October.
Originally written for a timed challenge at http: An eleven-year-old with russet hair and an owl, standing on stone steps. He bounces up to the stool, and waits there for a long time, while the Hat deliberates and finally roars "Gryffindor". An eleven-year-old with unnatural talent - if provoked, he is capable of hexing you faster than any Slytherin. A bored boy, who unleashes a plague of frogs in Transfiguration classes. A dare-devil flyer, afraid of heights, who would always be too unreliable to be picked for the house team.
October. A seventeen-year-old boy, preparing for his NEWTs under the shadow of what his sixteen-year-old brother (fortunately at Beauxbatons) had done with a goat, just after his brother had become head of the family. A prefect, secure in his power, known for liking sweets of all kinds. A boy who had learnt patience, and how to keep his temper, these lessons beaten into him by the caretaker in innumerable detentions. A young man who had developed an extraordinary talent at chess, as well as excelling in potions and transfiguration. A young man with a cautious, duplicitous nature, who had carried out paralell affairs with a Slytherin boy and a Hufflepuff girl, and had found a heady rush of power when doing so.
October. A young man in Germany, listening to rabble-rousing speeches, and noting the currents of magic in the air. A young man who had heard of Grindelwald, and had been sent by the ministry on a "good-will" mission. He felt little good will when he saw splintered glass across the streets, saw shutters up everywhere. He began to spy in earnest.
October. He knew where Grindelwald was, now. He had practised duelling in every spare moment he could find. He bound his auburn hair back off his face and went hunting across Central Europe, killing Dark wizards by the score, while the Allied invasion followed behind him. Grim-faced, he would deal the killing blow.
October. A man, no longer young, arrived at Hogwarts, tired around the eyes, with an enormous beard and a clanking case full of decorations and appointments. A man who would teach, but could not avoid watching, even in peace. He watched a half-giant be accused unjustly, and a Slytherin boy wage a war in himself, a war that had now only one outcome.
October. A man, on many wizarding committees of the greatest importance, head of Hogwarts, deluged by paperwork, interviewing a pretty witch for a teaching position. A man recruiting spies and colleagues and allies for a war not yet begun. A man, admitting a werewolf into his school, and a dark Slytherin boy who knew too many curses, a boy from a Slytherin family who would be sorted into Gryffindor.
October. A man dealing with a sullen Slytherin boy, rebellious, infuriated by the continued presence of the werewolf and the other boy. A spirit worn thin by bullying, but with no hint of forgiveness. A boy whose hatred would break him. A man recruiting his beloved Gryffindors for the fight, his hair with many threads of silver now, as killings mount and the ministry is paralysed.
October. A baby alive, a nation rejoicing. The old man recalls the child's parents, so bold for him. The weight of a prophecy makes him fearful. He recalls too a young man, collapsed on his hearth-rug, begging for forgiveness he could never dispense himself. The old man had thought he needed lions for the fray, but the broken serpent, hard to handle, prone to fits of outrageous rage (but never when spying), would be his most useful and enduring tool.
October. An old man, saddened by a lifetime of experience, but ever buoyed by an unreasonable hope, saw a boy sitting, wearing the Sorting Hat, waiting. He resolved to protect the boy, but he already had a more conscientious guardian.
October. Another dark lord had been vanquished, but by another's hand. The old man watched the young boy walk away to adulation with a haunted look in his eyes. The dark man shut himself in the dungeons and brewed potions until he collapsed, and the white-haired man, grieving, carried him to the infirmary.
October. A gravestone in a quiet place, invisible to most passersby. It had a name, two dates, and no other words. Two dark men stood beside it in the rain, then walked away together.