Godfather – In Which Tonks Asserts Her Wifely Authority

When they find out that their firstborn is going to be a boy, Remus is the one who hesitantly suggests that they name the baby "Theodore" after her dad, but Nymphadora Tonks is the one who wants—none of this gentle suggesting business that Remus so likes for the brash daughter of a Black, thanks very much—the godfather of her unborn child to be Harry James Potter. She is quite adamant about it, actually.

Remus agrees, of course, how could he not? His inexorable and frighteningly pregnant wife decrees it so, he loves Harry as well as if the boy is his own, and Harry is the kind of person who would take his responsibilities as godfather very seriously, given how much of an impact his own godparent has had on him in his short life.

But still, Remus has to question it at first; Harry is only a teenager, after all, even if he is a very brave and talented teenager who is working on defeating the greatest Dark Lord in British history.

'Are you sure that'll be so wise?' he hedges, wary of his wife's temper. It is something that she's inherited straight from Sirius' and Andromeda's family, that volatile Black mood prone to rising up when least expected. It's been a while now since they've gotten married and longer still since they've first been acquainted, but Remus is still learning to live in caution lest he arouse that notorious temper.

Tonks only looks irritably at him with tired eyes, scowling as if he has committed some cardinal faux pas, her hair rapidly cycling through blood-red, dark purple, black and sickly green before she says, 'Of course I'm sure, Remus. This is Harry we're talking about, aren't we? Harry Potter.'

'I know that,' Remus is quick to respond, 'but it's just that it's an awfully big duty to place on a mere teenager's shoulders. And Merlin only knows that he has enough on his plate already without us adding to it…'

'Well, yeah, but Harry will pull through it all, even if no one else does,' grins Tonks confidently. 'That boy is a survivor, and he has Hermione Granger on his side, doesn't he? If Harry's own resourcefulness fails, Hermione will keep his head on his shoulders for sure, and he'll protect any one of his own like no one else, come hell or high water.'

Remus frowns a little at the use of the unfamiliar Muggle idiom, but shrugs it off. 'If you think it best, I suppose,' he concedes graciously. 'Harry is very protective.'

'That's right, Lupin,' nods Tonks firmly. 'Harry's the only one for our Teddy's godfather. Besides, who else would you have for the job, eh? Ron? The twins? Merlin knows that I'm not going to trust anyone else with our baby. How much safer can you get than with the only one who can defeat Voldemort?'

'How do you know that?' demands Remus, jumping up, alarmed. 'How —'

Tonks only shrugs, and places a hand on her swollen belly. 'I just do, that's all,' she says matter-of-factly, and she means it—because no one can look into Harry Potter's green, green eyes without realising it as a truth. There's determination and courage and loyalty and love in the eyes that Remus insists are Lily Potter's, and Tonks reckons that if Lily Potter had eyes even just half as expressive as Harry's, she must have been a bloody beautiful woman. Because that's what Harry's eyes are: beautiful; beautiful in their clarity and openness that surely promises a victory for the Light side.

'All right,' Remus murmurs, and Tonks nods resolutely.

'Harry's going to save us all, Remus,' she says fiercely, blinking back sudden tears. 'That boy is going to squash Voldemort like a bug and save the whole world and us, and he's going to give Teddy a bright future to live in, a future that our parents couldn't give us. Mark my words, that boy will be the one to do it.'

'I never said otherwise,' her husband soothes quickly, and she bursts into tears at the thought of Harry's thin shoulders squaring to take on the world and so much more. He is really a hero, really a saviour, and Tonks feels so privileged that she has gotten to know this hero in all his moody, angst-ridden teenage self from that night so long ago at Privet Drive when she went along for a ride to pick him up.

So when months later, when Tonks feels her world go black with death from a curse by her dear old Auntie Bellatrix, she is so very glad that she chose Harry for Teddy's godfather, because now that she's leaving this world, Harry will take care of her son like no one else can. Because that boy is a hero, and who better to love and care for Teddy like the greatest hero that she has ever known?