The Lost Horcrux

Damage Limitations

Disclaimers: Dark themes, police state ideas, mention of spousal abuse on and off-screen, death of minor characters, graphic imagery and violence, frank sex discussion, copious bad language, bashing the fucking Weasleys, liberties taken with mythical history.

***

Harry woke slowly, stretched out languidly on his bed and looked around. Daylight was streaming in through the windows now, which could only mean that he must have finally passed out at some point in the night ... but not after he'd been making love to Hermione for hours. Making love to his wife actually, he correctly himself joyfully. The thought sent his mind into a tailspin and, for a moment, he just stared up at his ceiling, fighting the urge to kick his legs up and down with the ecstasy of it all. Harry noticed the plaster on the ceiling was cracked and blistering as he looked at it ...

It was like it had been exposed to some serious heat.

He laughed quietly to himself at that. He didn't want to wake his wife, fast asleep and obscenely pretty next to him. His wife. Harry just stared at her, grinned widely and decided he wasn't going to use her actual name for a while, just her new title. It made him stupidly happy just to think it. He wasn't supposed to be this euphoric. It wasn't even contentment that he was feeling ... it was bliss. Enraptured, exalted bliss. But he was Harry Potter ... dark, broody, tough saviour of the world.

Mindless joy wasn't supposed to be on his menu. But here it was, swirling all around and threatening to smother him with happiness.

Harry needed a dose of his old reality to get his head down from the clouds. So he slipped quietly from the bed and eased on his dressing gown. It was, remarkably, in one piece. It must have been one of the few items left in the room that could make such a claim. For the place was a state ... there was actual debris littered around Harry's feet. He found the sight ridiculously funny, and bit down on the sleeve of the dressing gown to offset a fit of hysterics that threatened him, as he looked around at the charred walls and smashed furniture ... the aftermath of his sex-shattered domain.

Harry Potter was convinced that had never seen a funnier sight in all his days.

He pulled the black and red dressing gown around his shoulders, it had the Gryffindor badge emblazoned on the right breast and was the cosiest piece of clothing Harry felt he owner. He didn't bother tying it, as the air was still stiflingly hot. He'd better open the window, just in case his wife needed a bit of a breeze on her sweaty body. It might blow the heady aroma of sex from her sticky skin. Oh ... oh yeah! ... there was no window! Harry just stared at the vacant square in the wall, like it was a curious piece of abstract art or something ... then remembered some of the arts he'd been practising there a merely a few hours before ...

And Harry smacked his lips at the luscious memory. He turned to look at his partner in that sexy crime, spread-eagled on his tangled sheets, naked as the day she was born. She was so beautiful. This was definitely Harry's favourite outfit for her. He wondered vaguely how often she would wear it for him.

Every day ... for the rest of my life ... so long as I don't find a way to mess this up.

The truth of the thought careened into him like a sledgehammer, and he was back to grinning like a dopey teenager again. Harry picked up one of the wine bottles that Rhian had brought them last night and slurped down its remnants. It may have been a bit early to start drinking, but Harry was parched and in a celebratory mood. Then he spotted another bottle, wedged firmly between the splintered remains of his bedside table. He remembered, with a flashed memory of filth, of trying to drink the wine from every orifice of his wife, then trying to use it for a bit of decadent lubrication when things got a bit dry ... only to spill the whole thing and having to reignite the lubrication charms he'd built into the walls, which wasn't nearly as fun, even if they were far more practical and effective.