I woke to the light on the floorboards. It was not the usual ache in my chest or the tight knot behind my ribs. It was just light, soft and golden, sliding through the tall windows without glare in broad bands that caught dust motes in the air. For the first time in longer than I could remember, I did not want to move. No plan, no urgency, just light.
I did not trust it yet.
Outside, the world had already started turning. I could hear it faintly: someone dragging a deckchair across a patio, tyres crunching on gravel, and a light laugh from a garden two houses away.
I sat on the edge of the bed, my bare feet on the wooden floor, cool beneath my skin. I looked at my hands and flexed them once, then again, to try to decide what I was meant to do today. They did not help.
The room looked softer in daylight, steadier too. The Quidditch posters on the far wall lifted at the corners in the breeze. Viktor Krum was mid-stretch, his broom angled with a calm face. I envied him. That kind of freedom, playing for yourself and no one else, felt impossible.
My owl shifted on her perch in the corner, feathers puffed as though she had been awake for hours and was not impressed by my slow start. She gave a low, non-urgent hoot. A small reminder that time had not stopped, even if I wished it would, just for one morning.
"Yeah, yeah," I muttered, voice rough. I had not meant to speak. The quiet felt close, so I kept my voice low.
I crouched beside the trunk at the foot of my bed, still half packed. T-shirts lay crumpled, books stacked unevenly, curled scraps of parchment and a few empty Chocolate Frog wrappers. The scattered things looked like proof of months spent moving without stop.
I did not bother to choose. I grabbed the nearest clean enough shirt and pulled it on. It did not matter. Not today.
The stairs creaked beneath me as I went down, barefoot and quiet. It was not a harsh sound or a warning. It was the sound of old wood under my feet.
And then the smell reached me.
Toast with melting butter. A hint of spice, cinnamon or cloves. Strong, earthy tea, the way Remus always brewed it. The smells were strong as I reached the bottom step.
I did not speak straight away. I stood in the doorway and let it settle.
Remus stood by the hob with his sleeves rolled, his wand stirring the kettle as it hovered over a blue flame. The scent of rosemary had joined the others. He looked at ease, though there was a softness to his shoulders, a stillness I rarely saw.
His movements were unhurried for once.
I did not want to interrupt. It felt wrong to speak. I watched, sunlight lying across the floor at my feet.
"Good afternoon, Harry," Remus said without turning. There was a small smile in his voice, the kind that told me he knew how long I had been awake, lying there and thinking instead of sleeping.
I gave a short laugh. "It's barely morning," I said, though we both knew mornings did not mean much to us anymore.
He turned slightly, one eyebrow lifting. "It's nearly midday," he said, as if announcing a small mercy.
I shrugged, though the corner of my mouth twitched. He handed me a mug with that same easy, practised movement I remembered from every place we had stayed. It looked ordinary enough to be any quiet morning, not a temporary pause.
The tea was perfect, slightly sweet, with a trace of chamomile under the stronger herbs. He had judged the strength the way I prefer.
He had been like that since the first safe house, when the curtains were always drawn and I was too young to ask why.
We drank while the world outside carried on without us. I could hear birdsong, the soft crackle of the fire, and somewhere beyond the trees, a faint tune playing from a wireless.
"Toast?" Remus asked, voice casual. "Or are we feeling extravagant? Scrambled eggs?"
"Eggs," I said too quickly. It was not about being extravagant. It was about being asked.
I leaned against the counter, hip pressed into the warm wood, and looked out of the window. Outside, the village carried on as if nothing had ever gone wrong, as if no one had vanished in the night or been hunted for their name. Gardens showed strong colour. A neighbour knelt among hers, trimming a hedge. A dog wandered past the post box, tail wagging. Somewhere in the distance, a bell rang, perhaps from a bakery, perhaps a clock tower. I did not know. But it was normal.
The mug warmed my hands. Steam rose at my face. The window latch clicked in the breeze. The flagstones by the door held last night's chill. The kitchen clock read eleven twenty; its second hand moved on with a soft tick.
Plain, fully normal. None of them knew who we were, or what we had seen, or what we carried. To them, we were just another pair of quiet faces passing through, who kept to the edge of the lane.
We cooked in silence for a short while. The sounds from the hob filled the room: the faint pop and sizzle of oil and the scrape of a spoon against ceramic. It should have felt empty, but it did not. The cottage was quiet, and the air was still.
Remus spoke first. He noticed everything.
"You're quiet today," he said softly, the way he always did.
I hesitated and traced the chipped rim of a mug by the sink. I did not want to lie, but I did not want to explain.
"It's nothing," I said, and winced as the words left my mouth. I did not believe them, and neither did he. That made it worse.
Before I could stop myself, I added, "Just a bad dream."
He paused. He shifted his shoulders and tilted his head, as though listening. He did not rush to speak or fill the gap. He turned towards me in a slow, careful way and looked.
"Harry," he said quietly, "that's not nothing."
He stepped closer and lifted my chin with one hand, not roughly but with a steady care that made my chest tighten. Kindness still caught me off guard, and I did not know where to put it.
His touch steadied me. Remus did not look at a legend or a story. He looked at me, scarred, tired, and still trying. Somehow that made it worse, because it made the moment solid.
"I'm sorry," he murmured, brushing his thumb beneath my jaw before he let go. "I know it's not easy."
I looked at him. The lines on his face were deeper than I remembered, and the skin under his eyes showed the colour of little sleep.
He turned back to the hob and stirred the eggs.
"We're only here for a while," he said, voice barely louder than the breeze through the open window. "You know that."
I nodded and felt my stomach twist.
Of course I knew. We never stayed long, and we never could. However solid the walls were and however many mornings passed without alarms or whispers, the stay was temporary. Another safe house. Another short stop.
"I just…" I began, but the rest stayed in my throat.
I wanted to stop running. I wanted to breathe without looking back and to believe this could be real.
Instead, I dipped my head in a small nod. I hoped it said what I could not voice.
Remus saw it at once. He always did.
"There's no need to rush," he said after a moment, softer now. "We'll talk later." He tapped the rim of my empty mug, then set it by the sink.
Later. The word sat between us. It was not a promise but enough to keep the day from collapsing.
I held on to that.
Sometimes it felt like that was what I did most days.
Living with Remus had started as a precaution, a strategic step. Dumbledore's idea, really, another safe house for a boy the world had forgotten, a boy who was not meant to exist. The truth was simple. Remus took me in because he cared, because no one else thought to, and because he understood what it meant to be hunted for something you could not change.
Knowing that did not make it easier.
He said it was for my safety, and maybe it was. Every day I stayed, and every night, I felt guilty. It felt as though I was taking from a man who had already lost too much.
There was another truth I could not wash away. The full moon was weeks off, but its date sat in both our heads because of him; it meant extra watchfulness for both of us. It showed in Remus's small winces, in the stiffness of his shoulders and the way he started at sudden noises. I saw it, and I did not like how small it made me feel.
He rubbed his forearm once and stopped when he noticed me watching.
I knew he would carry the pain without asking for help. I did the same.
Maybe that is why we kept a steady distance in the house, not quite kin and not quite strangers, two tired people trying not to fail in front of each other.
Morning light came through the curtains and fell across Remus's face. It drew shadows beneath his cheekbones and showed the tiredness there. His shirt hung loose and was thin from years of washing, faded from blue to a colour that was hard to name. His trousers sagged a little at the waist and relied on the belt more than the fit. He did not look like the sort of man people pictured when they said "protector".
He kept his back straight and his chin level. He did not posture. It came from long work in the hours after battles ended, when the house had gone quiet again.
I watched without speaking. His hands moved slowly and with care as he turned the eggs in the pan. The movement was sure from long practice after many setbacks.
I wondered, not for the first time, how someone so tired could be the one to keep me safe. How he could carry our shared memories when his own were heavy enough.
I looked away, heat and guilt moving up my neck. The mirror above the sink caught my eye; the glass was cracked straight through, and no one had mended it. My reflection stared back: pale, thin, with hair sticking out in every direction. My glasses sat crooked on my nose, useless as ever.
And the eyes. Always the eyes.
Remus said they were my mother's. He thought it would comfort me. All I saw in them was a burden. Expectation. A history I had not chosen.
Remus turned from the hob and set a plate in front of me: scrambled eggs, neat and steaming. He rinsed his own at the sink, every movement steady and deliberate.
I picked up the fork. The plate was warm at my fingers, and steam rose into my face. The eggs tasted soft and salted, with butter at the edge. I chewed, swallowed, and felt the food settle. I sipped tea and set the mug down; the handle was hot, then bearable.
Remus crossed to the window seat with a slow breath and sat down, the old bench creaking under him. With a flick of his wand, the Daily Prophet drifted across the room and unfolded in his lap. He did not open it quickly. He held the paper and checked each line with care.
"What's new?" I asked, though I already knew the answer. It was never good.
He did not answer at once. He tilted the paper so I could see.
The headline did not matter. The photograph said enough.
The moving photograph showed smoke rising and thinning. A figure crossed a corner and vanished. A shard of glass flashed in the light before smoke swallowed it.
"When did that come in?" I asked.
"This morning's edition," he said. "Two attacks today. One near a market, one on a lane."
Ash and ruin filled the frame; walls had collapsed inward. Black smoke rose from what had been a home or a Muggle café. It was hard to tell. Above it, in the sky, hung the Dark Mark.
Green. Twisting. Cruel.
I stared until the image blurred, but I did not look away.
"Muggles live in fear now," Remus said at last, his voice low and tired. "Even in the quietest villages. There's nowhere safe anymore."
Guilt came fast and hard. I looked round the kitchen; the scent of rosemary and toast still hung in the air, the sun was warm on my skin, and the floorboards were smooth beneath my feet. All of it felt wrong.
How could we have peace, even a sliver of it, when others had none?
"What can we do for them?" I asked quietly, almost to myself. "While we sit here, safe and hidden, they're out there dying."
Remus turned his head slowly. His eyes were unreadable and guarded. Not unkind, but distant. He kept something back from me.
"There's a plan for you," he said at last. "Dumbledore has organised things. You will understand in time."
He meant arrangements that would place me where I could be trained and kept under protective wards.
The words were meant to help. They did not.
I did not want a plan. I did not want prophecy or fixed endings. I wanted freedom, choice, and the right to be ordinary. To decide for myself who I would be, not who the world thought I was meant to become.
But that had never been mine, had it?
I looked back at the paper, at the smoke and green light, and the fear returned, slow and familiar.
I did not feel safe now.
And I was not sure I could save anyone.
"They're scared," I murmured. "All of them. And all we do is sit here. Just watching."
For a long moment, Remus said nothing. He folded the paper with deliberate care, pressed the crease flat, and set it aside. His face gave nothing away, blank and still, but when he spoke, his voice was gentler than I expected.
"Fear can stop people," he said. "Make them freeze. But it can also push them to do things they never thought they could. You've seen that. You've lived it."
I swallowed hard. The lump in my throat came on fast and made no sense.
"And you've done more than act, Harry," he said quietly. "You've given me something to believe in. You've given me hope."
Hope. The word hurt, and a dozen faces rose in my head: people who had followed me, who had died because of me.
And still, I was here.
That was what made it hard to breathe some days.
"I feel I'm a mistake," I whispered. "A name in a story I don't know how to finish."
Remus turned fully then, watching me with his quiet focus. Not judging. Not pitying. Just seeing. Seeing too much.
"There has to be something we can do," I said again, my voice rising. The words came out quick and rough. "Anything. I can't just sit here. I can't wait. Not while people are… while they're…"
My voice cracked. I did not care.
He smiled, but it did not reach his eyes. It sat faintly at the corners of his mouth.
"Perhaps, Harry," Remus said softly. "But the change begins here."
He tapped his chest with two fingers.
"Changing the world starts with learning to change yourself."
Outside, wind moved through the trees. Bare branches scraped the windowpane and rattled once.
"Master your craft," he went on, voice quiet but steady. "Not just the incantations. That's the easy part. Learn restraint. Precision. Learn to lead, not merely react. Become the kind of wizard who can carry what is coming and endure it."
I hesitated. My throat tightened.
"Do you really think I can?" I asked. I hated how small my voice sounded.
"Yes," he said, without a pause. No hesitation. No doubt. Just yes.
"But not all at once," he added gently. "Today, practise the spell I showed you. Tomorrow, we will talk about what comes next. Put one foot in front of the other, Harry."
There was something in his tone, firm and certain, that steadied me. Not away from the war or the fear, but back to something solid.
One footfall.
One breath.
One spell.
I nodded and swallowed. The tightness in my chest eased slightly.
Outside, the wind still whipped through the trees.
But inside the cottage, the warmth held.
The village kept a slow, deliberate pace. Ottery St Catchpole ran on long-set habits. Stone cottages huddled close together with ivy climbing their chimneys. Smoke rose from hearths. Mornings brought birdsong and the smell of jasmine or damp earth, depending on the weather.
People waved as you passed. They paused to exchange pleasantries, to ask about the weather, the price of eggs, and whether the baker's daughter had married the smith's apprentice. Milk bottles sat on doorsteps. Dogs dozed in patches of sun and did not mind the comings and goings.
Even here I could feel a tension in the quiet. Sidelong glances. Questions that stopped at polite smiles. They did not know who we were, but they knew we were not locals. They knew we did not belong.
A boy who looked too closely at everything.
A man with scars on his face and dark circles under his eyes.
We were not guests or cousins come to visit.
We wore borrowed clothes and kept to the edge of their streets.
Sometimes, when the wind came in from the east, I heard it: the faint crack of Apparition, the harsh laughter of Death Eaters through the trees, and distant shouting from somewhere else. The noises felt far, but they were warnings; not everyone who remembered me kept their distance.
I wanted to believe it could be ours. That quiet could last longer than a moment.
Remus's voice cut into my thoughts.
"Do you agree, Harry?"
I blinked. "Sorry, what?"
He was watching me, not with frustration, but with the steady weariness that had become part of him. The look of someone who had learnt that most answers are not found in books or spells, but in keeping going.
"We were speaking about Hogwarts," he said evenly. "About keeping a low profile."
Right. Hogwarts.
It felt wrong. I could not picture myself in those corridors, following House routines and timetables, acting as if I were another student.
But Dumbledore had arranged it. He said it would keep us safe for now. He said there were things I needed to learn. And Remus had to stay traceable enough for Hogwarts to find him. I was still the one no one was meant to remember.
The castle would protect us, and it would confine me. Stone walls, rules, and corridors where footsteps echoed.
Remus cleared his throat.
"You and I will be there in different capacities, student and staff. That gives us access, but it brings scrutiny. Hogwarts is full of secrets, Harry. You will need to keep your eyes open."
I nodded slowly. My shoulders tightened.
"Sounds absolutely marvellous," I muttered, and a reckless part of me meant it.
Even now, the thought of going to Hogwarts, despite everything, made me feel slightly better.
Remus caught it. Of course he did.
"Enthusiasm can be useful," he said wryly. "But dangerous, too. Attention brings questions. Questions you may not be ready, or safe enough, to answer."
I exhaled and rubbed the back of my neck.
"Alright. I will keep my head down."
"Self-control," he corrected gently. "Not silence. Not hiding. Just awareness."
I knew he was right. He always was, curse him.
That did not make it easy.
"It is just harder for me than it is for you," I said quietly, not meeting his eyes. "You always knew how to disappear into a room. I will never have that once I use my real name."
For a moment, he did not answer. Then he faced me fully, and when he spoke, his voice was low and steady.
"It is not about luxury, Harry," he said. "Or ease. It is about necessity. Not that it matters; no one at Hogwarts will recognise it. Dumbledore's seen to that."
He paused.
"Sometimes the safest move is to draw less notice than those who are hunting you," he added. "Not forever. Just long enough to outlast them."
His words took time to settle. I did not respond. I stood still and added it to the rest.
There was a softness in Remus's eyes that caught me off guard. Not comfort. Not kindness. Quieter than that. Knowing. He held back, and he had lost people.
"You have done hard things before, Harry," he said, voice low and measured. "Harder than this. And you will do more because you must. But do not forget there is strength in patience, too. In knowing when to hold back."
I opened my mouth to say something sharp or just tired. I wanted to say I was done with waiting, tired of staying back while attacks carried on. Tired of watching others fight and fall while I stayed behind curtains and spells and plans I did not understand.
But then I saw the slight pull at his mouth, the new lines above his brows, and the worry he had not quite managed to hide.
The words did not come.
"If anyone can do it," he said simply. That was all.
No speech. No fuss. Just quiet certainty.
I turned back to the window. The village lay under the morning sun, rooftops in soft, pale light that comes just after dawn. Light came through the clouds in clear bands.
For a single quiet moment, everything held still.
"One breath at a time," I told myself. "One day at a time."
I would blend in. I would keep my head down. I would do what was needed, even if I no longer knew who that was. Even if every part of me wanted to be someone else entirely. Someone unburdened. Unmarked.
Remus moved through life with a set pace: measured, deliberate, steady. His composure did not come from ease. He had learnt it and practised it. It was survival, sharpened by years with a wand in hand. Watching him was seeing someone who had memorised rules and kept them without fail.
And me?
I was still going line by line.
He slipped into cover with the ease of habit. He knew how to vanish in a room and how to stand without drawing notice.
It annoyed me, that calm.
While I struggled under new names and borrowed smiles, he settled. He made it look simple, this life on the run. But I did not want simple. I did not want practised smiles or half-truths spoken with clenched teeth. I wanted contact. Something plain and real.
A laugh not pushed down by fear.
A touch that did not flinch.
A story told in the open without looking over our shoulders.
Sometimes, on long walks through Muggle parks, or sitting across from each other in small cafés that smelt of coffee and dust, I let myself pretend. I would sit there, fingers round a mug, and think, "Maybe this is what being normal feels like."
Just a boy with a scar and a headache.
No prophecy. No war.
But thinking like that brought risk. The more I reached for it, the closer danger followed.
And always, Remus noticed.
He would give me a look, a silent warning, and then we would leave. No argument. No explanation.
Another door shut behind us.
Another place left behind.
This time, he said, was different.
But Hogwarts did not feel different.
The thought of those halls and staircases, those long rooms with echoes, did not calm me.
It made my chest tight.
Even as Remus spoke of protection and rules, something in me drew back.
I did not believe in safety.
Not really.
A school full of sharp-eyed students and portraits that never slept did not sound like a refuge. Portrait eyes follow movement. I have seen them watch.
It did not sound safe.
Still, his voice, calm and certain, kept me steady.
"Hogwarts is the safest place for you," he said. "The Headmaster has protections you cannot yet imagine. If you stay within its walls, you will not have to keep running."
He meant wards, binding charms and layers of protection that hold inside the castle.
I wanted to believe him. I did.
"Time to get changed," he told me.
I nodded.
I went upstairs and opened the trunk at the foot of my bed. The hinges squeaked the same way they always had. Familiar.
Inside, my robes waited, folded and neat.
I put them on. The sleeves were too short. I let one set hang loose and tried a second robe from the trunk. The fit was the same. I had grown taller and leaner, with more angles than soft lines. The fabric sat wrong on me, as if cut for another build.
Or maybe it was not the robes that no longer fit.
Perhaps I was the one who had changed.
I stared at myself in the mirror.
The boy looking back was not quite the one I remembered.
There was something in the eyes.
Something I had not seen there before.
A wariness.
A weight.
Maybe that is what war does to you.
Not all at once, but in small steps.
Until one day you cannot recall what it is to be unafraid.
I smoothed the front of my robes and turned from the mirror.
It was time to go.
Even if part of me still was not sure where I was going back to.
Downstairs, Remus was already waiting.
His robes were crisp and dark, cuffs buttoned, and collar pressed.
Even so, the signs of wear were clear in the slight forward set of his shoulders and the grey in his hair.
His eyes were watchful and tired and had not changed.
He stepped forward without a word and straightened my tie with hands steadier than mine.
His fingers moved deftly, practised, as if he had done this before for someone else.
In the hall mirror beside us, I caught a glimpse of myself.
The Hogwarts crest sat bright against black robes.
A school hat perched awkwardly on hair that stuck up.
It looked wrong to me.
I did not look like myself.
I looked like a boy trying to pass for someone else in school colours.
"There," Remus said at last with a faint huff of amusement. "From wandering nomad to certified schoolboy."
I flinched, just slightly, at the words.
Wandering nomad. The phrase landed harder than it should have. Not because it was untrue, but because of how casually he said it. As if it were a label. I could not tell whether he meant it kindly or if it was simply a fact that no longer hurt him to say. Either way, it pressed in my chest.
"I'm not sure about this," I said, my voice low and uneven. "What if I am not ready?"
He paused, the humour fading. Then he stepped closer, close enough for me to see the slight tremble in his jaw and the quiet strain at the corner of his mouth.
"You are," he said gently. "I have watched you, Harry. I have seen every step, every choice, every burden. You are stronger than you believe. And ready or not, this is the next step. You will do great things."
It was meant as encouragement, but it did not comfort me.
You are stronger than you believe.
You will do great things.
People said lines like that to me often, and I never knew how to answer. It felt less like a compliment and more like an order. A prophecy handed down.
"I do not want to be someone who is supposed to do great things," I muttered. "I just want to feel like I belong somewhere."
Remus looked at me, steady, asking nothing.
"You do belong," he said. "And you will not be staying out of sight anymore, Harry."
My throat tightened. I looked away.
"What if something goes wrong?" I asked, quieter now. "What if I can't hold it together in there? What if I bring danger with me?"
"Then we will face it," he said at once. "Hogwarts is not just a school; it is a secure place. And it is where you will have space to be, not just survive."
His trust in that place was hard to share.
Still, I wanted to believe it.
"But it still feels dangerous," I admitted. "I am walking into a situation I may not be ready for."
He set a hand on my shoulder, firm but not heavy. "That is why I am here. And that is why the Headmaster is watching. You are not alone this time, Harry. You do not have to be. You will be safe."
"What if Hogwarts is not safe?" I asked.
Remus's hand stayed on my shoulder, steady. "Then we will learn to make it so."
He meant it kindly. We stepped outside, and the wards gave a faint ripple as they settled. A thought came.
If safety can be made, it can be broken.
We walked down the path toward the lane. My robes brushed my shins, and the air smelled of wet leaves and woodsmoke.
A post owl crossed the sky; a cart rattled. The cart's iron wheel clicked twice on a cracked flagstone.
My shoes felt tight across the toes.
We reached the gate. The latch clicked once.
The lintel charm gave a short chime from the front path. Remus lifted his wand and, voice low and hard, said, "Stay behind me."