A Wizard Thief in America

by the stargate time traveller

Very AU - Set in a world where Lily & James were muggleborns who got mixed up with the prophecy anyway and were killed, they managed to get Harry out of Magical Britain and away from Dumbledore. But Harry is nothing like what Dumbledore expected him to be, but how can you be when you're a Wizard growing up on the streets in a country where muggleborns are considered scum?

1. Chapter 1 The End of the Potters

Disclaimer - I don't own Harry Potter or the franchise. All I own are ideas that make my stories come true.

Author's note - A Wizard Thief in America and its sister story, A Wizard Thief In London, are virtually identical, aside from a bit of wording. Please do not be confused - its only at the ending where you see the differences. I'm playing around with different what if scenarios.

Anyway, enjoy my stories and please drop me a review.

Prologue - The End of the Potters.

Lily Potter sat listlessly at the table of the living room of the cottage she and her husband were living in at Godric's Hollow.

She still couldn't believe what she'd just learnt from scanning Voldemort earlier - she didn't know whether to laugh or weep. How stupid could the bastard be to use that kind of magic? Lily closed her eyes and sank deeper into the chair.

The dark red haired and heavily pregnant young witch hoped that by sitting still for long periods without doing much after the hell in Diagon Alley earlier today then her adrenaline would run down, but truthfully her mind was too shaken to process what she had just learnt. She had been a mess at hospital when her husband James had taken her there, but she had been glad she had insisted on visiting a muggle hospital. It was simple sense - there were too many Healers in St. Mungo's hospital of magical maladies who were sympathetic to the aims of the Death eaters.

There were daily reports of people in the hospital who'd died of accidents, and she didn't want to deal with another Death eater, only one who was disguised as someone sworn to help.

Dumbledore would probably not like it, but she didn't care. She had refused to tell her husband about what she'd learnt during the fighting with Lord Voldemort - if she and James had not been set up she would've been surprised, and those Order members who were 'discreetly' nearby had proven that Dumbledore was playing his little games again - and in that fight she had magically scanned the Dark Lord when the bastard murderer was occupied with fighting her husband and the Order members.

If James had been murdered, then it would simply be recorded as yet another muggleborn needlessly slaughtered by that psychopath. The Ministry didn't care about the rising statistics. Lily and James Potter were muggleborns who had not known they were magical until their eleventh birthdays, though Lily had known about the truth of those weird events where something miraculous happened was magic earlier than James or others like her did, thanks to Severus Snape. Lily grimaced in distaste at the thought of the greasy haired Death eater.

Yeah, he might have been her 'friend' growing up, but Lily had always known he'd lusted after her rather than loved her, if he thought he was being Slytherin by covering up those looks he sent her way, looks of hunger like a lion who hadn't seen an antelope for a fortnight, then he needed his brain examined. Then again Severus had never been very good at moving on past his emotions. To Lily, she would always be grateful for him for telling her about magic. But she was not grateful for the way he just sank into a crowd when he should know better.

She knew Severus's home life was appalling but it wasn't an excuse to become a Death eater. Lily shook her head in sadness at the thought of Severus being marked like a branded cattle, but that was the life he had chosen, and if Severus couldn't see the sorry excuse of a life he now had she didn't want to know him.

She couldn't work out why he'd thought she'd go out with him when the company he had fallen into at school had put her off, and the way he listened and absorbed that hateful shit about blood purity….. Lily shook her head as she became lost in memories that didn't really make any difference now - she didn't want to think of the Junior Death eater movement which was still being a major problem at Hogwarts, not helped by the stance of Albus Dumbledore and the rest of the teachers. The place was becoming a Death eater factory and training camp, not helped by the teachers.

Would they never open their eyes to see what was going on, or were they doomed to just create Death eaters each year?

Lily was truly disappointed in some of her former teachers, she knew she wasn't the only one. It wasn't a nice feeling for her since she had learnt a great deal from them, but she couldn't help it. If they had pulled their fucking fingers out and punished some of those students who had been infected by the disease that was Lord Voldemort who had paraded around the magical world like Adolf Hitler, saying all the magical world's problems were due to muggleborns, but Lily and James were convinced some of those teachers had agreed with him. So much for the lies that muggleborns were treated as equal. As far as she knew, muggleborns were still being visited by the teachers from the school and being told that lie. It wasn't true. Muggleborns were seen as scum.

It was the prejudice that made strained her relationship with Marlene and Alice, but now she only had one of her friends left since Marlene had died not so long ago, and even Lily didn't know how long her friendship with Alice would last.

Lily had often thought aloud that the magical version of the Star of David the Nazis had used to pick out the Jews would be passed around to the muggleborns, and a few other muggleborns had agreed with her when things had begun to get worse. Lily could picture it happening - some weird magical symbol being passed around to the muggleborns, teachers picking them out in the crowd and making them perform humiliating rituals, and all the time Albus Dumbledore sitting serenely in his golden throne in the Great Hall saying his hands were tied, his eyes twinkling insincerely with a look of pitying understanding on his face, though truthfully Dumbledore didn't understand and he didn't want to either.

There were exceptions - Filius Flitwick, Pomona Sprout, Horace Slughorn - but they were only a few exceptions but they had managed to give the muggleborn students hope, whereas people like Minerva McGonagall didn't seem to care. During those times when she and her fellow muggleborns were being harassed, sometimes in the Great Hall, she would see Dumbledore's look of amusement as if the suffering before him was one great big and very sick joke.

Many muggleborns and even half bloods had lost their faith in the old wizard. It had been a few years since Lily and James had been at Hogwarts, but they didn't know if they even wanted to know how the next generation of muggleborns were walking around in packs, keeping an eye open for Junior Death eaters and defending themselves when the teachers didn't seem to care. Were the teachers still turning a blind eye? Was Flitwick doing his best to mitigate the worst of the prejudice seeing he was a half goblin himself? Was Dumbledore still unapproachable, and did he still look at the bullying like it was funny while saying his hands were tied, a stupid excuse if anyone had ever heard one?

Lily shook her head as she remembered how things had gone down hill one day when she realised that the magical world was not what she'd thought it would be, though there had been signs for sometime.

Snape had called her a mudblood, one of the most foulest things she had ever been called because it attacked not just her but her entire heritage, when she had made the mistake of trying to help his ungrateful arse when the marauders were bullying him. The marauders - Frank Longbottom, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew - were a gang of Gryffindor boys who had attacked the kids of some of the other houses.

They called it pranking.

Lily called it bullying.

She wasn't alone either, and many muggleborns went out of their way to avoid the obnoxious boys though Remus Lupin was more bearable, though his cowardice left much to be desired. And it seemed the anger of the pranked students who had been forced to endure it year upon weary year had festered and had made many of them turn to Voldemort, and now they were marked Death eaters who ran around in halloween costumes that crossed with Ku-Klux-Klan inspired clothing complete with masks to hide their faces, but Lily called them cowardly for refusing to show who they really were and getting their revenge on everyone.

Truthfully the marauders were as bad, if not worse, than the junior Death eaters and it was made worse by the fact Dumbledore protected them. Sometimes he did it openly.

Lily and James had never liked the marauders, in fact few of the muggleborns did since the idiotic Gryffindor boys involved them unwillingly in those stupid pranks of theirs.

Unlike their magically raised fellow students, there was a line that had to be drawn between pranking and bullying, and the muggleborns had been aware of that line the whole time. James was unlucky enough to have to share the same dorm with them for 7 years. He had tried to make friends with them because he was the only muggleborn in their dorm and he had needed the support, but his lack of knowledge about their world and the fact he was a muggleborn strained any attempts of friendship.

That was something Lily had always been bothered by, if you didn't even know or had even met a muggle or a muggleborn, how can you know you automatically hate them? Anyway, it hadn't mattered - over the years James had become disgusted by the attitudes of the boys who hadn't been very nice, and he had joined the muggleborn group which had been formed as the political climate outside the school grew more soured by Voldemort.

Lily had also joined when it became clear to her that Snape was becoming more and more involved with the Death eaters, and when the teachers lack of response or support for the muggleborns just grew day upon day until the muggleborns simply gave up hoping one of them would start helping them.

Unlike James who had been forced to bunk with four immature little boys, she had been with two of the best friends she'd ever had. Unlike boys like Frank and Sirius, Marlene and Alice had been automatically supportive of her because of her heritage, and it was from the pair of them Lily had learnt more about the magical world and its problems, but there was a gulf between them but they were more fascinated by her being a muggleborn than anything else. But over the years Marlene and Alice had distanced themselves from her like many of the other pureblood witches and wizards in the school who had muggleborn friends. Voldemort was showing his true colours all the time by murdering families who either refused to join in with him or those who believed he was going too far.

The separation from her friends had hurt, but that hurt her the most was the fact she could understand them.

After Snape had shown his true colours, Lily had become more involved with James and she was glad she had. They had already formed a bond despite James's occasional arrogance, but if there had ever been a choice without Snape calling her that foul name then it would only have James. Unlike Snape, James was willing to be there for her.

Lily shook her head out of her school memories and focused on the last two years. She and James had married after school and they had both become curse breakers since the other jobs were being pressured by those high up in magical society to deny muggleborns or half bloods who lived in the muggle world access to magical jobs. The goblins didn't give a damn if a human was muggleborn, half blood or not - to them a human was a human. Lily and James hadn't wanted to be curse breakers but they had little choice because of the coming war, and like many muggleborns who were just fed up of the prejudice and lack of action from those like Dumbledore who was supposedly a champion of their rights as living and thinking people, not barbarians who'd been civilised like a monkey being taught tricks and taught how to dress in a stupid costume, the newly wedded Potters had done their best to ignore the war and simply hope it passed over their heads.

Unfortunately, it hadn't worked. Lily and James had become involved with the fighting when Albus Dumbledore pressured them into joining the Order of the Phoenix.

Lily grimaced at the thought of the Order. She had never met such a useless bunch before. Oh, they believed they were putting up a good fight since they were on their own and the Ministry was compromised, but Lily could see many ways they could be better, but she knew better than to tell them that. She knew she'd be wasting her time.

Dumbledore wouldn't listen to her. Others like Molly Weasley would argue with her, yelling at the top of her banshee voice that she should be ashamed of doubting a great wizard like Albus Dumbledore. When she'd been younger Lily had never liked the thought of vigilante groups, but as she grew older and learnt that rules and laws of order could be changed or altered slightly that in the end they made little difference. Nowadays Lily didn't really care about magical laws since they did nothing to protect muggleborns.

The war against Voldemort had become an open war three years ago after years and years of political wrangling, though there had always been a shadow of darkness draped over the magical world like a slick of oil, drowning everyone.

Lily closed her eyes as she tried to force out the terrible memories she had accumulated during that time; watching people being slaughtered needlessly, muggle homes with the Dark Mark hovering overhead with the doors and windows disintegrated, blood smearing the floors with women and girls bloodied and showing obvious signs of rape. It was just as bad in the magical world.

Voldemort might claim he was doing what he did for the good of the pureblood wizards, but he was murdering families who were supposedly pure, and the number of people being murdered was rising more and more with the Death eaters gleefully slaughtering people they had probably met at parties without a care in the world. To make matters worse their ranks were being filled all the time, usually by morons and desperate sick bastards who wanted to have a proper outlet for their disgusting tastes, and people were disappearing.

Many muggleborns had fled the war, never to be seen again, and Lily couldn't say she blamed them. A few were staying to try to fight and they fought dirty, much to the anger of Dumbledore and the Ministry of Magic who in many ways were sympathetic to the Death eaters and it didn't help that Minister Bagnold was fucking hopeless. But really, what did they expect? What did Dumbledore with all his useless double talk expect? Did he really think the muggleborns wouldn't lash out after all the shit he and others had pushed them down? What did Bagnold expect? The woman had never been Lily's favourite person when it became clear that she couldn't see the cancer the Death eaters were, for tying the hands of the aurors and anyone else who wished to fight. Didn't she realise that this wasn't a political game? Lily had decided she didn't care for her reasonings because while she was beginning to show signs of seeing reality, it was too little and too late in Lily's mind.

There were far too many Death eaters, many of them pureblood and half blooded witches and wizards, who now saw the cause as being worthwhile since there weren't any actual fighters. And the Ministry was making things easier despite the work of a few to try to stop the mess from getting worse. Lily did feel for some like Amelia Bones.

It had taken Bagnold a few years, but now she was seeing that the war was not what she had imagined it to be. What efforts she was putting in now were too little, too late in Lily's opinion.

Lily frowned as she thought about how suddenly she and James had been pushed into the war by an outside influence and they had encountered Voldemort three times this year and today's little skirmish was the third time. Because of their profession and because they travelled to other countries where there were dozens of spells, curse breakers were encouraged by the goblins to study the old magical spells found in old libraries or tombs to build their spell repertoire to understand the magic of the wards, and Lily and James had quite a large repertoire of ancient and really dangerous curses that really helped to even the playing field between them and the Death eaters. Voldemort was a challenge, but at least with those curses they lived to fight another day.

Lily was a wicked duelist though she was more of a fighter - she didn't really like the etiquette that went into magical duelling - and thanks to her petite willowy build she was light and quick on her feet, and with her talent for using vicious spells and everyday domestic charms in her fighting she was an unpredictable fighter.

Fighting Voldemort was no longer an option for Lily in her present state, and to make matters worse Lily believed Dumbledore had made sure she and James were in Diagon alley when the attack took place. It was too much of a coincidence, and now Lily was beginning to suspect Dumbledore himself was pushing her and James into encounters with Voldemort, which were dangerous for the baby, but the old man didn't seem bothered and the thought he was a bigot seeing an end to three 'mudbloods' had crossed her mind.

Things had gotten more suspicious when Voldemort had ignored everyone else the moment he had laid eyes upon them both, and the look in the sick wizard's eyes at the sight of her pregnant belly had terrified Lily. She had been forced to hide in a shop and provide covering fire from a position of safety, and it was during that terrifying experience that Lily had decided to magically scan Voldemort while he was distracted.

When she had studied the results she couldn't believe the monster would do something so disgusting and yet so stupid. Was Voldemort really desperate he would make them? After the fighting was over, despite whatever insistence of Dumbledore that such things were safe and hadn't been compromised, Lily had insisted herself that she and her husband go to a muggle hospital to have her checked up.

After nearly being killed by blood purists who'd love nothing more than to murder her and her unborn 'filthy blood' baby, Lily hadn't wanted to take the risk healers with dark sympathies getting their hands on her. There were dozens of Death eater sympathisers in and around magical society, people who believed the sick lies muggleborns stole magic from pureblood witches and wizards, rendering them as squibs, and wanted to do something about it. When the fighting was over and James suggested them go to a hospital, she'd insisted they simply go into the muggle world for a checkup. No, being with muggles again was better than being with wizards. Lily had grown sick of them for one day.

What followed was a thorough check up on her baby, and though she and James like every other muggleborn tried to spend as much time in the muggle world as possible though many had been abused and tormented over the years by their peers and families who hadn't known that their children were actually magical only to see the magical world was no better so they were caught between two worlds, but it was a better choice than being murdered by the people nearby you without anyone raising a finger to stop it.

James knew she had learnt something, but they couldn't talk about it and even when they'd come back to this fucking cottage Dumbledore had put them in, for 'protection', she and James had been summoned to an Order meeting. She had refused to go - the doctors had prescribed rest for her, and if Dumbledore thought for one instant she was going to one of his pointless meetings he would get another thing coming. She had no intention of seeing the useless bastard now, and besides she was too worn out after the day she'd had, and if Dumbledore thought she was going to put a meeting first above her baby then she would methodically introduce the old fool to a number of slow torture spells that she'd discovered from an ancient Chinese tomb. She had told James to go for the pair of them while she rested here.

Lily only hoped James came back with something good to tell her.

---

The instant James Potter walked through the door of the new HQ of the Order - the Order had to move to different locations because Dumbledore was having a lot of trouble finding a decent place to hold the meetings, or if he thought he was being too clever for the Death eaters by making it hard for them to track the Order down, but why that would be James didn't really care - he knew he would be having problems. He was still shaken by the attack in Diagon earlier, knew Lily was too, and the knowledge that Lily had found something out because of her scan, but she had refused to tell him when Dumbledore had summoned them to this ridiculous meeting.

The Order - he and his wife hadn't even known they had been nearby in the alley - had taken heavy casualties, not helped by Dumbledore's stupid policy of stunning the bastards so they can have a chance of redemption.

But the problem was the Order simply didn't have the mindset to fight and win this war, and that combined with Dumbledore's questionable policy didn't make a good combination for fighting a war against an enemy who didn't have the same scruples. The meetings were just chats like a really bad writers group who met once a month to discuss writing when all it was were just brainless chats.

None of the Order members barring one or two really had any interest in fighting or even lifted a finger to help anyway. Sure, some of them were skilled, some - like Moody, and the former marauders though he knew that bunch of idiots still thought of themselves as pranksters - were willing to go the extra mile to fight back.

But the others…Half of them were old, and some of them were just old friends of Dumbledore's brought in for Christ knew what reason, though what contribution they actually made for the war effort James had long since stopped trying to work out.

Why did Dumbledore not have friends or associates who he could trust, those who could contribute something to this war?

Lily was the same, she often sneered about the members behind their backs at the end when they returned to wherever they were staying, asking herself and him what would possess Dumbledore to recruit such useless people in the first place when he should be recruiting genuine aurors, curse breakers, healers, unspeakables, and even criminals to tell them all what the state the war was having in all avenues of society. People like that had a great deal of influence over a war.

But no. Instead the Order consisted of old people afraid of lifting a finger to fight back. For some reason, Lily had come to suspect Dumbledore wanted the war to be waged the way it was with people who were virtually useless because it meant HE could influence the outcome of the war. James had the feeling his wife was right.

It was just….the thought Dumbledore saw the war as a massive chessboard made him feel sick, because Dumbledore did have that mentality.

What was worse were their attitudes.

Many of the Order members, barring a couple, were pureblood witches and wizards, and some of them hadn't really even spoken to a muggleborn in their lives, and as a result many of them had much the same prejudices as the Death eaters only they weren't as extreme. But there were times the Potters chose not to attend, unfortunately it had made some of the members who thought more with their mouths and less with their heads believe they were Death eaters themselves. Lily and James ignored that little mob. They weren't going to bother defending themselves, nor were they going to say they would rather fight the bastard who was waging a double war on the muggle world and the magical world, and not caring who he killed in the meantime, since they knew the mob wouldn't listen.

Granted, Lily had been pissed at first, but so had he. Now they didn't really pay much attention.

Others simply didn't like muggleborns like the typical pureblood didn't because they believed that as muggleborns they wanted to change magical culture and everything they knew because many muggleborns were often heard complaining about the differences in the magical world.

They need not have worried about Lily and James - both had passed the point where they believed the magical world could be changed because they had both realised magical culture was very different and there was nothing they could do about it, and after everything that had happened they had passed the point of interest and had approached apathy with the speed of an Intercontinental Missile.

They didn't care about the wizarding world, and they preferred the world of tombs, deserted cities and temples to the living world since they knew that was where the wizarding world would head if they continued to murder everyone they didn't like. But after everything that had happened over the last few years, James would personally be happy if the war DID wipe out British wizards.

James hadn't blamed his wife for refusing to attend tonight's meeting, she was under enough strain as it was and the last thing he wanted to do was put their child at risk. If Dumbledore didn't like it, that was just too fucking bad. James didn't know that his thoughts mirrored Lily, but it didn't matter. Besides Lily didn't like the Order of the Phoenix since she was certain they'd been manipulating her and James into joining when so many other muggleborns could make contributions and maybe do something.

Instead the pair of them had to contend being the only muggleborns in the group, forced to listen to the pureblood majority who made up the group talk about the murders of muggleborns sound like an everyday event.

"Ah, James," Dumbledore was standing up in front of the massive table with dozens of other witches and wizards, James recognised many of them but he and his wife hadn't really bothered to socialise with many of them. "But where is Lily? She should be here."

"My wife didn't want to come," James replied, deciding to be honest. "After the attack in the alley, can you blame her?"

Minerva McGonagall spoke up, looking worried. She had always been fond of the Potters before they'd married though she was unaware that they'd lost their respect for her a long time ago. "Is she alright?" she asked looking worried and concerned. "Is the wee bairn okay?"

James wasn't sure how to answer that question because of the person asking it. The concern was touching but in his opinion too late; McGonagall had been the deputy headmistress, and she had had the power to give more help for the muggleborns like him and Lily than the others, but she hadn't done it.

He would never forget the times the Junior Death eaters sometimes went too far and she and Dumbledore didn't do anything to punish them, and just said it was just harmless pranking and that they should be forgiven. It was because of those actions the Death eaters believed they could anything and everything to make other people's lives a living hell, to say nothing of Bagnold's stance of placating their worthless families by following Dumbledore's example and doing nothing.

Why Dumbledore couldn't see his policy of turning the other cheek was doing more harm than good was anybody's guess.

"She'll be fine," he said at last without giving too much away, knowing if he gave too much away then Dumbledore would ask too many questions - his interest in his unborn child and the one Alice Longbottom was carrying herself was too obvious. The less he knew the better. "We'd both been through a lot today."

If James had hoped the Order meeting to begin after that he was in for a disappointment. Molly Weasley opened her fat mouth. "A pregnant woman has no place in the fighting. Lily has finally realised her place is in the home."

Alice shouted a protest at Molly since she did as much as Lily when it came to fighting, as James stiffened, and his voice was even more dangerous. "Lily and I were caught unawares by the Death eater attack. What was she supposed to do? She hid in a shop and provided cover. I think you'll find my wife is more talented than you are," he said, ignoring the bridling woman who had poked her nose and her fat mouth into their lives without thinking that perhaps she should just keep her opinions to herself. But Molly's unwanted opinion didn't make him angry, no what made him angry was how the attention of the Order had been placed at the Potters' door.

Arthur didn't say a word, he just pulled his wife down and shook his head. James felt nothing for the henpecked man, and was grateful he had married a woman who had some common sense between her ears, and didn't use her mouth each second when no one would want to listen to her.

"Excuse me, but I was under the impression this meeting was concerning the war, not whether my wife is pregnant and should be cooking as if nothing had happened. Can we get on with this please?"

Dumbledore nodded when he finally saw that he wasn't going to get anything out of James. He had hoped to find out a little bit more about what the Potters had done in the attack. But he knew he wasn't going to get anywhere. "Yes, we can. A good idea James, but I would like to speak to you about your use of spells in the battle-"

"That was not a battle," Moody interrupted with his characteristic growl. James didn't know if the man was defending him or not, but frankly he was too happy that he was being defended against Dumbledore by someone like Moody. The auror's impatience was so thick you could see him clenching his fists angrily. James eyed him with respect since it proved that Dumbledore's constant holier than thou stupidity was grating on the scarred and grizzled dark wizard catcher as it was on the Potters. "We had our arses kicked Albus because you keep insisting we should stun them to give them the chance to repent. The only thing these scum understand is how to kill people, and we'll never match that if we keep using stunners. Face facts, it is not going to happen!"

There were voices that muttered in agreement with that stance and Dumbledore and his little posse of sycophants who repeated his talk the Death eaters should be forgiven and their crimes forgotten took the opposing view. James had to fight the urge to snicker at the look on Dumbledore's face as the voices became more annoyed.

This was one of the reasons why the Order of the Phoenix simply didn't work.

Too many of the members had been killed and their families along with them simply because they had naively followed the view the war could be ended with stunners, but all that happened was the order members who stunned one Death eater and stunned two others before fighting more would have to face the 3 they had fought before in a never ending battle, and the Death eaters didn't show mercy. They went for the jugular and they enjoyed playing games which would get order members who didn't like fighting killed after they grew tired of repeating the cycle of being stunned and waking up or being revived by one of their pals and fighting back even harder before deciding enough was enough.

The Potters were one of a handful of members who used excessive force against the Death eaters, Moody was another. James and Lily didn't like killing anyone. The only problem was they were often caught up in situations where they would have no choice but to kill, they didn't like it but that was life. Lily was pregnant, and the Death eaters were trying to kill them because of their blood statuses - was it any wonder the Potters were killing the Death eaters nowadays?

Molly Weasley just couldn't keep her gob shut. "Albus is right, if we kill any of them we prove we're no better than the Death eaters. Besides Albus always says there are alternatives to killing someone!"

There were overlapping voices of agreement from the Dumbledore posse but James saw the majority of people from Alastor Moody and Frank Longbottom and others looking at Molly with disdain. You could always count on her to stick up for Dumbledore even when it was clear the old wizard was clearly in the wrong.

James had often asked himself why Dumbledore had inducted Molly and Arthur into the Order, and had guessed not many people had wanted to get involved with the war, or wanted to put themselves into a position where they'd be killed. But why would the Weasley parents join when they had kids? For all Molly's harping about being a parent, she wasn't a good one if she thought coming to these meetings and talking about fuck all was going to help.

Some of those people had been labelled as dark by Dumbledore which James saw as a little extreme, but James saw the Greengrasses and their stance of neutrality as a sign many people didn't want to get involved because it could get them killed. James was not surprised by their stance.

The Greengrass family had a newly born daughter, they weren't going to make her into an orphan for Albus Dumbledore. Besides he didn't really care if the Greengrass family and others were dark; they had more than enough enemies as it was without labelling others whose only crime was having minds of their own and didn't follow the old fool who was too blind to see that not everyone gave a damn about the so called 'Greater Good' that he preached on a daily basis. If Dumbledore couldn't see for himself that the Greengrass family simply wanted to be left alone to protect their child, then he was even more out of it than James had thought.

Two muggleborns being labelled dark simply because they didn't want to fight, ridiculous.

If he had had his way, he and Lily wouldn't be involved in this in the first place. And then he and his wife would be labelled as dark simply because they didn't want anything to do with Dumbledore. Free will was something alien to the old fool.

"Enough!" Sirius Black barked, and everyone shut up. "It's time to wake up, we managed to stop Voldemort today but the war's not going to stop just because of that! We need to fight back."

James didn't hold his breath, knowing full well nothing enlightening would come out of this.

"We can't become like the Death eaters!" Molly simply wouldn't let it go.

James sighed under his breath and wished he had something for his growing headache, but he needn't have bothered to hide his sigh - the ambient noise in the room made his sigh unheard if he'd done it aloud. So much for the idiots getting their fingers out of their arses.

Black glared at the increasingly fat woman who put more pounds on with each of her many pregnancies. "Listen, the longer this war goes on the more people who agree with Voldemort will flock to his cause, and believe they're invincible. It's time for you to wake up; we are losing this war. Say it with me, Weasley, perhaps it will sink in!"

Rolling his eyes at the sight of the bunch of the Order members wincing in fear, and look around themselves as if expecting the Dark Lord himself to appear with his haunting bone white skin that looked curiously like a cross between snake scales and human skin, and those red eyes narrowed into slits, James wondered if the Order members were stupid. The Order headquarters were always warded to prevent the taboo working, and since Dumbledore said it, why would this bunch of Dumbledore worshippers fear it and have little faith in their leader?

James eyed Sirius Black wonderingly. He had never liked the marauders for the way they bullied others at school, to this day he was pleased he had never joined their little gang of misfits though they had only pranked him during the night until he had cursed them all so badly they had decided he wasn't worth it. Gryffindors were supposed to be brash and brawny, but in Jame's eyes they were a bunch of fools who rushed in stupidly, but after that night when he had lost his temper they had backed off.

He had done it every month and year afterwards to simply get them off his back, and he had built his repertoire of curses. McGonagall had scolded him each time, but James had ignored it since the woman was too weak willed to do anything more. But now James was seeing a different side of them. He still didn't like them though because he had met dozens of Death eaters who had probably only joined the Dark Lord simply to get revenge on people like Black and Longbottom for their actions, and he wondered if Black's little speech was said more out of pity than genuine anger. If it wasn't for him and his idiot friends then maybe those same people wouldn't have joined the enemy. Their all out secret little war with the Slytherins and the Junior Death eaters had only stoked the fire in their minds and made them join Voldemort in waves.

James didn't bother adding anything meaningful to the table - he didn't even care when he was rebuked by Dumbledore and Molly over his brutal approach to fighting, he had been rebuked so many times in the past he didn't let it get to him anymore. They hadn't been there, they hadn't seen many of the battles with the Death eaters, and so they couldn't claim the moral high ground.

He had done what he had too to fight back and to protect his wife and child. If they wanted to practice a philosophy that would get them killed, then they could so long as he and his wife were left out of it. If James followed their philosophy, Lily and their kid would be dead. No chance. Besides he had protested more than once in the past, and nothing good had ever come out of those protests.

When the meeting was finally over after an hour with nothing really planned, much to the annoyance of James and others who wanted Dumbledore to actually prove to them he knew what he was doing to fight, James was about to leave and head back to have a talk with someone more intelligent than this bunch when he was stopped.

"James, could you please wait for a few minutes? I would like to talk with you," Dumbledore called out.

James cursed the old wizard angrily. He just wanted to get back to his wife and unborn child, and get away from morons like the Weasleys, and he wanted to talk to his wife urgently. Steeling himself for the encounter - James didn't doubt the old fool would lecture him about the use of force - he sat back down in his chair. To his surprise James wasn't the only one staying; the Longbottoms were here too. While he wasn't completely fond of Frank, James did respect him and his own wife, Alice. Alice Longbottom had been one of Lily's best friends at Hogwarts, and like Lily she was pregnant and had fought against Voldemort personally a few times.

Lily and James were suspicious about why Dumbledore seemed to not care about the fact he had two pregnant women in his little band, and why he didn't even try to stop them from fighting. He didn't actively encourage them to fight, but the fact was Voldemort seemed to appear from nowhere, and launched an attack with Lily and Alice nearby.

The Potters had spoken to Alice about it once since Frank was one of those people who respected Dumbledore enough to believe he was a great wizard but not a practical thinker in this war, and they didn't want their suspicions getting back to the old wizard. Fortunately, Alice was worried as well. James was glad it wasn't just her.

James pushed those thoughts out of his mind - he was convinced by now that Dumbledore was trained in the mind arts - and focused instead on Lily and wanting to get back to her, and waited for the old fool to talk.

Dumbledore didn't begin with his usual pleasantries for a rare change. Instead, he immediately got down to business, his face was grave. "I was hoping that Lily would've been here," he began, "but I'm afraid we shall have to speak about this now. I shall say this only once because the information is too sensitive."

"What is it Albus?" Frank asked.

Dumbledore took a deep breath like an actor taking a dramatic pause, not seeing James roll his eyes at the posturing. "I am afraid Lord Voldemort is after both children born into your families," he said, before adding, "I am sorry."

"Why is he after both children, that doesn't make any sense to me," James said, trying to hold back his fear. No wonder the bastard had zeroed in on him and Lily in the alley. He was after their child, the sick fuck.

Alice nodded in agreement. "Why would he want to kill our child," he waved a hand at herself and Frank, "and Lily and James's baby?"

"A prophecy was made some time ago. It said that the one to be born to parents who had defied Voldemort 3 times before would go on to have the power he didn't have," Dumbledore said gravely.

The Longbottoms were amazed but horrified. "Our baby could be the one to stop You Know Who?" Frank asked in awe, though both James and his own wife were happy with the idea. Alice even elbowed her husband in the ribs.

James couldn't believe it himself, and he was suspicious when he realised that Voldemort had fought both he and his wife and the Longbottoms 3 times over the past year. "When was this prophecy made?" he asked suspiciously. "Lily and I faced Voldemort only today, and Frank and Alice faced him the third time last week. When was this prophecy made?"

The Longbottoms began to see the sense of his questioning, and they didn't like the way the man whom they had both been brought up to admire looked uncomfortable. "Albus?" Alice prompted with her voice shaking.

"Tell us," Frank prompted.

Dumbledore sighed and he realised he was being cornered. "A year ago I heard the prophecy," he admitted.

"And you're only telling us this NOW?!"

---

Lily looked up startled when she heard the sound of her husband flooing into their temporary house. Lily had just been cooking to pass the time and to also give her husband something to eat when he returned, and while she hated the thought of being a mere housewife like Molly Weasley who believed that was all a wife should be, she knew that James deserved a good meal.

Regardless of knowing her husband was in the house, Lily still took out her wand and padded softly to the doorway. There was a good reason why she was cautious. Too many Death eaters had managed to break into houses through the floo connections and too many people had died as a result. It was just another example of how bad the magical world and the Ministry was getting and how well connected the Death eaters were if they could use the connections like that.

The moment she laid eyes on James she pointed her wand at his head. "Did you ever go on a date with Marlene McKinnon like Sirius Black dared you to go on?"

"No." James grinned at the memory of how he'd ignored the dare when they were 16-17 years old respectively.

Lily lowered the wand only slightly as another question came to mind. "In the tombs in Egypt, one of the curse breaker students with us tried to open a chest. What happened to him?"

James's grin disappeared. "He was melted because of pressurised salt acid."

Lily lowered the wand at last, and she grinned at her husband. The Potters were both satisfied with the answers though James hadn't asked any questions himself, but then he hadn't needed to. Her reactions to the answers was proof enough for her. The curse breaking answers were known only to them and the goblins, who wouldn't tell anyone anything about something like that if they were paid to.

"I've got something for you to eat," Lily said and she led her husband over to the kitchen table and she placed two hot plates of food onto the table. James tucked in, he was so hungry he couldn't believe it though he wanted desperately to tell his wife about what had happened. "The Order meeting was the same," he said without being prompted, "still the same endless and pointless debate about using force. Black was telling Molly Weasley that she had to face facts that we're losing this war, but I don't know if he only said that out of guilt for the number of people he and his bunch of friends had bullied who joined the Death eaters."

Lily made a face. "Maybe," she said. "What else happened?"

James took a deep breath. "Dumbledore asked me about you, but I told him you were resting after the attack. McGonagall sends her best wishes by the way, but that's not the worst of it. Dumbledore held me and the Longbottoms back. There was a prophecy made a year ago, that Dumbledore knew about, that said that a child born to parents who had fought and escaped Voldemort 3 times would have some power he didn't know and would defeat him. The Longbottom's child fits the bill. But ours do as well."

Lily could not believe it. "What? A prophecy, and let me guess Voldemort believes it?"

"Voldemort doesn't know the wording," James pointed out. "All he knows are a few lines. Apparently Dumbledore heard it, but a Death eater managed to learn the first few lines. I don't know what happened - why a Death eater was nearby, what Dumbledore was doing at the time, so don't ask. But he does believe it. Voldemort's like all those leaders in the muggle world who are obsessed with things like the occult, only in his case he knows what is real and what is just superstition. Dumbledore wouldn't tell us what the prophecy actually said either, he just summarised it for us."

Lily was silent, then she began to shake with anger. "You mean to tell me that all those times you and I faced that bastard for the last year, Dumbledore was encouraging it so then he could just have some secret weapon, an ace to use just the once and then discard without a care in the world?!" She shrieked with rage. James was just as angry, his retelling of what happened after the meeting and his wife's own temper stoking his own anger. But he knew he needed to keep a cooler head in the face of his wife's temper. But it was hard - the weapon his wife was talking about, the one Dumbledore wanted so badly to end the war, could very well be their son. "That's about it," he said.

Lily paced the room like an angry tigress. "I knew that old fool was keeping one too many secrets that he shouldn't have done," she snapped. "I didn't think he would be so callous to push a child into the role of some saviour. Who the hell gave it, and where the hell did Dumbledore hear in the first place?" James didn't reply. He didn't know.

Suddenly Lily whipped out her wand and began casting a few spells. James watched her in sudden worry. "What is it?"

Lily ignored him and didn't speak until she'd finished casting. There was a purple light that suddenly appeared on James's clothes that she quickly dispelled. "That should do for now," she remarked. "Sorry, I wanted to check to make sure there weren't listening charms on you, and there was. That light."

James gritted his teeth and asked himself if Dumbledore even knew he was making himself more and more unpopular. He sighed and looked his wife straight in the eye. "I'll keep watch on myself every time we meet him," he vowed. "But in the meantime I think we should rely on ourselves to make sure our child is safe."

Lily reflexively placed both of her hands on her pregnant belly as if she could protect her child herself just by posing like that. She sat down and looked at James. "What do you think we can do? Voldemort is hunting us down, and whether or not we believe in the prophecy or not there are others who do, Voldemort and Dumbledore are two of those people. I don't know if Frank or Alice believe in the prophecy or not, and to be honest I don't care."

"Do you think we should include them, make plans that could protect ourselves?"

Lily thought for a second. "We could. But they might want to depend on Dumbledore for help, I don't see how we can persuade them otherwise. We'll speak to them at some point, sound them out." Something occurred to Lily at that point. "I think we should also have the baby in a muggle hospital, mostly out of safety but also because I don't want our child to have a magical Britain citizenship, and I think we should get the goblins to help us with that angle."

Muggleborns who were born outside the influence of the Ministry were automatically chosen to attend Hogwarts. But with goblin help and having them born in muggle hospitals, first generation muggleborns could opt for their children to be educated abroad. It wasn't commonly done, but Lily and James had heard on the grapevine that more and more muggleborns were opting for that little loophole. The Ministry could stop it happening, but they doubted it would happen.

James's eyes widened, but he wasn't really surprised by Lily's suggestion. "Are you saying you want our baby to not go to Hogwarts?" Personally he didn't really care when he remembered his own experiences at the school, remembered being called 'mudblood' for the first time, how that disgusting name and the pureblood's disturbing attitude had followed him and other muggleborns throughout their Hogwarts years. He didn't want his son or daughter going through the same thing if he could help it.

"I don't want our baby to face Voldemort full stop, and if he does go to Hogwarts then he'll be in danger. You know Dumbledore, he might say he cares, but he doesn't seem to care about the welfare of the children under his care. We saw it all the time during our time at the school, and how many times did we beg him to do something about the Death eater wannabes at school? I don't want our son to go through the same grief, only to endure worse than us. What would stop Voldemort or Dumbledore from causing trouble? Besides, in another country he could learn how to defend himself, and live peacefully for a time without constant pressure and attention, and I don't trust Dumbledore. Knowing now what he's been doing for the past year now makes sense to me, who's to say he won't push our child into dangerous situations that could see him get killed? No, James. I'm not having it. I don't care what the old bastard thinks."

Lily's mind was racing as a number of plans shot through her mind. Many of them would probably take time to really think through and had dozens of flaws, but with James's help and insight she should be able to come up with a good plan that would save their son.

By now the Potters had begun to accept the fact their child would probably have little choice but to be a key player in the war. They didn't like it but it was something they would probably have to accept. But Lily wasn't finished. "I think we should try to kill Voldemort ourselves," she added grimly, remembering the results of the scan she'd performed in the alley. "While you were fighting him, I scanned him and I found out what he'd done to himself."

James was about to cheer that at last they might be able to stop the war by unravelling the rituals Voldemort had used to make himself invincible, but the look on Lily's face stilled him. "What is it?"

Lily took a deep breath. "Voldemort created horcruxes, James. Plural. His soul is literally in tatters from being torn apart god knows how many times. Its hanging by threads. It's a wonder he's still alive and sane, more or less sane anyway," she added after a second's thought, "but what I can't understand is why he would depend on horcruxes for immortality."

James was equally surprised by the news. He almost laughed. Horcruxes were one of the biggest jokes in curse breaker circles, though in other circles were a serious threat since many dark witches and wizards had decided ripping their souls would make them immortal. No one knew who had created them first, there were stories of soul fragments during the times of the druids, but their common use occurred in Ancient Egypt when stupid wizards in the courts of the pharaohs had been ordered to find a way to make their rulers immortal.

There were even cruder examples in places like Australia, Africa, Peru, Malaysia and America where the ancient natives of those countries had studied magic. The horcrux was the end result. It was also a trap. The druids and the Ancient Egyptians had quickly worked out that when you split the soul you made it vulnerable and easy to destroy. It was like a burglar getting into a house and unlocking a bedroom window from the inside only to be caught because they'd left a clue behind. But in the case of the horcrux, if you had one of them belonging to a pharaoh or a common witch or wizard then you had a way to drain both the fragment and the individual of their magical power.

As curse breakers Lily and James rarely had a week when they never had to deal with them. Egypt, Syria, Iraq, Persia, Pakistan and even places in China along with others were littered with the disgusting things. And they always drained them of their magic to preserve the treasure they were preserved inside.

Soul fragments needed a vessel to house them, like the human body housed a soul to balance the boundaries between the spirit and the physical form.

The goblins hated the things because so many priceless treasures had been lost because they were either destroyed by accident over the centuries, or idiots had believed in the dark arts books that described how to destroy a horcrux, where they would have to destroy the fragment and the object that housed it with a killing curse or something just as powerful. While it was theoretically possible for someone to feel true remorse for the soul fragment to reunite with the main part of the soul, it had never actually happened before. Lily and James both knew better than to expect remorse from someone like Voldemort. Killing him would be a mercy - for the people he'd murdered over the years.

Lily and James had learnt about horcruxes during their training. They had been taught the specifics of the horcrux and the dangers of using the things, but also how to safely deal with them with the help of a ritual. Contrary to what some people might imagine the horcruxes didn't give people immortality - the people who'd created those ancient horcruxes over the centuries were proof it didn't work, and yet they still found them. A horcrux was just basically an echo of the main soul, but a powerful one and when the main body and soul died out the horcrux was diminished. If Voldemort lost his life now the creation of so many horcruxes would probably go on, but in an equal diminished state. Lily and James had performed the ritual many times in the past, and while they were prepared to deal with Voldemort to give their baby a chance to live, there was one tiny problem.

"We can't perform the ritual, not without a soul piece belonging to him," James stated the obvious. "Besides, if we were to use one we'd need to know more about who Voldemort was before he became a dark wizard. For all we know his name could be Ben Sutton, or something."

"I know. But I was thinking that if we can perform the ritual with Voldemort nearby-"

James nodded as his mind picked up on the thread Lily had left off on. "Then we can still have a piece of soul to work with, but the problem is I don't remember during our training that that was possible. And there's another thing - how do we know where Voldemort will be? We can't carry the tools needed for the ritual around with us, and hope for an attack. Voldemort rarely leads the attacks himself unless he's sure he can win."

Lily agreed with the logic. She went silent and then her heart sank. "James, we might have no choice but to hope our baby isn't the child," she whispered, feeling bad for saying such things. "You know how he's always putting pureblood ideals first, lets hope he goes after Alice and Frank."

It was an awful thing to say, and neither Lily or James were stupid enough to believe that maybe the Longbottoms felt the same way and were saying the same things in their own home. If they were then neither Potter could blame them.

"You know that Voldemort might not care," James pointed out though he felt the same thing. "He might decide to simply kill us and our babies just so then he could ensure his own safety in the long run. And if Dumbledore tries to influence more parents to have children in the same manner as us, making parents fight that monster 3 times, then Voldemort can do the same thing over and over again until Dumbledore realises its hopeless and the prophecy just isn't going to work."

"I still believe the old fool waited after a year to tell us," Lily growled. "I wonder why he involved us."

"I think he was desperate. There aren't that many women in his order that he could sacrifice for his 'greater good' and there are plenty of people out there who hate and fear Voldemort. He claims that those who have thrice defied Voldemort would fit some of the criteria, but the problem is unless he got Molly and Arthur Weasley to have a kid in the middle of a war, and facing that snake faced piece of shit, he would have to depend on others. It wouldn't be difficult for him to set someone up to do all that."

Lily shook her head at the cold bloodedness of Dumbledore's scheme, but she also had to hide her admiration for the scale of it. "Did he say who made the prophecy?"

"No. I did try to press him, but he refused to talk."

Lily gave a derogatory snort in her mouth. "Surprise, surprise." She had never had a great opinion about divination. The subject had always been a crappy one at Hogwarts, in fact, it wasn't even taught at the school. But Lily had never believed it possible to tell the future by reading tea leaves. In her mind the future was something that was constantly shifting beyond the extent of the human imagination to work out. It figured supposedly intelligent wizards like Dumbledore and Voldemort would believe in something so stupid, and waste time expending energy trying to fulfil it.

James stood up and walked over to his wife and pulled her into a hug. "I think we should try the ritual on Voldemort, but I also think we should try and find a place to live. Get away from Godric's hollow, and if the ritual fails we think of something else."

He felt her nod into his chest. She agreed with his plan, and she pulled back so their eyes were separated by only a distance of inches. "James, I also think we should be prepared for the worst," she said.

James felt as if someone was walking over his grave. But Lily had spent the past few hours in the library reading the books that were collected there to gather dust and read some of the books she'd kept for herself when they'd been moved here after the second meeting with Voldemort, and she had learnt something interesting. She outlined a plan for James and the more he listened the more he became fascinated and happy. James had many doubts about the ritual working on Voldemort's soul piece rather than a genuine horcrux, but if what Lily was telling him was true then they could still help their son after they died, but they hoped it wouldn't come to that.

---

Lily looked adoringly at the little baby wrapped in her arms. Harry Potter was a beautiful baby, only a few months old after being born in a hospital in Liverpool, and already the boy had messy black hair - inherited from his father, and his mother's green eyes. Harry didn't know how cruel the world was, he seemed content to eat, sleep, shit himself, cry, and laugh. Lily and James had gotten their wish of having Harry born outside the magical world, but the Longbottoms had had their own baby. Neville Frank Longbottom had been born in St. Mungo's.

Dumbledore was not happy about where Harry was born, and both Potters refused to even take their son to the Order meetings that still took place. They were still in Godric's hollow but now they were under the protection of the Fidelius charm. Lily had to admit it was a good idea, but the dangers were too great. What made it worse was that their secret keeper was also protecting the Longbottoms.

Peter Pettigrew wasn't the person Lily would've chosen as Secret Keeper, but the Longbottoms had agreed with Dumbledore when the old wizard claimed no one would expect Peter to be given such an important role.

Lily couldn't understand her friend sometimes. Alice was like her, desperate for the other one to be saved to gave her own child the chance to live. Thinking of Alice made Lily upset because their friendship had taken a battering during the final stages of pregnancy. They'd rarely met and they both saw in each others eyes the wish they hoped the other's child would be the one in the prophecy, though James had made a point by saying that perhaps Voldemort would simply come after both of them and kill them without a care in the world.

That was one reason she was concerned by the stance of having a the same person as keeper. It was too dangerous. Pettigrew was a mediocre wizard. His skills lay in potions only, that was it. He was useless when it came to duelling and his spellwork was dismal. Against a wizard like Voldemort he was hopeless.

While she disliked Black and Lupin, the former because of his immature streak and the latter because of his inability to move on from his 'oh, I'm a werewolf, woe is me, I can never have a life like others' attitude, she would have preferred them to Pettigrew and she would have been happier with someone like McGonagall. But like with many things Dumbledore had ignored them. Both Potters had refused to allow the old wizard anywhere near their son while the Longbottoms allowed him access to Neville.

They didn't know what he would do, but felt that he wouldn't be able to do anything if one of them was there to stay near Harry. And then there was something else. Dumbledore had pressured both the Potters and the Longbottoms to write their wills up, complete with a list of guardians in case something did happen to Peter that forced the man to give up their locations.

Dumbledore had commented that Lily and James should consider the Dursleys as guardians for Harry. Why he was poking his nose into something not even his concern bothered Lily no end since it wasn't his family, not his concern, and she had told him that to his face. Whether or not he got the nint, who could say? Both Potters had refused, the memory of what had happened the last time they'd met the Dursleys clear in their minds, and both of them wondered if Dumbledore wanted their child dead even if Neville was the supposed chosen one.

If so, then he was going the right way about it.

Lily had not seen her sister and her fucked up pig of a brother in law since their parent's funeral. The Death eaters had killed their families, though why the Dursleys had been left alone Lily did not know. Lily was certain it was Snape who had told his master where their families were, and he wouldn't be surprised if that were true. But she didn't want her son to live anywhere near the Dursleys. Dumbledore seemed to believe that if she and James forgave Petunia and Vernon all the enmity would disappear like the steam in a kettle evaporating, but her sister's hatred of magic was much too deep, and Dumbledore didn't understand it and probably never would.

Petunia had always been jealous of Lily, though the redhead wished she would grow up and make something of her life rather than wallow in her growing hatred. Petunia had brains and talents, Lily knew that and she had tried to encourage it to stop the older woman from constantly following her like a fucking groupie, hoping to catch a bit of Lily's effortless glory, but Petunia hadn't and she had let whatever talent existed in her wither and atrophy like a dying tree that had simply given up on life after giving it all it had.

Lily knew that Petunia had been contacting Dumbledore to allow her attendance at Hogwarts, but because Petunia was a muggle and couldn't practice magic she was denied. That and their parent's pride in her grades and what she was learning at Hogwarts even if they lacked the understanding of what she was learning, had done little to help her relationship with Petunia, who had just stewed in her jealousy.

Lily grimaced as she thought about what had come next, a match made in heaven. She didn't understand what her sister saw in Vernon, and before they'd died neither had their parents.

Vernon was a bore. He was so piggy, greedy and morbidly obese she was surprised the sun could come out. His prejudices about people who weren't white British made her sick, but he hated anything abnormal, so really he and Petunia were a good match, though she felt her sister could have done much much better.

Lily was the epitome of abnormality in their eyes, and so was James and so they didn't get along. Lily had often wondered what her sister had told him about her, but now she didn't care. Worse, Petunia and Vernon were ignorant of magic in so many ways despite their awareness of it's existence. They didn't realise that raising a child would mean many counts of accidental magic, and they would probably slap Harry or beat him just to stop him being a 'freak' if he was raised by them and despite growing up with a witch, Petunia had never bothered to gain any insight into what caused accidental magic.

She would probably slap and verbally abuse Harry if Dumbledore had his way, and her baby boy was to be raised by them. But Vernon was more extreme - she still remembered having to visit Petunia to wish her well and to tell her sister that it would be best to leave. Lily had been pregnant at the time, and she had needed to banish the fat pig into a wall to stop him from 'doing his duty, by riding the world of freaks.' But Lily was furious; she'd woken the pig up and used curse after curse on him. None of them were harmful in the long run, they were just painful, but since Petunia and Vernon both had medieval attitudes and mindsets when it came to magic, they wouldn't know that.

Lily had hated having to hurt Vernon, but she was protecting her baby. Why should she care if she was hurting a threat? The only problem was the Death eaters caused more pain for muggles, and so Lily found it hard not to think that maybe she was no better than her enemies. No. She was better. Lily knew Vernon, knew he was a brute with a lack of common sense and decency; in that case he was a good match for Petunia. She had told the two muggles that if they wanted to be killed by Voldemort, then so be it. She warned them the Dark Lord wouldn't give a shit if they tried to tell him they didn't know where the Potters were.

Then she and James had left and she hadn't heard from her twisted relatives again. Whether Vernon would heed her warnings or just ignore them since he believed his family were safe regardless, Lily didn't know. Probably the latter - Vernon was so arrogant and didn't realise that when someone like Lord Voldemort was around, no-one was safe. Vernon would probably think he could boss a 'freak' like Voldemort around without realising the Dark Lord would kill him and his family.

Hadn't the fat pig been watching the news? Lily knew that while the Ministry had managed to mitigate the worst of the Death eater's activities like wanton murder, torture, rape and kidnapping, some things had slipped through the cracks, but if Petunia hadn't seen the signs and realised what was going on in reality, then there was truly no hope for her.

Petunia was a mother now herself, Lily was aware of it, but she hadn't met her nephew. But she pitied him because while the kid was innocent now under Petunia's care he'd be smothered and mollycoddled, and with Vernon as a dad he'd probably grow up into a thug.

Dumbledore had also given the Potters and the Longbottoms a copy of a book about Blood magic. That had been a surprise for the Potters, and it made them suspect Dumbledore was deliberately trying to find a way for Harry to be given to Petunia.

Blood magic was one of those forms of magic which had so much potential, yet the Ministry of Magic in all its awe inspiring wisdom didn't have any qualms about banning study of the magic. Lily had already encountered different forms of magic which likewise were banned by the Ministry simply because they didn't understand it. She had lost count of the number of times she and James had found dozens of books, scrolls, and texts on the walls of tombs that contained all kinds of archaic magic. Besides she read it anyway, after scanning the book and seeing if there was a compulsion charm on it to make them read it, and to use some of the magic to help safeguard their family. There was such a spell on the book, and the utter shamelessness of Dumbledore showed its ugly head again.

The blood magic book joined another book Lily had in her own collection, which she felt could help her save Harry and protect him. She was curious why Dumbledore had given her a book so openly, but she quickly learnt about a sacrificial ritual that if powered by blood magic would be powerful enough to prevent her son being hit by a killing curse. While she was surprised Dumbledore would openly give her such a book with such a ritual, the compulsion charm made her realise that Dumbledore had already decided that she and Alice, not to mention James and Frank were expendable. She and James had not told Alice any of their suspicions because of the rift that had grown between them. Alice and Frank had decided to distance themselves from the Potters, though they didn't understand why.

Lily and James had also actively stopped attending the Order meetings since they didn't want to spend too much time in Dumbledore's company without their son. Besides when they had attended a meeting with their son, Molly Weasley had tried to offer 'advice' that came across as opinionated and patronising. Weasley had also hinted she didn't think Lily and James should be parents, and Lily had almost lashed out at the arrogant bitch for giving an opinion she really shouldn't have. Not for the first time Lily wondered what Molly actually did for the Order, and she knew her husband sometimes asked himself the same question, though Lily always asked why was Molly and Arthur special. Lily had only seen the other woman fight just once, and while the woman was good with magic, she had gone up to some of the Death eaters that she'd bound to the ground.

She had leaned in, hands on hips, and snapped, "What do you think you were doing?" The Death eaters hadn't been intimidated by the fat middle aged witch with dull red hair. They'd laughed instead, at least until Lily had fired a curse at one of them when one had tried to escape. Molly had shouted at Lily, but she had met her match that day, and after that the enmity between them had grown.

While Arthur was a nice man and easier to speak to than his wife, Lily and James did not like the way the man spoke to them and about muggles as though they were animals to be gawped at in a zoo. Learning to look after Harry had been tricky, but they'd managed it in the end and now they have learned how to take care of the boy with a little help and advice from Poppy Pomfrey; the school healer's experience might by more geared to healing students who'd fallen from their broomsticks, but she wasn't stupid when it came to basic baby care. Plus, she wasn't as critical as Molly Weasley.

They had also made it clear Dumbledore wasn't to know anything about her examinations of Harry. Dumbledore would try to gain an advantage.

During the time where she and James spent their days taking Harry out into the muggle world - it was a risk, but the Potters didn't want to spend every waking moment cooped up inside a cottage everyday doing the same things and wondering they would even be alive the next day, and besides if she and her husband were to die then she wanted to spend as much time with her son as she could. Their safety was still a risk because Voldemort could launch an attack anytime on the city itself.

The Potters also bought newspapers during those little days out. Harry enjoyed them and would laugh out loud when he saw ducks, cars, trains, dogs and cats, oblivious to the hell going on because of a handful of fanatics who didn't realise the harm their little war was causing. Harry was taken everywhere. They went on theme park rides, to museums, to the zoo and the sea life centre and they went on heritage railways, anything to make their baby laugh.

And in all that time Lily and James were putting the final phases of their plans into operation. Together they both transferred small amounts of their memories and knowledge into Harry's mind, always aware of the potential brain damage their son might receive if they poured too much in. When they were finished, Lily would have to place a time lock on the memories so then they would open when Harry was old enough to understand what was in his mind. Lily called it his inheritance. It was more precious than gold, silver, books or whatever trinkets there were in Gringotts.

October, 1981.

Lily's eyes watered as she stood over her baby boy who was crying his heart out, the smart little boy already knew that something terrible was happening, but she was thankful he didn't know that Lord Voldemort was inside the house. Somehow she wasn't surprised Pettigrew had betrayed them to the monster, and she doubted that Alice or Frank were safe either. In her heart and mind she cursed the Death eater who had told Voldemort about the prophecy which must have been made in a public place, Dumbledore for pushing her and James into one dangerous mess after another with Voldemort bearing down on them all the time. Lastly she cursed Pettigrew for handing both families on a plate to that monster, and then Voldemort himself for ripping away her life and her husband's from her son, and having more children who could've gone onto doing great things.

Lily was using a brush to lightly paint blood runes onto her son's face, though there were also a few runes in parselmagic. Lily had discovered her ability which was considered another dark art when she was in Egypt and India. While she was there she had spent a lot of time with other parselmouths who'd taught her a great deal about the so called dark art, and they'd given her books written to what for others were squiggles but to parselmouths they were as easy to read as a picture book. Lily had spent a lot of her time experimenting with both parselmagic and blood magic to see if the two could be used in tandem with the necessary sacrifice, and while the two were separated by a great deal there were similarities between them to make it work. The good news was parselmagic and blood magic sacrifice rituals worked the same way. But it was Lily's hope the two would be so powerful the backwash might kill Voldemort, though those horcruxes would make it difficult for the bastard to die.

Despite the danger and James yelling for her to take their son and escape so then he could grow up with just one parent in his life, Lily had already tried to see if they could escape, and she was furious when she found a number of spells on the house which prevented anyone from getting out of the house. A quick scan had indicated it was another blood magic spell, but it wasn't from either her or James. Lily had realised that it did come from someone, someone unexpected.

Voldemort himself.

No, Dumbledore couldn't have done. But it was true because she had cast the spell that would narrow in on the witch or wizard the blood magic was drawing its strength from, and it was from Voldemort himself, but had he done it? It seemed a little extreme for a Dark wizard like Voldemort to use magic like that. Burning with curiosity, Lily held her son tightly to her chest when the sound of that dreaded incantation spoken by that cold, high voice that sounded like it was coming from the arctic, "Avada kedavra," and she didn't hear James's voice. The only thing she heard a lifeless thump as James's corpse fell to the ground.

Lily cried out in horror as she used her back to shelter Harry from the exploding door when Voldemort used a curse on the door. Harry cried out with her, their voices drowned when there was nothing but silence behind them. Lily quickly put her baby into the cot, and she stood protectively in front of it. She couldn't help but shudder when she took in the sight of the figure in the doorway. Wrapped in a black cloak with a cowl covering his head, Voldemort didn't look out of place with all the muggle kids and adults out there trick or treating. The only problem was this horror was real.

Voldemort strode into the room, his expression inscrutable as his cold red slit eyes.

"Stand aside, girl," he demanded.

"Wait!" Lily said. "Why did you use blood magic to seal us inside this house?"

Voldemort had never given anyone the impression he was anything but confident in himself, but Lily's unexpected question took him by surprise. "What did you say?" he hissed.

Pleased her question had distracted him momentarily, Lily went on so she could find an opportunity to complete the ritual, "Blood magic. Do you really think I'd stay in this house where me and my son would be killed by you without trying to escape? Please, give me more credit than that. I din't care what Dumbledore might think; my husband and I had no intention of being murdered by you and not be there for our child. Why did you use blood magic?"

Voldemort glared at her. "I didn't," he said. Using his wand he cast a number of spells over himself, muttering in latin the necessary spells to detect blood magic on his person. That gave Lily plenty of time to record the last few minutes of her life along with a quick and hurried message to her son. She basically told him that she would always love him, but he would need to learn how to survive in order to fight this monster.

She didn't close the spell off though she set the time lock to seal the memories and knowledge she and James had passed onto Harry to open in 5-6 years. She didn't have a lot of time to really concentrate on the timing. While she and James had hoped that Harry would live with them and the time lock would open up the knowledge they had in his head, they had hoped it would give him some help when he went to school.

Now it was his only chance to survive. She also cast a few other spells on him while Voldemort was busy.

Finally the Dark lord finished, and he looked furious though the cowl he had covering his head managed to hide his features, but she could see the way his slit like eyes became even more slitted, and his lipless mouth moved as his teeth ground furiously. "I did not use blood magic myself, but someone else did. Who was it, girl?"

She had no desire of telling him. Instead Lily sneered at him, hoping to make him angry enough. "You think I'd tell you? I have a good idea who it was, but since you want to murder me and my son, I'm not going to tell you."

Voldemort remembered why he had come in the first place at the mention of the boy. He pointed his wand dangerously at Lily, all the while thinking that he would solve the mystery of who had used blood magic to seal the house in the first place. He wasn't sure whether to be angry or thankful to whomever it was that two of his biggest annoyances and the little brat who could be destined to be his downfall would be trapped in this house, or furious someone had managed to steal some of his blood to power such a spell.

But that was a matter for later. "Move aside, you silly girl!"

"No!" And with her head raised high, Lily Potter spat out her last defiance. "You'll have to kill me!"

Lily didn't even close her eyes when the bright green light and the rushing sound of the killing curse streaked towards her and hit her in the chest with the force of an express train. As life left her body, she wished her son all the best in the world. "Goodbye Harry, James, I love you both," she thought to herself when the curse impacted on her chest.

And then Lily Potter was dead.

---

Lord Voldemort looked down almost regretfully at the dead and still body of Lily Potter. While he and his followers openly hated mudbloods, and everything they stood for despite his own heritage he didn't let that mindless hatred stop him from admiring some mudbloods and their talents.

Lily Potter was one of a dozen who had won his respect. She was skilled in healing, curse breaking, charms, potions, and a host of other branches of magic.

It was just a pity.

Voldemort wasn't so hypocritical that he wouldn't have made an exception for the Potters to join him in his ranks, and he even entertained the fantasy of Lily Potter and Bellatrix Lestrange and Narcissa Malfoy carving a path of murder and brutality through the muggle world; he had several female Death eaters in his ranks, and the inclusion of Lily would have made her stand out.

His followers might believe that he would never induct muggleborns into the ranks never mind the Inner circle, and that was true enough but truthfully Voldemort needed a lot of talent in his army if it was to survive, and Lily and James Potter had both impressed him. It took a lot to impress someone like Voldemort.

Unfortunately, it had never happened, the Potters had not seen sense by joining him, and Voldemort knew it would never happen now.

It was truly regrettable. From what his spies had claimed the Potters weren't the typical members of the order. What made it more tragic was that prophecy. Voldemort didn't believe in prophecies, he hadn't even taken divination during his time at Hogwarts because he had always considered the subject to be rubbish, but he hadn't wanted to take anything to chance.

He was still surprised by how easy this all was, in fact he had expected more from Dumbledore besides a fidelius charm, the secrets of the locations of the Longbottoms and the Potters been given to a single person. At the time he had been suspicious that he was wandering into a trap, so he had spent months trying to learn the truth. But he hadn't found any hint of a trap, so he had decided to attack both families on the same night. He had decided to go alone, prepared for anything. But he had been surprised by the revelation of the blood ward. Why would Dumbledore be setting up blood wards with his, Lord Voldemort's, blood? Was he trying to trap him with the Potters? Or was there something more to it?

No matter.

He walked over to the cot, wand in hand.

---

Albus Dumbledore was pacing his office. While he was pleased his plan to rid the world of Voldemort for a time so then the people of magical Britain could enjoy peace for a change, he was not happy overall. The Potters were dead, the house had been destroyed, and there was a body that could have belonged to Voldemort. Ah, poor Tom, Dumbledore lamented, you were a brilliant student, but its a pity the path you chose led you to this.

But Dumbledore was angry because Harry Potter had disappeared. He had personally visited the cottage when Hagrid had met him and Minerva at Privet drive, the home of the Dursley family, to hand Harry over to Lily's sister.

They were the only family he had left, and the boy needed Lily's blood which ran in Petunia to keep him safe, but he also needed to prove whether Harry would turn down the same path as Voldemort because of his upbringing.

The knowledge that he could have helped Riddle had come too late. He knew the Dursleys would treat him cruelly, but in the long run it was for the best and for the Greater good, and besides if he was right about Harry becoming a horcrux it wouldn't make any difference if the boy was mistreated in any shape or form as he grew up, but still he would be safe from the Death eaters who would probably hunt him down and kill him for what had happened to their master; their hatred of muggleborns was strong enough, to learn the child of two muggleborns had been responsible for Voldemort's..death would stoke the fire. He still wasn't sure if Tom had created horcruxes yet since Horace still wouldn't see the need to serve the Greater good, but he would have plenty of time.

But the boy was gone. Now Dumbledore had no idea where he was, and to make matters worse everyone knew that the child of two muggleborns had saved them all. He didn't know how the information had gotten loose, but he knew it would have repercussions for many years to come since many still disliked muggleborns. Personally Dumbledore didn't really care how magical society felt about the matter, in fact it would probably make things easier for Voldemort to take control over since he could appeal to the pureblood majority that the muggleborns had stolen magic or some other nonsense to fight against him.

Dumbledore couldn't work out how the plan had failed. In his mind he had had it worked out - he would have trapped Lily and James with a blood ward using the blood of Voldemort himself. He actually found it poetic that the dawn of the Dark Lord's end would be helped by the Dark Lord's own blood. He had stolen Tom Riddle's blood a long time ago when he had become increasingly worried about the boy's leanings, so he'd helped himself to his blood to analyse it. He kept a small amount in case it came in handy later. Anyway Voldemort would have two trapped parents and a second generation muggleborn child to deal with, and the blood magic Lily would have studied would have seen her son protected while Voldemort failed to kill him. It was unfortunate two talented people had needed to die, but since it was a war the old wizard considered it a grand sacrifice that was necessary.

His plan and expectations had worked perfectly; Voldemort, having depended on vile forms of magic, had been ripped from his body and was now a wandering wraith, and Harry had probably been marked by something. It was probable the boy was now an accidental horcrux himself, but that couldn't be helped.

The boy would sacrifice himself after spending time with his mother's relatives, and he would be loved for generations for his sacrifice. But the problem was that part of his plan had failed - the boy had vanished, and Dumbledore had no idea where he'd gone.

He had tried to find the boy, but since Lily and James had refused to let him anywhere near the child and Poppy couldn't speak to him, her headmaster, because of healer-patient confidentiality except to give Lily and James parental advice, he didn't have a strand of hair or blood to use, and Fawkes didn't seem inclined to help.

The phoenix had refused to help him look for the boy, in fact he had left only an hour ago when Albus had insisted.

Looking out of the window, he whispered. "I will find you, Harry Potter," he said. "You cannot escape your destiny."

---

All around magical Britain people raised their glasses in toast to Harry Potter, and in the muggle world many wizards and witches carelessly flouted the statute of magical secrecy with their antics, but it would be a long, long time before Harry Potter returned.

If ever.

Officer Kate Bourne of the NYPD sighed as she got out of her car with her partner, a rookie Tim Ellison, and walked along the familiar paths into Central Park. It was getting late and she was nearing the end of her shift, but she wouldn't get off duty for another 2 hours. But she knew this call would probably make her busier though she barely noticed it during the routine.

A baby boy had been found abandoned in the park. She hated calls out like this, and as a cop who'd served in the NYPD for more than 7 years she had seen her own fair share of kids in trouble, but she hated them each time because they always filled her mind with bad dreams. Kate had seen many kids who had been abandoned over the years, ranging from babies to small toddlers, and she hated it.

She felt sickened because the parents had either abandoned them because they couldn't cope and look after themselves never mind a child, or the child had been kidnapped for heaven knows what from sexual fetishes or something really bad.

Kate glanced at Tim. The boy had only been in the police for a week, fresh out of training and so ignorant of the world. He would learn, providing he stayed alive long enough, or whether he would develop the balls for the job. Tim had already gotten a macho attitude which he fortunately knew when to turn off, so he was learning what was appropriate or not.

The two police officers walked down the path where there was a small crowd of people gathered around along with a few patrolling police officers near a few trees. Not in a public place, Kate thought to herself, if it was then whoever abandoned the baby would have been seen. Kate nodded to one of them, a friend of hers.

"Becky, what've we got?" Kate asked.

Becky sighed when she came closer to her old friend. "A few minutes ago a jogger called in to say she'd found a baby, a boy by the look of it, just left in the park."

Kate tutted and shook her head, but Tim looked around, "Didn't the jogger see anyone?"

Becky hadn't met the rookie before now, and she had met him and he had just asked a question that should've been obvious. She sent a questioning look at her old friend. Kate rolled her eyes and gestured for Becky to go on. "No, they didn't, and the reason that jogger didn't notice anyone was because of the trees and bushes. Look at them."

Kate moved quickly on. "And the jogger called us in?" she asked.

"Yeah, and then we had a crowd. Many of them are women or girls who are cooing over him, he's quite sweet. If we don't find his family then we'll have to put him into care."

Kate stiffened. She had grown up in care herself after her parents had died in a car accident when she was a few years old, and it was an experience she would not wish on anyone, but it had worked out for her because her time in care had shaped her life, and now she was a cop. Becky and Tim noticed her reaction, but only Becky knew why her friend looked so stiff all of a sudden.

Pushing aside her feelings, Kate said, "Let's have a look at the kid."

Becky led her fellow cops over to the kid. The moment she saw the child, Kate's heart, hardened by the years she had spent learning how unkind and unloving the world could be, and all the time she had spent seeing the true face of people as a cop, almost broke as she caught sight of the red rimmed emerald green eyes underneath the black hair that the pale skin suited.

The baby boy had lost energy crying, and now he was sniffling in a heartbreaking way.

Pushing her feelings aside though she was aware of them, Kate knelt down. "Hey sweetie," she whispered, and she brushed the boys' black hair out of his eyes. Her eyes widened in horror when she saw the scab on his forehead, the scab in the shape of a lightning bolt. "Ooh, nasty, don't worry," she whispered to the baby though she was curious about how he'd gotten that painful looking head injury, and several nasty possibilities came to mind, though she hoped it was none of them. "We'll take you to the hospital to get that cleaned out."

Kate picked up the boy and carried him over to the car. Suddenly giving into his exhaustion, the baby fell asleep. Kate would take the baby to hospital and from there there would be checks to see if there were reported missing children, but she had no idea that her hope the boy would find his family and be returned to them safely wouldn't come true. In time she would more or less push him out of her mind since her career made her busy.

But she had no idea that when the boy was old enough, he would be anything but innocent.

At least, if Kate ever found out what he became, he wouldn't become a sick rapist.

---

Authors note - Please read the other story, where Dumbledore DID manage to get Harry. Please tell me what you liked and disliked about my stories, and please make them as helpful as possible. No offence - I just do not like people leaving reviews that make it look like no one has read a single line.