When We Were Young

C H A P T E R N I N E

September 1st, 1943

Harry sat in the little compartment Tom had found for them in silence, wondering why Tom was taking so long to come back and petting Raven to pass the time.

Raven was liking all the attention he was receiving from Harry, his eyes half-lidded as Harry pet and lightly scratched his feathers.

It didn't take long for Harry to fall asleep, as he wasn't very interested in reading the dry Potions book he had taken out of his trunk for the ride prior to getting on the train. While Harry had no doubt that it would be fun to brew Potions, he didn't think that reading about it was going to cut it for him. Harry was more of a hands-on learner.

And so Harry fell asleep in the most awkward position ever, his chin to his chest and a hand resting on top of Raven's head. The poor bird's neck got squashed down from the dead weight of Harry's hand and he had to escape from all the weight. Of course, Raven decided to sit on Harry's head, as the boy never let him do it while he was awake (except for the day he first met Raven, but that was it).

When Tom walked into the little compartment 15 minutes later, his eyes had a vindictive little gleam and his mouth was halfway open to begin rambling on about how the Slytherin's looked constipated after the big reveal, but his mouth clicked shut and his gaze softened when he saw Harry in his awkward sleeping position. Then, Tom scowled, quietly shooing Raven -the ugly beast, why did Harry like him again?- off of Harry's head.

In truth, Raven was as handsome as a raven could get, for there where other ravens that looked positively hideous.

Tom sat down next to Harry and gently pulled the younger boy toward him, Harry grumbling a bit at the movement before sighing and relaxing into Tom, going into his usual position.

Harry usually took a two hour nap, sometimes longer (which kind of annoyed Tom since he wanted to hang out with a conscious Harry), after noon, so Tom was glad that Harry was knocking the nap-time out now rather than when the train was closer to Hogwarts. (Tom had once woken Harry up before the two hour line, and Harry had given Tom a glare so cold that Tom promised to never wake Harry up before two hours again).

Tom ran a hand through Harry's curls, glaring at Raven as he plucked several iridescent feathers out of Harry's hair. Raven clicked his beak a few times and ruffled his feathers, as if challenging Tom to do something to him.

Tom cursed Raven under his breath, squishing Harry closer to him. If Raven were anyone else's familiar, Tom would have drowned the bird already for being so annoying. Alas, Raven is Harry's familiar, and Harry would be heartbroken if Raven died, and he would probably never talk to Tom again for killing his familiar.

Harry had told Tom that Raven used to be his father's, the raven being past down to him after his father died. Harry said that Raven was still alive because of the stasis charm his father placed on the bird.

Tom figured that that was why Harry was tear-stained after seeing the Raven, but there was something off about the bird that made him question whether Harry was telling the truth or not- but that was nonsense. Harry wouldn't lie to him, right? Especially not over a bird.

Although, the bird in question seemed different. Smarter, ancient, but Tom told himself that he was imagining things. Raven was nothing more than a simple raven that liked to get on Tom's nerves. Perfectly normal.

Tom told his brain to shut up and nuzzled his face into Harry's corkscrew curls, sighing out and deciding to follow Harry's lead.

Once both boys where asleep, Raven got up on his two feet and waddled over to the nearest shadow, shifting to the other side of the veil.

Death had never given Raven over to one of his masters before, so Raven knew that this new master was special to Death.

Raven let out a loud caw and took off into the air, following the cold trail of magic that lead him straight to Death. Raven landed on Death's shoulder, a bone finger coming up to scratch Raven's feathers as Raven gave his life long companion a loving head-bud.

While Death had no regrets giving Harry his raven, he had felt lonely without his companion following him everywhere.

A cleared throat interrupted the lovely reunion of Death and Raven.

"You left me quite the amount of paper work by sending your precious master back in time, Death."

Death let out a rattling sigh before turning around to face his counterpart, Life, surprised to see her. It's only been a few hundred years.

"And, pray tell, what do you want me to do about it now? 11 years after my master was already born?" Death asked, his fingers clicking against his scythe and his other hand dropping from where he had been petting Raven.

Life scowled, crossing her arms. "I didn't want to see you 11 years ago. I just thought that I'd drop by to tell you want a pain in the ass it was to file all the paper work. I had to arrange a whole new bloodline, Death! You know I don't like doing that!"

"It's nothing you haven't done before, Life. You can deal with it," Death replied dryly, turning away from Life and walking by a couple of faded souls that arrived hundreds of years before. It was always interesting to see the other side of the veil.

The people that believed in Christianity and Catholicism expected Heaven and Hell, and so that was what they saw when they arrived. The Greeks expected to see the Fields of Punishment, the Fields of Asphodel, and Elysium Isles, and that's exactly what they saw on the other side of the veil. The Atheists believed in no higher power or after-life, so many just floated around in darkness, at peace and content where they are.

The 3 gods of judgment ruled over where the humans were placed in their specific afterlife, Death's job being to only escort the souls from their body to this side of the veil. The Atheists that were bad people just got placed in Hell with the Christians and Catholics that had sinned.

It didn't matter what religion the souls believed in. If they were good people, they got rewarded, if they were bad people, they got punished. It was the simple order of things.

The thing that Death liked the most was that the souls remained in the clothing of their time, so he often saw people of the 18th century walk around with confused faces when they saw people of the 20th century walk by them.

Life huffed and faded away from the afterlife, clearly seeing that she no longer held Death's attention.

Death barely noticed Life leave, his gaze on two children giggling and playing tag, seeming to still be full of life.

Death wondered what it was like to be human, so fragile and often insignificant to the world. He just wished that Harry would be ready to take the burden when Death handed him his scythe.

Death was tired of his job. He wanted to be at peace, to rest after so long, but he couldn't. Not yet. His master wasn't ready to be the next Death. Harry deserved to live some more before Death handed him his scythe.

All the masters before Harry weren't the right people to be Death. Their personalities were much to unbalanced and bleak.

Harry was next and only person in line, and he had to be ready when the time came.

Raven let out another attention-demanding caw, drawing Death from his thoughts.

Right then, Death was reminded of how needy was companion was and sighed.

Oh, Raven.