Prologue: Reminiscences of Revolution
Godric's Hallow, 31 October 1981
It was a dark night; no stars to be seen, the moon hidden behind some clouds. Yet it wasn't merely a dark night; it was a 'dark' night. Something sinister lurked in the shadows. The presence of something evil could be felt. An ever impending doom. Vile, malicious, the kind of feeling that would make you turn tail and run for hours on end. Of course, it was Halloween; a feeling of dread, scary shadows, and unnatural happenstances were entirely to be expected.
But on this particular Halloween, the gates to - and from - the living world were even farther open than usual. Death had cast its reviled shadow over Godric's Hollow. A family would die.
It was an empty street; children, happily collecting candy, were nowhere to be seen, as if, somehow, they knew what was about to happen. Curtains were closed, although light could be seen from behind them. A shadow fell upon the street, barely visible in the dark, yet one couldn't not notice it. Had there been people on the street, they would have been petrified, their gazes drawn to this emerging blackness. There were none, however, and the black figure purposefully marched through the street with long strides. He was alone and hidden underneath a piece of black cloth that inspired terror and fear. He was alone, for his business was too important. Too secret.
He came to a halt, all of sudden, and turned around in the blink of an eye. He rose his hand, as if to grasp the air, as if he was searching for something. After a few seconds, he froze. He murmured something. Blue light appeared around the man, although nobody would have been able to trace its origin. Blue markings, too, visible in the air in front of his head, yet only for the smallest of seconds. A mighty roar and a tidal wave of energy spelled the end of the light. It also spelled the end of parts of the street, and half of a house; the shock wave had vaporised parts of the pavement.
Yet, attached to the now-destroyed pavement, next to a scorched and collapsing house, stood another house. It was the strangest of things, really; a whole house appearing out of nowhere. A house, so unlike any of the other houses on the block, a princely home, fit for a nobleman - indeed, it was no house, it was a manor. Its white marble bricks shone oddly in the eerie darkness of the street, but after a few seconds, the glowing ended. What would have fit in a movie - the protagonist finally finding the item he or she was looking for, accompanied by an epic choir and an angelic glow - now looked like a devastated manor, inhabited, yet far short of its glory days.
The man strode inside, the door swinging open for no apparent reason at all, save the commanding aura of the man. An invisible barrier of light grey became visible the moment the man walked through it. It promptly cracked and fell apart, too, and now, voices could be heard.
"It's him!"
A tiny smile surfaced on the man's face. A malevolent smile. Still walking with long steps through the hallway, he heard two adults rushing away.
"Go, take him - Go! I'll hold him off! I... I love you! Now go! Save him!"
A man's voice. Someone ran away. Something - a table? - was thrown on the ground. And then - a cry. A baby's cry. The man's smile grew. He reached the end of the hallway and paused for a moment. He lifted his hands, and a strange wind began blowing around him. After mere moments, the roaring sound of a storm drowned out all other sounds. Paintings, candles, and even pieces of the wall flew around him in a whirlwind of power. Then, he pushed.
His arms shot forward like lightning. In less than a tenth of a second, the door was completely blown away. A storm had been unleashed, an explosion of magic, ravaging everything in its path. Only a second later, an eerie silence hung in the air. The hallway looked ready to collapse, missing various stones and decorations. But the room he now stood in wasn't 'ready to collapse', no, it was a warzone, it had collapsed ten times over. Taking in the sight of his work, of a job well done, he saw that a table had been put in front of the door. A table, of which now only splinters and dust remained. A table, meant to protect the other man in this room. A man, barely recognisable as one, split in numerous pieces, flattened and utterly destroyed by the storm. A man once known as James Charlus Potter, now smeared out over the whole room; blood, bone, and flesh was everywhere. The room, once perhaps a dining room, now looked like the epicentre of the detonation of a nuclear bomb.
A job well done indeed. But he had work today, as indicated by a baby's cry, coming from upstairs. A pity the Potter patriarch had to die. He had been one of the more reasonable purebloods. After quickly repairing the staircase, he went upstairs. He didn't need to use any magic to determine where his target was, for when he arrived at the upper floor, a flash of red hair shot out of a room. Probably intending to surprise him - which was funny, really - but doomed to fail. She couldn't even fire a single spell before she was slammed against the wall.
There was no escape possible from a pocket dimension, save for the designated entrance and exit spots. Portkeys work only in the dimension they've been created, and traditional apparition fails outright. The house, having been hidden inside a pocket dimension, and having also been Fidelius'ed, was the perfect fortress. And the perfect death trap.
"So, Lily Evans. Muggleborn. Strange, isn't it? Yes, James Charlus Potter was a reasonable man, that much I admit. And yet he valued tradition and ideology over the oppression of many thousands. Is that the selfless, honourable man you know?"
He smiled. She cried, silently, shaking her head.
"Have you ever realised, Evans, that he, through passivity, accepted and even enforced the laws that discriminate against you - and all other muggleborns? The laws that would have your friend Remus Lupin locked up in Azkaban? The laws that would see you be little more than a toy, a sex-slave, dare I say?"
"NO!" She cried out in horror. "That is FALSE! James was an honourable man, a good man, how DARE you?" She spat and kicked, trying to break free from invisible barriers. Truly there is no fury like a red-haired woman's.
"Perhaps. I offered him my hand in friendship. Alas, he declined. And I make the same offer to you, Lily Evans. All I require is your child. Harry James Potter. Regardless of your choice, I will take him. Think, Evans. Muggleborns are prided on being more rational than pureblooded bigots. Do you honestly think you can stand against me? What difference will it make if you die here or not? You knew it would come to this, even before he was born. You were told of the prophecy, were you not?"
She kept shaking her head.
"So you do not know the precise wording of the prophecy?"
He looked into her eyes, preforming silent and surface-level legillimency. She did know about the prophecy, but not the exact wording.
"A pity. I don't know whether this was a smart move, or an incredibly dumb move by Slughorn - or were it the Blacks? No matter. I assume you reject your chance at living in a world free of bigotry and oppression?"
At this point, she lay against the wall, rocking back and forth, wand having fallen from her hand. The effects of a Dementor's Shroud - Veil, Cloak, Mantle, however you want to call it - are terrifying beyond belief. If one was exposed to it long enough, he or she would become little more than a crying, shaking blob of flesh, continuously tortured, beyond any hope of recovery. No wonder, then, that with Riddle wearing one, Lily Evans lay on the ground, shaking and crying.
Without looking back, he walked into the room from which Lily Evans had emerged, but not before casting a gust of wind that slammed her against the ceiling, breaking her skull and killing her instantly. This room clearly was the bedroom of Harry James Potter, son of James Charlus Potter and Lily Potter née Evans. A mere baby, prophesied to be the downfall of so-called Dark Lord Tom Marvolo Riddle. He laughed internally. As if a baby whose sole ability was crying could best him. Indeed, a cry from the Potter boy seemed to confirm that this whole prophecy business was nonsense.
But dealing with fate was a fickle business, although he had come prepared. Out of his extensive repertoire of spells, he would use Avada Kedavra. Direct and to the point, but also bland and uncreative. Dark magic - an Unforgivable, even - fuelled by emotion, fuelling addiction and desire. He detested it, but it was the best way. He pointed his wand and cast the spell. Two words.
"AVADA KEDAVRA!"
He shouted - screamed, even - because the curse is fuelled by emotion, and he didn't want to leave anything to chance. Green light shot out of his wand, heading straight for the boy's head. The beam seemed to hit, although the green light of the curse made it impossible for him to see the boy. The room didn't glow green as much as it usually should have, though. Instead, the room glowed blue, just like the blue light in the street, a few minutes ago. The room seemed to spin around, a vortex of blue centred on the corpse, still hidden from view by the light. The green light of Death was sucked up by this vortex. The vortex expanded, sucking in more and more, devastating the room. He tried to penetrate the vortex of blue light, to see the boy, to know with absolute certainty that he was dead, but he couldn't. He swayed, simultaneously pushed and pulled by the growing vortex. He lost his balance, against the overpowering force of the whirlwind.
Of course, he couldn't apparate away, and of course, the portkey he carried on him all the time didn't work. Fumating in these circumstances would probably destroy his molecular integrity, there was too much chaos to flame away, and his house elves couldn't reach him. He felt himself being pulled in the vortex. He knew it would consume him. He knew anyone else would die then and there, but not him. Never him. He had a plan.
The pull was too strong, his body stretched thin and fading away in the maelstrom. A gold glow briefly overtook the blue glow, before disappearing just as quickly. Then, an ear-shattering explosion and a huge fire. The house burned to ashes in mere moments. And on those blackened lands, where once, a house had stood, now full of ash and small fires, a young baby glowed blue, the light flowing into him. And while the street burned, while the other houses collapsed into dust, and while its inhabitants screamed in terror, one man was watching.
"Interesting." He remarked. Unnoticed by anyone, he walked - glided? - over to the epicentre of the firestorm. The epicentre devoid of fire, strangely enough. He saw the last of the blue light fading into the baby, now unconscious. He picked up the black cloak lying next to the baby. A Dementor's Shroud, all that remained of the former Dark Lord. After casting a few spells, he disappeared. And the baby, still unconscious, was engulfed in fire.
The proverbial Helm's Deep had fallen. And with it, Tom Marvolo Riddle, Dark Lord of Britain. Many had fallen for his forked tongue and empty promises. Many had died fighting his forces of inhuman creatures and impure men. But in this manor, his power had been undone by the Potters, and all that remained was a small child - a baby, even. Such a peculiar creature, he didn't yet know how important he would come to be. He didn't yet know what exactly depended on him. Harry Potter, heir and all that remains from House Potter, had saved Magical Britain from revolution and terrorism. Or had he?
Author's Note:
First of all; thank you for reading! My writing sucks, I know, but I'm Dutch and I just do it out of boredom. That, and I like worldbuilding. I used to spend a large part of each day reading Harry Potter fanfictions, but I haven't done so for about half a year... I really dread catching up to everything I missed. Anyway, comments, opinions, criticism, anything you feel like sharing, would be greatly appreciated! But I warn you now, updates for this will be slow, and that is if they come at all.
