CHAPTER 1: The Real Thing

Seven-year-old Harry Potter awoke with a start as his dream finished to see that he had been crying during it. He brushed the tears from his face ashamedly. Sitting up he found a pair of socks, de-spidered them and left his cupboard under the stairs. He had finished cooking and setting the table in time to rush out the back door with his pilfered apple when his uncle came in the room. They had a strict 'Seen-but-not-Heard' policy; meaning Harry was not to be seen but not to be heard ether.

Stretching his legs and arms Harry made his way to the street. Flexing his bandaged hands, Harry crossed, weary of cars, and jogged his way to the stores. Monitoring his breathing, Harry took off into the wind that whipped his face at his fast jog. Smiling to himself, he freed his mind and body to the physical exertion.

He ran three and a half miles to the store and pulled money, money he'd saved up from the odd jobs he'd done around town, from his shoe and calming his breath made his way to the bookstore. A small backpack thumped heavily on his back as he walked up and down the aisles looking for new books.

He came across the section of books he'd been buying before that day and looked at the small wad of cash he had clutched in his small hands. Picking up an advanced version of the hand-to-hand combat book he had been studying he made his way to the langue books and got the final copy of the world langue books he'd been studying. He did some quick math and made his way to the back. Here where his favorite books, the weaponry books. He took one of the shelves and made his way to the front to pay for them, leavening him with just enough money to buy a muffin from the adjoining coffee shop.

He packed everything into the backpack and jogged off into the distance unaware of the large bear-like black dog watching him from behind the trashcan he'd been pretending to rut through only moments ago.

It followed Harry to the park another three miles back from the house they'd just left, and into the woods that stood on the edge of the public playground. He watched as Harry uncovered the hiding place within the center of the trees that no one would have found without being shown. The hollow of the old tree was large enough when uncovered to fit a small boy and it was into this that Harry looked. He patted the head of a vicious looking garden snake and gave it a bit of bacon from his pocket, which the snake gobbled gratefully before settling down to watch the boy.

He pulled out assortments of thick books on a manner of subjects. There were complex math books and books in a different langue, books on fighting both hand-to-hand and with a weapon. There were photos and drawings tucked lovingly between the pages and even some letters they boy had written to his missing family and simply pretended he'd forgotten to mail them. Even at that moment he was looking at one and sighed.

"In all the excitement of getting new books I forgot to by stamps again. Sorry Padfoot old friend. Looks like I'll have to send this later."

The small child replaced the letter within the folds of the book and continued to look through the stash. At the bottom of the pile Harry pulled a very familiar stag doll from the tree. He smiled at it sadly and sat down with it.

The big dog continued to watch him late into the morning as he read his books or made notes with the stub of a pencil he'd grabbed up at school. Eventually the boy had to leave. He picked up an old photo and whispered a heartfelt good bye to the occupants of the picture before adding it to the growing pile of mementos within the old tree's trunk.

As soon as the boy left the dog came out of the bushes changing briefly into a man. He knocked the snake away with a sweep of his hand so as to collect the books and papers and pictures into a bag, shrink it with a small wave of his hand and pocketed it before changing back into a dog an followed Harry three miles back to the store then back once again to the house, pointlessly running the extra distance around the large playground closer to his uncle's house. The kid liked to run, as if he was constantly running from something, and never getting anywhere.

Harry had returned to the house just before his uncle's business party. He finished cooking the dinner in time for his uncle to give him a painful shove into his cupboard as he answered the door, in a tux looking presentable for anyone's standards.

That night seemed to drag on forever. Noise filled the downstairs making it hard for Harry to sleep and at one point his door had been rattled so violently Harry had been scared it would be forced off it's hinges.

When the party finally drew to a close, his uncle appeared drunk in the doorway of his closet muttering in his drunken gibberish as he hauled Harry into the air with one massive fist. He took a broken bottle up with his unoccupied hand and brought it scrapping down Harry's head, gorging out his eye.

Harry screams could be heard miles away, but it was the uncle's that where heard round the world.

When Sirius Black had finished with the oversized whale of a man, he was hardly recognizable. The enraged Godfather took up the bloody kid and disapperated, not caring he'd set off the wards he'd tip-toed around for so many days, not caring he'd have a tracer on him instantly, not caring that he couldn't change into a dog. All he could care about was getting Harry to his sister and his mate. If anyone could fix him, it'd be a healer and someone who'd been healed for the most grotesque self-inflicted injuries imaginable.

He ran up the slopping drive, barely stopping for the wards to recognize him. He flew through the familiar cottage and past the house elf, ignoring the wands trained on him by two adult wizards, a witch, and two young wizards not even in Hogwarts yet.

"Rem…Cissy…help! Harry!" The werewolf took the boy from his husband's arms faster than he recognized his long-lost mate.

Narcissa followed Remus into the kitchen, the door slamming shut behind her with a slam.

"Reg…"Sirius croaked.

"It's okay big brother. You're home." Regulus Black took his fugitive brother into his arms and rocked the elder man back and forth as he cried for the first time in six years.

Down on the floor, little Draco Malfoy and Dante Lupin-Black looked up understanding that their family was finally coming together, just in time for war.