Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter.

Written for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry (Challenges & Assignments): History of Magic (Assignment 8)

Prompt: Write about any historic Harry Potter event (any era) with it's outcome changed.

Note to marker: Capitalisation of 'he' and 'his' in places is intentional- just so as you know for SPAG.

Written for Hogwarts School of Witchcraft & Wizardry (Challenges & Assignments): Scavenger Hunt (Imperio)


You might wonder who I am. I'm nobody. I'm just the narrator, simply someone to tell you the story. I am a part of it, and yet mine is a small part, unimportant to most. I simply observe both sides, and watch the balance tip from one side to the other.

Enough about me though.

It has been ten years since the Battle of Hogwarts, since Harry Potter was defeated and the students were rounded up and imprisoned. Ten years that Britain has been under the Dark Lord's rule. Ten years of fear. Of terror. Of loss and heartbreak and pain and ruin.

No one is quite sure how it happened. We all had such faith, such hopes for the young boy with the scar on his forehead. But it was to no avail. Perhaps there was too much pressure. Perhaps he didn't want, couldn't stand the responsibility. Perhaps he was simply too weak. Anyway, he failed.

He was so young, they were all so young. Their faces were not those of soldiers but of children. They were caught up in the joy, the excitement and the promise that war brings with it at first. And then it started to go wrong. There were too many who were loyal to Him. Too many had been bribed and brought, cowed and corrupted. The ranks turned on themselves, fighting was everywhere and in the chaos, somehow, the-boy-who-lived became the-boy-who-died.

Almost immediately the fighting was over. Hogwarts was the first great victory and the Ministry fell completely soon after. Muggles were imprisoned, sent up North to Scotland to be kept in overcrowded camps. Those who were lucky worked as slaves to the wealthy Death Eaters, enduring daily torture in exchange for food and shelter.

The muggleborns were killed. Almost every single one was burnt or drowned or simply cursed. They had magic, they were dangerous, a fact that no one liked to admit but everyone knew was true. Public 'trials' were held, where no defence case was allowed and were all swiftly followed by punishment. Those loyal to Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix were tortured, the imperius curse used on them to crush every last hope the country had.

Those who remained loyal to the Dark Lord took over muggle London, living in the finest houses and eating the finest food. They had constant entertainment, gorgeous clothes and lived in the greatest level of luxury.

The rest of the world, all the wizarding ministries who had claimed to be our allies in peace time simply watched merrily as Britain burned in the fires of Voldemort's wrath.

Sorry, I'm a little bitter.

Anyway, with anyone who had magic and might oppose the Dark Lord's reign safely locked up or killed, or simply tortured until they could no longer function, He was safe. Now He hardly sees anyone, he is guarded by the most elite of his Death Eaters and only a select few may gain an audience. His paranoia drives him to send out yet more commands, every day many are killed so as to satisfy his appetite for blood. London is a city drowned in sorrow and cruelty, and none but the lowest of the low see it as it truly is.

That one twist of fate, when we were all so convinced that He would fall, and we were all so wrong, changed everything. All hopes were dashed, all was lost. Now, nothing remains that is good, or true. Nothing remains of love, or hope. It is all gone.