Dark Phoenix (Nico Di Angelo & Harry Potter)

7

Nico had aged five years by the time he had managed to lock himself in Harry's room.

The bed had been dragged haphazardly across the rotting floorboards, leaving behind alarmingly visible skid marks that revealed a twenty year build up of dirt and grime, parting to expose the once magnificent hardwood below. All the brooms had been dumped in a corner to collect more dust, but the distracting posters were still up, with their bright eyed people waving their brooms around as different leather bound balls swirled over their heads.

Nico dragged the sheets off the bed and gave them a good shake before they were deemed clean enough to lie on, then he threw them over the mattress and flopped down.

It gave a creak - expected - but Nico's back was sore from keeping itself ramrod straight for what felt like forever as Mrs Weasley - bless her - had fed him a congratulatory early lunch of leftover roast and potatoes while everyone watched him like hawks. Nico could hardly swallow as it was, and an audience didn't help anything go down. It was a miracle he had managed to down half the plate at all, and he blamed his poor appetite on jittery nerves.

"You alright, Harry?" Mrs Weasley had asked for the billionth time that day, with the same hopeful smile on her face as she had taken the plate from him.

Nico had offered her a reassuring smile in return, forcing as much of his appreciation into it as possible. It was difficult, seeing as he had hardly received a wink of sleep ever since Malfoy had woken him up before the sun was even in the sky.

"I'm good," he had stated, before telling everyone that he needed some space to think and try to rekindle the flames of his past, or whatever.

He could tolerate a creaky bed.

Grimmauld Place, once you got to know it better, made Nico wish he hadn't known anything in the first place. If the buzzing curtains weren't enough to make him shiver, the wrinkled elf heads pinned on to the wall had definitely done the trick.

The occupants were long used to the horrors of the house, and instead, maneuvered themselves away from the portraits that refused to be put down, and the remaining cursed ornaments that had welded themselves onto the shelves.

Nico didn't know who had broken the news about his whole ordeal. He wasn't even sure if they had taken it in good stride.

But in front of him, they had been awfully nice about everything, with the exception of Sirius Black who had taken to following Nico with his silvery eyes ever since he had arrived.

The son of Hades couldn't blame the man. He did read the papers when Mr Weasley had left him in his office after the courtcase to settle some matter about toilets.

And from what Nico could gather, Sirius Black was wrongfully convicted for the murder of Muggles and was believed to have led James Potter and Lily Evans to their deaths.

Or rather, had led Voldemort to them.

Wrongfully convicted was what he chose to side with because everyone around him seemed to morally aligned with righteousness to siddle up to a criminal, but then again, wasn't that how most cults were formed?

Sirius obviously cared about his godson, and the son of Hades didn't want to take away too much of his happiness while he lasted.

That was an issue itself. He had to find out exactly why he knew that Sirius was going to die.

He waited for the sleep to come. It didn't.

Nico stretched, not feeling particularly refreshed even after every joint in his body gave a satisfying crack. He ran a hand through his black hair, cropped too short to his ears for Nico's tastes, and then took off the damn glasses that he'd have to use later when his eyesight decided to screw with him.