Disclaimer: This story uses characters and locations created by J.K. Rowling. No copyright infringement is intended and no profit is made from this work.
Author's Note: This story was originally posted on the official WB boards, several paragraphs at a time. You will find canon inconsistencies, plot holes within the narrative itself, and one of those original characters. It was written prior to the release of Book 6, so nothing from HBP or DH is taken into account.
Edited 20th February 2014 to remove review responses and superfluous author's notes.
A Slytherin's Spell
1. A Different Perspective
It's odd to think that the actions of one man can change the world, can save or condemn thousands of innocents. There are not many who possess the power, guts and charisma to win hearts and minds, to change everything with a single word. And this life-changing hero or villain need not be the obvious suspect. Very few people have ever doubted that, should the devil-man I will call the 'Dark Lord' for reasons of convenience ever be stopped, then the wunderkind Potter would be the one to do it.
For those in the know, of course, a certain prophecy provided a good reason to believe this. Sybil Trelawney was no Seer. But those who were commended her prophecy as a genuine one. And sealed it up with the others in the Hall of Prophecy, to be forgotten for many years. When re-discovered it was taken as an affirmation of Potter's status as the Chosen One. And yet, the language was opaque, and in the heat of the moment some possible meanings were never considered.
…either must die at the hands of the other…
Neither of them would be able to strike the death blow; in a battle of equals, neither can win. Who, then, was this mysterious 'other'? Was he the one man with the power to avert an otherwise inevitable fate? No, surely, a troubled man, a man with a foot in both camps, hence either one could die at his hands. But no one stopped to wonder about this interpretation. There was no profit in idle speculation. Again and again Potter had stopped the Dark Lord, therefore he would vanquish him completely at the end… or be vanquished.
And so it was that the young man whose agonising decision would one day decide the fate of the world stepped out of a steam train on September 1st, unheralded and unnoticed. Well, not quite unnoticed. Heads did turn as he walked up, accompanied by his best friend, to the horseless carriages. He wasn't handsome, exactly, but an almost electrifying charisma radiated from him. It looked as though it was not only teenage girls who fell under his spell. As he moved, his silver Head Boy's badge glittered in the weak moonlight.