All in the Family

Chapter 199: The Flaw in the Plan

The opulent home felt vaguely familiar, though they'd yet been here. Cygnus and Druella Black's place of residence was a fine, respectively-sized mansion hidden so well within the British Isles nobody was actually quite sure where it was located. There was no door, no windows to the outside world, and the only chance to come and go was through the floo network or apparition. Once the occupants were all deceased, and if no new residences were brought in, most likely it would vanish altogether with time.

James slid on the highly polished floor like an obscene water slide until he face-planted a bathtub, the whole room wide enough for a Gryffindor party. Lily smacked into some solid silver cups and had golden saucers dance all around her from a cabinet with more obscene wealth than the Weasley's would ever make in all their generations. Regulus fell into the library that sent books flying and the family tree fluttering in all directions as he groggily sat up in the center.

Sirius landed in her room. The grand bed a soft landing, rather than the abundance of mirrors on every surface. There was one hovering above in the canopy so that she could wake up every morning looking as beautiful and perfect as when she fell asleep. There was one on either side as he sat up to show off every glimmering angle of her white-blonde hair that would cascade around her in smooth waves.

Black daffodils were painted into silver walls, green banners with snakes hung about since the day she was born, Narcissa's old room earmarked her for how she would grow up to be, or face the consequences.

On the makeup table at the nearest wall was the only evidence of her personal touch. A picture of the three sisters, all looking so different from each other it was laughable, and yet smiling. She stood as the youngest, hands on her hips and beaming at the older two, her family in the tapestry the picture was taken in front of. Andromeda had her arms around her and both were giggling about something long since passed. Bellatrix stood slightly apart, looking from the camera and back to the connected lines with boredom.

He hadn't hung around Bellatrix much in his youth, though in his very earliest memories he remembered admiring her for her wild spirit, brazen and haughty demeanor that seemed to get her everything she wanted. For a while he'd tried acting much the same way, but when his parents not only indulged this, but began their teachings at that age for him, he'd realized what was really going on.

He'd avoided Andromeda and Narcissa as well as their sister very much ever since, only at the gatherings he'd attended had he ever talked to the middle child much because she, like him, seemed reluctant to laugh along, and yet had never seemed sure how to break away.

Yet it was not the future Mrs. Tonks whom was apparently going to be featured. If Harry was to come back from that other place as he'd been offered, he would be surrounded by Death Eaters.

It wasn't Bellatrix who would discover the ruse, he suddenly knew. The decision of Harry's life would fall into this mother's hands, the one who had once pleaded for her own child. Would she spare another, or sacrifice him in an effort to get back to her own in the same, repetitive, horrible mistake all Death Eaters seemed destined to make?

His little brother had died proving otherwise though, he reminded himself, and Peter had hesitated, there at the end...maybe for one last time remembering the father of the boy who had spared his life, rather than him and Remus, willing to kill Peter on the spot in front of three teenagers.

He rubbed at his shoulder as he thought of Lily and what she might soon ask of him, all of them. To set aside their differences if Severus Snape made a good choice when they got back. There was no blanket decision for anything.

They always tended to gather up in the kitchen, Regulus had noticed, when given the chance. Not the sitting rooms where conversations were meant to be had, but around food being passed around, what should be a quiet and refined affair at parties. School had dissociated that a bit, but he so rarely spoke unless spoken to anywhere it had all been the same to him.

The book was dwindling down to the last chunk of pages, you could easily tear them out with one good rip now if any of them were crazy enough to do that. Alice was sitting close to Frank, as always, as she read of Harry waking up. She was built to be a mother, an ever-lasting kindness to her rounded features that spoke of Narcissa's exchange with Harry that saved him from the surrounding enemy in her every tone of support and love for this family to reunite, no matter their sordid background.

Harry had to keep the ruse up to Hagrid, and then his own family in Ron and Hermione and James shuddered at the idea, his son was far more than he'd ever be keeping the larger picture in mind where as he still couldn't imagine going back and not risking it all just for one shot at Voldemort and even knowing the risks without the imagination not to do it without his friends beside him. He needed them to much.

Their son did it though, the last bit of Voldemort's soul truly left his body behind for good in the Entrance Hall they could be casually sent back to any moment now. It didn't seem real to conceive they'd be able to go back looking at anything without the fear and pain of this future on every thought, and yet he smiled at his seven friends in anticipation for all to come.

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Lol! I feel bad for laughing, but I did not know when I started this there was a 200 chapter limit on Wattpad! If anyone would like to read 19 Years Later, I'll post it separately along with a chapter index of this very long fic, but I'm just giggling because it's hilarious! Of all the chapters to be cut out!

Or, if you don't want to wait, I'll post it on Thursday like usual on my Tumblr account, HalothentheHorns

Anyways, last chapter to be posted on the 18th along with both mentioned. Thank you all so, so, so very much for reading!