"Moony?"
"Remus Lupin." Black sighed with what sounded like fondness, but didn't smile. "He never visited me in prison. He must have thought I was as guilty as all the rest. Or maybe he didn't forgive me for assuming he was a spy during the war."
This sounded as bewildering as everything else, and in a way that Harry didn't think he needed to pay attention to. He changed the subject. "So you think that Pettigrew is still alive somewhere out there? Is that why you broke out of prison, to go chase him?"
"I know he's still alive," said Black darkly. "I feel it in my gut." He clapped his hands over his stomach. And then he seemed to hear the rest of what Harry had asked, and shook his head hard. "No. I know he must be alive, but I don't know where he is. I came to get you."
"Because you think I ought to go back to being Harry Potter."
"I told you, the real families are the chosen ones." Black's voice was soft and coaxing again, and he was leaning forwards for the first time in a while. "Not the ones you were born into."
"But you didn't give me a choice," Harry said. "And everyone told me I was born a Potter. It's not—it's not the same thing as you running away to live with the Potters when you were sixteen."
"But you can still have a better life as Harry Potter than you ever can here." Black looked around scornfully at Malfoy Manor, and then looked at Harry again. "Come on, Harry. We can go and live on the run somewhere, and I'll teach you all the spells I know, and then we'll complete the necromantic ritual, what do you say? We can go abroad. There are countries where people have never heard of the Blacks or Harry Potter."
Only the last part of that sounded tempting. Harry had hated the way people gawked at him when he was still Harry Potter, and there wasn't much less gawking now that he was walking around with Malfoy features.
But being with a madman didn't sound tempting. Being adopted or re-adopted or whatever in some kind of insane ritual didn't sound tempting.
And the thought of what he would leave behind him, and how Mrs. Malfoy would probably cry, halted Harry before he could even think about saying yes.
There was the promise he had made Mrs. Malfoy, too. And his revelation from earlier, that everyone had good and evil in them.
Even Sirius Black did. He shouldn't have kidnapped Harry, but he hadn't deserved to be bunged up in Azkaban for twelve years for a crime he hadn't committed, either.
Harry shook his head. "I want to stay here. Thanks, but no thanks."
Black's eyes snapped straight to devastated so suddenly that Harry could see the madness again. "But you're the only thing I have," he whispered. "Harry. I'm your godfather. You have to allow me to be your godfather."
Harry sighed out, long and slow. Black reminded Harry of himself in so many ways. He wasn't at home in his family, he hadn't been at home with the Dursleys, and he had been desperate to change things so many times.
But the difference was, Harry was going to stay with the Malfoys and see what happened. He wasn't going to run away the first time a chance presented itself, especially with the man who had been responsible for him not feeling at home in the first place.
Black had given up. Harry didn't want to.
"No," he said. "I don't want you to get arrested and go back to Azkaban, but I don't want you to take me."
Black gave a hollow, desperate laugh. "You don't have a choice."
He started to lunge at Harry, but Harry hurled himself over his bed and onto the floor. And then he stood up and called, "Dobby!" even as Black was trying to scramble over the bed.
Dobby appeared between them at once, his head uplifted. "You shall not harm Henry Malfoy!" he snapped at Black, and then snapped his fingers.
A huge, transparent bubble appeared, encasing Black. He floated off the floor, staring at Harry and Dobby in bafflement. Harry swallowed and nodded to Dobby. "Thank you, Dobby." He paused and looked back and forth between Black and the house-elf. He probably should have asked Black earlier, when he was in his expansive mood, but maybe Dobby would also know. It wasn't like it would have occurred to the Malfoys to ask. "Do you know how he's getting through the wards, Dobby?"
"Oh, yes!" Dobby looked delighted to be able to answer. "Mistress Narcissa is being thought of as a threat by the wards of Malfoy Manor when she be marrying Master Lucius. He be having to build exceptions into the wards that not react to the Black madness and let someone who has it cross the boundaries."
Harry blinked. It seemed odd that the Malfoys wouldn't have thought of that, but then again, perhaps Mr. Malfoy had thought it was only Mrs. Malfoy it would let in, or maybe that had been long enough ago that neither of them had thought about it in a long time.
"Thank you, Dobby," Harry said, and looked at Black. "Can you take him over the boundaries and then do something to make sure that he won't come back in?"
Dobby gave him a cowed look. "Dobby cannot be adjusting the wards without permission from Master Lucius, Master Henry."
Henry. Harry listened to the name, and nodded in acknowledgment of it. If he kept nodding, if he kept working with it, then he thought the name would probably transform in his mind.
I won't give up.
"But," Dobby said, and suddenly seemed to perk up, "Dobby can be doing other things!" He faced Black and clapped his hands together, then held them there and closed his eyes. He seemed to be concentrating deeply.
....
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