2

Chapter 2 - Going to Be Okay

The door opened of its own accord and on the other side waited a small group of grim faced -well, grimmer even than what was normal.

"Welcome, Lord Peverell," one said in a gravelly down.

Harry made a harsh sound in his throat and held Teddy a little closer to him, his Holly Wand ready at his side. "I am no lord. The 'lord' system has been out of the wizarding world for a long time."

"Not as long as you might think," another said, holding out a paper to him, which he didn't have a free hand to take.

Harry looked at the paper, disappearances, ministry scrambling to unearth, yada, yada, yada…

He read the date. Merlin. "You brought us back to the seventies?" he asked, outraged. He hadn't even been born yet. His parents were still in school, Nymphadora was probably Teddy's age.

Only two years working a child's daycare and three years as a father kept him from cussing aloud.

"How do we get back to our rightful time?"

"You don't," the first goblin declared.

Harry pointed his wand at the foul thing, "You want to bet?"

"The dust is gone, you can't go back."

"Is this some kind of joke?" Harry asked, "To get back at me for the dragon thing?"

"I assure you, Sir, this is no joke. Your names are Henry Black Peverell and Theodore Lupin Peverell. You were briefly married to a witch by the name of Naomi Lupin who, I can assure you, did exist. You had what some might call a 'shotgun marriage' with her at a town hall where you simply signed paperwork. She was the estranged sister of Lyall Lupin, and was murdered by the same dark lord who murdered your parents, whose names you do not know because they died when you were young. You were taken in by muggle foster parents and learned magic from books that you inherited from Gringotts once you turned eleven. You did not attend Hogwarts because your muggle family forbade you from attending. You have come to London looking for a new job because someone unknown has burned down your house and all your belongings, leaving you to no longer feel safe. You, and anyone who thinks to investigate, will find documentation that supports this story."

"How-" Harry began.

"Much is possible when the centaurs are on your side."

One of the goblins held out a small bag of coins.

Harry glared at them, "What? You pull me back in time to change fate and all you can give me is a small bag of gold?"

"Give?" the goblin asked, sounding scandalized at the very notion, "No, this is a loan."

"I can't take care of a child with that for long," Harry said, knowing from just the size of the bag, there couldn't be more than ten to fifteen galleons, assuming it was galleons and not knutts.

"Then I suggest you get a job. Best of luck, Lord Peverell," the goblin said. Now, get out, the bank is closed and your vault is empty." A house-elf appeared from nowhere and snapped its fingers at them.

Harry and Teddy were popped into Diagon Alley, and Harry had to bite his tongue to keep from swearing. Teddy began crying into his shirt. The little sack of money settling in Harry's pocket.

Harry's mind was reeling. He had nowhere to go and staying at an inn would add up in no time. Where could he get a job?

He tried thinking from the top, it was just after sundown and the air felt warm, August in 1975. He took deep breaths and began rubbing Teddy's back.

"It's going to be alright, my little man," he whispered, "it is going to be alright."

It was going to be alright, he would make sure of it. The headlines on the newspaper made it seem like the first of Voldemort's wars had yet to begin.

Which was certainly a good thing, though Harry wasn't looking forward to a Horcrux hunt. Maybe he should move to America? Disney was an American thing, and Teddy loved Disney.

But Harry couldn't abandon his country, all that he had ever endured would be for nothing. All that Teddy had endured would be for nothing. Harry would be putting him at risk by staying, but there had been several attempts in their lives in their own time. At least here, no one knew who they were.

Indeed, even though Harry looked like a Potter, he was no longer the carbon copy of his father. He had grown his hair out to his shoulders, making it far more manageable -strangely, more curls now than birdnest. He wore it in a low ponytail most days, and he had replaced his round spectacles with a pair of golden rimmed rectangular ones. From the pictures he had, his face looked more like his grandfather's than his father's now.

Which as the Peverells were related to Potters wasn't a bad thing.

Harry undid the charms he placed on Teddy, his hair immediately revealing itself to be a shocking color of green with red lowlights.

In this time, it was better to be magical.

No sooner had the thought crossed his mind, did they here a loud bang. Harry should have ran in the opposite direction, but that just wasn't his style.

He turned to find a woman in an alley fighting off three men. Her wand work was deadly, but the three goons were fighting like a well-oiled machine, a tested unit. When one fired the other shielded.

Harry considered them goons because the morons weren't watching their back.

Teddy had seen a lot in his young life, even run through practice drills, he knew to be still and quiet in case of an emergency and to stay put when Daddy told to stay put. It was likely having an adverse effect on him, but their 'drills' had saved both their lives before.

As the old adage goes; you're not paranoid if there really are people out to get you.

Harry was able to sneak up on them and have all three of them stunned before any of them knew he was there. He stepped closer to the woman catching her wrist while still holding his wand to keep her from bringing her curse down on him. He looked down into her face and smiled; Andromeda.

It was so good to see her alive and unbroken. Her brown eyes simmered with intelligence and focus, a focus she had lost by the time Harry moved in with her.

But then he realized that her hair was too straight and a darker shade than Andromeda's chestnut, that her eyes were a bit too large on her face.

This wasn't Teddy's grandmother. No, this was Bellatrix Lestrange.

He released her at once, and hurriedly began to make his way to the inn. One night of rest to get his bearings and then he would go job hunting in the morning.

"Wait!" she called.

He didn't wait.

"Wait." She caught up to him easily, "Can't I know the name of my rescuer?"

"You look like a witch who can take care of herself, I only meant to spare you the trouble."

Nobody needed to save Bellatrix, people needed to be saved from Bellatrix. But Harry couldn't dispose of her in cold blood, not when she looked so much like Andromeda.

There are some things one can never unsee.

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her shock at his response.

"At least give me your name?" she cajoled him.

"Henry Peverell," he answered, and managed to keep from sighing.

"Like Ignotus?" she asked, sounding startled.

"So I've read."

"Well, I'm Bellatrix Black."

So not married to Lestrange yet. She seemed saner than Harry remembered her.

Teddy peaked at the woman timidly.

"And who is the child?" she asked, not taking his hints to leave them alone.

"My son, Theodore Peverell."

"Hi," Teddy said waving at her, his hair turning bubble gum pink when Bellatrix waved back and smiled at him.

"Hello, little one," she greeted with more warmth than Harry would have imagined possible. "Would you like to have dinner with me and my family?"

Harry stiffened.

"I'm sure your father wou-"

"We have to find a place to stay for the night," Harry interrupted.

She stepped in front of him, he jerked to stop on the cobblestones. All the shops were closed for the night and he didn't like being alone with her, not at all.

"I must insist," she said, hands on her hips, "you helped me, the least I can do is feed you. Besides, I know my uncle would be pleased to meet the Peverells."

Harry opened his mouth to protest but she spoke before he could get a word in edgewise, "It would be rude to turn down an invitation from the Black Family." she offered her hand to him, "You said yourself, you were looking for a place to stay."

Harry would have turned down the offer, he was used to dealing with pushy women, but it was Teddy who took hold of Bellatrix's hand.

At once, they were pulled into a side along apparition.

Harry found himself, hugging Teddy in a tight grip, using his body to shield him away from Bellatrix. He was a little late. Looking over his yellow-haired head at what to be Grimmauld Place -though it was cleaner and slightly less creepy than he remembered.

Harry's pulse was in his throat. A man with dark hair and a grim expression stood in the greeting room, he looked vaguely like Sirius. Bellatrix addressed him as, "Father, I hav-"

"Who is this?" the man demanded.

"Mr. Henry Peverell and his son Theodore. I insisted they co-"

"Why?" Cygnus Black asked.

"He saved m-"

"You should not have been out at night on your own."

"Father, please," she said, almost as if she were begging.

He sighed and met Harry's gaze, "You are here now, we cannot turn you away. Come, dinner as already begun to be served."

The dining room was far grander than Harry remembered it but just as dimly lit, perhaps more so. At the head of the table sat who Harry recognized as Pollux Black, beside him Orion, Sirius' father, and then Walburga, followed by Regulus, and -Sirius.

Sirius who looked young, healthy, and as depressed as Harry had ever seen him, he didn't so much as look up at their entrance.

On the other side of the table sat Cygnus' wife Druella Black who Bellatrix took her seat next to.

"Who is this?" Pollux said with such a highbrow draw it hurt to listen to. There was British and then there was insufferable. It was a sliding scale that in three syllables the head of the Black family had managed to find the extremest end to.

"Henry Peverell," Cygnus introduced contemptuously, "And his son."

Sirius had jerked to attention at that name, his eyes shimmering with curiosity, "Like Ignotus Peverell, from the story?"

Harry nodded and sat beside Sirius at Pollux's slight hand motion to take a seat. Harry kept Teddy very firmly on his lap, his wand ready to draw from his wrist sheath, this would be a bit like eating dinner with sharks.

No, they didn't really want to eat him, but they might, just for the hell of it. Just to see what he tasted like.

"Who's this?" Sirius asked leaning to the side to catch Teddy's gaze.

Harry was relieved that it was his son who answered, "Teddy."

Sirius grinned, "I'm Sirius, but you can call me Padfoot."

Teddy giggled, putting his hands to his lips. He looked up at Harry with Sirius' blue-grey eyes.

He knew exactly who or rather what Padfoot was, as well as Moony and Prongs. Teddy had to be the smartest three year old, because he didn't declare to the room that Sirius could change into a dog.

Harry wasn't sure what would have happened then because the last of the dinner guests breezed in, and she took his breath away.

Narcissa Malfoy had been a lovely lady, but Narcissa Black was a knockout. Curly blonde hair that framed her high cheekbones and startlingly red lips. Her eyes were pale blue gemstones, that flicked to each occupant of the room, judging the world for all its shortcomings.

"This is my sister," Bellatrix introduced, "Narcissa Black. Cissy, this Henry Peverell and his son Theodore."

She nodded at him before taking a seat across from him, she looked to be about Harry's age.

"What are your parents' names?" Pollux asked.

"I don't know," Harry answered with a twisted sort of honesty, "I was raised by a foster family."

"Did they die?" he asked bluntly.

"They were murdered," Harry said, wishing he wasn't here, that Teddy wasn't here, "by a dark wizard."

The air of the room changed and Teddy wrapped Harry's arm more firmly around his small personage. Sirius and Bellatrix looked interested, Narcissa looked bored, Regulus looked fearful, and the other adults looked ...disinclined to give a flying-monkey-feather.

"What is your middle name?" Pollux asked.

"Black," Harry said shortly.

Again the air in the room shifted and the parents in the room -aside from Harry, relaxed.

Sirius looked a bit disappointed while his brothers and cousins looked more interested.

"What brings you into London, Mr. Peverell?" Orion Black civility than Harry would have expected from him. "I am Orion Black, by the way. This is my father, Pollux, my younger brother Cygnus, his wife, and daughters. This is my wife and our sons."

Harry found it interesting that he didn't name either the women or the children, as if they didn't matter, as if they weren't fully human, just ornamentation.

"I've come to find work."

"Did you lose a job recently?" Walburga asked with a suppressed sneer that she was not doing a decent job at restraining.

Deciding to trust the goblins, Harry said, "My house was burnt done. I no longer feel that it is safe in the country." And he didn't just mean in rural Britain.

"Do you have anything in mind?" Orion asked politely.

Seeing Sirius had given him an idea.

"I was hoping Hogwarts might still be looking for a Defense Against the Dark Arts professor."

This got everyone's attention, and it was Narcissa who asked, "And you think you are qualified to teach Defense?" There was something in the way she said that, a challenge of sorts.

His lips curled and he knew he looked arrogant, but then there weren't many people who had lived through all that he had. "Extremely qualified."

"But you didn't attend Hogwarts," Druella cut in, "Surely, my daughters would have remarked on you being in their classes. You are what, twenty-five, twenty-six?"

"Twenty-one," Harry said dryly, "And no, I didn't graduate from Hogwarts, my foster parents were muggles who refused to allow me to attend." Which wasn't technology a lie.

Teddy didn't contradict him, he was a bit preoccupied trying to get spaghetti to stay on his fork.

"Muggles," Walburga said with great malice, "muggles such as those should be burned at the stake."

Harry shrugged, "I would rather see the wizard who murdered my parents and my wife burn. But we can't all get what we want."

Teddy looked up at him. He knew his mother had died in the war, died fighting. But he didn't know who had been the one to kill her. It was a cruel game that the Lupin's true murderer sat across the table from them.

"And who might that have been?" Pollux asked.

Harry probably should have kept his mouth shut, he was in the snake's pit after all, but the bit of sanity in Bellatrix's eyes drove him to speak. How much of the past could he change? What impact would his words have on people?

"Voldemort."

Bellatrix choked on her wine, coughing violently. The elder Blacks exchanged looks and Sirius asked, "What kind of stupid name is Voldemort?"

Harry smiled, and Teddy asked, "Are you okay, Bellati?"

Bellatrix waved a hand at him, holding cloth napkin her mouth and breathing deeply, "I'm fine," she croaked.

"He made it up from his birth name, Tom Marvolo Riddle. It is an anagram for 'I am Lord Voldemort.' He spouts nonsense about pureblood superiority, but really he's just trying to bully the country into submission. Tom Riddle Jr. is half blood and a hack."

The room went silent and Sirius looked up at him with adoring eyes.

The other Blacks seemed unable to tell if he thought pureblood superiority was nonsense or whether he meant that this Voldemort was full of nonsense. Walburga's next question illustrated that quite nicely. "And your wife? What was her name?"

"Nyma Lupin," Teddy said proudly.

"Naomi Lupin," Harry said gently, hating that he was correcting Teddy with a lie, hating more that Teddy accepted it at the truth without protest.

They were going to have to have quite the discussion when he got to be a few years older.

"Lupin?" Sirius asked, "No way! One of my best mates is a Lupin, Remus Lupin. You wouldn't happen to be related, would you?"

Harry nodded, "Naomi was Lyall's sister, I believe Remus would be my nephew. She did mention him, though we have never met."

"I would think not," Sirius grinned, "Remus would have mentioned if his uncle was a Peverell."

"You are awfully young to be a widower," Narcissa remarked.

Harry met her strange crystalline gaze. "She left us too soon," he said honestly.

For a moment he thought he saw something warm in her gaze, or not warm exactly, more like the grey became more blue, more alive. "I am sorry for your loss." Her words were as cold and distant as anything he had ever heard her say and yet…

And yet, Harry was reminded of the woman who had spared his life for the mere knowledge of her son's safety.

He was a father now, he knew now better than he had known then what had driven her.

He nodded toward her, and the rest of dinner progressed in an oppressive silence. No wonder Sirius had run away. Surely, this wasn't what all their meals were like?

But everyone acted as if it was normal and no one made to break the silence as they ate. Even Teddy seemed happy in the quiet, his hair changing color between pasta blonde and sauce red depending on what made it onto his fork with each bite.

Sirius seemed utterly delighted by this and kept snickering under his breath.

When they had cleared their plates, Harry and Teddy were shown to a guest room as it would be 'indecent to allow them to leave for an inn' for the night.

Sirius and Regulus led them up the steps, as the guest room was on their floor. Regulus was almost as quiet as Teddy. But when Teddy asked him what his name was, Regulus said, "I'm Reggie," rather than his given name.

"Do you really think you will get hired at Hogwarts?" Sirius asked.

"If Mr. Dumbledore is hiring then yes. Charms and DADA are my best subjects."

"And Magic Creatures," Teddy added.

"He likes Newt Scamander," Harry explained.

"So do I," Regulus said, turning to smile at Teddy who Harry was holding in his arms on a lower step.

Teddy smiled back, his hair turning black his eyes mirroring Regulus' deep brown.

"That is so cool," Regulus breathed.

"You know our cousin, Nymphadora Tonks is a metamorphmagus too," Sirius told his brother.

"Shhh," Regulus shushed him, "mother will hear you."

Sirius rolled his eyes but didn't say anything more on the subject, rather he asked Harry, "Can I write to my friend about you, your nephew? Do you think you would like to meet them?"

It was a personal question that lacked tact, but then most of the Black's questions had lacked tact. So he answered, "Certainly, I always regretted not having more family."

Sirius gave him such a look, "Family isn't all it's cracked up to be."

"You're a selfish prat," Regulus snapped at him.

"Well, you're a spinless-"

"Sirius," Harry chided, "my son is three years old."

He flushed, "Sorry." They got to the correct landing, just in time as Teddy was giving one of his famous yawns.

"Guest bedroom is at the end of the hall," Sirius said, "it's clean and there's a small bathroom, and shower too. Don't be afraid to call for one of the house-elves, they are bitter little things but they are good at their jobs."

It was so good to see him alive.

"Thank you, Sirius, Regulus, goodnight," Harry said first, and then Teddy said, "Night-nights, Padfoo, Reggie."

"Goodnight, Mr. Peverell, night-nights, Teddy," they chorused in such perfect unison that Harry wondered how much of Sirius' dislike for his brother was bluster to keep up appearances around his Gryffindor friends.

Harry was relieved to find pajamas laid out on the bed for them, silky pajamas that seemed to fit them perfectly. They took a shower together, and Teddy nearly fell asleep in his arms. He used a drying spell and got him tucked into bed. Harry laid down beside him, staring up at the ceiling, not knowing where to begin unraveling the day's events in his own thoughts.

For once, Teddy didn't ask for a story, he just curled close against Harry's side and said, "Going to be okay, Daddy, I promise."

Harry curled around him, taking more comfort than he was probably able to return, "That's right, it's going to be okay. I promise you, my son. We will be alright."

Teddy fell asleep long before Harry was able to. He wondered how on Earth one went about keeping such a promise.