"But he would do anything to make you happy. He turned away from being a Death Eater to make you happy. He would be unhappy if you asked him to stop protecting you, but I do not think that his attachment to necromancy in particular is so great that he would want to continue practicing it if you asked him to stop."
"That still puzzles me sometimes, you know."
"What does?"
"That I can ask someone to stop, and they'll listen."
Harry turned red as soon as he'd said it, but Healer Letham leaned forwards and stated with soft emphasis, "Your family will stop if you ask them to. And I hope you know that I will always stop, as important as I might think it for you to listen to my words."
Harry took a deep breath. "Yes, of course." At least she wasn't going to talk about what his words meant when it came to the Dursleys. Then again, she probably already knew. "You think I should talk to them?"
"I do."
"Of course, Henry." Lucius could barely speak the words past the choking sensation in his throat. He had never once thought that it might be his use of necromancy—not the Imperius or Dark spells in general—that would upset his son. "I promise you that I will never use that spell again."
"Thank you, Father."
Henry had come through the Floo; Healer Letham had said in a brief note that he needed to. Lucius almost wished that she was here for this conversation, at the same time as he believed it best held in private. Henry was fidgeting with his hands, biting his lip again and again.
"Son?"
"I—realized another reason that the necromancy bothered me more than other things."
"Please tell me." Lucius laid his hands flat on his knees. He wanted to get up and hug Henry, but Henry had asked that they stay at opposite ends of the small sitting room for the moment. It was an impersonal room done in browns and steel-blues, with many comfortable chairs, and it had been Healer Letham's recommendation. She had thought it would make Henry more comfortable.
"It's the rituals," Henry said in a rush. "The ones that didn't happen, the one that Black wanted to do to make me a Potter and the one Pettigrew brought me to the graveyard to do. That would have been a resurrection ritual, right? Like the one I had the nightmare about?"
"Yes," Lucius said quietly. Crouch had confirmed it.
"I—Father, I didn't even realize that I had nightmares about that, or about Black turning me into a Potter again. I would wake up sometimes gasping and feeling hurt and shaken, and I didn't know why. But the nightmares have become conscious since I heard about what you did."
Lucius closed his eyes in pain. "Of course, Henry. I will never do it again."
"Why?"
"Why? Because you asked me not to, of course."
"No, not that. Father, you—told me once that you didn't really feel emotions like other people." Not long before the graveyard, in fact, Lucius thought. "But you seem really upset now. Why is that?"
Lucius stared at Henry for a long moment, and then decided it was a good thing they had their son in Mind-Healing.
"Because you and your brother and mother are different," he said. "I also told you that. And that I froze inside when you were stolen, but that I had begun to thaw since you had returned. Did you not remember that? Did you think that my using necromancy somehow negated my care for you?"
"No." Henry swallowed. "I just—sorry. I need to keep hearing it."
Lucius stood and crossed the room to his son then, because he had to. He would not touch him if Henry didn't want him to. But he needed to be closer, needed to be able to see the expressions on Henry's face from nearer to.
Henry launched himself at Lucius, thus solving the question of whether Lucius should try to embrace him or not. He wrapped his arms around his son's shoulders and brought him close, sighing a little when Henry came to rest against him.
"I will do what you ask of me within reason, always," Lucius said. "And I will never perform necromancy again. I am willing to swear an oath to the effect if you will."
"No. It's all right. I trust you, Father."
Lucius closed his eyes and made the vow to himself. In their eagerness to defend Henry and defy the Dark Lord, they must not lose him, or cross all the lines that separated them from the Dark Lord himself.
Even if they thought of those lines differently than other people did.
"You can't do that again, Mother."
Narcissa blinked. She might have expected an ultimatum of that sort from Henry, but this was Draco, not actually identical when one looked closely, leaning forwards and giving her a long, cool look through the Floo Healer Letham had set up in the Room of Requirement.
Healer Letham hadn't blinked at setting up the Floo for Draco as well as for Henry, or recommending that they both speak to their parents. Despite her occasional annoyance that Healer Letham kept Henry's secrets from her, Narcissa had never regretted hiring her.
"What do you mean, Draco?"
"Prioritize your vengeance above your children."
Now she stared at him. Draco just looked back. There was a jut to his jaw that reminded her of Lucius's when he was angry, but didn't look the same on his face. Draco was truly coming into his own.
"I did not do that."
"Yes, Mother. You did."
"Your father was there with you and preventing the Aurors from—"
"And you weren't."
....
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