Death is but the Next Great Adventure

It Ain't Easy Being Immortal

In the last chapter: Harry sneaks into Gringotts to steal Helga's cup, putting the tortured dragon there to rest. When Harry returns to Hogsmead, he runs into Bellatrix and saves her from the dementors in exchange for her leaving him alone to look for her master. Snape has some unpleasant dreams.

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Returning home for winter break, Harry's spirits rose to incredible heights. He had three of the five Horcruxes, Bellatrix vanished without a trace, and he could tell that the period of just learning the language of the dead would soon be coming to an end. The short conversations he'd held with the dementors must have been enough to prove to Death that he knew the language well enough, for the lessons were centered more around 'polishing' what he already knew rather than the rigorous studying he'd been doing up to that point.

All of Harry's hard work over the past few years was finally providing results and he couldn't have been happier.

Sirius and Remus noticed the uptick in his mood immediately and began their foolish game of trying to figure out just what had him smiling so much. Unsurprisingly, Sirius kept listing off the names of Harry's peers—most likely to see if he had a 'crush' as they called it. Remus, having had the opportunity to observe Harrys interactions with the other students, doubted that it had anything to do with infatuation. Harry's reputation as the 'Ice Prince' didn't come from nowhere, after all.

Either way, it just felt really nice to be home, Harry thought upon entering the Black ancestral home.

The days leading up to Christmas—or Yule, as Sirius called it—were blanketed in thick duvets of snow as the three remained within the home next to the warm fire or wrapped in a blanket at a window seat with tea or cocoa encased in their fingers. Sirius was able to drag the other two out the day after a particularly large snowfall to play some winter games and build some snowy lumps that barely passed as figures. Although he and Remus had complained the whole way out, when they returned, they were rosy-cheeked and grinning, large flakes still melting in their hair and eyelashes.

When Christmas finally came, Harry found himself sharing in the holiday exuberance as he enjoyed an enormous and syrupy breakfast before sitting down in the warm drawing room with his small family and tearing through the piles of gifts from his friends and guardians. Any gifts that Harry received from the fanatic 'unknown's—there were always a few at every birthday and Christmas—were checked by Remus and Sirius before Harry could either decide to keep them or through them out, and he usually threw them away.

He hadn't a clue how the people who sent the gifts didn't see how inappropriate it was for strange adults to send gifts to a thirteen-year-old bi-annually. Sure, some were people of power who wanted an opportunity to boost the public's opinion of them through association—which Harry could mildly understand—but most were just adults who wanted to 'thank him for his service to society' and were his 'fans.' Harry hadn't even done anything to garner their attention save for his testimony at Sirius' trial and the initial fame that came from what happened with Voldemort.

Harry wasn't ignorant, he knew that there were some his guardians never even let him see. Occasionally he got the odd letter or two while at school that praised everything he did and expressed worrying amounts of devotion and affection. He received newspaper clippings of the very few times his picture had been in the paper usually accompanied with detailed poetry or letters about what he meant to them or misguided declarations of love. If he were anyone else, he would probably be terrified or disgusted, but as it was, Harry just vanished them or set them aflame. He had more important things to worry about than the inappropriate gazes and thoughts of strangers.