Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter nor am I getting any money from this.
AN: Okay, so, this is a plot bunny that popped into my head and I just had to write it. Also, this isn't beta'd, or really proof read. Therefore, any mistakes you see: Sorry! There shouldn't be many, though!
OUROBOROS
It is on Christmas Day when everything in Harry's life changes – at least, that is to say, when everything in his life seems to change. In truth, nothing really does, aside from his view point on everything he's ever done or ever known. But then, remembering a past life would likely to do that to a person. Especially, if that person was who he had been – and still was, in a way.
It had began, really, two weeks ago, when Snape had forced him to drink his 'remembering solution', a potion he couldn't make – and shouldn't have been making, really, in his fifth year. He had, however, because serving a detention with Snape was bad enough without losing hundreds of points for reminding the bitter man that it was an after NEWT potion and, therefore, not suitable for him.
He'd known then that he hadn't done it right. He hadn't honestly expected himself to.
He also, of course, hadn't expected to be told to drink it, either, to "test it", after all it wasn't like "anything in it was… poisonous."
So, in a moment of perhaps complete foolishness, he had. He'd been glaring and shaking with anger, but he had definitely drank it, all the same. Mainly because he hadn't thought it was really worth the effort of refusing, and also because he had just wanted to go to bed after the pre-detention "occlumency lesson".
Now though, as he lay in bed, in the suddenly all too familiar house of Grimmauld Place, he couldn't help but wonder whether he should have just thrown the vile at the nearest wall and left without a backwards glance.
Then again, he also couldn't help but be thankful that he had drank it, too – whatever it was that he'd inadvertently made – even if it had opened up a whole new – old? – lot of issues. Some that were, admittedly, very hard to think on, never mind to actually deal with, just yet.
Like his old brother, for instance.
Or the Horcrux locket, which, it turned out, they'd actually gone and thrown out the summer before, utterly undestroyed…
He let out a sudden pained, exhausted, and completely unamused laugh.
It was just his luck, really, wasn't it?
Regulas Articulas Black, he thought. The youngest Black and a pureblood heir, by default.
In all honesty, the parallels weren't lost on him.
Both had been raised in an abusive environment.
Both had been abandoned, somewhat, by family.
Both had had problems at Hogwarts due to misplaced prejudice.
Both had – and were being – dragged into a war they didn't really want to be in.
Once for the Dark, a Death Eater, because "One Black needs to live through this!" his Father had snarled at him, because his brother had chosen his side, quickly and easily, which meant, according to them, he had to choose the other.
"If the Dark Lord should win, Regulas, your brother will be lost! If he should lose, however, your brother will be free! One Black – at the very least – needs to come out of this alive! The line of the Black's must continue! So, yes, for the love of Morgana, boy, take the damn Mark!"
And once for the Light, an untrained teenager, but still, the Boy-Who-Bloody-Lived.
Harry – Regulas, his brain supplied – cursed in annoyance, cursed at that stupid title, and for his remembered life.
He knew – he just knew – those memories of his were going to alter more than just his mindset.