( Christmas Day )
Looking at his hair in the mirror, instead of his normal color he now sported a vibrant blue with gold stars, a result of Sirius pranking his bedroom door. On a scale of one to ten, this was a zero on the scale of possible annoyance, and to be honest, he kind of liked the colors. However, his joy didn't last for long, as soon as he put on his dressing gown it morphed into a red and white Santa suit. Sighing, he looked himself over, 'So creative,' he mentally voiced, more than a bit disappointed. He headed down the stairs to the front room with a spring in his step, showing no sign of embarrassment, even if he looked like an idiot.
Seeing the lavish magical Christmas tree in the front room filled with softly glowing fairies, he allowed himself a rare smile, hoping this would be a proper Christmas. There was a 'pop' sound behind him, causing him to turn around to see Remy holding a glass of orange juice. "Thank you, Remy," he said, the elf immediately popping away once he took the glass from him. Moving into the kitchen he saw that Remus was already up and about, eating some toast. "Good morning," he greeted, not going to let anyone ruin his good mood.
"Good morning, nice outfit," the werewolf greeted with a grin.
"Hardly an original idea for a prank, especially from a legendary Marauder," he stated whilst taking a seat. "I expected better from you two, you guys must be out of practice."
"That sounds like a challenge there, pup," Sirius challenged from behind him, taking him by surprise.
'Crap,' he thought, realizing what he had just started, 'distract them before they can make plans,' his mind shouted. "Merry Christmas!" he yelled out, that being the only thing that came to mind.
"Merry Christmas to you too, pup, sleep well?" the dog animagus asked.
"Not too bad," taking a bite of his toast hoping he had dodged a bullet, "any plans for today?"
"Andy and her family will pop over around about midday, I thought it would be nice to have the whole family here for Christmas."
"Sounds good, I got Tonks a nice spellbook, with some rare and lesser-known jinxes and hexes in it," he told Sirius.
"Good idea, is she still set on being an auror then?" Remus inquired from his seat.
"I think so," Harry replied, "however she has lost quite a bit of faith in them, after seeing how ineffective they've been around Hogwarts. I think she may be looking into other possible career paths, maybe a shield sister," he offered. "I can't see her doing a normal office job regardless," considering the fact that his cousin may be escorting curse breakers in the near future, while raiding ancient tombs.
"Sounds interesting," Remus answered. "She knows that's dangerous work, right? Dangerous wild creatures, ancient ruins to investigate full of deadly traps, then there's the continuous danger from raiders and slavers hitting your campsite," clearly concerned about the girl for whatever reason.
"Tonks is a big girl, Remus," Harry answered. "If she wants a life full of adventure, who are we to stop her?" he asked them, sticking up for his cousin's decision which he could easily relate to. "All we can do is provide her with the best equipment and support we can. If she wants to go, she will, and we won't be able to stop her." Supporting his cousin's choice. "And as Sirius once said, women are stubborn, no sense standing in the way when it's inevitable they'll do what they want anyway," getting a chuckle from the pair.
"So you do listen to what I say then!" Sirius exclaimed proudly.
...
( Boxing Day )
Walking down the familiar street to Number 4 Privet Drive with his godfather in tow, it was time for some old-fashioned revenge against his relatives. Oh, what a wonderful Christmas this was turning out to be! With Sirius' help he could bewitch the whole house, and start making their lives miserable for a while, before using his final solution.
Finally arriving at the cursed household, he noticed the BMW was gone, the garden was different, and it had changed a lot over the last year and a half. This was awfully strange as his aunt had never changed the garden the whole time Harry was there.
"Something wrong, Harry?" Sirius asked, sensing his unease.
"Yes," he said firmly. "When I was staying here the garden stayed the same the whole time: the same flowers, the same bushes, the same old post box. Everything is different now," he summarized whilst looking over the house.
"They probably just fancied a change after such a long time," his godfather assured.
"Maybe," he said uncertainly, having a bad feeling that his relatives were gone since there were Christmas lights on the house. His horse-faced aunt would never allow that unless the whole neighborhood had them. She was obsessed with appearing normal to the world, but that also meant you would never be astounding either.
"Wait here, I'll check it out," Sirius offered, walking up the driveway towards the house, while pulling down his hood. Watching Sirius walk up the drive, he found it amusing that Sirius was easily comfortable in non-magical clothing, in his jeans and trainers, with hoodie.
Watching eagerly as his godfather knocked on the front door, he waited patiently for one of the Dursleys to answer. Eventually the door opened to reveal a well-dressed blonde-haired woman in her early twenties. "Yes, how can I help you?" she asked with puzzled expression.
'That's not Aunt Petunia,' he noted dryly as Sirius engaged the blonde in small talk. "Eh, sorry, I was led to believe the Dursley family was living here, I wanted to surprise them for Christmas," Sirius offered in explanation with a canine smile, whilst discreetly checking out the blonde.
This explanation clearly annoyed the lady. "They moved away last September, I don't know where; they didn't even bother to leave a forwarding address for any of their mail," she explained with venom.
"Oh," Sirius replied naturally, "that's a shame. Petunia was an old friend of mine in my youth, you don't happen to have any idea where they've gone, do you?"
"Sorry, can't help you," the blonde offered with a fake smile.
"You wouldn't happen to know why they moved?" his godfather enquired.
"There were rumors that they had murdered their poor nephew. From what I heard they were a rather strange family," she offered with a sad smile.
"Oh, well thank you for your help," moving away from the door, before saying, "Happy Christmas," as the door shut in his face and Sirius walked over to him. "Seems you're right, pup, that's definitely not Petunia, they're gone…"
"That's annoying," he admitted, annoyed at losing the chance to spoil their Christmas.
"Want to head back? Or do you want to ask around?" Sirius enquired.
"Might as well ask around for a bit, maybe the Piers family will know something." He gestured to a house further down the street. "They were bastards too; we can always pull a couple pranks on them, so this whole trip won't be wasted."
"Sounds good," Sirius replied, following Harry's lead. "Harry, what did you think of that blonde? Nice rack, right?"
"Sirius… yes, she was very appealing," he reluctantly admitted, finding the lady rather attractive after all. "But I had other things on my mind rather than perving," giving his godfather his best disapproving look. "Have you thought of a suitable first task yet?" whilst considering whether to bother tracking down his relatives…
"Yes, but you have to wait for New Year's Eve," Sirius stated. "That's the deal, remember."
...
( 28th Dec )
Walking around the empty ruins of the ancient Potter Docklands, he felt a profound and growing sadness; it had once been the crown jewel, the cornerstone of the Potter family's prestige and power.
Now\... it was nothing but decrepit ruins, an empty shell of what it once was, and a visible reminder of his family's fall from power and position through the ravages of war, murder, and many levels of betrayal by supposed friends and allies. That would change now, he vehemently vowed in the depths of his heart, his magic stirring around him violently in response to his powerful emotions.
Before, he would have delayed taking on such a massive reconstruction effort until his position was stronger and more assured, but the recent attempts on his life had pushed him into action. If he was going to die young, he wanted his history as the last of the Potters to be glorious and defining, full of drive, vision and energy, not of some orphan kid hiding in the shadows. This was one of the reasons he was returning to Hogwarts rather than hiding away.
If he was going to soon face his parents in the next life, he wanted them to be proud of him, he wanted even the ancestors he never met to be proud of him... he stopped this line of thought as he fought back the emotions threatening to overcome even his impressive mind magic.
Burying his raging emotions down deep, he decided to use them as fuel to overcome the many challenges ahead. He forced his focus back on to the current task of inspecting the site. Snow masked most of the area, covering the broken stones, but helping him to numb the feelings of loss he felt as he walked around the ruins.
He could still see the outlines of broken walls, half-burnt timbers rising out of the mounds, icicles hanging from them, broken hulls of merchant ships resting next to the rotting piers, moss hanging from their rusting hulls.
Despite the fact that he never knew this place existed until recently, never saw it in its full glory, he still felt the loss as if he had. He could easily imagine what this place would have been like before the war, as hundreds of wizards and witches went about their business, cargo being loaded and unloaded, money changing hands, and opportunities seized.
...
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