Chapter One:
Eleven years later
Ashley ~ My first review! I'm so glad you like it!
Kenny Gajos ~ You find out what happened with Hermione in this chapter (Kinda). Hope you won't be too upset with me for it though... And Ron and Lavender: I don't know why they got together. When I was writing this, it just seemed right.
Lisette ~ The Scoobies got torn apart after season six on Buffy. Sorry I didn't mention that earlier. And no one ever said they were getting back together! I'm shocked! I never write what people expect. Trust me... Oh, and as to the timeline: Sorry that wasn't so clear. It's been five years since they graduated and two months since Harry disappeared. Good news! You find out about Herm in this chapter...
Witchy-grrl ~ Hmm... I wonder... Could it be.... Buffy? Gasp! I hope that's the only predicable thing in this story! I don't write happy go lucky stories so you may not find every one all smiles in this.
To everyone else who reviewed: Thank you so much!
Disclaimer: No, I don't own it so stop asking me!
A/N: Warning! this story contains Slash. That means same sex relationships. More to the point, girl/girl relationships. It's not a big part of the plot but it's there. Don't bitch about it. If this offends you, get lost. Don't go screaming at me from your moral high ground that homosexuality in children's books is sick and wrong. This isn't the books... It's call fanfiction... And don't go shoving religion in my face either: I'm atheist. I don't care. Thanks to Danish Pastry for beta-ing this for me.
Also, This takes place five years after the trio graduates and 13 years after season six on Buffy. Willow went evil and all that but Tara never died. She just go so carried away with the magic that when Tara was shot she only thought she was dead. Tara was fine but Willow never knew that. Confused? I'll explain it all later.
In Other news today if you want an update by e-mail for when this story is updated please leave your e-mail address in the review and I'll send you a notice when I update this fic.
Happy reading!
***
Harlen Weasley bounded down the stairs of his family's home with the energy that only an eleven year-old could muster at six in the morning. His mother glared at him over her cup as he jumped the last few steps rocking her china in its' cupboard behind her. The tiny earthquake also dislodged a wooden candle stick holder from its dangerous position on the top of the cabinet behind her and with a wave of magic the offending object was forced back against the wall where it would hopefully stay.
Then she smiled at her son who beamed back at her. Lavender couldn't suppress a laugh at her son's good mood. Just then Ron decided to enter the room. He too wore a broad grin and a laughing twinkle in his eyes. It only succeeded in making everyone smile just a little bigger. And so there they all sat grinning like fools as an old owl the size of a very small something or other came slamming into the kitchen by way of the closed window. With a wave of magic, Ron noted that Pig had grown no less excited in his old age but his eyesight seem to fail even more each day. But cookies for trying, that's for damn sure.
Harlen jumped at the letter but Ron watched in amusement as Lavender snatched it from his hand. "It's not for you," she said opening it. "It's from Hermione." Harlen slumped against his chair looking pointedly at his father.
"You should tell your friends not to write here when I'm expecting mail. It makes a boy confused!"
Ron laughed. Lavender handed him the letter already telling him what it said.
"She says 'hello.' She and Jessica may stop in for a visit later." Ron smiled. He was happy for her. Hermione's being gay had shocked him like nothing else but once he was over it he saw how happy she was and couldn't imagine her any other way now. That added to Hermione's success as a writer in both the Muggle and wizarding worlds made her one of the happiest people he'd ever known.
And that's when the Hogwarts' owl decided to fly through the window. Harlen pounced on the poor bird who seemed to be expecting it and lazily dropped the letter and leaped aside. Ron watched his son tear the letter open with a huge grin and a bright red face. "Mum! Dad! I got into Hogwarts!"
***
He was cold. Not that it was cold out, mind you, but Seth's mum liked to have the air conditioner in the car turned up as high it would go. Shivering down in his seat, Seth watched as the boring London suburbs slid past his window, on their way to pick up his sister from her ballet class. Mrs. Wiles hummed along with the song on the radio up in the front seat.
Seth loved her voice. Her accent was pure American and to Seth that made her like a wild rose in a field of weeds. So exotic... Different.
But there was always something about her that he couldn't place. A darkness in her happy demeanor. Something the young man never saw but deep inside he knew it was there. The reason she had left her life in California to come here and love his father and his sister and him.
"What'cha thinking' about back there?" she asked him. Her voice broke the stolid silence.
"Nothing." He smiled at the look on her face as she watched the road with a resolve he didn't know was required to drive.
"You're just so quiet tonight," she said with a laugh. "Come up front here," she smiled. Seth scrambled over the seat and settled in the seat next to her with a grin. She laughed softly. "That's better."
"Mum?" Seth asked after a moment. "Why'd you move here?"
She wavered a second before the smile was back. "I just couldn't stay there any more. There was nothing there for me any more." And Seth knew the conversation was over.
The rest of the drive to the dance studio went smoothly but without comment. By the time they had arrived, the class was over and Michele came bounding out of the tiny studio with her slippers in her hands and her hair flying out of the bun her mother had worked so hard on two hours before.
Glaring at her brother in the front seat, she climbed in the back prattling on about some new step she'd learned.
"It's called an assemblè! And I got it right on my third try! Jenny says if the whole class can learn it we can do it in the Christmas show." And she blabbered on and on. Seth looked at his mother who was smiling softly at her daughter's excitement. But there was nothing to suggest that the conversation earlier had even happened.
At home, the three of them piled out of the car with Michele dropping her shoes on the pavement and then suddenly realizing that she'd left her bag at the studio.
"We'll get it tomorrow, dear. Now pick those up and go inside."
"But I don't have class tomorrow!" she whined.
Trying to soothe the girl, Mrs. Wiles missed her husband bursting out of the front door in a state of near panic.
"Thank God you're home!"
Glancing up from the distraught dancer she looked at him. "Jonathan! What's wrong?"
He didn't answer but grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the house with the children following. Michele had stopped crying to see what was going on. Mr. Wiles was explaining in rushed words that there was an old man inside claiming that magic was real! Can you imagine?
Inside they found a very old man sitting on their not so pristine couch drinking tea from a mug of their mother's that read, 'Kiss the Librarian'. Seth wanted to laugh at the whole thing but held back when he saw his mother's face. She believed this man!
"Lemon drop?" she offered him offering him the bowl on the table next to her.
"Yes! Thank you." With a child's excitement he helped himself. "Mmm... There's nothing quite like a lemon drop." Mrs. Wiles smiled.
"How can we help you this evening Mr...?"
"Dumbledore. Albus Dumbledore. I was just telling your husband that magic exists and having a very hard time of it, too, I might add. But now that I've met you, I see that my visit here is uncalled for."
She blushed. What was going on here Seth wondered.
"Oh, I haven't... Not in a long time."
The man smiled.
"But it isn't you I'm here to see. It's him." He was pointing right at Seth himself and the boy listened with wide eyes as the man began to explain about magic and a place... a school... called Hogwarts...
***
He'd found it. After thirteen years of searching and at last he'd found it! Wolf was a wolf no longer...or at least almost. He'd found a potion that could stop him from changing at the full moon. Even now his brothers at the monastery celebrated his success in the other room with all the things they'd given up so long ago.
As he set about carrying out his mentor's advice as to what to do with the information, Oz had a light heart and a smile. Scribbling out a message that he hoped would be readable in his haste to write he it, he thought of all that this could do for him. All he could reclaim. Then, tying it to the owl who would carry it for him he told it, "the ministry for the cure of incurable illnesses," and watched as he flew away into the night before rejoining the party.
But as he celebrated, Oz had no way of knowing that the ministry would not share his happiness.
"We cannot let this get out!" the head of the department said to his men. "Do any of you have any idea how this would undermine the ministry? We have to get rid of the evidence."
"Sir, if I may? I think I might know a way."
And so it came to pass that the Unspeakable known only as Scar received orders to kill the man that would be coming into the country within the next few days.
"A werewolf," they told him. "He's dangerous. He means to infect as many people as he can to build an army."
And so Harry Potter had waited. As an Unspeakable, no one called him that any more. Only one person knew his true identity and Harry liked it that way. He wasn't sure he could go back and face his past if every one knew what crimes he had committed on the ministry's orders as Scar.
It had all began simply enough. "Stop this or that evil soul." But then things had begun to build. Soon he was known around the halls of the ministry as the 'Hit man' but this was never told to the superiors or to Scar himself but a good spy knows what to listen for. He knew and they didn't know he knew. Which was the way it was supposed to be.
Looking again at the man in the photograph he'd been given, Harry wondered what had happened to make this man so evil. He was young but older than Harry himself. He had brown hair and a shy way about him but his eyes spoke of intelligence that comes from years of study in a library. Not something you'd normally find in a mass murderer or whatever they ministry was trying to make him out to be.
But as he watched this picture, Harry wondered, not for the first time, why it was that he still went along with this. What was he going to achieve by getting this man comfortable and settled in before killing him like a spider trapping it's prey?
Harry looked up just as the man himself walked off the plane. He looked happy about something and clutched a small briefcase to his side. A tune slipped out of his mouth, which Harry vaguely recognized as a Tibetan prayer. Why, this man was no werewolf bent on raising armies of others of his kind. He was a scholar and a priest and, well, he was a werewolf. But that was the only thing that went along with his file.
Harry had seen evil. He could recognize it at a glance but this man wasn't it. So then why did the ministry want him dead? Deciding to follow him and watch him for a while, Harry knew he would find the answer and deep inside, he knew he'd hate what he found.
***
Seth was so confused. Magic? A wizard? Him? Michele too? He looked at his mother who looked almost sick. Why wasn't she happy for him? Why wasn't she acting like Dad who had already planed out his whole future around this new magical world? But Seth shook it off. It'd work out. It always did.
"And I assure you that he will be very well looked after. Nothing can happen to him while he's in my care."
Dad said something unintelligible. Which it appeared Mr. Dumbledore understood.
"Grand! So, We'll be seeing you on September first then won't we, Seth?"
His mother led the wizard to the door. As he walked out, Seth heard him saying to her, " Don't worry, Mrs. Wiles. Please. He'll be perfectly fine. It's better if he's trained. After all, magic is a dangerous thing and we can't all grow up on Hellmouths."
Ashley ~ My first review! I'm so glad you like it!
Kenny Gajos ~ You find out what happened with Hermione in this chapter (Kinda). Hope you won't be too upset with me for it though... And Ron and Lavender: I don't know why they got together. When I was writing this, it just seemed right.
Lisette ~ The Scoobies got torn apart after season six on Buffy. Sorry I didn't mention that earlier. And no one ever said they were getting back together! I'm shocked! I never write what people expect. Trust me... Oh, and as to the timeline: Sorry that wasn't so clear. It's been five years since they graduated and two months since Harry disappeared. Good news! You find out about Herm in this chapter...
Witchy-grrl ~ Hmm... I wonder... Could it be.... Buffy? Gasp! I hope that's the only predicable thing in this story! I don't write happy go lucky stories so you may not find every one all smiles in this.
To everyone else who reviewed: Thank you so much!
Disclaimer: No, I don't own it so stop asking me!
A/N: Warning! this story contains Slash. That means same sex relationships. More to the point, girl/girl relationships. It's not a big part of the plot but it's there. Don't bitch about it. If this offends you, get lost. Don't go screaming at me from your moral high ground that homosexuality in children's books is sick and wrong. This isn't the books... It's call fanfiction... And don't go shoving religion in my face either: I'm atheist. I don't care. Thanks to Danish Pastry for beta-ing this for me.
Also, This takes place five years after the trio graduates and 13 years after season six on Buffy. Willow went evil and all that but Tara never died. She just go so carried away with the magic that when Tara was shot she only thought she was dead. Tara was fine but Willow never knew that. Confused? I'll explain it all later.
In Other news today if you want an update by e-mail for when this story is updated please leave your e-mail address in the review and I'll send you a notice when I update this fic.
Happy reading!
***
Harlen Weasley bounded down the stairs of his family's home with the energy that only an eleven year-old could muster at six in the morning. His mother glared at him over her cup as he jumped the last few steps rocking her china in its' cupboard behind her. The tiny earthquake also dislodged a wooden candle stick holder from its dangerous position on the top of the cabinet behind her and with a wave of magic the offending object was forced back against the wall where it would hopefully stay.
Then she smiled at her son who beamed back at her. Lavender couldn't suppress a laugh at her son's good mood. Just then Ron decided to enter the room. He too wore a broad grin and a laughing twinkle in his eyes. It only succeeded in making everyone smile just a little bigger. And so there they all sat grinning like fools as an old owl the size of a very small something or other came slamming into the kitchen by way of the closed window. With a wave of magic, Ron noted that Pig had grown no less excited in his old age but his eyesight seem to fail even more each day. But cookies for trying, that's for damn sure.
Harlen jumped at the letter but Ron watched in amusement as Lavender snatched it from his hand. "It's not for you," she said opening it. "It's from Hermione." Harlen slumped against his chair looking pointedly at his father.
"You should tell your friends not to write here when I'm expecting mail. It makes a boy confused!"
Ron laughed. Lavender handed him the letter already telling him what it said.
"She says 'hello.' She and Jessica may stop in for a visit later." Ron smiled. He was happy for her. Hermione's being gay had shocked him like nothing else but once he was over it he saw how happy she was and couldn't imagine her any other way now. That added to Hermione's success as a writer in both the Muggle and wizarding worlds made her one of the happiest people he'd ever known.
And that's when the Hogwarts' owl decided to fly through the window. Harlen pounced on the poor bird who seemed to be expecting it and lazily dropped the letter and leaped aside. Ron watched his son tear the letter open with a huge grin and a bright red face. "Mum! Dad! I got into Hogwarts!"
***
He was cold. Not that it was cold out, mind you, but Seth's mum liked to have the air conditioner in the car turned up as high it would go. Shivering down in his seat, Seth watched as the boring London suburbs slid past his window, on their way to pick up his sister from her ballet class. Mrs. Wiles hummed along with the song on the radio up in the front seat.
Seth loved her voice. Her accent was pure American and to Seth that made her like a wild rose in a field of weeds. So exotic... Different.
But there was always something about her that he couldn't place. A darkness in her happy demeanor. Something the young man never saw but deep inside he knew it was there. The reason she had left her life in California to come here and love his father and his sister and him.
"What'cha thinking' about back there?" she asked him. Her voice broke the stolid silence.
"Nothing." He smiled at the look on her face as she watched the road with a resolve he didn't know was required to drive.
"You're just so quiet tonight," she said with a laugh. "Come up front here," she smiled. Seth scrambled over the seat and settled in the seat next to her with a grin. She laughed softly. "That's better."
"Mum?" Seth asked after a moment. "Why'd you move here?"
She wavered a second before the smile was back. "I just couldn't stay there any more. There was nothing there for me any more." And Seth knew the conversation was over.
The rest of the drive to the dance studio went smoothly but without comment. By the time they had arrived, the class was over and Michele came bounding out of the tiny studio with her slippers in her hands and her hair flying out of the bun her mother had worked so hard on two hours before.
Glaring at her brother in the front seat, she climbed in the back prattling on about some new step she'd learned.
"It's called an assemblè! And I got it right on my third try! Jenny says if the whole class can learn it we can do it in the Christmas show." And she blabbered on and on. Seth looked at his mother who was smiling softly at her daughter's excitement. But there was nothing to suggest that the conversation earlier had even happened.
At home, the three of them piled out of the car with Michele dropping her shoes on the pavement and then suddenly realizing that she'd left her bag at the studio.
"We'll get it tomorrow, dear. Now pick those up and go inside."
"But I don't have class tomorrow!" she whined.
Trying to soothe the girl, Mrs. Wiles missed her husband bursting out of the front door in a state of near panic.
"Thank God you're home!"
Glancing up from the distraught dancer she looked at him. "Jonathan! What's wrong?"
He didn't answer but grabbed her hand and pulled her towards the house with the children following. Michele had stopped crying to see what was going on. Mr. Wiles was explaining in rushed words that there was an old man inside claiming that magic was real! Can you imagine?
Inside they found a very old man sitting on their not so pristine couch drinking tea from a mug of their mother's that read, 'Kiss the Librarian'. Seth wanted to laugh at the whole thing but held back when he saw his mother's face. She believed this man!
"Lemon drop?" she offered him offering him the bowl on the table next to her.
"Yes! Thank you." With a child's excitement he helped himself. "Mmm... There's nothing quite like a lemon drop." Mrs. Wiles smiled.
"How can we help you this evening Mr...?"
"Dumbledore. Albus Dumbledore. I was just telling your husband that magic exists and having a very hard time of it, too, I might add. But now that I've met you, I see that my visit here is uncalled for."
She blushed. What was going on here Seth wondered.
"Oh, I haven't... Not in a long time."
The man smiled.
"But it isn't you I'm here to see. It's him." He was pointing right at Seth himself and the boy listened with wide eyes as the man began to explain about magic and a place... a school... called Hogwarts...
***
He'd found it. After thirteen years of searching and at last he'd found it! Wolf was a wolf no longer...or at least almost. He'd found a potion that could stop him from changing at the full moon. Even now his brothers at the monastery celebrated his success in the other room with all the things they'd given up so long ago.
As he set about carrying out his mentor's advice as to what to do with the information, Oz had a light heart and a smile. Scribbling out a message that he hoped would be readable in his haste to write he it, he thought of all that this could do for him. All he could reclaim. Then, tying it to the owl who would carry it for him he told it, "the ministry for the cure of incurable illnesses," and watched as he flew away into the night before rejoining the party.
But as he celebrated, Oz had no way of knowing that the ministry would not share his happiness.
"We cannot let this get out!" the head of the department said to his men. "Do any of you have any idea how this would undermine the ministry? We have to get rid of the evidence."
"Sir, if I may? I think I might know a way."
And so it came to pass that the Unspeakable known only as Scar received orders to kill the man that would be coming into the country within the next few days.
"A werewolf," they told him. "He's dangerous. He means to infect as many people as he can to build an army."
And so Harry Potter had waited. As an Unspeakable, no one called him that any more. Only one person knew his true identity and Harry liked it that way. He wasn't sure he could go back and face his past if every one knew what crimes he had committed on the ministry's orders as Scar.
It had all began simply enough. "Stop this or that evil soul." But then things had begun to build. Soon he was known around the halls of the ministry as the 'Hit man' but this was never told to the superiors or to Scar himself but a good spy knows what to listen for. He knew and they didn't know he knew. Which was the way it was supposed to be.
Looking again at the man in the photograph he'd been given, Harry wondered what had happened to make this man so evil. He was young but older than Harry himself. He had brown hair and a shy way about him but his eyes spoke of intelligence that comes from years of study in a library. Not something you'd normally find in a mass murderer or whatever they ministry was trying to make him out to be.
But as he watched this picture, Harry wondered, not for the first time, why it was that he still went along with this. What was he going to achieve by getting this man comfortable and settled in before killing him like a spider trapping it's prey?
Harry looked up just as the man himself walked off the plane. He looked happy about something and clutched a small briefcase to his side. A tune slipped out of his mouth, which Harry vaguely recognized as a Tibetan prayer. Why, this man was no werewolf bent on raising armies of others of his kind. He was a scholar and a priest and, well, he was a werewolf. But that was the only thing that went along with his file.
Harry had seen evil. He could recognize it at a glance but this man wasn't it. So then why did the ministry want him dead? Deciding to follow him and watch him for a while, Harry knew he would find the answer and deep inside, he knew he'd hate what he found.
***
Seth was so confused. Magic? A wizard? Him? Michele too? He looked at his mother who looked almost sick. Why wasn't she happy for him? Why wasn't she acting like Dad who had already planed out his whole future around this new magical world? But Seth shook it off. It'd work out. It always did.
"And I assure you that he will be very well looked after. Nothing can happen to him while he's in my care."
Dad said something unintelligible. Which it appeared Mr. Dumbledore understood.
"Grand! So, We'll be seeing you on September first then won't we, Seth?"
His mother led the wizard to the door. As he walked out, Seth heard him saying to her, " Don't worry, Mrs. Wiles. Please. He'll be perfectly fine. It's better if he's trained. After all, magic is a dangerous thing and we can't all grow up on Hellmouths."