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It all started from a conversation with a vampire. Harry had surprised Valentina in a dodgy bar on Knockturn, taking off his cloak and grinning at her when she startled a little.
“If I had a heartbeat, you would have stopped it,” she grumbled, tossing her long black hair over her shoulders.
“Sorry,” Harry lied.
“I’m used to you by now,” Valentina said, pursing her blood-red lips.
“Did you miss me when I was away?” Harry asked, amused.
“No,” Valentina lied. “Did you find Rabastan Lestrange then?”
“Yeah,” Harry said. “He’s in custody. Thanks for the help.”
Valentina nodded, and stared at his pulse point just a little. “No problem. I could think of a way you could repay me for my intel, but you might taste like death.”
“Excuse me?”
“You heard me just fine,” Valentina said sweetly, running her finger across the top of her martni glass.
“It’s just a bit of a weird thing to say, I’m sure I taste great,” Harry joked, not wanting her to find out at all. Hermione sometimes said he had a death wish, but not like this, in a dodgy bar with a vampire.
Valentina rolled her eyes, and reached out and touched the fabric of his cloak. “Doubtful, death tastes like ash. And I don’t know why you still have this old thing anyway.”
“Ehm, because being invisible is dead useful, and it’s a family heirloom!”
“Sure, sure,” Valentina replied, looking bored. “And sorry if I step out of place, I’m not great with human emotions anymore, but you’ve lost quite a lot in your young life haven’t you? It’s surprising you haven’t tried to make a trade.”
Harry blinked at her. “Yeah, I’m not following you at all. How many martinis have you had?”
“Five,” she replied. “But my point stands. I’d have thought you would have traded your hallows for someone, wizards are very sentimental. I used to be, once. I had a beau and everything before I was bit.”
Harry just stared at her. “Traded? For a person?”
“Deathly Hallows, Master of Death, you can bring someone back in a fair trade,” she said, staring at him like he was stupid.
“That’s not in the stories,” Harry protested. “Where did you hear that?”
She shrugged. “Can’t remember. But as most Masters of Death prefer power over love, it hasn’t happened yet. I would have thought you’d be more sentimental, you’re very kind for an Auror.”
“Thanks,” Harry said. “How do I do it?”
“The only step by step instructions I can give you sweetheart are in seduction or creating new vampires, I can’t say I know. It’s probably just something simple like asking though,” Valentina said. “Now, buy me another martini, I’m bored of this conversation, and I’ve been putting it all on your tab.”
Harry laughed, and flagged down the bartender, paying off her very large bill before he got back home.
It was an open-plan cottage with big windows, not far from the Burrow, and with ceilings so high and light so bright that it couldn’t be any further from his cupboard or Grimmauld Place. He didn't like small spaces.
Harry kept his cloak on, and opened up his top dresser drawer, where the stone kept reappearing after he dropped it in the Forbidden Forest some seven and a half years ago. It always found its way back to him. Next to the stone was Draco’s wand, which he didn’t use on missions in case someone disarmed him, but he never returned it to him.
“I’m being ridiculous,” Harry said to himself, as he picked up the stone and wand, and went to sit in his living room. “Valentina is probably pulling my leg,” he said aloud, but she had a weird sense of morality for a 500-year-old-vampire.
Harry looked at the stone and wand and put them in a pile with the cloak on the floor, and thought about death. About losing his parents at 15 months old, at George living without his twin, at Teddy losing his parents even younger than he did, at Andromeda's grief about losing her daughter.
Maybe he could bring them back, but that’s not the name that kept swirling about in his mind.
He was never very selfish, but Sirius’s death still hurt nearly a decade later. Sirius lived in a cave and died for him and escaped Azkaban, well, for revenge, but maybe to keep him safe too, and it was so unfair that he was taken away from him, so soon after Harry got him back again.
And after the war, when Harry realised he was bisexual, he’d sometimes think about Sirius when he touched himself and felt equal parts guilty and sated. He didn't even know the funny feeling in his stomach when he saw Sirius was somewhere between love and a crush when he was younger.
Maybe Sirius was happy where he was, but if Harry got a choice at the train station when he died, maybe Sirius got a choice too, and maybe, just maybe, he’d want more time with him too.
“I’d like Sirius Black back please,” Harry said aloud to no one, feeling very stupid. “You can have the Hallows back as a trade, I want Sirius.”
Nothing happened for a moment and Harry sighed, but then the whole room started to glow, the house vibrated, and the hallows—wand, cloak and stone---all disappeared, leaving a man in its place.
It was Sirius, young and healthy and fit like he was when Harry used the stone last, and naked as the day he was born. Sirius cried out as he stumbled back into consciousness on the floor, stretching like he wasn’t used to having a physical body.
Harry ran over to help him up, arms gentle with him as he led him over to the sofa.
“Harry? Is that you?” Sirius said, his voice rough.
He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.
“Merlin, look at you,” Sirius said, cupping his face with his hands. “You’re grown so much, Harry James!”
“I’m twenty-five now,” Harry told him.
“A whole quarter century, and hopefully at least a century more,” Sirius said, grinning, showing white teeth.
Harry couldn’t help it, he looked at his godfather’s gray eyes and swallowed back tears. “I’m so sorry, Sirius.”
“For what?” Sirius said.
“For getting you killed,” Harry said.
“You didn’t,” Sirius said, wiping a stray tear off his cheekbone. “None of that, okay? You were so brave, doing what you thought was right, and I’m the one who was bested by Bellatrix.”
Harry nodded. “She’s dead now.”
“Good,” Sirius said, sounding vicious. “And Voldemort too?”
“Yeah, for a while,” Harry said.
“Well done,” Sirius said, looking away from his face to the first time to the wood beams in the ceiling. “Where are we, by the way?”
“Ehm, my house,” Harry said. “It belonged to Muggles, we're in Devon, there's lots of space outside too.”
“Good, this is a hell of a lot nicer than Grimmauld,” Sirius said, looking down and realising his nakedness for the first time. He shrugged, and grab a pillow and placed it over his lap.
“I thought you’d like it, it looks a little like the common room,” Harry said quietly. “Thanks for coming, Sirius.”
Sirius wriggled his fingers. “It feels like I’m staying too. I wasn’t quite sure, but if you wanted me, of course I’d come to you. What did you do?”
“Traded the Hallows,” Harry admitted, and reached out to grab Sirius’s hands, solid and warm and so alive.
“The Deathly Hallows?”
“Yeah, Dad’s cloak was one, and I won the wand and Dumbledore gave me the stone,” Harry explained.
Sirius’s eyes went wide with shock. “You had them all and you trade them….for me?”
Harry nodded.
Sirius’s face was a picture of shock, and before he could say something ridiculous, like how he didn’t deserve it, how he’d made a mistake or something, Harry leaned in and kissed him gently.
Sirius parted his lips and kissed back, tangling his hands in Harry’s messy hair, but he pulled away first.
“It’s like that, baby boy?” Sirius asked, but he was smiling.
“Yes—but we don’t have to, I just wanted….” Harry trailed off.
Sirius laughed, but it was kind. “We can figure out what we want from each other later, now that we have the time. Besides, I rather think it’s my fault for showing up in your living room all handsome and naked.”
Harry rolled his eyes. “And modest, too.”
“Always,” Sirius quipped back, sticking out his tongue.
Harry felt like he was in a fever dream, joking with his godfather in a home that was truly his.
“I’m not going anywhere,” Sirius said, correctly interpreting the look on his face. “Your eyes are still so expressive, kiddo.
“I’m not used to good things staying around,” Harry admitted, a lifetime of that lesson imprinted onto his brain.
“Me neither,” Sirius said. “But I don’t want to be anywhere but right here, with you. Why don’t you make me a cup of tea—I’m thirsty, that’s new!—and tell me the highlights of what I missed? And give me a tour of this house, and if you want, it could end in the bedroom.”
Harry swallowed and looked back at Sirius, so alive, and more precious than the world’s most powerful wand or Peverell’s cloak.
“Sounds great,” Harry said quietly, eyes soaking in the sight of him.
This time, they had time.