Harry Potter is owned by JK Rowling
The Protector War is owned by SM Stirling
Slytherin Rising was created by J.L. Matthews

For most people, cannibalism had been a last resort. After emptying out the stores, people had roamed the countryside killing and eating all of the livestock they could find. At zoos and wildlife parks, the keepers had eaten all of the edible looking animals like antelopes and water buffalo and let loose the ones that didn't look so appetizing, like lions and rhinos. As a result, Britain now had wild rhinos, lions, tigers, leopards, monkeys, chimpanzees and a single family each of mountain gorillas and bonobos. The big cats had done especially well and had adopted humans as their preferred prey. After the defeat of the cannibal army, predation from the big cats cut drastically into the numbers of cannibals roaming the countryside.

But one cannibal had managed to beat the odds. He called himself the Eater. His real name was no longer important. He had acquired a taste for "long pig" a little quicker than most. He had been at and survived the final battle at Hogwarts. Since then, like the big cats, his favorite prey had become his fellow cannibals. But as the years passed, humans became rarer and rarer. So, he had fed himself on bugs, spiders, worms, and housecats . . . anything he could find. He preferred human flesh, however.

He came across the settlement at dusk. It was a new farm that had just been set up recently. There was a stream nearby and he saw the spot where children like to play in it.

(Children . . . Yummy! My favorite!) Thought the Eater.

After sundown, the eater went down to the creek and covered his head in mud and crawled into some reeds that grew near the place he had seen the children during the day and he sunk down into the water until only the top half of his head was above the water line. Then he waited . . .

It was around mid-morning the next day before a child came to the swimming hole. It was a young girl, about five years of age. (Perfect!) If he could pull her under water, he could drown her and hide with her under water in the reeds until nightfall. Nobody was watching her . . . (Closer . . closer my pet . . .) when she was close enough, the Eater sprang! Unfortunately, she slipped out of his grasp and was able to give off a blood-curdling scream before he pulled her under! As the adults came running, the Eater froze up, torn between his hunger and his sense of self-preservation. He felt a sharp pain in the back of his head and then blackness . . .

. . . the Eater awoke with his arms in great pain. They were tied together and he was hanging by them from a tree.

"Glad you're awake," said Stan Paulson. "That was my daughter you almost killed. Now, I'm going to make sure your death is slow, agonizing and painful."

Behind Stan, the Eater could see several figures approaching on horseback.

"Hold on, Stan," said Bruce Campbell, pointing at the horsemen. "It looks like the Sheriff's men are coming."

"What's going on here?" asked one of the horsemen.

"Cannibal attacked Stan's Daughter, Sir Edgar," said Bruce. "We were just about to administer a little homespun justice."

At that moment, three owls swooped down and flew into the nearby house.

"Owls!" said the Eater. "I know where they come from! Let me live and I can take you there!"

Just then, a series of squeals erupted from the house and a child came running out clutching a letter.

"Daddy! An owl brought me a letter!" exclaimed Byron Campbell. "Read it to me! What does it say?"

In the days after the Dying year, literacy and education seemed less important than survival. As a result few people under the age of sixteen could read.
Bruce took the letter from his eleven-year-old son and read aloud:

You have been accepted to the Hogsmeade Academy of Witchcraft and Wizardry. A teacher will arrive to transport you to school on August 24th.

Sincerely,

Horace Slughorn,
Minister of Education

"I know where that freaky school is! If you let me live I can take you there!" Pleaded the Eater.

"This bears further investigation," said Sir Edgar. "Under the circumstances you should hand the prisoner over to me. We'll see what the Sheriff has to say about all of this."