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Returning to Sanity	By : AchillesTheGeek Category: Harry Potter > Slash - Male/Male > Harry/Draco Views: 31212 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 3
Disclaimer: I do not own the Harry Potter books or films, nor the characters from it. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

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96. Returning Sons to their Fathers
Tuesday December 22, 1998
In Wools Orphanage, Tony Adams slept fitfully.
"Adam," he heard a kind, female voice say.
He looked around.
"I must be dreaming," he told himself.
For he knew perfectly well that he had gone to sleep in the ten-year-old boys' dormitory. But now, instead of the thoroughly institutional room he had gone to sleep in, with its bed-and-wardrobe capsules separated by curtains and uninspiring beige decor, he found himself in a nicely-furnished sort of small lobby painted a fresh, crisp shade of lemon yellow. There was an umbrella stand, and a coatrack. This was obviously the entrance to a nice house. A house that, somehow, seemed rather familiar.
But more importantly, there was a person in front of him, calling him Adam. It seemed strange; that wasn't his name, after all; it was his surname with the 's' missing, as far as he knew. Yet coming from her mouth it seemed so right, somehow. And then something exploded in his head, and he knew who she must be.
"Mum?" he said, looking up, and the woman smiled at him and extended her arms.
Tony, or Adam as he supposed he should call himself now, did not hesitate. He might be ten years old, and act all tough when he was with the other boys, but he was not too old for a mother's hugs. She lifted him up and sat down on a bench that hadn't been there moments before, and just cuddled him for the longest time.
ooOOoo
Dudley Potter woke early that Tuesday. To his very great surprise, he had had a wonderful day at the Ceremony of the Woods. Despite what his housemate Megan had said to him about pure-bloods and their judgmental ways, he had received nothing but kindness from anyone he had spoken to. To be sure, there had been that table of people who had sat in one corner and kept themselves to themselves, and Dudley rather suspected that they would not see him in a pleasant light; but they had not said anything to him, so he could pretend they weren't there.
As Kreacher had brought him home rather late after the Ceremony, he had gone more-or-less straight to bed; so the inevitable inquisition had been postponed. But not cancelled. It began as he sat down to breakfast. In contrast to the way Petunia would have badgered him for details, Megan just sat and gave him a rather demanding stare.
"Tell me everything," she said when he wasn't immediately forthcoming with what she wanted to know.
With the look on her face, he wasn't sure which was scarier to deal with, Petunia or Megan.
Wisely, he did indeed tell all.
ooOOoo
Andreas Nott woke up with that strange feeling of dislocation that comes when waking in a strange room.
Even though he had been there for three nights, he still wasn't used to it yet, the dark and the cold. He had grown so used to the warmth and fierce light of South Africa, not to mention the space; the winter climate, gentle light of his home country were very strange. And sleeping in a room this cozy.
Not that he was at all ungrateful. In his dealings with the Malfoys, they had been the very soul of kindness, much to his surprise: he had always thought they would shun squibs as assiduously as his parents had, and it was very surreal to find two such eminent pillars of the pure-blood community going out of their way to accommodate him.
Literally: they had appreciated that Malfoy Manor would be a bit daunting, so he and Theo were staying with Harry's muggle aunt and cousin. And their very pretty lodger, who, it turned out unexpectedly, was a witch, but clearly had no problems with the muggles, nor with him as a squib.
In fact, Andreas quite liked Megan Llewellyn. Not romantically, of course; there were too many years between them, and anyway he was quite sure the witch had her sights set on the still oblivious Dudley Dursely. Or Potter, now, he remembered. He wondered idly how long it would take for the boy to open his eyes to what was in front of him. Not, of course, that a relationship would be particularly easy for Dudley with his mother around. He shuddered at the thought, as he visualized how his own mother would have tried to interfere with him if she'd ever had the slightest interest in him. But, mercifully, Petunia Dursley was not Messalina Nott.
He got out of bed, grumbling as the chill air hit him, wrapped himself in a dressing gown, and went in search of tea.
As he arrived in the kitchen, he heard Dudley telling Megan about his day yesterday. He quietly took up position leaning against the doorjamb and listened in. A smile slowly crept over his face as he heard the boy telling all about the Ceremony and getting more excited in the telling.
Petunia noticed him before the other two could, and got up from the table, handing him a cup of tea. Andreas gestured to the front room, and the two adults quietly left, taking care not to disturb Dudley and Megan. Not that they were likely to; the two youngsters were engrossed in the conversation, both with shining eyes, and Andreas suspected they could have stomped out without being noticed.
"They're so cute together," he said as he and Petunia took seats in the front room.
"You think so too?" Petunia asked with a smile.
Andreas grinned. He had been wondering for the last couple of days whether Dudley needed a push in the right direction, being your typical oblivious young male; it seemed he had found an ally.
OoOOoo
Breakfast at Malfoy Manor was practically a non-event.
Lucius was the only one up. He had tried to rouse Narcissa, but it seemed that after the resounding success Ceremony of the Woods she was completely spent and, for the first time in a very long time, had simply rolled over and gone back to sleep. Not that he blamed her; the day had been stressful enough for him, he could barely imagine how it must have been for her, feeling the whole weight of its success or failure bearing down on her.
And he was hardly surprised to find that Harry and Draco were still in bed. No doubt, if they were awake, they would have other things to do besides having breakfast, and, not wanting to think about that, he demanded tea from Mappy and picked up the Daily Prophet.
For once, the front page was benign; the headline was 'Felicitations at the Solstice', and the article was nothing more than a fluff piece. It seemed that all was going well for a change. It wasn't till he reached the social pages that he found out how wrong it was.
And here it was: an article by – who else – Rita Skeeter, discussing the Ceremony of the Woods. There was a paragraph or two gushing about Narcissa – "how brave of Lady Malfoy to host such an enormous event given what a tumultuous year she had had" – a not-so-subtle dig, he felt, but at least the words 'Death Eater' had not been mentioned – and then a bit about the Ceremony, detailing the participants …
"And just who, I ask myself, was the rather gorgeous squib seen in the company of Theodore Nott, organising the Woods and setting up the different tents? He is a new face to the Daily Prophet. Our readers will remember that Mr Nott and his charming wife Pansy, née Parkinson, have emigrated to South Africa; perhaps our tall, dark, handsome stranger is a friend from there? We certainly hope to see him again soon ..."
Lucius gulped. It was all very subtle and harmless; but he was very concerned. If Messalina Nott read it, he was quite sure that her mind would leap by accident to the correct conclusion from sheer paranoia; and then what if she were to take it into her head to move her grandson?
He couldn't risk it. He had intended to get the boy on Christmas Day as a special celebration; but it seemed that plan needed to be moved up somewhat. But, he supposed, they could invite the Notts to the burning of the Yule log; it seemed only fair, given that Andreas had especially chosen a lovely piece of oak for them.
ooOOoo
Tony Adams was at something of a loss.
The last few weeks at the Orphanage had been rather difficult for him. Firstly, he was very embarrassed at having blubbed in front of the caretaker, and was now avoiding the man as much as he could. Which was harder than one might think; Vernon seemed to be always around. In his more paranoid moments, Tony wondered if he was being stalked. But Vernon never actually approached him or referred to the incident any way.
Of course the truth was simply that, since he was thinking of Vernon so much, he was noticing the man more; but that sort of sensible thought is slow to come to the mind of a ten-year-old.
It did not take long before the other boys sensed that something was wrong. Initially, Tony had thought the worst thing would be if they attacked him for his weakness. He was wrong. They did not attack him, even verbally; in fact, they offered sympathy and concern. That pushed him back into thinking about what had happened, and what had caused it, and that was even worse than hard words or fists would have been.
And now that it was Yule, they did not have classes for two weeks to celebrate. He should have been happy. But two weeks with no classes meant two weeks with no order and routine to keep his thoughts away from the awful events of years ago that had come crashing through his mind. The visions of the old woman killing his mother played out over and over again, until he wanted to scream with frustration.
Yes, it had been three weeks of hell. But when he woke on the solstice, something was different. A feeling in the air. Something was going to happen, he just knew it.
Something good.
He looked around. It still early; but there were no classes over this fortnight, and their chores were suspended over Yule, so there was no requirement for them to be up their usual time. He grinned a little. First good thing for today: he could go straight back to sleep.
ooOOoo
Marjorie Dursley wished she could go back to sleep. Or even better, wake up and find that it had all been a bad dream. But no such luck; as the months went by, she was getting more and more frantic. And more and more angry.
Her brother and nephew, her only family, and probably (apart from the vet who looked after her dogs and, on a good day, Vernon's wife Petunia) the only people in the world that she gave a damn about (no, scratch Petunia, she was really a horse-faced bitch and not good enough for her brother; and after all, The Freak was her nephew and all), had, it seemed, disappeared off the face of the earth. It didn't help that the police seemed to be doing nothing at all; yes, she knew perfectly well that they were all adults, but they wouldn't just disappear without telling her. To the police, it seemed it was just a run-of-the-mill Missing Persons case, but to her it was family.
What really galled her was that her less-than-scrupulous inside contact had told her yesterday that the police actually knew where Dudley was but hadn't told her. And so she marched into the police station at Little Whinging and demanded to speak to the superintendent.
The duty desk sergeant sighed. Marge Dursely seemed to come in at least once a month, and it was never pleasant. Everyone had got to the stage where they simply blanked her, refusing to acknowledge that they had met her before.
"Yes, madam?" he said with institutional, and entirely false, politeness. "How may I help you?"
Marge narrowed her eyes at him.
"I've already told you, Sergeant Smith, that I want to see the man in charge. And don't pretend you don't know me, you've seem me often enough! Or are our poor hard-working police having trouble with their memories?"
As she said this, her tone bitingly ironic, she looked scathingly at the man sitting on his chair with papers in front of him. Clearly, to her, sitting at a desk did not constitute 'hard-working'. He would like to see her last five minutes with the bureaucracy of the police system, he thought ruefully to himself. But he was a trained professional, and pushed down those thoughts.
"Yes madam," he said simply. "And if you would tell me what this is in regards to, I'm sure it would avoid unnecessary delay."
"WHAT IT'S IN REGARD TO!?" Marge screamed. "VERNON DURSLEY AND HIS FAMILY GOING MISSING! WHAT ELSE WOULD IT BE IN REGARDS TO!"
"Yes, thank you, madam," Smith said. "Please take a seat in the waiting room and I will advise the relevant officer."
Marge, slightly mollified by the appearance of some civility and deference, huffed a little but did indeed go and sit in the waiting room. For most of the morning. For, while Sergeant Smith was a conscientious man who always kept his promises, he didn't say anything about when he would pass on the message…
ooOOoo
Andreas was very nervous.
Lucius had arrived quite unexpectedly half an hour ago to find him and Petunia still chatting together while Dudley and Megan were in the kitchen. That in itself was enough to cause anxiety – Lucius was a wizard to be reckoned with, and his British client's husband, and he wanted to keep on the right side of him; he had no idea how Lucius felt about Petunia but all his experience of pure-bloods screamed at him that he man was likely to fly off the handle at anything that might be considered Unbecoming Behaviour.
These worries disappeared once Lucius sat down and explained why he was there, only to be replaced with new ones.
"You really think this Prophet article is going to cause issues?" Andreas asked.
"See for yourself," Lucius answered, handing him the paper, folded so Rita's article was on top.
"And just who, I ask myself, was the rather gorgeous squib seen in the company of Theodore Nott," he read out loud, blushing at the description before the colour drained from his face. Here it was, laid out, the South African connection, his connection with Nott being raised; it was Very Not Good.
"If mother sees this..." he said in horror.
"No," Lucius replied, "not 'if', 'when'. Even if she doesn't read the rag herself, someone's bound to ask her what Theo's playing at."
"Merlin!" Andreas replied, terror starting to creep into his eyes. "We have to get Adam! Now!"
Lucius quite agreed. Perhaps he was being infected with Harry's Gryffindor sentimentality but he was determined that that bitch was not going to rip a family apart for the second time.
ooOOoo
When Tony woke up again, it was the middle of the morning. He got up, feeling rather groggy after more sleep than he was used to, pulled on some clothes, and made his way to the boy's washroom to get ready for the day. It wasn't until he standing at the mirror washing his face that he remembered about the dream. He was so stunned as he relived it that he might have stood there all day; but Philip Johnson, one of his least-favourite dorm-mates came into the washroom and saw him, apparently gazing at his reflection in the mirror.
"Hey, Tony!" he said. "Stop loving yourself, mate!"
"Adam", he replied softly, turning to his fellow.
"What?" came the reply.
"Adam. My name is Adam."
"You all right, Tony? Blow to the head or something?"
But, much to Philip's surprise, the barb got no reaction. Normally, he could count on Tony Adams to get riled up and come at him; as he was a year older, larger, stronger, and fitter, this invariably led to pain for Tony and some rather sadistic pleasure for Philip.
Before he could say anything else, a voice called out.
"Hey, Tony! Old man Ries wants you in his office! You've got a visitor!"
Adam, as he would now call himself, smiled as he made his way to the head's office. This, he was sure, was the good thing.
ooOOoo
"I rather thought I might see you today," Johan Ries said as he greeted his visitors at the front door.
"You've seen The Prophet, then?" Lucius asked.
Ries nodded.
"Where is he?" Andreas asked, skipping all small-talk.
Ries smiled. "I sent a boy to fetch Tony when the wards alerted me to your arrival," he replied gently. "By now, he should be in my office."
And, indeed, as they entered the Director's office, they found a rather anxious-looking ten-year-old boy turned to greet them.
It took Adam Nott less than a second to work out which one was his …
"Father?" he asked cautiously.
Andreas looked at him, the pain of years of separation in his eyes as he opened his arms in reply.
For a moment, there was a tangible tension in the room.
For a moment, things hung in the balance.
Andreas's head began to fill with doubts as the moment dragged on. Would his Adam accept him?Why was the boy hanging back? Perhaps it had been a mistake come at all, to imagine that he could just waltz in and reclaim the son that had been stolen from him?
And then …
And then Andreas Nott was nearly bowled over as the blur of a boy running at full pelt hit him, and he felt Adam's arms encircle him. They didn't go all the way round but that didn't matter a bit as he, in turn, held his son to him in a desperate embrace, his doubts fading to nothing now that he held his child again for the first time in so many years.
ooOOoo
They had gone up to Adam's room to fetch his few belongings and were wandering down the corridor back to Reis's office and drew level with a door on which was printed 'Janitor' in neat letters when it happened.
As Andreas walked past the small store room, he felt like some strange, oily substance was being poured over him. Fired with curiosity, feeling helpless to resist, he found himself opening the door and wandering into the room. At first, he saw nothing but the mops, buckets and brooms that one always finds in such rooms, together with that particular stale smell of dirty water and disinfectant; but then, to his very great surprise, the room seemed to change before his eyes. Instead of cleaning equipment and damp, dingy smells, the room was set up as a bedroom, with a bed running alongside the wall and a large wardrobe at one end, dark and dominating. The window, which moments before had been dirty, dusty, and letting in a bare minimum of light, was now quite clean, and the room was a lot brighter and airier because of it.
But most surprising of all was the small boy sitting on the bed. One look convinced Andreas of two things: he had never seen this boy before in his life, he was sure of that; but also, the boy was clearly an orphan. He had the haunted look that all the boys he had just met shared.
And yet, it wasn't quite the same. There was something different about this boy. Something more self-assured. He struck Andreas as someone who would go far.
The boy turned to him but seemed quite oblivious to his presence, his gaze continuing around the room. It was obviously his room; as well as self-assuredness, he had that air of possession that comes only to people in their own space. But the way he was sizing it up was intriguing; it was as though he were working out what he needed to defend. But from what?
"Look at me!" he heard a male voice say, and the boy snapped back his attention to Andreas's right. The squib turned to see a man standing there.
Man? Not just a man. A wizard, that was clear. And more than that. For the oily feeling Andreas had felt was definitely coming from this man. It was intoxicating. It was alluring.
It was dark.
This was definitely a Dark Lord, and he reeled at the thought that this might be Voldemort himself. For, he realised with a sudden crystal clarity, this was not the present, nor any dream or premonition. No, he was seeing an event from long ago. He found himself powerless to intervene as the wizard stood there, eyeing the child like a predator its prey.
"What do you want?" the boy asked, his voice curious but not fearful. Andreas shuddered. If the boy had any sense, he'd run a mile rather than talk to this man. But perhaps he didn't have any choice; the man was blocking the door, the only feasible exit, after all. No wonder the boy had been looking around, then.
The man smiled. It was not a nice smile. The oily magic – for Andreas was now convinced that that was what it was – suddenly became visible as all-but transparent tentacles reaching out towards the boy. When they touched him, something rather strange happened. Andreas had been horrified that they would engulf him, but instead they seemed to meet some sort of resistance.
"Intriguing," the man said, slowly. Andreas was rather surprised by his tone; there was no anger, nor disappointment, but an almost detached academic interest.
Almost. For mixed in it, he realised, was … pride.
"You are very powerful, young man," he said, confirming Andreas's thoughts. "I think you will make a worthy successor …"
And then, something must have gone wrong. The man stopped abruptly, and looked to the ceiling in contemplation.
"Will the fool never leave me alone?" he said, anger creeping into his voice for the first time. "I'm afraid we shall have to postpone this meeting until a more propitious moment…"
With that, the wizard abruptly vanished.
"Andreas!" he heard a voice call. "Mr Ad.. Nott!"
He started to turn slowly. He thought he should know those voices …
"Dad!"
Ah, he knew that voice. That voice brought him hurling back to the present. A present with Adam. A present that, for the first time in a long time, promised some hope …
ooOOoo
Marge Dursley had all but given up hope when she was finally called into the office of Senior Detective Ian Barnes.
"Now, Miss Dursley," the detective began. "How can I help you?"
Marge eyed him coldly.
"For a start," she said tartly, "perhaps you can explain to me why it's taken nearly all day to get to see you? Where is this much-vaulted efficiency I've been reading about?"
Barnes grimaced inwardly to himself. It would never occur to the Marge Dursleys of this world that the biggest cause of inefficiency in his job was people coming and ranting at him and stopping him from doing what he was paid for. Still, at least you knew where you were with them, he supposed.
"Miss Dursley," he said crisply, "do sit down. I'm afraid our duty sergeant has only just now informed you that you were here; no doubt the two armed robberies and various motor vehicle accidents he has had to attend to during the day caused your case to slip his mind a little. No matter, here you are. I take it you have communicated with your nephew?"
Marge puffed up; had she but known it, she began to look strikingly similar to her appearance when Harry had accidentally blown her up like a balloon. Not, of course, that she had any memory of the event; the Accidental Magic Reversal Squad from the Ministry of Magic had made sure of that.
Fixing the man with a fierce glare, she all but bellowed, "how can I possibly have 'communicated' with him, as you put it, when I have no idea where he is?"
Senior Detective Barnes looked puzzled.
"You don't know where he is?" he asked. "But we sent you letters!"
Marge's eyes narrowed. This man was not going to fob her off with the old 'letters lost in the post line', she could tell him that for nothing.
"And just what did these letters say?" she asked coldly.
"They advised you that your nephew was now resident in Swansea, and, while we are not at liberty to give out his address, he can be contacted through the Police Department there. Here", he continued, reaching for a file, "here are the file copies, duly receipted by Royal Mail."
Marge accepted the file and saw that, indeed, there were letters addressed to her, with proof of posting attached. It seemed, then, that she should direct her fiercest ire at Royal Mail, rather than the Police. The thought didn't really assuage her temper any. Especially when she read about Dudley's new name.
"DUDLEY POTTER!?" she yelled. "WHAT DO YOU MEAN, 'POTTER'? HOW COULD SUCH A TRAVESTY HAPPEN? HE TOOK THE FREAK'S NAME? HOW COULD YOU ALLOW SUCH A SMEAR ON THE DURSLEY FAMILY NAME!"
"MISS DURSELY!" Barnes said crisply, matching his visitor for volume, and momentarily stunning her into silence. "Mr Dudley Potter is of age, and free to do what he likes in regard to such matters. I can assure you that the name-change was entirely above-board and done of Mr Potter's free will. Please feel free to pursue any issues you may have with him; it is not, in any way, a police matter."
"All right," she said, somewhat begrudgingly, "but what of Vernon?" And then, as an afterthought, "and Petunia?"
"As you can see from the next letter, they are still missing."
"Still missing?" she shrieked. "After what, nearly six months? How can this be possible? I love my brother dearly, but even I can admit that he is on the large size. He's not exactly easy to miss."
Barnes wished that he could allow himself to chuckle at this. From the photographs they had of Vernon Dursley, this description was, if anything, an understatement.
"All right," Marge continued, heaving herself to her feet, "I suppose I shall have to go to Swansea get the run-around there. I do hope you will look into these disappearing letters as well. What is this country coming to when loyal citizens don't receive their mail? No, don't get up, I'm sure you're a busy man."
And with that very pointed, spite filled comment, Marge Dursley swept out of the Little Whinging Police Station. And every officer offered a – more-or-less devout – prayer that she would never darken their doorstep again.
Well, all except one. Sergeant Smith had rather enjoyed the misery that they had managed to inflict on this disgusting Muggle. He alone knew what had happened to the missing letters – in fact they were languishing in a cupboard in the Dead Letter Office, where no-one would ever find them – for the simple and excellent reason that he was the one who had confunded the mailman.
For Sergeant Smith was, in fact, a pure-blood wizard. And it seemed that taunting Marge was no longer on the menu. On the bright side, that meant he could leave this boring job behind. One last report to the witch who had asked him to check up on the woman as a 'special favour' and he could be shot of the Muggle world again. Though it would be an interesting report – he was sure that Messalina Nott would be most interested to learn of Dudley Dursley's whereabouts.
Swansea, eh? Who would have guessed. Perhaps he should have read the letters before losing them, after all. No matter. They knew now. And if Dudley had taken Potter's name, that might mean they could use him as leverage somehow. Apparently, despite all the mass of evidence he had uncovered about the way the Muggles viewed Harry Potter, the latter had a soft spot for this one, at least.
And such a thing could easily prove to be an exploitable weakness...
ooOOoo
Vernon Dursley collapsed onto his bed as the sun began to set at four o'clock. For once, it seemed, there were no chores to do: no children to marshal to classes; nothing to clean; no-one yelling at him. And after the stress of visitors, and seeing Lucius Malfoy again, and making sure the wizard didn't see him, and the relief that Tony – or Adam, he supposed he must call him now – was now with his family, with a father that loved him; after all this in one day, after so many weeks of tedious drudgery, one can perhaps forgive Vernon for being exhausted.
So he lay down to rest for five minutes.
Johan Ries looked in on his caretaker at five o'clock. He was a little concerned about how the man might feel; for Johan had come, not exactly to like, but at least to accept, the Muggle. And he knew that Dursley had a soft spot for Adam Nott, so perhaps it was not surprising that he wondered if Dursley might be feeling a little down.
What was surprising was the sight that greeted him as he gently entered the room.
There on his cot, sleeping soundly, lay Vernon Dursley. And, for the first time ever that Ries could remember, he was smiling.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

Sorry for the long delay. Real life got very hairy.
Grateful thanks as always to the wonderful Bicky Monster for helpful suggestions.

Thanks: To all who reviewed!
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