“There is certainly something odd about the entire sequence of events,” Lucius said to Harry. They were both sitting on the sofa with an official Ministry document. Alexei had finally been able to pull everything on the Crouch family, particularly Crouch Jr., and brought it home. Lucius had read through most of it, finding a few inconsistencies. He was now going through it all with Harry.

“What exactly?” Harry asked, trying to see what Lucius was seeing.

“It would appear Mrs. Crouch disappeared around the same time her son died in Azkaban,” Lucius said.

“Why is that odd?” Harry asked. “Maybe she was just really sad and wanted to leave.”

Lucius hummed to himself. “Maybe.”

“You obviously don’t think so,” Harry said.

“I’m not sure what I think,” Lucius said. “I find it hard to believe that Crouch Jr. could be alive but…”

“Is it possible?” Harry asked and Lucius sighed.

“There are ways to appear dead.”

“Why so somber?” Alexei asked as he entered the rooms, holding a couple of large brown envelopes.

“We’re looking at all the Crouch stuff you brought,” Harry said, moving over closer to Lucius so the vampire could join them on the sofa.

“Find anything?” Alexei asked, putting his packages on the coffee table.

“There is something odd, but nothing conclusive,” Lucius said. He went to close the file but found it snatched by Harry who read through it all intently. “It seems it could be possible that Crouch Jr. is alive.”

Alexei’s eyes widened in surprise. “Really? How?”

Lucius shrugged. “As I said, nothing is conclusive.”

The vampire nodded, looking at Harry whose eyebrows were furrowed in his concentration. “Well, I have something that could provide a distraction.” He reached out and grabbed one of the envelopes, the larger of the two.

Harry looked up. “What is it?”

“These are the listings on all of my properties,” Alexei said. “I thought we might go through them and begin trying to decide where we would like to live. After all, there is only a month of the school year left.”

Harry found himself blinking as he realized the truth in the vampire’s statement. There was only a month left. He really wasn’t going back to the Dursleys’. He was really going to be living with these three men. His face fell into a slight frown as he considered something.

“Isn’t it going to be hard or dangerous for me to live with you?” Harry said. “Severus is a spy and Lucius is still thought to be Dark Side Loyal. What if someone finds out?”

“Then we will deal with it,” Lucius said.

“All of these properties are well protected and cannot be traced,” Alexei said. “Nothing will ever be able to get any of us at these places.”

“You are staying with us no matter what,” Severus said, coming out of his lab. “We all knew it wouldn’t be a simple situation.”

“I just don’t want to put you in more danger,” Harry said. “What if Voldemort comes back?”

“Then we will be in danger regardless,” Severus said. 

“But at least we’ll be able to make sure you are protected and safe,” Lucius added.

“You will be safer with us in one of these places than Privet Drive,” Alexei said, pulling all the papers out.

Harry nodded. “What’s going to happen in the long run?”

The three men looked at him question.

“What do you mean?” Severus asked as he sat in Harry’s chair. He reached across the table and took some of the papers from Alexei as they waited for Harry’s answer.

“The guardianship,” Harry said. “Will you be trying to find like a foster family or are we just going to stay like this?”

The three men glanced at each other, Alexei giving Severus a pointed look.

“I hadn’t really considered it,” Severus said. “I have no problem keeping guardianship. If it suits the both of us, we can keep this arrangement until you are of age and then you will be free to do what you want and go where you want.”

Harry didn’t see the stern look Alexei shot at his guardian. “The guardianship would be stable for that long? You would want to be my guardian for that long?”

Severus gave him a gentle smile. “I will be your guardian for as long as you want me to be.”

Harry returned the smile and nodded.

“Alright,” Alexei said, breaking the silence that had fallen. “Let’s start narrowing down our options.” He handed a few papers to both Harry and Lucius.

Harry gaped slightly. “How many houses do you have exactly?”

“Eleven,” Alexei said simply and Harry stared at him with wide eyes. Lucius and Severus shared amused looks at Harry’s shock. Alexei returned the boy’s stare with a raised eyebrow. “I’m fairly old, rebenok,” he added as though it perfectly explained and justified owning eleven properties.

Harry eventually just shook his head without responding and began looking at the property listings he had been given. He stared incredulous at the first one. It was huge! It looked like it could be a school or an orphanage. He scanned the details. Why would anyone ever need twenty-three rooms, nine of them being bedrooms? He instantly put that one of the coffee table as a rejected choice. It was way too big.

They were mostly silent for a while aside from the odd question about what they would all like or not like in a place. Eventually, after close to two hours, they finally had it narrowed down to three properties.

“We’ll take some time to really decide,” Alexei said, taking the rejected properties. “We don’t have to make a final decision now.”

The others nodded in agreement.

“It is dinner time so it is time Harry and I head up to the Great Hall,” Severus said, getting to his feet. “We will see you in a little while.”

Harry gave a small wave as they left the rooms even though he knew he was going to see them in a couple of hours.

“So, what is the other envelope?” Lucius asked Alexei when the others were gone. He and Alexei also got up and headed into the kitchen.

“Just something Severus asked me to get,” Alexei said vaguely, realizing Severus hadn’t told Lucius about his potential plan.

Lucius nodded as he tapped the table to make the food appear. “You know where the blood is,” he said to the vampire, sitting down.

Alexei retrieved a large glass of blood for himself before taking a seat across from his friend. “So, what is this apparent anomaly you found in the Crouch files?”

“It’s not an anomaly, more of an odd coincidence,” Lucius said, taking a bite of his lamb. “It seems Mrs. Crouch went missing around the same time Crouch Jr. died in Azkaban.”

“That’s not overly strange,” Alexei said.

“No, except Mrs. Crouch adored her son even after he was revealed as a Death Eater and sent to Azkaban,” Lucius explained. “She made sure to set up visits once a month. I can’t imagine she would just stop one day and not be around to bury her son.”

Alexei nodded, processing the information. “That does make it odder. Any theories?”

Lucius shook his head. “All I can say is it could be possible Crouch Jr. faked his death. Maybe his mother brought him something during a visit.”

“Perhaps,” Alexei agreed.

“I’m not sure there’s much else to discover,” Lucius said with a slight sigh. “This is all there is on the Crouch family. If Crouch Jr. is alive, there is nothing documenting it.”

“I will see if there is anything else I can find,” Alexei said and Lucius gave him a thankful smile.

Harry stared down at his cauldron, one eyebrow raised in confusion. His potion seemed to be a strange colour. His eyebrow rose further and was joined by his other when the smoke rising from his cauldron turned green. Everyone else had a lilac-coloured smoke.

He sighed and sat, wincing slightly as Severus vanished the ruined potion. He briefly met his guardian’s eyes but looked back down at the disappointment he saw there. He had messed up the potion twice and now there was no time to start again. He couldn’t explain how he felt seeing Severus’ disappointment. He had never felt it before.

He shook his head at himself and started to pack away his things. Class was almost over and the other students were beginning to bottle their completed potions. He didn’t know what had happened. He couldn’t seem to focus.

The bell rang and everyone began to leave. Harry had rose but found himself halting at the professor’s call.

“Potter, stay behind.”

Harry flopped back onto his seat with a huff and dropped his bag heavily on the floor. He watched the rest of the students leave the class, some sending him various looks from sympathy to glee. He just shook his head and waited.

Severus was walking around the room, cleaning up any remaining ingredients or tools left behind. He didn’t seem to be rushing either and Harry scowled. The man was making him wait on purpose.

“Can we just do this now so I can go to dinner?” Harry said eventually, tired of waiting for his guardian to end the game.

Severus looked up from the sink where he was washing a few tools. He raised an eyebrow and Harry sighed.

“I know you’re mad and I’m sorry, but I couldn’t focus. Can I go eat now?”

Severus grabbed a towel and dried his hands as he turned around. He stared at Harry as he dried his hands, making the boy shift uncomfortably. Once he tossed the towel aside, he crossed his arms, continuing to stare at Harry.

“I am not angry,” Severus said and Harry frowned. “What happened?”

“I don’t know,” Harry said, giving a small shrug. “I couldn’t focus.”

“Why?”

“How the hell should I know?” Harry snapped irritably.

“Reign in the attitude, young man,” Severus chided and Harry fought against rolling his eyes. He couldn’t push the man that far without incurring a dreadful wrath. “Now, calm yourself and tell me what is going on.”

Harry poked at a scorch mark on his desk, trying to push down his anger. He wasn’t sure why he was suddenly so angry. Severus hadn’t done anything. After several moments, he let out a deep breath, feeling a bit calmer.

“I don’t really know,” he said honestly. “There’s just so much going on in my head.”

“Like what?”

“Moody, Crouch Jr., Lucius, the Final Task, Sirius,” Harry listed. “Everything’s just a mess.”

“You can’t worry about things you can’t control,” Severus said and Harry huffed, feeling his anger rising again.

“I know that, but I can’t help it,” Harry said. “Like the whole Crouch Jr. thing. I am so positive Moody is Crouch Jr., but I have absolutely no way to prove it. Everyone and everything says Crouch Jr. is dead.”

“Alexei is trying to find more about that,” Severus said.

Harry sighed. “I know.”

“Come on,” Severus said. “Let’s have some tea and then you can go to dinner. I have something to give you.”

Harry nodded and followed his guardian from the class. They went down the corridor a few doors before stepping through one into Severus’ rooms. The lack of Lucius implied the man was probably resting in his room. Lucius had been sleeping a lot since his return home.

Harry sat in his chair and watched Severus summon everything for tea. He tapped the kettle to begin boiling the water. They prepared their tea in comfortable silence. Once they had their tea, Severus banished everything and summoned something else. Whatever it was landed on the sofa beside him.

Harry sipped his tea and waited, staring at his guardian in quiet curiosity.

“We have been waiting until you were more healed from what Black and Lupin did. We were waiting until you had accepted and come to terms with what happened,” Severus said.

“Okay?” Harry said slowly, slightly frowning.

Severus held out what he had summoned and Harry saw it was a small stack of letters. Harry took them and, looking at the front, recognized the messy scrawl. His eyes flew up to his guardian who was watching him somewhat warily.

“Sirius?” he said quietly and Severus nodded. His eyebrows furrowed together. “You’ve been hiding my letters?”

“You were still recovering,” Severus said. “We did not want anything to set you back.”

“So, you took my letters? My letters from my godfather?” Harry said angrily.

“Harry…”

“No!” Harry jumped to his feet, clenching the letters in his fist. “You kept these from me! You hid them!”

“Harry…”

“No!” he yelled again, shaking his head. He felt his eyes watering as he stared at his guardian. He shook his head again and rushed from the room. He ran out of the dungeons and into the Great Hall. He sat heavily at the end of Gryffindor table. He pushed the empty plate aside and stared down at the half a dozen letters from Sirius.

He couldn’t believe Severus had hid the letters from him. Severus never hid things from him. Why would he do this? It was reminding him too much of other things. He couldn’t help compare it to his Uncle Vernon taking all his Hogwarts letters. He also kept remembering how Dobby had taken all the letters from his friends the summer before second year. People were always hiding things from him. Hell, he hadn’t known he was a wizard until he was eleven! Every year bad things happened because of lies and things being hidden. Severus had never been one to hide anything from him. How could he?

He blew out a breath to calm down and pulled out the letter he assumed was the first. He stared at it and chewed his lip. Did he want to read it? Did he want to hear anything Sirius had to say?

“Hello, Harry.”

Harry looked up at Luna as the girl sat across from him.

“Hey, Luna,” he said, putting the letter down on the table. 

“How are you?” she asked.

Harry shrugged and sighed. “I’m not really sure, to be honest.”

Luna nodded and gestured to the letters, asking, “What are those?”

“Letters,” Harry said, “from Sirius.”

“I didn’t know he had been writing you,” Luna said.

Harry scowled slightly. “I didn’t either. Severus was hiding them from me.”

“You are angry about that?”

“Well, yeah, he never hides things from me.”

“He must’ve had a reason to do so this time.”

“That doesn’t make it right.”

Luna gave a soft smile. “No, it doesn’t, but doesn’t it remind you how much he cares about you? He was protecting you from someone who had harmed you and done so when he was unable to help. He needs to try and protect you now that he can.”

Harry tapped the letters, contemplating what Luna had said. It made sense but he still couldn’t help feeling hurt that Severus would still hide something from him. If he hid the letters, what else could he be hiding? What could he hide in the future?”

“He’s not like the others, Harry,” Luna said quietly and Harry met her calm eyes.

He just sighed again.

Harry walked into Severus’ rooms later that evening. He looked around the door before entering and found no one else there. He closed the door behind him and moved through the sitting room. He tossed the still unopened letters from Sirius onto the coffee table. He still didn’t know if he wanted to read them. He hadn’t forgotten or forgiven what had happened. He wasn’t sure he ever would. He turned to head into the kitchen to get a snack when something he had seen on the coffee table finally registered.

He turned back, staring curiously at the large brown envelope. He walked around the table and sat on the safe in front of the envelope. He knew he probably shouldn’t look. It was probably Severus’ or Alexei’s or Lucius’. They could be mad if he looked. It could be private but, if it was, they wouldn’t normally just leave it lying around.

He bit his lip, his natural curiosity screaming at him to open the envelope. Whenever he followed his curiosity, however, he usually found himself in trouble. He bounced on the sofa a little, anxious. He wanted to know what it was but he didn’t want to get in trouble or make anyone angry.

After several more moments, he finally shook his head at himself and grabbed the envelope. It was a little heavy and felt slightly thick, indicating a package of papers inside. He hesitated another couple seconds before flipping it over and reaching inside to pull out the contents. As his eyes first fell on the pages, all he saw were words filling the paper. None of it was really making sense. They were obviously from the Ministry and filled with legal, political, Ministry jargon. He flipped through the pages, trying to find something he could understand.

He was flipping and scanning when he stopped. A single word had caught his eye and he went back to the previous page. His eyes immediately focused on a single word at the top of the page.

Adoption.