A Life More Ordinary

Malfoy Manor--September 3, 1991

"Surely, you have realized the benefits of such a close association with Harry Potter," Severus said as he sipped his dark wine. "He will always be known as the Boy-Who-Lived. And we both know how powerful the Dark Lord was, Lucius. If the boy was capable of defeating him at barely a year old, just think of the power Harry must possess."

Lucius drew a slow breath, his eyes lighting with the idea of such magical prowess. "It is exactly as I told Narcissa," he said with a nod. "Though she was not keen on a friendship once Sirius Black was given custody of Harry."

"Sirius Black is owed a great deal by the Ministry, as you well know," Severus said, as if the fact had just occurred to him. "He has not taken any of their offers of compensation for wrongful imprisonment, but he may yet."

Severus watched Lucius frown as he considered that.

"There has been talk of offering him a position on the Hogwarts' board," Lucius said and Severus' eyes widened in feigned surprise. Lucius grimaced as he concentrated on his own wine. "And as you know, Dumbledore is quite fond of Sirius."

"He may well wield more power than you, in that case."

Lucius looked up sharply.

"Fudge will surely take to Black," Severus continued, sneer in place. "He enjoys keeping company with those who have money and power. Were he to take the position, Black would have both in ample supply."

Lucius refilled his wine glass, his eyes shadowed in thought. "It would not serve any of us to have Sirius in too close an association with Cornelius."

"No," Severus agreed, though he himself had no such associations with the Minister. But as he had Lucius hanging onto every word, he leaned forward a little. "By all accounts, the Potter boy is a loyal as he is intelligent. As things remain now, Harry's greatest future ally will undoubtedly be a Weasley."

Severus held in a smile as Lucius' pale fingers tightened around the stem of his glass. With an inelegant thump, it was relegated to the table beside Lucius' chair.

"Dobby!" he called, the single word laced with several layers of impatience and the nervous elf popped into existence at his master's feet.

"Master Malfoy is calling Dobby?"

"Fetch Draco," Lucius command, his fingers clicking to emphasize the order. Dobby popped out again even as he nodded. Less than a moment later, Draco's head appeared around the corner of the study; he smiled a little as he caught sight of Severus. He straightened up as he came forward.

"Dobby said you wanted to see me, Father."

Lucius turned a little so that he was gazing over his progeny. "Have you forgotten your manners, Draco? A proper greeting for Severus, if you will."

"Good afternoon, Severus," Draco said obediently, coloring a little under his father's rebuke.

"Good afternoon, Draco," Severus said with an easy nod.

"That is better," Lucius approved with a small smile; he bid Draco closer. Draco came to stand alongside his father's chair. "I was just telling Severus-" A thin-lipped smile in Severus' direction. "-how clever you were to think to choose Gryffindor."

Draco looked between them. "I beg your pardon, Father?" he said, his voice strained.

Lucius chuckled as he patted his son's shoulder. "Do not be modest, Draco. Severus knows that you understand how important our family's status is. And Harry Potter is a very important wizard, is he not?"

Draco nodded, the movement uncertain.

"You will be an excellent friend for Harry, Draco. And I am certain you will continue to make your mother and me very proud."

Draco's fair cheeks flushed again, this time with pleasure. "Yes, Father," he said quickly.

Lucius patted his son's small shoulder again and Draco fairly beamed. "Dobby will help you pack your trunk," Lucius said. "We will leave for Hogwarts within the hour."

--

"A whole foot," Ron moaned as he slumped back in the cozy chair by the fire. "It's only the second day of classes. McGonagall's mad!"

"We have two whole days to finish it before we have class again," Hermione said from the low table where her books and parchments were neatly organized--almost halfway across the room.

"We've written more for your mum loads of times," Harry interjected quickly before Ron's scowl could find a voice.

Ron turned his disgruntled glare from Hermione and back to his Transfiguration text. "Well," he huffed, "I suppose so. But it is only the second day of lessons."

"We didn't get any homework for Defense Against the Dark Arts, so it evens out," Harry said. He gave his friend an encouraging smile and Ron sighed in acceptance.

"We'll be sure to have homework next class," Hermione murmured, her bushy head bent busily over her half-filled scroll. "Once Dumbledore finds a replacement for Quirrel."

"Dumbledore should go on teaching it," Harry said as he dipped his quill into ink. "He was brilliant."

"Funny too," Ron said, grinning. "Did you see the way he made Nott's hair stand all on end like that?"

"Lessons aren't supposed to be entertaining," Hermione said quietly.

"He was showing us a spell," Harry said with a shrug. "Mrs. Weasley always made our lessons fun when we were kids."

Hermione cocked her head as she gazed at Harry and apparently having no answer, she bent back to her work. Ron smirked at her bowed head before going back to his reading. Harry shook his head, wishing Ron would at least give Hermione a chance. He caught Neville's eye across the table and Neville shrugged.

Harry glanced around the room as Neville hunched over his text. Most of the students had class now and the common room was mostly empty except for the first year girls who were giggling together on the other side of the room. Well, all except Hermione. Harry watched her glance over at them, her lips pinched as their giggles echoed through the stone room. She looked down when she found Harry looking at her.

Harry chewed the inside of his cheek for a moment and then stood up and walked the few paces toward her. He dropped into the chair opposite hers and she looked up, her quill poised over her parchment.

"Want to join us?" Harry asked before he lost his nerve; he saw Ron's head jerk up but Harry ignored it. Hermione looked confused and her quill descended slowly back to her essay.

"Do you need help?" She nodded in understanding though she paused again when Harry shook his head.

"We have an empty edge," he said with a shrug, gesturing to the unoccupied side of the low table. Hermione's taut eyebrows slowly relaxed and with a small smile, she nodded. Harry picked up her bag as she gathered her books and parchments. Neville smiled at her as she sat down across from him.

She and Harry were just settling back into their work, when Seamus and Dean appeared at the bottom of the stairs leading to the boys' dorms.

"Oy," Dean said with a frown, "another bed just appeared out of nowhere."

"Can't move a centimeter in there now," Seamus groused as he flopped into the closest chair.

Before anyone could find anything to say, the portrait swung open and a familiar blond head ducked inside.

"Draco!" Harry said excitedly, surging to his feet. The rest of Draco's body came through the hole. He straightened up, his grey eyes uncertain as they darted around the room.

"Hi Draco," Neville said quietly. Parvati and Lavender echoed his greeting and after a moment, Dean did as well.

"Are you back then?" Seamus demanded. "There's a sixth bed upstairs and you can't even walk into the loo without breaking off a toe!"

Draco didn't say anything for a moment but finally he murmured, "The elves should be able to enlarge the space."

"How can we contact these elves?" Dean asked, looking around the room.

"There are house-elves at Hogwarts?" Hermione asked, her eyes wide.

"Of course there are," Ron said, rolling his eyes. "Who else do you suppose makes all that food?"

"There wasn't anything in Hogwarts: A History about house-elves," Hermione protested, suddenly looking very upset. "I thought only very rich wizarding households kept them as slaves."

"House-elves aren't slaves," Draco said, frowning a little. "They're servants."

Hermione sat up; her eyes were flashing. "Do you pay them?"

"Of course not. House-elves don't accept money."

"Then that's slavery!"

"Hermione, I think house-elves like their work," Neville interjected, smiling apologetically at her. "Ours does; Gran has tried to give him clothes dozens of times but he won't take it."

"Give him clothes?" Dean echoed.

Hermione opened her mouth to make her retort to Neville, but Harry said quickly, "Maybe we can rearrange the furniture a bit. Or maybe Professor McGonagall knows a spell."

"Do you think she knows your back, yet?" Seamus asked Draco curiously.

"Yes, she's-"

The portrait hole opened once more. McGonagall ducked through and immediately found Draco. "Ah," she said pleasantly. "Good to see you again, Mr. Malfoy. Now, I've been told we're short a bed."

"Not anymore," Seamus called from his chair. "Now we haven't enough room."

McGonagall frowned. "Well, we'll have that taken care of in a moment. Come along, Mr. Malfoy." And with that, she swept up the stairs. Draco hoisted his pack over his shoulder and with another uncertain glance at the clustered first years, he trailed along behind her.

"Be right back," Harry said to his remaining friends and hurried up the stairs after Draco.

When he stepped into the dorm, there were four house-elves in the room, doing something--McGonagall was nodding in satisfaction. As Harry and Draco watched, the room seemed to grow, the walls expanding as the elves applied some variation of a Displacement Charm.

"Why didn't they do this after the sorting?" Harry asked. McGonagall smiled slightly.

"It seems Draco hadn't made up his mind yet."

Harry wasn't certain what she meant, but it didn't seem to matter since there were six beds now and Draco didn't seem to mind terribly much that he was here.

"There we are," McGonagall murmured as the elves finished. "Thank you."

The elves nodded and popped out of existence.

"Mr. Malfoy," McGonagall said, turning her attention once more to the blond boy, "it seems you have two days worth of homework to attend to. I'm sure you're housemates will be happy to assist."

"We'll all help," Harry assured her.

"Very good, Potter," she said with a nod. "Oh," she added as she turned to leave, "and welcome back to Gryffindor, Malfoy."

"Thank you, ma'am."

The boys watched their Head of House leave. "Everything's all right with your parents, then?" Harry asked, turning to his friend once they were alone.

Draco frowned as he opened his trunk and began sorting through his textbooks. "Mother is still upset, I think."

"Your father isn't?" Harry asked; he nodded when Draco held up his Transfiguration text questioningly.

"He was," Draco said slowly. He paused to put his D.A.D.A. text back into its place when Harry shook his head. "He told Dumbledore he would remove me from Hogwarts altogether."

Harry cocked his head. "What made him change his mind?"

"Not sure," Draco said as he slipped his books and parchments into his backpack, along with several self-inking quills. "A friend of his paid a visit this morning and Father told me he was proud of me."

Harry tried not to look too surprised. Draco's fingers smoothed one of his quills; his bag still open and Harry got the feeling that there was more to Mr. Malfoy's sudden ease, but he didn't want to force Draco to tell him things he didn't want to tell. So he smiled.

"I'm glad you're back," he said. Draco looked up, his face relaxing until he was smiling as well. "Come on," Harry said. "We better go downstairs and get to work on our homework. You have loads to catch up on."

"Father said Quirrel had a heart attack," Draco said as they jogged back down to the common room together. "Who's the new D.A.D.A professor then?" he asked when Harry nodded.

"There isn't one yet. Dumbledore taught our class this morning," Harry said and told him all about Nott's hair standing on end. And just like Ron had, Draco chortled at the image.

--

"Why did you have to invite Hermione?" Ron groused as Harry stooped to tie his trainers Saturday after breakfast. Harry shrugged.

"Why not? Hermione's nice enough."

"She's a bloody terror."

"Maybe Harry's sweet on her," Seamus said with a snicker from where he was sprawled on his bed. Harry rolled his eyes as he straightened.

"Don't be a prat." He swiped a jumper from his bed and pulled it over his head; Sirius had reminded him twice yesterday that he'd need one. The mirror conversations had been a regular occurrence since his parents' visit earlier in the week and once the other boys had found out about them, they'd all been envious--except Ron, who said his mum's nagging letters were quite enough.

"I asked Ron to come and I'm not sweet on him," Harry added with a smirk. Ron feigned a look of offense and Harry threw a pillow at him.

"Good aim," Dean approved as it hit a sputtering Ron square in the face.

"Harry can go on an outing with a girl without it being romantic," Draco said, not looking up from penning a thank you note to his mother; she'd sent a parcel of sweets and chocolates that morning. "Perhaps he simply prefers more mature company."

Seamus and Dean stuck out their tongues. Draco glanced up at them and smirked. "Precisely." He dipped his quill neatly in his ink bottle and went back to his letter.

"Don't you ever have any fun, Draco?" Dean asked sarcastically.

"Fun and immaturity are not one in the same."

"Well then, why didn't Harry ask you to come along, if you're so mature?" Seamus demanded, sitting up and plucking a chocolate frog from the box Draco's mother had sent.

"I have an appointment with Professor Sinistra in an hour," Draco murmured.

"What for?" Seamus asked around his mouthful; bits of frog spewed over his coverlet. Draco wrinkled his nose and didn't answer. "You have detention, already?"

"Of course not," Draco said, not even looking up. "My mother and the professor were dorm mates in Slytherin."

"So?"

Draco's head came up slowly; his grey eyes were narrowed. "So," he said slowly, as if speaking to a rampaging mountain troll, "Professor Sinistra and my mother are friends and she wishes to speak with me. I've known her since I was a child."

Seamus' lips twitched. "Are you having tea together or something?"

Draco shook his head. "Add uncivilized to the list."

Seamus shrugged and chomped down on another frog. "So all the purebloods around here have tea with professors then?"

"I don't," Ron said as he peered into the overflowing box of sweets.

"If your parents had long associations with a professor, you might," Draco said.

"With who?" Ron snorted. "McGonagall? Most of the professors are ancient."

"Sirius and Remus have had Dumbledore over for tea loads of times," Harry said as he slipped his wand into his sleeve.

Seamus paused in mid-chew. "You have to have tea with the headmaster?"

"He already did," Ron said as he swiped up a rat-shaped mint and stuffed it into his mouth. "Yeshtadawy."

"Yesterday," Harry clarified.

"What do you even talk about with the headmaster?" Dean asked.

Harry shrugged. They'd mostly talked about Quirrel and his tragic heart attack. And Harry had assured Dumbledore that he hadn't felt any pain in his scar since. Neither had he had another nightmare.

"It's nearly nine-thirty," Draco informed them; he was just signing his name to his letter.

"I'm surprised Hermione hasn't stormed up here to fetch us," Ron said as he wiped a sleeve across his mouth. "Are you certain she has to come?"

"She's coming, Ron," Harry said, grabbing his friend's elbow. He waved to the other boys as Ron made a face. But he followed Harry anyway.

"She doesn't even like Quidditch," he pointed out as they thundered down the steps. "She'll be bored while we pick out your broom."

"I'm going to introduce her to Ollivander."

Ron rolled his eyes, but didn't say anything more even though he had never understood Harry's fascination with wand making and the old master. They found a pacing Hermione in the common room a moment later.

"We're going to be late," she said as soon as she spotted them. "Sirius said nine-thirty, didn't he?"

"Yeah," Harry said, elbowing Ron to keep him quiet.

"We're going to be late!" Hermione pivoted around, her mane of hair swishing about as she hurried to the portrait hole. "Hurry," she scolded them as they started down the stairs at a normal pace.

"They're not going to leave without us," Harry said, as unworried as she was frantic. "They're coming here just to pick us up."

"Well, it's awfully rude to be late, Harry."

"They're my parents, Hermione. They're not going to give us detention or anything."

That slowed her down, but only just. And as soon as she made it to the bottom of the stairs, where Remus and Sirius were waiting, their backs turned and their heads close together, she blurted, "We're late!"

Sirius and Remus turned, their brows creased as they gazed down at Hermione. Hermione stuck her hand out between them.

"Hermione Granger; how do you do?" Before they could answer, she added, "I was ready fifteen minutes ago but I had to wait for Ron and Harry."

Sirius' lips twitched as he took Hermione's small hand in his own. "Good morning, Hermione," he said solemnly. "Sirius Black; and that's quite all right. We've been reminiscing."

"Oh." Hermione deflated a little and Harry figured she didn't know what to say now that he and Ron hadn't been scolded for their tardiness.

"It's good to meet you, Hermione," Remus added after introducing himself as well.

"Punctuality isn't really Harry's strong suit," Sirius told Hermione with a wink. "Ron either, unless you're serving food."

Hermione smiled.

"I'm never late for dinner," Ron agreed as he hopped off the third step and landed with a loud thump in front of her. She pursed her lips but otherwise didn't acknowledge that he'd spoken.

Harry followed Ron's exuberant landing, grinning at his parents as they turned to him. "Hi!"

Sirius chuckled. "Hi," he greeted, reaching out to rumple Harry's hair.

"It certainly sounds like you've had a good week," Remus said with a smile.

"He's just happy we don't have to do any homework today," Ron explained, smirking.

"It will still be there tomorrow," Hermione said critically. "Unless, of course, you thought to finish it last night."

"Of course not," Ron said with an emphatic shake of his head. "We played chess last night."

"Well, of course you did," Sirius said, smiling as he slid an arm round Harry's shoulders and turning them both toward the door. "Fridays nights are the perfect time for chess matches, and Sundays are much better suited to homework.

Harry bit back his laughter at Hermione's look of shock, which she quickly covered when Sirius nodded very seriously.

"Thanks for letting both of them come," Harry said when Hermione looked away, scooting in a little closer to his godfather as they walked.

Sirius smiled down at him and squeezed his shoulder before turning his head to watch Hermione scold Ron for aiming for a puddle instead of skirting it.

"They don't seem to like one another," Sirius said, though Harry could see the crinkling lines of amusement around his eyes.

Ron made a show of walking far around the next puddle and then sidled up next to Remus and pointedly ignored Hermione.

Harry sighed. It was going to be a very long day.

--

"I'm surprised you did not think of it yourself," Lucius drawled; he crossed his legs elegantly while Nott Sr. frowned. "The Potter boy is quite taken with my Draco."

"It is good that he did not think of it," Severus said, the rehearsed words sliding easily from his tongue. "Even Dumbledore, as aged as he is, would have been suspicious to find himself with two unexpected additions to his lauded House."

"He is not suspicious, even with a Malfoy in Gryffindor?" Nott demanded, his dark eyebrow high on his wrinkled forehead.

"Dumbledore has high hopes of saving him," Lucius said with a curled lip, and Nott settled back with a contemptuous smile. "Fancies Draco another Sirius Black."

"Fucking blood traitor," Crabbe spat and beside him, Goyle nodded.

"That's a head I'd like to see on the end of my wand," Yaxley murmured quietly, his fingers fondling his hawthorn lovingly. Dark chuckles echoed round the circle.

When Severus emerged from his shop hours later, he blinked as he adjusted to the relatively brighter light of Knockturn Alley. His guests had all left through the Floo, Lucius as puffed up as Severus had ever seen him and Severus was glad to be rid of them. Just when he began to despise the company of his former comrades, he could not be certain.

Severus side-stepped the witch with the never-dwindling supply of fingers and shook his head at a proffered flask of eyeballs--still blinking--and made his way up the narrow steps which led to the more respectable side of the wizarding street.

He paused as he reached the top, pulling himself against the side of a stone building, even though he was still hidden in the shadows stretching out from the dark alley. The very subject of Yaxley's morbid fantasies was just across the street, walking along the cobbled street with an arm round a young boy's shoulders.

Severus narrowed his eyes. A boy with black hair, as wild as his father's had been. Both of them were laughing. And ... yes, the sandy head of hair bobbing along beside Black's belonged to Remus Lupin. There was a redhead with the trio--a Weasley, no doubt and a girl with bushy hair and a nervous mouth.

Severus watched them as they crossed the street. He had only seen a handful of pictures of Potter's son in the years since he'd captured Pettigrew. And each photograph had seared him with guilt--with regrets he'd never managed to assuage, no matter how many acts he attempted to absolve himself with.

Severus' fingers curled around the edge of the stone, the wall supporting him as he saw Lily's son for the first time. The child smiled and the expression stabbed Severus. It was Lily's smile. And it seemed to come as easy to her son as it had to Lily.

Harry Potter was obviously very happy.

Just as Albus had told Severus dozens of times when the guilt threatened to undo him time and time again. Lily's son was happy. And that had to be worth something to her.

Still grinning, Harry and his group went into Fortescue's.

Severus peeled himself off his wall and continued on his way.