A/N : This chapter is for Fiito who asked for a 'Harry discovers that Teddy smokes' chapter way back at 'Acceptance'
So here it is, terribly sorry about the wait.

At fourteen years old, his forth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Theodore Lupin smoked his first cigarette.

Leaning against the stands after a Quidditch match with his younger cousin Fred Weasley the Second and a gang of older boys, Teddy felt bullet proof. He was still aching from a confrontation with a bludger that ended badly for him, but somehow it all seemed to fade away because this was Patrick-bloody-Jordan they were talking about; he was, undoubtedly the coolest guy Ted knew. Dark-skinned, dark-eyed, a mischievous smirk constantly on his face; he was always the life of the party, Quidditch captain and Prefect. He'd invited Teddy and Fred to come and hang out with him and his friends as Teddy limped out of the showers that afternoon.

"So you're Harry Potter's son then, huh?" one of them asked, eyeing Teddy carefully. Trying his best to act nonchalant, Teddy shrugged.

"His godson, anyway. He pretty much raised me"

"Wicked. My old man always goes on about 'im. He fought in the Battle of Hogwarts, you know" another one bragged. From off to one side, Godric Wood snorted. Teddy swallowed when the older boy winked at him, feeling like a mortal who had suddenly landed on Olympus.

"So'd everyone's 'rents worth a damn, mate" Godric Wood drawled, sounding more American than he normally did. The sixteen-year-old son of Oliver Wood, who had played for an American Quidditch team and had only recently moved back to England, had been shocked to find that even all these generations later, there were still those who remembered his father's Captaincy of the Gryffindor Quidditch Team. A tall and lean Chaser, Godric was elegant and handsome and wore rebellion like a very sexy second skin. He was the one every bloke there would kill to be and every bird would kill to bed.

"Here, wanna fag Teddy?" he asked, catching the younger boy's eye, retrieving a pack from the inside pocket of his robes. Everyone looked at him strangely until he remembered the word had different connotations in this part of the world.

"Oh. Ah, sorry, a smoke. Cigarette" he amended, looking faintly embarrassed. The older boys took the piss out of his Americanisms while he passed the pack around. Not wanting to be left out, Teddy took one and passed the pack to Fred, who hesitated before taking one as well and then passing it back to Godric.

Holding his breath at the first intake of the ghastly grey smoke, Teddy managed to get through the whole stick even though Patrick Jordan and his friends teased him mercilessly for the sickly pallor of his features. Fred had such a coughing fit he gave his half-smoked cigarette up to one of the others and swore he'd never do it again.

He was true to his word, but even though Teddy threw up back at the Gryffindor dormitories, when Godric offered him a smoke again after Hufflepuff went down to an agonising margin against Slytherin the next week, he took it and spent the hour puffing away with the older boys.

At sixteen years old, Teddy was home for Christmas when Harry smelt cigarette smoke on him for the first time and didn't comment. With narrowed green eyes, Harry watched his godson help his adoptive mother clear up dinner while the younger children squealed that it was just four days till Christmas, daddy!

Ginny, however, was recovering from a cold and didn't smell a thing. So when Teddy pleaded off a second round of Wizard's Chess and snuck out the back, Harry handed the burden of referee to Ginny and followed him out.

Stepping silently onto the creaky back porch, Harry scanned the darkness of the backyard which led out to the fields where Teddy had broken his arm all those years ago. At first he only saw Teddy's silhouette, a black shape against the dark grey night, gilded in silver by the rising moon, but then he saw the flare of a bloody red dot. It was the laser target of a snipers scope, illuminating the young man's features and casting them in a bloody flood.

He bit his lip, hard, and wondered what to do. His godson was sixteen, so really he was old enough to making these sorts of decisions himself.

Life-altering, dangerous, hazardous-to-his-health, stupid decisions the consequences of which would follow him like a Grim right through the rest of his days whispered the part of his brain who still looked at him and saw the terrified little boy he'd dropped off on his first day of school. For a long moment, watching the darker column that was Teddy shift his feet and raise the crimson fire to his lips again, Harry debated marching down there, snatching it out of his hand and grounding him for a month. He wondered what his father, what James Potter the first, would have done if he'd ever caught Harry smoking. He'd never smoked. None of his friends had and he'd always been too busy duelling Malfoy, saving the Wizarding World or finishing Potions essays to much in the way of normal rebellion. No, when Harry broke the rules, he broke rules like 'The third floor corridor is forbidden because of the giant, vicious three-headed dog guarding a priceless magical artefact' not 'smoking is bad for your health'

In the end, he slipped back into the house and left Teddy to finish smoking his cancer stick, unobserved. When he came back into the longue, he seemed utterly unchanged. Harry didn't know what he was expected; for him to suddenly have black bangs and a leather jacket? Who knew? He was out of his depth and he knew it. It was a feeling he was uncannily familiar with, however, and so in his own way he began to tread water.

"How's you allowance carrying you through, Ted?" he'd slid it casually into conversation after checking the account he and Andromeda had set up when Teddy turned eleven and headed off to Hogwarts.

"It's alright. But hey, you wanna chuck me a bonus, I'm all for it" he'd laughed. Harry smiled and shook his head.

"Mr Port passed away last week" he told Ginny over Sunday breakfast one day. She'd looked up over Albus' eggs.

"Who?"

"Fellow from the Magical Law Enforcement Office. Lung cancer" Harry replied. She extracted the sugar from James before he put another teaspoon on his cereal.

"How old was he?"

"Forty. I think-" Harry's gaze slid to Teddy, who was scoffing toast and listening over the edge of the Quibbler. Ginny noted it, frowned, but didn't comment.

"-He's smoked since he was sixteen. Terrible business" he finished slowly. Teddy didn't see his pointed look, and returned to his toast as if nothing happened.

"He probably thinks he's bulletproof. You know how it is at that age; nothing can hurt you. He prob'ly reckons cancer'll turn tail and run from his perfectly gelled bloody hair" Lee Jordan and George had counselled Harry over drinks one night. They, after all, had sons around Teddy's age. Harry had nodded as if he really did know.

But he didn't. He'd felt that invincible feeling that Lee spoke of only a few times in his life. Once, holding the Snitch in his hand while the Lions roared for the son of James Potter. Secondly, when he tore across the surface of the water on Buckbeak's back, the wind blowing through him. Thirdly, when Ginny kissed him in the Gryffindor Common room. Another when he'd taken the Felix Felicis, but even then there had been the black feeling in the back of his mind, of Voldemort's consciousness lying like a cougar ready to pounce. They'd been fleeting and precious. He couldn't contemplate a time when he'd ever felt safe enough to do something for the hell of it.

They were sitting out the back cleaning the family's ensemble of brooms when Harry broached the subject again. His prized Firebolt lay across his lap, gleaming, and Teddy concentrated on James' Comet.

He almost spoke a few times, and then closed his mouth again. He couldn't find the words. Finally, Teddy took pity on his struggling godfather and looked up.

"Dad, spit it out! What's wrong?"

A pause.

"Do you smoke?"

Teddy blinked, opened his mouth, and then closed it and leaned back against the back door, staring at Harry.

"Why?"

Harry couldn't meet his eyes. He hadn't denied it. He hadn't even bothered.

"I don't think you should, Teddy. It-well, not to succumb to the cliché, but it'll kill you slowly"

Teddy snorted and bent his head to a nonexistent scratch on the Comet's surface.

"Nah, Dad, don't worry about it, yeah?"

"It's my job to worry, Teddy" Harry teased, still not convinced. They worked in quiet for a few moments longer.

"Just to be clear-"

"Harry, seriously, I don't smoke, okay?"

Harry nodded, relieved and his shoulders relaxed as he returned to contemplating the broom across his knees.

"James is gunna be a real all-round threat, inne?" Teddy commented, changing the subject. Harry beamed with pride, suitably distracted.

Watching the toxic blur dance in clouds from his mouth, Teddy closed his eyes and enjoyed the heat of the smoke burning his mouth and throat, the cool night air against his skin, the sound just behind him of James and Albus and Lily arguing with Ginny.

Teddy froze when he heard the unmistakeable sound of somebody stepping off the porch and swung back to the house. Harry's shadow stepped across the garden to meet him.

"Theodore"

Teddy winced, looking down at the cigarette still gracefully caught between his middle and forefingers. It's evil red eye winked back at him. He remembered one other time in his entire life up until this moment that Harry had called him by his hated given name. He'd been nine and taken the Firebolt without permission. Harry had nearly throttled him.

Except this time, it felt worse.

The time he'd taken the Firebolt, Harry had been furious. He'd ranted and raved and stormed about and threatened a years worth of grounding, but with some gentle (and not so gentle) persuasion from Ginny, settled on a month.

This time, looking steadily at him with his hands in his pockets and his brow knitted, there was no real anger in Harry's tone. Just a cool, resigned breed of disappointment. He gestured to the cig.

"You lied to me" he said. Teddy swallowed and dropped the smoke like it was burning him, grinding it into the dirt. Without the rush of red light across their features, it was suddenly very black and cold.

"I…I'm sorry, dad" he said, lamely. Harry shrugged.

"It's your life, son" he replied, not a trace of anything in his tone. Teddy swallowed, wishing he could see more of the man's features than his glasses, reflecting the moonlight and obstructing his eyes, and the flat shadow of his mouth.

"I-I know, but-"

"If you want to make it up to me, quit. Other than that, I've got nothing to say" Harry said simply, shrugging in a way that was so much like Teddy it shocked the younger boy. He remembered Victore saying something about children developing their parent's mannerisms. He wasn't really too sure. He'd been too busy watching her brand new tongue ring glint in the sun and later berating himself for thinking something like that about a girl who had been his best friend as a kid.

They were silent, a quiet that sat over them like a brick wall, and Teddy kicked at a clod of earth.

"I kinda wish you'd yell or something" he muttered awkwardly, trying to joke, thinking about the Firebolt again. Harry blew on his cold fingers.

"Don't tempt me" he snapped, a fraction of the anger cruising under the surface like a predator lashing out. Teddy flinched and Harry sighed.

"What I mean is; I'd really like to yell, Ted. I'd like to shout at you and stomp around and make you hand over those cigarettes and sit you down at the kitchen table with Ginny and make Hermione tell you every disgusting detail of what's going to happen to your body now you're smoking and I'd really, really like to shake you until your head falls off…but…I dunno. Just seems kind of pointless now, doesn't it? I mean, how long have you been…how long?"

Teddy rubbed the back of his neck, feeling even worse.

"Forth year" he mumbled. Harry made sound of frustration under his breath.

"How did I not notice until now?" he exploded, his anger turning inwards, as he was prone to do with it.

"Dad, c'mon, it's not your fault. I…I mean, I don't do it…a lot. Just, you know, more of a social thing than anyfing…hanging out with my mates round the back of the Quidditch stands 'aving a blow-" his English steadily deteriorated in his state of distress.

"-But I started gettin' cravings an' that sort of shite so I was cuttin' right back"

"You have cravings?" exclaimed Harry. Teddy flinched again and watched uneasily as his godfather ran a hand over his retreating hairline.

"Bloody hell, Ted, why didn't you say something? I would have helped"

Teddy chewed his lip.

"Helped?"

"There's patches and that sort of thing, you bloody idiot. To kick the habit" Harry pointed out. Teddy suddenly raised an eyebrow.

"Hang on. How long have you known for?"

"Start of the holidays"

Teddy thought about that and a thought occurred to him.

"There is no Mr Port from the MLEO, is there?"

Harry laughed out loud for the first time since he'd smelt cigarette smoke wafting from his godson's clothing.

"No. No, there's no Mr Port"

Teddy laughed along with him.

"Jeez, Dad, that scared the hell out of me!"

Harry gave him a teasing push.

"Yeah, well, it was supposed to. Ya git!"

Teddy's teeth flashed brilliantly in the darkness then faded. He took the pack from his pocket, making Harry's breath catch like it was a bomb instead, and turned it over in his hand.

"D'ya ever smoke, Harry?" he asked. Harry thought about the conversation he'd had with Lee and George.

"No-" he confessed.

"-I was always a little more concerned with…other forms of danger"

After a moment of contemplation, Harry's eyes widened when Teddy suddenly offered the pack to him, flat in the palm of his hand. There was something in the gesture that was so trusting and innocent it made Harry's heart pound a little slower, just to take it in. He looked up and peered through the darkness to find Teddy's hazel eyes looking steadily back at him.

"Okay" he said out loud and took the packet. He read the brand name and breathed out slowly.

"What?" Teddy enquired. His godfather sounded oddly relieved. In reply, he shook the half-empty pack.

"I'm just grateful these are the only sort of drug you're addicted to. This conversation could be a whole lot more serious otherwise" he said grimly and Teddy shuddered at the thought.

"Christ, no. Never. I'm not that stupid"

Harry shrugged.

"I would have thought you weren't stupid enough to smoke, Ted. You know what they say about saying never…just…we'll sort this, Teddy, alright? But…-" the coldness from moments ago iced the edges of Harry's voice.

"-You ever lie to me again, I swear to Merlin, Godric and the Founders that I will tell your mothers. And your grandmothers. And your aunts. And I will sell tickets and volunteer happily to clean up the mess"

Teddy didn't need to be told twice!