“Dad? How come you walk with a cane?” a small voice pulled Harry’s attention from the book he was reading. “Mum won’t tell me. Was it from the war? James says it is.”

Harry smiled wistfully at the child standing in front of him. Named for the two most important men in his life, Albus Severus Potter was far more like his middle name-sake than his first. For being just shy of ten, he was already extremely observant, quite reserved, and more sensitive to change than either of his siblings. Of course he would be curious as to why his father walked a little strange and acted ‘funny’ sometimes.

“Come here, Al,” Harry said, patting the sofa cushion next to him lightly. “The story as to how I ended up with a cane is a long one. James knows some of it; we told him a few details before he started school, but I know you won’t just accept a few details.”

Al climbed onto the sofa, sitting cross legged and facing his father. His dad had walked with a cane for as long as he could remember. The few occasions he didn’t use the cane, he limped extremely badly and would lean on things around him for support. It never stopped him from playing or flying though. Some of Al’s favorite memories were of his mom yelling at his dad for doing things that ‘would get him killed’ like flying his broom super fast.

But once he realized his dad was different from the other dads, he was worried.

“You know how there are people out there who call me ‘The-Boy-Who-Lived-Twice?’” Harry started.

Al nodded and leaned in, “Because you survived the killing curse when you were a baby, right? And then again during the war?”

“Yes, and won against Voldemort. What most people don’t realize is what the killing curse did. You see, the first time I was hit by it, it left my scar. No one had ever survived it before, however, so no one thought to check for any damage.”

Al gasped. Even at nine years old, he knew that getting hit in the head could cause damage. There had been a lot of muggle news reports from America about muggle American-football players having horrible brain damage from getting hit in the head. It scared him to think that something like that had happened to his dad.

“Because it happened when I was so young, I grew up with the damage done. It caused me some problems with my left side, which caused me to get teased a lot when I was in primary school, but I learned how to hide my weaknesses rather quickly. When I got into Hogwarts, everyone was expecting a healthy boy to be there, so that’s what they saw. Everyone except for Professor Snape ignored the slight weakness I had on my left side.”

Harry paused for a moment as Al smiled. The boy loved hearing any stories about his name-sakes, particularly ones about Severus Snape as the man was still considered to be a rather controversial figure.

“Did he figure it out, dad?”

“Sort of, though he didn’t realize what exactly was wrong until after my fourth year. That summer, I started having visions of Voldemort and his followers. If he tortured them, I could feel it too. I hope you never, ever have to feel the Cruciatus curse, Al. It’s terrible,” Harry said, shuttering.

“Over and over, I would fall into these visions. Over and over, I would be tortured. And every time I woke up, there was damage done to my brain and nerves. Every time this happened, it further damaged the areas that had been damaged by the killing curse as well as causing damage to other nerves in my body. After Dudley and I got attacked by a dementor, it destabilized some of the magic that was protecting my brain. Professor Snape figured out pretty quickly it was the Cruciatus I was going through after I was taken to a safe house to live with him and Professor Dumbledore got me help.”

Al looked at Harry with wide eyes. Everyone knew some of the timeline of events which had happened to his dad; they even talked about it some in his history class last year! To hear his dad talk about it and fill in the gaps was scary. But now that he had started talking, he needed to know the whole story. He had to know.

“I continued to have visions periodically throughout the school year and had to keep being put on potions to combat the damage these visions were causing me. Professor Snape even tried to teach me Occlumency, but I was so rubbish at it we stopped after a few lessons. I couldn’t focus on anything for a long period of time and would routinely forget things by that point, despite the potions. After one particular vision, I tried to get my friends to go with me to the Department of Mysteries because I swore up and down that Uncle Padfoot was being held there by Voldemort.

“He wasn’t, and thankfully Professor Dumbledore got a hold of him and brought him to me. Otherwise, I would have likely found a way out of school and gone to the Department on my own to rescue him.

“That summer, I spent much of it in the Janus Thickey Ward at St. Mungo's as they pumped my stomach full of potions trying to counteract the damage that was being done during my visions. At one point, before they discovered a potions cocktail which worked for me, I was completely paralyzed on my left side, I could only see out of half of each eye, and was refusing to acknowledge my left side even existed. I was also having seizures after a vision.

“Your mom would come every day and help the healers take care of me. She actually blames me for her getting interested in healing and not trying to pursue a professional Quidditch career.”

Al was in shock. He had never thought his dad had been that bad off. He was always so strong and worked so hard, to think of him as anything other than that was difficult. And to think of his mom as being a Quidditch player was equally strange. She had always been so happy working at St. Mungos, it was hard to think of her ever playing sports and being good enough to think about playing professionally.

“What happened then?” Al said, leaning in.

“Professor Dumbledore discovered that Voldemort had been creating Horcruxes. He had been splitting his soul so he could live forever. During my sixth year, the visions lessened up and allowed me to get on top of all of the problems I was having. Professor Dumbledore took me around with him to destroy many of the Horcruxes as I was better able to draw them out, though we weren’t alone. Professor Snape and Uncle Padfoot came with us a lot.

“Eventually, it was discovered that the connection I had with Voldemort was not simply due to the killing curse backfiring. I had a piece of Voldemort’s soul stuck in me by accident.”

Al gasped in horror. Voldemort was the most evil being ever and he had been inside of his dad? Did that make his dad evil? Was Voldemort still stuck in him?

“You got him out though, right dad?” Al said, nearly begging.

“Yeah, though not on purpose. You see, shortly after we found out I was a Horcrux, Professor Dumbledore got cursed by a different one of them. He ended up losing his battle with the curse mid way through my sixth year. By that point, Voldemort had regained much of his former power and decided to attack the school. We all put up a good fight, but in the end Professor Snape ended up going against him. See, Professor Snape had been a spy during the first war and knew how Voldemort liked to fight.

“Professor Snape was a fantastic dueller, but Bellatrix LeStrange attacked him from the side. I ended up being the next person to fight him and he tried to kill me too. But he ended up only killing his Horcrux. I was dead for several minutes as well, but Uncle Padfoot had found the Resurrection Stone of the Deathly Hallows during our searches for the Horcruxes. While Voldemort was gloating over my death, he snuck over to me as a dog and put the stone in my mouth and brought me back to life.

“By some miracle, I managed to fight Voldemort one last time and he was finally destroyed.”

Al let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. He knew his dad would win, but it was still a scary story.

“But then what happened?” Al asked, knowing the story wasn’t over.

“Bellatrix tortured me for several minutes before she was apprehended and killed. I still don’t know who killed her; no one will tell me. I spent the next few months in the intensive care unit followed by a whole year in the Janus Thickey Ward. I ended up graduating a year behind Uncle Ron and Aunt Hermione because of it. No one thought I would be able to do it, but I worked really hard and your mom helped me study even when my memory was giving me problems.”

Al sat in silence for a few minutes as he mulled over the story. He had known his dad was incredible, how could he not, but hearing the story out of his dad’s mouth made it even more unbelievable how amazing he was. To have survived so much and only come out the other side with a limp and needing to take several potions every day was a miracle. It was no wonder then that people were always so in awe when he said he was a Potter.

“Dad?” Al finally asked.

“Yeah?”

“How did Professor Snape know something was wrong before everyone else?”

“I couldn’t use the floo without falling over,” Harry said, laughing slightly. "Of all the things to tip that man off, my inability to use the floo was it."