Work Text:
Sixth year starts with stares and whispers, like all the other years, but this time they’re tinged less with suspicion and now with curiosity, with misplaced awe, and, as Hermione so bluntly points out, with a bid to get to know their chosen one on a much more personal level.
Harry sits in the Great Hall, his broken, bloody, nose in the centre of this attention, and listens as Dumbledore warns the students of the ever-worsening war, and as Snape is given his true heart’s desire.
He sits at the start of this new year with the knowledge of the world on his shoulders but with a hopeful feeling of the year ahead.
.
Hi Harry
As you can imagine I’m falling to bits without you. Fred has locked me in the store cupboard to stop me scaring the customers with my wailing. Believe it or not, we do still have customers even after you lot went back to school but You-Know-Who hasn’t popped in yet. I’m sure he’s busy.
Let me know how tryouts go - if you lose us the cup under your captaincy I’ll never speak to you again.
So, no pressure. Make that your priority please. I’ll handle You-Know-Who and everything else.
I’m warning you now, I’m about to sound like Mum, but please control that lovely temper of yours and don’t get killed or anything like that. It’d be a waste to have written this whole letter only to find out you’ve been trampled by a Hippogriff.
Fred says hi (he also repeated Quidditch threat, so, we’re being serious)
Enjoy Potions!!!
Love
George x
.
Harry’s mouth runs on Malfoy, what he’s up to, where he goes, why he’s not interested in Quidditch, and it drives Ron and Hermione crazy. In between his checks of the Map, he scribbles notes to George, leaving out names, and getting agreement back.
“See!” he says triumphantly, waving George’s letter above his orange juice. “George believes me! Malfoy’s up to something.”
Ron grabs the letter, scans it, his nose wrinkling the more he reads. “Fuck - I regret taking that from you. I should respect your privacy.” Harry accio s it back, face warm. “And George is only saying that because you’re - you know,” and he gestures to the letter to make his point.
“As if George would believe me just because of that,” Harry says. “You know what, I think he might be my favourite -”
“Don’t you dare say favourite Weasley,” Ron groans, both of them keeping up the unimaginable for a minute before laughing into their breakfast.
Hermione’s just glad Harry isn’t talking about his Malfoy theory.
.
Hey George
[What follows is a blow by blow account of the match, his writing sprawling down the parchment to a weight that Hedwig almost can’t lift.]
I think we can do it!! Another year!! And maybe I’ll get to actually play in the final this year.
But how are you? How’s the shop? Is anything else open in Diagon Alley? How’s your family? How’s Fred? Is there anything happening that the Prophet isn’t saying? I want full answers to every one please.
I miss you.
Love
Harry x
P.S Thanks for letting girls sneak Love Potions past Filch - turned into Mad-Eye and can’t accept any liquids Hermione hasn’t vetted
.
Harry,
Wood came into the shop today. The man clearly can’t let the third weekend in November pass without waking up in a cold sweat. I read out your letter - he says he’s proud of you, always thought you should go pro. I can see you blushing from here and I can relate - we all fancied Wood, I know.
Why don’t we pack in this war and play a bit of Quidditch? I think we’ve got the makings of a beautiful team. Bring Ginny with you.
Diagon Alley is quiet without you. The flat is quiet without you. We’re spending nights carrying out any Order missions we can - this means a lot of time with Dung so we’ve got big ideas for new products thanks to his supply.
Love
George
PS Fred says hi -- and to take Mrs Norris to the Slug party (please explain more about this soon, you’re killing me)
.
“Harry, I heard you’ve not asked anyone to the party yet.”
“Fancy a Gillyweed, Harry?”
“Hey, Harry, do you --?”
“Thanks, Romilda, really, but I actually have --”
“Are you dating someone? Because I would know.”
“Well, sort of, wait -- where are you going?”
.
“Honestly, Harry. You should know better than to give Romilda any piece of information like that.”
“Hermione, you’re making out like she’s some sort of spy.”
“She’s so much cleverer than a spy,” and there’s something almost admiring in her tone.
.
So Harry spends the next couple of weeks denying that he’s ever so much as kissed someone and he wonders why people are so interested in whatever his heart wants when there’s a war on and people are dying.
Well. He supposes it’s nice to have something a bit lighter to focus on.
In the end he bats off enough questions and pretends he misunderstood the initial question and everyone decides he’s single, he’s just giving You-Know-Who his full attention. They mostly leave him alone after that which is quite nice.
.
Harry goes to the Slug Christmas party with Luna ( as friends, he says, to which she replies don’t worry, harry, i know you’re taken ) and follows Malfoy and Snape and learns about the Vow and then he’s on a train back home to the Burrow.
He spends Christmas Eve going over what he heard with Ron, batting back excuses to every refusal that he’s wrong about Malfoy until all either can do is roll their eyes and leave it to focus on helping Mrs Weasley chop vegetables for dinner.
When she leaves the room Fred and George appear, wired from a day of last minute present buying from people desperate to cause a little chaos with their family over Christmas.
George drops his head onto Harry’s shoulder, hugs him from behind -- “Hi.” He kisses Harry’s cheek and Harry leans into it, twisting to kiss him properly. 4 months feels like a long time ago.
Ron coughs. Fred snorts.
And George pulls back to say “Your necklace sounds lovely, Ron.”
Ron rounds on Harry. “Do you tell him everything ?” and Harry shrugs because it’s nice talking to someone about the ridiculousness of Ron and Hermione.
George waves his wand to finish the chopping. “C’mon, Harry, I’ve got to show you something,” and he pulls Harry across by the kitchen, winks, as though it wasn’t immediately obvious what is running through both their minds.
“Oi,” Ron says, scowling at his own pile of carrots, unchopped. “I was talking to Harry.”
“Yeah, George,” Fred chimes in, grinning. “I want to spend time with Harry.”
“Merlin, it’s like I’m dating the Chosen One or something. What’s so special about you, hmm?” He peers into Harry’s eyes, his hands on Harry’s shoulders.
Harry laughs, “Everyone wants a piece of me -- I’m a popular boy.”
“Look at him,” George sighs. “He thinks because he’s fit, Quidditch Captain, and can save us all from old You-Know-Who himself that he’s God’s gift. Don’t worry, lads, I’ll deflate his ego --”
“You can blow --”
“Get out of here!” Ron says, banishing them from the kitchen with a wave of his hand. “Ugh - Fred, is George as bad as Harry?”
“Now now, brother of mine. It sounds like poor Hermione has to put up with the pair of you experiencing that young love for the first time. Tell me more about Lavender. I always thought she was a smart girl - did you give her a Love Potion?”
“Oh, fuck off.”
(Incidentally, Harry and George are far too busy falling into the twins’ old bedroom to hear this final part.)
.
Ron gets poisoned because there’s never a quiet day at Hogwarts and Harry holds the life debt of the Weasleys in his all too willing hands.
Ron survives and Harry spends the day in the hospital wing with Hermione and Ginny, talking and talking about the astonishingly high number of theories. They talk themselves in circles until Harry’s throat is dry with the fear of how close he came to losing his best friend and he drops back in his seat in stunned silence, staring at Ron’s sleeping face and feeling that rush of love that they never give voice to.
It’s really Harry and Ginny who talk and Hermione who sits and keeps vigil over Ron. In this quiet moment Harry watches her watch him and gets an inexplicable sense of missing George.
Which is really quite powerful because the door swings open and Fred and George walk in moments late, their voices all too loud but all too comforting in the stifling room. They fall into seats, open-mouthed at their baby brother, and Harry watches them take it in, see that he’s alive, refocus their lives once again.
The twins ask what happened, listen to the theories once again, offer their own, and then it’s time to go back into the corridor while Madam Pomfrey does something, anything, to Ron. They cluster around the bench, calmer now, their thinking kept inside.
When Fred starts up again, Harry takes a step back, catches George’s eye and nods. They walk away from the group, to an alcove that conceals them slightly. It’s not a secret anymore but Harry just needs quiet.
He steps into George, drops his head on his shoulder, and tries not to think about how common this has become, this dependency on the presence of George. George’s hand cradles his neck as Harry curls his arms around George’s back and they stand in silence.
“Is that it?” George murmurs in his ear. “You missed me so much you poisoned Ron to get me here?”
Harry laughs, pulling back. “I’ll stop at nothing.”
“Ruthless is a beautiful look on you,” and then George is kissing him and Harry closes his eyes and narrows his world down to this, not thinking past the next few minutes.
A cough startles them out of their moment, both of them turning to see McGonagall standing behind them, an eyebrow raised.
Harry opens his mouth to say something, he has no idea what, but instead they get a tiny smile, a nod, and she sweeps away to talk to Madam Pomfrey, a strange blessing placed upon them.
.
Throughout this, Harry is learning about Voldemort and his past and following Dumbledore down the path that has been drawn for him since before he was born. He dips his head into the Pensieve, watches pieces of Voldemort’s life float together and he listens as Dumbledore says love love love . He tells Harry to think of his family, of Sirius, of Ron and Hermione, and Harry adds a whole host of other people to that last, George slotting in at the top. He can’t believe that the swooping feeling he gets in his stomach when George pushes a hand through his hair, when he kisses Harry, makes his knees tremble, that this is all power against the dark.
.
I heard about Malfoy - are you okay? What’s happening?
.
It’s fine. I deserved it. I somehow made it out with just detention for the rest of my life. Ginny’s replacing me for the final so we’re going to win anyway.
.
Dumbledore dies and Harry’s brain won’t stop replaying the night over, from Trelawney spilling about Snape, to the locket, to the fall and the death that was all for fucking nothing.
He trails after the in denial Hagrid, ends up the hospital wing where he gets to be the one to spread the news that their holy face of their war is gone, killed by something as absurdly simple as a Killing Curse, his body lying in the grass.
They turn away from Bill and his wounds, react appropriately, and then spill their own tales from the night. Harry sits in a chair and lets it wash over him, how Malfoy snuck the Death Eaters in (he can’t even be vindicated about this, but he catches Ron and Hermione’s looks that tell him they know it), how Snape moved through the crowd as one of the Order, no one questioning it, how Felix saved more lives than bears thinking about.
He sits and he listens and he fights the urge to close his eyes and sleep, awoken by the surprise announcement from Tonks that she’s been in love with Lupin this whole time and that the war means they shouldn’t stop their love.
Harry lets out a huff of laughter when George walks in with Fred and Fleur because look at that timing, does he know Legilimens? Can he tell that Harry is almost always thinking about him?
The three of them crowd Bill’s bed, the twins quiet as they look at a second of their brothers in a hospital bed. They move back to let Fleur in, where she stares, impassive. Harry’s always liked Fleur.
As Molly and Fleur bond over goblin made tiaras, the twins drop into seats either side of Harry.
Harry has the stupid urge to make a joke so he mutters to George, “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”
And George, he gives him it, a smile, an acknowledgment, before he reluctantly turns sombre. “Harry, we heard rumours on the way in. There’s a body outside. They’re saying it’s --”
“It’s Dumbledore,” and Harry takes that and reaches out for George’s hand, squeezes it.
Taking that lead, George goes further and puts his arm around Harry’s shoulders, pulls him against him. There are worries here, of making this too public, of putting everyone in more danger than he already has, but almost everyone he trusts is in this room, it’s fine. So he drops his head onto George’s shoulder, onto this person who has been there for him in every other way from Ron and Hermione, and he suddenly feels the night drop on him, making him bone tired.
He catches the look that passes between Tonks and Lupin as they glance in his direction and then he sees the way Tonks gestures in his direction, in Bill and Fleur’s, and he suddenly understands the patronus, the hair, the way she’s looking at Lupin.
When McGonagall bursts in, says the Minister is coming, Harry presses his forehead to George’s for the briefest second and then follows her, every scenario running through his head.
He stares up at Dumbledore’s portrait, that final confirmation he didn’t need, as they decide to come back in September, Harry nodding along as though the decision in his head hasn’t already been made.
“Harry, a word please,” (Headmistress) McGonagall says. She asks about the tasks ahead of him, that she needs to know so she can help, but Harry has all the help he needs and he can’t give away anyone else’s secrets.
She dismisses him as the Minister appears on the grounds and he flees to the sixth floor alcove where -
“I never thought he would die.”
Harry slides down the wall, knees bent. He should go to bed. He should find Ron and Hermione and tell them everything he couldn’t in the hospital wing. But for now he has lost yet another father figure and he’s going to lean into what he wants, to be selfish for a little bit.
“Me neither,” he admits to his knees. Looking up, he meets George’s gaze, sees how tired George is and knows he must look so much worse. “It was so quick -- I couldn’t --”
He closes his eyes. Then he feels George’s arm around him and for the second time that night he leans into him, focuses on the solid body beside him, the rise and fall of his breathing, the warm weight of George.
“Hey, Harry, there was nothing you could do, okay? I know you feel awful but there was nothing you could do. And Dumbledore knew what he was doing.”
“You’re right,” Harry sighs. “That first time you kissed me -- I bet you didn’t expect so much death in your life.”
“I had an unfortunate idea,” George replies. “But I’m glad I did it anyway.”
And Harry makes the decision (maybe it’s the wrong one, we’ll see in the morning) to push aside any grief and any regret and any thoughts of R.A.B and shifts so he is in George’s lap, cupping his face and kissing him.
Merlin, he loves him.
.
Hermione shows Harry that she was right about Eileen Prince and Harry wants to rip the paper from her hands and set it alight but instead he acknowledges it, spits out a promise to find Snape, wherever he ends up.
He’s so tired. Of death, of prophecies, of the title on his shoulders. He wants to go back to his eleven year old self who thought he was coming to a magic school simply to learn how to levitate feathers and turn vinegar to wine and tell him to make the most of those tiny moments, of sitting with Ron and Hermione, doing homework and laughing and laughing. He wants to tell him that he shouldn’t interfere with matters outside his own classes and that the most important thing is to have a normal life.
But if he’s saying all that he supposes he should also tell tiny Harry that he’ll meet a family that will give him everything and expect nothing in return. That he’ll meet his best friend and that one of his twin brothers will make you laugh more than anyone else and that you’ll both get banned from a sport together and somehow that’ll lead to your first kiss. He wants --
“Harry?”
He blinks, comes back to Hermione and her slip of paper. “Sorry, what?”
“I was asking if you’re okay?”
And he nods, shrugs for good measure. “Just thinking about all the things that have happened since I found out I was a wizard.”
“Merlin, that’d take forever,” Ron says. “Second year alone we had Myrtle, ‘Mione turned into a cat lady, spiders ...”
Harry laughs, the sound strange in the air. -- “Exactly.”
.
The funeral passes in a bunch of nonsense words and a flash of flame. Half the magical population of Britain turns out and Hagrid carries the body and cries. Harry hasn’t been to a funeral before, despite all of the death surrounding him, and he wonders if this is the norm and realises nothing Dumbledore does (did) would ever be normal.
He sits with Ron and Hermione and George, Fred, and Ginny, and though he keeps his gaze straight across the grass his knee is pressed against George’s and that tiny contact is enough to ground him.
When it’s over there’s a lull and in that moment it crosses Harry’s mind that he should probably end things with George. It’s the noble, sensible thing to do but --
“From the way you just screwed your face up I assume you’re thinking of breaking up with me,” George murmurs, his mouth close to Harry’s ear.
“I don’t want to.”
“Then don’t,” and when Harry turns to him he continues. “Hardly anyone knows about us, my family is in danger anway, it’s not going to stop either of us from feeling the way that we do, except maybe a little more sad, so.”
And he’s right. “If you die because of me I’m killing you.”
“Has no one told you this whole war is about you?” George says, pulling up a smile. “I’m on the wanting to live side.”
“We’re all on that side,” which feels like something that has to be said. He goes in further, wonders if Rita is around here somewhere, decides he doesn’t care despite what he just said, and he says, “I love you, okay?” into George’s ear, laughing at the grin he gets.
“You’d better protect me against your fans, then, Harry,” George laughs. “They all love you.”
“Please don’t joke about that,” Harry frowns, fails after a second. “Romilda probably will kill you if she ever hears.”
“You’ll protect me,” is the easy reply. “And I, little old me with my joke shop, will do anything I can to help you.”
“It sounds like we’re good together.”
“Hey, haven’t I been saying this for years?” George glances around them but they’re the only ones left sitting. He smudges a kiss on Harry’s cheek. “I love you. Do what you need to do and I’ll be here.”
And that’s all they need.
.
Sixth year comes to an end in a different place from where it began. Dumbledore is dead, Snape is gone, and Horcruxes are the path to follow. It sounds bleak, when it’s put like that, but, as Ron points out, there is at least one more shining day of happiness. It almost blinds Harry, thinking about a wedding in amongst everything else, but it’ll be one last day before the beginning of the end and, hey, we all need a perfect day.