Abandonment

Chapter Two

It was early in the Headmaster's office. Too early it seemed for the Headmaster as he actually looked his age. He was half asleep with dark pools under his eyes. The Headmaster hadn't gotten much sleep that night seeing as how he had forgotten about Harry Potter, supposed dead son of James and Lily Potter. It didn't seem like it was going to be a good year with the start it had just had.

The young child in his office looked at him with emotionless eyes. The Headmaster calmly looked back into the child's eyes, but had to avert his eyes; those emerald green eyes were so much like his mother's. The hair, raven black and just as unruly as his father's. The child cleared his throat rather loudly bringing the Headmaster back to the present. The Headmaster sat up straighter, but still clearly did not know where to begin.

"I...Harry," a stern glance stopped that start of the topic, "Mr. Potter...how are the Dursleys?" Harry made an irritated noise in the back of his throat.

"I don't know I haven't seen them in seven years Headmaster." Dumbledore looked startled at this declaration.

"Why would you not know how the Dursleys are, you just saw them yesterday?" Harry looked annoyed.

"I would think that I wouldn't miss seeing a large oaf of a man, a horse faced woman, and a whale sized child, but apparently I did." Harry stopped a moment. "I haven't seen the Dursleys in seven years Headmaster since they dropped me off in London. That is why I don't know."

There was silence in the room. The old headmasters and headmistresses that hung on the walls were silent, all were wide awake and watching the exchange. Fawkes, the Headmaster's phoenix, stood silently on his perch also, not making any movement. Headmaster Dumbledore looked down at his desk in shock and remorse not daring to make eye contact. Harry, on the other hand, gazed at Dumbledore with angry and blazing eyes.

"Where...where have you been the last seven years then Harry...Mr. Potter?" Harry made an impatient noise in the back of his throat, clearly not wanting to be here of all places answering questions.

"I have been somewhere safe where I was cared for by people who cared about me. Not by people who would sacrifice their son or by people who forget other people. Not by people who would abandon an infant."

A pointed look was thrown at Dumbledore. Dumbledore slumped in defeat. He knew he was defeated, that he had been condemned by his actions ten years prior. There was no way to escape it. He had thought he been thinking in the best interest for all, but that wasn't so.

A one year old sacrificed to a dark lord so that the rest of the world may live on in peace because of a prophecy. It was selfish and immoral, sacrificing an infant. There was no good reason after ten years in Dumbledore's mind, just an act of desperation to stop the spreading darkness.

Harry cast one last emblazoned look at Dumbledore before turning and exiting the Headmaster's office. The peace was quickly thrown out the window when Harry reached the bottom of steps behind the gargoyle statue. There was James and Lily Potter standing there. They both looked like they hadn't slept last night. Lily had puffy, red eyes, she had spent the night crying; James looked haggard and worn, he had spent the night trying to comfort his wife and not cry, trying to stay strong for his wife. Harry gave a loathing at them both before stomping off in the general direction of the Great Hall.

Harry was sitting at the very end of Gryffindor table as far away from the head table as possible when the teachers arrived at the beginning of breakfast. No other students were in the Great Hall yet. All looked at the young child sitting alone glowering at the plate sitting in front of him. Most were confused while a few were sad and felt pity for the child. Hogwarts' Potions Master was more than confused though. Why hadn't Potter and Lily kept their son? It hadn't made any sense. But then again, there had been that article in The Daily Prophet after their supposed death.

He Who Must Not Be Named Defeated in a Trap

Last night He Who Must Not Be Named was defeated in a trap last night at Godric's Hollow set up by James and Lily Potter and Albus Dumbledore. The Potters were long hunted by the Dark Lord especially after their child was born. However, their son wasn't really a child, but the beginnings of a ploy set up by the Potters and Dumbledore. The child was a golem.

In September the Potters cast themselves under the Fidelius Charm, but used golems instead of themselves. Their secret keeper, believed to be Sirius Black, was actually Peter Pettigrew and was betrayed by him. Pettigrew was a servant to the Dark Lord and him the secret location of the Potters. Pettigrew was found and will supposedly serve a life sentence in Azkaban.

There was little more to the article as it repeated itself and then went on into the lives of both James and Lily Potter. Snape looked at the child once more, they had lied to everyone, they had had a child and he was still alive. Although how he had survived the demolition of Godric's Hollow without being severely injured was amazing. Snape shook his head, it didn't matter to him, he was still a Potter and he had his father's personality.

Although, Snape thought, there was the way Lily and Potter changed after the attack. They had both seemed sad, very sad, almost as if the child had been real. It was like the Potters had grown attached to their golem child, acted as if it had actually been real. Lily and Potter had just started coming out of their self-imposed depression. They each still had a haunted look in their eyes, but they were coming out of their shells.

Snape looked towards the supposed Potter child. Damn this child whoever he was for making Lily upset.

All of the students and teachers were sitting in their seats at their respective tables with many casting glances at the unknown kid of Gryffindor. The morning mail arrived on time as per usual at Hogwarts and owls flooded the air above all of the tables. Many of the student only received one owl or no owl at hall; the unknown kid received a total of thirteen owls. Many stared at him and all of the owls hovering around him waiting to relieve there load of packages.

Harry groaned very loudly at all of the packages, no doubt all late ordered something-or-others that his caretakers wanted him to give out. Very quickly he off-loaded all of the packages from the owls, arranged the packages into orderly piles, and sent the owls back on their way. Without a care to what ever was in the packages, Harry banished them all to their respective owners with a flick of his wand.

There were several letters left after all the packages were gone. All except one was for Harry; the one was addressed to the traitors, his parents. He wanted to burn that letter just for it being for the traitors, but he didn't, instead he banished it away to its recipient without a further thought.

Harry would have to deal with the traitors for the next two years. The less contact with them, the less likely he would be to vent. This venting would most likely be far worse than the venting he had had when he first learned of his parents abandoning him. However, Fate was already working against him: Charms with Professor Evans first thing followed by History of Magic with Professor Potter. Harry really wished those hadn't been core classes.

Harry stuffed the letters away in his book bag to be read later as classes were going to start soon.

Nobody noticed that morning at breakfast that Professors Evans and Potter were missing from the Head Table nor did they notice the slump in Dumbledore's shoulders or his twinkle-less eyes.