AN: This chapter took longer than I had thought it would. But it finally is finished. I hope you're all as well as once can be and that this chapter might be a bright interruption.

oooOOooo

Growing Dissent

Lily hid a grin behind her teacup. Tom looked as if he had a hangover, which Lily hadn't seen before.

"Did it get late yesterday?" She was curious, and as Harry was currently intently focused on his breakfast, she didn't need to keep too much of her attention on him.

"Yes," Tom answered, sighing, and rubbing one hand over his face. "And I did drink one too many of those cocktails." He leant back and heaved a sigh, which forced Lily to hide another grin.

"No sober-up at hand?" she asked him, taking a sip from her tea.

Tom gave her a look and rolled his eyes. "I did take one before going to bed. That doesn't change the fact that I didn't get enough sleep." Then he sat up straighter in his chair, and took another piece of toast. "Nor that I have a lot of very boring things to read and write today. I would rather do something else." Tom spread some orange marmalade onto his toast, and they were silent for a few moments, each eating breakfast and sharing in the task of keeping Harry out of trouble.

It was Tom who broke the comfortable silence first. "How was your evening?"

She hadn't stayed up until Tom was back, just as he had asked. She had contemplated not going to bed, but once she realised she only was thinking about that idea because she didn't want to simply do what Tom had asked – indirectly – she had dismissed that notion and gone with common sense. As only one of two people mainly caring for a not-yet-two-year-old child, she needed all the sleep she could get. Silly actions just not to do what someone else had implicitly recommended were not worth it.

So they hadn't gotten to talking about their evenings when Tom got home.

"We had fun. Severus seemed happy to get out of attending a party, and I got to ask him a lot of questions about the festivities. It was a win-win situation." Lily really had learned a lot, and after sharing that one letter with her friend, she had new motivation to tackle more of the long and slow process of translating those old documents. Only a few were as interesting on first glance as that letter had been.

"Ah, yes. Severus, the dark cloud over every party he is forced to attend." Tom's chuckle surprised Lily a little. She hadn't been aware that Tom cared enough to learn such little insignificant things about the people working for him. "He was lucky to avoid the Lestranges." Lily could see the shiver running down Tom's spine and felt her brows go up to her hairline.

"He hinted at that," she said, quickly thinking about how to pick her words to get to the bottom of that particular puzzle presented here by two very different men. "Certainly they wouldn't give you a hard time?" Lily could see Bellatrix – whom she had not interacted with before, but heard about a little from Sirius – teasing Severus. But surely the woman had enough sense of what was appropriate to leave Tom alone at a party hosted by her sister?

Tom snorted. "Well, they do lack a certain sense of… personal boundaries, shall we say? And the time both Bellatrix and her husband have spent trying to find another opportunity to ask me to join them makes me wonder how they would act around someone they do not see as standing above them on the social ladder." He shook his head and seemed intent on changing the topic. But before he could say a word, Lily interrupted him.

"You know that you're only heightening my curiosity with all those hints, right?" Severus had been more direct, and Tom's allusion to personal boundaries pointed in the same direction, but still, Lily wasn't sure what was going on there.

Tom's eyes flicked to Harry – who was intently chewing on a slice of cucumber – then back to her, before he took a deep breath and briefly closed his eyes. "Bellatrix and her husband… they like to be watched, and to watch others, during sexual acts. They like watching each other while being with others. I guess they are lucky to share this interest. Not all arranged marriages work out like that. But be that as it may, they are not exactly subtle while searching for company, nor do they gracefully accept a negative answer." Lily felt her mouth falling open. "Well, maybe that's not entirely fair. I never witnessed nor heard of them getting violent or negative over being rejected. But they are relentless in trying to get the people they find interesting to agree anyway."

That's what she got from being nosy for the sake of her curiosity, not heeding the warnings that both Tom and Severus had given between the lines. Hopefully her next sensual dream wouldn't be interrupted by Mr. and Mrs. Lestrange looking on with eerie smiles on their faces.

They both were rescued from dwelling on this topic further by the house-elves, bringing the morning post.

The Daily Prophet was placed, folded, on the table between Tom and Lily, and a shallow basket was placed at each of their sides, both filled with letters and scrolls.

Since Lily had set up her post box for professional mail, the amount of correspondence had gone up for her. Tom had started getting his mail at the breakfast table – Lily suspected it was only part of it – only recently. She saw it as a sign that he was trying to show her that he didn't try to hide stuff from her.

"Wes had to remove a tracker spell from one of Missi's letters. Changed the colour of it to bright orange, we did. Master Tom's letters were a mix, all cursed or spelled ones are in the usual place they are." Tom thanked the elf – Lily really needed to learn their names, she wasn't happy with not being able to address them properly – which popped out of the room, leaving the mail where it had been placed.

Tom reached for the newspaper, shooting Lily a questioning glance. She waved him on, and turned towards Harry. With a smile she flicked her wand at her baby boy, spelling him and his clothes clean again, before she stood to pick him up from his high chair. "Do you want to play or have a nap, Harry?" The moment Harry saw that they were moving over to the playpen, which was more a warded safe area then the little prisons they usually resembled, he started clapping and asking for "'Nake!" the snake plushie Tom had given to him. With Harry taken care of, Lily returned to the breakfast table, where she could keep an eye on Harry while she went through her mail.

She really wanted to know who had sent a letter with a tracker on it. In fact, she had expected it to happen sometime, once one of her acquaintances realised that she had set up a way to receive mail.

Once Lily had flipped through her mail – most of it a mix of orders and advertisements by the look of things – she found two letters that were not connected to her enchanting business. One was from Remus, the other was from Alice and was in a brightly coloured orange envelope. She felt quite a few different feelings warring inside her. One part was happy that her closest friend since they had left school had remembered her and had gone to the effort to write, the other part remembered that day when the Order had come to Potter Manor prepared for what probably hadn't been anything good. That there had been a tracker on the letter gave the suspicious part of her the advantage in that fight. But hope was not called a tough fighter for nothing, so Lily opened the letter, hoping for the best.

A few sentences in she realised that her hope had been misplaced.

Lily,

It did take some time to find a way to contact you. Why have you been avoiding us? Can't you see that we need you? That Death Eater in the post of Minister is a blow! And while Frank and I do have some galleons to put towards our cause, it's not enough. Aren't you ashamed that you withdraw the Potter funds?

She had done that? Lily basically had ignored all the finance stuff since she had had to flee from the Manor. Maybe she should read James' letter and see what the state of things was before some kind of deadline passed without her noticing.

The letter rambled on like that for most of the page. It was one massive guilt trip. Or at least an attempt at one. Lily wasn't sure if Alice had decided what to write, or if she just had written the letter because she was – or had been – the closest friend she had in the Order and Moody wanted to use that. Neville was brought up more than once and how Alice only wanted the best for her baby and didn't Lily want the same for Harry?

There was no doubt in Lily's mind that she did want the best for Harry, but getting that would not necessarily line up with what Alice thought best for Neville.

Still torn – fear could make people do some really desperate things – Lily folded the letter and placed it back in the envelope, reminded once more by the bright orange that there had been a tracker spell on it.

With a sigh Lily placed the letter back in the basket, and picked up the one written in Remus' hand. It was written on cheap paper, a stark contrast to the expensive parchment Alice had used, and with what looked like a pencil, not ink and quill.

Dear Lily,

I know that you have little reason to trust me, but I beg you to read my letter to the end. I'm in a bad spot, and it isn't looking up. Under Moody the Order is getting more extreme by the day. Especially their ability to discern between allies and opponents is decreasing. Everyone not completely on their side is automatically considered an enemy.

I took a risk a few nights back and spoke up in defence of a young girl who has been attacked recently and will transform for the first time on the next full moon.

Sirius did defend me, but the hostility when he's not around has been mounting. And I get the feeling that I'm the only exception that can possibly exist for him because Dumbledore gave me a chance and the old Headmaster obviously would have had to have known.

I fear that sooner rather than later I'll have to leave and hide. As you've been able to hide yourself and the baby so successfully from the Order so far, I wanted to ask for your help to do the same.

I don't want to be killed, or put out of my misery as some have rationalised their actions, by those I thought were my friends. But I'm also not willing to go and join one of the packs. So I'm quickly running out of options.

Remember the dead letter box we used to use? I'll check there for an answer in the next days.

Remus

Lily did remember the place Remus was talking about. A small concealed hole in a wall on the outskirts of Hogsmeade that a few Gryffindors had used when they had been in third year to pass notes and sweets between each other. It had been a game, nothing serious, but it would come in handy now.

But what should she write? She couldn't very well invite Remus to live with them here. It wasn't her house and she also wasn't sure Remus would like living with the Dark Lord, or that Tom would like a wizard in his house who wasn't sworn to him.

"Why are you frowning?" Tom asked, breaking Lily's train of thought.

"I got two letters from… friends, I guess?" Lily really wasn't sure what to call Alice, and Remus had always been James' friend first, just as Sirius had been James' friend and not hers.

"I guess they didn't write just to keep in touch then?" Tom asked, tilting his head to the side like he did when he was transformed. Knowing so many animagi, Lily had noticed that some mannerisms carried over from the animal form to the human in all of them. It was kind of endearing, something she never would mention to any of the animagi she knew.

"No. One pretty much only vented their frustration with me and my drawing back from fighting, and the other asks for help, as the Order is getting more extreme under Moody." Still hope forced her to keep some information to herself so as to not reveal the identity of the people who wrote.

"Alastor Moody certainly isn't the most stable individual," Tom said, his tone of voice contradicting his almost polite word choices.

She could tapdance around what she wanted to know for the whole day, or she could simply go the Gryffindor way and ask. Lily decided to go for the direct route and ask. "What is your stance on werewolf rights?"

Tom blinked a few times, slowly, and then folded the newspaper to place it next to his plate. "That's a complicated issue," was the first thing he said before taking a sip from his tea. He clearly was thinking over what he wanted to say, and Lily let him.

She was aware that there were a lot of negative things associated with werewolves pretty much everywhere in the British magical community. It didn't make much of a difference who you asked, people feared them, pitied them, and generally preferred not to interact with them. "You certainly are aware of the prejudice." Tom didn't say it like it was a question but Lily nodded anyway. "But they are not a group that can be overlooked in this struggle for dominance. I'm not actually sure how their existence and the way they are ostracised from our society ties in with our obligation of honouring Magic. One thing is for sure, though, we can't afford to keep them at the edges of society, and at the same time I know it'll take generations of work to overcome those ingrained prejudices."

"That was a politician's answer," Lily stated, throwing Tom an unimpressed look. "And now something with a little more substance, please."

Tom chuckled, looking down at his plate, then looked up again, nodding. "We can't allow transformed werewolves to roam the land as they please, because they will attack humans. At the same time, denying them employment, the right to own land, an education, and everything else that should be available to all magicals is not something that we should continue doing. But it's hard to get into contact with them to see what they need, or want. They are understandably cautious when a wizard approaches them. And I can tell you that there are quite a few among my followers who see lycanthropy as a curse and those afflicted as less than human." He shrugged and looked a little helpless. "I've had contact with a few werewolves, and obviously many that have been infected young lack a good education, but there are quite a few who were adults before being bitten and only lost everything after. I don't have a plan yet, but if you have any ideas, I'm all ears."

Lily nodded slowly. She couldn't really blame him for not having a plan. It wasn't like Dumbledore had had anything more than a politician's answer to this question either. And that the old man had allowed Remus to attend Hogwarts might have been a nice gesture, but it had done nothing to improve the situations for werewolves as a whole.

"If I think of something I'll let you know." Maybe she could find a way to help Remus, but she also should consider that he was really attached to Sirius and had been indebted to Albus. Better to be careful.

ooOoo

A few days after Lily had left a letter in the dead letter box near Hogsmeade, she had finally managed to find the resolve to read the letter from James.

Harry was already in bed, Tom had excused himself with plans to brew, and Lily had nothing to do that she could reasonably claim to be of greater importance than the letter left to her by James.

So here she was, sitting on her bed, letter in hand, hesitating.

There was nothing for it, she needed to know what James had written, and needed to take care of whatever responsibilities she might have until Harry came of age to take care of them himself, if he even still was entitled to the Potter assets. It would be better for Harry if he could decide himself if he wanted to lay claim to the Potter name. She shouldn't risk his losing that opportunity.

Lily ignored her trembling hands as she broke the wax seal decorated with the Potter coat of arms getting the letter out.

Dear Lily,

I hope that you'll never read this letter. That Albus and the Order manage to defeat this Dark Lord as Albus did the last, and that we'll be able to live peacefully before Harry turns two.

But I am an Auror, and while I'm confident that we'll win in the end, it is possible that I will not live to see it happen. So I decided to write this letter, as I can't get myself to say any of this to you directly. It seems that you have decided to go the traditional way and pretend that Harry is my son, and I have to confess that I'm more than happy to go along with that.

That being said. I want to apologize. It took Andromeda Tonks ranting about her family and her reasons to cut ties with them for me to realise that I was acting like an arse.

You were right, I should have accepted the possibility that I was the reason we didn't have a kid of our own as quickly as I would have liked. And I shouldn't have instructed the elves to feed you fertility potions without your knowledge.

I don't want to contemplate who you asked, and hope it wasn't Snivellus, but now that I've checked myself and know that Harry can't be mine, I'm glad that you somehow found out and took matters into your own hands.

I made certain that Harry will get the title of Lord Potter and all the money that goes with it. You'll be responsible for voting the seat until he gets old enough to do so himself, and you also will be responsible for taking care of all the other stuff that comes with owning land, houses, and so on.

The Headmaster asked me to make him Harry's proxy should something happen to me, but I think someone willing to question him from time to time and strong willed enough to not blindly follow, will be better for House Potter in the long run.

I still hope that you'll never get to read this letter. But I know if I should die in this war you'll take care of our son and do your best to see him grow up happy.

I love you, Lily,

James

He had known?

Lily didn't notice how the letter slipped from her slack fingers and fell to the floor, her hands shaking. Her mind was reeling.

And he had thought Lily deliberately had searched out another man's company so that they could have a child? James really had only thought about himself in this, hadn't he? He could have told her that he had been sorry about feeding her fertility potions, even if he hadn't been able or willing to tell her that he knew he was infertile.

Lily wasn't really sure how that would have gone down. Especially as she hadn't gone out in an attempt to get pregnant and pretend that the child was James'. The very idea of such actions being normal and traditional boggled her mind.

Tears started falling from Lily's eyes. What would James have thought if he had known that Lily hadn't known of that custom, that she had flirted with a stranger in a bar and that ending up pregnant had been an accident? What would he have thought if he had gotten a chance to know who Harry's real father was?

Once the shock that James had known and never said a word had worn off, grief took over and Lily allowed herself to slump on her bed, one of the pillows clutched to her chest, tears falling unhindered.

She wasn't sure how her life would have turned out if she hadn't met Tom in that pub. Or if she and James had managed to actually talk about their problems. If they hadn't trusted Peter, which would have allowed them to stay safely hidden. So much could have gone different.

But what-if's never did anyone any good, and so Lily gathered herself back together slowly. She had committed herself to doing the best she could to make sure Harry, her little miracle baby, would get to live the best life she could help him to get. Albus was dead, and Moody was ruining the Order of the Phoenix, turning away more and more from what the original goals had been. She was learning more and more about why it might be a good idea not to turn away from all old traditions, as so many proclaiming themselves the allies of Muggle-born witches and wizards wanted to do.

Tom was winning, Moody wasn't an alternative, and there was a great need for reform in wizarding Britain.

With the plan to go to Gringotts the next day to sort out all that finance stuff she had ignored so far, Lily went to bed, taking a dose of dreamless sleep, after checking in with Tom, who agreed to keep an eye – or rather a monitoring charm – on Harry for the night. Lily hadn't bothered hiding her red eyes from him, and he hadn't commented, but she knew he had seen. Being an adult was much more complicated than Lily ever had thought possible when she had been thirteen.

And the fact that she felt her path was set, regardless of what her translation would bring to light, wasn't doing anything to improve her mood any. She guessed that sometimes there was no ideal choice… or rather, there was never a path without its downsides if one wasn't ignoring stuff on purpose.

oooOOooo

"And this will work?" Lily looked sceptical while turning the bracelet Tom had given to her just a moment ago over in her hand.

"I've created it myself. The bracelet and the runic array. It will make sure that no one can identify you." Tom felt a little insulted that Lily didn't trust his work. He was sure that it would work exactly as he had planned. No one who didn't already know who she was would be able to identify her even while standing right next to her.

In fact Tom was rather proud of his work. As they needed specific functionality, the already existing spells wouldn't have done. All standard spells used to conceal identities did this without exception. But Harry needed to know that his mom was there with him to feel safe. So Tom had come up with this one to solve the problem they had been faced with.

"But have you tested it before?" Lily looked up to meet his eyes, and the challenge was clear in her eyes.

"Not in a large setting. But it will not hurt you, and the theory is sound." Tom bounced a little in place to entertain Harry who was sitting on his hip, snake toy tightly clutched in his little hand.

Tom could clearly see that Lily wasn't impressed. "You know that this is not the proper way to test new enchantments or spells, don't you? Even Severus at fifteen, when he started developing his own spells, was more thorough than this!"

Tom took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. "Which is why, now that we'll have an opportunity to test beyond what I already did test, I made sure to invite Severus to be here sooner than the Healer, so we can test if he will be able to recognize you while you're wearing the bracelet." Maybe he should have included Lily a bit more in the planning of this.

"Well," Lily said carefully winding the bracelet around her wrist with her other hand, "Then let's see if this works as you planned it to."

"You need to activate it with a drop of blood," Tom instructed, adjusting his grip on Harry, as the toddler started to wiggle.

"You did explain that already, Tom." She sounded exasperated but also fond, and she was right, he had explained how it worked. Not hesitating, Lily first made a small cut to smear a drop of blood on the rune that would activate the bracelet, and then quickly healed the small nick. While she did so, the rune-carved stones, beads, and bones the bracelet was made of made tinkling noises as they moved against each other.

The ripple of magic was almost visible in the air around Lily, at least for Tom. He always had been very sensitive to magic, and he had honed that talent, as it was very useful when one had to deal with intrigues and politics.

Harry giggled and reached for his mother. "Ma!" He let go of the snake plushy and gravity took over, leading to the toy's falling to the floor with a soft "flump" sound.

"Come here, my little boy." Lily smiled and took Harry from Tom, seamlessly passing toddler responsibility from one to the other. Lily looked at Tom, one brow drawn up. "So far it doesn't look like my identity is concealed."

"And it shouldn't be for everyone who is in on the secret. Namely Harry and me. Now let's wait for Severus and see if he can also recognize you." Flicking his wrist, Tom checked the time. "He should be here any moment now."

While they waited, the three of them settled down in the living room they used most often when they spent their afternoons and evenings together. Harry's toys littered the floor, the room had started to look much more lived in since Lily and Harry had moved in. They agreed that Lily would not say anything before Severus talked to her, so they would know if the concealing magic worked.

It didn't take long for Severus to arrive and for the elf to lead the man to where they were waiting.

In a smooth motion the dark haired Potions Master went down on one knee, bowing his head in greeting. "My Lord." Tom had seen the eyes of his spy flick to where Lily was sitting on a loveseat entertaining Harry.

"Severus," Tom nodded, indicating with a small movement of his hand that the other man should rise. "I trust that you have brought the potion."

"I did indeed, my Lord," Severus answered with another incline of his head, while rising back to his feet. In the next moment he reached into his outer robes and pulled out a small crystal phial filled with a brightly coloured fluid, glittering inside.

While he set the phial down on the table his eyes searched the room, lingering on the door leading outside into the garden, and on the disguised Lily. Tom was pretty sure that Severus was searching for his best friend, but didn't dare ask for her whereabouts, as Severus had to assume that there was a stranger in the room with them. Or at least it looked that way to Tom.

For a moment he entertained the thought of letting the man stew, but did cast it aside quickly. Lily needed the proof that the bracelet was working before the Healer arrived.

"Is there something you want to ask, Severus?" For the briefest flicker of a moment the other wizard tensed, before relaxing again. Tom felt a short surge of joy that he had managed to read Severus Snape, Master Occlumens, correctly, and he had noticed as well.

"I was wondering where your son's mother might be, my Lord," Severus asked, now that he had been prompted, keeping a respectful tone and stance.

Tom didn't answer the question, but turned to Lily, smirking. "See, I told you it would work, Lily."

She rolled her eyes at him, clearly unimpressed by his preening. "Stop being so smug. No one likes a braggart."

Severus looked back and forth between them, clearly confused. Until his eyes fixed on Lily, brow furrowed in concentration. "Lily? Is that you?"

Lily turned, changing her grip on Harry to prevent him from falling, and nodded. "Yes, it's me."

It was great seeing Severus' eyes going wide in surprise. "What spell was that? I don't know of any that would fall like that!"

"Thank you, Severus. It's always nice to see one's work being appreciated," Tom said, shocking the young wizard back into a more respectable expression.

"Of course, my Lord." It was almost like watching someone dress, the way Severus built his composure back up. In a few years, if he kept working at it, Severus would appear unshakeable to anyone who didn't know him well. "Do you want me to administer the potion now, my Lord?"

"We're waiting for Healer Greengrass to arrive. I told her to be here a while after you arrived, Severus. Because she will not be informed of Lily's identity," Tom explained, because he hadn't done so before. To make sure the test of the bracelet would work out, Severus couldn't have known that Lily would be in disguise, and he would have wondered why the Healer wasn't already there.

"Aren't the Greengrasses neutral?" Lily asked, Harry standing on her legs, bouncing up and down with obvious delight.

"Most of them are," Tom agreed. "Or try to be. But it's one of the bigger families left. Two generations ago there were four brothers. And they all married, to later have at least two children each." The Greengrasses were one of those families Tom suspected had kept up the tradition of regularly getting "fresh blood" into their family tree, either by adopting so-called muggle-born children, or searching them out as partners and hiding it successfully. "Septima Greengrass is from a lesser branch of the family tree and not happy with her father's plan to marry her off as profitably as he can manage. She has managed to get him to agree to allow her to finish her education, and came to me asking for help to avoid her father's plan for her." He shrugged. "She's good, and I do need a Healer I can trust."

Lily snorted and set Harry down as the little boy clearly wanted. "Sure. Isn't it interesting how prevalent those patriarchal structures are even here in our oh-so-different and better magical society?"

Tom sighed. "There are a lot of places where things could be better than they are right now. But as with others, this one will need time for us to change anything." Lily rolled her eyes, but shrugged with one shoulder. She clearly wasn't happy, but she was too intelligent not to know of the limitations in the flexibility and ability to adapt in the magical society.

Severus was standing between them rather awkwardly and started to look rather unhappy when Harry reached him, and took a firm grip on the man's robes, pulling while looking up along the long body. "'rus! 'rus!"

Lily chuckled, which led to Severus shooting her a betrayed look. Tom didn't try to suppress his grin. "I think he likes you and wants to take advantage of your height, Severus."

"Pick him up, Severus, he won't just give up if you ignore him." Lily sounded really amused, and Tom felt thoroughly entertained by the pained look on the Potions Master's face. Poor man, forced by his friend and his Lord to interact with a toddler.

In the end Severus bent down to pick up Harry, who laughed in delight, waving at both of his parents. Tom dutifully waved back, sure that he had a silly smile on his face.

Then there was a knock at the door. "Come in," Tom called out and watched as Severus and Lily turned so they too could see who was being led in by the elf.

Her pale eyes – Tom never was quite sure if he should call them blue or grey – swept the room, taking everything in, while she went to her knees before him in a proper greeting. "My Lord."

"Septima, welcome. Please take a seat." Tom waved her over to one seat and stood to take Harry from Severus, indicating with a small nod that Severus should sit down right next to the healer, while he himself walked over to sit with Lily.

Harry settled right in between Lily and Tom, eyeing the stranger cautiously from safety.

"Before we begin, I think you'll need more information, Septima." He hadn't told her much when he had set up this meeting. And that usually was enough, but today was not a usual appointment. "I asked you to come here today, first to check my son's health and progress, and secondly, to oversee the administration of a potion Severus has brewed for my son to take."

Lily had agreed – reluctantly – to be a silent observer, so she didn't object to his taking the lead. She usually was a mother lion, fiercely guarding Harry's wellbeing. For one thing, she insisted that two adults were present if Harry was to use his toy broom.

"What potion, my Lord?" Tom knew why he had chosen her from his followers with a healer's education, despite her youth. She wasn't spooked by much, and was much more open-minded then the others he could have chosen.

"One that is designed to reverse the effects of that potion witches take to make a child resemble another than the actual father." It was kind of puzzling that the potion didn't have a name. Usually potioneers were all for naming their inventions.

At that her eyebrows went up in surprise. Then she carefully posed a question, sitting tensely next to an equally tense Severus. "Might I ask some questions?"

"Go ahead," Tom nodded.

He was surprised when Septima turned to Lily to ask her question. Only the fact that he had trained to hide his emotions when need be prevented his surprise from showing. And just like that their plan for him to speak and Lily just to observe was shattered.

"When was your son born?" The Healer conjured a floating piece of parchment with a quill that started to make notes right away.

"End of July, 1980," Lily answered, ignoring Harry, who was playing with the bracelet on her arm.

"So he's not two yet," Septima stated, to which Lily only nodded. "When was he last checked by a healer? And did he get all the recommended vaccinations?"

"He got the vaccination potion for dragon pox, but nothing else. And he hasn't been checked by a Healer since a few days after he was born." Tom had known that the Potter family had gone into hiding relatively soon after Harry had been born. But until now, he hadn't really thought about what the consequences of that had been.

The quill scratched out more notes, and Septima didn't react in any visible way to the hints being dropped. "May I cast a few diagnostic charms at your son?"

Lily nodded. "Yes. Do I need to do anything specific?"

"No need." Septima proceeded to walk over to where Lily and Harry and Tom were sitting, lowering herself to sit down on the floor, smiling at the toddler still sitting between them. "Hello, Harry." She waved, and after a moment Harry waved back, half hidden behind the fabric of the robes Tom and Lily were wearing. "Look here, do you like bright lights?"

It didn't take long for Septima to cast the diagnostics she wanted to take. And Tom did notice that she used different spells than he ever had seen any healer use. When she was checking up on him – regularly as he wanted to make sure he would not be killed by any preventable illness – she wasn't using spells that glowed quite that cheerfully.

"Are those special diagnostic charms for children?" Lily asked when Septima checked on something the quill had written down, leading to a longer break in her spellcasting.

"They are," Septima answered, with a small nod, eyes trained on the notes taken. "Not in the way they work, but in the way they look and affect the person they are cast on. No tingling, or uncomfortable feelings, bright colours to entertain and distract. I learned them from a specialist because I remember vividly how afraid I was of healers when I was a small child."

Just a few more spells later, Septima stood again, notes in hand, and took a few steps back. "All seems to be well. He's healthy and well within what one would expect of a little boy his age. Currently he has a slight tendency to myopia, but such could be caused by the convenient potion and vanish once the effect is reversed."

Tom felt relieved that Harry was healthy, and surprised that the potion seemed to have a name after all.

"The convenient potion?" Lily's words dripped with scepticism.

Septima shrugged. "That's how women in my family refer to it, if they mention it at all. But I know that it's more widely used than those using it are willing to admit. Some witches planning to use it go as far as searching out several men of similar looks to their husbands to make sure they don't know who the actual father is. Which brings me to the next set of questions." Septima turned to concentrate on Lily, almost turning her back on Tom. She was braver than he would have thought a Hufflepuff would be.

Lily didn't wait for the question to be posed, but answered what Tom would have guessed would be the next question, with more force than would be considered polite. "I'm quite sure he," here she waved a hand in Tom's direction without looking, "is the father. Beside my late husband, who was infertile, and him," another wave, "I was with no other man during that time." Tom's eyes moved through the room, trying to not think about Lily with other men, and realised that Severus was paler than usual and probably wishing to melt into the cushions of the loveseat he was sitting on.

"He is a Parselmouth as well. Which is not one of those gifts that jump generations," Tom threw in, not wishing to linger on this particular topic. "A paternity charm I learned in South America also confirmed it."

Now three sets of eyes were fixed on Tom.

"Wouldn't this potion be pointless if a paternity charm can reveal the actual father over the assumed one?" Lily asked what the others had on their minds as well.

"Oh, it was not any old paternity charm. In fact, on British soil, the spell I used would be considered dark magic. Just as any other that can circumvent the convenient potion would be. Interesting coincidence, isn't it?" And it certainly was, in Tom's opinion. How often specific spells, potions, magic were outlawed, not because they were dangerous in some way, but because they were inconvenient to the ruling classes.

"Well then, I do know half of the medical family history of the little darling here. Only the mother's side of the family is left to ask about," Septima stated, taking Tom's revelation in stride.

Lily hurried to answer that set of questions as well, starting out with what she probably thought to be the biggest revelation. "As I'm the first witch in my family, there isn't any magical medical history to be spoken off. If you need any more information, I can try to answer those questions later. Or are those answers of importance for the purpose of our meeting? Harry is getting restless, and I would rather not draw this out any more."

"No, they are not," Septima conceded, making the way free for Severus with the potion in hand.

It wasn't hard to get Harry to take the potion. It did smell sweet enough to be among those potions that actually did tasted good. And the hour after that was spent trying to soothe and distract a cranky toddler. It felt similar to the nights when Harry was teething. Hellish torture of not being able to help his son effectively, while knowing that the result was worth it, somehow.

It was late, Severus and Septima long gone, when Tom found himself wandering down the corridor that led to Harry's room. Lily was there as well, standing next to the small bed with its railing, looking down on their son.

Tom walked in, not trying to remain unnoticed, coming to a stop right next to Lily. "He doesn't look all that different, does he?"

"I think his hair might be a bit tamer, less wavy. And a little darker?" Lily murmured, her eyes trained on the sleeping boy.

"I'm happy that he has kept your eyes," Tom stated, feeling Lily's warmth on his arm, they were standing that close.

"It's not really a surprise that the changes are not all that visible. That's why the reversing potion needs to be taken while the child is still young." Lily sighed. "I guess he'll start to resemble you a little more when he gets older."

"That's likely," Tom murmured. "Good night, Lily." He lingered a moment longer but finally went to bed. Tomorrow he would have a lot of work to do, and he had a playdate to organize now that they knew the bracelet was working as intended.

oooOOooo

AN: Writing those letters wasn't easy. I'm not sure if the one from Alice or the one from James was harder. Probably the one from Alice, because I had to cut it short. No way would I have been able to make a rambling guilt trip read interesting.

First published 2nd of August 2020

Thanks to Jordre and Jake for helping to improve my spelling!