The Journey Cycle Pt 2: New Zealand (pt 2 complete

8

The following day dawned bright and sunny. Harry was vaguely aware of a small sound from somewhere until he undid the silencing charm and the noise resolved itself into a knock on the door. Yet another shout for the Potter-Snapes to remind them of impending breakfast. It would seem that neither were really morning people, though neither minded being woken to the sound of, “Brekkie in twenty, guys”. A quick wash and brush and they were seated around the fire, tucking into hot food, again courtesy of Frank who was inspired by the fire that he cooked on, waving away all offers of help.

Harry noticed the logs were starting to get low and said as much out loud. Frank chucked his keys at Sammy, “Take the sidie, get a big pile. I take it you guys need some for Bessie?” Severus smiled at him, “It’s a bit decadent, but it ensures a nice warm night, thanks”. Sammy spoke up, “Who’s coming with....?”, and before he could get any further, Harry had volunteered.

After breakfast, Sammy and Harry piled onto Frank’s big Triumph with a sidecar and started to move off down the hill. The journey was bumpy in the extreme, which led Harry to cry out loud. Sammy howled laughing, “I guess it was your turn to be drilled into the bedding, then?” Harry said nothing, only thumping his shoulder. Over the next vicious bump, he grabbed onto the back of Sammy’s jacket, and over the next, something brushed his hand as it flew out of Sammy’s pocket.

“Whoa, whoa”, Harry thumped Sammy’s back until the man slowed and stopped. “Something fell out of your pocket”, Harry explained, before jumping off the back of the bike and heading back the way they had come. He looked hither and yon in the sparse, dry grass and spotted something a few feet away.

Sammy called out, “Well spotted, mate, it was my wallet”, as Harry reached and bent to retrieve it. It was as he yelled out, “Found it”, that he picked it up. It was as he picked it up that he saw it was open to the inside. And it was as he looked through the small plastic window to what was obviously the man’s current driving licence that he saw.....

The blond’s name. And Harry’s world shrank a little.

Under the laminate was a signature and a printed name. The signature was a blur but the print was quite clear. It said, Mr X. G. S. Samuels-Black. Along with a photo of a much younger Sammy.

The picture had faded somewhat and the ruddiness in the man’s skin wasn’t there. Neither was the plumpness in the cheeks. The picture jolted him as to it’s likeness to Draco once again, but now, in light of what he knew, he redrew the man’s jawline, the square set, the set of the firm mouth even while the lips were plumper and the bridge of the nose was a little more pronounced. And gulped.

“I take it, ‘Sammy’ is from Samuels?”, Harry asked lightly. Sammy snorted, “Well, you should have been fucking lumbered with the rest of it. That’s how I knew Severus’ name was Latin, ‘cos all mine are too”. Harry dug gently, his heart hammering, “Oh, do tell. I won’t tell anyone else except Sev”. Sammy cast him a sidelong glance, “There’s only Jed knows me full name. Tell anyone but your hubby and I may have to deprive you of knees”.

Harry gave his best innocent expression and Sammy took a deep breath, “M’name’s Xavier Gaius Sirius Samuels-Black”.

Harry had to sit down rather suddenly, “What was your father’s name, if you don’t mind me asking?” Sammy shrugged, “You seem awfully interested, Harry. Truth to tell, I don’t know much. When my mum finally told me of my origins, I was about fourteen. She’d been to this bike rally and had met this bloke. Made for each other, to hear her tell it. They had this great week together then split up. They’d exchanged phone numbers.

A few weeks later, mum finds out she’s pregnant with me and tries to track this bloke down. You have to remember, all she knows is that he’s English, same as her. Anyway, after quite a bit of effort, she does track him down and he weeps and wails all over her but isn’t going to take responsibility, says he’s in hiding and in great danger, gives my mum ten grand and a one-way ticket to New Zealand. So she takes it and we come out here. The next time she tries to contact him again, she hears he’s been locked up for life for some kind of spree killing. Then the next we hear is that he’s dead. Beyond that I know little else but his name. Sirius Black. He apparently said he was the son of aristocracy but I know mum looked him up in Burke’s Peerage and Debrett’s and he was nowhere to be found”. All said so casually, but Harry was in knots inside.

They gathered the wood, Harry keeping his tone as light as he could and rode back up the field. Harry and Severus ate lunch separately from the others, smoked salmon in a warm bean salad, perfectly cooked by Severus as Harry raised the issue with Severus, “Looks like ol’ Sirius had a son”, Harry commented around a mouthful of food, “And then shipped them out before the war came to him. Knowing Siri, that money would have bankrupted him, but he would have done all he could at the time”.

Harry noticed Severus’ sceptical look and batted his shoulder, “Well. A short time later, he was in fucking Azkaban. What gets my goat is, were those names old Black family names or did Drae know more about my godfather than he let on?” Severus shook his head, “No, those names go back a long way. But surely, it’s a lot of supposition for someone this far away, even though he does bear more than a passing resemblance to both Draco Malfoy and Sirius Black”. Harry shook his head, “I’ve got a weird feeling about it all, Sev. I need to talk to Hermione”.

Severus smiled at his beloved, “Then, let’s go and see if those ladies in that bus have their Internet connection sorted out yet”, he snaked an arm around Harry and pulled him in for a kiss. Harry replied passionately, “Yes, let’s”, as he drew away reluctantly, then undid the laptop and the wires, stuffing them into the backpack.

The others were just finishing lunch when Harry and Severus climbed down from Bessie, said their good day’s and headed for the bus halfway down the field, Harry slinging his pack over his shoulder as they went.

Harry tapped shyly on the driver’s door to receive no answer. They heard a shout from overhead. They stood back to see this tiny woman executing the most perfect karate kata Severus had ever seen. She was on the roof of her bus going through the moves like a hot knife through butter and both men watched, fascinated. She finished her kata, bowing to the East then spotted them, their mouths agape. Harry applauded, then shaded his eyes as she climbed down, “That was beautiful. We’re looking for Rosie”.

The two men watched as she descended with all the grace of a feline then she approached and held her hand out, “I’m Rosie, you must be the two Brits with Frankie’s lot?” Harry laughed and took her hand, shaking it, “News travels fast here. You’re right. I’m Harry and this is my husband, Severus”. The tiny woman gave both their hands a decisive shake. “Come on the bus, I’ll get you a connection sorted out. We always have a few teething problems each year”. She continued her mumble as she climbed aboard and led Harry and Severus.

The bus’ interior was pretty bleak. Desks with monitors all down one side and a booth to the rear. This was a business space not a living space. She awoke the main computer then allocated them a space for the laptop and Harry plugged in. She took a few dollars from him and established their connection via Sat-phone. “We can’t get a better connection than this”, she muttered as she left them to it. The first thing Harry did was call Hermione.

She wasn’t at home yet so he caught up with her at work, doing a late shift. She was delighted to hear from him and they exchanged mindless gossip for a while until he dropped his little bombshell, “It’s looking like Sirius had a son that he knew little about”, that made Hermione go silent on the line. Then she delivered her own missile. “Harry, you need to check out the e-mail I sent you, the result of Christine’s endeavours here, you have to admit it was most successful. Click on the attachment I sent you and see what you think. Have you got....?”, and she named some proprietary listening software, Harry answered in the affirmative. She wouldn’t or couldn’t give any more details than that. They chatted a bit longer to the limit of Harry’s time, Hermione speaking to both of them and then the line was cut as they were saying their goodbyes.

Harry paid over some more money and concentrated on his e-mails, his eyes widening as he saw some of the titles, most from Hermione. But it was the one entitled, “I’ve Cracked It!!!” that he opened first. He downloaded the attached file and opened it into the appropriate programme. He waited for it to load and felt Severus’ arms around him. “No matter what this is. You will not face it alone”, was his only comment and Harry melted into the circle of his arms. The instruction on the e-mail said to open a sound programme, like Media Player, as there was sound.

Harry duly did so and the file looked for all the world as if it were playing, but Harry and Severus were not hearing any of it. Harry turned to Rosie, “This is only configured for stereo, yeah?”. The woman nodded, her head emerging from under a desk. Harry’s system was 5:1. He downloaded and saved the e-mail along with all the rest to be read off-line then quit his station, folding up the laptop. He was incommunicative as they made their way back to Bessie.

Harry was clearly nervous as he plugged in back on Bessie, his full sound system plugged in. This time when he ran the sound file, instead of nothing, was a sound to chill his bones.

Parseltongue.

A diatribe, not a curse.

And absolutely nothing mentioning deadly diseases.

Instead, the snake-faced bastard had ranted on about the prophecy being fulfilled at long last but that his final plan, left to others, would still flourish after his death. How he was unable to lead in the flesh but that his spirit would live on evermore, once he had ‘eaten death’ or some such thing, in the very land of the dead, and those that made it there alive would enjoy ultra-long lives in the land of ‘eaten death’.

This made absolutely no sense to Harry at all, and, even with the slowing down technique that had been employed, Harry knew he was missing several chunks of it, so saved it to a file then shut his machine down. He would examine it in greater detail later. It still left several questions unanswered.

Like why Harry and Severus had not been infected. If Remus and Draco had caught the disease the normal way, then surely, he and Sev..... Harry’s thoughts whirled around.

“You realise that this means we probably need to be tested, don’t you?”, Harry murmured. Severus drew Harry close and kissed his hair, “You’re probably right. The two of us could be ‘typhoid Mary’s’, couldn’t we?” Harry nodded, “All this time and I thought it was a curse he cast. So what was that yellow light all about? He was obviously casting something. And what the hell do we tell Sammy about his father? God, life just got a whole lot more confusing”.

Severus’ tone was reasonable, “Are you able to dowse for magical ability? Like Hermione did for Julia in Crete?” Harry turned in his arms to face his lover, “I sort of know what I’m looking for, but her and Ollie are the experts on this” Severus looked absently over Harry’s shoulders and Harry could see the work going on behind the dark eyes, “It occurred to me, that if Sammy is indeed the spawn of the mutt, then he may have inherited some of his father’s abilities. Whatever I think of the man personally, he was a strong wizard and an Animagus to boot. If Sammy is indeed a wizard, it’s quite likely that he is completely untrained and actually a bit of a liability to himself and others at times”.

Harry shrugged, “He seems to have got through life okay up to now”. Severus smiled down at him, “Well it may look that way, but we hardly know the man after all. Perhaps we should cook a meal for him and his lover and drill them for a bit of info while you dowse him secretly. If he is a complete squib, perhaps it’s better he doesn’t know any more than he already does”. Harry was annoyed slightly, “Whoa, hang on, there. If Sirius is his dad, then he has a right to know that the man was exonerated, that he didn’t die a criminal at any rate, magical matters aside”.

Severus grumbled his assent. Harry continued, “And what kid, of whatever age, doesn’t want to hear about a parent they never knew? I know I would if new info was forthcoming”, his voice was soft. Severus relented, “You are right. O wise one. The man has been dead for over twenty five years and I should be past all the crap by now. All right, having decided that we’ll tell him a bit more, what happens if you read magic from him? How much do we tell? And if he is a wizard, what can he do to train his powers at this late age?”

Harry sighed, “I’ve no idea”, before he brightened and pulled away from Severus’ embrace, “Tell you what though”, his eyes were bright as he rummaged for his phone, “I could talk to Ginny and she could take a peek into the Book of Registration at Hogwarts to see if a name appears in the vicinity of Sirius’. If there’s sufficiently magical progeny born to any witch or wizard that attended Hogwarts then a record is set up, even though there may only be a question mark if there’s no name, or the person slipped out from under the radar”.

While he conceded this an excellent plan, Severus gently reminded Harry that it was now gone midnight in their half of the globe. Harry laughed, “Ginny always was a night owl, Sev, and it’s Friday night back home, so she won’t have to get up in the morning”. He busied himself trying to call but there was just a series of strange noises on the line. “We’ll have to use the Sat-Phone again. Come on, no time like the present”, he jumped up again. Severus sighed and followed him.

There was a queue for the phone this time, so Harry busied himself at one of the consoles, sending Ginny an e-mail instead, then another to Ron asking him to make sure his sister saw hers and got in touch with Harry as soon as possible. He’d done all he could for now and closed his account.

Severus wandered back to their camp leaving Harry in line for the phone. Harry got into idle conversation with the others who were waiting, a younger Malaysian couple as it turned out, who made the trek to New Zealand every year for this event. The two men were heavily pierced and tattooed from what Harry could see of the flesh protruding from sleeves of their t-shirts and the board shorts they both wore. They tuned out and got into some serious snogging. The girl on the phone finished her conversation, red-eyed and sniffling as she handed the machine back to Rosie.

“Well, these are next, but they look a bit preoccupied”, she snorted at Harry as she offered him the next go. He stepped forward and into the little booth.

He dialled Ginny’s mobile and waited to leave a message for her when the woman herself picked up and answered cautiously, “Hi, Gin, it’s me, Harry. Sorry if it’s a bit late. If you don’t recognise this number, it’s cos I’m on a satellite phone though I believe it’s quite safe to talk freely”. They gossiped for a while then Ginny’s voice grew serious, “Come on, Harry, you don’t ring in the middle of the night just for a goss. What’s up?” So he told her.

He could hear the gasp from across the world. “Fuck. Aurora’ll still be awake, she’s not so much a night bird as a pure insomniac. I’ll firecall her right away. Can you call me back in half an hour or so?” Harry assented and hung up. He popped his head out of the booth, “I have to use it again in half an hour. Trouble at home. Would it be possible....?” Rosie nodded, “Those other two will be back later, I think they went off for a fuck, but for now, matey, it’s all yours, so long as you aren’t having your buddies call back are you?”, she narrowed her eyes, all business. Harry dug into his pockets and paid her again, “No, I’m to ring her back”.

Harry twiddled and paced as he waited, consulting the clock on his own phone. The second that thirty minutes had elapsed, he was back on the phone and Ginny picked up on the first ring.

“Wow, Harry. You were right, there’s a question mark under Sirius Black’s name in the Register. He’s definitely got a kid some where and said kid’s a magical. So there’s your answer”. Harry sighed heavily, “I rather feared that this would be the case. Shit, Gin. How do I get myself into these things?”, to hear Ginny’s clear laughter from several time zones away, “Harry, it’s just you, sweetie. You’re a trouble magnet, love, and always have been”.

“So, what do I say to the guy now, Gin?” He could almost hear her classic shrug, “Dunno, sweetpea, just play it by ear”. “Well, take a look at the pictures I uploaded to ‘Mione. Sammy’s dead easy to spot, he’s a ringer for Drae with Siri’s mouth and chin. There’s no mistaking the Black genes and he knows his dad’s name. If I do nothing else, I want him to know that Siri was exonerated of his crimes. The guy thinks his dad died a hunted serial killer, so I can do that much at least”. Ginny assented, “Though it could be sort of good for him to know a bit about his magical side, as well. There will have been things that happened to him, especially when he was an adolescent, that were probably pretty scary....”. Harry cut in, “Yeah, we’d thought of that, but what about if he wants to train, you know? Or wants to have a go at finding a wand to fit him. All that sort of thing?”

Ginny sighed, “I really don’t know, love. I really felt for that little friend of yours, Julia, last year, and was glad that her magical levels weren’t much, to be honest. She and Hermione have a good correspondence and she shows a lot of interest but that’s as far as it goes. Does this Sammy even know that his father was a wizard?”

“No, it would seem not. Sirius told Sammy’s mother he was from an aristocratic family and she looked him up in muggle sources, so I presume even his mother didn’t know. They met at a bike rally in England”. Ginny laughed, “Well, that would certainly explain Sammy’s love of bikes at any rate”, and Harry joined in, chuckling. He always felt calmer after talking to his sisters. There was a polite knock on the booth door reminding Harry that his allotted time was running out. “Have to go, Gin. Great talking to you, girlie, and check out the pics I sent to ‘Mione. Keep in touch, yeah. Love to everyone”, and he rang off.

Severus was enjoying a laugh with Mike and Matt around the fire when Harry returned. The laughter died on the older man’s lips when he saw the expression on Harry’s face. He stood quickly and embraced him whispering, “Is it as bad as we feared?” Harry nodded, “He’s a full-on wizard, Sev, he’s got a question mark in the Register at school and Aurora Sinistra and Ginny have no reason to lie to us”. Severus pulled away slightly and ran a distracted hand through his hair. Harry glanced around the fire, there were only the four of them about, the others weren’t in evidence.

Mike tentatively asked, “Are you guys okay? Trouble back home?” Harry moved into the circle and sat heavily on the groundsheet. “How well do you know Sammy and Jed?”, he asked. “Pretty well. We’ve been riding regularly with them for a few years now, ever since they joined the Wellington chapter in fact. The six of us ride everywhere and we’ve socialised outside of the bike scene. We don’t know much about each other, though. I know his mum brought him up single-handedly and she’s English but that’s about all. We’re not tell-all buddies or anything. Why?”

Harry sat forward, crossing his legs tailor-style and leant his elbows on his knees dropping his head into his upturned palms, “It’s just I think we may have known Sammy’s dad back in England”, he went no further than that and the other two just shrugged. They obviously had never been told of Sammy’s father’s notoriety. Not that Harry could blame Sammy. If that were all the knowledge that he had had about his own father, he wasn’t sure that he would want such things generally known either.

He nodded and raised his head, better not to give too much away at this point, certainly not before he had had another chance to talk to Sammy. “It’s just a bit weird is all, to think that we may have something that important in common and the randomness with which we all met up. Still, if travel has taught me anything, it’s that the strangest things happen on the road”, he smiled ruefully. Mike chuckled, “You can say that again. I was in some damn place in the American Midwest, you know, the one-horse town, middle a’ nowhere, walks into the local saloon and a guy two years younger than me at school serves me behind the bar. Weird or what?”

Harry casually asked after the others to be told that Frank and Chris were helping the organisers set up the racetrack for the following day and Jed and Sammy were off-site shopping and riding around. “Sammy didn’t look too happy after you two had been woodin’ this morning”, Matt stated baldly, “You didn’t come on to him or anything, did you? He looked proper put out”. Harry shook his head. “Nah, that’s when we talked a bit about his dad, but he has no memory of him. That would upset anyone, I suppose”.

****

In the end, it was Sammy who approached them. As he got closer, Harry could see the red rims of his eyes and sense the confusion pouring from him, that someone he had met out of thin air could actually know his own father better than he. Harry’s heart went out to the man. Sammy cocked his head in the direction of Bessie, “Can we go in her and talk?”, his voice was a bit croaky. Harry nodded, “Of course”, recognising the need for the other man’s privacy. “Would you prefer if it were just you and I?” Sammy shook his head. “I want Jed with me and I don’t mind your husband being there, It’s his home after all”.

Severus leaned forward and kept his voice low, “I don’t mind in the slightest if you don’t want me there, but there is perhaps, information that you require that only I can supply”. Sammy nodded, “Okay then, just the four of us”.

Harry closed Bessie’s door and invited Jed and Sammy to take the sofa. Severus offered them cold beer which all accepted and Harry searched his brain for a place to start.

Sammy broke the tense silence, “So, just what do you know of my dad, then?” Harry stopped pacing about in the cramped space and had an idea. He toed off his shoes and jumped onto the bed over to his locker and mumbled the spell to open it. He fetched down an old hardbacked exercise book held together with rubber bands. He undid it and drew out two photographs.

“Sammy, stand up a minute”, he requested gently and the man did so. Harry opened the door of the wardrobe, revealing the mirror. He switched on the little light over it and invited Sammy to stand before it and look at himself. “Could you remove your cap, Sammy?” and the man did.

Harry then held up the first photo, a head-shot of Draco taken about two years before he died, before he had lost weight and his eyes still were full of life. Harry held the picture next to Sammy’s head, one hand obscuring the lower half of Draco’s face. Sammy glanced from his own reflection to that of the picture Harry held and he gasped, “Bloody hell, no wonder you both reacted as you did when you first met me. We really do look alike. Is this your ex, Harry?”

Harry hummed his assent. He then took down the picture of Draco and placed his palm over the top half of the second picture, once again positioning it where Sammy could plainly see himself and it. The strong, square jaw was unmistakeable, and, although, his own lips were thicker, the mouth was in all other ways identical, to the little crease by the left corner. Sammy was once again stunned, “So, who’s this then?”, he asked softly. Harry took the picture away and asked Sammy to turn. “If you can handle it, then this is a picture of your father”. The man held out a shaking hand and Harry handed it over.

There was a long silence. Sammy slowly ran fingers over the somewhat creased black and white shot, “This is really him? Sirius Black?”, his tone held awe. “This is the first time I’ve ever seen a picture of him. Mum often described him to me, but I still would never have thought.....I’m babbling.....he’s a looker at any rate”, he subsided and his hand visibly shook. Jed stood to be beside his lover and snaked a comforting arm around his waist, “Are you okay, babe?”, he nuzzled Sammy’s neck.

Sammy turned a little to give his lover a distracted kiss then back to the picture. Harry said gently, “There’s something that I need for you to know, Sammy. Your father was not a killer. Eventually the person who did commit the murders was caught and imprisoned and Sirius was pardoned. You have to believe me, you see, Sirius was one of the people I loved most in the world and when he died it was like a piece of me went with him. I say this, because the crime for which he did time was that of killing thirteen people in a public place and that of leading their murderers to my parents who were killed in cold blood when I was a baby”.

At this, Sammy’s shocked face came up sharply, “Really?”, his only utterance. Harry nodded, “I found out he’d been framed and I was partly instrumental in the capture of the real perpetrator, even while I wanted to believe in his badness. But for the short time I knew the man, he was always a good bloke”. Harry dug Severus in the ribs at the snort which emanated from the older man.

“All right, I may as well tell you”, Severus began, “I knew your father from boyhood, we attended the same school, were in the same year. Let it suffice to say that we never really got on, although it pains me that father and son will never know each other. That I wouldn’t wish upon anyone. I thought the man a careless rogue and a chancer, but I imagine that to some, that would seem to rather add to his so-called charm. However, he was killed in an heroic manner and perished trying to save Harry here who was under grave threat. If nothing else, then your father had a lot of courage, mixed in with equal parts foolhardiness”.

Sammy turned bemused eyes to Harry, “Why was he saving you? What were you to him? Are we, erm, brothers or something. After all this, I wouldn’t be at all surprised”. Harry smiled, “No, Sirius was my godfather. I am not related by blood, but when he broke out of jail, he came to find me. I was still at school and half of Britain was looking for him but we had, erm, sort of tracked down the actual murderer of my parents and all the mugg-er-innocent bystanders. He had to warn me that this killer was after me and had, erm, infiltrated the school in, er, disguise. He risked all sorts to warn us.

As to relations, you and I share no blood whatsoever, but your are a second cousin to my late partner and, yes, strange as it may sound, you are actually from a very old and aristocratic bloodline”. This made Sammy protest, “But mum looked it up everywhere and there was no trace of an ancient family of Black”. Harry looked helplessly at Severus, “I hate only telling half the bloody story”, he groused. Severus raised a brow, “It’s up to you, Harry. Can we trust these two. Remember your own position vis-a-vis recent events and what revelation may cost you”.

Sammy and Jed looked thoroughly confused by now and sat back down on the sofa once more watching this interplay with fascination on Sammy’s part and trepidation on Jed’s. Harry flicked a glance at Sammy and flashed his open palm his way as he spoke to his husband, “Yes, but he has a right to know what he is and where he comes from, that’s if you want to know”, the piercing green eyes had suddenly been turned on Sammy and he gulped under such intensity, “I don’t know what you mean, ‘what I am’”, he sounded a little breathless and a teeny bit affronted, but he couldn’t doubt the seriousness of Harry’s tone. Harry breathed deeply, “You’re special. You always have been and this specialness was passed from your father”.

Severus cut in smoothly, “You know, Harry, you really should ask them to swear to secrecy or something first, you know, whatever you tell them from here on in should remain in this van and not outside of it”. Harry turned to his husband and flashed him a grin, “Yes, love, you are right”. He turned back to the other two and held out his hand, “Do you solemnly swear not to reveal anything of what I tell you in the next few minutes?” Sammy braced himself, licking his lips, then held out a strong hand, “I swear, mate”, and shook Harry’s. Harry once again glanced at Severus who nodded once. Harry knew then, that Severus had ‘read’ him using Legilimency and he was sure of his motives.

Severus inclined his head slightly at Jed and also nodded. Harry turned back to them and shook Jed’s hand. He paced a moment and dived for the fridge, “I think this next bit will be easier with a bit of lubrication, so to speak”, to the nervous guffaws of the two on the sofa. He uncapped the cold bottles and handed them round, then slid down to the bed, thinking.

Eventually he sat up having decided on his tack. “Sammy, when you were a kid, especially when you were in your teens, did odd things happen to you? For example if you were angry or sad?” Sammy was taken aback by this track and shook his head and looked down, searching his memories, “Well, er, yes, as a matter of fact. All through my teens, mum was convinced we had a poltergeist and it seemed to be centred on me. She sent the story to one of those paranormal mags and won five hundred bucks I believe. But it died off once I reached my twenties. Why?”

Severus asked the next question, “How did these poltergeist episodes manifest themselves. What would happen exactly?”, he was standing, leaning on the back of the passenger seat, an old trick, so that neither of the other two could see them both at once and had to flick their glances to and fro. This way, the two wizards could make assessments and communicate to each other without Sammy or Jed being much the wiser.

Sammy lowered his head somewhat, “Well, when mum sent the story to the mag, we had a guy visit the house from some research place, yeah, the ‘psychical research institute’, I think that was the place and they ran a whole battery of tests on me: ESP and automatic writing, that kind of things. Apparently, my poltergeist was unlike anything they’d ever heard of before”. He stopped and took a long swallow of his beer, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.

“Poltergeists are supposed to chuck stuff about and knock and bang according to this guy but mine didn’t. It seemed it only happened when I was pissed off, and, maaan, was I pissed off as a kid. Mum was always on my case about my room and my music and my mates, you know, the typical teen stuff, but my poltergeist broke things and only very close to me”.

The man frowned deeply, hanging his head in thought, “D’you know? I haven’t thought about all this in years. Why do you want to know?” His tone was suddenly wary. Harry ventured, “It may have some bearing on this ‘specialness’ I mentioned earlier. Bear with us, if there’s something you’d rather not explain, then just say so, we’re just curious. You’ve glimpsed our library after all. You know that we have an interest in these things”.

Sammy conceded ruefully, “That’s prob’ly why I can tell you two, you won’t think I’m a fuckin’ freak or something”. Jed looped his arm round his lover’s waist again as they sat tensely on the edge of the sofa, resting his head lightly on Sammy’s shoulder. Harry smiled at Severus as he spotted this gesture. Whatever he told Sammy now, he knew that Jed would be there for him.

Harry took a deep breath once more, deciding to go off the deep end. “Sammy, have you ever heard of witches and wizards, not the conjurors who pull rabbits out of hats, but the real thing?”

To both Harry’s and Severus’ surprise, the man glanced at them both, then his partner and nodded once. “That guy that tested me? He went on about some parallel universe where these magical folk live and that the poltergeist phenomena reminded him of that kind of thing, erm, what did he call it,,,,erm...”, he tailed off.

Harry said, “Untrained magical phenomena? Something like that?” Sammy looked at him, his eyes widening, “You mean?....Ah, no! Get out! You mean you believe all that? I thought the guy was a nutjob. He seemed quite serious and scientific at the time but when he got onto all that.... I mean”, he twirled his right forefinger in the vicinity of his right ear, “I couldn’t take him seriously.....”, his voice withered again. The silence thickened.

Sammy licked dry lips, “What are you trying to tell me, here?”, he whispered, looking squarely at Harry. Jed looked too. Behind them all, Severus drew his wand and passed it quickly over Sammy’s head after rubbing the tip between his palms, after a moment, he jolted his hand up and nodded, wincing a little, at his husband. Harry caught the look and smiled.

“Sammy Black, you are a wizard”.

For a moment, Sammy looked as if he might keel over but Jed held on tight murmuring, “Always knew there was summat special about you”. Sammy turned to him, “You don’t mind?” Jed kissed his cheek, “Idiot, I’ll always love ya. Now let’s find out more, eh?”

Harry and Severus winked at each other at this display, this was definitely good. Harry slid from the bed to the ground, coming to sit cross-legged before the sofa. He grabbed Sammy’s hands. They were freezing cold. “Sev, we could do with a little heat, could you, love? You have the better angle from here. Watch, Sammy”, Harry instructed.

Severus leaned forward and opened the door of the oven, piling in a few sticks. He stood back and pointed his wand, “Incendio”, he muttered and the sticks burst into flame. “Wow”, blurted Jed, “Does this mean that you two are whassisnames....wizards, too?” Severus smiled, “But of course. Magic is a thing one is born with, it never can be acquired with learning. The learning a wizard does is how to train his or her magical usage and the trammelling of their individual powers. This begins before adolescence, either in a wizard or witch’s own family or when they go to school at eleven. It would appear, Mr Black, that you quite slipped through the net and would seem to be completely uncognisant of your situation to this point”. Harry looked up at his husband and grinned, “You’re not at school now, Sev, lay off with the ‘professor’ thing”.

“No, it’s all right, Harry, I understand”, Sammy squeezed Harry’s hand. The blond looked up at Severus, “So, you just lit a fire with magic? Pointed that stick at it and it lit?” Severus nodded, “Quite so, Sammy. Harry and I are fully trained wizards, although we don’t use a lot of magic whilst travelling, not much point really”, his manner relaxed somewhat.

Sammy nodded at the ‘stick’, “So that thing you’re holding? That would be some kind of ‘magic wand’?” Severus nodded again, “Your brains have definitely come from the matrilineal line”, he remarked drily. Harry laughed, “Oi, less of that”. The blond then admitted, “I’ve seen you use them before, your wand things. The other night while we were still at the beach. You tidied up after we had all gone to bed but I watched. I thought I was having hallucinations, I was a bit pissed after all, but I wasn’t was I, you were doing magic then?

Sammy used the surprised expressions on their faces to release his hands from Harry’s and grabbed his beer, taking a swig, “So you and my dad really didn’t get along then?”, he faced Severus, “No, indeed we didn’t”, the older man sighed, “But I will try and temper my comments. Do not be offended. I forget that Harry has grown used to my sniping and laughs it off. I do not mean to malign the man. I mean no harm”. Appeased, Sammy turned to Harry, “So tell me more”, his eyes sparkled and he shook his head slightly in wonder. Severus turned to the food supplies and started digging stuff out, it was going to be a long afternoon and he was starting to feel peckish. Maybe he wouldn’t be such a nowty bastard with some food inside him. Leaving Harry to tell Sammy and his partner what he could, he tuned them out and started to cook.

Harry moved the three of them to the bed. The others removed shoes and they all scrambled on to give Severus more room to maneouvre and all huddled, wide-eyed, the two natives hanging onto Harry’s every word, Jed just as fascinated as his partner. Severus eyed them from time to time as he worked, musing that if Sammy had been able to attend school, he would almost certainly have been only a year below Harry at school, not to mention being another Slytherin. Perhaps Sammy and Draco...? No, the thought didn’t bear thinking about.

He served them all a Spanish omelette with roasted vegetables which the three hardly noticed, but at least it was eaten. Severus cleaned up, non-magically, he needed something to do, then settled down on the sofa with a book after first casting a silencing charm around those on the bed. Sammy whirled round at the crackle of magic against his skin, “Whoa, what was that? Have we pissed Severus off somehow?” Harry laughed, “No, it’s how we get a little privacy in such a small space. He cast a light charm separating us from him, so we can gab as loud as we like and he has peace and quiet for reading. Magic can be so subtle yet it can kill with two words”.

They carried on talking long into the night. Harry got up for a pee and more beer to notice his husband asleep on the couch, his reading glasses all skew-whiff. He gently removed them and set them aside, kissing Severus on the brow before sitting back with the other two and re-casting the charm, “Don’t want to be too much longer, Sev’s crashed out, and his back’ll play up if he sleeps there all night”.

Sammy tilted the neck of his bottle in Severus’ direction, “So, what did my old man do to piss him off all these years later?” Harry sighed, “It’s a long story, but basically, your dad was best mates with my dad and Remus and Peter, Remus was first your dad’s lover, then Sev’s, by the way”. This made Sammy’s head spin, but he saved the questions for later.

“They went around in a bit of a gang, and, cos they were the popular ones in their year, sometimes they would, er, bully some of the less popular ones. Sev was one of them and they were really mean to him. He would fight back, but it was four-against-one, not nice. Our dads weren’t angels, Sammy, and, yes, love him though I did, Sev’s right when he said your dad could be extremely foolhardy. It’s what got him killed in the end. He didn’t lie to your mum, you know, he really was in danger and he was being hunted. He had been disinherited from the family for being a rebel and not toeing the family line, but he really was an aristocrat. He was also right into bikes and the weirdest thing is, you and he ride more or less the same machine. Yours is from a few years later”.

“Oh, Wow. Okay, so dad was a rebel aristo, into bikes and men and women. He was a wizard as are us three, and, bloody hell, this is all too much”. Jed caught Sammy as he swayed slightly, “I think he’s still in shock, you know. Maybe I’d better let you two get to bed and we can continue this in the morning”. Harry patted his shoulder, “Good idea”, then barely suppressed a yawn. A quick look on the clock on the dashboard confirmed that they had been talking for best part of seven hours. He saw them both out and shut and locked the door before waking Severus.

“Bed time, sleepy”, Severus grunted and rolled away from him. Harry sniggered and simply levitated him over to the bed, stripping him before he landed, then Harry pulled the covers over him. He opened a fresh beer and sat on the floor before Bessie’s open oven door staring absently at the flames as he thought over the day.

They had found another wizard and Sirius’ son at that. This was possibly the nearest he would ever be to having a full-on brother and he found the thought a little disturbing. After all this time, he had a passel of brothers, the Weasleys, and he didn’t really want any more; but he liked Sammy, and Jed - he had to admit, but now what? Was this just another transitory travel thing or could this go deeper. He could tell that Severus probably wanted no more to do with all this, but Harry had a feeling that for good or ill, Sammy Black had just become a semi-permanent fixture in his life. Still, he mused, Julia and Hermione had a great correspondence relationship going that was going from strength to strength and it would be unfair of him to leave Draco’s cousin out in the cold having just informed him of his heritage. So, his randy old godfather had a kid? He had nearly died of shock when he’d seen the name on Sammy’s licence earlier, but the family resemblances were startling. He’d have to ask the man to agree to a short identification test then he would tell him of the codicil attached to Drae’s will. He finished his beer, slowly clearing his mind, a habit from the old days, but tonight, if he didn’t it would be anxiety and worry keeping him awake. He sighed, it was better than blind fear and numb horror at any rate. He needed to talk to Hermione again. On that thought, he sought his bed, carefully closing the oven door and dousing the lights.


Heehee, the plot thickens! Please review! The Squig