Chapter 10: What's Past

After dinner a couple of nights after they had come back to Forks, Harry James Potter and his family sat down in the lounge. The pack and the Cullens wanted to know more about his life in England, Seth had actually been demanding his story. He didn't know why he hadn't come clean to them since he had married Seth, he could guess that their protectiveness over him would have prevented him from being able to return to England.

There was so much of the last two years, that Ron and Hermione as well as Seth and his parents. That confused him or just didn't make sense of him. He wasn't sure what had happened in that court room just a few day ago, would ever make any sense to him. Let alone the rest of it. So yes he had to start from the beginning with how he came to be with his birth parents and go from there.

"So how did this all start?" Seth asked.

"Ten years ago in Surrey." Nicholas said to him. "We had gone to a meeting with the Dursley's at their home, the potential investment in their company saved Harry's life that night quite possibly." Nicholas said to them. "This is how it all started." he added.

Flashback

Ten years ago

The Hewitts were a well known family, who had been invited to Grunning's with a view to investing in the company. The company was owned by one Vernon Dursley, they were taken to the house that the man and hiss family lived in. The house was completely normal, they were in the middle of dinner when they heard screams coming from inside the house, taken completely by surprise the couple watched in horror as Vernon Dursley mad his way to the cupboard underneath the stairs muttering to himself about ungrateful freaks.

What they saw next horrified them beyond all believe, Vernon Dursley dragging a boy out of the cupboard who was black and blue, his arm and ankle obviously broken. The boy was in absolute agony, before the big man started to batter him some more screaming at him.

"How dare you interrupt my meeting you little freak, I'll kill you for this." Dursley screamed. "You should have been drowned at birth, or died with your waster parents you freak." Dursley continued to scream.

Nicholas cursed the man away from Harry with such force that he hit the kitchen sink and smashed it to pieces, he could not and would not stand back and allow this man to kill a child. One that was obviously being abused, then Petunia stepped in and stamped on the boys already broken ankle while screaming at him and Rose to get out of their house.

Rose hauled Petunia off of Harry slamming her against the wall while Nicholas tended to the boy on the floor. "Rose stun that bitch and call for an ambulance." Nicholas said to his wife. "Its okay kid help is on the way." Nicholas said to him.

"Get away from that freak, he doesn't deserve anything." Petunia snarled. "He should die and be out of our misery." Petunia snarled Rose had heard enough of this and finally stunned her, she looked at the fat kid huddled in the corner of the living room. This kid had been the centre of their affections fed in to the plump little fat kid that he was, while the kid in the cupboard was sking and bones.

Twenty minutes later the auror's were taking their statements, it was lucky for them that they had answered the call to this particular incident. The muggle couple were arrested and sent to the ministry of magic while the child was sent to a foster care centre. They both knew that Dudley Dursley would never see his parents ever again. Those people were never going to see the light of day again, if the couple had anything to say about it.

End flashback

"So your saying that the Dursley's nearly killed him?" Seth asked.

"Oh he nearly died that night we rescued him, Harry's wounds were infected, he had an open fracture of his ankle. If it hadn't been for the magic Harry would likely have lost his leg if he were lucky and quite possibly his life for that matter." Rose said to them.

"What about Dumbledore?" Esme asked.

"Oh he made an appearance at the hospital that night, we had refused to leave his side until we knew that he was going to be okay. So we were there when he showed up, he tried to say that this had been one massive misunderstanding. That the Dursley's were loving kind parents to Harry, it was only after the evidence had been shown to him that he went away for a while anyway." Nicholas said to them.

Flashback

Three months later

Court room 1

Ministry of magic

Today was the day that the custody hearing was going to be heard, Dumbledore had put forward Severus Snape for guardianship. The old man was telling any one who wanted to listen to him, that the man was the perfect man for the job of raising the boy who lived.

"Mr. Snape I have one question for you at the moment maybe some more after wards. That depends however on your answer to my first question however." William Tate the Hewitts family lawyer said to the man, Harry had been in their care since he had been released from the hospital. They had certainly become almost like a family, in the time that they had been together.

"Tell me Mister Snape are you a death eater?" Tate asked him.

"Objection what relevance does this have." Dumbledore jumped up from the other table.

"Your honour if this man is to be Mr. Potter's guardian we must be absolutely sure that he is suitable, and since the death eaters master was killed by Mr. Potter. If Mr Snape is a death eater then regardless of what he is now, he is far from a suitable candidate for guardian of the boy who lived." Tate said to them.

"I concur Mr. Tate. Mr. Snape you will answer the question." the judge said to the man.

"I am a reformed death eater yes." Snape said to him with a sneer.

"I didn't ask whether you were reformed Mr. Snape I asked whether you were a death eater, so please have you killed children before now muggle or otherwise?" Tate said to him. "I will remind you that you are under oath." Tate added.

"Objection." Dumbledore roared. "Badgering the witness." Dumbledore added.

"Overruled." the judge replied.

"Yes I have killed children." Snape snarled at him.

"Your honour this is the man that Dumbledore wishes to raise a child that has already been abused." Tate said to the judge. "Mr. Snape just one more question possibly, please tell me how do you see Mr. Potter's father?" Tate said to him.

"I hate him and his entire fucking family." Snape sneered Tate raised an eye brow at this.

"No further questions your honour. Mr. Dumbledore your witness." Tate said to him as he walked back to the table where the Hewitts were sat.

"Mr. Snape would you take care of Mr. Potter? Would you treat him like your own son?" Dumbledore asked trying to retrieve something from this mess.

"Of course." Snape said to him.

"Would you make him prepared for his role in our world?" Dumbledore asked him.

"Yes." Snape sneered.

"No further questions." Dumbledore said to him.

"Mr. Tate would you like to cross examine the witness?" the judge asked.

"Yes I have one further question." Tate said to him.

"Your witness Mr. Tate." the judge replied.

"Mr. Snape what is Mr. Potter's role in the world?" Tate asked.

"As its saviour of course." Snape said.

"And how would you prepare him for that?" Tate asked.

"I would put his feet firmly back on the floor, the spoiled brat would not get coddled by me." Snape said to him.

"Did you read the report of the case against the Dursley's?" Tate asked.

"Yes." Snape sneered.

"And what did you make of it?" Tate asked.

"It was a pure fabrication, the boy obviously is an attention seeking brat." Snape said to him.

"Your honour I am done questioning this man." Tate said to him.

End flashback

"So what happened?" Sam asked.

"The case was found in our favour, Dumbledore couldn't pull enough strings to save his case." Nicholas said to Sam.

People in the room shared looks as he said this, they knew now what kind of man Dumbledore had been in those days. The truth had come out about the man years later, all of his manipulations his murderous rampage. The press were calling him the light lord serial killer, he had killed countless people in his life to protect his secrets. The search of the Dumbledore's office and personal belongings at his family home was still on going, the first serious find of that search, had been a diary. It was a grotesque thing to look at, it listed the people who he had either killed or had ordered deaths. It spanned back to 1930, with the death of an innocent wizard who had stumbled upon his make out session with Grindleward. It had ended with an unknown wizard in Germany while he had been on his break the summer just gone.

"So you took Harry home with you to Forks?" Hermione asked.

"No, we took him home for sure, but at the time we were living in Miami." Nicholas said to him.

"You moved from the heat of Miami to Forks? Are you insane." Jared said to him.

"I'd like to think so." Harry said to him they all laughed.

"So you lived in Miami until when?" Sirius asked.

"I was ten when we came to Forks." Harry said to him.

Flashback

Three years later

August

Miami

They had spent most of the summer on the beach, sunning it up Harry had been ill with Dragon pox at the start of the summer. So they hadn't been able to go on their usual trip abroad, after three weeks of being in isolation he had finally been able to get out of the house at the start of August. Now he had a tan to match his parents, the heat of the day beating down on them, the private beach attached to the back of the property his parents owned.

"Harry come inside, fresh sea bass for lunch." Rose called to her son.

He hadn't even noticed that it was getting late in the morning, he could see people about a mile from the house spending the day on the beach with their kids. Enjoying the heat, the great thing about Miami he thought was that it was hot all year round not just part of the year round.

Nicholas held out a glass of freshly squeezed orange juice for him as he took his seat at the table in the dinning room.

"You need to put more sun block on before you go back out." Nicholas said too him. "Or you will look like a lobster before the end of the day." he added Harry giggled.

"We wanted to talk to you about something." Rose said to him.

"What?" Harry said to her.

"We have decided to move away from Miami, you see there is one of the best magical schools a few states over in the world. Mainly it accepts native American's but we have spoken to the principle and you have a place there if you want it. It is an alternative to Hogwarts, you wouldn't need to be away from home for nine months of the year. From next year that is." Nicholas said to him. "Its not a boarding school and your make a load of new friends." Nicholas said to him.

"Where is this school?" Harry asked.

"Washington." Nicholas said to him.

"D.C.?" Harry asked.

"No state." Nicholas said Harry spat his juice out as he nearly choked on it.

"Dad that's not a couple of states away, that is an entire country away, your talking about moving to the other side of the country." Harry said to him Rose chuckled. "You failed geography didn't you." Harry said Rose burst out laughing at this.

"Yes I suppose I did." Nicholas said to him.

"I am getting bored of always being hot." Harry said to him.

"You bored of the heat of Miami never." Rose said to him Harry laughed.

"So totally am." Harry said to her. "I don't care what else this new house has, I inist that it has a pool in it or we can build one." Harry said to her she laughed.

"I think we can manage that." Nicholas said to him.

End flashback

Every body found the demands of a young Harry, very funny. The fact that the man in front of them wasn't the spoiled brat, that he could have turned out to be, probably had something to do with his past. It could so easily have turned him into something much darker, his friends from England and his godfathers were very glad that he had such great people around him.

"So you met the pack at school that year?" Hermione asked.

"I meet Seth and Jake who are my own age, Colin and Brady are younger than us the rest are older than us. So I didn't meet the older pack members until Jake's birthday party, it was when most of the tribe got together to celebrate his birthday." Harry said to her. "Jake and I hit it of straight away, but Seth was a bit clingy and always followed us around like a lost puppy." Harry added Seth glared at him for this. "Baby as much as I love you now, back then you were the guy who tagged along with us just to be cool." Harry said Seth smiled. "You so don't do that now." Harry added before pressing a kiss to the mans lips.

"I guess I was." Seth said to him.

"Jacob came up to me on my first day at school, and said hi I'm Jacob but you can call me Jake. I'm going to be your best friend." Harry said the room dissolved into laughter at this.

"You really said that to him Jake?" Paul asked.

"Yeap, I turned out to be right as well." Jacob said to him. "It wasn't long after mom died, Rachel and Rebecca weren't about. So Harry and his parents would bring me up here to give dad a break, it was okay though because as you can see the house was full of gadgets that ten year olds love to play with." Jacob said to him.

"With Billy's legs the way they were, we made sure that Jacob was able to do normal stuff when ever we could. Billy appreciated it of course, he loved the peace and quiet that came with Jacob being out of the house." Nicholas said the pack laughed.

"Its how I got into mechanics." Jacob said to him.

"I am a bit of an amateur mechanic, I know how to take things apart in a car and put them back together. Harry didn't have any interest in that side of things, he only cared if they were fast or not as the case maybe. So he would pass tools to us and drink pop while we worked, we'd do fun stuff in there and have to be dragged out by Rose for dinner or so I could take Jake home." Nicholas said to them Jacob and Harry shared looks.

"These two were never far from trouble however." Rose said to them.

Flashback

Thanks giving day

Harry and Jacob were daring each other to climb a tree in the middle of the back garden, it was an ancient oak tree, the lowest branch was ten feet of the ground. Jacob finally bit back his nerves and started to climb the tree. Harry egged him on finally he reached the lowest branch and perched himself on it, legs over either side of the branch.

Harry scampered after him, he had longer legs than Jacob being a couple of inches taller than him. His arms were longer as well, so he had a bit of an easier time climbing the tree, finally reaching the lowest branch he slipped down next to Jacob both wearing triumphant grins on their faces.

"We did it." Harry yelled waving his arms above his head.

"Of course we did." Jacob said Nicholas came out onto the back porch just in time to see the branch give way, the two boys falling out of the tree and hitting the ground hard. Harry groaned as he hit the ground while Jacob screamed out.

End flashback

"Your telling me that is how these two ended up in the ER, they said they had been battling dragons." Seth said the room dissolved into laughter.

"Harry had a severe concussion and a dislocated shoulder, Jacob lost three teeth and broke his leg." Rose said to him. "Those two definitely are definitely always looking for trouble." Rose said to him.

"Trouble tends to know where we are at all times mom." Harry said to her she laughed.

End of chapter

AUTHORS NOTE:

So hey guys I hope you liked this, it's a shorter chapter than the last four but I wanted to do a little experiment… someone liked the idea of me doing a prequel to this and even suggested that I should. Anyway I wanted to see whether I liked the idea of writing it, and I do but I now want to know whether you guys would like that as well.

So you guys know Harry in this story doesn't really match the looks of Daniel Radcliffe, I'll touch on it at some point, but their was a slight magical adoption in this story for Harry. Not just a muggle one so he gained some of his adoptive parents traits.

I picture Nicholas being played by Matthew Fox, I'm not sure about Rose but she has dark brown hair and light coloured eyes. As for Harry, I really like Josh Hutcherson for him. Anyway your comments are always welcome if you have an idea for a play by for Harry's mom, throw me a line in your reviews or pm.

Till next time

Owen