No Ones Hero

Chapter 3: Before You Die

Harry Potter does not belong to me

Many years in the past…

Headmaster's office, Hogwarts.

The two men sat across from one another a cup of tea held lightly by one, a glass of wine grasped in the others hand.

"Severus…"

"I did not come here to be patronized"

"You must know how it sounds… even to me"

"I always suspected that they had done something like this. It explains how they got away with so much"

Dumbledore raised his eyebrows but Severus pressed on unaffected " and it is the best explanation of how Black escaped from Azkaban"

"Yes you're right of course but how will it sound to the minister? Harry saw a dog chase him that you never saw"

"Not even Black is that stupid"

"And therefore it is Sirius Black escaped convict of Azkaban"

"An animagus!"

"And where do you suppose he learnt this? Becoming an animagus…"

"I thought I had made that obvious - both Potter and Black learnt while in school, it also explains why they were safe from that werewolf while I…"

"Still that is quite an achievement don't you think?"

Severus smirked "doubting the abilities of your Gryffindor golden boys?"

"But why keep it a secret"

Severus glared at his friend "and spoil all of the potential bullying they could accomplish?"

Dumbledore leaned back in his chair surveying the man across from him. "I suppose the question I should be asking is not whether your suspicions are likely but why you are so intent on…"

"The boy must be kept safe" Severus said his face blank of any emotion.

"Then this is not just an opportunity to get revenge on an old childhood rival?" Dumbledore said his blue eyes looking directly at Severus with an intensity that made even the feared potions master uncomfortable.

"I can not deny that if I were to be the one to hand Black to the Dementors there would be a certain amount of satisfaction," he said returning the elder mans stare steadily. They both already knew that was the truth of it and Severus saw no reason to deny it or say otherwise.

"Several members of the old crowd have already agreed to keep watch over Harry until Mr Black has been re-captured" Dumbledore said turning apparently in disinterest to pick out a sweet from a big brown paper bag that had been sitting on his desk and proceeded to gaze out the window. Severus knew it was Albus's way of dismissing any more of that discussion, but was not willing to be shut off.

"I don't intend to stand guard over the boy, as you know" he said

Dumbledore who was sucking hard on a piece of candy appeared to not have heard Snape at first.

The Sun was very bright but there was a splashing of clouds across the sky and they could both hear the normal noise of children talking, birds chattering and trees bending their great brunches in an almost unnatural manner.

"Why are you here Severus?" he finally asked, "You don't need my permission to hunt down Sirius Black"

Severus glared at the man angrily "I am here for a discussion with a friend - the war is over Albus, I am no longer some solider in your order, you do not come down for a glass of wine with me on evenings for secret meetings or battle plans old man. It is companionship that you like I seek out… my friends are few, and most are dead. I am not a boy any more, but a man and your equal, it is time you started to treat me as such – I am here to discuss my suspicion and seek a friends opinion"

Albus sighed, swallowed his lolly, and turned from the window and back to the man across from him. Carefully he took another sip of tea "it is true - there is no one alive any longer that I trust more than I do you, nor is there another with whom I can discuss the things that matter the most to me. You are a friend and confidant"

Severus stayed quiet; he could tell that Albus was not yet finished. Though he had stopped speaking he had that pensive look of deep thought upon his aged face, which was a sure sign that he had more to say.

"I require your patience Severus, I am only just beginning to learn how to be a friend. The draw back of being a leader I'm afraid, it has separated me and denied me the human companionship that I have long been in need of"

He took another sip of his tea and still Snape remained silent his dark eyes never leaving the crystal blue ones of the most revered and possibly most powerful, wizard of they're time.

"I am only human, and sometimes I need to be reminded of this"

Hogwarts Castle

Harry took a deep breath; he would have rather stayed in that bloody box. surely the blissful nothingness of unconsciousness was better than waking to find you've lost everything that you had left.

He closed his eyes briefly, taking a breath and a brief break from the onslaught to his sensors. The rush of sound and images hurt his head – he had still not recovered from his journey; despite having had a sleep and a feed of half grown vegetables with a funny coloured meat (something that was supposed to be a treat if going by his 'rescuers' meant anything).

He was in the great hall, but he couldn't see the sky out side. The enchanted roof seemed to have the same amount of Magic in it as the portraits that lined the walls – not much. Hogwarts was dieing.

The four tables were missing; only the head table remained with many smaller tables spread out around the hall. The crowd of strangers smiled at him. He found hands touching his arms and back as he sat drinking what a strange new type of alcohol they called 'Tosipia'. It seemed people were still craning to touch him.

Looking up at the head table he found his eyes roaming. The wizards who were seated there were obviously important. Cullen was there as well as Jonathan Weasley but he did not recognise any of the others. Despite his daze like state he was doing his best to learn about the world he was currently trapped in.

He would need to keep his focus if he was going to get out of this one. His eyes kept roaming to the middle of the head table, as if his body still believed he might see a familiar gaze settled on him, like it so often was.

A sudden idea struck him with such ferocity that he barely noticed he had moved before he was out of the great hall and running up towards the gargoyle and spiral staircase. Why he had not thought of this first thing he did not know.

Feeling intensely dizzy he found his hand touching the wall beside him. And then grasping it as if he was clutching to an old friend. Leaning against it he crushed his face to the stone bricks. There was nothing there of course; the stone cold seemingly dieing walls could offer him no comfort. Suddenly Harry found his body give way. But still he was drawn to the walls. Grasping at them. In his fallen form he did not notice Spiro some ten meters away watching him closely.

Harry was becoming weaker and weaker and then just before unconsciousness claimed him a great exploding awareness. He could see the great hall, he could see the blank sky outside, he could see all the portraits of Hogwarts – in a single moment he could see the last living parts of his home. And then all was black.

Cullen's rooms.

"He suddenly ran from the great hall, I followed and caught up to him as he collapsed to the ground. I thought that he was crying and did not want to intrude. That was when the bright white light came from his body and he went limp."

"A bright white light? " Markus asked incredulously.

"Yes" Spiro said.

"Coming from his body?" Cullen asked still passing backwards and forwards beside his couch where their fallen hero was laying still unconscious, having had a white light come from his body. Frankly Cullen didn't know what to make from it – it sounded ridiculous.

"Yes"

"I see"

"What do you make of it?" Andor asked

"You say he was holding onto the wall?" Cullen stopped suddenly and asked Spiro.

"Indeed" Spiro said looking at Harry intensively "he was clutching on to it in a desperate manner, that's when I thought he was crying"

Cullen recommenced his passing "Hogwarts is a very magical place, there are few places, if any quite like it in the world. It welcomed back its student as if the war had never happened opening its gates with a simple touch of his hand. But I do not know enough of Hogwarts to know if it could have had a part to play in Harry's collapse"

"Will he be alright?" Matt asked.

"I do not know" Cullen replied "for our sake I hope so"

Verity entered through the portrait with a heaving chest, walked over to one of the armchairs before sitting down.

"Verity?" Spiro asked looking less stone like than the others were used to. But Verity did not look back at him.

"Something has changed in the castle," she said looking at Cullen who was standing holding the back of the couch where Harry lay.

"The portraits – they're moving," she said.

"The portraits have always moved" Markus said.

"Not like this" she said looking up at the portrait on the opposite wall.

Swinging around Cullen, Markus, Andor and Matt all found their eyes on the portrait of an old women with an elegant high coloured green dress. Her eyes were closed, which was in itself unusual but other than that she seemed at first sight to be as still as usual.

Slowly the group moved closer.

"She's breathing" said Matt suddenly "look at her chest – she's sleeping!"

Silence ensured for a full minute as the occupants of the room looked in fascination at the moving breathing chest.

"And its not just the portraits" Verity said "the suites of armour, they move there heads as you walk past, the stair cases, they move as well. The entire castle is coming alive"

It was only a moment later and all but Harry had left the room to see for themselves.

Sure enough all over Hogwarts Order members were walking around there home in wonder as it slowly woke up from its slumber.

The silence of the occupants was made up for by the sound of the portraits greeting each other and celebrating they're reawakening.

"I knew this day would come" one of them announced happily to her friend "it was only so long before Hogwarts received students once again"

The current state of quite among the castle population was broken up with a shrill scream, quickly Spiro, Andor, Markus, Matt, Cullen and Verity rushed along with every one else, to find out what the cause of the screaming was.

Bursting around the corner they found one of the elder Order members; a 91-year-old women everyone called Stincy (her name was actually Stacy Nince) drenched in bright orange liquid.

A small crowd had appeared and she looked at them all in shock "the castle has a ghost!" she said whirling around "he did this to me!"

"But ghosts can't handle anything, its not possible" Someone said.

"Well I'm telling you that this one did," she said hotly.

"Perhaps it wasn't a ghost" Andor said "but something that looked quite similar"

"I may be old but I'm not senile yet, and I'm telling you it was a ghost!"

Cullen waved his wand and cleaned old Stincy up "I'm sure in time the mystery will be solved" he said as if he found the entire thing a bit funny.

Stincy glared at Cullen "I'm glad you find this so amusing! But the ghost is hardly the only problem, people are getting lost! The stair cases move and doors are appearing that have never been there before!"

This got Cullen's attention "doors? Leading where?"

Straightening her robes she looked at them all "why not go join the other explorers and find out for yourself".

Most of the group disbanded after that, except for Cullen and the others who Stincy approached slowly "I was actually on my way to see you, Jonathans lot have discovered an ancient library" she said "he's keeping it blocked of from everyone else and has specifically asked for it to be kept from you – I thought you might like to know" and with that she turned and left.

Harry awoke to find himself back in Cullen's rooms completely alone for the first time since he had arrived. Carefully he sat up and peered around himself. All of the groggyness he had been feeling since his arrival had left him.

"Hello there" a women's voice said.

Startled Harry spun around but he could see no one. It took him a moment to look up at the portrait and see an old women smiling at him.

"Hello" he said back "you're alive"

"Of course we were never dead, we can not die. We have been in a coma like state for a very long time however. It seems your presence has re-awoken us"

"My presence?"

"You are Harry Potter?"

"How?"

"I've just had to chuck out some more visitors to my portrait, every ones clamouring to get a look at you to see if the rumours are true"

"Where are Cullen, Matt and the others?"

"Oh they've run of to have a look around. The Castle is waking up again, its state of lockdown is coming to an end"

Getting up Harry rushed away though the portrait, out into the corridor and towards Dumbledore's office.

He didn't care about any of the other portraits; he only needed to speak to one.

Everywhere the corridors were filled with people, young and old walking around in wonder, talking to portraits, examining moving staircases, or strange statures that had not been there before.

They watched him in curiosity as he ran by but no one made to follow him for which he was pleased.

Now that they had reawakened the corridors seemed like they had not changed in all the years he had been away. He had never noticed before how busy and fill of life they had been until he had seen the castle in a state of – well death.

Stopping in front of the gargoyle he started sprouting out every Muggle lollie he could think of.

"Marshmallows, Jubes, jaffas, jelly babies, Eskimo's, pineapple lumps, lemon drops, dam it Albus! What did you…"

He must have gotten it right at some point because the staircase was there before him winding up. Harry took no time to run up the stairs and burst into the room.

It was nearly the same as Harry had last seen it. Except a think layer of dust covered everything. Little gold devises sat around on the shelves along with the books.

It smelt empty; it looked empty, like no one had been in there in hundreds of years. Fawkes perch was empty. It had never struck Harry so strongly that Dumbledore was dead than it did in that moment. It was real. He wasn't going to wake up. His dream like state had not simply been the product of his journey or headache, he realised that now, he had been in shock. But now standing in the dusty old office he found his legs heavily dragging into the room. His eyes looked around at the portraits that were all looking down at him quietly. And there right behind Dumbledore's old desk sat the old man himself; surveying Harry over his half moon glasses.

Harry walked up to it "Albus" Harry said quietly.

"Hello Harry"

"Your dead" he wasn't quiet sure why he said it, it was just standing there looking at the portrait made it so final.

"Yes I am."

London.

Cecil entered the house in which his brother had occupied.

"Arden?" he called out upon finding the living room empty. Stepping though into the bedroom he found that it too was empty. He returned to the living room and took a seat to wait for his brother to return, glancing the room over again he spotted the place the photo of his mother usually occupied.

"Shit" he said standing up and turned to leave, but as he approached the front door he spotted something. At the side of the door rolled up and stuck down was a scroll, it was placed so that when he entered he would not have seen it but when leaving he would have to have had his eyes closed to miss it.

Still annoyed about being tricked he pulled it from the door and unrolled it.

Cecil

Bythetimeyou get this I will already be well on my way. The Death eaters youhave ordered to watch mehavebeen a source of amusement, they fumble around like idiots, much like youhave with this little plot of yours. Did you really think that you could capture me? You should have known better. But this is not a letter to mock you little brother. It is one last attempt towarnyou. That diary is dangerous and it will do you nothing but harm. It cannot be trusted. Destroy it now ordie.

Arden.

Cecil read the letter quickly, his anger growing with each moment. He finished it, screwed it up and tossed it to the ground. Twisting around he found his wand pointed at the piano. His brother loved music. The piano exploded into thousands of tinny pieces which flew out through out the whole room.

Feeling a lot calmer Cecil brushed the splinters of his robes picked his brothers letter from where he had thrown it, left the house and walked calmly around the corner by several men in black robes "lets go" he said angrily "he's already gone"

That night as Cecil took his dinner by himself in his rooms he pondered his brother and the letter. In just three more days he would be announced and with the added power that gave him he would hunt out his elder brother.

The letter had clearly been a threat, he would need to move somewhere safer, and make sure he had more death eaters assigned to his protection. But it would have to be somewhere his brother would not expect… or somewhere he would be unable to murder his own brother. Cecil knew just the place, the only problem would be getting his fathers agreement, that part of the castle had been boarded of for years.

He would also need to come up with a plan to kill his father. His father had never loved him and he had never loved his father. He would feel no regret in his murder. It was just another part of the plan – of course originally Arden had planned to kill him, he had probably had something big planned for the man.

Arden held Cash responsible for his mother's death, something that in Arden's eyes seemed to outweigh everything else the man had actually done. Although Cecil agreed that Arden had plenty enough reasons to kill their father he did not hold the man personally responsible for their mothers murder.

Arden had already told him that Armine had murdered her; he had even watched Arden kill her for it. Watching his aunt being killed had made it easier for him to sleep at night. It seemed it didn't do the same for Arden though. The satisfaction Arden had found in her death was short lived and ever since he had thought of nothing else but their fathers down fall.

Arden had not simply wanted to sneak into the mans room and stab him while he slept. Not even a long drawn out death by poisoning had been enough. No Arden wanted to first destroy everything that the man had loved. Having already killed Armine he had moved onto Callystah before destroying most of his fathers inner circle at workcamp 34. Cecil did not know what Arden had planed next as he had only every told him the parts he would be involved with directly, but he knew it had finished with his own eventual rise to power.

Many years in the past…

"Stop it!" Ashley Powden said angrily pushing Dudley away from Harry.

The boy's glowered at her but walked off a moment latter, leaving Harry to watch after them in surprise.

Picking him-self of the ground he looked at her, she was looking back at him with a friendly smile on her lightly freckled face. She pushed some of her shoulder length brown hair behind her ear.

"You alright?"

Harry nodded and watched as she walked away.

After school that day Dudley was particuly nasty to him, Harry knew it was because of what Ashley had done, but he didn't care - it was all worth it. He had a friend. Surly that was what Ashley was? She had been nice to him after all, and that's what friends were – people who were nice to you.

Harry smiled to him self from in his cupboard that night. Not in the least bit focused on the family watching TV together, or his hungry stomach. He had a friend. A friend. "A friend" he said out loud feeling out the words in his mouth.

…………

The next day Harry didn't drag his feet to school. He knew the bullies would be waiting for him. But at least now he had a friend. Smiling he watched the trees over his head as he sprinted down the hill on his way to school.

Peeking around the side of the fence like every other morning he couldn't believe his luck. Dudley hadn't arrived yet. Glancing around he sprinted of to his classroom. With one of the first bully free mornings in a long time behind him Harry sat in his usual seat. Glancing across to Ashley's seat wondering when she would arrive he pulled out his workbook.

The other students arrived one by one, Ashley was one of the first and Harry made sure to smile at her as she walked past him.

"Hi Harry," she said smiling back.

Harry ignored the nasty remarks he got in class that day from his fellow students, not that he usually reacted but they didn't seem to hurt as much. And he was less fazed by the customary pushing and shoving that he received as other students moved past him.

At lunchtime Harry found him self pressed against the brick wall of the E block. He was hiding from the bullies. From where he stood he was protected by a garden, which he could see out through. He had a view of the field, which was filled with children playing, kicking footballs, playing chasing games, or just wondering around together in groups.

He could see Dudley on the far side of the field with his gang picking on some other kid. His eyes fell on Ashley who was sitting with a small group of girls not to far from where he was hiding. Glancing again at his cousin Harry stepped out from the garden. The girls looked up at him as he walked over. They were all smiling at him, a girl called Sarah was giggling to her friend Natalie, who was whispering something back.

Smiling back at the group Harry stopped just in front of them.

"Hi Harry" Ashley said, "Did you just come out of the garden?"

"Yes" said Harry "I was hiding"

"You know your not allowed in the gardens" Sarah said "ill tell Miss Mallet on you"

"I didn't mean to…"

"Do you still wet your bed?" Natalie suddenly asked.

Harry felt his stomach squirm "no".

"Then why do you always smell?" Sarah asked.

All the girls started to giggle except for Ashley who just kept smiling at Harry.

Harry looked at her "I'm only aloud one shower a week, its not my fault"

"Is that because your mum and dad don't love you? That's what my mum says. She says we should feel sorry for you," the last girl who was called Katie asked.

Harry frowned at the girl "my mum and dad love me"

"Then why are you only allowed one shower a week?"

"I don't know" he said, "Can I sit with you?"

The girls looked at each other "no" they laughed.

Harry frowned his eyes found Ashley but she wasn't looking at him. She was looking right past him and at some other kids playing. At least she wasn't laughing at him he thought.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because you smell and no one likes you," Sarah said.

"Ashley likes me," he said.

"She does not" Natalie said, "why would she like you? You stink and your dumb and every one knows you're weird"

"No he's not," Ashley said so quietly that for a moment no one reacted.

Harry felt his chest heave with happiness. It didn't matter what they said to him if Ashley still liked him. He still had one friend and one friend was all that he needed.

All the girls looked at her and then begin laughing, "Ok Ashellllyyyy wants to be your friend Harry. Go play with your new friend Ashley" Sarah said.

All of the girls began laughing and started to push Ashley towards Harry.

"No" Ashley said just as quietly.

Harry's stomach dropped.

"Harry and Ashley in the tree K I S S I N G"

Ashley took a step back further away from Harry "I don't like Him" she said angrily "he's a stinky freak"

"Stinky freak! Stinky freak" the other girls chorused.

Harry just stood there for a moment. It took him a moment to fully register what Ashley had said. His only friend ever had called him a freak.

Turning he started to walk in the direction of the road. It hurt somewhere in his stomach but he couldn't pin point exactly where.

It hardly mattered. No one loved him. No one wanted him. He was dumb, he was smelly, he was ugly and weird and a freak. He felt tears on his face, which was hot.

He started to run then and run and run, away from the school down the road, away from the other children who were laughing and playing.

It was just like his uncle told him, he was nothing. He had never quite understood exactly what his uncle had meant by that but now he did. He wasn't any one and he never would be.

'The boy who lived' saviour of the wizarding world was later found by none other than Severus Snape who intervened on a little meeting between said boy and a rather large black dog. A large black dog that got away… but that part of the story is for the next chapter.