Harry Potter and the Heirs of the Ancients
Chapter 1The Return of Evil
Dumbledore sat in his study; he was going over some of his papers, he leaned back into his plush chair and sighed. It had been 13 years since Harry had died and Hermione had disappeared, the Ministry had failed and was still failing to find Hermione, neither her body nor her. She had been declared dead and given a memorial, strangely enough her parents hadn't even shed one tear, yet stranger still the Ministry hadn't stopped the search. Dumbledore wondered why; why declare her dead and continue searching? The new Minster was wasting resources; declaring someone dead was the usual method they employed to stop searching for someone; not to continue it. This was causing Dumbledore to wonder about this Minister; Dumbledore knew nothing of him before his election, which was narrow. But he was gaining a lot of public support with this war; 'Although,' Dumbledore smiled slightly, 'They aren't really supporting him by joining as Aurors.' Dumbledore turned his thoughts towards the last couple years, ever since Harry had died…
During the past 13 years Dumbledore had pretty much gotten over Harry's death… well, if you could call it that. But though every time he thought of Harry's demise his mood turned dark; he had loved Harry like a son and still did. Harry had been the most noble person Dumbledore had ever met, Harry had given his heart and soul to restore the Wizarding World, Dumbledore had seen the extent of the damage done; but not only to the Wizarding World, but also to the muggle world. Dark spirits had caused much havoc, although, to their credit the Ancient Ones had stopped the majority from escaping. No one could be expected to be perfect, but Dumbledore couldn't help it, "At what cost?" he mused, "The Ancient Ones were destroyed, now we have no guardians. Harry destroyed… Hermione wandering around insane or dead… the latter the most likely and the Ancient Ones destroyed." Dumbledore knew that the Ancient Ones had not died as we know it. Death was nothing to them; they merely returned after being killed. The Ancient Ones had been destroyed just as Harry had been. Destroyed, meaning that their souls and hearts had been utterly destroyed, lost to this life and the afterlife… lost to everything and everyone, they simply were not. 'Neo' had tried his best, still Dumbledore didn't know Neo's true name. But also knew that Neo wouldn't reveal it for a reason; the Ancient One didn't do anything without a reason. What had really damaged the Wizarding World, other than the Dark spirits and Shadows, had been that magic hadn't worked for a couple of weeks; not even a summoning charm worked, because the Ministry and a lot of other magical places were hidden with magic a lot of muggles had noticed some of the magical world around them. Luckily; the Ministry had been able to control most, if not all, of it. Dumbledore sighed again, with the attacks from a new Dark Lord these past few years he couldn't say anything about how strictly the new Minister had regulated the school, especially in the past year. Dumbledore's position was pretty much obsolete, only a name, he had no real power anymore. He wished Harry was still alive, if he had survived, Harry could have taken back the school. Harry could also have taken on these new weird Dementors; it was now taking at least four Aurors to ward off one of these new Dementors.
That was why Dumbledore couldn't throw them out; he couldn't take them on by himself even with all the teachers behind him. No one knew who this new Dark Lord was, only that he had a lot of resources, a lot of resources, Dumbledore was getting too old for this; he was thinking now of his retirement. But he hadn't found a new Headmaster yet… not that the position was important anymore; however, there was one advantage, the Minister had appointed 13 new Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers and 13 new Potions teachers in the past 12 years. Interestingly enough; one year they had gone through 2 teachers for both positions; stranger still, in the same year for both as well. The Minister was running out of people willing to take the position. Dumbledore had taken it upon himself to print an ad in the Daily Prophet. He was still waiting for someone to respond to it. Although, Dumbledore doubted anyone would answer… but still, there was a chance, even though rumors said the position was cursed, only Harry and Hermione had lasted more than a year since Quirrel and Snape had died. It didn't help that people said the position drove all four to their deaths. Dumbledore was the only one who knew the position had taken on a life of its own; it was waiting for the right teacher to appear. Then the 'curse' would stop. So much had been happening the past 13 years, but first Dumbledore picked up the Daily Prophet and started reading through it. Most of it consisted of new attacks from the unknown Dark Lord, still there was something between the lines; a few battles had ended badly for this new Dark Lord. Dumbledore leaned back; he wondered why, it seemed that the battles far north of Britain were being lost by the Dark Lord, yet he was winning everywhere else. The mystery of it was perked Dumbledore's curiosity. It was strange that they would lose every battle north of Britain but win everywhere else. This was something that was an almost obvious clue; something was going on in that area. One of the surviving Aurors reported that an individual had appeared, then disappeared as quickly as he had appeared. It had almost seemed like more than one person; but said they only saw one at once. Although admitting he or she had been completely covered, so it could have been 50 different people and they wouldn't have been able to tell.
'Why' preoccupied Dumbledore's mind nowadays, it seemed as though many things were changing in the Magical world, yet everyone else seemed either not to notice or was ignoring it. After Harry's death everything had gone smoothly for the first 6 years, but then this new Darkness had crept in from goodness only knows where. But somehow it had hidden from Harry's last assault on Darkness; Dumbledore was confused as to how it had destroyed the Ancients, but somehow missed this Darkness. He wondered if perhaps it had grown during the past 6 years, after Harry's assault. Dumbledore sighed and rubbed his temples, it was getting more and more confusing by the second. Sometimes the way the world worked was beyond him, another reason he thought he was getting too old to deal with this. Then he shook his head; how could he say he was too old when Harry had definitely been too young? Yet Harry had borne it like a man, accepting what he could not change and done what it took to ward off the impending destruction of the Magical world. But Dumbledore wasn't kidding himself; he was starting to weaken, his years were beginning to catch up with him. This had to be his last year as Headmaster, he had to get some rest; if he didn't this was going to kill him prematurely. Already Dumbledore had felt as though the past 13 years had aged him 100, time seemed to be multiplying exponentially and every second time seemed to be gaining on him. But perhaps it was because of the delicate balancing act he was being forced to play. He, Dumbledore, called the greatest wizard of the age, couldn't protect his own students anymore. For some reason Harry's protective charms had died out about 7 years ago, after Harry had been destroyed. Even in the first attack from the new Dementors and… Dark wizards…
Dumbledore stopped to consider the question that had crossed his mind, what were these new Dark wizards called? Voldemort had called his Death Eaters, but they had no name for these… new ones. It seemed as if everything had gone in a circle, Voldemort had been destroyed and a new evil had risen, but yet, it was different… this time there wasn't a prophecy of a young boy who could defeat this new Dark Lord. Dumbledore hoped someone could save them; the Ministry wouldn't be able to hold off the inevitable destruction of the Magical world forever. They had to have a strong leader; one who didn't put a price tag for his leadership. One who did this to protect people, or a person, someone willing to sacrifice everything for the greater good of all. But Dumbledore also knew that there was few, if any, wizards left that possessed such qualities. Though Dumbledore doubted anyone would come to the rescue this time, they were on their own.
But still Dumbledore couldn't help thinking about the battles the Dark Lord had lost. It was strange, all the reports coming in from the Aurors… well, if any survived, this new Dark Lord was powerful, so were his followers, the last couple of engagements south of Britain had wiped out all of the Aurors that had fought. The Ministry was starting to recruit people that didn't quite meet the cut, but even those were running out, people didn't want to become Aurors as in the past. Dumbledore couldn't blame them; who would if they thought that they were just going to be sent off as 'cannon fodder'? That was what was happening; 'Whatever or whoever was fighting the Dark Lord and winning must be pretty brave and powerful… or very stupid and lucky,' mused Dumbledore as he considered the death toll of Aurors. Dumbledore tended towards the latter, he couldn't imagine one person being able to defeat 12 new Dementors and 20 Dark wizards. So, logically they must be lucky… and stupid to boot, but Dumbledore's heart and mind nagged at him, there was evidence to the contrary. Dumbledore turned to the Daily Prophet and the Britain Times to start reading again, the Daily Prophet mentioned another battle to the north again, it seemed as though engagements up there had dramatically decreased since the last large scale attack, almost as though the Dark Lord had realized that something there was defeating his troops.
Dumbledore wondered if there was a new leader rising there, perhaps a new guardian. He knew that every time the good or bad side lost a valuable player, another came along… "But who is it?' Dumbledore asked himself out loud. He hoped whoever this new 'hero' was answered his ad in the Daily Prophet; maybe he or she would be accepted by the position rather than rejected outright. Dumbledore got up and paced for a few moments trying to collect his thoughts before heading to the pensive. Dumbledore put his wand behind his temple and pulled out several thoughts, he placed them in the pensive. His mind felt as though a load was taken off it; Dumbledore sighed in relief, then he poked the white stuff and memories started to swirl; Harry's stony, cold face appeared. Dumbledore sighed, "Why Harry? Why did you have to sacrifice yourself? Why wasn't there another way?" he asked the white form. He had known Harry was having a tough time of it; Hermione had been OverShadowed last year. The war had apparently taken its toll on Harry; he tried to find out what he could from McGonagall and some of the surviving Light Within members. Harry had definitely had a really hard time; Ron had betrayed him. Although, Ron was not at fault, he too had been taken over by the Shadow; Harry had become almost acceptant of his fate in the end, almost as though he knew he would die. Dumbledore felt very sorry for Harry; no one should have to accept death at that age. Yet, it wasn't enough for Harry to have a difficult life; he had to die at a young age with no joy in life. It just wasn't fair for him; he hadn't asked much out of life, just a life not a wonderful life, just a regular life. Harry just wanted to live like everyone else; not worrying about defeating every dark creature and wizard that came along. Harry was a special person, one who put up with almost anything; when he did something for you, he didn't ask anything in return. That in and of itself was rare, Harry had saved the wizarding world… not to mention the muggle world; yet now, he could not ask for anything in return. He had made such a sacrifice that he had nothing left to give. Dumbledore slumped into his chair; his mood was definitely darker than a few minutes ago. The new school year was to start in a few weeks; by then he hoped to have Defense against the Dark Arts and Potions positions filled. If not, he was in trouble; he had to find a decent teacher for his students to learn from.
Then his thoughts turned to another question; one he had been pondering for 13 years: why had magic stopped working for a few weeks? What had caused it? The only logical reason was Harry's serious magically… whatever it was, but still, magic was magic; why had magic stopped working? Why then did it come back? These questions had plagued him for 13 years, he wondered if he would ever know the answer to these. He may know a lot, but there were still mysteries in the magical world to which he had no answer. His explanations for this were either wildly out there or non-existent. It bothered him that he couldn't figure it out, 'But on the other hand,' thought Dumbledore, 'life would be boring without unsolvable mysteries.' Even this thought didn't comfort him; perhaps he was getting too old for this. This turned his thoughts back to the current issues he was facing; fortunately, the Minister still would allow him to pick his successor, from an 'approved' list. Meaning Dumbledore wouldn't have much choice… unless, he could find a Headmaster willing to stand up to the new Minister. But who could? The new Dark forces were really strong, even the Ministry had a lot of trouble keeping them at bay. But Dumbledore knew if he was really honest with himself, the Ministry couldn't keep them at bay, or they wouldn't be knocking on the Hogwarts doors. Already quite a few times the new Dementors had broken into the castle. Dumbledore had tried to repel them with the help of the rest of the teachers, but they had barely escaped getting Kissed. Fortunately; the Ministry Aurors showed up at the last minute. Although, the Minister had attached a price tag to their help; if Dumbledore obeyed all Ministry acts that the Ministry would protect them, if not, they wouldn't. Dumbledore shook his head, it was strange that the Patronus Charm failed to repel these new Dementors, but they had to have a weakness, but Dumbledore was far from finding it. Already they had tried several new tactics, they had all failed. It was starting to look grim for the Magical world… not to mention the muggle world. Dumbledore knew that once the Magical world had been wiped out that they wouldn't spare the muggle world. Whoever this Dark Lord was he had a huge advantage; for right now, the good side had no leader.
Dumbledore smiled, suddenly remembering something pleasant for once, there was one thing he had been looking forward to this year. Ron and Jessica's first born, named for Harry, was starting Hogwarts this year. Ron and Jessica had three kids; the oldest, Harry, was turning 11 this year, the middle one partly named for Ron's mother which is given away in the last three letters, Tally, who's 6 and the youngest, a 2 month old baby boy named, Gabriel. Ron's dad had been ecstatic when Ron had told him he was going to be a grandfather. Dumbledore had been flattered when Ron had asked him to be their child's Godfather. Dumbledore had eagerly accepted; he was thrilled that Ron thought so much of him, even though that Dumbledore had taken Ron's prefect badge in the last year. Ron had told Dumbledore that he didn't blame him for doing so; in fact, he had called it a wise move; it 'wasn't good for a Shadow to have a prefect badge'. They had discussed a lot of what happened in Ron and Harry's last year at Hogwarts. This was where a lot of Dumbledore's knowledge of what had happened came from; Dumbledore had died before all this took place. Harry had apparently taken the Headmastership temporarily as Dumbledore had asked Michael to relay, but also had to pass it on to McGonagall for most of the year because he was out fighting the Shadows for too long. Harry couldn't take care of both responsibilities at once. Also, a Ministry official had helped the Shadows gain control over the school for a little bit before Harry could arrive. According to Ron; the Shadows had tried everyday since they took over the school, but they had obviously failed in every attempt. They hadn't even come close to budging the door an inch, which apparently was all they would have had too. But while the door was closed, somehow Harry had prevented anyone else from Apparating into the Headmaster's office; even the Shadows. The door had some writing on it when they had approached it; it was written in a strange language that not one of them had known, except the Shadows.
They had told Ron it read, 'Shadow is not, Shadow exists not, Light emanates within; Shadow is dispelled, destruction imminent by Weapon known not to Shadow.' The Shadows had been extremely worried after reading this, for some reason they took this seriously as why they couldn't get in. But refused to answer Ron's questions, according to the report from Fudge; the Shadows had backed up when Harry started to become cold. Also, that somehow Harry had become brighter than the sun, before being ripped apart by the very spell he had cast… if that was the right word for it, nothing Dumbledore had ever dealt with was that powerful… powerful enough to rip the wizard apart, atom by atom. Tears crept up into Dumbledore's eyes as he thought of all the pain Harry must have experienced; no doubt it was beyond even the Cruciatus curse. The Cruciatus curse might set your nerves on fire, but whatever spell Harry cast must have ripped apart not only Harry's body, but also his heart and soul, something no one could ever describe. Something no one should have to experience, let alone a child, but Dumbledore realized that it wasn't fair to call Harry a child; he was more adult than most wizards. Harry, at eleven years old, had to face Voldemort for the first time. Then at 18 Harry gave his life in service of others, something that few, if any, older wizards today would do. Yes, it wasn't fair, nor honest to call Harry a child, he was an adult more so than many… It wasn't fair that only the good wizards were killed in defense of the Magical world; rarely, did a cowardly wizard die in war, it was sad but true, so all the brave wizards didn't live long enough to pass it on to their children… or, in Harry's case, long enough to have children to pass it onto. This was another thing that caused Dumbledore to worry; Harry didn't leave behind any heirs. So, whoever this new fighter was, he wasn't related to Harry. He had known the Potters for a long time; since about two generations before James was born. There had only been one remaining descendant; James. Then through him, Harry. Dumbledore knew also that somehow the Evans were related to the Potters, about 40 generations before Dumbledore had known them. James and Lily had never known it though, neither of James' parents had told him, nor had Lily's. It had something to do with wanting to leave their family ties behind them. Some reason that had caused them to separate. Something about a prediction made many generations before they had split, but Dumbledore had never been told more than that.
The rest he could only infer had something to do with Harry; Dumbledore knew one thing, it must have been about power. He didn't know whose power, but he could guess that it must have been about Harry's, because he was the last descendent of the Potters and Evans. Even Petunia had had powers of her own, but she hid them; scared of being discovered. But when her parents rejoiced about Lily's Hogwarts letter, she had turned her back on all of them. Dumbledore sighed, jealousy was a horrible thing; Petunia could have made a good witch, maybe not as good of one as Lily, but good nonetheless. Dumbledore paced the room again, so much information was in his head; it made it spin. Why had Lily and James' families split only to become united by their children again? Perhaps because Harry's birth had been predicted before Trelawney, if it had, Dumbledore didn't know about it. Then Dumbledore picked out a thought and placed in the Pensive, it swirled before taking shape of a man, balding, old and withering but had a smile on his face.
"Dumbledore, don't worry about our family secrets, just don't tell Lily or James about it. The prediction told us to pass it down until they who we would know would unite us, and there the Prophecy should die. Take it to our grave we will, it will be rediscovered by the one of whom it speaks to, who understands the future and the past, one who is of, yet not of, us." The figure paused, "The union between our families is very old; we had lost contact with the Evans for a while, as we were supposed to. The Prophecy said to, and we obeyed. 'Until such time that they who unite bring together what has been lost…'," said the figure.
"But Joseph," said Dumbledore quietly reiterating his question for him back then, "Does it speak of Lily and James' child?"
"Of that we will not know," replied Joseph, "All we know is it is about a future generation, one that will surpass all predecessors."
"Do you mind if I go look at it in the Ministry?" Dumbledore asked Joseph.
"It isn't at the Ministry, it was never recorded in anything but the deepest memories of our ancestors. It is for our security, this was a prediction made to the others in our family, about our family, by one in our family, we do not wish for them to know that our family will destroy the last evil," replied Joseph.
The memory sunk back into the silvery liquid as Dumbledore considered something, "But yet… there is another evil," he muttered as he turned to Fawkes' perch.
Fawkes' perch had been empty for the past 13 years. Dumbledore wasn't sure if Fawkes was even alive, he had disappeared sometime during the war; perhaps, destroyed by the Shadows. From what he had heard; Amanda had also disappeared, but much earlier in that year than Fawkes, she had been found just after the destruction of the Shadows. No one knew where she had been; or even why her parents had missed the fact that she was missing. Dumbledore wondered; what had happened to Amanda and Fawkes? Dumbledore had been fighting so much for the first six years, since the Minister was elected he hadn't thought of it. But in the last six he had to give up since the Dark Lord started attacking Hogwarts. Since then the battles had gone on and off.
Dumbledore turned to the Britain Times as he sat back down, to find out how much the muggles had figured out. As well as their take on the recent attacks reported by the Daily Prophet. A particular article stood out, the preface especially:
Editor's note: Normally; this paper wouldn't print something this far fetched; but in light of recent events we believe that perhaps in the interest of truth and good reporting, that this, although hard to believe, may be the truth and although we have been pressured by government officials to keep this silent, we will still bring you, the great British people, the truth.
In this day and age, we are taught to believe 'magic' is merely tricks and illusion, but perhaps this is not the case some survivors of a mysterious attack north of Britain report. They report that some dark robed people appeared out of nowhere and attacked with sticks that struck down over 20 people today. Somewhere in the mists of the ensuing screams and panic, several other people appeared and began to fire at the dark robed people with more sticks. All the latter people were killed soon after; however, one lone figure appeared and stood between the remaining survivors and the dark robed people, but before anything else occurred, three more appeared next to the previous person. The details of what happened after this point are a little sketchy for all of the survivors; all we know is that the four individuals fought and won this battle, how and why are still unknown. We at this paper question whether or not magic exists now, mostly due to the strange nature of this incident and do not think it is the first, we have had several reports that have stated the same type of situation.
Reporting:
Jonas Smith
Dumbledore leaned back in his chair, the Magical world wasn't a secret anymore, or at least if this kept up for much longer it wouldn't be. But he did know that it looked as though the four people had put memory charms on the muggles for all the events past when they arrived, Dumbledore sighed, this was definitely a turn for the worst. If the muggle world found out about the Magical world, there was no telling what would happen. The Magical world had stayed hidden for so long because they were afraid muggles would fear wizards as they had in the past. Dumbledore wondered whether they could keep hiding now; there was no question as the fact that things wouldn't be the same if left alone much longer, if things could be the same again. Dumbledore's thoughts turned to the paper again; this muggle paper had reported something with more detail than the Daily Prophet. Four people had defeated the dark wizards, this in and of itself was valuable information, apparently there was not one lone hero defending against the impending dark forces, there were four. Dumbledore leaned back further into his chair; this was an interesting development, one that was definitely worthy of notice. Though the paper hadn't mentioned any descriptions or anything of that nature which would have made tracking these four down easier, as it was, they were going to be difficult to track down, if not impossible. But they had narrowed it down some; most, if not all, the Wizarding World would still be unaware of these facts… simply because none of them would read muggle papers. Dumbledore sighed, he seemed to do that a lot lately; there was nothing he could do but accept what was. Although, because of the Minister's downgrading of the Headmaster position, he should be able to disappear for a few days; he was grateful he would have the opportunity now to attempt to track down these people after the two open positions were filled. But the "why" he could disappear for a few days unnoticed left something to be desired. His thoughts turned back to the four new 'heroes'.
Dumbledore wondered where he would start; all they had was that these four were mostly staying north of Britain, but that was all he knew. Dumbledore thought of something; he pulled up a map of all the recent activity of the Dark Lord North of Britain, then Dumbledore tapped the map. Some of the dots alternated blue and red, telling Dumbledore one thing. Whoever was doing this wasn't that dumb, he had attempted to find a correlation between all the battles that the four had participated in an effort to find a range of proximity; this meaning, he was looking to narrow down to a particular area. Dumbledore looked at it, it was just random, completely random, there was no correlation he smacked his wand down on the desk and cursed. He had been so close; he began to think of another way to figure out a range of proximity.
There was a knock on his door that interrupted his thoughts, "Come!" called Dumbledore. Professor McGonagall entered, "This just came for the new school year from the Ministry," she said handing him a note with a Ministry seal on it. Dumbledore opened and read it; he sighed, there were no muggle-borns on it, the new Minster… Dumbledore stopped his thoughts for a minute, the Minister wasn't new; he'd been Minister for nearly 13 years, either way he was still extremely anti-muggle. Well, at least as far as them attending Hogwarts, and no other school was currently admitting muggle-borns. Dumbledore's eyes widened as they stopped a little more than halfway down the list and he looked up at Professor McGonagall in surprise, as though this was a joke. Professor McGonagall gave Dumbledore a curious look, "What is it Albus?" she asked concerned. Dumbledore still looked disbelieving, "Minerva, have you read these names?" he asked. "No, of course not!" replied Professor McGonagall, "I'm not in the habit of reading other people's mail." "Minerva, there are two names on here…" Dumbledore trailed off. "ONLY TWO?!" shouted Professor McGonagall. "Not just two students, what I mean is: there are two familiar names," replied Dumbledore. "What names?" asked an exasperated Professor McGonagall. "Lily and James Potter," replied Dumbledore.