LFAM65

Disclaimer: I’m just borrowing the characters, I don’t own them.

Chapter 65

Lily and Narcissa were, indeed waiting for the pair when they arrived. There was a lot of congratulating and back slapping from Aurors as they arrived, but when they caught sight of the grim-looking wives, the fearsome Aurors melted away with mutters of ‘good luck’ leaving the two to give their wives sheepish smiles - all on their own.

Harry and Draco had no worries about facing their mothers and ran to them in delight. The women clutched Harry and Draco close, and a few tears fell. Lucius and Severus sensed a weak moment and got in on the hug with a few explanations of ‘we were on the run and there wasn’t any floo nearby to let you know where we were.’

During their debriefing with the Aurors, Narcissa and Lily with the children were allowed in with Albus. They all had to stand quietly in a corner, if they wished to hear the tale as well. Rufus and Amelia listened to their tale of abduction and then the small cave, and plan to get help in silence. A very large group of Aurors was listening at the one way mirror in the next room.

The news that Severus Snape (the wizard that had come up with the Sectumsempra!) had flown without any broomstick had gone through the Auror's ranks like wildfire. They were now crowded around the mirror to listen in on the debriefing with bated breath. Flying without a broom wasn’t even on the curriculum anymore, although it was mentioned here and there, in case an Auror ran into a dark wizard who had learned how to do so.

The few Aurors who had been in on the rescue had seen Severus fly and were sure the ability would come in handy and there were plans to corner Severus into another lesson with the Aurors to go over flying for those who were interested.

James stood in the doorway listening to his fellow Aurors talking about how brilliant Snivellus is, and how brave the blond ponce Lucius was. It was enough to make a Gryffindor hurl.

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Christmas came and went peacefully, except for Dolores – who found that Rastaban had beaten her to the Riddle Manor after the messed up kidnapping, and had locked her out. She was now living rough in caves near Hogsmeade. She had even found the one that had once housed Andrew Essex and had moved in that one with a sneer. She stole food and other necessities as best she could and watched, waiting for … she was not sure what, but she knew that one day her chance for revenge would happen.

1985 dawned without incident in for the Snapes or Malfoys, although Laurel Briggs lost her parents to a drunk driver on New Years evening – Why did these horrible things happen to her on New Years? This was devastating to her, as she simply had no other close family. There were distant cousins that she had rarely met and since the … incident … her friends had drifted away, uncomfortable with what had happened to her.

Weeks and then months drifted by, her job as a book editor could be done at home, and she felt more and more alone. Her thoughts often drifted to the baby she had given up, and then shied away. He would be over four, now. The adoption agency had said that the couple had named him Corbin.

They had also said the couple had agreed to send pictures and let her know how he was, if she contacted the agency and asked.

Laurel looked out the window at the sunny day. Did she want to contact them? It wouldn’t hurt to just remind herself that she did still have a close relation – a son – even if she had no contact with him, perhaps she would feel less alone.

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The Headmaster looked out over the eager faces of the incoming 1985 fall students. He smiled jovially as Minerva started the sorting. Justus Wood was at the end of the high table, beaming in excitement at starting his 2nd year as apprentice to Albus Dumbledore. Justine Moody was full time Culture teacher; although the others who had helped start the class would be helping with an occasional class or outing.

Alastor was smirking happily at Justine’s side. He, James and Sirius would be trading off every two months with the DADA classes. Albus wasn’t happy about the possible inconsistencies, but he was keeping a careful eye on the curriculum, and the teachers were among the best, so at least he didn’t have to resort to incompetent teachers, as yet.

He had argued with Alastor, James and Sirius at length. He was keeping careful track of the number of days each worked, he did not want to lose any of them to the one year curse, but all three were sure that they could break the curse. Albus wanted to believe them, but he didn’t intend to sacrifice any of them to some of Voldemort’s malice.

After the one lecture at which Lucius received a standing ovation and acquired a following of starry-eyed fangirls who eagerly begged him to return the following year. A flattered Lucius had agreed to return each year for a few more lectures on mixing Astronomy and Arithmancy, that he would co-ordinate with Sinistra and Vector.

Albus chuckled a bit, Narcissa had been quite annoyed with the giggling ‘fangirls’, but he had overheard her talking to Justine – any time Lucius had a lecture, she was suddenly needed in the culture class as well, so she could discourage the starry-eyed idiots from doing anything too stupid. That little dance between Narcissa, the overeager teen girls and the mostly oblivious Lucius had amused the other teachers greatly.

Albus sighed as the last first year scampered over to his new house, the sorting was always over far too quickly. He looked at the Gryffindor table. Bill was now a sixth year, and a prefect. Charlie had started his fourth year and Albus expected that Percy would be joining them in two years.

He still hoped to talk Severus into more guest lectures, but he seemed to still be mentally exhausted from trying to instruct the Aurors about flying. Albus shook his head and stood to give a brief welcoming speech, and then retook his seat so the feast could start. Severus had gone to the Auror headquarters on a weekly basis for almost six months, showing the Aurors his notes and modifications to spells to be able to fly. Some of the Aurors didn’t have enough control or power; others didn’t want to invest that amount of time in learning to fly when they had brooms available. In the end he had about four Aurors who ended up coming to Briarfrost once a week for ‘tutoring’ and had finally gotten the hang of flying.

Since Severus had only just ‘gotten rid of his students’ Albus wasn’t sure he should try to persuade him anytime soon.

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At that particular time Severus and Lily were watching a now – five year old Harry being trotted around on a small piebald pony, Larkin holding the leading rein and encouraging proper form. Proper form seemed a lost cause at present, as Harry grinned and whooped excitedly with arms wildly waving.

Severus and Lily watched in amusement, Lily wielding a wizarding camera to capture the moment. Over the past summer she had had more time to arrange meetings with Petunia to let Dudley, Harry and Cybele play together at parks near Petunia’s home. They had taken to exchanging pictures, and Lily had bought an album for the wizarding pictures that would immobilize them if any non-magical person other than Petunia opened it.

Severus watched the patient pony walking steadily in a large circle. This was not the first child he had helped to train in the art of horseback riding. Jigs was a highly tolerant, ‘bomb-proof’, babysitter of a pony – considered by nervous parents to be worth his weight in gold because even a very small and inexperienced child like Harry was totally safe with him. As an added plus Jigs was used to Granians, and totally unafraid and unimpressed with their flying about in the warded pasture next to his.

Jigs was currently on loan from Marius Malfoy and his wife Antonia, who would eventually need him back for some of their own children. Draco had his own ‘family babysitting pony’ who would show him the ropes before moving to larger horses and eventually the Granians.

Lily watched the exuberant boy happily bouncing on the long-suffering pony with mixed feelings. She still didn’t like the idea of Harry on a Granian – no matter how far in the future it was. Bad enough to have him in the air with his father, but what about when he insisted on a solo flight? Harry and Draco always looked forward to Granian rides the way most children looked forward to candy. She was grateful that Cybele, only four, was friendly with the Granians, but showed little interest in rides on them.

Harry’s ride finally ended after he managed to hold the reins properly at the same time as he sat properly in the saddle – heels mostly down while his feet were in the stirrups. Harry fed Jigs a carrot and kissed his nose and helped Larkin unsaddle and groom the pony, finally turning him loose in the pasture next to the curious Granians. He calmly went to graze, turning his fat rump to the aristocratic winged horses and ignoring them.

They all wandered in for dinner, Larkin complementing Harry on his attempts at riding. The dinner went smoothly with Lily and Severus talking about their latest projects.

“Well, it was good to cut my ‘Auror’ students loose, especially since one of them was Sirius Black. He spent as much time needling me as he did learning.” Severus grumbled.

“Well he did stop after you charmed that flock of pigeons to follow him around, pooping on him while he tried to fly.” Lily looked at him reprovingly, while the children giggled. She didn’t want Harry to learn that particular charm. “You never did tell me how you learned that – I looked for days before I found it in a very, very old text.”

Severus smiled smugly – it had taken him weeks to find it, himself. Lily was quite good at research and she was more familiar with charms than he was, but he had at last found a charm to help prank that mutt Black and silence his needling – at least for a couple of ‘lessons’.

At last the four Aurors had mastered flight – not well, but enough so they could continue practice on their own until they were proficient in it. Sirius had clapped him on the back and said, “Well, you might have made a decent teacher – in another life, or if you tried teaching potions – who knows, you might learn to like kids enough to really enjoy it!”

Severus had been too horrified at the thought of such a terrible fate that he hadn’t recovered in time to hex the idiot.

Severus shook his head and asked Lily about the werewolf project she and Lucius were still pursuing with Damon.

“You know it took us forever to find a combination of runes to fit together in a manner that the arithmantic sequence said would fit the astronomical combination to consistently block the lunar cycle. Poor Damon did a mountain of combinations to come across the right one. We feel that we have that now – but we’ve hit another block.” She sighed and looked apologetically at Larkin. She always felt she was letting him down personally whenever they had a setback with this research.

“The werewolf that helped us two months ago – he just wore the rune necklace – like I told you before, he didn’t change physically, but mentally he still changed and he seemed…well, doubly savage. He hadn’t taken Wolfsbane, of course, we didn’t want that to interfere with the runes. So last month we tried combining the two – the necklace and the Wolfsbane, but the potion still had no effect – if anything he was worse.” Lily looked discouraged and upset.

Larkin patted her hand, “You’ve come closer than anything I’ve heard of – you blocked the physical change of a Werewolf. Yes, you haven’t solved the whole problem, but you’ve only been on this a bit over a year. Give yourself time. And likely the reason the Werewolf seemed doubly angry was because the Wolf had control - but realized he hadn't changed physically, so he felt trapped in the body of a human. That would have enraged the wolf, I'm sure.”

“It sounds like you need additional runes to protect the mind – or a different Wolfsbane potion.” Severus smirked. “Maybe I can help you with that.”

”Oh, do you know something about potions, Severus?” Lily asked archly. Severus just rolled his eyes, but Harry took the question more seriously.

“Mum, dad’s real good at potions; I’ve been watchin’ him at it forever.” Harry said gravely. “You should let him help.”

Lily bit her lip to keep from laughter, and Severus looked at Harry and smiled. “Thank you for upholding my honor, Harry. It’s good that someone remembers I’m a Potions Master.” Harry nodded happily; glad he could put a good word in for his dad.

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A/N – Sorry this is short, but I had to squeeze it in between 12 hour shifts, however this does set the stage for some of my upcoming chapters.