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No spell can awaken the dead. Prior Incanteum can bring only echoes.
And that was usually the case.
However, two brother wands weren’t typically pitted against each other in battle, turning two spells into one.
Nor did the brother wands have phoenix feathers for a wand core.
And phoenixes are notorious for their immortality.
In one universe, the spell did nothing but bring back shadows that vanished once the spell was broken into its original two parts.
But in another…
“Your father’s coming. Hold on for your father…it will be all right…hold on.”
“When the connection is broken, we will linger for only moments...but we will give you time...you must get to the Portkey, it will return you to Hogwarts...do you understand, Harry?”
“Harry…take my body back, will you? Take my body back to my parents...”
Cedric had died, Harry was sure of it; he’d checked his pulse!
So why had Cedric let out a wheezing breath when they landed hard with the Triwizard Cup? And why were his eyes, shining with shock and fear, open at all?
Harry was the only one who had ever survived the Killing Curse (allegedly), and that was because of his mum.
He stared at Cedric, and Cedric stared right back.
But, before they could exchange a single word, Mr Diggory excitedly swept up Cedric, crowing about his son’s victory.
And, after the entire debacle of not-really-Mad-Eye Moody, the subsequent Veritaserum, and then the Hospital Wing, Harry still hadn’t managed to talk to Cedric.
So, the moment he was unsupervised, he slipped off to find Cedric, who was likewise looking for him.
Harry opted to drag him along to the summons for the headmaster’s office.
So, once they were sitting in Dumbledore’s office, they were throwing questions at each other with the ferocity of a heated Quidditch game.
“I thought you died!”
“I did! And Voldemort is still alive? I thought he died!”
“He’s been around since my first year.”
Cedric sputtered, his face contorting, and if this were any other moment, Harry might have laughed.
“And why is he here? He’s a convicted criminal!”
“He’s innocent!”
Out of the corner of his eye, Sirius shifted slightly, looking profoundly uncomfortable.
Even when Dumbledore walked in, they didn’t look up, too busy debating what could have led to Cedric being brought back from the dead.
“No spell can awaken the dead,” Dumbledore responded once Harry and Cedric had calmed down enough to tell Dumbledore what happened. “Prior Incanteum can bring back only echoes.”
Harry pointed at Cedric, who snorted. “It brought him back.”
That gave Dumbledore pause, and Sirius’s eyes swivelled to Harry. “What do you mean, pup?” Harry glanced back at him and felt some of the anxiety that had built up in his shoulders during the whole thing trickle out.
“I died,” Cedric informed them bluntly. “And no, the spell didn’t miss me by an inch. Harry felt for my pulse and found nothing. And no, it couldn’t have been a stunning spell or something. It was bright green, and a rat-man said the incantation for the Killing Curse. And yes, I am positive I died, I remember it.” He shuddered, and Harry grimaced. He had been close to death many times, but he had never actually died.
It did not sound fun.
Dumbledore nodded, his lips pursing in confusion.
“Who else did you see?” The look on the headmaster’s face was now one of pure intrigue. Harry shifted slightly in his seat, his head bowed. Was it foolish to have a twinge of hope that since Cedric returned, maybe his parents…he shook the thought from his head.
“Me. An old man.” Cedric began, his face solidly settling into an impassive expression. “Bertha Jorkins, and…”
Harry swallowed hard, and Sirus grabbed his hand as tears started welling in his eyes. “My parents.” He muttered and felt Sirius’s hand spasm slightly in his grip.
Dumbledore began shaking his head, but before he could say a single word, the floo flared green, and two people came stumbling through it, covered in dirt, grass, and soot.
One had red hair, green eyes, a sparking wand, anger, and maybe a little fear etched onto her face. The second had messy black hair, glasses, and an equally tense posture. Two people he’d only ever seen in pictures and heard about in stories from Sirius and Remus.
Lily Evans Potter and James Potter.
Mum and Dad.
Alive.
Sirius’s hand had gone limp, Cedric and Dumbledore were staring, and Harry felt a traitorous lump in his throat.
“Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore.” His mum began icily, her eyes focused firmly on the Headmaster. “Where is my son?” The headmaster stared some more before clearing his throat.
“Ah, Mrs. Evans Potter-“
His mum cut him off. “Don’t you, Mrs. Evans Potter, me, Dumbledore. I just dug my way out of my grave, found my house in ruins, and your magical signature was all over it. So.” She growled, stalking closer to him, soot dropping off of her as she did so. “Where. Is. My. Son?” His dad walked to stand beside his mum.
“Is he with Sirius and Remus?” His mouth was pinched in a thin line, and his voice was quiet but trembling with anger.
And even though Harry wanted to call out to them and say, ‘Yes, hi, I’m right here, I’ve just grown in the last thirteen years and am no longer a baby. Nice to meet you!’, his tongue was stuck to the roof of his mouth, and his voice had decided to take a vacation.
Beside him, Sirius let out a strangled noise that more or less summed up Harry’s feelings on the matter. His dad glanced over at the noise before double-taking. His eyes swivelled from Sirius to Harry and Harry to Sirius.
Harry gave a small wave when his dad’s eyes swivelled back to him, and the man stared back. “Uh, Lils?” His voice was high-pitched, and his eyes were still swivelling between Sirius and then Harry. His mum glanced up, and her face paled as her mouth dropped open.
Unlike his dad, whose eyes were still darting between him and Sirius, his mum was firmly focused on him. He tried not to shrink under the stares, but…
“Harry?” His mum’s voice cracked, and he waved again, unsure what else to do.
“It’s been thirteen years,” Cedric interjected, shifting in his seat slightly when Harry’s mum’s eyes fixed on him. “Since you died, I mean. And yeah, that’s Harry.” Harry’s dad drew in a sharp breath, his knees buckling. His mum’s mouth had dropped open, tears welling in her eyes.
Dumbledore stood, beckoning to Cedric. “Mr Diggory, I think it best if we leave them alone for the moment.” Cedric nodded, practically fleeing for the door, the headmaster following at a more sedate pace.
Harry’s eyes didn’t leave his parents for a second.
Harry was frankly, fully out of ideas on what to do. There wasn’t an instruction manual for when your dead parents came back to life because you and the homicidal maniac trying to kill you had brother wands, and it was all an accident, really.
So, he did what he did when Hermione and Ron cried over him.
“You don’t need to cry!” He jumped out of his chair, hurrying towards his parents. “I’m fine, I’m okay! Not dead or anything!” He tried for a grin, but it felt a little flat.
And it didn’t work either, tears started rolling down his dad’s face, and his mum’s shoulders started shaking.
Then he was wrapped in a tight, but warm embrace. It felt like the ones Sirius gave him.
He nestled closer to his mum, not caring in the least that she was filthy; he was still a little dirty from the Tournament.
Then his dad joined in, and he was sandwiched between his parents and the tears that he’d been fighting back, the grief of being an orphan he’d become accustomed to threw itself against the dam, and he started crying into his mum’s t-shirt.
Unlike Aunt Petunia, who had the habit of yelling at him whenever his eyes welled up (it didn’t matter if it was from dust) and threw him in the cupboard if a tear managed an escape, the embrace only tightened.
His dad pressed a kiss to his hair and began rubbing circles on his shoulder. His mum started murmuring, ‘We’re here, sweetheart, we’re here,’ over and over.
And that was a new thing, the endearment. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon only ever called him a freak, and sure, Remus and Sirius called him ‘cub’ and ‘pup’, but it was over letters.
No one had ever called him sweetheart, let alone with so much warmth and love fused into it.
It felt nice, wonderful even.
That made him cry harder, the tears and sobs now impossible to control, hiccupping into his mum’s shirt.
Eventually, though, his sobs tapered off, and he was able to pull back.
“I’m sorry I got your shirt wet.” He croaked, looking down at the ground.
“Oh, sweetheart.” His mum cooed, bringing his head back up with her hands cupping his chin, her thumbs pushing up his glasses slightly to wipe his tears away. “There’s no need to apologise.”
“Especially not for this.” His dad came around to his mum’s side, his hand still resting on Harry’s shoulder.
Harry nodded, feeling a little unsure about that, but unwilling to push it. His dad’s eyebrows knitted, and he lifted his hand to run through Harry’s hair.
It felt nice.
“Does this mean I don’t have to go back to the Dursleys?” He mumbled to his shoes.
His dad’s hand froze, and his mum took a sharp intake of air. Harry looked up to see his parents staring at him.
“You weren’t living with Sirius?” His mum asked carefully, glancing back at the man who currently had his head stuck in green fire. Harry shook his head.
“Remus?”
“Alice and Frank?”
Harry scrunched his nose. “Sirius was in Azkaban. I didn’t meet Remus until my third year.” His nose scrunched further. He didn’t know a Frank or an Alice. Oh, there had been the Pensive memory…the one with Crouch’s son and the Dementors. He shivered just thinking about them.
He had never heard Neville’s mum’s name, though. Just Frank.
“Do you mean Neville’s parents?” He ventured, biting his lip when his mum nodded. “I’ve never met them. Dumbledore…” There wasn’t any good way to put this. Would they be mad at him for the bad news? Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon sometimes were. But these were his parents! Surely, they wouldn't? “Dumbledore’s memory, in the Pensive, I mean, he said that-“
Remus stumbled through the floo then and let out a wounded noise that sounded not unlike the one that Sirius had made, fully interrupting Harry’s word vomit.
Thank Merlin.
His mum smiled sadly at Harry’s old professor, and now kind-of-uncle, and his dad rose to drag Sirius and Remus over while clucking over the two of them.
Which Harry thought was hilarious.
“Now, why was Sirius in Azkaban?” His mother’s voice had tightened, and the air seemed thick with her magick.
“Tried to go after Peter, but he set me up. Didn’t even get a trial.”
His dad drew in a sharp breath, his eyes shinier. “Peter betrayed us?” Harry’s nose scrunched further; how had they not known? Sirius and Remus nodded grimly, and his mum’s grip on him tightened ever so slightly.
“And Alice and Frank?” His mum whispered, grief and anger swirling in her eyes.
Remus shook his head. “After…Halloween, Death Eaters found them. They tortured them.”
“What?” His mum’s face was white.
Remus nodded grimly. “Into insanity. I visited them a couple of times in St. Mungo’s if I was in the area.” Mum was crying now, and Harry didn’t quite know how to handle that.
Hermione and Ron sometimes cried, but they were usually able to comfort each other without his interference. Except for the Crookshanks-Scabbers thing. Frankly, that had been the worst part of the year, dementors forcing memories of his parents’ deaths included.
Parents who were in front of him. Parents who were alive.
One of whom was currently glaring holes into the wall as her grip on his shoulders tightened even further. Frankly, he didn’t mind the tight grip in the least.
“And who thought sending my son to live with my magick-hating sister was a good idea?” Sirius shrugged, his lips pursing. Remus’s lips flattened into a thin line.
“I tried to gain custody, even visitation, but Dumbledore insisted that if I visited, it would lead Death Eaters right to him, because everyone knew how close we were. He flat refused to tell me where Harry was. I tried sending owls, but there must have been a mailing ward of some kind because all of the owls returned with the letters.” He hesitated. “I’m sorry.”
“Moony, if Dumbledore wouldn’t tell you where Harry was, how is that your fault?” Harry’s dad chastised, and Remus ducked his head slightly.
His mum was now seething, her magick rolling off her in waves, and if his mum was this powerful, he could see how she had defeated Voldemort, even if it was only temporarily. Even his dad looked a little wary.
“I’m going to kill him.” She sounded so matter-of-fact that Harry’s heart jumped in his throat.
“No! Don’t!” He was fully aware that he was edging into begging territory, but he didn’t think he could survive losing his parents again. “Don’t, please. I…” He couldn’t quite get out the words that expressed how much he needed them to stay.
They seemed to understand, though, and he was wrapped again in another embrace, though this time with Sirius and Remus.
He snuggled into his parents’, godfather’s, and kind-of-uncle’s embrace, a few more tears slipping out, ones of overwhelming happiness. Which was then doused by reality.
“You’ll have to leave Hogwarts, won’t you?” Everyone pulled back, and he firmly looked at none of them. His dad shook his head vehemently, but the truth of the matter was that parents didn’t get to stay at Hogwarts.
“I was working on a Charms Mastery with Professor Flitwick, and I had to meet with him in person to complete a good portion of it. I’ll be able to stay here, sweetheart.” His mum soothed, tucking a lock of hair behind his ear, bringing his face back up to meet her eyes.
“Minnie will let me stay.” His dad grinned at him, and a smile crept up on Harry’s lips.
“I got an O on my DADA owl; I can be the next DADA professor!” Sirius grinned before his eyes turned sly. “And Professor Lupin, here…”
His mum crowed in victory. “I knew it!” Her grin turned mischievous, and he had thought his dad had been the prankster, but it seemed his mum had her own mischievous streak. “You know what that means.” She singsonged.
Remus groaned. “It’s not like I’m going to be a professor again!” His mum’s smirk didn’t even flinch. “Fine. For under twenty galleons, you can buy me anything you like for a month.”
“Professor Binns is a pretty boring teacher…” Harry said innocently, smiling at his parents and Sirius grinning, almost evilly, at Remus, whose face was exasperated.
“We are not exorcising a professor just so I can get a job!”
“I do have the supplies, though, and you did say anything under twenty galleons…”
“Lily!”
His mum threw her head back and laughed.
And sure, there would be Voldemort to deal with, exploits he should probably tell his parents about, Ron and Hermione to introduce, but in that moment, he had his parents, his godfather, and his sort-of uncle.
In short, he had his family.
And he was completely and utterly content.