"Nonsense" Charlus replied. "You are family, regardless of where or when you come from" he stated firmly. "I didn't even have any siblings so we can't even say you're a nephew" he added with a sigh.
"Well we have to think of something, the boy could pass for James's twin" Dorea said exasperatedly.
Charlus's head shot up at that and he looked at his wife with a smirk.
"Say that again" he requested.
"What, that he…" she paused mid-sentence. "Could pass as James's twin" she finished in a whisper and looked at Harry speculatively. "Woah" Harry piped up in realisation. "No, just… No" he finished disbelievingly.
"It could work" Dorea concluded, ignoring Harry's protest.
"How would that work?" Harry asked weakly. "It could" Charlus agreed. "No one knew about James until we sent him to school except for Dilys, who is now dead and… Arcturus, he was the only who came to our house when James was growing up", he finished with a sigh.
"We can always tell him" Dorea suggested. "He would understand, it's family Charlus, he would understand" she reiterated.
Charlus nodded.
"We can just say that we sent him away to be privately tutored, hell the boy is more than talented to make that believable" Charlus pointed out. "The boy is a damn prodigy" he added sincerely. "We can just say we brought him home because of the war, we wanted him close" he concluded triumphantly.
"I would advise against informing Mr. Black", Dumbledore cut in gravely.
"This is family business Dumbledore" Charlus retorted irritably. "It no longer concerns you" he added in a no nonsense tone. Dumbledore simply shrugged and remained silent.
Dorea sighed.
"That's all well and good but you are forgetting one thing" she said with a shake of her head. Charlus frowned and looked at his wife questioningly.
"James", Dorea reminded him exasperatedly. "Ah", Charlus deadpanned.
The two sat in silence for a while until Charlus spoke again.
"We tell him the truth" he said simply.
Dorea frowned at him and shook her head. "He's 16 Charlus, you can't put that on him" she sighed.
"We can't lie to our son hell, he deserves a chance to get to know the boy it's not like he needs to babysit him, it might even make him bloody well grow up some" he responded.
He sighed before he carried on speaking.
"I'm not saying it will be easy, far from it but it will be worse if we try to hide it from him" he pointed out. "We are family, no matter how we are related we have to look out for each other it's small enough without lies and secrets amongst ourselves" he finished with a sad shake of his head.
"Honestly, it's ok" Harry piped up once again. "I can just change my name and wear glamour's" he offered, though he felt reluctant doing so.
"You'll do no such thing" Charlus responded firmly. "You're a Potter" he added simply.
"This is just causing problems and I didn't want that", Harry said sadly. "I don't need anything and I'm ok, I have more than enough gold to buy myself a house when I finish school, maybe we should just forget about this", he suggested and stood to leave.
He really did not want to cause problems for his family, he had only come here to enroll at school, perhaps find a much needed ally in Dumbledore and had been thrown into this unexpectedly.
"And what about us?" Dorea asked emotionally getting to her feet. "You just expect us to forget that we met you?" she added with a shake of her head. "You are our Grandson, no matter how you came here" she finished firmly.
Harry paused with his hand on the doorknob and swallowed deeply.
Charlus stood and placed his hand on his wife's shoulder.
"As I said, our family is small Harry" he spoke quietly. "We never got the chance after James to have anymore children" he choked. "We can't just forget that you are here, you are family and you don't have anyone else, James will understand, it will probably take time but he will, he always wanted a brother, just as we wanted more children" he finished with a weak smile.
"I never had a family" Harry whispered.
"And now you do" Charlus replied. "It will be an adjustment but we will make it work somehow" he added with a nod.
"But it's not fair on my Dad" Harry responded with a shake of his head.
"And it will be even more unfair if you hide from him and not give him the chance" Charlus pointed out.
Harry dragged his hand through his hair.
This situation was even more strange than he could have ever have comprehended and he had no idea what to do. He felt as though he had no choice in the matter. He could walk away and hide and know that he had hurt the only family he had ever had or he could face what he felt was coming.
He turned to face the couple and could see the pleading in their eyes.
How could he say no to them?
The simple answer was that he couldn't and he knew it. They were willing to at least try, he should be able to do the same and he knew he would regret it if he left now and didn't.
He sighed and nodded, noting the relief appearing on his grandparent's faces as he did so.
"I'll go and get him" Dorea offered as she walked towards the fireplace and she paused. "Sirius is there" she said in realisation.
Harry's breath hitched in his chest at the mention of his godfather. "We will worry about him after we've spoken to James" Charlus replied.
Dorea nodded and disappeared into the flames after throwing in some floo powder.
"If you plan on attending Hogwarts Harry I will need a transcript of some sort", Dumbledore broke the silence that had fallen after a moment.
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