Teddy Lupin and the Resurrection Stone

Note: Birthday fic for Lazy Neutrino, with a virtual curtsy to her very own wonderful Teddy who inspired this. Many thanks to the good folk at Quill Sinister (*cough*, Melusinahp and Treeson, *cough*) and my Thea for excellent beta advice!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Harry ran.

The humid air closed over him like a blanket that clogged his lungs, worsening the fist that already clamped around his heart. A thin drizzle plastered his hair to his skull. Wet twigs whipped his face and body, mud squelching under the soles of his boots as he sprinted through the foliage. The smell of the Forbidden Forest was strong - of leaves, earth and rotting vegetation.

Sweat ran down his face. He wiped it off with the back of his hand, then hissed when a twig stung the inside of his wrist in a spray of droplets. He didn't slow down; his godson was out there in the half-dark with a monster.

The heavy Auror's robes clung to his skin like a damp carpet, but as much as he wanted to shrug them off, the repellent charms woven into the cloth might save him when he encountered Greyback. If he encountered Greyback.

If he encountered Greyback before Greyback found Teddy.

With every step Harry cursed himself for indulging his godson's passion for the Tales of Beadle the Bard. Teddy had been raised on stories of the Hallows, requesting bedtime repeats with all the single-minded persistence of a toddler. Small wonder that he had pieced things together the moment a frantic fifth year had raced into Hogwarts' Great Hall after stumbling across Trelawney's slashed body in her own tower study. Trelawney, who had almost killed Greyback in the Battle of Hogwarts. Trelawney, who had come out in Teddy's first year with a prophecy about the Resurrection Stone, and Teddy asking, oh so innocently during the Christmas holidays, why Harry had dropped it somewhere in the forest, and, oh Merlin, where?

His Slytherin godson!

In retrospect, it was so terribly obvious, but back then he had been busy with work, and the children... Greyback had been sighted near Hogsmeade before the beginning of the school year, in an eerie parallel to Harry's own third year, when the sighting of Sirius had brought the Dementors out of Azkaban. Those days were past, but even the pair of Aurors stationed at the school for protection hadn't stopped Greyback from sneaking in and slaughtering the seer who'd struck him down in final battle.

When Harry had disposed of the Resurrection Stone, its location had been engraved with blazing clarity in his mind, in spite of what he'd told Dumbledore's portrait. The years had dulled the memory, however, and the forest was ever-changing. Even as he raced through the trees, pausing ever so often to cast "Point Me!" at the trunks rising to the heavens around him, he wasn't entirely sure he'd recognize the place.

In the end, he didn't. An eerie flicker of light caught his attention from behind a row of overhanging willows.

Steeling himself, he wiped water off his face and fringe and crept towards the light.

The small figure in the clearing stood with his back to him, but the black Hogwarts cloak, stance and hair were unmistakable. Unlike his mother, Teddy had grown rapidly out of his youthful fascination with bubblegum colours. His hair still morphed in response to his feelings, but darkened to black in anger or fear, and bleached to blond and red when he was happy or excited. Now, it had the shade of mouse-brown that looked exactly like Remus's.

Harry opened his mouth to call his name, only to have it die on his lips.

His godson held the Resurrection Stone in one fist, clenched as tightly as if it was a sponge he was trying to squeeze water from. The strange light spilled from the stone and Harry paused, arrested, when he saw what it illuminated. No, not what - who.

Remus Lupin looked as young as Harry had seen him when the stone had first revived him after the battle, his hair a warm brown without any traces of white. Harry clutched at the bark of the tree beside him. It didn't even surprise him that Teddy would call up his father. Growing up between Harry's and Andromeda's household, he'd heard everything about Tonks from his grandmother - who had never quite forgiven Remus for his failures as a husband. And Harry had only realised when the boy was old enough to ask questions how little he truly knew about Remus John Lupin, werewolf and Marauder.

"Dad?"

Harry's heart cramped at the shaky note in his godson's voice, and at the desperate, pained hunger on Remus's face. He slumped against the tree, stifling his voice behind his hand. He had got to see his dead parents more than once himself - it was unfair somehow that Teddy should not.

And then something smashed into the side of his head with the force of a sledgehammer. He had enough presence of mind to roll up so that he crashed into the tree bark with his shoulder rather than his skull. He caught a whiff of unwashed animal, then a second blow landed on his arm and the wand fell from his numbed fingers.

Feeling mud and wet moss under his cheek, Harry fought against passing out when he heard Teddy scream. It brought him back to consciousness instantly. He stumbled to his feet. And froze.

Greyback crouched behind Teddy, one massive arm wrapped around his throat, a mocking, bare-toothed grin on his grizzled face. An old, knotted scar ran down his temple where Trelawney's crystal ball had hit.

"Greyback..." Harry croaked with vocal cords that sounded as if they'd been run through a cheese grater.

"Ah..." The werewolf cut him off, tugging Teddy's head back. Harry had never been so aware of just how thin the boy's limbs were, how vulnerable his neck. Teddy's nails clawed at the arm across his throat, wiry as an animated tree branch, but Greyback didn't even bother to notice. The boy's eyes were fixed on Harry, wide and frightened; his hair had turned a dull black.

"Potter..." Harry's name melted on Greyback's tongue like the most delicious of sweets. "I knew that gutting the old bitch would bring you running, but this... this is better even."

Harry clenched his fists, but Greyback had already turned his attention to the shadowy figure that was Remus.

"Ah, traitor... I didn't think I'd ever see you again." He pressed his cheek against Teddy's, ignoring his squirming, and licked a broad stripe up the side of his face. "He tastes like you, Lupin..."

"Greyback, don't." Remus's voice was weak, barely a whisper, as if he knew that pleading wouldn't make a difference to the monster.

"Should have left it alone, boy," Greyback whispered against Teddy's ear. "Did no one ever tell you that using that stone brings bad luck?"

The sly smirk on his face clashed with the horrible scar as he cocked his head at Remus. "Tell me, traitor: which one would you rather see die - your son, or your best friend's godson?

Fear clawed at Harry's heart, unexpected and unbidden. Even after the war, nine years as an Auror had left him no stranger to terror. And this was a nightmare from the past that struck at his family. Greyback could literally make him trade his life for Teddy's. And knew it.

He stared at the werewolf, hard. "He'd choose for Teddy to live. As would I."

"Of course you would, Potter..." Harry's neck prickled with dread as he watched Greyback's smirk broaden. "My first thought was to gut you and leave you to choke on your blood while I took your boy to play with until the next full moon. But now, I have the Stone, and both you and Lupin are here, helpless, to watch him die... Who could resist such a treat?"

"If you hurt him," Harry ground out, "I'll hunt you to the end of the earth!"

Greyback licked his lips, slowly. "Oh, I hope you will, Potter."

The world slowed as if the air had turned to sludge. Harry gasped, trapped between Greyback's smiling eyes and exposed canines. A mute cry of horror welled up inside him and his muscles flexed to jump forward, no matter how ineffectually.

With slow-motion clarity, he saw Greyback bending the boy's head back, and then, still holding Harry's wand, his dirty, permanently claw-tipped fingernails crept towards Teddy's jugular.

When Teddy moved, it was so fast that Harry almost missed it. His godson's arm came up, stretching for the wand, his small fist closing around the middle just above Greyback's own fingers. The boy didn't try to snatch the wand from the werewolf's grip, but pulled it towards him, the tip wavering dangerously. A pained squeak escaped when Greyback's arm tightened around Teddy's throat, pressing out the spell's syllables like Parseltongue.

"Sectumsempra!"

Harry flinched as if the curse had sliced into him. Light spilled across the side of Teddy's face and cut into Greyback's neck. Harry could see the gash open, from shoulder to throat like an axe sinking into a block of soft butter, bubbling red, spilling over. The werewolf didn't have time to make a sound; he jerked once, his head falling to the side at an awkward angle. The tattered shirt he wore stained quickly, soaking up blood around the collar.

In a heartbeat, Harry had crossed the few feet between them and tore Teddy from the werewolf's slackening grip before Greyback's bulk had time to topple. He was trembling as badly as the boy, checking Teddy frantically for cuts under the blood that had sprayed his face and neck.

"I killed him," Teddy moaned, eyes glazing over. Harry took him by the shoulders and shook him once, very gently.

"You saved your life, Teddy. And mine too, I think."

The boy's breaths came fast and hitched, and it took several minutes with his face pressed into the stiff fabric of Harry's Auror robes before he stopped shaking. His body was rigid when he drew away and turned his head towards the ghost of his father. Harry wiped a smear of blood off the boy's soft cheek. He found it surprisingly hard to let go of him.

When he did, Teddy took a few hesitant steps forward, careful as if Remus would go up in smoke if he came too close. When he stopped, Remus lifted his hand to touch his face, as if not quite believing that his son was really here and alive. Then he hugged him close, pressing his cheek to the top of Teddy's head for a moment, concentrating all of his not quite physical presence on the boy. Teddy's shoulders were trembling again, but Harry wasn't sure whether it was in response to his ordeal or the fact that he was seeing his father for the first time. When Remus looked up and met Harry's gaze over the crown of Teddy's head, there were tears in his eyes.

Harry felt a sharp sting in his own, and forced himself to smile and look away to give them their privacy. He busied himself retrieving his wand, then leaned forward to probe for a pulse in Greyback's limp wrist, knowing altogether too well that he wouldn't find any. There had been a short moment when he could have used the counter-curse, which had become standard Auror repertoire after the war. He hadn't, and couldn't regret it. Greyback's eyes were wide and glassy; his blood was already starting to clot. Harry shuddered and looked back at his godson and Remus.

They had been joined by a third figure, achingly familiar and coltish with a head of cobalt-blue hair. At some point, they had ended up on their knees in a huddle with Teddy in the middle, and were talking quietly. Harry watched Tonks lift Teddy's Slytherin tie with a very mischievous smirk, then peck him on the cheek.

She handled it so much better than Ginny or himself. Ginny had been shocked when Teddy was sorted into Slytherin. Harry's own surprise had been more subtle, or so he hoped, less as if Teddy was going to morph into a little Tom Riddle at any moment. But it had opened a gulf of sorts between him and his overly observant, sensitive godson. He wished he could have handled it with Tonks's easy grace, and suppressed his own longing. No matter how much he wanted to speak to Remus and Tonks, to beg forgiveness for endangering their son and for being a far less than perfect replacement father... this was Teddy's moment.

It was over soon enough. Remus wrapped semi-substantial arms around the boy once more and tugged him to his feet, holding on to him as if letting go would mean taking a carving knife to his own intestines. Tonks embraced her son more lightly and released him with a kiss and a cheerful, bright smile that Harry would never have been able to replicate in the same position. Their fingers interlinked as watched Teddy walk away.

The boy's face scrunched up in misery as soon as his back was turned. His expressive bottom lip trembled when he dropped the Resurrection Stone into Harry's palm. The stone was warm from Teddy's grip, and Harry was glad he couldn't see his parents flicker and fade behind him when it changed hands. Part of him wanted to cry out, to pour his longing and Teddy's need into the Hallow and bring them back, bring them all back.

"How did you find it?" he murmured, closing his hand around the stone for the first time in thirteen years and feeling the very same urge to never let go again.

"Summoning charm," Teddy admitted. "It just turned up when I tried - as if it wanted me to find it."

It might have, Harry thought. Perhaps the Hallows were altogether too powerful to lie forgotten, or Teddy's desire to use the stone was so strong it had called out to it.

He swallowed and dropped the stone in his robe pocket. Greyback had been right about one thing: the Resurrection Stone was dangerous, as dangerous as the Mirror of Erised. More so, perhaps.

"I'm sorry," Teddy whispered. "I shouldn't have gone after it."

"No," Harry said, touching his shoulder softly. "You had to."

"I thought if he knew where it was, if he made Professor Trelawney tell him... what if he used it to bring back Voldemort?" A sharp pause. "I did want it for myself, too."

There would be a time to point out the madness of running into the Forbidden Forest, alone, after a monster, but this wasn't it, and Harry certainly had no right to throw stones. His lip twitched into a wry curl. "I would have gone too," he admitted. And he had, not only in first year.

He studied Teddy's white, pinched face. His godson's neck was covered in gooseflesh, "Are you all right?"

The boy nodded, although Harry knew too well to actually believe it.

"Will they punish me? For... for killing someone?"

Teddy's eyes wandered to Greyback's messy corpse as if drawn by force. His hands trembled. Now that the adrenaline of battle and of meeting his dead parents was fading, shock was fast catching up with him.

"No one will punish you for defending yourself," Harry insisted. He put a finger under the Teddy's chin and lifted the boy's face to his.

"Where..." Harry's voice was rough as sandpaper. "Where did you learn that spell?" He held Teddy clasped to his chest, one hand gently resting on the back of his head to direct him away from the sight of carnage.

"Professor Malfoy taught me."

Harry's head snapped up. "Malfoy?"

"When Gr... when he was sighted in Hogsmeade and the Aurors were stationed at Hogwarts. He said you wouldn't mind - he said it's one of your favourite spells." The dark head moved from where the boy's face was pressed against Harry's robes, and Teddy's brown eyes peered up at him. "Is it?"

Harry gulped down a throatful of memory and anger. "No," he murmured into the slowly lightening hair. "I used it once, when I had no idea what it was doing."

Teddy nodded. "I thought so."

Harry hesitated for a moment. "There won't be any consequences. But I would rather tell my colleagues that I cast the spell. It will show up in my wand anyway." Seeing Teddy's hair go grey, he petted his hand. "You don't need more questions. Especially not about how you came to know that bit of the Dark Arts."

Teddy bit his lip, then winced when he tasted blood on his mouth that wasn't his own. It was very Teddy to hesitate, Harry thought. Even as a little boy, he'd always met punishment with an air of stoic pride. It had never once deterred him from doing what he wanted. The oblique mention of Malfoy silenced the boy into an acquiescent nod, though.

Harry was glad that Malfoy had taught his godson, but equally determined to make sure that he wouldn't impart any other Dark curses on his students. Minerva might have developed a level of protectiveness for her ex-Death Eater professor that rivalled Dumbledore's predilection for Snape, but even she wouldn't be able to overlook this. Not that Malfoy needed the job; Harry had done his part to make sure that the Ministry would not un-feather the comfortable nest of his inheritance.

With a last look at Greyback, he raised his wand and sent his Patronus stag galloping off towards Hogwarts. The pair of junior Aurors stationed at the school had been spectacularly useless in preventing Trelawney's murder; they could at the very least clean up now.

"Ready to go home?" he asked.

Teddy's eyes flitted to the patch of grass where he'd knelt with his parents, as if hoping for them to reappear. He looked... old, when he finally took Harry's offered hand.

Dusk was falling slowly, and their way back through the darkening forest was torturous, for Teddy in particular. After the third time he stumbled over a gnarled root, Harry swept him up into his arms.

"I'm too heavy for that!" Teddy's protest came softly, his squirm more pretend than serious.

Harry waggled his wand. "We're wizards, remember?"

He took it as a tribute to the boy's exhaustion that Teddy let him cast Wingardium Leviosa without another word of protest. Instead, his head came to rest on Harry's shoulder, and Harry felt his body sag despite the weightlessness charm.

He didn't fall asleep, though. His face was buried against Harry's neck, and Harry could feel Teddy's cheeks turn wet although he made no sound. Biting his lip against the bitterness that welled up inside him, Harry tightened his arms and carried his godson home.

~ finis ~