Glimpses into an alternate universe which diverged from canon in 1980 when Severu s Snape went straight to Lily

(and James) once he realised Voldemort was going a fter the Potters. Fictionwill be spread across theperiodbetween the end of the wizarding war (which fa lls on Hallowe'en 1980 in this alternate universe) and 1998. Chapter 1: The Sorting of Dudley Dursley [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling, and I'm just playing with her toys. The same goe s for any HP Lovecraftmythos stuff which is hinted at.

Dursley, Dudley , the deputy-headmistress called.

Dudley nervously approached the stool, picked up the hat, and sat on the stool.He put the hat on his head.As with every other pupil, it flopped down to pretty much his eyeline, being sized for an adult rather than an eleven year old. Oh-ho!And what have we here? A voice said in Dudley s head.Either we have an unbelieva bly potent natural occlumens, or else I fear the headmaster is playing some sort of prank on either me or the school.No, don t speak back to me, boy.Just think your answer, and I ll be aware of it. Please Mr. Hat.Don t send me away.My mum sent me to Hogwarts and it s one of the proude st moments of her life. Nevertheless, you appear not to have a single drop of what they regard as magical talent around here in your body.Dudley got the impression that if the hat could sigh, it would be doing so, right now.Does this esteemed matriarch have a name? Matriarch?Dudley panicked for a moment, before realising the hat meant his mother.

She s Petunia Dursley, Sir, Mr. Hat, Sir. Still not ringing any bells.Do you have any other relatives? There s my dad, Vernon Dursley.And then there s my Aunty Marjorie on my dad s side, and my cousin Harry, and his sister Celia and their mother my Aunt Lily on my mum s si de Wait!Dudley had the impression the hat would have just drawn its breath in rather sharply, if it could breathe.Lily who? Oh, Lily Snape, Sir.Formerly Lily Potter.She was married to someone else before her current husband but her first husband was killed in a battle, and so she marrie d Uncle Severus.I think she must have been Lily Evans before that, because my mum was Petunia Evans before she married The Woman who Lived .Oh Albus, what games are you playing, that Lily doesn t send her o wn son this year, but you needs must entice her sister to send this poor lad?No, don t worry about answering that, Dudley.I was lamenting the latest schemes of our school s current esteemed headmaster.Forgive an old hat its foibles, if you will There was a short pause, as the hat apparently considered the situation.Okay, Mr. Durs ley.So: in the shape of your Aunt Lily you have a very accomplished witch in your family.I don t get out and about much, and by the sound of it I m unlikely to encoun ter any children immediately associated with her other than your good self.Can yo u tell me much of what she does these days? She looks after their house for her husband, and home-teaches my cousins Harry an d Celia.And she reads books and scrolls my dad finds for her.He spends a lot of ti me going away to places like Baghdad or Tibet or Indonesia, though he occasional ly goes to other parts of the world; there was this time once when he went to So uth America, and he says it was all running through the jungle and fighting basi lisks and exploring lost cities of the Incas.And Indiana Jones dresses just like he does some of the time Right.So you do have some experience of at least of tales of the magical world the n.No, don t answer that, Dudley, that was me thinking aloud, so to speak, again.Hmm.D udley had an impression that the hat would be screwing its face up in concentrat ion at this point if it were a living person.You have some knowledge of Hogwarts from your Aunt Lily, and her husband.Interesting that I can t see much of her in yo ur thoughts.Do you have any preference as to which house I should place you into, Mr. Dursley?

 Err, no. Mmm.Also interesting.I do believe that the headmaster and his heads of house expect me to do something such as place you into Hufflepuff.Well.We shall just have to d isappoint them on that count, won t we, Mr. Dursley?At this point, Dudley got the d istinct impression from the hat s mental equivalent of tone of voice that it would be starting to grin in an exceptionally evil manner if it had at all possessed the face necessary to do that.I strongly dislike being placed in this position by the headmaster as part of one of his political games, and besides, I feel that with the sheer number of questions you are bound to be asking, you will make an ideal Socratic foil, and therefore, I shall place you in: RAVENCLAW! Mind how you go, Mr. Dursley.The hat commented as Dudley hesitantly got to his fee t, and a stunned silence fell on the hall. The silence was disturbed only by the thump of the deputy-headmistress fainting c lean away, and then by the at first rather weak and timid clapping of the little man who was the head of Ravenclaw. Then, the clapping slowly gained in strength and spread to the other Ravenclaw members as Dudley took the hat off and put it back on the stool, and the headmaster hastily got out of his chair and came forw ards to poke the deputy headmistress with his wand and murmur what sounded to Du dley like enervate! The deputy-headmistress came around, with a groan, as the headmaster started to h elp her back to her feet. Well go on, Mr. Dursley. , the headmaster said to Dudley, his eyes twinkling. Your hous e is waiting for you. Author Notes: Well, this is a brief glimpse into some of the chaos which entaile d from events in this alternate universe from events in 1980. Dudley Dursley is s till a bit slow, still with no absolutely magical ability (in terms of using wit ch/wizard wand magic) whatsoever, but due to the conflicting machinations of Alb us Dumbledore, Lucius Malfoy, and Lily Snape has ended up at Hogwarts. Given that in canon it's indicated that Petunia was once desperate enough (as a girl) to w ant to go to Hogwarts that she wrote to Dumbledore asking, that she might not ta shouted the hat out loud.

ke too much persuasion from Dumbledore to agree to send her son there. As a note, Lily Evans/Potter/Snape is very much still alive in this universe and has a wor king relationship with the Dursleys, not least because she employs Vernon to run around the world carrying out errands for her. (I figure that if she occasionall y equips him with a charmed device so that he can handle basilisks or shoggoths, that with Vernon being her brother-in-law (and the fact that she did dispose of Voldemort) if the Ministry do ever hear about it they certainly don't bother to take any action regarding the statute of secrecy.) Oh, and sorry about the broken up text, butthis is my first fanfictionattempt, and I'm still getting the hang of thisformatting stuff... Chapter 2: Peter Pettigrew: Making the Most of Things [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling. I'm just playing with her toys. ******* Peter Pettigrew had, of necessity, been obliged to register himself as an animag us when he joined the Security Service. Exploiting certain loopholes in the Inte rnational Statute of Wizarding Secrecy which permitted him to put certain magica l skills at the disposal of MI5 in the first place was one thing, but potential embarrassment which could easily and legally be avoided was another altogether. This morning Peter Pettigrew was on surveillance duty in Kensington Gardens. He had entered a cab in the special briefcase of one of his handlers, in his animag us form of a decent sized brown rat, and been conveyed by his handler to Kensing ton Gardens where his handler had set the briefcase down, whilst pausing to tie a shoe-lace, and Peter had slipped out of a flap in one end of the case and into a flower bed. Although a rat in daylight might raise some eyebrows, he could ha ng around with much greater liberty than a man could to observe the forthcoming meeting, and he had besides a weak variant of the protection from muggles charm ap plied which meant that creatures without any kind of magical abilities or herita ge would find it almost impossible to notice him, unless he drew himself to thei r attention. Peter pottered around for a bit, enjoying the August sun, sniffing at fallen ros e petals, and ignoring discarded drinking straws, crisp packets, and ring pulls from cans. His known target had arrived, and was sitting on a nearby bench, a do zen feet or so away from Peter s current position. The man was an Italian business man with a Russian mother, who was suspected to be spying these days for the USS R. MI5 had known about him for several months, and he was believed to be buildin g a network of contacts. They had kept the surveillance light as the man was unb elievably cautious; then again he was believed to have grown up in the Italian c riminal underworld, which perhaps explained his at times near-paranoia. Peter wa s here to monitor the man and to see if he either met someone or left any kind o f drop and in the latter case to observe who came to pick it up. Oh yes, there were half a dozen different ways Peter could have collected the sa me information with spells such as disillusionment charms or divination magic, b

ut this was simplest and thus carried the least risk of breeching the Internatio nal Statute plus the only information he ever needed to give his muggle handlers (for all that they may be allowed to know) about his capabilities was that he c ould turn himself into a rat. And also, truth be told, he rather enjoyed doing t hings this way. Except for the bit when kneazles or part-kneazles became involved. Such as today , for instance. An old hand at sensing danger, Peter sensed the approach of the infernal cat whe n it was twenty five yards away, stalking purposefully across the grass towards him. It was an ugly beast, with mangy orange hair, a malevolent expression on it s feline features, and the distinctive aura of something which wasn t quite a norm al cat. It wasn t a full-blooded kneazle the bloodline had been diluted by breedin g with non-magical cats, and Peter reckoned it could be half-kneazle at most but it was capable of sensing him, and had unfortunately spotted him. Peter mentall y tagged the offending creature as Tiddles . It looked like it ought to be called T iddles. Under other circumstances, Peter would have simply run for it, disappearing into a drain or somewhere that it couldn t get him, but unfortunately his target for s urveillance hadn t gone anywhere or done anything, meaning he was in theory suppos ed to keep watch on him. Peter assessed the approaching menace and his options. Fortunately, the kneazle bloodline looked at least sufficiently diluted that there wasn t much more than th e regular dumb cunning of a cat to the look in its eyes. Tiddles was a brute, an d a dangerous brute, but lacked the sentience to be truly threatening if Peter k ept his wits about him. He scrabbled around in the flowerbed, and came up with an old rose stem he could just about get his forepaws around, a discarded trimming from whenever the bush es in this bed had last been pruned. It was a good seven or eight inches long, a nd hadn t been lying around long enough to start rotting. Ah good. This offered possibilities. Peter reared up on his hind legs manoeuvring the long rose-stem in his forepaws like a lance. He glanced around, checking angles and distances, and then looked back at the advancing feline menace. It was now about ten yards away, and was ab out to make a rush. It had speed and weight over him, but he had wits and agilit y on his side. Plus a good half foot of rose-stem. Peter s surveillance target was still sitting there on the bench, legs crossed, reading a paper. Peter flashed his teeth at his enemy, hopped out of the flowerbed and backed awa y across the grass, keeping just out of spring and rush range. Tiddles was clearly puzzled about the way its presumed prey was behaving, but ca me after him with the innate sadism of a cat, not making a dash for it right now , but continuing to prowl forward in stalking-and-toying mode. Peter continued to retreat backwards, weaving a little to either side as he did so to continue to keep it thinking and to set the angles up right. The monster crept on forwards, and then, finally, once he was under the shadow o f the bench Peter halted. The man heard the part-kneazle at this point, and glanced away from his paper, b ack over his shoulder, but saw what to him must be nothing more extraordinary th an a perhaps slightly large stray cat.

Tiddles snarled, as Peter, directly under his surveillance target s posterior, twi rled his whiskers at it. Peter waved the rose stem around, and wished he knew le gilimency so he could try and push this creature s mental buttons, directly. Without the need for further provocation, Tiddles decided enough was enough anyw ay, and in one smooth rush came bounding forwards. Peter resisted the urge to turn tail and flee for his life and instead sidestepp ed and whacked the part-kneazle full across the face with his rose-stem. He thou ght a thorn might even have caught it in one eye. Snarling with fury, claws coming out, the part-kneazle collided with a leg of Pe ter s seated surveillance target, half blind and ripping at anything which it got into contact with. Peter watched, in weird fascination, what happened next. Oh well, there went the surveillance operation for today probably for the next w eek or two, by the look of it. He actually winced as the fight developed and fur and cloth began to fly. ******* The observation this morning in Kensington Gardens: There was an unforeseen devel opment. , Peter Pettigrew, back in human form, reported to one of his handler s at l unch time. Really? the handler raised a silvery eyebrow.

To some extent the handler resembled a beardless Albus Dumbledore, with about si xty years less cunning and deviousness. A magical cat intruded upon the scene. It was initially interested in me, but bec ame involved in a fracas with the target. It had not been a pleasant sight, a man trying to pull a part-kneazle off his face after he had kicked it following the way it had savaged his leg. The surveillance target is likely to be in hospital for a week; maybe longer. Oh well, long enough for us to bug his flat I suppose, steam open any mail which happens to be lying around there, and to do other stuff. , Peter s handler said. He didn t sound entirely unhappy with this result. Probably because the other stuff inc luded the fact that the target was going to be under observation in an environme nt where just about anyone could walk up to him and start pumping him full of dr ugs designed to make him highly talkative, so long as such a person happened to be wearing an appropriate uniform Peter reckoned his handler must in fact be quite pleased by this turn of events, but he continued anyway, as he had more to report: Whilst he was trying to haul a couple of stone of feline fury away from his visag e, I popped around a convenient shrub and resumed human form. Peter said. Then wit h everyone else in the vicinity gathered around the semi-conscious target or run ning to a public call-box for an ambulance, I appropriated his briefcase, which he d left on the bench. He produced it with a flourish and put it on the desk. His handler smiled broadly. Ah, I think the responsible thing to do would be to turn this in to lost property once we ve inventoried the contents, of course.

Permission to defer the written report until tomorrow? , Peter questioned since his handler was in such a good mood. It s my god-daughter s birthday party this evening. Peter had a gift-wrapped jigsaw puzzle of Chenonceau and a card shrunk down and stowed in one of his pockets. Celia was brainy and enjoyed jigsaws of French cha teaus. His handler made a mmm, you don t get off quite that easily my friend face.

Where does she live? The Hampshire Downs. Near Humble-on-the-Down. Peter knew that was on his file, and that his handler knew that was on his file, and supposed it must be protocol th at he was being asked it anyway. I ll tell you what. I ll arrange a ministry car, and see you as far as Humble-on-theDown myself. You can write the report up in the back of the car. Peter made a face, but supposed this was the best option he was going to get on this occasion. And at least he d be there for the start of the party. ******* Peter Pettigrew s goddaughter was called Celia Johanna Roberta Brearley Snape, hav ing been born in the throes of the Ashes summer of 1981. She was fortunate to ha ve been born a girl, since Peter suspected her father would have probably tried to name her after the entire England squad otherwise. As it was, apparently he d p ut her on the waiting list for membership of the MCC, despite the fact that they didn t (currently) take female members. Her father had a fascination unusual in a wizard for cricket. Apparently he found the tactical and psychological struggle s evinced in cricket at the highest level to be the purest form of sport or some thing like that. With the history Celia s father and Peter had had at Hogwarts, it went without say ing that it had been Celia s mother, Lily, who had asked Peter to be her girl s godf ather. Peter had felt slightly wretched about the whole thing at the time, given what h ad at that moment been in his recent and what he considered not-so-glorious past , and he had tried to decline without going into specifics. Nonetheless, Lily ha d fixed him with those glittering green eyes of hers: I know you think you re weak Peter. I know that under minimal shaking you told Seve rus where to find me, and a couple of months later other Death Eaters. And I kno w you think James is on your conscience. It was a war Peter: telling Severus tur ned out for the best, and telling those other Death Eaters was part of an Order of the Phoenix plan they hadn t completely briefed you on; they were relying on yo u to do that, and Voldemort lost the war as a result. They even gave you a medal for it. Yes, James is dead, but all of us in Godric s Hollow that night accepted there was a chance we would die, and we thought it worth the risk. And this litt le lady, she glanced down briefly at the girl cradled in her arms, wouldn t be here today without you. She had looked back at him. I m still asking you, Peter, despite the things which have happened but, whether you accept or not, for Merlin s sake i f you re feeling scared and powerless in future ask someone for help. If no-one el se will, I will consider you a friend, and Sev will go with whatever I tell him on this count. And she had actually meant it. It hadn t been like the way James or Sirius or even Remus had looked on Peter in the Marauders or after. He wished she d been like th is to him at school

Alright, Lily, I ll do it. He d mumbled it a bit, although he had managed to look her in the face when he said it. And now, eight years later, here he was again, on his way to celebrate another o f Celia s birthdays ******* Author's Notes: By way of explanation, regarding an animagus working for MI5 and the Internation al Statute of Wizarding Secrecy, I've taken the liberty of assuming that when th e statute was drawn up, allowances were made for heads of state and their offici al bodyguards to know about magic, (no point in being a bodyguard if you don't k now to throw yourself in front of that person chanting in latin with a funny woo den stick) and that Peter's immediate handlers in MI5 are officially Yeomen of t he Queen's Body Guard. Peter's been working for MI5 for half a dozen years by the point of this short s tory. The specific date it occurs is the 8th August (Celia's actual birthday). F or the record, Celia is the (eldest) daughter of Severus and Lily Snape, and by this point the Snape family have moved into their permanent (custom-built) resid ence called 'Grassguards' on the Hampshire Downs. The actual location of Grassgu ards is sort of secret, hence Peter's vagueness over where his god-daughter and her family live. Chapter 3: Gatecrashed! [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not J K Rowling. I am just playing with her toys. The same goes f or H P Lovecraft and his contemporaries with regard to Cthulhu mythos things men tioned in the author's notes at the end. ******* The Yule Ball at Malfoy Manor is naturally a white-tie event, with the men discardin g robes for dark trousers and tailcoats, over white silk shirts, ties, and waist coats, and the women garbed in a variety of sumptuous gowns. Lucius Malfoy is un masked, being the host of the event. Most other attendees are wearing a variety of masks, of either the half or full-face variety. Of course no-one is so tastel ess as to wear a Death Eater mask, since the attendees of the Malfoy Yule Ball h ave been exclusively upright, outstanding, citizens ever since the defeat of the Dark Lord at Godric s Hollow in 1980 and even though it s been a couple of years si nce the last such occurrence, there is always the chance of a Ministry raid, jus t to check up that the Malfoys and their friends are keeping their noses at leas t officially clean. House-elves are circulating with trays of mulled wine, a pleasant hubbub of conv ersation about how fortunate various attendees were to have been acting under th e Imperius curse or duplicated by persons unknown using polyjuice during the gre at wizarding war, and all in all the event looks to be yet another perfect socie ty function But then, with the knowledge of a practised host, Lucius senses that something h as just gone almost catastrophically wrong. He s already heading across the great hall for the main entrance, when a house-elf stumbles in and announces: Lily Snap e . The amiable buzz of conversation dies away at once, and the atmosphere freezes o

ver, as all eyes turn towards the entrance, and the lone figure who has just ent ered behind the house elf. She s dressed in a black velvet gown, with matching elbow length gloves, and her l ong red hair falls in waves about her shoulders. She s wearing a half-face mask of black feathers, and dangling from her waist by a golden cord is a wand with whi ch Lucius is all too familiar. Coming close to her, Lucius can smell a bouquet w hich he s scarcely caught since the fall of the Dark Lord the scent of smoke and o f plaster dust: the scent of a destroyed building. Lucius was vaguely aware of L ily Evans of Hogwarts, later Lily Potter, who lost her first husband and her fir st wand at Godric s Hollow but slew the Dark Lord. Lucius knows that his wife s cous in, Sirius Black, is occasionally in contact with her, and that she had taken as her consort the man, Severus Snape, who betrayed the Dark Lord, and has borne a t least one child by him, but beyond that she has been a complete mystery. She v anished from the wizarding world after Godric s Hollow, and right now Lucius is wi shing that she had stayed vanished and not chosen to turn up at this party. This is almost certainly the Dingleberts fault. Former servants of the Dark Lord occa sionally discussed going after her, but until the Dingleberts did so several mon ths ago, nobody had actually quite worked up the nerve to activate any plots. The Dingleberts had heard a rumour that she had relocated to an ostensibly vulner able location in southern England and decided to move against her in the name of vengeance; Rupert Dinglebert, the active agent in their plot, botched it and en ded up caught and sent to Azkaban where influential former Death Eaters took ste ps to ensure he was quickly kissed by a dementor, before he could give testimony which might inconveniently embarrass anyone else. The aurors were nosing around Edgcumbe Manor, the Dinglebert ancestral seat, for a month afterwards, searchin g for any clues of a conspiracy, but the Dingleberts were too politically well c onnected for the investigation to make any headway Pardon my gatecrashing. , the unexpected guest murmurs to Lucius. I stopped by Edgcum be Manor on my way here, since Rupert Dinglebert delivered me an invitation back in the summer, but do you know, the party there was rather a blazing bore, so I thought I d pop by here instead. And she flashes her teeth in a little smile. Her green eyes glint, and Lucius notes the deliberate use of the word blazing . The fingers of her gloved right hand aren t exactly stroking the hilt of the yew w and which must have a phoenix feather core and used to belong to the Dark Lord, but they re conveniently close to pluck it forth and slash it through the air if s he feels inclined to unleash mayhem. Whatever Lily Evans/Potter was, in her half a decade away from the wizarding world Lily Snape has grown into something with the grace of a dangerous predator, and Lucius is certain she s prepared to kill i f she considers it necessary. Somehow, despite all the wards and protections aro und Malfoy Manor, she s breezed in here without setting off so much as a single al arm as far as he s aware Ah, quite charmed. , Lucius says, exerting all his charm and charisma to play the p erfect host. He ducks his head to formally kiss her left hand, which she graciou sly lifts just a little to make it easier for him. He rises. How are your husband and children? Resting up, safe and sound for the big day tomorrow. Your own family are safe and well, I trust? Lucius doesn t flinch at the subtext of this little exchange; she s taken precautions to ensure her family are quite secure to her own mind before coming out, whilst if she chooses she could quite easily go after his, here and now. Oh, quite. , Lucius says. Let me introduce you to Narcissa. And he turns, moving arou nd to her left side, and offering her his right hand to lead her across the floo r. For a moment, despite his outward appearance of imperturbable calm, Lucius is as frightened as he s been ever since he last stood in the presence of the Dark Lord as to what will happen next. Then, having taken long enough to signal that she s

made her own mind up about this rather than been rushed into it by her host, she raises her left hand and permits him to lead her across the floor of the hushed room to where his wife is standing. Lucius inwardly relaxes, slightly. Apparently Lily Snape is satisfied that she h as sufficiently made her point that attacks upon herself or her family will not be tolerated, and will not do anything further for now about former acquaintance s of the Dingleberts. Lily, this is my wife, Narcissa. , Lucius says as conversationally as he can manage. Nar cissa, this is Severus wife, Lily A frantic ripple of speculation goes through the throng, who heard the announced name but not the quiet exchange by the entrance and can scarcely believe that t hey re seeing Lucius introducing an uninvited muggleborn witch to his wife. Lucius gives a number of them meaningful looks and murmurs of later out of the cor ner of his mouth. Several hours later, after the most nerve-wracking Yule Ball ever, Lucius is overse eing the house-elves clearing up operation. News arrived before the evening was o ver that in an attack of belated conscience, Rupert Dinglebert s father and severa l of his house-elves were voluntarily assisting the aurors with their enquiries in to an attempt against Lily Snape and her family over the summer. The reasons for this change of mind were currently unknown to officialdom. Lily Snape was polite, charming, and her right hand was never more than a couple of inches from her wand throughout her stay at the ball. She never actually spo ke any direct threats. She didn t need to do so. Lucius has been unable to determine if she intends to ever make a bid for power in the wizarding world, but after tonight, he s certain he doesn t want to have her pointing that wand at him if he can conveniently avoid it. Narcissa, once she realised what was going on, was absolutely terrified. The war ds over the Manor intended to protect guests would have made any magical escapes impossible, and the Malfoy s young son and heir, Draco, was asleep on the premise s. And once the guests grasped quite what was going on, the mood of the gathering ne ver quite returned to its former air of bonhomie. Lucius was going to have to do his best, before holding any such future gatherings, to ascertain whether or no t Lily Snape intended to attend, and in what capacity? She had killed the mood t onight far more effectively than the auror raids of other years. ******* Author's Notes: I'm unclear whether 'white tie' would be a usual form of dress for a society event in the wizarding world, or if the Malfoys (in canon) would normally insist on i t, but this is an alternate universe, and if it would be out of character by the normal conventions, they're trying it out this year as a form of 'fancy dress' for what amounts to their Christmas party. Also on the subject of the Malfoys, if Lucius' fatherAbraxas is still alive at this point, he's too ill/bedridden to ho st the event, leaving Lucius in charge. The Dingleberts of Edgcumbe Manor are a pureblood family I have (as far as I know) invented, who happened to be Death Eaters. In the summer of 1986 the son and hei r of the family, Rupert,tried to attack Lily but he severely underestimated how d angerous she was, and she easily incapacitated him and called Alastor Moody in t o 'take him in'. A dementor 'accident' was arranged for himbyhis 'friends'whilst he was in Azkaban, and without any testimony from him the auror investigation hit a brick wall. Basically Lily has waited until it's practically Christmas to see i f the aurors got any more breaks, before nudging things along a bit. (She's lived without being bothered by former Death Eaters for half a decade; she'd rather h ead any further attempts off as she's busy getting to grips with various mythos

things such as shoggoths and various crazy cults on the Arabian peninsula that V ernon keeps running into whilst out book-collecting for her.) As for Lily herself, at this point on the timeline, home isa caravan on the Hampshi re Downs, whilst the permanent residence, Grassguards, is being built nearby. (Th e Dingleberts got news of the caravan, and mistakenly assumed she was vulnerable for this reason.) Severus is back home keeping Harry [Potter], Celia [Snape] and Laura [Snape] safe. In the biggerpicture, whilst the events of this particular Christmas Eve don't mean much to Lily personally (beyond ensuring shegets another long spell of not being bothered by hostile former Death Eaters) it has major repercussions for Luciusan d the Malfoys, as Lucius has seen Lily up close and personal for the first time and been impreseed with just howdangerous she is.He starts trying to find out more about her, andto emphasise that he doesn't want to be her enemy (and would like t o be an ally, or even a servant)whilst,suddenly horribly aware of justhow easy itwou ld beto wipe out the Malfoy line, lookingto expand his own family. As a final note, as of the time of first posting this in January 2012, I'm assembl ing a pieceregarding events leading up to, concerning, and in the immediate after math of the Battle of Godric's Hollow in 1980, and looking to post itat some poin t in the next month or so. It's mostly going to be about Severus (plus Lily and w ith some James) and probably going to be posted as a separate story in its own r ight, as I think I may need to give it a higher age rating. Working title is (cur rently) something along the lines of: 'Shadow of Three Bolts: Lily & Severus' Chapter 4: Bawled Out [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not JK Rowling; I'm just playing with her toys. ******* Sergeant Michael Tapping of Her Majesty s Armed Services opened the door to find a tall woman in a blouse and kilt with a businesslike expression on her face on th e doorstep. She had dark hair and green eyes, and seemed to be middle-aged. Good morning. , she said. I am Professor Minerva McGonagall, deputy headmistress of H ogwarts School. May I presume that you are Mr. Tapping, father of Samantha Bronw yn Tapping? That s Sergeant Tapping, ma am. He eyed her with slight irritation. The sergeant was in his mid-thirties, and had seen active service in a number of trouble-spots at t he end of the seventies and across the first part of the eighties. These days he oversaw part of the process of breaking in new recruits, who had a similar tend ency to forget rank, at least at first. His wife joked that his once crimson hai r had survived action but was rapidly being subdued by peace. My apologies, sergeant. Our information is mostly regarding your daughter, and did not refer to your rank. May I come in, please? Alright then. He stepped back, opening the door for her to come through. He closed it behind her once she was in. The sitting room s this way. This is the your daughte r is in fact a girl with unusual abilities and we would like to offer her a plac

e at our school

speech, isn t it, ma am?

The deputy headmistress blinked in surprise as she sat down. Err, indeed yes. Have you had previous contact with the magical world? Samantha s godfather knows someone in special ops who put us in contact with a polic eman or auror as I believe you call them a year or so ago. Fellow by the name of A lastor Moody. Good thing. We were starting to get worried about our daughter. He pops by every couple of months. Moody? the deputy headmistress frowned. Glass eye, watchword is constant vigilance ?

That s him, ma am. Oh, well. You already know something about our world then, and I don t have to do th e demonstration I give to some families. What s he said about Hogwarts? Only that you re a boarding school for witches and wizards in Scotland and that some one would likely be dropping by with a letter at some point. He said it was no b usiness of his to try to do the job for whomever showed up, ma am. The woman puckered her lips, thoughtfully. Well I have here a letter conditionally accepting your daughter into our school. Th e deputy headmistress produced an envelope from a pocket and put it on a coffee table. If I could hand it over to her? she looked at Sergeant Tapping expectantly. She s out down the shops at the moment, ma am. he replied. In the meantime, as her fathe r, I have some questions for you about your institution. Specifically: What subj ects do pupils learn, what qualifications do pupils gain, and how safe an enviro nment is your school? Well we teach a broad curriculum of magical subjects including astronomy, potions, transfiguration, charms, divination, and defence against the dark arts. Pupils sit OWL exams in their fifth year and NEWT exams in their seventh year, which wo uld be our equivalent of O and A-levels. We are the safest place in wizarding Br itain, and one of the greatest wizards in the world, Albus Dumbledore, is our he admaster. In the magical world s counterpart to your last major European war, he d efeated the dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald. I thought there was a war amongst witches and wizards more recently than that, ma am ? Sergeant Tapping frowned. Here in Britain in the seventies? Oh, yes. Of course, I suppose Moody would have mentioned that. Well, Albus was hea dmaster of Hogwarts by then, so was busy with school business, but he did play a n active part in the resistance against the dark wizards. He liaised with the mi nistry and aurors, and helped organise and coordinate a group of volunteer witch es and wizards who were fighting that war s dark wizard and his minions. Sergeant Tapping s frown deepened, but he forbade from commenting that it sounded t o him as if Dumbledore had been a bit of a busybody then, with his fingers in se veral pies instead of just focussing on one area of concern. He concentrated ins tead on his own major area of concern. So: defence against the dark arts. That s self-protection against magical attacks by evil wizards, right? Broadly speaking, yes. The lessons assist in protecting oneself in any witch or wi zard duel, and against unpleasant creatures such as boggarts and dementors.

The sergeant nodded. What teacher would Samantha have for it if she attends your school next year, and what are his or her qualifications and experience? Err. the deputy-headmistress frowned. We have a high turnover rate in defence agains t the dark arts staff, and generally speaking they don t last past the end of the academic year. It s not clear yet who our teacher will be for the next academic ye ar. We re still reviewing candidates. What? The most important subject you teach, and you can t hold down a teacher for mo re than twelve months? Sergeant Tapping s disgust at this news was evident. I though t Hogwarts was supposedly the safest place in wizarding Britain ? Do all your teach ers only last twelve months or less? No, we only seem to have a problem with the Defence position. the deputy headmistre ss winced. It isn t that teaching or learning the subject is in and of itself dange rous but it appears that there are

You re witches and wizards. Don t give me extenuating circumstances , ma am. the sergeant s having difficulty controlling his rising anger. All too many new recruits givi ng pathetic excuses about girlfriends or pets dying or having a cold were flashi ng before his eyes. Is the bloody position cursed, or something? Well, actually You ve got supposedly one of the greatest wizards in the world as your headmaster, b ut he can t do anything about a cursed position on his staff one regarding the mos t important subject on the whole curriculum? What the hell kind of fool do you t ake me for, ma am? The sergeant was actually shouting now. He took the envelope off the table and ripped it into four and shoved it back at the deputy headmistress . I will NOT trust the safety and life of my daughter to an institution like THAT . YOU CAN TAKE YOUR LETTER AND GET OUT BEFORE I THROW YOU OUT, WITCH OR NOT! The last was delivered at parade ground volume. The deputy headmistress produced a wand, tapped the envelope, and it repaired it self. Unfortunately, Mr. Tapping, your daughter has to receive the letter and decline it herself. There are rules. Letters will keep coming otherwise. She put it back on the table. Well I shall give it to her, and tell her just how unsafe she will be at your madh ouse, so she can decline it herself. And it s SERGEANT Tapping, ma am. ******* Minerva McGonagall departed the Tapping residence with the usual inward wince of recent years. Military families of muggleborns tended to be predictable. They al most always asked about fighting, and the subject of Defence Against the Dark Ar ts came up, and the situation regarding the continuous turnover of staff in that position got mentioned. At which point the conclusion was practically forgone. Admittedly that was one of the loudest bawling-outs she d had from a military pers on for some time. Probably because his daughter hadn t been present, so he had had no need to restrain himself, in front of her. She d told Albus time and again tha t the ongoing Defence position situation didn t look very good with such families, and he usually sighed and said he was sure everything turned out for the best i n the end. Still, since Alastor Moody knew this family personally, maybe he d be able to give

the Tappings sufficient basic directions that their daughter didn t otherwise end up being perceived as a problem by the Ministry, the way that such military famili es occasionally did ******* Author Notes: I had hoped to have this one out earlier, butI have had repeated formatting proble ms. Regarding Sergeant Tapping. his daughter's godfather is also in the army and is i nvolved with dealing with things such as kelpies (and other stuff) that pos a da nger to muggles which Ministry of Magic officials miss; that s how (by a roundabou t route) Alastor Moody came to hear about Samantha, and her accidental magic, an d why he occasionally drops by. Sergeant Tapping is protective of Samantha as sh e's the only surviving child he and his wife have. Two boys both died in infancy due to an inherited genetic condition. Chapter 5: Touching Magic [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not J K Rowling and I do not own Harry Potter. Nor am I H P Lov ecraft nor do I own Al Azif, The Necronomicon, Abdul Alhazred, Shub-Niggurath, o r various other trappings of the Cthulhu mythos. Note: The initial conversation occurs in January of 1981; Vernon s final meetings in Baghdad and subsequent return to the UK occur in late April/early May 1981. I do not (currently) have the exact length of time Vernon spent in Baghdad determ ined, but it was probably several weeks. The time between the conversation and V ernon s trip to Baghdad was filled by Vernon with his day-job at Grunnings, resear ch with dealers, contacting the foreign office, and so forth.

Vernon Dursley looked at the gold bars on the living room coffee table as if they might evaporate at any moment. Given that his sister-in-law was a witch, it wasn t entirely impossible that they might, although this didn t have the air of a prank . Just over two months ago some criminal from the wizarding world had murdered h er husband of the time and tried to kill her but she had ended up killing him in stead in a big fight somewhere called Godric s Hollow . Vernon approved of that. Crim inals and gang-leaders of the sort that this Lord Volgablort (or some such nonsens e) had by all accounts been richly deserved everything that they had coming to t hem. The impact of that encounter on his sister-in-law had been dramatic though. She d h ad a nervous or hysterical breakdown for a bit. A couple of months after that, here his sister-in-law Lily was, in his living roo m, with a pair of gold bars on the table. She had definitely changed. Her eyes w ere harder, and she looked warier. She had one of those wands, over a foot long,

to hand and it wasn t her previous one. Any sudden sound such as a backfiring car saw her hand go for the wand for a moment, until it became clear that there was no emergency which involved her. I need something, Vernon. Lily said. I need a copy of a book called Al Azif written by an Arab named Abdul Alhazred in the eighth century AD. Whilst an original wou ld be brilliant, at this point I ll settle for a later century reproduction. Why can t you borrow a copy from one of your friends or from some wizard library? Ver non asked. This Al Azif sounded to him suspiciously like something to do with magi c. Because this isn t normal witch and wizard magic Vernon. It may not even be magic, b ut at this point I m sufficiently desperate I ll chase even fairy stories. I killed one of the most powerful dark wizards of recent times, Vernon, and I took his wa nd, but when he comes back and he almost certainly will come back unfortunately I m probably going to have to fight him all over again and I want something he s nev er even dreamt of to smack him down with until he either stays dead or goes away and stops bothering me. She was starting to lose her composure, and had to draw several deep breaths to c alm herself before concluding: This isn t something witches or wizards keep on their shelves, Vernon, which is why I want it. Vernon glanced at the wand his sister-in-law had propped up by the side of her ar mchair, ready to snatch up in a hurry if disaster had threatened. He made the mi stake of trying not to think about the things it might have done under the owner ship of its previous user and ended up grimacing. Why me? Vernon asked hurriedly, trying to head off from any further discussion that might involve that wand or its previous owner. Not that I m agreeing to head off o n a wild goose chase for this Al Azif , but why can t you go looking for it? Because I need to spend the next however many months it takes learning Arabic so t hat I can read a copy if one turns up. Lily said. Well partly that, and partly bec ause at some point in the next eight or nine months you will hopefully have eith er another nephew or another niece and I don t have any idea how long it will take to find a copy of Al Azif. And I can t ask Severus to go, since I need him to han d to discourage any attacks by Death Eaters still roaming free who are upset abo ut the way the Battle of Godric s Hollow played out, and I don t want to involve any other witches or wizards I know in this right now because this whole thing is s upposed to be a surprise if anything comes of it. You and Petunia are the non-wi zards I know best, but we both know it would be silly to ask Petunia to do this. Vernon found this a bit confusing, but she was sounding stressed and he got suffi cient of the point of it not to feel the need to ask her to clarify. Petunia was currently upstairs, feeding and changing baby Dudley, and Vernon had to concede Lily s point that it would be silly of her to ask her sister to go gallivanting o ff looking for some book with Dudley in tow. Well yes. Vernon prevaricated.

Vernon had a job at Grunnings, a drill-making firm, but it was rather a prosaic j ob right now, even if it might have long-term prospects. He eyed the gold bars on the table. He had no idea how much they were worth possi bly Lily didn t either but they were gold bars and they were nine or ten inches lo ng. Indeed the table had creaked rather alarmingly when they were placed upon it

. But, his Grunnings job did offer long-term prospects. Is it just the one book you want? Vernon asked, weighing the prospects. extent can you afford to fund this line of research? And to what

I hadn t thought much beyond Al Azif to be honest with you. Lily said. There are sever al copies of it listed in the inventory of Owain Glynd?r s royal library, which se emed odd and was what put Severus and I onto it in the first place. There are at least half a dozen further books and scrolls in the lists too, which neither Se verus nor I recognise as regular magical texts, which could offer additional lea ds. And this is about the safety of my family, Vernon. Money is no object if it looks even remotely promising. She waved at the gold bars on the table. I don t know exactly how much this is worth in the non-magical world, but I m sure it s quite va luable, and there s quite a bit more in the Gringotts vault. Plus various investme nts. When I married James we endowed each other with all our worldly goods . Vernon had never liked James Potter very much, pegging him for an arrogant brat o f a wizard, but it sounded like he had been quite well off, which maybe explaine d some of his attitude. And apparently it was now all Lily s and she was prepared to spend however much it took with this craziness. At this point, Vernon had to remind himself that she was his sister-in-law, and s o, witch or not, there was some behaviour on his part (such as taking undue adva ntage of her) which was unacceptable. And if I m unable to assist? he asked.

She twitched slightly, and when she spoke her voice definitely sounded strained. I suppose I ll have to find someone tely necessary to ensure cooperation. ook-dealers and agents if I look hard er my feet given who I killed and the rfaces again. else non-magical and curse or I m sure your world must have enough. I can t afford to let unknown length of time I have hex them if absolu some sort of b grass grow und before he su

Vernon wasn t sure if witches were normally allowed to curse or hex normal folk , but noted that desperate though she was apparently Lily considered it currently out of bounds to curse or hex him, for which he was duly grateful. Well I could take a or you. Vernon said. me auction houses and ecially not with this couple of months holiday from Grunnings and look about a bit f He figured it couldn t hurt to got to London and ask around so dealers about this book for at least a short time, and esp much money on the table.

Thank-you. Lily s face lit up for the first time that he could remember since well Oct ober, he supposed. I ll write the name of the book and author down for you. And Gri ngotts recommend you change the bars for money at the Bank of England, since app arently the Bank of England has someone there able to authenticate the stamps an d serial numbers on bars from Gringotts. Oh, and if you need anything by the way of potions don t feel too ashamed to ask. I know you re not a wizard, but I m sure si nce you re family no-one at the ministry would quote the statute of secrecy at me if I supply you with some, and I might even be able to slip you the odd charmed object.

 Several months after that conversation, Vernon Dursley was slipping through the ho t and dusty streets of a Baghdad night. He had acquired a useful contact with th e Foreign Office over several long lunches in London, and been able to get the n ecessary visas for this trip with relatively little trouble. He d read up on the l ocal customs, and what sort of restrictions and regulations Saddam Hussain and h is regime imposed on movements, and arranged modest gifts for the appropriate Iraq i officials. Vernon Dursley had become aware over the last few days that apparently he wasn t th e only one in the running for this particular copy of Al Azif, but that some wei rd bunch of religious fanatics were after it too. Fortunately, the religious fan atics weren t in favour with the ruling regime, and kept running into trouble with what passed for local law enforcement. Even more fortunately, they were apparen tly just normal men and women (or at least normal in terms of magical ability) a nd didn t possess the means that Vernon had at his disposal to simply disappear fr om the sight of anyone who wasn t a witch or wizard. Lily hadn t been sure how effective those particular knick-knacks would be, at firs t, and had insisted Vernon test them out on the streets of London, some of her f riends having cleared it first with the ministry that regulated British magical society. She d been surprised at how effective they d been indeed that they d even wor ked at all despite the humming and hahhing of some mentor called Professor Slugh orn whom Vernon had briefly met and who insisted she d always been very good at cha rms . Anyway, in an emergency, Vernon could simply crunch one of the knick-knacks betwe en his fingers and simply vanish as far as anyone without any magical ability wa s concerned, for a period of an hour or two. Apparently it even fooled security cameras and, in case of inspection by any heavy handed customs officials, Lily h ad somehow worked things so that they only had effect if he was the one doing th e crunching. Vernon almost felt a bit like James Bond armed with various little bits of gadget ry by Q . He wondered if it was possible to produce magical effects that duplicated actual Bond gadgets for real, like that wristwatch with the magnet effect in Li ve and Let Die, although, he wasn t sure how he d justify that with Lily Vernon had also discovered during his researches in London that apparently Al Azi f might well be the original and Arabic name for the book which Lily was interes ted in, but that various translations in circulation in Europe were more commonl y known as The Necronomicon although apparently these were much harder to find t han copies of Al Azif since they were written in more accessible languages and all sorts of weirdoes were after them. As far as Vernon knew, himself aside, there was just the one bunch of Arab whackos after this copy of Al Azif, who dressed i n black and carried curved knives. Several had tangled with a group of Iraqi sec urity officials a couple of days ago and come off the worse for it, going down i n a hail of bullets. They d kept shouting something about Shub-Niggurath as they wen t down. Once he had found that there was a potential copy of Al Azif on the market, but t hat it would require travel to and negotiations in Baghdad, Vernon had picked up the basics of spoken Arabic with a speed which surprised him. It seemed he had a natural gift for mastering the routines of ingratiating himself with foreign o fficials, requesting information and/or directions, and for trading insults and haggling in a foreign language. Indeed, haggling in a Baghdad bazaar Vernon felt a good deal more at home than at a supermarket back home in Little Whinging. It was good fun trading insults and underhanded compliments to try and get a price

down or obtain a vital piece of information or recommendation. And he had dilig ently followed a trail of rumours from a contact outside a mosque after one Frid ay prayers through three shady coffee houses, one barber s shop, and a very polite and respectful den of thieves to a trader who reportedly had a copy of the desi red Al Azif. Apparently he was prepared to negotiate with Vernon because Vernon was a foreigner, and clearly not likely to be an associate of some other persona ge or organisation with whom the trader wished not to deal. Vernon rather strong ly suspected from what he had picked up of local goings-on that these Shub-Niggur ath crazies had made at least one attempt to obtain the Al Azif before from his p ossible supplier, and it had ended very badly turning into an outright robbery a ttempt. Vernon arrived outside the small back-streets book-dealer store, where the rendez vous with a friend of the trader was supposed to take place, and checked his wat ch. Twenty minutes to go. He adjusted his fedora and sank back into the shadows of a doorway across the street to wait. Somewhere nearby the faint sounds of music from an Arabic radio station was trick ling out between the shutters of a building, and a dog several neighbourhoods aw ay was barking

Mission accomplished and book acquired after a ride in a van to a backroom in a Ba ghdad garage where the final negotiations and handover had occurred, Vernon had taken precautions to seem just another tourist or businessman in leaving Baghdad but he had a feeling that his departure from the airport had been watched by un friendly eyes. On arrival at Heathrow, and having cleared customs with an approp riate duty payment regarding the rare book he was now carrying, he found a couple of men of Arabic appearance surveilling the arrivals lounge, looking up and down from some sort of documents or photograph which they had. Now they could have b een looking for anyone off the flight Vernon had just disembarked from, and they certainly weren t wearing those black robes that the freaks in Baghdad had been, but Vernon was certain that they exchanged words and one of them pointed briefly in his general direction at about the same time that he collected his luggage f rom the carousel. Vernon calmly headed across the hall and out of the airport to the taxi-rank. He didn t bother looking back. He selected a cab several vehicles back along the rank and gave the driver directions to take him to somewhere out in the middle of no where, half a dozen miles from Heathrow. Looking back occasionally through the r ear window, once the taxi he had boarded was in motion, he noticed that the taxi appeared to be being followed by a black limousine. He grimly smiled to himself. The taxi dropped him off on the green of the indicated village, and Vernon paid t he driver, and disappeared from sight around a corner, and hurriedly employed on e of his invisibility knick-knacks. Moments later he heard a limousine pulling up and people getting out, with someon e barking instructions find him! in Arabic. He heard running feet and saw a couple of Arabs in dark grey business suits come into view, their right hands casually dipped into their pockets as they went scu

ttling past, who took a quick glance at the long straight stretch of street whic h he would now (ordinarily) be exposed to view in before heading on. Vernon set off. It was going to be a long walk with his suitcase and hand luggage to the next village. Some fifteen minutes later, he glanced back, just before he disappeared over the crest of a hill, to see that the Arabs were now apparently going door to door, k nocking and showing papers or pictures of some sort to anyone who answered

Who or what is

Shub-Niggurath , Lily?

Vernon asked.

Having walked to the adjacent village and waited for the invisibility effect to e xpire, Vernon had called himself another taxi from a local pub, travelled to a d ifferent village, caught a train, taken another taxi and a bus, just to be sure he had shaken any pursuit, and finally arrived at a small cottage in the Lake Di strict formerly owned by James Potter, and currently the home of Lily and Severu s and Harry. I m not sure. Lily frowned. I think Quoggle s Myths stated it was a very big black goat that some non-wizards worship, but I don t know how accurate that is. She waved a h and. It s one of those things which witches and wizards don t take seriously, whateve r it is. Lily had filled out in the months since Vernon had last seen her and was now very n oticeably pregnant. She also seemed much calmer than in January, although Vernon couldn t tell how much of that was down to the passage of time and how much might be to that she was in a place she felt secure. Well Shub-Niggurath apparently has some associates devout enough to follow me in B aghdad and chase me several dozen miles across southern England because I was lo oking for that book. Vernon said. By the way: apparently there are European transl ations printed under the name The Necronomicon, but not just these Shub-Niggurat h lot but all sorts of crazies are after those. Were you in any trouble? Lily looked concerned. I don t remember you calling, and I th ink someone s been in most of the time, but for various reasons we d rather not have an answer-phone. They weren t any bother. Vernon said. They couldn t cope with your invisibility from non -wizards knick-knack. It was annoying to be chased by them though. Well, if you got away unhurt, that s the main thing. Lily said. get the book, but by the sound of it

It s a shame you couldn t

Oh, but I did get the book. Vernon said, producing the tome from his briefcase with a flourish. He enjoyed the look on his sister-in-law s face, as he placed it on t he desk. She rose to her feet and for a moment he thought she was going to fling herself u pon him and wrap her arms around him, but then she grimaced, and patted her stom ach instead.

 Sorry. Baby. she said, and sat back down again. Then Vernon reached into the briefcase, and with considerably less enthusiasm ret rieved the two bundles of banknotes. She hadn t ever said she wanted any change, b ut she was his sister-in-law, and he had had fun damnit would have stories about this for Dudley when he was older. He put the banknotes on the table. I ll write up a report of what I ve spent in the next few days and get it to you. id. With even more reluctance he began to retrieve the unused potion bottles and knic k-knacks. Keep them. Lily said, meaning the magic items. And ask me if you want anything more like that. I ll find some explanation to run past the ministry, and this Shub-Niggu rath crowd might be on the look out for you now. I ll ask around and get Severus to do so too; see if there s anything definite we can discover about them he sa

Author Notes: Vernon Dursley isn t entirely up to speed on exactly what happened to Lily, since m ost of his information regarding events in Godric s Hollow have come by telephone conversations with Severus Snape, with only a couple of face to face meetings (a nd those brief). Lily s state of mind, at least in January 1981, is very fragile still especially if she s away from home and Severus isn t present and she tends to over-react and not ex plain herself very clearly in such circumstances. She probably could have handle d the initial discussion with Vernon better if Severus had been there, but she w anted to find out how she could handle such a trip on her own. I have posted a partial account of events leading to the Battle of Godric s Hollow of 1980 in the Shadow of Three Bolts: Lily & Severus story. I had several more cha pters sketched out, but as of the moment (27th February, 2012) the work and stre ss involved in converting lengthy documents from their original Word format for publication on this site is more than I can comfortably handle. At present I hav e just one more chapter in this collection of short stories lining up for this s ite, concerning Draco Malfoy s doings on the morning of the 1st September 1991 whe n he heads for King s Cross. Chapter 6: Tides of History [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not J K Rowling. I do not own Harry Potter.

Note:A glimpseof a rather unusualweek atHogwarts from the mid eighties. (Revised for spellings 10th January 2013).

Monday, the sixth of May, 1985 was a day which was to go down in Hogwarts folklore and an unfortunate fifth year history of magic class of Ravenclaws and Gryffindo rs were to be the ones at the very sharp end of it. Several of the Gryffindor st udents had brought along or transfigured pillows and were actually asleep after an all-night poker game, whilst most of the Ravenclaws were busy talking quiddit ch plays or the latest news to emerge from the Bagnold ministry, when Professor Cuthbert Binns ghost and long-term holder of the most boring teacher in Hogwarts his tory title swept into the room, striding in through the wall. He glanced around, noting that everyone seemed to be ignoring him, cleared his th roat, and put the entire class in detention. Until the end of the school year. A nd deducted two hundred house points from Ravenclaw and Gryffindor each for the collective disrespect of their pupils. He spent the next few hours grilling an increasingly panicky class on the goingson of the court of the court of the late eighth and early ninth century caliph o f Baghdad, Harun al-Rashid, taking off a slew more points in the process. Finally he set remedial essays on the subject, took fifty points each off four m ore students, and dismissed the class. Word spread like wildfire through the school. The next history of magic class a m ix of second year Slytherins and Hufflepuffs at least knew better than to assume this was going to be another boring Binns drone where he could be safely ignore d. There were still a good many points deducted though. Over lunch many students who knew that they were going to have Binns that afterno on could be seen frantically cramming and flicking through textbooks at the dini ng tables in the great hall, between mouthfuls. By the end of the day ng teacher in Hogwarts students. It was clear ut exactly what nobody Professor Binns was rapidly on the way from being most bori history to most terrifying for the current generation of that something had happened over the weekend just past, b was quite sure.

Err, Cuthbert: Are you feeling quite well? Albus Dumbledore eyed his history of magi c professor in an emergency staff-meeting which had met on the morning of Saturd ay the eleventh of May in the immediate aftermath of Professor Binns points-deduc tion and detention-awarding spree. Every other member of staff in the room was e yeing Cuthbert as if he had at least two heads. Yes thank-you, headmaster. Professor Binns replied. For a ghost, that is

We re concerned about you, Cuthbert, since you ve deducted well over a thousand points this week. deputy headmistress Minerva McGonagall observed. You ve also issued mult iple detentions, suspended three pupils, and set in motion the process for attem pting to expel another. My classes have been utterly incompetent. Professor Binns complained. The pupils hav e been lacking in discipline and basic knowledge. If I didn t know that I d been tea

ching them, I d think an idiot must have been doing so. Just because much of my mi nd and attention has been elsewhere for the last few decades, that should not ex cuse my students from an expectation that they should do their best to work arou nd a teacher who has not been entirely focussed on them. So where exactly has your attention been, Cuthbert, and what happened to change th at? the headmaster enquired. I ve been paying attention to the rhythms of the ebbs and flows of wizarding history , as any good historian should attempt to do at least once in their career. Profe ssor Binns replied perhaps a touch stiffly. I may perhaps have been paying attent ion for a little longer than ought to have been strictly necessary by most metri cs, but as a consequence my attention was in the right place when a marked sea-c hange occurred last Saturday, in Antarctica which was sufficiently dramatic to s hake me out of my partial reverie. Do you mean to say, Cuthbert, that you ve been effectively sleepwalking through clas ses for the past however many years? Professor Flitwick asked, his tone rather mo re curious than critical. I suppose the analogy has a certain truth to it. Professor Binns replied defensivel y. But now I am awake. Do you know what happened in Antarctica? the headmaster asked. Nothing beyond that it was something truly momentous. Professor Binns replied. Perha ps you should ask Sibyll, he shot a glance at the divination teacher, if her inner eye reveals anything? Sibyll has been absolutely free of any predictions or announcements, alarming or o therwise, this month. the headmaster said. Though she is in no way at fault for th is state of affairs. he raised a hand to forestall any possible protest from Siby ll. He stared at his history teacher thoughtfully. I suppose the detentions, poin ts deductions, and suspensions will have to stand, though I shall advise the boa rd against the expulsion. But having shown you are capable of raising your game, Cuthbert, you are on notice that I shall take every step possible to dismiss yo u, if you let yourself and things slip again. He looked around at the others. This matter is closed for now. Does anyone else have any issues which they wish to r aise? The meeting was relatively tame after that...

Author Notes: Harun al-Rashid is the caliph of Baghdad who features in a number of the 'Arabian Nights' stories, so I have taken the liberty of assuming he might be a figure o f interest foran OWL levelhistory of magic class. I'm unclear when the start of the exam season at Hogwarts is, but I assume it's maybe mid-May at the earliest, so the fifthyears would still be studying at this point. The actual event which Professor Binns sensed which sent a shockwave through the fabric of history was something Lily and Severus were upto down in the Antarctic , being the first wizards to explore the applications of a *very* big piece of m agic for decades or more...

 Chapter 8: Destination Hogwarts? [View Online][Printer Friendly Version of This Chapter] Disclaimer: I am not J K Rowling. I do not own Harry Potter. Note: A previous chapter, 'Neville's party'has beenrejected on the basis that 'Lon gbottom is on the list of banned characters on my new archive'. It was not my int ention to breech the rules of this site, and since I am currently unable to loca te the list of banned characters this is likely tobe my last post here.

On the morning of Sunday the 1st of September, 1991, Draco Malfoy left Malfoy Mano r still not entirely sure where his educational future was going to lie. He had multiple trunks packed, to cover the different possible contingencies. As far as he could see, there were three possibilities currently in play: Hogwarts and a traditional wizarding education, return to Malfoy Manor to be tutored at home by mother and private tutors, or being sent to study under Lily Snape at her home. Whilst his father had been vacillating between the first two for quite some tim e, mother of course was now pregnant again, and after the tragic experience of a couple of years ago, wanted as little stress as possible this time around. Havi ng Draco s four year old sister, Gabrielle, underfoot at the Manor was taxing to m other, since Malfoys supervised as much of the early years of their children as possible it wouldn t do to have them left to be reared by house elves or anyone hu man but socially too inferior. That had left Hogwarts the front runner, as far a s Draco could see, but his father seemed to be playing a game which involved kee ping the Lily Snape option open for as long as possible which was something that Draco did not understand. She associated with muggles, for Merlin s sake, and had he himself not seen her involved in the operations serving refreshments at that village fair two years ago, seeming to fit right in? That was another of his fa ther s whims, which Draco still didn t understand. It had been his father s idea to ha ve an outing to the muggle world to see that May Day fair, the purpose of which ha d apparently also included to observe Lily Snape and her husband and children, a nd see them they had; though they had also, to Draco s amusement, bumped into some former girlfriend of Sirius Black, who was apparently looking for any rumour of his current location on the grounds that he was likely the father of the grumpy toddler she had had with her, and that she wanted him to acknowledge his respon sibilities (and to hand over large quantities of cash). Draco s mother, who was of course Sirius cousin, tended to refer (in private) to the head of the Black family as that playboy auror idiot . Sirius was apparently aware of the sentiment, but as long as Narcissa kept her opinion strictly to family c ircles he seemed to regard it as rather amusing and tolerated it. He tended to g et really nasty if anything damaging leaked into the press however; he had deplo yed the Black family wealth and influence to utterly annihilate a once moderatel y popular reporter who had made the mistake of writing an article containing all egations about uncle Sirius time at school. The journalist in question, one Rita Skeeter, had last been heard of on permanent special assignment to Timbuktu, somew here out in the Sahara Desert. The Hogwarts defence against the dark arts teache r who had been her source had simply vanished from the face of the Earth, six we eks before the end of that academic year.

But, the scary machinations of the Black family aside, Draco was supposed to be c oncentrating on the forthcoming morning which would determine his fate although actually, come to think of it, hadn t uncle Sirius been the godfather of Lily Snap e s son by her first marriage to the Potter pureblood? Maybe if the slightly scary Sirius Black considered Lily worth associating with, then she couldn t be a compl ete write-off. Then again, maybe he had been more an acquaintance of James Potte r, and hadn t had much to do with Lily since her first husband died. Anyway, Draco s head was hurting with the complications of all these family angles, and trying to work out what possible ramifications remarriage should have for b lood and social status. Fortunately, the limousine which the ministry had been k ind enough to send to convey Draco s father and Draco to the station was arriving at its destination smoothly now. Mother had had one of her attacks of morning si ckness, and wasn t coming to the station today, but staying home with Gabrielle. Draco and his father emerged from the limousine, Draco carrying his owl, Mercury, in his cage, and made their way into the station, protected by charms from bein g noticed or bothered by muggles. As they approached the wall between platforms nine and ten, Lucius took Draco by the arm and guided him through the barrier to platform nine and three quarters where the carriages headed by a steam locomoti ve of the Hogwarts Express awaited. The platform by now was busy with parents and children and trunks. Lucius had of course shrunk Draco s trunks down and stowed them about his personage in various p ockets for now. He paused at the entrance to the platform, surveying the mob ahe ad, then apparently fixed upon something, and set out, at a dignified pace, walk ing cane clicking and Draco trailing dutifully behind. As they went, Draco nodde d to some of the children he knew, as they passed. He would have liked to have s topped to have a word, or even to just wave in passing, but that would have been presuming upon his father, who had still not yet stated to Draco exactly where Draco would be ending up. And then, rounding a knot of those Weasley menaces, Draco came into sight of what his father had apparently been looking for, and Draco had to remember his manne rs and force himself to keep from gaping. The idiot schoolmaster, Severus Snape, whom Draco had last seen two years ago hav ing sponges thrown at him for that muggle entertainment was garbed as a dignifie d footman today, all in silver and white, and holding an infant. And, trailing t he rest of her children in silver-grey about her like constellations, Lily Snape was dressed and cloaked in a velvety black so breathtaking it made the eyes wat er and the heart ache, her wavy red hair tumbling about her shoulders. She halfturned from the wizard she had been talking to, as Draco s father approached her, and lifted her gloved left-hand for Draco s father to politely bend and formally k iss, which he duly did. It was his mark of the highest respect for a woman, and up until now Draco had only ever seen his father do that to Draco s own mother and to the dowager Augusta Longbottom. Draco was vaguely aware of his father saying something to Lily Snape, and Lily Sn ape returning the pleasantry. Her green eyes seemed to be sparkling with polite amusement this morning. Draco couldn t understand it. Where was the woman of the H umble-on-the-Down May Day village fete of two years ago? This woman radiated an aura of practically tangible power and command. This was unquestionably a woman who had vanquished a dark lord. He was experiencing difficulty reconciling his t wo wildly contrasting impressions of the same woman. Unless she deliberately liv ed on the edge of a muggle community and swathed herself in nonentity as a cloak so she would not be bothered? Had Draco s father known that this other Lily Snape existed, but gone to that fete to view the masquerade she executed in her seclu sion from the magical world? Why would she hide though? None of this made much s

ense, but Draco had discovered that sometimes first impressions could be wrong, and appearances deceptive. Yes, he had read the theory of it in books, and forgo tten about it or sneered at something so simple it should be obvious, but this w as the first time he had experienced in a personal context that it could actuall y be true. Get on her bad side, and Draco was certain that Lily Snape would prove at least a s dangerous as his Aunt Bellatrix had been before she became a long-term guest o f the aurors and dementers of Azkaban. Draco saw his father engaging in conversation with Lily Snape and the wizard she had been conversing with before, and so Draco looked around for anyone he recogn ised to similarly engage with. There wasn t anyone of his age in the vicinity, exc ept Lily s children. He wished he d paid more attention to his genealogy studies, as at least the name of the son, born before the business of Godric s hollow, out of Lily s union with the Potter line was known in the wizarding world, although he w asn t sure that any of the others were. Draco approached the boy, with his dark hair and round glasses, put his owl down, and as a matter of habit stuck out his hand. Except of course, the boy s hand was currently occupied with keeping hold of a girl of maybe four or five who had wavy black hair, green eyes, and was staring at e verything going on around them on the platform as if this was one of the most in teresting things ever that she d seen. The oldest girl in this group who looked perhaps a year or so younger than her br other moved in to relieve the potentially embarrassing social situation. She had wavy dark hair, but her eyes were dark, unlike those of her brother and sister. Hello. Celia Snape. , she said brightly, taking Draco s hand and shaking it. Harry, as you can see, is busy with Laura. My brother

Harry Potter. That was it, Draco remembered. Harry James Potter. And the mention of Snape reminded him that the man who was Lily s second husband must be Severus Sna pe, one of the youngest potions masters ever. Draco recalled that his father had mentioned that at one time there had been a possibility that Severus Snape migh t have ended up as Draco s godfather, but that the notion had fallen casualty to t he swirling tide of war. Draco Malfoy. Draco introduced himself. Umm. His mind was completely blank. In a mome nt he was going to say something really dumb like: So what s it like growing up in the house of Lily Snape? Oh Merlin, that sounded awful. Like he was some brainles s fan, or worse Celia was busy suppressing a laugh, so Harry had the kindness to answer. Weird. Mum and Dad only told us about magic several months ago didn t want us experi menting I guess but a lot of stuff makes sense now. Like some of their friends, and what Celia s godfather does and why mum wants us to learn Arabic Draco saw Celia administer a brief nudge in the ribs to Harry. Uh, right, forget the Arabic. Only uncle Vernon goes My brother, is an idiot at times who doesn t know when to shut up. Celia said, elbowi ng him rather more vigorously this time. She smiled a predatory smile at Draco, and Draco was suddenly rather relieved that he was on a station platform with do zens of other people and his own father only a few yards away Although of course Celia s mother was standing there too, and even though in the interests of family

loyalty Draco would like to be able to honestlybelieve that his father was toughe r than Celia s mother he wasn t quite sure what the result would be if the pair of t hem did square off. So, Mr. Draco Malfoy. Celia said. What s it like growing up in th e house of Narcissa Malfoy, formerly Narcissa Black?

Well he s Draco started, before catching the question. Wait, huh, what, you re asking ab ut my mother? Well you asked in the context of ours. Celia shrugged. Turnabout is fair play.

She was a merciless inquisitor. Draco wondered whether she got it from her mother or her father or perhaps both? And she knew his mother had been a Black before she married, which was more than he could say about her mother. Uhh, Harry, some help here please? Draco looked at the other boy for some reassuran ce. Harry seemed to be easy-going, or maybe it was just that he was currently pr eoccupied with small sister control duties. Well what was it like growing up at Malfoy Manor? Harry asked. We ve heard about your mother and father and your father s various day to day activities with the magical government, but we ve been a magical household less than six months and mum still makes us do household chores by hand whereas you ve lived in a world where a flic k of a wand does goodness knows what for your whole life. Oh, right. I suppose I hadn t thought of it like that. Draco said. Well given how rich and important the Malfoys are, we probably don t count as a normal magical househ old he had the grace to colour slightly here since not every wizarding family live s in a large mansion with marble all over the place and albino peacocks on the l awn, but

Draco s father eventually came back to join Draco, accompanied by Mrs. Snape. Draco. Draco s father waited politely until Draco had finished narrating an anecdote regarding the antics of a house-elf, before intervening. In what has to be some s ort of record, the latest Hogwarts defence against the dark arts teacher is dead before the school year even started, and I regard it as unacceptable for you to attend a school where the headmaster has had to grub around for last minute rep lacements to the teaching staff. Although other developments in the wizarding wo rld are sufficiently disturbing that I would prefer to keep you at home under no rmal circumstances, I am sufficiently convinced of Mrs. Snape s ability to ensure your safety that if you wish to go to live at her house and take tuition at leas t up until Christmas alongside her own children I am prepared to countenance tha t. Be warned that owing to the steps she takes to maintain her own privacy most regular communication with the wizarding world is impossible from her house, alt hough she is prepared to adjust the defences to permit the passage of your own m ail owl. So there it was at last: Draco s father had sensed something in the wind anticipate d that sending Draco to Hogwarts might be highly undesirable and had formed this backup plan. Sensitive to events, he had kept his options open right up until t he last minute. Or at least Draco supposed that that might be at the heart of hi s father s actions; there were probably rather more layers to it than just that. T he teacher dead before the school year had even started was just the final nail in the coffin or the perfect cover excuse for Draco s father to initiate a pre-pla

nned course of action. It occurred to Draco that technically he had been asked by his father to express his opinion on what happened next? Oh hell. He was being asked to choose between staying at home with the family thereby throwing whatever arrangements his fath er had been making out of the window and spending at least two and a half months away with people who were currently practically strangers probably incommunicad o (except for the occasional owl) from the wizarding world in general. No pressu re then. Some sort of female bushy-haired menace brushed past Draco, heaving her trunk on a luggage trolley. Her seeming age and manner, accompanied bythe duplicate of a p age from a book that she occasionally glanced at before staring around suggested she was a first year muggle-born student. She stopped and turned to Draco. Excuse me please. she scowled. Have you seen Lily Potter around anywhere? She looked at the page from the book. I figure her son Harry must be eleven this year, so if she s still in the country she must be sending him to Hogwarts, and there s a good chance she ll be on the platform. Draco glanced at the picture on the page and had to resist an urge to smirk. It d epicted one of the more outrageous images of Lily Potter which cropped up in dub ious works these days. Celia reached over and pushed her brother s mouth shut, and muttered something at h im about celebrities. I think I d have noticed any seven foot tall blonde-haired women crowned with lightn ing and dressed in mink-furs and cloth of gold. Draco observed in as neutral a to ne as possible. Well she could be invisible. Or have sent her vampire praetorian guard retinue ins tead. Again, I do not see any invisible women, or obvious undead Roman soldiers. id. Draco sa

A lot of good you are. the bushy-haired girl said. She resumed her progress along t he platform, trying to spot Lily Potter, apparently blithely unaware that she ha d just walked straight past Lily Snape and family. And that is a very good reason for being in seclusion from the wizarding world wit h no floos and highly restricted owl access. Lily dryly said to Draco s father. Something about the encounter had crystallised Draco s mind for him. Stay at his ho me or Lily Snape s, he wasn t going to see much of his childhood friends this year, but it would be insane to not even sample an opportunity to reside with a myster ious icon of the wizarding world. And Harry and Celia, at least, would be some s ort of company. I thank you kindly for the offer which you have made to the Malfoys, and graciousl y accept. Draco turned to Mrs. Snape and gave a formal little half bow. Draco noted a faint flicker of approval in his father s eyes, and then the nearly u nreadable mask he wore in public was back once more.

 Before Draco s father took his leave, he murmured a few pieces of advice to Draco, i ncluding a reminder that since Draco was not going to be in public, he could aff ord not to pretend that he cared about blood status. Draco was not stupid enough to think blood status comments could go down well given Mrs. Snape was muggle-b orn, and sincerely hoped that his father had not thought that he was, and that t his was thus simply his father s official sanction not to take that line

Supplied with appropriate trunks for his trip to Mrs. Snape s home, Draco looked at Mrs. Snape. So what next, Mrs. Snape? Well, there s some time for you to chat with friends who are going to Hogwarts, as w e re waiting on another student for the coming year who s supposed to be meeting us here. Her father s in the army, and at least as annoyed as your father about the i nability of Hogwarts to hold down a defence professor. Since I know the girl s god father, and he speaks very highly of her, I offered to teach her as nobody in he r immediate family is magical. Draco did some rapid reckoning and concluded that meant this other mysterious stu dent was a muggle-born. He concluded it wouldn t be a good idea to comment on that though, unless specifically invited to do so. I think I should have a word with Daphne Greengrass if I can find her. Draco said t houghtfully. And maybe Neville Longbottom too. A number of us hve been owling one another over the summer and had sort of been expecting to get together in Hogwa rts this year, and I should probably at least attempt an explanation that I m not going with them today...