The next morning Ellie woke Harry at nine o’clock sharp for breakfast. When he reached the kitchen only a few of the adults were up, namely Ellie, Remus, Tonks, Charlie, Molly and Arthur. “Morning, Harry,” Remus said in a voice that was sadder than usual. “Are you sure that you still want to come today?” there was something in his tone of voice that caught in Harry’s chest; Remus clearly wasn’t thrilled at the idea of visiting the home of his former best friends again.
“I do, but I thought that the house had been destroyed the night that Voldemort came?” He had been tempted to say the night my parents died but he couldn’t bring himself.
“It was, but magical homes can rebuild themselves when asked to.” The older man’s eyes were so very gloomy. Tonks wrapped her tiny hand around his rather larger one and gave him a reassuring look.
“So someone had the house rebuilt? Who?” Harry tried not to press too hard for answers.
“Me, I ask my granddad to arrange it,” Ellie entered in to the conversation. Although she was better at hiding the sadness, Harry could still see that it was there.
“Why?” The truth be told, knowing that he where he was going in the morning had made Harry’s sleep restless. It wasn’t that he didn’t want to go, he did, he wanted to go more than anything in the world, but he wasn’t sure that he was ready for it. Godric’s Hollow was the home he had forgotten, the one he had shared with his parents prior to their death and he wanted to see it. When he thought of homes like The Burrow and Grimmauld Place you could tell a lot about the owners from the way the house was furnished and decorated, and every picture on the wall told a story. He wanted to see the home that his parents had created; he wanted to hear the stories told by their pictures.
“I just thought that it was about time that we went back there, it’s been a long time,” she replied.
“Erm…could I ask a favour?” He had thought of something that might make it a little easier to deal with.
“Of course you can,” Remus answered.
“Can Ginny come with us?” Harry saw his guardians share a fleeting look. Was it delight?
“If that’s what you want,” Ellie told him kindly.
“It is, I’ll go and ask her if she wants to come.” He left the table and made his way up to Ginny’s room. He knocked softly several times without any response and was going to go back downstairs when he decided to open the door just an inch. He could see Ginny fast asleep in her bed; he slipped inside the room and sat down beside her. She looked like a flame- haired angel with her pale skin and the content expression. She stirred slightly and rolled on to her side. “Ginny?” he whispered. He called her name several times; on each occasion he spoke a little louder until her eyes fluttered open. She gazed at him for a moment, evidently confused by his presence.
“Harry? What are you doing here?” she mumbled sleepily.
“Ellie and Remus are taking me to Godric’s Hollow today and I’d really like you to come with us,” he said hopefully.
“Godric’s Hollow?”
“It was where my parent’s lived; I really want you to be there.”
“Come with you? Are you sure?” she spoke with such concern.
“Positive, I’m not sure that I could take it without you.”
“Can you give me five minutes to get washed and dressed?” she smiled.
“I’ll wait downstairs for you.” He rose to leave the room but felt her gentle hand on his arm; she was now kneeling on her bed. He tried desperately to ignore the fact that her pyjamas were on the skimpy side of things. He could see a good four inches of the bare skin covering her stomach. She pulled him in close and kissed him gently. “What was that for?”
“Nothing,” she whispered.
“Right, you’ve got five minutes,” he grinned devilishly and went back to the kitchen to wait for her. She appeared a grand total of ten minutes late. “I thought you said you’d only be five minutes?” he teased.
“Well I took longer than expected, I didn’t realise we were in such a rush,” she answered indignantly.
“We’re not; your mum’s just about to put out breakfast.”
“So you’re telling me off for nothing?
“Pretty much yeah,” he grinned.
“You’ll pay for that, Potter!” There was a scheming glint in her eye that told Harry he was going to be in very deep trouble when they got back.
“Young love!” Ellie exclaimed. Mrs. Weasley laid out the breakfast table as it was Dobby’s day off and everyone munched in silence. When they were finished Ellie and Remus waited patiently by the fire for the two teens.
“Are you sure you don’t want us to come with you?” Charlie and Tonks had been whispering together for a minute before he put the question to his girlfriend and her godfather, Tonks nodded her approval at the query.
“I think we’ll be all right.” Remus looked at Ellie for a moment. “Yes, we’ll be okay. Harry, Ginny, are you ready?”
“Just coming,” Ginny mumbled with a mouthful of sausage. They joined Ellie and Remus at the fire, assuming that they were going by Floo but Remus pulled an old wallet from his robes and held it out for the others to grab hold. With a short sharp tug behind his navel Harry was deposited in Godric’s Hollow.
They had landed in the middle of what was blatantly a Muggle village. It was full of little rural cottages that had been built from moss-covered bricks, many, many years ago. Some of them even had thatched roofs and little smoke-emitting chimneys. The houses were arranged in a kind of circle around a large grassy park area in the centre with some climbing frames and swings for little children. Remus led the way across the road, which was devoid of cars and Harry noticed that the older man had a slight grip on Ellie’s hand. Ginny linked her own hand with his and tugged him along in his guardians’ wake. In front of them stood an average sized, two-storey cottage, it had a small front garden that was enclosed by a three-foot high stonewall and a little wooden gate. You could tell that the garden had once been well kept but had fallen prey to the ravages of nature in the absence of proper care.
A little plaque hanging to the left of the front door read ‘Potter House’ it was swinging back and forth gently in a light summer breeze. Remus stood to one side allowing Ellie access to the heavy mahogany front door. She rummaged in a pocket of her robes for a moment or two before pulling out a hefty wrought iron key which, when pushed in to the lock and twisted, gave a loud and satisfying click. The door swung open to reveal a pastel yellow hallway that was blanketed by a thick and luxurious beige carpet. The first room they came upon was the living room, it was a deep cherry red, and there were three plush looking settees with extra plump cushions. The vocal point of the room was the impressive fireplace that was in the middle of one wall; above it Harry found his family waving back at him. His mum, dad, aunt, uncle and grandparents were all smiling heartily out of their family portrait.
His grandparents were sitting in the centre of the picture with his father and uncle standing proudly behind them. His mother and aunt were kneeling down on either side to keep a close eye on a tiny Ellie who was bouncing newborn Harry up and down on her knee. Harry felt a lump rising from his chest to his throat; he was fighting the tears so hard that it bordered on painful. His grip tightened on Ginny’s hand, she returned it with a little squeeze and a gentle smile. She was surprised when a gasp of laughter escaped his lips, a couple of the tears he had been fighting slipped out during his lack of concentration. He pointed her to the picture where Ellie was jovially sticking her tongue out at her mother and trying desperately to get Harry to do the same. In the meantime Lily had placed her forehead on the ground and Harry could tell from the convulsing of her slight frame that she had succumbed to fits of laughter. From their position behind their mother and father James and Andrew couldn’t see what was causing the commotion and they stumbled round to the front for a better look. James doubled over in laughter and Andrew began to scold everyone, including his mum and dad who were smirking at the hubbub in front of them. The elder Potter brother was wagging his finger in a fashion that reminded Harry of Molly Weasley. Every time her father wiggled his finger at her Ellie wiggled her tongue right back and it wasn’t long before Andrew had also slumped beside his wife laughing cheerily.
Ellie watched the whole thing with tears cascading down either cheek; she smiled at Harry sadly and said, “Feel free to look around.” Remus was clutching her arm very tightly, Harry wasn’t sure if it was to steady himself or her. Ellie pressed on towards what looked like the kitchen while Harry headed in the direction of the stairs with Ginny. The first room they came to on the upstairs landing appeared to have been Harry’s nursery. A baby’s cot was in the middle of the room and it was adorned with Quidditch bedcovers. The little curtains that draped over one end had some little Snitches zooming around the fabric; Ginny grinned at him as she reached into the cot and pulled out a cuddly toy that was shaped like a broomstick.
“What d’you reckon, baby Harry’s favourite cuddly toy?” She said shaking the soft broom in his face.
“I could believe that,” he smiled. He looked over the room carefully and found another toy broomstick; it was an older version of the one that Harry had seen a pair of young witches playing on at the Quidditch World Cup. In a trunk at the bottom of his wardrobe he found a complete set of Quidditch balls. He had many toys, some which were obviously wizard toys “such as a fluffy Snitch, while others were evidently Muggle “ in particular, a plastic, bubble-blowing Postman Pat figurine.
He left Ginny to her own devices as he headed back out on to the landing and ventured into the next room, he could tell that this had once been his parent’s bedroom; each bedside cabinet bore a picture of one of his parents. A picture of the guests from their wedding was perched, pride of place on their chest of drawers and in a little alcove between the wardrobes, his mother and father’s brooms stood respectfully side-by-side. He smiled at them mournfully for a moment before moving on to explore the rest of the house. Two adult toothbrushes and two small children’s ones waited patiently for their owners in their holder by the bathroom sink. The third bedroom was a little girl’s room, Harry presumed that this had been done for Ellie’s benefit; it would certainly explain his cousin’s fondness for the colour pink. Everything in the room that could be pink was, this varied greatly in shades from the pastel pink on the walls to the hot pink of the bed covers and the near lilac of the miniature loveseat that was sitting in one corner. The ceiling mirrored the summer sky from outside with the exception that the clouds that spelled out words like ‘Broom’, ‘Quidditch’, ‘Snitch’, ‘Wand’ and some simple spells like ‘Reparo!’ Harry smiled up at it as the words ‘Potter’s Rule!’ drifted from one side of the room to the other and disappeared.
“Your dad took family pride very seriously, the first word you ever said was Potter.” Ellie’s eyes glistened as they flitted over what had become her third bedroom in six months. The room itself was jolly but it came attached to the horrible thought that four people had died before she got here and two more had died before she left. “What do you think of the place?”
“It was just like I expected,” he wasn’t entirely sure what he meant by that.
“Really?” she smiled hopefully.
“Yeah…well no…I’m not sure. I didn’t really know what to expect but what I’ve found hasn’t surprised me. Does that make any sense?”
“I think so. Why don’t you come down stairs and see the rest of the place?”
“Okay, where’d Ginny get to?”
“I’m right here,” she said emerging from his parent’s room looking very solemn.
“Are you all right, Ginny?” Ellie asked.
“I’ll be fine.” She smiled falsely but Ellie didn’t seem to notice. Harry did though and made a mental note to ask her about it later. The red head gave him a rather strange look and then glanced over her shoulder, back in to the room she had emerged from. As he walked past Harry stole a quick glance in, a small lime-green St Mungo’s uniform had been laid on the corner of the bed tenderly. His breath caught in his chest for a second time that day.
“Was my mum a healer?” he suddenly asked.
“She was.” Ellie was stood on her tiptoes to look over his shoulder, when she spotted the uniform she gave Ginny an appraising sort of look. “She had a very caring nature.” Ellie led them down another staircase that brought them to the kitchen where Remus was sitting at the table looking thoroughly distressed. In that moment Harry felt for his guardian more than ever. Looking at the destroyed expression now gracing his handsome features reminded Harry just how much Remus had lost in the last sixteen years.
“Remus…” he considered asking if he was okay but decided at the very last moment that this was a very stupid question, he was quite obviously not okay.
“I just need a minute, Harry; it’s a little bit harder than I thought it would be. I…” he could go no further as his voice died away.
“We understand,” Ginny said compassionately, for neither Ellie nor Harry could find their voices.
“Thank you, Ginny,” Remus offered when he had regained his composure. “Why don’t you both nip down to the study, there are some very useful books down there.” Remus pointed to an almost invisible door under the stairs behind them. Purely out of interest Harry and Ginny pulled the door open and descended down the staircase that was revealed, the bottom step exposed a spacious basement study come library. It was very reminiscent both of the library at Hogwarts and Grimmauld Place. Harry walked along the shelves pulling out random books, What To Do When The Worst Happens by Healer Hippocrates Smethwyck, Triumphs Of The Dark Force Defence League by Justus Pilliwickle, Healing In The Home by Dilys Derwent, Defence Spells to Save Lives by Elladora Elphwick, to name but a few. He grabbed a few of the more interesting defence textbooks to take home with him to read.
“Moony was right, there are a lot of useful books in here,” he commented to Ginny.
“They even kept their old school books,” Ginny pulled two copies of The Standard Book of Spells Grade 7 by Miranda Goshawk off the shelf she was examining.
“Just think how it’ll look,” Harry whispered in her ear as he stepped beside her.
“What do you mean?” she puzzled.
“When our two books are lined up there, and then of course there’ll be our kid’s editions as well,” he smiled at her.
“Do you really mean it, Harry?” she asked excitedly.
“I do,” he grinned at her, he wasn’t sure if she realized that she was bouncing up and down on the balls of her feet.
“Say that again,” she pouted.
“I do. Now it’s your turn,” he prompted.
“I do,” she smiled and kissed him.
“Now, now you two, no snogging in the study. What would your parents say?” Ellie had appeared in the room and was staring at Harry accusingly.
“Actually, Ellie, I daresay that James is up there somewhere cheering Harry on,” Remus smiled properly for the first time that day.
“Remus, you and I are supposed to be acting responsibly and rationally, we are not supposed to be encouraging our charge to lock lips with poor, unsuspecting teenage girls!” she told her godfather authoritatively.
“I must apologize to Ginny for what I’m about to say… but she is hardly a ‘poor, unsuspecting teenage girl’ I’m afraid that you’re only right on two counts there,” Remus reminded her.
“No apology necessary,” Ginny chimed.
“Oh that’s right! Everybody gang up on Ellie! What happened to sisterhood? What happened to family ties? No, no that’s fine; if nobody wants to listen to me then I’ll be sure to keep quiet from now on!” She stormed up the stairs spectacularly. Remus shook his head gently.
“Ever the drama queen. So Potterish,” he said with a wry smile.
“Hey! I’m still a Potter you know!” Harry protested on his family’s behalf.
“You don’t need to tell me that, Harry,” Remus chuckled. “Are you ready to go or would you like a little longer?”
“I’m good to go; can I take these books with me?” He motioned to the pile of books that he had abandoned on a nearby table in the heat of his passion.
“Of course you can.” The former Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher led the way up the stairs. “Ready to go, Ellie?” he asked tentatively. She was staring out of the kitchen window in to the wild back garden; she faced them and surveyed her surroundings for a second before she nodded. The four left the house, crossed back over the road and took one last look back at the house before they took the Portkey back to Grimmauld Place.
When they landed back in the kitchen Remus made excuses to leave very quickly, he was seen disappearing into his room not long after. Ellie quietly whispered to Tonks that it might be a good idea to go after him, which she dutifully did. Molly took one look at the returning party and immediately put the kettle on; she was so typically British and believed that a cup of steaming tea could cure any ill. The tea was received well by all, and an uneasy silence filled the room until Remus and Tonks returned and even then there were only small spatters of conversation.
After lunch Harry and Ginny wandered out into the garden and planted themselves on the roots of a large Willow tree that was a good distance from the house. “What happened earlier?” Harry asked Ginny.
“What do you mean?” she raised her head off his shoulder slightly.
“Back at the house you looked really upset. Ellie may not have spotted that fake smile but I did.”
“As a matter of fact she did, she asked me about it over lunch,” Ginny said quietly.
“Well…” he probed.
“I suppose when I found that uniform it just hit me all of a sudden…they were only a little bit older than us, they were really only just married and had their first child…they were just starting out in life…and it was all taken away. They lost everyone and then they had their lives stolen as well… it’s just so tragic. I know that they were your parents and we’ve talked about them a lot but I suppose that…to me they were just names and pictures, but seeing all that today…they were people…good people and they were taken for no reason really…” in the midst of her speech Ginny had begun to cry softly.
“I know. Ellie told me something… ‘As a well spent day brings happy sleep so life well used brings happy death’ it was something some Italian bloke said, but it’s true. They did a lot of good things in their life, I mean dad was an Auror and mum was such a nice person…” Harry listed off his parents’ achievements.
“And a healer to boot,” Ginny added.
“Exactly, so they both helped a lot of people and they took care of Ellie, so they made their lives count for something.” Again he fought his tears bravely.
“They looked so happy in their pictures. Do you think…that maybe one day we could be that happy?”
“We will be, one day when Voldemort is gone.”
“Do you think you can beat him, Harry?”
“I think we can beat him. We’ve got too much to live for,” he said firmly.
“Hear, hear,” this came from Ron who had approached with Neville, unnoticed. They sat together quietly contemplating the things that lay ahead.
Later that night as they were getting settled in bed Neville’s voice rang through the darkness, “Harry, can I ask you something?”
“What, Neville?” Harry mumbled, he was already half asleep.
“Can I help?” It was the strangeness of this question that snapped Harry back to full consciousness.
“Help what?” he looked over in the direction of Neville’s bed despite the fact that he couldn’t see anything through the darkness.
“Help you fight Voldemort. It’s a good fight and I want in. I want to do what I can,” he said firmly.
“Neville, you already are in, we all are.”
“Oh, good. Night, Harry,” satisfaction was evident in the other boy’s voice.
“Good night, Neville,” Harry slurred as he was over come by a yawn and fell into a peaceful sleep.
Almost a week had passed since their visit to Potter House. It was over dinner on the Thursday night that Ellie approached him about another outing. “Harry?” she asked quietly as she passed him the Shepard’s pie.
“Um-mm,” he garbled incomprehensibly with a mouth full of mashed potatoes. Apparently Ellie understood that he was listening.
“Would you like to visit Potter Hall?” she said in a hurry.
“Potter Hall?”
“Yeah it’s where Grandma and Grandpa Potter used to live and my mum and dad of course,” she informed him as she speared some carrots with her fork.
“I’m not sure that Remus could cope,” he whispered, not wanting to attract the attention of the man who was sat only a few seats away.
“He’ll be all right, I think we should probably take Tonks along, she seems to have a good effect on him,” Elizabeth smirked.
“You’ve got that right,” Harry grinned back at her mischievously
“That’s settled then, we’ll go on Saturday morning,” she said agreeably.
“Sounds good, can Ginny come again?”
“If it makes you feel better then by all means.”
“Thanks, I can’t wait,” he smiled at her as he shoved another forkful of his recently acquired Shepard’s pie in his mouth.
A/N: I hope you all enjoyed that. Harry’s little quote wasn’t just said by any Italian bloke, it came from Leonardo Di Vinci. The next chapter is…The Second Return.