Disclaimer: I do not own the world of Harry Potter, I'm just playing with it and promise to return it with the characters only slightly traumatized ;-)

A/N: If you are reading this and would like there to be a next chapter, review, otherwise I'll think no one cares and go back to writing in my head. More reviews will also get a new chapter faster.

Harry Potter was having a delightfully odd dream about a flying motorbike. It ended abruptly as his god-father knocked on his door and informed him breakfast was ready. The now ten year old son of Lily Potter assured his god-father that he was coming and grabbed the nearest relatively clean clothes. Once dressed he hurried down the stairs to the kitchen of number 6 Privet Drive where his mother was pouring juice while eggs tipped themselves onto three plates.

Harry was not surprised by the floating frying pan; for most of his life his mother and god-father had been using magic around him, though they had waited til he was old enough to know not to tell anyone about it unless they were family. Not that it was a good idea to talk about it with Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon who lived next door, and his cousin Dudley had never been told. Harry wished he could tell his cousin, because threatening to turn him into a pig would have been useful for making Dudley and his gang leave him alone.

"It's Dudley's birthday to day," Lily reminded her son as he picked up a piece of toast. He groaned, earning a frown from his mother and a grin from his god-father. Usually, Harry and Lily would go over on Dudley's birthday, drop off a present, though they had never gotten one in return, and that would be it. Today, however, Lily and Sirius were both going to Diagon Alley and, as usual, had refused Harry's please to go with them. Therefore, Harry was stuck going with his cousin to the zoo. He hoped he would run into some of his school friends at the zoo, but he doubted it.

Harry did not meet any other friends and was forced to spend the entire day with his cousin and his cousin's friend, Piers Polkiss. He hung back as much as possible since the Dursleys liked to pretend they didn't know him and the feeling was mutual. It also went a long way from preventing Dudley and Piers from beating up on Harry when they began getting bored with the animals.

The day went surprisingly well, Harry was even allowed to finish Dudley's first dessert when Dudley threw a fit, complaining it wasn't large enough. After lunch, however, things began to go wrong.

They had gone to the reptile house where Dudley again lost his temper because the largest snake wouldn't move. He sulked away but Harry stayed by the tank.

"Sorry about him," he apologized to the unmoving snake. "He's a git. You're lucky you don't have to put up with him all day though."

Although he had been raised with magic, Harry was still surprised when the snake lifted it's head and hissed sympathetically. "Can you understand me?" Harry asked, leaning closer to the glass. The snake nodded and Harry was excited, as he always was when his own magic manifested.

"You're from Burma aren't you?" he asked. The snake pointed to a sign that said "bred in captivity." "That's sad. I bet you'd love to go to Burma," Harry answered. The snake nodded. Before Harry could say anything else, he suddenly found himself falling and hitting the ground hard. Dudley had pushed him and was not shouting for Piers and his father to come see what the snake was doing.

Harry's temper rose and for the second time that day, his own magic manifested. As he rolled carefully off his freshly scraped knees and palms he heard a frightened cry behind him. He looked over his shoulder and saw the snake slithering through the place where a few moments ago a thick sheet of glass had separated it from the rest of them. The snake snapped at Dudley's heals as it passed, hissed its thanks to Harry and disappeared into the bushes outsisde.

Later that night, as Harry was losing a game of wizard's chess to his god-father, his mother arrived home.

"Did you set a snake on your cousin?" she demanded, depositing several bags on the kitchen counter. "Petunia's having a fit!"

"Harry looked up from watching Sirius' black knight destroying his own white bishop. "I didn't do it on purpose!" he protested. "Dudley pushed me!"

Lily sighed as she joined them at the table, catching the defeated bishop and the knight threw it from the board. "I figured it was an accident. But you have to try to control your temper, you know what happens when you don't." Harry opened his mouth to protest further. "I know," Lily continued before he could, "you can't help it and Dudley is always provoking you." She sighed again. "I'll be glad when you go to Hogwarts and learn some control."

Harry nodded and turned back to the game, sending his remaining bishop after one of Sirius' pawns. His mother's efforts to teach him control had mostly failed though Harry could occasionally recognize in time that his temper was likely to get him in trouble and calm himself down.

The chess game finished, Sirius' queen destroyed Harry's and checkmated his king at the same time, a few minutes before Lily finished making dinner. The meal was unusually quiet and Harry found himself fidgeting anxiously. When the clean plates were back in the cupboard, Lily and Sirius say back down and told Harry they needed to talk.

Harry sat down, looking back and forth between the two of them worriedly.

"It's about the night your father died," Lily began, glancing at Sirius quickly. Harry blinked at her in surprise. His mother had told him a few years ago that his father had been murdered by one of the most powerful dark wizards in centuries. He knew also that the attack had destroyed their house and that the lightning shaped scar on his forehead came from that night.

"Harry, the night Voldemort attacked our house, he tried to kill you. He used the same curse that killed your father and many other wizards. It hit you, but didn't kill you. It rebounded, that's why he disappeared that night."

Harry stared at his mother in shock for several minutes before he finally found his voice. "Why?" he whispered.

Lily and Sirius exchanged looks again. "We're not...well, no one knows for sure. But he did, and everyone with wizard parents at Hogwarts will know it. Anyone not muggle-born will have grown up hearing how Voldemort vanished because of you."

"That's why we never brought you to Diagon Alley with us," Sirius told him a few moments later, when Harry's breathing had returned to normal. "We didn't want you to find out that way."

"I hope you understand why we didn't tell you all this before," Lily said quietly, taking one of Harry's hands in hers. "It's hard to know when someone's old enough for that kind of information."

Harry nodded mechanically. The two adults answered a few more questions that Harry asked, but avoided the issue of why Voldemort had targeted a baby wizard. That night, Harry dreamed about a flash of green light and people screaming.