The world is grayscale. Except for the wraith.

It is bathed in red. Anger, resentment, hate— he recognizes it all. How? It doesn't matter. There is this strange creature standing next to him. It reminds him of something— of someone— but who—

"You shall not harm Harry Potter—"

He recognizes the words. Every individual fragment's contribution. But the collective meaning? The sentiments that lay within? Like grains of sand through his fingers. So why— why— WHY—

He tilts his head. The creature remains defiant. It stands in front of him, finger raised. He feels hungry now? No, the hunger is from this strange creature. This defiant, little… thing. It wants to protect. It wants—

Maybe he should help it. Pour a little coldness, a little death into it. Show it the truth of all truths. Give its life some meaning. Allow it to revel in the deep, dark softness of the blackest night.

"Harry… Potter…"

There it is again. Odd voices. They resonate with something inside him. Funny, he didn't think there was anything there. He now realizes the words are spoken by someone else, not this creature. Yet, he cannot remember who. Or what. Or WHY—

A familiar coldness engulfs him. The stillness of death. The prelude to the dirge. It was comforting. Pure. No questions. No worries about right versus wrong. No quibbles about motivations and goals.

There is no room for doubt.

Just pure, cold, serene death.

The creature still stands. Defiant. Weak.

He snorts. A quick flick of his tail, and the creature drops. Grunting, he moves around, staring at the wraith. The spirit exudes emotions. Pesky little things. Hate, envy, anger, jealousy, arrogance, resentment… So much to devour. The creatures around it resonate with her energy.

A good meal, all in all.

He snorts again.

And the dam breaks. The wraith screeches, and the doxies attack. He barks out a laugh. More of him comes out of the cloak. His jaws are bone. His flesh is dark. Horns sprout from his head. His deathly green eyes glare. Malevolent primordial energy flows from him, snarling at the world.

So much life.

So much emotion.

So much magic.

So much to… kill.

The doxies rise against him. Useless. A petty tide trying to swallow the moon. They shoot at him like spears. They tear and bite. They claw at him with their tails and nails. They leap and howl and snarl in vicious hunger.

He kills them with all the effort of wiping sweat off his brow.

A quick slash of his paw. Reality screams as the world twists around him. The air brims with malevolent energy once more. Everything he touches is obliterated. Everything.

The wraith screams again. This time, it is fear. He laughs. Fear is good. Fear is acceptance.

Yes, he will make her fear come true.

Obsidian claws glint in the darkness. He draws closer.

The wraith is desperate. She screeches. She wails. She pulls at curtains, demolishes the building. Its eyes are wide and terrified. Not unexpected. It is about to die, after all.

He bares his fangs. Power rushes through him. A void of blackness spreads around him. It enters into the wraith, binding her, gnawing into her, devouring her from the inside as she screams and screams and screams—

Fire spread across his chest.

Harry tried to pry open his eyes and take a breath, but it only prompted another burst of agony, radiating from his core. He held off taking the next breath for as long as possible, until he couldn't put it off anymore. And again, it burned.

He repeated the cycle several times, his entire reality consumed by the simple struggle to breathe and endure the pain. He was on the losing side of things, but though the pain didn't quite lessen, it did, eventually, become more bearable.

"Good," whispered a raspy, feminine voice. "Very good."

Slowly, he could feel the rest of his body. He was lying on something cool and contoured. Not exactly comfortable, but far from torment. He tightly clenched his hand into a fist, but something was wrong with it. They barely moved, as though someone had replaced his flesh and bones with lead weights. His body was heavy and inert, and his tendons and muscles were too weak to break the inertia.

The soft silk sheets beneath him were one of the few silver linings.

"Excellent," rasped the voice. It was strangely familiar, though he still couldn't put a finger on it. "I know it's difficult, but try to open your eyes, Harry."

The sound of his name felt like a trigger. He tried to open his eyes once more, and bright light inundated his view this time, the burning sensation now no longer limited to his center. After blinking several times, he managed to open them without hurting his head.

Then, the memories came back.

"Emme— Miss Vance," he croaked.

"Just call me Emma," the voice replied. Turning his head, he looked up further and found himself staring at Emmeline Vance, his private healer, and tutor over the past few days.

"I told you, it'll hurt for the first few times," Emmeline— or Emma, as she preferred —spoke up. "But it was a major success."

Harry weakly smiled. A day after he'd woken up from his healing coma, Emma had allowed him to start using his magic step by step, starting with a simple lighting spell. From what he understood, his body had undergone a major upheaval because an enormous amount of magic flowed through it. She'd said it was akin to the human body getting struck by lightning— the real thing, not the Fulminis spell.

Unfortunately, she had no idea how such a thing had come to pass. And she was also certain that the accident had thrown his ability to wield magic into jeopardy, and he'd have to remind his body about how it used to be.

Whatever that meant.

That was why Emma, with help from Sirius, would sit down and watch him cast one spell after the next. The magical influx had thrown his half-admirable skills with transfiguration to Dreadful levels. The pin he'd tried transfiguring into a pillow had expanded in size and started shooting out feathers like projectiles before exploding. Then, he'd successfully converted a goblet into a mouse, only for the mouse to squeak loudly before exploding.

Emma had asked him whether he had any aspiration to become a Dark Lord, since he'd clearly be good at it. At the time, he wasn't able to tell whether she was joking, too focused on the puddle of gore in front of him.

At least his performance with Charms had been mostly unaffected, which was probably a good thing. But Defense Against the Dark Arts was another beast entirely. A wholly surprising one.

Especially since he accidentally killed a transfigured pig with a stunner.

A stunner.

Emma had not been thrilled.

That was when Sirius really stepped in, handing him a book of offensive spellcasting and making him perform each of them. It had been surprisingly easy, albeit more than a little draining. Both Sirius and Emma had kept pushing him until he'd dropped to his knees, ready to keel over and pass out from magical exhaustion.

That was how every night had ended for the past couple of days.

"I—" he coughed, "I had another dream."

Emma frowned, gazing at him with concern. "The doxies?"

He slowly nodded.

"Harry, you've been through a traumatic incident. It's only natural that you—"

"You don't understand!" he hissed, raising his voice a bit. "This was— this was different. I was killing them. The doxies, they were dying, and I was— I was— and that wraith—"

His temples burned. Hissing in pain, Harry slumped back into his pillow. "Gods, it fucking hurts."

"Do you remember what happened?" Emma asked kindly.

He morosely shook his head. "Nothing. Only that I was killing them, and—" he paused, meeting her gaze. He'd grown pretty comfortable around the healer over the past week. She had been present every time he needed her, and was always there when he woke up. And most importantly, she never judged him.

It made him feel… normal.

"The wraith, she was screaming. And I— I felt good. Powerful, even. I was— I was winning, and the doxies were nothing before me. I moved, and they just," he swallowed, "they just died. And then I woke up."

The wraith. It always came down to the wraith. He'd talked to them about the entity before, and Sirius had roamed the entire townhouse— no minor feat —like a man possessed, meticulously searching for the elusive spirit. Three days of active searching, to no avail. Still, his godfather had hired someone to perform an exorcism, just to be sure.

Whether the wraith was still around or not, it had at least been driven away. Hopefully.

"Well, get up," Emma sighed. "I'll get your breakfast ready. Do you need any help?"

Harry couldn't prevent the rosy blush from crawling up his neck as he vehemently shook his head. Emma was a professional, which meant she wasn't averse to literally helping him with anything— even his sanitary… issues.

"If you're sure," the woman replied, getting off his bed. Straightening out her attire, she walked out the door, leaving the room all to himself.

And what a room it was.

Located on the third floor of the large townhouse, the room was one of the few that overlooked the adjacent street. It included a European king-sized bed facing the windows, with thick white curtains draped around them and covered with red-and-gold sheets. A door leading to the hallway stood to the left, with a study desk and chair to the right. There was also a large walk-in wardrobe just past the door leading to the in-suite bathroom.

His new room. His sanctuary. His to use. His to decorate as he wished.

Unfortunately, having lived in a cupboard for the majority of his life and then shared a dormitory with four others, the room was precisely the sort of extravagance he wasn't entirely comfortable with. For one, it was easily thrice the size of Dudley's room back in Privet Drive. That, coupled with the fact that it was entirely for him alone made it feel even larger. The darkness in the limited space of the cupboard had been comforting, but at night, this vast expanse of blackness made shivers crawl up his spine.

He hadn't really tried explaining it to Sirius. Nor was he going to. The man had already given so much, and he didn't want his godfather to think he was the ungrateful sort.

Sirius had brought in some hired help early on, renovating the entire house while he was comatose and healing at St. Mungo's. Now that the rooms were all cleaned up and fitted with all kinds of nice furniture, he finally had a much better idea of just how large his new residence was.

Black Manor was a brooding chateau.

And no, he wasn't exaggerating.

Built at some point in the early eighteenth century, only with more gargoyles and gothic features than the Notre-Dame itself, it was an expansive, brooding structure with very little light coming in. He'd know. His own room was one of the few that actually allowed direct sunlight to filter in.

Emma had taken a room down by the end of the hall, and Sirius decided to stay in his old room on the second floor, just next to the dojo. It surprised him initially, but if you had as many rooms as this house did, he guessed it made sense to have one be a dojo.

Sure, he'd roll with it.

All in all, it was almost like being at Hogwarts during Christmas. Only less expansive, less bright, and… well, more lonely.

He'd thought about getting Ron to come live with him. Maybe he could ask Hermione to spend her summer with him this year? The Weasleys had invited him and Hermione to join them for the Quidditch World Cup at the end of last year, so maybe he could invite them this time around?

He'd thought about raising the issue with Sirius, but thinking about it and doing it were completely different things. For one, he may have been the man's godson, but that didn't mean he was entirely comfortable demanding things from his godfather just yet. To demand something like an extended sleepover would be taxing on the man's benevolence.

Come to think of it, having people over probably wasn't a good idea anyways. The house practically had Slytherin written all over it, from snake-themed doorknobs to green-and-silver decorations. A lot of it had faded with the renovations, but the signs were still there, and still unmissable.

At least it didn't look like a house of dark wizards anymore.

Four years had passed since the Hat had sorted him, and for better or worse, he'd grown from the starry-eyed kid that clung to Ron Weasley and refused Draco Malfoy just because Ron didn't like him. More than once, he'd seen first-hand how Gryffindors had treated him, and now more than ever, he understood just how flimsy the House differences were. Emma had been a Slytherin, and she was easily the sweetest person he knew— this was from being in her presence for a week at best.

So, no. He didn't subscribe to the 'Slytherins are evil' dogma that Ron professed. But that didn't mean he was about to get up and bear-hug Draco Malfoy either.

Better be… Gryffindor, he chuckled to himself.

Sirius Black let out a shaky breath as he slumped back into his chair, exhausted from his recent dealings. From a young age, he simply never had the propensity to sit and deal with legalese nonsense and fatcats coasting on their family name. Being a Hit-wizard was so much better. 'This is the mission! Those are the bad guys! Apprehend them and use any measure necessary! And above all, stay alive!'

It was a simple life. One he'd enjoyed to the fullest.

But it wasn't his life anymore.

Now, he was knee-deep in the murky political world, hobnobbing with the likes of Lucius Malfoy even though playing politics with his ilk made him want to take a long, hot bath.

He glanced towards the staircase. Harry was probably up by now, with Emmeline looking after him. The young healer came with a glowing recommendation from Andi, which was all the guarantee Sirius needed before offering her the job. That, and her father Jacob Vance had been a member of the Order of the Phoenix during the last war, until he and his wife were killed by Voldemort himself. Emma had only survived because she'd been safe at Hogwarts at the time.

Naturally, it was unsurprising that the woman didn't hold the Order in high regard. For an organization dedicated to saving lives, Dumbledore and his fellow Order members did very little in that regard.

Even for their own families.

Dumbledore was very much needed for what was to come. But as much as he wanted to help him restart the Order, he couldn't help but agree with the woman's sentiments. What had the Order done? It had failed to save its own members. It had failed to counter the Death Eaters. In fact, its sole source of funds was from those that were part of it, those who fought and bled and did whatever the great Albus Dumbledore asked of them.

He would know. He had seen James funnel a significant part of his family fortune into the Order, a fact that had led to multiple confrontations between him and his father Fleamont. All culminating into a fight that led to him storming away from the security of Potter Manor only to take shelter in a little cottage in Godric's Hollow.

And where did that get him? a cold, cruel voice whispered in the back of his mind.

Fourteen years had passed since that fateful Hallow's Eve, and there was still no change. The same people were in charge. Voldemort was regaining power by the minute, acting in the shadows while his Death Eaters began to torture and terrorize the common populace once more. Meanwhile, the Ministry was busy sticking its head into the sand, caught up in its own shenanigans and politicking as it happily ignored the threat on the horizon.

Sure, Dumbledore was restarting the Order. But to what effect?

At least during the previous war, he'd been a Hit-Wizard Captain. But he was retired now. Twelve years of dementor exposure had left its mark on him. Physically, magically, spiritually. There was no doubt he'd be somehow forced into the position of backer, squirreling away his family fortune to finance Order missions as Dumbledore tried brokering a fragile peace between wizardfolk and creature populations.

It hadn't worked the last time. So what chance did it have now? Especially when the Dark Lord had successfully proven that nothing would stop him. Not even death.

No, a different strategy needed to be considered moving forward.

He was going to need a new kind of strength. Something that former Hit-wizard Sirius Black couldn't provide. Something that the Lord of the Noble and Most Ancient House of Black could.

Political strength.

The meeting with Lucius had only been the first of many. Once he came into his power, he could spread his wings a little and start tapping into the political currents. The Lordship came with a plethora of responsibilities, but none without their perks. Perks that could prove instrumental in the days to come. And in return, all he had to do was embrace the role, along with whatever challenges accompanied it.

Sirius glanced at the staircase again, and let out a world-weary sigh.

For Harry, he told himself as he apparated away.

Cassiopeia Black was in her element.

Bitter winds rushed through her robes and curses flew around madly and without precision. Bloodlust dominated her instincts in a way she hadn't felt since her days in Grindelwald's service. It was enough to make anyone shiver in delight.

Swooping down towards the insurgents, she pouted when she couldn't see the faces of the people she was cursing. Just what was with the current generation and their horrid obsession with masks?

"You know," she shot a blood-boiling curse at a rather pale, portly wizard, "back in my days, fighting from behind a mask was considered cowardly." The masked man fell down the tower with a loud crash and what was most certainly the sound of bones snapping. Then, with a simple summoning charm, she pulled at the other insurgent's boots, causing him to cry out in shock as he rolled off the roof onto the rocky terrain below like his compatriot.

"Is this what passes for criminal these days?"

Her colleagues had already cleared up the rest of the building, leaving her to take care of the stragglers on the upper floors.

Adorable little bastards, she fondly mused. They know just how much I love heights.

They were called Shadowfall, an organization tasked with maintaining order in the power vacuum left by the end of Grindelwald's war. After the Dark Lord's defeat in 1945, she had been incarcerated and sentenced to life in Nurmengard's prison. One of the most talented witches of her time, yet she spent the next six years counting the bars on her cell door.

Then, one day, the Romanian Ministry came to her with a proposal. As the magical governments of Northern Europe slowly lost hope in the ICW to help them regain stability in the region, they'd created an autonomous task force that abided by the united authority of the countries involved, yet remained unrestricted by the ICW's changing norms and regulations.

She'd been offered a spot as a working member of the team, tackling all sorts of tasks— quelling the activity of the vampire courts, the rising tensions in werewolf packs, culling the wide variety of terrorists and dark creatures trying to promote insurgency in Northern Europe.

But she didn't care about any of that rubbish. A chance to fight again, to use magic and take down enemies as her blood pumped in the heat of battle?

That was what she was after.

And she'd been working with them ever since. Today, one of her strike teams had apprehended an insurgent whose entire group was holed away in Bistrita. According to the intel, they were stirring up trouble along the Transylvanian borders by smuggling hostile werewolves into Britain of all places. The last time something like that had happened was when—

"It's her! Attack!"

Cassiopeia deftly twisted her body to dodge two dark curses, firing bone-breakers without breaking her stride. One of the attackers dropped to the floor in pain, the curse having struck him in the bowels, while the other did a quick roll and fired off a flame curse.

She snorted in derision. Did they really expect that to bring her down?

Protego.

Raising her shield, she deflected the elemental attack and returned volley with a reductor curse, and then instinctively shifted her aim slightly more to the left.

Her opponent dropped to the floor, narrowly dodging the reductor curse—

"Avada Kedavra."

—Only to be struck by a bolt of green.

Idiot.

Cassiopeia couldn't help but purse her lips. The bastard had died far too soon, and far too quickly.

She'd forgotten how fragile people were.

"I'm really sorry about that," she sighed, walking over to the corpse. "It's— it's just a remnant from the old days, you see. In the war, we were just fighting so many people, and we needed to get things done quickly. The feint-and-kill was my personal favorite, but it still won't go away, the stubborn little thing—"

"STUPEFY!"

Cassiopeia whipped her head around, her wand deflecting the spell without a single word. Her eyes glowing with malevolence, she flicked her wand towards the offender, instantly conjuring ropes around him and banishing him against the nearby wall.

"A stunner? Did you really just interrupt my conversation with a stunner?!" she angrily demanded, storming towards the incapacitated man. "I was clearly still talking to your friend over there. I mean, really, terrorists these days. Manners no better than the average mudblood. Do you even know who I am, boy?" she scoffed, her voice now deathly cold. "Let me show you how we did it back in the day."

The man, a greying wizard with bulging, beady black eyes tried hastily opening his mouth to speak, but instead found a wand pushed into his face.

"Sanguiniferveo!"

Cassiopeia licked her lips, a twisted pleasure coursing through her veins.

This… this was precisely why she preferred the blood-boiling curse. Seeing the horror dawn in her opponent's eyes as they felt the heat grow and pulse within, as they felt the organs blister and erupt and burn, as they slowly and painfully accepted the reality of his own demise— it was an exquisite sensation.

Compared to that, the killing curse was just so… impersonal.

As her colleagues rushed into the room with the insurgents still breathing in shackles, Cassiopeia huffed and took a step back as she stowed her wand into her sleeve. "I trust you can all take it from here."

Pop!

Without waiting for confirmation, she apparated away to the entrance of her private villa in Sighisoara, just in time to see her nephew Alphard struggling against a massive trout on the other end of his fishing line. For a split second, she considered helping the man with a summoning charm, but knowing how obstinate her nephew could be about his ridiculous muggle pursuits, she just fondly rolled her eyes.

"Ah! You're back!" Alphard exclaimed. Letting out an enthusiastic roar, he pulled the trout out of the pond in one fell swoop, looking absolutely elated as he did so. Pushing himself onto his feet, he held the massive fish in one hand. "By the way, someone's here to see you."

"Me?" Cassiopeia raised an eyebrow. Her villa in Sighisoara wasn't a matter of public record. The muggles around town were mostly carefree, and Alphard was always charismatic enough to get people to do what he wanted. And if it wasn't enough…

Well, she had her ways.

It was a pity her nephew turned out to be a muggle-lover of all things. Why he couldn't just practice Dark magic and kill people like a normal Black was beyond her. Still, she considered herself lucky that he'd never met Albus Dumbledore.

A sudden Pop! jolted her out of her thoughts, and her wand immediately fell into her palm. But as the figure slowly drew closer, her defensiveness slowly bled away, replaced by a burgeoning sense of recognition. The dark silhouette began sporting features— familiar features, albeit of a person she hadn't met in over a decade. The same dark black locks, insolent good looks turned gaunt through suffering, and a mischievous grin on his face.

"Upon my word," Cassiopeia muttered in slight awe. "Sirius Black. It's you, isn't it?"

"In the flesh," Sirius intoned, making a flourished bow before opening his arms wide and embracing her in a bear hug. A smile slowly grew across her face, and she quickly found herself returning the gesture.

Pushing her back for a moment, Sirius gave her a long once-over. "You still don't look a day over thirty, Aunt Cassie."

"Flatterer," Cassiopeia snorted, the smile never fading. "Though, do color me surprised. You look quite stylish for a fugitive still avoiding the law."

"It seems you're behind the times. I'm a free man now thanks to my godson."

"You were acquitted?"

That was odd. Last she'd heard, Sirius had been arrested and thrown into Azkaban for betraying the Potters and murdering some no-name friend of his. Walburga had been downright unbearable, practically glowing with pride at the thought of her wayward son finally seeing the light. The woman had selective perception, seeing as her son muddied his way through and got arrested in the end.

Last she'd heard, Walburga died a few months later by suicide, and that was around the time she'd stopped all communications with the Black family in Britain. She had her own private little world here in Romania, and after Pollux's death two years ago, it had been just her and Alphard.

Seeing Sirius again, in the flesh…

"I never had a trial, Aunt Cassie."

"You never had a— you— what do you—" she spluttered, before her sweet grand-nephew cut her off.

"It's a lot of fucked up history that's gonna take hours to fully explain," he sighed, gently holding her arms. "The point is, I'm here. And I'm going to officially register my Lordship at the next Wizengamot meeting. I want you," he glanced towards Alphard, "and the rest of my family— our family —to be there for it."

Cassiopeia didn't know what to say. She knew that Arcturus had bypassed Orion and Cygnus, choosing Sirius as his heir instead, a decision Walburga and Orion and always resented. Not that she minded. Sirius had always been the cheeky bugger of the family— a free spirit compared to his brother Regulus, who always hid behind Walburga's skirt both literally and figuratively. Besides, Sirius's talent in wielding the Family Magic was spectacular, only matched by his bullheaded unwillingness to become the Lord.

But now, so many years later, that same boy— now a man —was choosing to take up the mantle he had so vehemently rejected in the past.

She had so many thoughts. So many questions. So much to talk about.

And yet…

Something is bugging me about this.

Cassiopeia was a woman of many considerable talents. A spinster from the Black family, before joining the tide to establish magical dominion over muggles, she had dedicated her life to researching magic and developing her own repertoire. Even so, chief among her skills was the ability to observe and make inferences.

The crux of her Shadowfall operation today was based on the mass smuggling of werewolves into British territory, thanks to the return of Fenrir Greyback, infamous werewolf alpha and known insurgent. With him operating in the shadows, tracking smugglers was becoming tedious and her life became awfully boring.

Coupled with Sirius's visit, however…

"Tell me, Sirius," she asked, an easygoing smile on her lips, "does your surprise visit have anything to do with the re-emergence of a Dark Lord in Britain?"

Sirius opened his mouth. Then closed it. Then tried again.

"Yeah," she snickered. "That's what I thought."