Severus knocked courteously on the bedroom door that Luna and Susan shared, waiting until he was granted entry to open the door.
It had been a harsh reminder that while Severus could throw Harry's door open at almost any time and find his child fully dressed, the same could not be said for the young women who lived in the house they were all forced to share.
"Miss Lovegood," Severus nodded politely at the young blonde sitting on the floor with her back resting against her bed. "If it suits you, I am available to take you to your house."
Luna looked up from where she had been fondly stroking Harry's incredibly deadly pet snake and smiled softly at Severus. She had grown to become a striking young woman; one aged by grief as much as she had time.
It caused an irksome twinge in Severus' chest when he saw Luna in small moments such at that. The young witch with the bravery and gentleness to pet a king cobra was the same witch who was listed as a wanted criminal by the Ministry meant to protect her. The brilliant girl who assisted Severus flawlessly in the potions lab was the same one unable to attend school lest she end up a causality of a war she had no business partaking in.
Orphaned before she was old enough to utilize magic freely and still went to Azkaban to free wrongfully imprisoned muggleborns.
"Yes, please," Luna said while she carefully disentangled herself from the snake. She brushed herself off and summoned her shoes silently with a wave of her hand.
Severus inclined his head in acknowledgement of the act of magic. "Harry has been working with you," he stated while Luna pulled the ratty blue leather boots on her feet.
Luna smiled brightly at Severus and shook her head. "Susan and Narcissa, mostly," she corrected him politely. "Narcissa's lovely, she says I'm like a daughter to her."
Severus considered Luna objectively, gazing at her as Narcissa's shrewd eyes would. Luna was an attractive enough young woman, she favored Narcissa in looks with her thin limbs and light coloring. Luna was intelligent, magically powerful, and had rare powers of seeing.
"Narcissa would be so lucky to have you as a daughter one day," Severus said frankly. He covered his lapse of his characteristic disdain with a quick sneer. "You are much preferable to Frederick Weasley."
Luna laughed brightly, the room ringing with her airy and youthful laugh.
"You're wrong, it's Frederick Potter now," she said. She offered Severus a small and white hand. "Shall we, sir?"
Severus accepted her hand. "We shall."
The two of them apparated in the valleys of the area where Luna's home had been. It was a pleasant change of weather; the seaside home Harry operated from was prone to bone chilling winds and frequent storms. The valley where Luna's childhood home rested was warm enough for the late October fall, the trees were still clinging to the last bit of colors.
It was a welcome change.
"My house is this way," Luna informed Severus. She dropped his hand and led him toward the home in the distance, a tall rook shaped house made of grey brick.
Severus felt no pressure to maintain conversation with the girl, yet he spoke up in an effort to minimize her agitated fidgeting.
"It is lovely country out here," Severus said, referring to the thick forest that surrounded the Lovegood home. "Did you always live here?"
"Hm? Yes," Luna said. "Except now I live with you and Harry, of course."
"Of course," Severus agreed with a mild twitch of his lips. "Although, I will admit, you are a much less obtrusive guest than many of the others."
Luna laughed and her incessant fidgeting ceased. She opened a rusted and creaking gate to lead Severus to the door of her childhood home.
"Harry used to be the loudest one there, but he's terribly quiet now," Luna said. "He's going through quite a bit right now, but I think he'll find himself in the end."
Severus hummed at Luna's nonsensical statement and cast a silent charm to ensure there were no others present in her home before he opened the front door.
"Oh…" Luna stepped inside and Severus placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder when she physically recoiled at the damage wrought within the house.
Aside from the general smoke damage and destroyed remnants of what had once been a kitchen, it also looked as if the place had been ransacked and utterly flipped in search of nothing that Severus could imagine.
A table and chair set were in splinters, dishes were shattered and strewn across the room, and Severus could not imagine the rest of the house looked much better.
"What precisely are you hoping to find here?" Severus asked Luna, softening his curt tone for one of the few beings alive that Severus would do it for.
Luna looked around and Severus made a point to ignore the quiet sniffle of emotion she made.
"I… I don't know now," Luna said quietly. Her young face was stricken by the damage. "I was hoping… Daddy's printing press and some- some things of my mother's, but…"
Severus waved his wand across the room, repairing what could be repaired and sending dishes back to their cabinets and splinters back to the furniture they once were.
"Come then," Severus said briskly. He would need to take charge, guide the girl through the process. "Let us see what you can find, Miss Lovegood."
Luna moved slowly, but she still moved through the kitchen, tucking a single chipped pink teacup in her bag. Severus followed behind her, attempting to repair damage before Luna was able to process it.
It was a small act of kindness Severus could do for the girl his son was so fond of.
Luna continued grabbing nonsensical items - a bundle of feathers, a throw pillow, a soft blanket. The two of them eventually moved up a spiral staircase, Luna hopped gracefully over stairs that were burned through.
Severus inspected the heavy machinery that filled the middle level of the Lovegood home.
"What is this?" he asked, running his wand alongside the silver machine and removing the smoke damage that coated it.
"A printing press," Luna said simply. "Can you shrink it? This is what Harry needs."
Severus raised a brow at Luna. "For what purpose?"
Luna smiled at Severus and there was a hint of Harry in her eyes, something cunning and mischievous.
"Harry wants to tell the world about Timmy, sir, and don't you—"
CRACK!
Severus grabbed Luna and pulled her behind him when the sudden appearance of a witch with broad features and dark red robes appeared before them. The witch seemed startled to find herself face to face with Severus and it was the single beat that Severus needed to stun and levitate them.
It was quick.
It was simple.
And the witch wearing robes from the DMLE never should have been able to locate them.
Severus wiped the woman's memory quickly, ensuring that she would never recall seeing Severus or Luna.
"We are leaving," Severus hissed. He waved his wand and shrunk the machinery Luna wanted before guiding it to his pocket and grabbing Luna's shoulder in a bruising grip.
"But, sir, I—"
Severus did not allow Luna to complete her statement before he spun on the spot and quickly took them four different locations before taking them back to Invisibility Way.
The moment they touched the lawn at Invisibility Way, Luna fell to her knees and began vomiting from the trip. Severus summoned her an anti-nausea potion and alerted Nymphadora with his patronus, "Lockdown."
"Okay, tell us again, slowly, what happened?"
Severus paced across the sitting room in front of an audience of Nymphadora, Lucius, and Susan. Luna had taken her recently rescued belongings to her room and Severus was relaying the quick incident to the others.
"We did nothing to alert the ministry to our presence. Luna committed no acts of magic, there was no sense of any undercurrent of wards waiting to trigger upon our arrival. There was nothing, Nymphadora, nothing."
"Could it have been a random check?" Lucius asked. He sat in a chair with a frown on his face while he swirled a glass of something that looked like Severus' spiced meed.
"A random member of the DMLE was sent to check the Lovegood home on the very day- the very hour -that Luna and I were there?" Severus shook his head while he continued to wrack his mind for an answer to the problem. "Doubtful."
"Maybe someone said you guys were going today," Susan said, her voice hard. Severus glanced over and saw that the girl had her eyes narrowed and her wand flitting between her fingers.
"Sev wasn't even planning on going today," Nymphadora said correctly. "I thought we were going tomorrow?"
"We were until I found that I required a distraction," Severus said. He had been locked in his office, brewing and stewing for days. Severus was as much a prisoner of the home as all but Harry were; they had all been named wanted criminals by the ministry.
It had been causing Severus to feel suffocated as he was not built to be confined in a home during a war. Severus was built for warfare, for using his magic to tear down the opposition.
Severus was not made to sit inside a house with others and hide from conflict.
Yet Severus was also not prepared for conflict if he could not decipher what had triggered what could have been an attack if Severus were a slower man.
"I was the only one who knew when we were leaving and my mind is impenetrable," Severus murmured to himself. "How did they come to find us in the house?"
"It's not what you thought, it's what we said."
Severus and the others turned to the stairs when Luna waltzed down them. She appeared to be calm, unfazed by the potential disaster they had faced.
"What's that mean?" Susan asked Luna, scooting over on the cushioned footrest she sat on. "What did you guys say?"
Severus considered their conversation just before the DMLE witch appeared.
"What is this?"
"A printing press. Can you shrink it? This is what Harry needs."
"For what purpose?"
"Harry wants to tell the world about Timmy, sir, and don't you—"
"QUIET," Severus snapped, holding a hand up for complete silence. Severus turned to Luna and saw that she was considering the same thing he was. "A jinx of that nature would require—"
"The entire backing of the Department of Mysteries," Luna said airily. "It's been done before, sir. Minister Fudge had it where anyone who mentioned heliopaths was instantly cursed with infertility."
It would be utter ingenuity.
Not the nonsense about Cornelius, but the idea that Luna had planted.
Harry was the only madman in the United Kingdom who dared call the Minister, the Dark Lord, 'Timmy'. Harry was the only one who called him that to his face, in his mind, and who encouraged his allies to do the same. Harry demanded it, truthfully.
A jinx on the name 'Timmy' would ensure that members of the DMLE were quite likely to find Harry or one of his allies. They would also occasionally find parents with children unfortunately named, but Severus doubted if they would mind a few false alarms if it meant that the Dark Lord had an opportunity to trap Harry in some way.
"Nymphadora, until I return, I need you to ensure that nobody speaks a single word," Severus told Nymphadora, waiting for her solemn nod. Severus looked around the room, idly realizing his personal hurricane of chaos was absent. "Where is Harry?"
Susan smirked rudely at Severus and raised her hand. "Am I allowed to speak, sir?"
Severus leveled her with a glower that used to make seventh years cower in their seats. "No," he said curtly. "Nobody speak, nobody move. I will return momentarily."
When none argued against it, Severus turned on his heel and apparated to a remote location not far from Minerva's home.
Severus held his wand tightly, his back to a tree and the space before him empty. He felt like an absolute fool, but he still spoke the word that Harry had been saying for years.
"Timmy."
Severus returned to Invisibility Way only a few minutes later, his mind now whirling with the possibilities for the chances to break down the Dark Lord's army.
Two members in the same dark red robes, members of the DMLE, had appeared less than three heartbeats after Severus spoke the name. Just as he had at the Lovegood home, Severus immobilized them and wiped their memories.
It was a trap set for Harry and his allies at present, but one that Severus was confident he could find a way to turn against the Dark Lord by the end.
"Do not speak the name," Severus told the others that sat in the sitting room still wrapped in tense silence. "The Dark Lord has placed a jinx on the name that Harry refers to him with. Understood?"
"Can they tear through our wards?" Susan asked.
"With the entire ministry backing them? Probably," Nymphadora answered for Severus. "I'll tell the others."
Severus rested his hand on Nymphadora's arm for a brief moment when she stopped in the doorway to press a soft kiss on his cheek before she went upstairs to alert the others who resided in the prison they all shared.
"Now," Severus fixed Susan with a hard stare, "where is Harry?"
Susan Bones smiling had never boded well for Severus. The girl had a center made of mischief and terror that was matched only by Harry.
And Susan Bones smiled then, she smiled politely with a sparkle of unmasked amusement in her eyes.
"Hogwarts. Harry's at Hogwarts."
Severus had scared away all the others as he sat stiffly in the sitting room, once more waiting for his child to return from an assassination. Severus had been under the impression that the fool would discuss it with him before he went and did something as impossibly impulsive as breaking in Hogwarts and murdering the Headmaster.
Albus had once asked Severus if Severus believed he was capable of handling the situation with Harry. Severus could recall perfectly what he had said, over six years ago, when Hogwarts had been waiting for the child celebrity.
"I believe I have plenty of experience in this area. I should be able to handle Potter's case if he ends up in the Slytherin house."
Severus had then told Albus that he would ensure that Harry was able to find some measure of peace.
It was laughable, looking back.
It was a mockery to everything Severus once set out to do. Teach Harry morals, guide him in a way to find peace from his past and safety in his future.
And now Severus was once again waiting to see if that child would return from yet another quest to commit murder.
Severus sighed and sat back in the chair, watching the floo for signs of it roaring to life, and he chuckled mirthlessly to himself.
Laughable, the entire situation would be laughable if it were not so horribly catastrophic.
When Harry returned, he did it hand-in-hand with Frederick and the two of them fell from the floo, giggling like children.
"Sev!" Harry disentangled himself from Frederick and smiled at Severus. "Guess what?"
Severus stood up and felt a wave of unease when he looked at Harry. There was a wide smile on Harry's face and his eyes were brightened with excitement… and the yellow long-sleeved shirt he wore was stained in dark red blood.
Severus studied his son and wondered if Victor Frankenstein felt the same way he did as he stared at the monster he had created.
For while Severus knew he loved the child, Severus knew his heart beat for the child, Severus could also look at Harry and see that deep inside him there was something irreparably broken inside of him and Severus wondered if he had ever truly tried to repair it.
"The Dark Lord has placed a jinx on the name you call him," Severus told Harry before the child could begin rambling about what was undoubtedly a successful mission. "If you speak the name, members of the DMLE and perhaps the minister himself will appear. Do you understand?"
"What?" Harry frowned and Severus could no longer bear to look at him, not then.
"Do you understand me, Harry?" Severus repeated.
"Don't say the 'T-word', got it," Frederick said. Severus spared him a quick glance and saw that he was blood-free and not giving off the cold feeling that Severus recently began to feel from Harry.
"Sev, don't you want to hear what we did?" Harry called to Severus' back when he turned to leave the room.
"No."
"You're just trying to protect yourself," Nymphadora said when she laid in bed with Severus that night and allowed him to share his unease with her.
"You think if you can see Harry as some monster that you won't feel so badly when- when he's gone," Nymphadora said, stammering over her words only slightly. "Your son? The kid you've practically raised for years? Losing him would be- will be- unbearable. But if you convince yourself that you're putting down some horrible monster then you don't think you'll feel so bad."
Severus laid there long after Nymphadora fell asleep and tried to convince himself that she was correct.
The Daily Prophet the next morning boasted on Harry's behalf of his misdeeds the prior day.
Severus beat Harry to breakfast and read the front page article that outlined Hogwarts Headmaster Amycus Carrow's death. Apparently the man was found in his office with his throat slit from one side to the other. There was no trace of magic, the portraits claimed to have seen nothing, and it was reported to be a complete mystery.
"Morning!"
The mystery itself walked in the dining room and Severus saw that Harry looked more refreshed and alert than he had been in weeks.
"Morning," Severus said shortly. He slid the paper across the table to where Harry typically sat. Harry snagged the paper and hid himself behind it, pouring over the reported details of his most recent murder.
"Son of a bitch!" Harry yelped. He slammed the paper down on the table and glared at Severus. "They made fuckin Alecto Carrow the Headmistress? Is this a fuckin joke? Is T—" Harry grimaced and Severus saw his fist clench on the table. "Is Thomas playing a fuckin game? I bet he's laughing his arse off right now."
Severus waited for Harry to finish his rant before he gazed impassively at him. "What do you plan to do now? Murder the new Headmistress?"
"Obviously," Harry drawled with a roll of his eyes. "I can't have the school full of kids with some crazy fuckin person in charge who thinks crucio is a punishment every time a kid uses the loo and doesn't get to Herbology on time."
Severus leaned forward intently and tightened his hands in the universal symbol of prayer on his lap.
"Did you take that man's life because he was torturing children or because he was torturing your misfits?"
Harry raised a lazy shoulder and Severus knew precisely what he was going to say.
"Does it matter?"
"Yes." Severus got up from his seat, his breakfast untouched, and gave the child he failed so miserably a look so full of disappointment that Harry cringed in his seat. "It matters a great deal, Harry. If you were any other person, you would see that."
Severus left the room again, leaving Harry to plot his murders and his mayhem on his own.