tamchronin | Erised - Chapter Fifteen (Reply)

Oh, right, I just remembered a warning I forgot to put on everything else. Spoilers. There are spoilers for all the books sprinkled in here, here and there. Oh, sure, right now some of you are thinking I've got everything all wrong, but all I can do is ask you to trust me. I know where I've got it "wrong" and it's wrong for a reason. Other notes and disclaimers are as above.

It is a well-known fact that the portraits in the Hogwarts headmaster's office are missing four very prominent portraits. Many headmasters have lamented, quietly, that they could not seek the wisdom of the founders of the school, at one point or another. There has also always been a bit of curiosity about them, even as omniscient as some of the headmasters have seemed.

Of course, they had portraits back then. As a matter of fact, Rowena Ravenclaw was the very proud owner of a portrait of Merlin himself, and that was the first portrait hung in the headmaster's office. There have been so many headmasters over the years though, that it is difficult to sort through them and figure out which one goes where in the history of all things. Some are old and senile and don't want to answer impertinent questions put forth about their age or when they were headmaster or headmistress. It's no one's business but their own if this magical advance or another had actually been achieved when they were alive, thank you very much, and it wouldn't affect their ability to give someone good advice.

There are a few obviously older portraits though that stand alone. The frames are frequently empty, or the occupants sleeping. The colors are faded despite many spells to keep them clear, and they are in bad need or restoration, but the portraits never complain. They figure they have earned the right to be rather left alone and do not wish to hear about this controversy or that. It's all the same to them as when they started, thank you very much.

There are no names or dates upon those frames, and no one has ever managed to get them to admit any.

Foolish headmasters have chosen to ignore them entirely and wonder why they are still even around. A few wiser ones have wondered, though. If they ever learned anything more than this, however, they have kept the secrets they've found to themselves.

Chapter Fifteen

Blood, Pure or True

Harry didn't realize he'd been holding his breath until he gasped along with everyone else at James's (my dad's...that's my dad...oh my God I can't believe it he looks just like in Snape's memory but this isn't a memory this is real and that's my dad and that's my mom right next to him and they're just about my age and why did Dumbledore send me here without warning me or saying anything and what is going on and why are Ron and Hermione so different and oh my God I'm staring at my own dad!) exclamation. He was feeling a little lightheaded, and leaned against the tree they stood under for support.

Hermione, in the mean time, looked as if she were going to fly into a panic, flustered and helping a young Severus Snape up to his feet. Didn't she even recognize him? Well, of course, this was Hermione. She'd probably apologize if she knocked Voldemort over accidentally. She'd try to kill him after he was on his own two feet, probably, but she was too polite and respectful for her own good sometimes.

"Sorry we didn't have time to fill you in," Ron murmured to him. "We're just as surprised to see you as you are to see us, I'm sure."

Harry nodded a little, noting for the first time, in the full light, that there was something different about his best friends. Their clothes were all wrong, for one. They looked a little older than they should be, for another.

"You'll tell me about it later?" he whispered to Ron.

Ron nodded quickly. "I'd have told you already, but I don't think Hermione expected anyone to be here right now."

The others were collecting around Hermione and James, who had stood up quickly to ask her if he was right. Hermione, for her part, was trying to pretend that there was nothing unusual about their appearance, and that they were all just home-schooled students who were given permission from the headmaster to do research there.

"Impossible," Snape glared, wiping off the back of his cloak.

"But, Professor Sprout's always allowed--" Hermione clamped her hands over her mouth as she noted the looks of surprise she'd received.

"What's Professor Sprout got to do with anything?" Harry whispered to Ron.

It was Ron's turn to look surprised. "She's headmistress. Isn't she?"

"Not even close," Harry said, brows knitting together. "What's going on here?"

Ron had a look of dawning realization. "Oh, right, the old guy must be--he even said he was. Sorry, I'm just not used to--"

"Are you Ron, or aren't you?" Harry would have seriously doubted his sanity, if Dumbledore hadn't warned him to not be too hasty to jump to conclusions about what would happen tonight, and warned him that it may even seem insane, at first.

"'Course I am," Ron said. "Probably not quite the same as the one you know, though. You see--"

He was interrupted by a foot landing on his toes. Hermione was glaring at him, since he'd ignored the first glare and the elbow in his ribs. "Ron! We don't have time for that now. We've got to ask everyone here for their help."

"There's less painful ways of getting my attention, you know!"

She gave him a look that Harry was all too familiar with. It was her, "stop being an idiot" look. She shot a look like that at Ron at least once a day, as far as Harry had been able to tell, unless they weren't talking to each other at the time for some reason or another. She tended to avoid unnecessary non-verbal communication with him at those times, as well. At least she did when he was looking. If he ever grew eyes on the back of his head, he'd probably be quite surprised at such times.

"We should all sit back down and talk about this," someone said. Harry looked over and realized it was Sirius Black, his godfather who had been dead nearly a year now, only he was now Harry's age, like the others.

"That's an excellent idea," Hermione replied promptly.

They all sat, Harry sitting last and very reluctant to sit with everyone else. He just felt so awkward being here at all. To top it off, he couldn't help but notice that something was very wrong. What was Snape doing, talking to everyone here, and where was Peter Pettigrew? Where was the traitor, Wormtail, in this group? Harry made sure he sat between Ron and Remus Lupin, where he felt comfortable. (He wanted to sit between Ron and Hermione, but they'd ended up sitting a little too close to each other, and for some reason they seemed a little unnerved by Harry sitting so close.)

Hermione spoke up again, once everyone was settled. "Now, what's this about time travel?" she asked, looking at James with a very serious expression.

James, for his part, didn't miss a beat. "Professor Dumbledore is entirely too careful about who enters the grounds to let three random people in to peruse the library, for one. And the only Professor Sprout we've got here is entirely too young to be headmistress, if we're meaning the same person. Finally," James paused, as he looked directly into Harry's eyes with something like a smug grin, "let's just say it's a sudden hunch, on my part."

It seemed like everyone else in the circle looked at Harry as well, and then did a double take. Lily's was the most pronounced as she looked at Harry, started to stand, looked intently at James, looked at Harry again, and then immediately ran over to him and gave him a great hug that squeezed the breath out of him. Harry didn't exactly complain, though, because he was holding onto her just as tightly, trying hard not to cry. He felt an immediate connection with her that he'd never felt with anyone before, and a cool feeling of peace and happiness centered upon his scar. It was a bizarre contrast to the burning pain he felt from the effects of Voldemort's rage and hate, but he realized that it made sense that if there would be the one, there would follow the other.

"Who are you?" she whispered. "And why are you risking so much paradox in coming here?"

"I--it's just, I'm just doing what Professor Dumbledore told me, that's all," he said, flustered.

Lily sat back, squeezing between him and Ron. "Well, why would he risk paradox like that, then?"

Harry was happy to make room, but Ron looked a little awkward about it, as he almost ended up in Hermione's lap. Everyone took a moment to shift over, leaving Snape sitting between James and Sirius, and everyone in the circle looking just a bit more awkward than they'd been a few minutes before.

Hermione sighed. "The problem is that the paradox is already upon us."

"So, Peter should not have died," said Lupin quietly, putting it all together first.

"Wait, what?" Harry stared at him. "Wormtail...dead?"

Ron and Hermione looked a little lost, shrugging, but the others in the circle had much more interesting reactions. James, Sirius, and Lupin all looked startled, but a three-way exchange of looks later they all nodded, as if this offered some final proof of the time-travel theory. Snape paled a little, and Harry didn't care. He didn't want anything to do with Snape right now anyway.

Lily looked confused, though, and frowned. "That was his nickname? It doesn't sound all that nice, if you ask me."

"There were...reasons," James explained, hesitating as he looked over Ron and Hermione.

Harry wanted to shout that it was okay to trust the two of them, but the words froze in his throat. These two weren't the same Ron and Hermione he'd known for years, somehow. He was positive of it, now, and he wasn't sure at all how much he should trust them yet.

Snape is the one who cut through the awkward atmosphere. "Is it true that I'm the one who should have died, then? Or was the attack in general something that should never have occurred?"

Hermione looked flustered. "I don't know. I'm not sure who, exactly, any of you are, except that you," she pointed to James, "look enough like Harry that you--"

"Must be his dad, huh? Don't tell me it took you that long to figure it out?" James was grinning in proud triumph.

Hermione nodded and then looked at Lily. "And, well, you must be his mother, and I'm sorry if this is catching everyone by surprise. I didn't mean for this all to happen like this."

Lily just smiled. "There's no need to worry. I mean, I am taken by surprised a bit, but the thought isn't as repugnant as it used to be." She blushed a little, looking over at James.

"Excellent!" James rubbed his hands together in glee. "Does that make you my girl?"

"Well, I'd certainly hope so, before..." Lily trailed off, indicating Harry with a tilt of her head.

Everyone in the circle laughed except for Harry and Snape. Harry was a bit pensive, since the entire situation felt awkward and unnatural to him. Snape, on the other hand, just looked impatient. Loath as Harry was to help Snape out for any reason, out of principle for all the bad blood between them, he wanted to be sure to say something.

"You're not meant to have died, as far as I know," Harry said, just loud enough to be heard. "At least, not in the timeline I'm from, if that means anything. Then again, Peter Pettigrew isn't dead then, either."

Harry stared down at the ground as soon as he'd said that. He'd tried not to sound bitter about either of those, when three people who sat here with him were dead, by his timeline at least. The three people from this time who Harry least wanted to be dead, in fact.

Lily put a hand on his back and gave him a small smile. She obviously didn't know what was wrong, but it didn't seem to matter to her. She just offered her sympathy, as only a mother could, even if the idea couldn't have really settled in yet for her.

Hermione held up a hand, as if she were in class. "Excuse me, but perhaps we should all go 'round the circle and introduce ourselves? I have a feeling that we're all from such different pasts that even if we think we know each other, it might be a good idea to say something anyway, just in case."

Everyone agreed, and everyone waited for someone else to speak up first.