Chapter Two: At Potter Castle:

January 1985:

Harry snuck down the stairs quietly intending on sneaking up on his sisters Rose and Violet. He had several weapons in hand and a feral smile on his face. His hair was exactly like his father's raven black and sticking up all over the place. His face and eyes were his mothers, instead of glasses like his father he had magical contacts. These would be changed out every six months until he started Hogwarts, then only once a year. His twin sisters were seated in the parlor, Rose with dark red hair and Violet with lavender hair, their heads bent over their dolls. Violet was a Metamorphous and she liked to keep her hair her favorite color that matched her lavender dress and her eyes a bright purple. When out in public she was able to keep her features in "safe mode" that of the black hair she was born with and bright green eyes.

Rose was a carbon copy of her mother and everyone knew she would grow up into a beautiful woman just like her mother. However she had her father's temperament right down to his sense of humor that drove her poor mother crazy at times as she was quite the prankster. However today Harry was going to get her back for yesterday. Sirius was in the room reading and he knew what Harry was doing but acted as if he did not, he knew he should stop Harry but this could be funny. The attack came at once and Harry got both his sisters with several water balloons getting them to shriek and tear after their brother. He ran for it two very angry sisters hot on his tail. He ran right into the black robed form of Severus Snape and hid behind him.

"P-professor Snape s-save me!" Harry said his speech much clearer than it had been just two months prior. With just a slight stutter now he was doing quite well in speaking. "M-my sisters are gonna kill me!"

"It is my sisters are going to kill me Harry." Severus corrected him gently, "what did you do young man?"

"Um nothing." Harry said looking up at him with wide innocence in his wide green eyes Severus gave him a stern look. "Okay I threw water balloons at them?"

"Why would you do that on a winter day?" Severus asked quickly drying off the furious twins who were standing before him not daring to get too close.

"Um it w-was fun, funny sir?"

"Harry apologize." Sirius said from the doorway trying to look serious for once. "You do not throw water balloons in the house and not in the winter your sisters could catch cold."

"I am sorry Uncle S-Siri!" Harry said then turning to Rose and Violet who had turned to a little carbon copy of Severus to show she was not amused at him, "sorry Rose and Violet."

"I think Mutt would be easier to say." Severus said quietly after Harry apologized.

"Shut it vampire." Sirius said.

"Better than an insane brainless inbreed pureblood imbecile." Severus shot at him.

"How dare you!" Sirius said. "You, you…"

"Still cannot come up with anything can you?" Severus replied coolly.

"Why don't you go wash your hair you slime-ball!"

"Why certainly, as soon as you take a flea bath!"

At once Sirius had turned into a large shaggy black dog and Severus just rolled his eyes and in a flash turned into Shadow his black wolf Animagmus. It had made spying easier as Voldemort had had no idea he was an Animagmus at all. It was how he had learned of Voldemort's betrayal and how it was easy for him to turn and start spying. Before that he had justified what Voldemort did by saying it was all for the greater good. The murders and the experimentation all of it he rationed had been for the greater good. Yet in that one moment he knew the truth and he had gone first to Lily and James and confessed and was shocked when he was not killed outright. After his vow made to Lily in the presence of Dumbledore and James he had become a spy and had saved at least a hundred lives. But now spying was not needed and so he taught and visited with his friends or fought with Sirius. Both canines circled each other growling and snarling teeth bared as Harry herded his sisters out of the way. The fight was about to begin when Lily entered the hall and paled in anger at the two canines before her.

"Turn-human-now!" She snarled, "or you will regret it!"

"But Lily he…"

"Don't even Mr. Black!" Lily said, Harry knew she was very angry now as she never used his godfather's last name unless she was really angry. "As for you Professor Snape."

"Lils I was defending myself!" Severus said then at the glare from Lily, "I am sorry I should not have fought in front of the children."

"The meeting is in the drawing room, Qua!" Lily called.

"Yes Mistress Lily?" A small house elf said bowing to her mistress, "what can Qua do for you?"

"Please watch the children and if we are not done before lunch give them lunch please?"

"Yes mistress." Qua said bowing low.

Qua was clad in a simple tunic and breeches and cap all in light gray with a tea towel tied over all like a toga. Qua was no longer a slave, a treaty was made the year before in the whole magical community world-wide. As the war had not ended with the death of Voldemort but continued under Wormtail who claimed he had defeated Voldemort and was the true dark lord. He had gained quite a few followers a new treaty was made. All sentient magical creatures were given freedom and basic rights, this included the house elves.

As many of the house elves had a hard time with the new freedoms compromises were made. The house elves were still allowed to bond themselves to a family or like those at Hogwarts and the ministry to a particular site. In return they were given clothes and physical punishments like beatings and self harm were forbidden. Old families like the Malfoys had protested but there was nothing they could do and so house elves were given back their dignity and allowed to do what they loved best in freedom, serve humans and other sentient magical creatures.

Lily liked this arrangement, it had been hard for the house elves at first, they had cried and thought they would be turned out. However when they had signed the forms and saw they would be allowed to continue much as before they had wept with joy. Even Severus had an elf now as Lucius Malfoy had refused to allow Dobby to sign with him and let Severus bind the elf to him. It turned out to be a good thing as the elf chopped the herbs and such for Severus's potions freeing a lot of time for Severus as he was still part of the order of the Phoenix. The order of the Phoenix was now secretly apart of the ministry with some autonomy to do what was needed to protect the British Wizarding world.

Lily turned and led Sirius and Severus to the parlor where James waited for them. He smiled seeing his wife clad in a long gown of dark green with a belt of delicate silver and gold. He kissed her and had Sirius and Severus sit on either side of Remus and he took a seat himself. He had taken over the order from Dumbledore as he was needed more at Hogwarts than here and he had made changes that helped unite the school more so than it had been in centuries.

"I gather you have news on Wormtail?" Severus asked.

"Yes, it seems he is doing us a favor in that he has found three Horcruxes of Voldemort and has destroyed them all." James said looking grim, "he did so by killing several people including Kreacher your house elf Sirius."

"I was wondering where he got to, no chance he did not suffer?" Sirius asked.

"I am sorry but there was not much left of him when he was found." James replied, "we found two prisoners who had helped Wormtail in destroying the three Horcruxes, one was a locket of Salazar Slytherin, another a ring that belonged to Salazar and a cup that belonged to Helga Hufflepuff. Wormtail had Rabastan put under the Imperious curse to get it out of his family vault. He was one of the prisoners, he was the most sane and least maimed of the prisoners."

"What did he do to him?" Remus asked.

"Cut off his left leg, he wanted Rabastan to admit to betraying Voldemort." Lily said looking grave.

"He never was with the dark lord." Severus replied. "Only Rudolphus and Bellatrix were."

"There is more, we now know where Wormtail is hiding." Lily said, "I think it is time to stop him fully don't you?"

"Was waiting for you to say something love." Sirius said, "just give the word and we will bring him in."

It was horrible to know that a one time friend of these three men had become so evil. He was bold and reckless too and did not fear being in battle himself. Wither it was because he was completely insane or just wanted to prove he was brave was hard to tell. James and Sirius had expected him to go into hiding and for him to do what he had done shocked quite a few people. He had waited until several top death eaters had been tried and locked in Azkaban before he started the war again this time not even pretending to be about protecting the Wizarding world, he was all about dominating it. Bellatrix and Rudolphus were locked in Azkaban for life for the brutal murders of Alice and Frank Longbottom.

With the war still going on the ministry had made some major changes to keep people from going to Wormtail. Every person arrested was given a trial, only those convicted of major crimes like murder, rape, torture or treason were locked in Azkaban to be the playthings of the Dementors. All other criminals were put on probation and required either to pay a fine or do community service. Once their probation was over they would have a band that they wore around their ankle to restrict their magic removed and be allowed fully back into society.

Torture was forbidden of any prisoner though interrogation was allowed as was Veritaserum and Legilimency. The Auror force was expanded to include a Crime Scene Unit (CSU) to fully process a crime scene and arrest the correct person. Arthur Weasley and Alastor Moody wrote new texts for Hogwarts for the defense classes and Remus Lupin taught Defense Against the Dark Arts. Dwarves in full armor guarded the castle while centaurs guarded the grounds. Anti-Apparation wards were in place around Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley both.

"Very well, we will have two squads of Aurors on foot surround Devon castle, the muggles see it as a ruin with dry moat and a cranky owner who does not allow anyone to see his ruins." Lily said, "however it has two things that will be hard for us to get through besides the wards, it has a lake on three sides and is guarded by two giants."

"Add the dragon warriors." Moody said limping in shaking his grizzled gray hair out of his horribly scarred face showing a normal beady eye and one magical vivid blue eye. "We got twelve of the finest dragons with their warriors."

"Good, that will take care of that, but we still have the werewolves to deal with, sorry Moony." James said looking over at Remus.

"They are lost, most of those who do not want to be monsters have come over, the Wolfsbane chews, tagging and private registering mean no excuse for a werewolf to stay a monster." Remus said, "dwarves with crossbows with silver tipped arrows will take care of that problem."

"So if we are ready we should get going." Lily said, "or you will go with James as I will stay here and run the front line from here."

"I think we have more than the upper hand, thanks to Lily and the others." James said proudly, "micro wards on radios, you are a brilliant witch."

"Thank you, it seems Muggleborns do have lots to add to the Wizarding world." Remus smirked.

"Yes, the telescope, microscope, radios, wristwatches and lots more." Sirius said grinning.

"Right well let's go." James said.

Lily smiled and did not dare show the worry she was feeling. She could not there was a war on and she had to help. She knew despite all they had on their side Wormtail had quite a bit of evil powers on his side. She still had a hard time believing it, Peter Pettigrew a mass murderer and aspiring dark lord. How had such a quiet and studious boy become such an evil person? Had he always been that way and they had not seen the signs? She walked to the heavily warded room with the magical screens and used her wand to put up a map of the castle and grounds on each screen. Andromeda Tonks was here to help with Augusta Longbottom. That meant that Nymphadora Tonks or just Dora to the adults and Tonks to friends was watching the children as she was twelve and fully capable of watching over the children. Lily studied the dots in the house and grounds, so far only the yellow dots that showed Wormtail's people were there. The order would be orange, ten people had died to get a monitoring charm on the castle. Wormtail hopefully had not seen the attack for the trap it was. Finally Lily saw orange dots appear on the edge of the maps and she went to work at once.

The next few hours were some of the most intense of her life. She knew that the success or failure of the battle lay with her and the two other witches. If they were not able to get the information to the fighters than all the work they had done, those lives lost would be for naught. Severus came into the room now and again between adding to his stocks of potions for after the battle to see how things were going. As even now he was not able to fight. The ministry was too pigheaded to even allow him freedom to fight against Wormtail. Even bound as he was he was able to send a few potion surprises that he had Lily had made up to show Wormtail how much he hated him. It would mean that Devon castle probably would become a real ruin after all was said and done but there was really no choice in the matter. Finally word came the battle was over, Wormtail was dead and Severus went to help with the wounded.

"It's over." Andromeda said, "it's finally over."

"Let's hope so." Mrs. Longbottom replied. "Lily you go see to the children, then rest."

"I am fine." Lily said.

"I think not you have been up for who knows how long getting this battle in place and taking care of your family." Andromeda said. "You go take care of your family, we will tend to the wounded."

Lily did as asked and the two other witches went and took care of the wounded. The battle had taken a lot of casualties, very few came out of the battle without wounds. Severus's potions bombs had broken not only the wards but half the castle as well taking half of Wormtail's army. The dragons had finished off the giants. There had been twenty giants not the two reported but ten dragons and dragon warriors with potion bombs took care of that problem quickly.

The rouge werewolves were the hardest, many were killed but quite a few escaped when Grayback called a retreat. He was only in the battle to get human blood and when things did not go his way he left for the woods with what was left of his pack. James had beheaded Wormtail and Sirius had worked his way through several dark wizards himself. The next day Sirius came back sporting several bandages and a slight limp. He saw Harry playing with his father and Sirius walked up and picked the boy up swinging him up getting Harry to squeal in delight.

"Hey how is my favorite godson?" Sirius said.

"I am you only godson!" Harry squealed.

"Ah you are a smart boy!" Sirius said grinning.

"What happened why you got bandages and limping?" Harry asked.

"Well you remember we have been at war since before you were born?" Sirius said.

"Yea I do, is war over?" Harry asked.

"Yes for now the war is over pup." Sirius said grinning, "it's over for now."

Harry grinned and hugged his godfather and ran back to his father. Sirius limped to the couch and took a seat and watched his godson play with his father. It was over, Wormtail was dead and hopefully they would have many years of peace. However a certain prophecy kept going through his mind and he knew that someday his godson was going to have to face Voldemort once more and that scared Sirius. Yet for now he could grow up as normal as possible in a peaceful world and when he had to face Voldemort Sirius vowed to be there for him.

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A lot to process here I know, I wanted to make it perfectly clear how evil Wormtail is and was. Yea I deviated from cannon here in having him take over like he did. However I wanted to get him out of the way quickly and make the Wizarding world more united and the best way to do that? Have the war go on for a bit longer. As Lily is a muggleborn she would know about muggle technology and as the order of the Phoenix technically does not exist so she could blend muggle and magical things as needed. As for Lily and Severus getting together romantically in this fiction? Never going to happen, Severus and Lily are going to be like brother and sister here only!

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