Cho Chang (formerchinadoll) wrote in after_the_bombs, @ 2012-07-22 19:07:00 |
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When it was all over, when he could finally slip away from the people who were determined to flock around him to ask him what he or they or someone should do next (how the hell was he supposed to know? He'd not expected to survive this long. He had no plans for the future), he Apparated to the back garden at Grimmauld Place. The old house was still run down and bleak and forboding, but it was blessedly quiet and empty. He supposed that the place really belonged to Andromeda Tonks or Narcissa Malfoy now, but he didn't let that stop him from going inside. Andromeda would not begrudge him this place and Narcissa owed him. As much as he still didn't like the Malfoys, he had spoken up for them when the first mentions of Azkaban appeared. For putting his 'chosen one' weight behind them, Narcissa could bloody well let him stay here for a while.
Aching and so very, very tired, Harry stood in the entry and stared blankly down the hall. The naps he'd caught here and there since fulfilling the Prophecy had been the proverbial sips of water in a desert. He knew he needed real sleep but he feared it. Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Kings Cross Station again. He couldn't help wondering that having cheated death long enough to deal with Voldemorte that he might have to now take that other path. Even as tired and purposeless as he was, he didn't want to die. That much at least he was certain of.
Kreacher startled him out of the mindless staring. The ancient house elf had dodged his reflexive curse nimbly. “Master has come home. Good, good,” he'd croaked, “Come, Master, Kreacher has prepared a room.”
As he had yet again run out of ideas by making the choice to come to Grimmauld Place, Harry followed along after the house elf. Kreacher led him to what had been one of the rooms that had refused to open on the other times he'd spent there. The three room suite – sitting room, bedroom, en suite – was scrubbed clean if still shabby and the heavy curtains had been pulled back to let light stream through the newly scrubbed windows. Harry could only blink in wonderment. He'd not thought that this much cleaning was left in the old elf.
Kreacher vanished as quickly as he appeared while muttering about keeping watch and making sure that no one appeared to disturb the Master's rest.
Harry wandered around a bit, trailing his fingers across the old furniture and checking the curtains for pixies and the closets and wardrobe for boggarts. Finding no dark creatures and only a few dark artifacts on shelves and in drawers, he smiled faintly and pulled his shrunken school trunk from his pocket. He quickly resized it and for the first time since he bought it with gold left to him by the parents he'd never known, he unpacked it completely.
Harry Potter was home.