Chapter Text
It was his fault.
Sirius was dead, and it was all his fault.
He hadn't been able to occlude, and Voldemort had tricked him. And Sirius was dead, and it was his fault.
His friends could have died too. They had been hurt. More of them would be. More of them would die.
What good was he?
How am I supposed to—
Stop.
No.
Harry forced himself away from the thought and went back to staring at the ceiling.
His breath hitched, but he refused to let himself cry. He didn't deserve to. Not after it was his failure that caused Sirius’ death. He had to get stronger anyway. He needed to, because…
His breath hitched again.
Why hadn't Dumbledore just told him sooner? He could have been getting ready! He could have fought him, really fought him at the graveyard! Maybe then Cedric wouldn't have—
Harry yanked himself back from that thought, too, just as the bars on his window rattled ominously. The door rattled too, and he forced himself to take a deep breath. Then he closed his eyes and took another for good measure.
The outbursts had been happening more frequently over the summer since the large one in Dumbledore’s office, and he was just lucky he hadn't broken anything yet. Uncle Vernon would kill him if he did. Or make him wish he was dead. Make him wish he'd been allowed to go after Sirius.
More than he already did.
A loud pop sounded outside, and Harry froze. Was that— Had someone—
He swallowed and sat up. He inched toward the window, wishing he had his wand on him, but it was locked away with his school things like always. The wards on the house should keep him safe from an attack, but…
A shadow moved in the yard, but Harry couldn't make out much because of the bars on the windows. They made it to the front door, though, and then he heard the creek of the door opening.
He sucked in a shuddering breath and returned to his bed. There was a wizard in the house, and there wasn't anything he could do about it.
Whoever it was made it up the stairs without being stopped, and then they were outside Harry's door. There was a long moment where Harry heard nothing, then there was a low, infuriated and animalistic snarl, and Harry went boneless in relief. He knew that sound, though he'd never heard him so angry before.
“Professor?” he called.
“Just Remus, Harry,” the werewolf answered. “Or Moony, if you'd like. Stand back from the door, please.”
“I'm not near the door.” He wasn't. He always stayed away from the door. Uncle Vernon was too fond of barging in and grabbing him if he was too loud, or if he'd had a bad day, or…
Harry always stayed away from the door.
The door didn't blast open, but it did dissolve, like it had been eaten away by acid. Harry watched it happen with wide eyes, his lips parted with surprise. The Dursleys weren't going to like that. When he came back next summer, he was going to get it for sure.
Assuming he was leaving already— it was earlier than he'd thought. Maybe. He hadn't exactly been keeping track of time.
Remus stepped into his room, thin and careworn, his amber eyes tired and kind. “Hello Harry,” he said, the words soft and gentle. His clothing was muggle and slightly outdated, but nothing too outlandish, and if it was in rough shape, well, at least it fit him better than Dudley's old clothes fit Harry.
“Hi Moony,” Harry said. He tried a smile, but it didn't really feel like it fit on his face. “Come to take me to headquarters? Aren't you early?”
Remus sighed. He raked a hand over his face and looked around Harry's room. “This is where Petunia raised you, huh?” His eyes lingered on the bars on the windows and the bare walls, on the barely serviceable bed with the threadbare blanket.
Harry shrugged. “It's better than my cupboard was.” He picked at one of the loose threads on said blanket and looked away from Remus.
“Your what?” There was a growl in Remus’ words. What phase of the moon were they in, anyway? How close to the surface was Moony?
“Before I got my Hogwarts letter, I was in the cupboard under the stairs. This was Dudley's spare room where he kept all his broken toys.” Harry shrugged again. “Now that's just where they lock away all my school things until I leave each year.”
Remus let out another growl, this one far more animalistic, and Harry’s eyes darted up to him. His amber eyes were almost glowing, and his face had half-contorted into something other that Harry had only ever seen once before. Then it rippled, and Remus took a deep breath, and then another, and Moony was back below the surface.
“Mind if I have a seat?” he asked, like he hadn't just nearly transformed even though Harry was certain it wasn't a full moon.
“Sure,” he said. He nodded to the rickety chair at the desk and also patted the bed beside him. “Wherever you'd like.”
Remus took the chair and dragged it closer to Harry. He settled gingerly and only relaxed when the chair didn't give out beneath him. “I'm not here to bring you back to Grimmauld.”
Harry glanced at his missing door. “You're not?” He swallowed at the sudden ghost sensation of Uncle Vernon's meaty hands grabbing his upper arms, bruising, of a belt taken to his back. He'd be lucky if that's all he got.
“I don't—” Remus dragged his hand over his face again. “Merlin,” he muttered. “Harry, Sirius and I, before he— before he died, we were talking about you, and about the war.”
Harry flinched and closed his eyes. His hands clenched in the fabric of his shirt and he took a shaky breath as the bars on the window rattled at him. “Sorry,” he said quickly.
“Oh Harry.” A gentle hand touched his head, and Harry flinched back.
His window shattered.
“Sorry!” Harry's eyes flew open and he stared at Remus, stricken. People didn't… they didn't touch him. Not gently, not kindly. He just— he hadn't expected it, and—
But Remus' hand was still on his head, and he was smiling even though his eyes looked like he was hurting. “It's okay,” Remus said, his voice soft. “You've been through so much, Harry, and you're still so young. And now you have the weight of two legacies pressing down on you. Sirius wanted to get you out of the country before he died, and I agree. So that's what I've come to do.”
Out of the country? “What?” They couldn't just take him out of the country. He had to— Dumbledore had said—
“I would imagine that Lily and Prongs would have told you about all of this when you were old enough to understand it,” Remus said, not quite meeting Harry's eyes. “But since they're not here, and Sirius didn't have the chance, I'm going to do it, and then we're going to leave, okay?”
“I can't just leave,” Harry started. “Dumbledore said there's—”
“A prophecy, right,” Remus agreed with a nod. “That he thinks applies to you. He finally told some of us what it said after the damned thing got Sirius killed. But it can't.”
Harry froze. “I meet all the requirements,” he said through a roaring in his ears. His heart was pounding, and the bars on the window were rattling again. “Born at the end of July, marked by him, my parents defied him three times—”
“Lily did,” Remus agreed. “But James wasn't your biological father.”
The world spun around Harry, and if he hadn't been sitting, he would have passed out. And he didn't think it had to do with a lack of food. “What?” The word was quiet, weak, and the magic around Harry went still.
Remus’ hand shifted to his shoulder, and his other hand landed on Harry's opposite one. He leaned forward, catching Harry's eyes. “James and Sirius both knew, and they both still loved you so much, Harry, but James Potter wasn't your biological father. He's a very wealthy Muggle in America, and I'm taking you to him.”
The magic exploded from Harry like a storm, ripping through the room and shredding anything in its path. Remus didn't flinch from it, but instead he moved closer to Harry and took him into his arms, holding him close and rocking him. “I know,” he said, the words achingly gentle. “I know, Harry.”
“I can't,” Harry managed, his magic still swirling around them in a maelstrom of destruction. The desk and bed were both destroyed. The bars from the window, too. If he could focus, he was pretty sure he'd see bits of plaster and wallpaper. “He— even if it isn't me,” he said hoarsely. “He wants me. He'll come for me.”
Remus’ arms tightened around Harry so much that they were almost painful. It ached, but there was something small inside of him that never wanted Remus to let go. Harry found himself relaxing into the hold, his head coming to rest against Remus' shoulder. His breath hitched. The storm of magic around them was easing off, but Remus didn't let him go.
“Maybe he will keep coming for you,” Remus said, his voice soft. “But I'm not leaving you, Harry. I'm going to stay with you and your father and keep you safe. He never had an American following, so he'll have a hell of a time getting to you. Let me do this, and leave him to adults here. Just say the word.”
And there were so many reasons why Harry should keep arguing— his friends, Hogwarts, his duty in the war; but in the end, Harry was tired. He'd been hurt. He'd done more in his five years in the magical world than most ever would. So, feeling like the worst kind of coward, he looked up at the last of his father's friends and the first he'd met and said, “Okay.”
***
Dudley knew that he was an arsehole.
He'd been one since he was a kid, and it had taken him too long to realize that the way his family acted about his tiny cousin wasn't normal. Hell, too long to realize that how tiny his cousin was wasn't normal. Smeltings taught him that, but only after the attack and the nightmares started. Only after Harry saved his life. That's when he finally started getting counseling, getting help.
And bloody hell, the things he was learning…
He was an arsehole, his parents were monsters for encouraging it, and his cousin was a wreck who needed therapy more than he did. So yeah, when he heard all that stuff start breaking in Harry's room while everyone was supposed to be asleep, he wasn't exactly ashamed of listening in. He might not be able to do anything to help, but he could at least tell someone what was going on, right? If he had to?
And then he heard them talking about running away. About keeping Harry safe, about getting him to his bio dad. And Dudley wasn't the brightest, but he wasn't stupid. Kids weren't supposed to come back from school looking like they'd been through a war, and every year Harry looked worse, not better.
Plus, hadn't his parents said before that Dumbledore was the one to leave Harry with them in the first place? What kind of arsehole leaves a magic kid with people obsessed with being normal?
There wasn't much he could do to make up for all that he'd put Harry through when they'd been kids, but maybe he could help him get out, even if his cousin would never know. He was very good at lying to authority figures when he had to. Maybe he could throw whoever came looking for his cousin off the trail a bit, and not even lie when he did it!
Dudley grinned.
***
Albus was not pleased to be called away from his hunt at such a late hour by a magical tempest in young Harry's summer residence. He understood that the boy was grieving his godfather and his childhood, but didn't the boy understand that he'd been given as much youth as Albus could spare?
There was only so much he could do to coddle a child of prophecy. He'd needed testing and tempering to forge him into the blade to be used against Voldemort. He'd needed to be shaped in the right way so that, when the time came, he'd understand exactly what he needed to do.
Albus had given him as much as he could! Harry's needs, as much as he loved the boy, could not be compared to the needs of the greater wizarding world as a whole. Tom had to be stopped, and Harry was an unfortunate and vital part of that.
But when he arrived in Surrey to have a conversation with Harry, to be sympathetic and yet stern about Harry's grief, the boy wasn't there, and neither were any of his things. The Dursleys were, and both adults were up in arms and in hysterics about the state of their house, which seemed to have survived a localized hurricane, but Harry was nowhere to be found. And the adults had heard nothing.
The boy, ominously, would only smirk at Albus and say, “I think I heard him say he was going to join his father.”
***
Sirius had known something was going to happen to him before the end of the year, and Remus hadn't wanted to believe it. He'd told him to set the trip up for three people, and he'd thought Sirius had listened, but when he went to Gringotts to meet with the Black account manager, Grimstone, he'd found that Sirius had done nothing of the sort. The trip had always been for him and Harry only.
“Do you know why?” he'd asked the goblin, his voice hoarse. He hadn't stopped crying since Sirius' death, it felt like.
Grimstone studied him. “I think it was a self-fulfilling suspicion,” he said finally. “The meeting with Mr. Wayne was always arranged just for you, Mr. Lupin, and the American accounts are all in your name.”
He'd left the bank with a horrible understanding that he'd never wanted, along with the two plane tickets and the two perfectly legal passports that he and Harry would use to get to America. Then, that very night, he'd gone for Harry, and he'd found a nightmare. He'd known the Dursleys weren't good to him, or at least had some idea after seeing him in his third year, but to see the fucking locks on his door, the cat flap, the bars on his window…
To feel the way he flinched when Remus touched him, like he didn't expect gentleness…
Moony wanted to kill them, damn the new moon.
But his pup needed him. He was hurting, grieving, and he had the weight of the Black Legacy bearing down on him and he probably didn't even know it, because why would Albus have explained it to him? His pup looked exhausted, and devastated, and the magical storm he caused was a nightmare that said travel wouldn't be good, but they had to go. Their flight was that night.
Their luggage was easily shrunk into one suitcase, Hedwig set free to meet them in America, and then they were off.
Even at such a late hour, the airport wasn't exactly empty, and Harry didn't seem to be up for navigating on his own. That was okay. Remus was there to handle it.
“I've got this, Harry, you just stay by me,” he said quietly. He wrapped an arm around Harry's shoulders and tugged him in close as they waited in the check-in line.
“It's busy,” Harry said. His eyes were fluttering from place to place, but he didn't really seem to be parsing anything.
He hadn't seemed to process much of anything since Remus had told him that James wasn't his father, and really, he didn't blame Harry. His poor pup was reeling from one hit after another.
But it was going to be okay. They were going to get through this.
He got them through the airport and onto the plane itself with little trouble. He'd flown once or twice before, having been dragged by James and Sirius both when they'd been younger and happier. Security in airports had gotten tighter, but things were basically the same otherwise. He made sure that he held onto Harry during the trip, because he wasn't entirely sure his pup wouldn't wander away. Harry was too out of it to really be able to promise that he'd stick close, or even to pay attention to where Remus was.
But then they were on the plane, in their seats, and Remus could relax a little. Harry was safely in the window seat, him in the aisle, and it was going to be fine.
He'd make it fine. For Harry.
***
Remus told him that Hedwig would find them in America, and Harry hated that he had to let his owl go before they reached the Muggle airport. On the other hand, he didn't know how easy it would be to try flying in an airplane with her, so maybe it was better to just let her fly.
He was glad that Remus was coming with him, because he was still reeling over the fact that James wasn't his father. That some unknown American was. He didn't— what was—
“Does he know we're coming?” Harry asked once they were in their seats on the plane. He'd never ridden on one before, but their seats seemed very nice. Roomy, and close to the front of the plane.
“I don't have a way of contacting him,” Remus answered. He'd kept an arm around Harry through most of the boarding process, and even now, he was holding Harry close.
It was… it was… Harry didn't need to be held. He wasn't a child. No one had ever done that before. But he didn't stop himself from leaning in to Remus, especially since they were settled on the plane.
“So we're surprising him,” Harry muttered. “And he doesn't know I exist.”
“He'll probably want to do a Muggle test to verify that you're his,” Remus said.
“DNA,” Harry agreed. He nodded, slumping a little closer to Remus. His eyes drifted closed a bit.
“Sir? Would your son like a blanket before takeoff?”
“You know, I think he'd like that, thanks.”
Remus shifted just a little, and something soft and warm draped over Harry. He hummed in response and didn't bother opening his eyes. He was safe with Remus. He'd promised to stay.
Exhaustion finally dragged him all the way under, and Harry didn't bother to fight it. He didn't have any fight left in him. Not anymore.