harlequin heroine. The receptionist chuckles behind her hand as she gives them the keys to their room, completely taken in by their act.

Once they close the door, the act ends, the curtain falls.

“Ugh,” Lal complains, loudly, and rubs her face with both hands. “I absolutely hate this. Why did I have to be the one stuck with you for this damn mission? I feel like vomiting blood,” she groans, then lets herself fall face-first on the bed.

“Likewise,” Reborn answers in a placid tone, taking off his shirt and going to the bathroom. “I will shower first.”

“Whatever,” Lal mumbles from among the pillows. Isn’t she suffocating?

To be completely honest, Reborn is tired. He’s never particularly liked to pretend to be in love, and certainly Lal Mirch would never have been an option if it was left up to him. And Luce probably knows this, too. Somehow. Because that woman knows far too much—as expected of the Giglio Nero Donna, honestly—and she’s obviously using it to her advantage.

Not that it will work, and she probably knows this, too.

Hopefully, her daughter’s birth will be distracting enough for her to bury the hatchet. She must have at least some maternal instincts that will tell her carrying this grudge any further is useless when she has an infant to nurture, right?

Reborn showers and ponders over his situation, and starts coming up with different plans they can implement to tie up their mission once and for all.

He wants to be back home.

Maybe he’ll make a quick trip to England, check over the house, write a letter to Harry. Check how things are as regards the multiple lawsuits he’s started or get in contact with the few discrete informants he’s gotten in the magical world.

“Hey! Are you done already?” Lal knocks on the bathroom door.

He sighs, but quickly rinses and gets out. “Yeah, yeah. Give me a moment.”

“You’ve been there for twenty minutes.”

“And I’m already out. All yours,” he says, opening the door and gesturing inside with a flourish. Lal rolls her eyes and pushes past him without even looking. Reborn smirks.

Married and madly in love. Sure.

He prepares for bed and, after Lal joins him, they briefly discuss their strategy for the next day. Once they agree on a plan of action, Lal turns off the lights. 

It doesn’t take much effort to fall asleep after that.

Renato is happy to find himself in a shared dream—they haven’t had one of those in what feels like years, even though it has barely been a month since the last one. It’s still a lot of time without seeing his soulmate, however, especially after getting used to seeing him every day during the holidays.

“Ren!” Harry exclaims as he throws his arms around Renato’s waist with usual exuberant happiness. “I’ve missed you! How are you? What are you doing?”

Renato chuckles and fondly messes up Harry’s dark hair. “I’m fine, bambino . I’m now in France, actually, and on a job.”

Harry smiles at him. “Take some pictures to show me later, yes?”

“Of course,” Renato accepts. “I already took some, but the job is almost done so I’m probably heading back to Italy soon.”

“Oh,” Harry says and wrinkles his nose. “Well, that’s good?”

“It is.” Renato smiles, amused. “So what do you have to share? I’m sure it’s been a busy first month. The last thing I knew, you were preparing yourself for Quidditch tryouts.”

Harry brightens immediately and practically starts vibrating where he stands. “Oh, yeah! I got in! I made the first line, Ren!”

“Of course you did,” Renato says. He knows how much this achievement means to the boy. “What position?”

“Seeker,” Harry says, proudly. “It’s actually the one I wanted, as seekers have the most freedom during the game. And apparently I’m really good at finding the Snitch.”

“That’s the winged, small golden one, right?”

“Yes! We actually have the first game on Saturday!” Harry says, excited. “The first game of the season was Gryffindor versus Slytherin, and of course I was cheering for Gryffindor since Fred and George were playing, but sadly they lost—they still don’t have a very good seeker, plus Slytherin had some ugly tactics and new brooms. But if Ravenclaw wins next game against Hufflepuff then we’ll play against Gryffindor, and I don’t plan of going easy on them just because my friends are playing, and I don’t think they will, either, so—”

Renato laughs. “You’re really excited for this, huh?”

“Very.” Harry laughs with him, though a touch of embarrassment colors his cheeks pink.

“And the rest of it? How are your classes going?” Renato asks with interest.

“Mostly they’re okay,” Harry answers, shrugging a bit. “McGonagall’s and Flitwick’s are still the best ones, and Snape is still something of a bastard, though he’s being more tolerable this year, in particular if you compare him to Lockhart,” he spits the name like it’s poisonous and disgusting, but Renato can totally see where he’s coming from.

“He’s as useless as we’d suspected, then?”

Harry huffs and crosses his arms, obviously miffed. “No, he’s even worse than that. In the first class he had us take a test, and it was all about himself—his favorite color, favorite song, favorite second way of doing his hair—complete tripe! And then he dared to free a whole group of cornix pixies and got his wand stolen by them. Stolen! It was a complete disaster and what did he do? He hid beneath his desk and told us to try and get them to stop! Hermione managed in the end but still, he didn’t do anything! Even when Neville was in danger, he didn’t do anything at all.”

“That sounds, indeed, like the fraud we suspected. How do you think they let him into Hogwarts?”

Harry shakes his head. “Beats me.” Then, he scowls. “The worst thing is that the idiot insists on trying to talk to me—he believes our ‘fame’ makes us similar or something stupid like that.” He shivers a bit before scowling harder. “It’s as if he doesn't remember your threat back then, or as if you being far away means he’s safe or something. Idiot.” He snorts. “And then there’s the little Creevey—a small first-year Gryffindor that’s obsessed with taking photos, and with me for some reason, and with taking photos of me. It’s lucky we’re not in the same house, but if I have to listen to him asking for an autograph one more time I might do something drastic.”

“Seems like it’s busy so far, huh?”

“Yeah, yeah it is—but it’s been fun, even so.” Harry smiles, honestly happy at first, but then it transforms into a more devious expression. “We’re also planning a couple of big pranks with the other three, you know? They loved some of the plans I came up with during the time I was with the Dursleys.”

“Planning on creating some good chaos, eh? Fantastic, I approve.” Renato grins, and Harry mimics the expression, eyes sparkling. Renato has the feeling that if his coworkers saw them together and smiling like this, they’d comically pale a couple of shades. “You’ll have to give me the details next time.”

Harry nods fervently. “Definitely! There’s a big one we’re planning for Halloween that’s going to be even better than last year’s April’s fools.”

“Now that’ll be an achievement!” Renato laughs, then sits down on the indistinct swirl of mixed colors that is the ground. Very rarely does the dream landscape actually resemble a real-life setting, but he’s long since stopped feeling it awkward.

They talk until they can’t anymore, when the dream finishes and Renato wakes up to Lal’s annoyed grumbles only to become Reborn once more.

It takes them one more day to complete the mission. If Reborn is in a much better mood than he’s been in weeks, Lal doesn’t do anything but eye him with narrowed, suspicious eyes.

Chapter Text

Lying prone on a bed of the Hospital Wing, bones of his arm painfully growing back after that failure of a professor Lockhart vanished them instead of letting people who actually know what they’re doing heal what had been a simple break, and having just heard a terrible conversation between Dumbledore and Professor McGonagall, Harry wonders if he should just bite the (almost literal) bullet and tell Renato what’s been going on at school.

He feels a twinge of remorse for not having done so still, even after sharing a dream with Renato the night right after the creepy wall message about the Chamber of Secrets being opened again left the whole school rattled and paranoid.

In his defense, he hadn’t thought much about it at first. Yeah, Mrs Norris the cat had been petrified and he felt just the tiniest bit sorry for Filch, but he’d assumed it had been a very ugly prank by Peeves or something like that. Honestly, he’d been more annoyed at the fact that he and his friends had to push back their planned prank if they didn’t want to be unfairly accused as the culprits by association. As it was, the incident didn’t keep him awake and it slowly seemed to fade from most of the student’s minds after a couple of silent days.

Of course, tomorrow it will start boiling over again, and now that the victim is a student, a first-year child, it won’t be as easily forgotten again.

Is this what Dobby, that damn elf, had been trying to tell him? He’d been so surprised by his sudden appearance on top of his bed after not thinking about him for months that the only reason the tiny creature wasn’t hexed was only because his wand arm was currently out of service.

Damn you, stupid Lockhart.

The house-elf had been so disappointed that Harry had actually ignored him and actually came to Hogwarts this year. As if his threat and all the trouble he caused Harry would have convinced him otherwise. The nerve!

(He is slightly—very slightly, mind you—grateful to him, because it was because of his rash actions that Renato came for him before he had planned to. So, he kind of owed him his freedom—not that Harry will ever tell the elf so, not while he’s still trying to maim or kill him “for his own good.”)

The only reason why he was not attacked during the first quidditch match Harry played in was because Dobby hadn’t known Harry was part of the team. (Quidditch tryouts are kept private, as are new players until their debut, at least in Ravenclaw. That’s so that the other teams cannot prepare countermeasures for them).

As things stand, apparently the Chamber of Secrets is a real thing that poses a threat to students, and—wasn’t Colin Creevey a muggle-born? So Hermione is also a possible target, and many others. What about half-bloods? Harry’s mum was a muggle-born witch. Does that mean he’s also in danger?

He grits his teeth and goes to turn over in the bed, only to stop and mentally swear when he feels pain all over but concentrated on his arm.

Should he tell Renato?

He pulls a face.

On the one hand, Renato would definitely do something.

On the other hand, Renato would definitely do something.

Harry doesn’t want to be taken out of Hogwarts. That’s certainly an option Ren would consider, though probably not immediately. Another…well, while it would be amusing if Renato stormed the castle, guns blazing, to demand answers and maybe hunt down this so-called Slytherin monster, Harry doesn’t want to put him in danger. Not when the monster would definitely go for Ren without a doubt, since he isn’t even a wizard.

No. No way.

Harry will have to think this over and have a talk with his friends, and maybe with some Slytherins if he can (Zabini and Malfoy both come to mind, since they’re the ones he’s somewhat interacted with amicably at some point or another). Try to find more about the whole thing. The adults haven’t found an answer yet, even though, apparently, the chamber had been opened once before. If someone can find who opened it this time, perhaps they can find what the monster is and get rid of it, right? Neutralize the threat.

If the threat is neutralized, then he’s no longer in danger, and thus there is no need to tell Renato the truth, ever, right?

...

He sighs, long and hard as he stares at the blurry sight of the ceiling without his glasses.

Yeah, no. Things will not be that easy, he can feel it in his gut. Something dark is coming, and thank you, Dobby, he could have realized that by himself, truly.

Urgh!

How is he supposed to fall asleep when his mind won’t stop working?

But what could the monster be?

It’s silent, for once. Nobody heard it attack or move away from the crime scenes. It somehow petrifies the victims. What kind of creature can cause petrification? Something with venom, maybe? There are some spiders that inject venom that paralyzes their prey so that they can eat it. Some insects do that, too. But, as far as he knows, there aren’t spiders or insects (because spiders are not insects, thank you very much, they are arachnids. Like scorpions. Ren has taught him well) that are big enough to affect a human like that. A cat, maybe, but not a human. What else? Snakes? Same thing.

“Why didn’t I buy the book about magical creatures?” he mumbles, brows furrowed as he stared holes into the ceiling. It’s a third-year subject, but it’s not like he’s not advancing at a fast pace through his own books. Knowledge is power. And now he really needs that power.

He sighs again and closes his eyes. They ache. He’s so, so tired. His arm prickles beneath his skin where the bones are regrowing still, and a pit of dread has opened in his stomach.

Too much has happened in too little time.

He needs to sleep.

Tomorrow, he’ll try to get some answers.

And he’s sure his friends would be happy to help.

Chapter Text

Draco Malfoy is a snobby prat.

He knows that. He owns it, with pride that he's just lately come to realize is not really earned nor deserved if not a tiny bit—well, a lot —misplaced.

He was raised like that; raised with tales of powerful purebloods and dignified Malfoys, of uncouth blood traitors and subversive mudbloods.

He makes a face.

What an ugly word, mudblood. How...inaccurate, too, he thinks, picturing Potter and Granger and many other Hogwarts students, many of his peers. Maybe, in another universe, things would have been different. Maybe he'd have never voluntarily tried to spend time (because of study rivalry! Nothing more! Nothing like, ugh, friendship, with people so annoying as Granger) with them and his view of the world would still be like the one he had before Hogwarts.

But he started school and The Boy Who Lived was there, in his same year, a Ravenclaw.

Draco was raised with stories of powerful purebloods and dignified Malfoys, but he was also raised on stories of Harry Potter, the boy who ended the war, the boy who destroyed You Know Who.

He was never quite sure what to think about him. The information he got varied widely between his different sources, and none seemed to have a real clue of the boy's personality or even where he was supposed to be living. Was he all-powerful, brave and dignified as any pureblood, even if his ancestry was tainted with a mudblood mother? Was he ancient beyond his years, an old spirit reborn in the body of a child to end the most powerful dark wizard of all times? Was he kind? Was he vicious? Was he even going to go to Hogwarts, with all the magic he must surely already know?

When, after being sorted into Slytherin—as expected—, and after some more names were called and sorted, he heard "Potter, Harry," Draco couldn't help the way he straightened on his seat and turned to stare. And he was not the only one, either.

Harry Potter didn't look like much, truly. He expected him to be...taller, at least. Messy black hair, tan skin, a bit skinny. Although, his robes looked new and of very good quality. And—oh. Draco only got a few seconds to notice the brilliant green eyes before they were covered by the Sorting Hat.

It felt like the whole Hall stopped breathing for a moment, everyone caught in the suspense. And then—

"RAVENCLAW!"

Draco blinked. Looked at the lions’ table, from where a pair of redheads— Weasleys, his mind supplied with a sneer—were very dramatically crying that they had been cheated. Then he looked to the eagles’ and found them clapping perhaps a little more enthusiastically than for the rest of their first years, but not enough to make them feel alienated.

A Ravenclaw, huh? For some reason, Draco was sure the boy would be either another hard-headed Gryffindor or a cunning Slytherin.

Perhaps the books were even more wrong than he’d thought. More observation was needed.

And so, he actually sought the boy out in order to talk directly to him. It was...a mixed success, to be honest, as Draco almost panicked and forgot how words worked for a hot second, but it was enough for him to disregard already some of the things he’d read.

One: Harry Potter was a little strange, but he was not the reincarnation of some powerful, ancient spirit. Just a child like him.

Two: Harry Potter wasn’t belligerent or uncouth, but he didn't act like a pureblood, either, not with the way he was studying the moving paintings.

Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad to keep close for a while. For research purposes, of course.

So that’s what Draco did. And he kept noticing things. Oh, so many things. And when he suddenly found himself joining Potter, Longbottom and Granger in their little study group from time to time, snarking and discussing theories with Granger and Potter and deliberately not saying anything rude to Longbottom? He was a little surprised with himself, yes. But. It was interesting. And very eye-opening.

Granger was a mudblood, yes. But she was brilliant and while she didn't get many things about Wizarding culture, she eagerly listened to them explain. Draco's view was different from Potter and Longbottom’s in many ways, but their discussions about it were enlightening. And at the same time Draco learned more about Muggles and their cultures, which was...a little bewildering, a little uncomfortable, as he realized there was much more to them than what he was taught. The word mudblood had been banned from their little study group from very early on, but Draco no longer felt like it was appropriate, anyway.

Now it makes him uncomfortable every time he hears it. It made some dinners at home during the summer less palatable than they should’ve been.

While Draco couldn’t and wouldn’t call himself their friend, they are...friendly. Friendly acquaintances. So when he went back home for the Summer and he was suddenly confronted with his past way of thinking in the form of his parents, and particularly his father, whom he'd idolized all his childhood…well.

Well.

He. Didn't quite know what to do. Especially when he overheard his father's firecall with one of his coworkers. He implied…he implied that something was going to happen in Hogwarts this year. Something bad.

So when the Chamber of Secrets was opened again, Draco couldn't help but wonder. If this is what Father was referring to. If this is part of his plan.

For a while, he really hopes it’s just a terrible coincidence. After the petrification of the cat, nothing happens for a while and Draco feels himself relaxing.

And then Potter is attacked during his second Quidditch game and has to regrow the bones of a whole arm, and in the next morning Headmaster Dumbledore announces that Colin Creevey was petrified during the night and suddenly everything is too real, too much.

“It’s just a Mudblood,” he hears Flint grunt, unconcerned, from where he’s not even looking up from his morning eggs. “He isn’t even dead.”

“Sad, that,” a third-year whose name Draco doesn’t really remember adds, tapping her full lips with her fork. “If he’d died, it’d have been one less problem in our hands in the future.”

Draco scowls and shoves a spoonful of cereal into his mouth to cover it up. That’s...that’s disgusting. A kid was just attacked, and they’re mourning he isn’t dead?

He feels sick. Sicker, even, when he realizes that he might have celebrated it happening not even a year back.

“Draco? What’s wrong?” Pansy Parkinson asks, eyebrow raised.

“Nothing that concerns you,” Draco snarks, with probably more bite than it was deserved. He cringes internally but doesn’t let it show.

Pansy huffs. “Fine, be like that.”

He should...do something. But. He doesn’t want to. So he finishes breakfast quickly and rushes out of the door.

There’s still an hour before the first class.

Maybe he would make a small detour to the Hospital Wing.