Notes:

This is another HP x KHR crossover, and another 'I wrote it in 2019 but it fizzled out' fic. I've polished it up and given it an ending of sorts so that I can post it as a one shot. (Better than leaving it to languish on my computer, I guess.)

AO3 Tags: How Do I Tag This, Post-War, Good Dudley Dursley, Reconciliation, One Shot

Magical Mafia Royalty

It was reluctant guilt that saw Harry giving Dudley an emergency Portkey after the war. He'd never expected the man to actually need to use it. Death Eaters had never gone after Harry's Muggle family directly, perhaps because Harry rarely talked about them. Or maybe because, when he did, it was never with any fondness – hardly a point of leverage. The only reason Dudley's parents died in the war was bad luck. They'd been caught in the crossfire of Snatchers, chasing a Muggle-born who just happened to be hiding out in the same random Muggle hotel as the Dursleys.

So when Dudley appeared in the whirl of a Portkey in the living room at Grimmauld Place, promptly losing his lunch, Harry just stared for a bit.

"That was— urgh! Your lot willingly travel around like that? Fucking lunatics."

Finally prompted into motion, Harry got up and took a closer look, assuring himself his cousin wasn't injured, and it was just the vertigo-inducing trip that had him out of sorts.

"Kreacher!"

"Master called?"

"Can you fetch an anti-nausea potion from the medicine cabinet."

"For the… Muggle?" Kreacher sneered, visibly restraining himself from a more offensive 'm' word.

Harry rolled his eyes. Though gratitude at the locket's destruction – fulfillment of Regulus's dying wish – and its subsequent gifting had inspired a begrudging loyalty in the elf towards Harry, and a respect for Ron who'd done the deed, Kreacher was still a bigoted little wretch who Harry trusted only so far. Harry always ordered him to stay out of sight when Hermione came over, because Kreacher still considered her a 'filthy mudblood' and wasn't shy to say so. It made Harry furious to see his friend, who usually wouldn't stand for such treatment, act towards Kreacher with kindness in turn because she pitied him, as if the elf's terrible past obliged her to put up with slurs and scorn.

Sometimes he wished Hermione would lose patience and re-enact second year with Malfoy and punch Kreacher square in the nose. But there were disturbing connotations to physical assault against a being who was essentially his slave, even if by choice – Harry had offered to free him, at Hermione's insistence, but Kreacher had literally had a minor heart attack, which dissuaded even Hermione from pressing the matter further.

"Yes," Harry said sternly. "Then make yourself scarce… cleaning the attic. All that junk still needs sorting through."

Begrudgingly, Kreacher obeyed.

Dudley gave the potion a suspicious look, but downed it. His expression turned repulsed and faintly betrayed when he registered the taste.

"Never met a potion that didn't taste like arse," Harry agreed with sympathy. "But even with the taste, I bet your nausea's gone."

"Huh. It is." Dudley clambered to his feet, and they stared at each other awkwardly. For all that they'd 'buried the hatchet', they were far from friends.

"So."

"Um. Yeah. So."

"What brings you here?" Harry asked, turning serious, hand unconsciously reaching into his wand pocket. "Death Eater remnants find you? I thought we hid you well enough."

"No, not wizards." Dudley's expression twisted in something like fear, which put Harry more on edge, despite his words. "Or, I don't think so. He didn't have a wand, and nothing he said sounded freak— I mean, wizardly? Wizardish?"

"Wizarding. Or magical."

"No. No, it was definitely magical. I—" Dudley took a deep breath and met Harry's gaze squarely. "What do you know about the Italian mafia?"

An hour later, they were ensconced in the kitchen, nursing Butterbeers and staring at nothing.

"Huh," Harry said.

"Yeah."

"Through Aunt Petunia?"

Dudley laughed weakly. "She'd be horrified, right? More freaks in her family tree."

Because apparently their shared maternal grandmother – an inexplicably blond Japanese woman – had descended from the equivalent of magical mafia royalty.

Honestly, Harry's life.

"Well, at least now I know where mine and mum's almond-shaped eyes came from," Harry said flippantly. He went to take another swig of Butterbeer and found it empty. "Lunch?"

"What? Oh, yeah, alright." Dudley shrugged. "Know me – never say no to food."

"Hmm." Harry headed over to the kitchen area, pulling ingredients from the pantry and quickly putting together sandwiches. "You're looking a lot healthier than when we were kids though." He set two plates down and once more sat opposite.

Dudley eagerly bit into a sandwich and thankfully swallowed before speaking. "Yeah, I've really been getting into boxing again, and my trainer is big on the fitness routine. Upside though: I can eat as much as I like, so long as it's not all junk food, and so long as I'm willing to work it into muscle at the gym."

Harry took in the new and improved Dudley. He still had a lot of padding, especially around the face and stomach, but there were thick muscles developing in his arms and shoulders. Added to that his height, and Dudley was looking fairly formidable these days. The sort of bloke you'd not want to meet in a dark alley.

Thank Merlin he'd gotten the attitude adjustment before the physical self-improvement.

But Harry digressed.

Magical. Fucking. Mafia.

Sighing, Harry ran a hand through his hair. "I think I need to contact the Ministry. See if they know about this, or if the Statute of Secrecy's been broken."

"Right. Sure." Dudley tore at a crust, avoiding his gaze. "In the meantime, can I… I mean…"

Harry grimaced. "You can stay here," he said reluctantly. He wasn't sure that hatchet was buried quite deeply enough for them to share space peacefully, but he couldn't very well turn his cousin out. Not when it left him at the mercy of a possibly rogue magical criminal set on training Dudley into the king of a foreign magical criminal empire.

It sounded ludicrous just thinking it. The weirdest part was that Dudley apparently had magic. Which manifested by setting his hands and face on fire after being shot in the head. By a well-dressed, weirdly intelligent baby. Whose gun was actually a shape-shifting chameleon.

The fuck?

Harry couldn't help wondering if what he'd always dubbed 'Potter luck' wasn't more accurately 'Evans luck'. Or… what was grandma's maiden name? 'Sawada luck'?

Harry didn't like to take advantage of his fame and influence. Generally, if he had a legal issue, he'd go to the front desk at the Auror Office like any other normal wizard. But a potential breach in the Statute of Secrecy? That struck him as the sort of thing that justified skipping straight to the top.

"Harry! Good to see you."

"Minister Shacklebolt." At the long look he got for that, Harry huffed a laugh. "Kingsley then."

"Take a seat. What brings you to my office?"

Harry explained the potential problem, and Kingsley listened intently. When Harry finished, the man sighed.

"That's not a breach of the Statute, Harry. That's just the mafia. Well, that's how it started at least – in Italy. These days, most countries are 'in the know' at the higher ranks of organized crime. There's even an addendum in the Statute that accounts for it and grants them the right to self-governance, provided they don't interfere in wizarding affairs."

"…You're telling me it's normal, amongst the criminal set, to go around setting people on magical fire?"

Kingsley's lips twitched into an ironic smile. "Squibs actually."

"Pardon?"

"The 'magical fire' is called Dying Will Flames, or Soul Fire. It's one of the few magics Squibs can harness, but because the requirements to activate it are extreme by anyone's measure, few do, no matter how desperately they wished they had magic."

"So Dudley's a Squib?"

"Seems like. No doubt through your aunt, since your mum was a witch. Dormant magical line."

Harry laughed. "Merlin, if Aunt Petunia was alive to learn she was of wizarding descent, she'd probably have a coronary." He shook his head. "Right. Okay. So Dudley's a magical Squib, organized crime wields fire magic, and they're legally in the know, so no worries?"

"No worries." Kingsley gave him a sympathetic look. "I can owl you a few books on the subject if you'd like."

Harry ran a hand through his hair. "I— yeah, if you would. I'd appreciate it."

A few days of awkward coexistence at Grimmauld Place followed. Harry ended up having to ban Kreacher from interacting with Dudley at all, worried he'd antagonize his cousin into putting his boxing skills to use and knocking the elf unconscious for his constant racist mumblings.

Or kill him. Kreacher was old and frail. A good punch might be something he couldn't get back up from.

The arrival of the promised owl was greeted with much relief, both for the prospect of answers to this 'Vongola' business, and also because having something constructive to do made sharing space easier. It hadn't been as bad as it could've been, but a distraction was still welcome. Harry and Dudley devoured the books in a few hours – even Dudley, who wasn't the best reader – then sat down at the kitchen table with Butterbeers and sandwiches once again as they let it all sink in.

"Huh," Dudley said.

"Yeah."

"So."

"Hmm."

Another long silence followed. They picked at their meals.

"I can learn magic?" Dudley said, longing in his tone.

Startled, Harry looked up to find an equally longing expression on his cousin's face. Harry… had never really thought about it from Dudley's perspective. What must it have been like to grow up alongside another boy and then find out they had magical powers you could never hope to wield? Harry imagined the situation reversed, and knew he would've been unbearably jealous. He comforted himself with the knowledge that he wasn't the sort to have let it turn him bitter and rotten on the inside though, like Aunt Petunia had when she learned Harry's mum was a witch.

"Yeah," Harry said, more softly than intended. "Looks like."

"Wow. That's… really cool."

Harry grinned. "Right?"

"Can you give me some tips?" Dudley asked eagerly.

"Probably not. I just have regular magic, not Soul Fire."

Dudley's brow furrowed. "That doesn't make sense."

"Hmm?"

"The books say—" He reached for one and read the words slowly. "'The Fire of the Soul is awakened in a moment of direst need; when one faces certain death, and refuses, to their very soul, to give up.'" He looked up at Harry. "When we were in hiding, um, well, I asked Dedalus and Hestia about you."

"You did?"

"Yeah. See, all my life, mum and dad filled my head with all this hate and stuff. But then when those, those Dementors came"—Dudley shuddered at the memory—"you saved my life. Without even thinking about it! And the terrible stuff they showed me was…" He glanced away, cheeks flushed with shame. "It was mostly myself."

Harry, feeling awkward, reached across the table and patted his arm. "But you've changed a lot since then. Moved past it. Become a better person." He really had, Harry mused.

"It wasn't easy, but I had a pretty brutal reality check." Dudley shrugged. "So yeah, I asked Dedalus and Hestia about you. I wanted to know more. To strip away more of mum and dad's lies. And if even half the stories are true," he said, meeting Harry's gaze, again with that confused furrow of brow, "then there's no way you haven't faced certain death and fought it at some point."

Harry's mind immediately flashed to the last time he'd faced death, and how, actually, he hadn't fought at all.

His hands trembled as he grabbed for his Butterbeer and took a long swig. Walking willingly to his death had been terrifying, the hardest thing he'd ever done. Not because he was afraid to die – there were worse things than death, Voldemort's existence had proved that – but rather because it had required him to not fight.

Harry had been fighting all his life, it seemed like. Defiance was engraved in the deepest parts of his soul. Which… thinking over Dudley's words, it did seem strange that one of his deathly adventures hadn't awoken his Soul Flames.

"Maybe because I have wizarding magic?" Harry theorised. "So I reached for that instead?"

"Maybe," Dudley agreed. "Would explain why Soul Fire users are extremely rare in wizards, compared to Squibs." Then he shrugged, and shoved the book he held aside, returning his attention to lunch.

Harry did likewise, but he wondered…

His mind drifted back to first year. He remembered the terrible feeling of Quirrell burning, disintegrating under his hands, and the sound of Voldemort's enraged screams. Had there been fire? He didn't quite recall – the whole thing was a blur, memory made hazier by the unconsciousness that soon followed – but he thought maybe… It would made sense, too, of why the protection stopped working when Voldemort took Harry's blood for his resurrection. From all the reading he'd done, Soul Fire didn't harm the wielder, and Voldemort had probably registered as some sort of weird, twisted, magical extension of Harry.

Harry shook his head. Look at him, leaping to conclusions. He knew very well that Quirrell's defeat hadn't been his doing – it was his mother's love and sacrifice at work. Wasn't that what Dumbledore always said?

Right. That's how it was.

Except no, not right! Struck by the epiphany, he straightened abruptly in his seat and slammed his Butterbeer down. Because as Harry had found out later, his willing death at Voldemort's hands during the final battle had duplicated Lily Potter's feat of sacrificial protection. From the moment he'd died, curses had stopped causing harm, and no more of Hogwarts' defenders had fallen. But, for all the miraculous stories he'd listened to – trying not to feel agonising regret that he hadn't gone to his death sooner, before Remus and Tonks and so many others were lost – for all the stories, not once had fire been mentioned, nor Death Eaters disintegrating at a touch.

"Harry?" Dudley, when he looked over, was frowning at him. "Looking really serious there."

"I think you're right."

"What?"

"Soul Fire. I think I have it."

Dudley blinked. "Oh. Well, okay. Which type? Mine were purple, so that's Growing Soul Fire – Cloud Flames." He grinned, full of relief. "Which, if these other books about mafia families and the Vongola are right, means I can't be their boss. I don't have the Harmonising Soul Fire – Sky Flames – needed for the job. So that crazy gun-wielding baby can just sod off."

"Here here," Harry said, because really, the idea of Dudley as a mafia boss was terrible for a lot of reasons.

"What colour were yours?"

"I, er, don't recall." He avoided Dudley's gaze. "The situation was pretty traumatic. I was eleven."

Dudley cleared his throat. "Right. Sorry. Um… you could do that line-age thingy the other book mentioned?"

"Line-age?"

Pawing through the pile of books, Dudley yanked one out and flipped through pages, then shoved it towards Harry. Looking at the page, Harry bit his lip, a feeling of awkwardness descending.

"Er, lineage Dudley. Not line-age." Reading never was his cousin's strong suit, and judging by how Dudley flushed a dull red, he knew it and was embarrassed by it. Quickly, Harry continued on. "But yeah, this could be useful. Thanks."

Two days later, Harry bled into a potion and then spilled it over a large parchment. He watched in fascination as names and lines appeared, family he'd never known, but connections he cherished all the same. But then, something caught his eye – something nearer to the bottom than it ought to be, something connected to…

"I'm going to kill him," Harry said grimly. "Well, I'll have to resurrect him first. But I'll do it."

Peering over his shoulder, Dudley asked, "Who are you killing? If you need an alibi, let me know."

"Thanks," Harry said, genuinely touched.

Weirdly, the longer he and Dudley shared a house and spent time together, the better they got along. Harry would've expected the opposite. It was a huge change from when they were younger. He could just put it down to age and maturity, but glancing down at the parchment and the bold orange core of his name's lettering, Harry had a feeling there was another reason their interactions had been so Harmonious.

Unsure what to think about that, he focussed on his name's colouring again – orange outlined in the green of Defending Soul Fire, also known as Lightning Flames. Strange, the lack of red, even as a secondary outline. Destroying Soul Fire would make more sense of Quirrell's fate. But then he saw the bold red of his mother's name, and thought maybe Dumbledore had been on to something after all. Maybe part of his mother's sacrifice had gifted Harry a spark of her Storm Flames to protect him.

He felt a momentary pang of grief that they were gone.

Of course, looking at the parchment meant noticing that name again – written in an orange that did have a red, not as an outline, but intertwined, each equally dominating – and Harry once more turned grim. He jabbed at the tree and the unfamiliar name connected to someone it ought not be connected to!

"Ksanksis?" Dudley stumbled over the name. "San? Ksan?"

"Xanxus," Harry corrected. "Xanxus Vongola. And judging by the birthdate," he said, quietly furious, "my father had a bit more fun on his stag weekend in Italy than he ought to have. He cheated on my mum!"

Dudley winced. "Ooh, shit, sorry." Then, in a transparent and weak attempt to cheer Harry up, he said, "But hey, you've got a brother!"

Harry opened his mouth to snap something angry, but then he froze. Because Dudley was right. Regardless of how it came about – and Harry was going to be dealing with those new conflicted feelings regarding his father for a long while – the end result was that he had a half-brother, family. He glanced at Dudley. Well, more family. Dudley was turning out… tolerable. Still, a brother.

"And hey, when the mafia try and drag you in—"

"Wait, what?" Harry stared, aghast. "Why would they do that?"

"This thing says you're orange, right? A Sky? All the books say the mafia's really gung ho about those. And I'm not the only bloodline Vongola – that Sawada woman was your gran too."

Harry, with sinking dread, realised Dudley was right.

Magical. Mafia. Royalty.

Fucking Sawada luck.

"Cheer up!" Dudley said, watching Harry have a quiet meltdown. "It'll help you find your brother. It says here his name is Xanxus Vongola, so he's already mixed up in it. You were gonna end up in that mess one way or another. No way you wouldn't of gone looking to meet him."

Harry reluctantly admitted Dudley was right.

Still, it couldn't hurt to share the pain.

"We," he said.

"We?" Dudley echoed, confused

"We are going to end up in that mess. I'm gonna need Guardians, and I'm looking at a prime Cloud candidate right here."

Dudley alternately paled in fear and flushed with flattery.

Harry laughed. It was maybe a bit hysterical, a bit incredulous, a lot resigned. Okay, fine, so he was going to be magical mafia royalty. And Dudley was going to be one of his right-hand men. Given his life, it wasn't even the strangest situation he'd found himself in. He'd figure it out, as he always did.

…Right after he hired a curse breaker to look into that Sawada luck.

The End

Notes:

Yeah, Harry totally becomes the next Vongola boss.

He spends the first half year or so dodging his friend's questions, because as much as Hermione's propensity to research all the things could come in handy when going into this mafia business blind, Harry rightfully fears her moral outrage. They eventually find out anyway. And the Vongola returns to its vigilante roots in short order. I mean, that was always Harry's goal, but with Hermione leading the charge, it happens with alacrity.

I was much less clear on who the Guardians would be in this one, except Cloud for Dudley, and Storm for Xanxus. I even envisioned a sort of mutual Guardian–Sky connection between them, where Harry was Xanxus's Lightning as well (because Levi is dumb, no one likes Levi, he can go die off screen). And maybe that connection gives Xanxus some not-inconsiderable recognition and influence that soothes his rage at being passed over for boss himself. A bit. A teeny-tiny bit. (I mean, it's Xanxus – he'd be working some lowkey rage even in his happiest timeline.)

Also, turns out Harry's slightly older half-brother is actually his several years younger half-brother… on account of magical mafia cryogenics. Cue Harry's protective instincts as he takes one look at the scars, hears the whole sordid tale, and is super fucking unimpressed with Timoteo.