Chapter Text
Thanatos is not a God that has children. He is Death Incarnate, no matter how beautiful he might be, and that leaves mortals with an instinctive fear of him.
James and Lily Potter were the first exception to that rule in a very long time.
As Thanatos holds his daughter--his first daughter, the first demigod child he has ever had--in his arms, Thanatos cannot bring himself to regret the events that have led him to this moment.
“She's beautiful,” James tells him, gazing down at their daughter. “She has your hair.”
She did. Black fuzz lined the baby's skull. Her skin was the same dark tan shade as Lily's. It was too early to tell whether she had inherited his eye color or Lily's. Asphodel Potter's eyes were still the cloudy blue all babies had.
“She looks a lot like Thanatos,” Lilly says to them both, smiling tiredly from where she lay on the bed. Sweat lined her forehead. “I'm glad.”
Thanatos lifted his hand and ran his knuckles along Asphodel's cheek. “...Thank you. Both of you. For everything.”
James laughed. “No. Thank you for joining us. For giving us a daughter as wonderful as Asphodel.”
Thanatos smiled. He could not tear his eyes from his daughter, not even to look at the two people who had given her to him. “Why name her Asphodel?”
Lily and James look at one another. “It's traditional to name a female child after flowers in my family,” Lily says. “You know that.”
“And…” James huffs and leans over, taking Thanatos's face in hand and tilting his head up so he could lay a kiss on Thanatos’ lips. “Asphodel is of the Underworld, isn't she? She deserves a name worthy of Death Himself.”
Thanatos blinks slowly at James, his wings ruffling behind him. Then he laughs lightly. “And Asphodel was the best you could come up with?”
“They grow in Elysium, don't they?” Says Lily. “We want that, for our daughter. Elysium, that is.”
“She will get it,” Thanatos promises. “When one day she dies, I will make sure of it.”
“She'll earn it on her own, I think,” says James, his eyes twinkling with mirth.
“Just like you,” Thanatos murmurs, leaning over to kiss James again. Then he turns and leans over to kiss Lily as well.
In that moment, Thanatos is happier than he has been in a very long time.
It does not last.
“NO! NOT MY DAUGHTER!”
Zeus leans back on his throne and gazes down at Thanatos below him. “Do you understand why you are here?” He demands. The other Olympians look down at Death in boredom or sympathy.
Thanatos flexes his wings and then settles them along his back. He gazes up at the King of the Gods, unashamed. “I saved my daughter's life.” Though I could not save her parents.
“You interfered directly in mortal matters,” says Hera. “And you broke the Ancient Laws regarding interacting with demigod children.”
“It's so sweet, though,” Aphrodite sighs happily. “A love story for the ages.”
“It put a rather abrupt end to the druidic wars,” Ares points out. “We anticipated they wouldn't end for some time.”
“There is a prophecy involved,” Apollo says. “There's no avoiding that. Perhaps this is fated.”
“Or perhaps it isn't,” says Zeus. “It was a blatant breaking of the Ancient Laws regardless. That requires punishment.”
“But what punishment?” Poseidon muses, looking conflicted.
They deliberate for some time, debating back and forth. Thanatos stands unbowed before them as they speak, waiting quietly for them to finish. He thinks of his daughter, of where she must be now. With Sirius, in all likelihood. He wishes dearly he were with them--but to split his consciousness and check on her--it would surely result in harsh punishment for the blatant disrespect.
Eventually, his punishment is decided upon. For three years, he will be mortal, performing tasks at the gods’ behest.
Three years until he can see his daughter again.
Only three years.
“Asphodel?”
The cottage in Godric’s Hollow is a tourist trap. The Potter Manor is long gone. The Black Townhouse is empty bar a mad house elf. Sirius Black is nowhere to be found.
No. Sirius Black is somewhere to be found.
“Asphodel, I'm sorry.”
Thanatos, invisible to mortal eyes, looks down at the shivering wreck that is Sirius Black, trapped within the walls of Azkaban. Rage fills every fiber of his being as he stares down at the wretched and emaciated form of the man before him. Drawing the Mist up around them, Thanatos allows himself to appear before Sirius.
“Where is she?” Thanatos asks, calmly. His ichor boils in his veins.
Sirius startles where he is curled up, gazing out the bars with distant eyes. He looks at Thanatos, his eyes going wide. “Death,” He says, afraid.
“Where is my daughter?” Thanatos asks.
“I don't know,” Sirius says, trembling. “They locked me up and won't let me see her. My goddaughter-- oh, Asphodel! I'm so sorry…”
Thanatos breathes.
Then, with a flash, he vanishes.
Someone has taken his daughter. He will find her.
He swears it upon the River Styx.
He searches.
Invisible, he hunts down Remus. Then he hunts down Dumbledore. Then he hunts down the Longbottoms. Nowhere is Asphodel to be found.
He searches the houses of the members of the Order, then the houses of the Death Eaters, then the houses of anyone Lily and James so much as spoke with within the Wizarding World. Still nothing. At the end of his rope, Thanatos almost gives up. Until--
“Pappa? I need you. I'm sorry. Where are you?”
A prayer. So light and soft and unmistakably his daughter. The first he's heard since regaining his immortality. Immediately he follows the connection and finds--
His daughter. His precious, adorable, treasured daughter. Trapped in a cupboard, in pain and crying silent tears, her hands clasped in prayer. And the house she is in--
The Dursleys? Petunia's house? But Lily specified that their daughter was never, under any circumstances, to ever go to--
Thanatos takes one look at his daughter, his hurt and crying daughter, before leaving for the Underworld.
He needs to speak to Hades.
Immediately.
(And, well, if the Lord of the Dead will not help him, then Thanatos will simply have to take things into his own hands once again. A few more years of punishment is nothing, not compared to the safety and wellbeing of his only daughter.)
It is very rare that Satyrs get sent out for specific demigods. Most of the time, demigods end up getting stumbled upon by accident more than anything else. For the most part, that works just fine too. Satyrs are very good at finding demigods, even well hidden ones. Every once in a while though…
Chiron bows. “Lord Hades.”
Hades waves a hand, gesturing for Chiron to stand up once more. “I need a Satyr to send after a demigod.”
Chiron pauses, his thoughts racing. “A demigod, my lord?”
Hades huffs. “Yes, a demigod. Not one of mine, mind you.”
Immediately, Chiron relaxes. If Hades had broken the oath… Well. Nothing good would have come of it, that was for certain. “Then who's, my lord?”
“My right hand’s. Thanatos had a daughter a few years ago, and her parents were murdered the year before last,” Hades says, looking Chiron up and down. “I advised against sending her here so early, but apparently the situation is… untenable.”
Chiron had heard of that. There were rumors floating around the immortal sphere that Death had been rendered mortal for a few years for breaking the Ancient Laws. Which Ancient Laws hadn't been specified, but if Thanatos had a demigod daughter…
There has never been a daughter of Death before. Daughters of Hades, yes. Even daughters of Melinoe, a time or two. But never a daughter of Thanatos.
“Of course,” Chiron says, recovering from his shock quickly. “Then we'll be certain to send someone to fetch her. What is the address?”
“Number 4 Privet Drive, in Little Whining, Surrey. It's in England, near London, if I'm not mistaken.”
Chiron bows. “Then we will send someone right away.”
Gleeson Hedge was not what most people pictured when they thought about Satyrs. He was loud, at times rude, and often violent. But he was a good Finder. A good Protector. Which was why to say he was pissed was an understatement.
Asphodel Potter, the demigod he'd been sent to pick up, was a tiny thing of only four years. She was the age when children should be running around playing and laughing, giggling with their friends. Instead, she was here, working under the hot sun in the garden, bruises littering her arms.
Hedge crouches down near her, clamping down on his anger. “Hey, kiddo.”
The girl looks up at him with wide green eyes the color of greek fire. Hegde meets her gaze head on and smiles at her. “Your dad sent me.”
The girl stills, her eyes going wide. “My dad is dead.”
“Nope, kiddo. He's living,” Hedge tells her. If you can call being Death living, anyways. Whatever. “He heard you praying. Wants me to take you somewhere safe. Camp Half Blood.”
“Half Blood?” Asphodel murmurs, looking down at the ground. The flowers start wilting under her hands and she immediately withdraws her fingers from the soil. They stop wilting. Frowning, she looks back up at him. “What's Half Blood?”
“It's what you are, kiddo. Half human, half god,” Hegde tells her. “You're a demigod.”
Asphodel fidgets with her hands, squirming in place. “...I'm that?”
“Yep. Means you're special.” Hegde nods solemnly. “Means that I've got to take you somewhere safe. I'm a Protector, you see.”
The girl looks at him with wide, watery eyes. “Safe?” She murmurs. Then she bursts into tears. Hedge held out his arms for a hug and the girl ran to him, holding onto him tightly. He stood up straight, picking up the girl as he went, and then started to walk away.
No one stopped him as he left.
A loud screeching filled his office. Alarm after alarm after alarm went off all at once. Dumbledore stood up and whirled around. Severus Snape and Minerva McGonagall, both in his office to discuss some disciplinary action regarding a pair of young boys from Gryffindor and Slytherin ending up in the Hospital Wing following a fight, watched with alarm as Dumbledore went from trinket to trinket turning alarms off and checking things.
“Albus? Just what is going on?” McGonagall asks.
“The wards around Asphodel Potter's house have collapsed,” Dumbledore says shortly, waving his wand and checking the scan for results. Whatever the results were gave him a grim look on his face. He walks briskly over to the fireplace, throws in some floo powder, and announces, “Ms Figg, number 6 Private Drive.” before vanishing. Snape and McGonagall take one look at one another before following.
“--you tell me about Ms Potter?” Dumbledore is asking when they arrive.
Arabella Figg, looking rather startled from where she sits with her kneazles, stammers a reply. “She's a sweet young girl. Quiet. Likes to garden from what I can see.”
“And have you seen her recently?” Dumbledore asks urgently.
Figg shakes her head. “I haven't. Not for more than a week. I assumed she was simply ill or something.”
Dumbledore nods grimly. “She's not. She's gone. The wards would only have fallen like this if she no longer considers this place the home of her family--No longer the place she will always return to.”
Snape's eyes narrow as he looks out the window and sees the suburban area. “Just where are we, Dumbleodre? What family did you leave Potter with?”
“It no longer matters. She's not here anymore. Come, Severus. McGonagall. We'll need to return to Hogwarts and begin a search.”