Disclaimer:

This story will be very dark. Harriet here has some similarities to canon Harry at the start, but they are minimal and will only decline with time.

I just really wanted to write a female villain protagonist, so here we are. And make no mistake: she will be a villain. Not a hero, not even an antihero. A villain. I think we'll find ourselves rooting for her anyway.

Expect foul language, significant character deaths, and harsh depictions of violence. If you're prepared for that, read on.

October 31, 1981

The most feared Dark Lord in the history of the British Isles tasted the broken magic in the air. He'd triggered several wards by stepping foot in the Hollow, so it was only a matter of time before reinforcements arrived, even with the anti-apparition precautions he'd taken.

He wouldn't waste that time. Tom Riddle blasted the front door off the Potter's cottage and glided into the foyer like a wraith.

Dishes shattered as a man's voice sounded from the kitchen.

"Lily! Go to Harriet! It's him! Go! I'll hold him off—"

Voldemort flicked his wand, disintegrating the wall between him and the voice. The cottage groaned in protest as several support beams went with it, but the house—magically reinforced, no doubt—did not collapse.

James Potter stood alone in the centre of the tiled floor, shattered ceramics at his feet. He'd dropped a levitation enchantment on the dishes to cast a protective shield around himself. His wand was raised in a duellist's stance. The sound of footsteps bounding up the stairs sounded out, and a door slammed elsewhere in the house.

Voldemort spoke, his voice as cold as a lake in winter. "Few in this world are capable of 'holding me off,' Potter. I am afraid you do not count among them."

The father of the sole threat to Voldemort's dominion was a tall, thin man in a green turtleneck. His round glasses were still flecked with water from the sink, and his eyes were wide and fearful—but they didn't waver an inch from the Dark Lord's face. There was a determination in the set of his jaw, an acceptance in the face of death.

It was nothing Tom Riddle could understand.

With the decisiveness of an Auror (but a fragment of the speed), James began mouthing the incantation to a powerful hex—and Voldemort's keen senses warned him that this would be no stunner or disarming charm.

Quicker than the sound escaped his lips, the Dark Lord pointed his wand at the floor, turning the shattered pieces of ceramic around James into large spiders. The twofold transfiguration took effect, and they swelled, quintupling in size almost instantly. With an imperceptible flick, Voldemort set them on the man.

James' shield was built to defend against hostile spells; it couldn't hold off something physical like the spiders. His eyes flickered downwards, and he stopped his incantation. To the Dark Lord, it appeared that he was either brainstorming a counter-curse for this new threat or preparing to flee.

The instant his eyes left his opponent's red gaze, Voldemort struck.

"Avada Kedavra!"

The incantation took him a fifth of a second, but it missed—it seemed Lord Potter chose the second option, dodging out of the way of the spiders. He rolled as the green bolt that sang death sailed overhead, sizzling harmlessly against the far wall. Arachnids leapt after him, several managing to latch onto his back, though most of them sailed by. By pure chance, James had stumbled upon the only course of action that could have preserved his life.

Voldemort did not falter. "Plan to hit, expect to miss" was the refrain every duellist knew by heart. He was already chaining his next volley of spells, following his quarry as he darted into the living room. A purple beam erupted from the Dark Lord's wand and appeared to miss, but when it collided with a cupboard the furnishing exploded, showering the room with wooden shrapnel. Several pieces sliced James, and the man stumbled away. The second spell that left Voldemort's wand was invisible. It hit the ground under Potters' feet, turning the entire floor into boiling tar. James attempted to push through, but his foot didn't come up, stuck fast in the sticky material. The man lost his balance, falling to his hands and knees, yelling as his skin contacted the scalding tar.

Concentration lost, the shield around James flickered out.

Voldemort laughed, playfully launching a slow-moving red orb from his wand. It drifted across the tar field and collided with James' upper left arm, which then began to visibly disintegrate. The man's screams turned hoarse as the fabric of his turtleneck—and the flesh underneath—turned black and started flaking away. A second later, a severed arm fell into the tar with a heavy plop. Yet the spell didn't stop. The black corruption continued to spread, quickly reaching Potter's shoulder, inching closer to his heart.

Somehow, despite the horrid death-curse, James Potter didn't let go of his wand. He pulled his remaining arm up, burned horribly and dripping with black tar, and pointed the weapon at the Dark Lord.

Voldemort's smile faded. "Avada Kedavra," he sighed.

He did at least enjoy the moment of disbelief that flashed in his victim's eyes before their light was forever snuffed out. Two Unforgivables in such a short span of time was an unthinkable feat of magic.

But "unthinkable" was a concept for lesser wizards.

Voldemort's feet glided over the boiling tar as though he were an ice-skater on the rink. He stepped over James' corpse to reach the stairs, but when he arrived at the top, he paused, slitted nostrils flaring. Something felt strange. A powerful magic in the air tickled his nose, but it wasn't from one of the common disciplines.

'Could it be… Ancient Magic? Which school? Time? It could be the prophecy at work—no, the child is yet an infant. That can't be correct.'

With a pulse of wandless magic, the door opened before Voldemort, but he did not enter. Several reconnaissance spells followed suit, returning with no unexpected results. Dilating his perception of time, he entered the nursery, preparing to unleash all his magic.

He expected curses, jinxes, even dark magic to be flung his way. He expected resistance. Lily Potter was one of the greatest witches of her generation, a far more capable combatant than her husband. She'd given his Death Eaters enough trouble that Bellatrix had taken to calling her "The Red Bitch." Yes, he was certain this witch wouldn't go out without a fight. Had she and her late husband worked together, they still wouldn't have stood a chance against him—though they might have been able to stall long enough for Dumbledore to arrive.

Yet, instead of a vicious adversary, he walked in on a woman standing in a pool of blood—her own blood. She turned as Voldemort entered, eyes glazed, and began to raise a hand. In it was clutched a dagger.

Both her arms had been sliced up to the elbow, and her life essence flowed freely onto the floor. With a shock of uncharacteristic fear, Voldemort realized that she was conducting a ritual. A Blood ritual. The magic was building in the air, a hostile, staticky force that set his nerves alight with dread.

Lily brought the knife to her throat.

'A sacrificial ritual! She cannot complete it!'

He didn't know what would happen, but one did not trifle with magic of old. There would be no entreaty, no offer of mercy from the Dark Lord, despite his loyal servant's pleas.

"Avada Kedavra!"

Lily collapsed to the floor. The oppressive, weighty magic went with her, dissolving with a sigh.

Voldemort, still tensed, spent a long moment staring at her corpse as though she might rise again. Even now, the witch was beautiful. Her vibrant eyes glimmered with unshed tears, red hair fanning out atop the pool of her blood.

He scanned the rest of the room. Other than the crib where a wide-eyed child clutched the bars and stared at him, nothing appeared to be a threat. The magic that had menaced him just moments ago had evaporated with the woman's death.

"Blood magic," he snarled.

Had the Gryffindors given her the knowledge? Possibly, but that house hadn't been known to dabble in Blood before. Dumbledore, then? But where would he have learned it, if not the Gryffindors?

Should he leave? Encountering something as unexpected as that had shaken the Dark Lord's confidence. No—the child would be taken in by Dumbledore if he left and finding her again would be nigh-impossible.

Fortunately for him, the woman had been unable to complete her ritual. His own specialty was in Soul, so glancing at the ritual preparations around the room gave him no insight into its purpose. But the magic had clearly left, so it should be safe.

Pointing his wand, he disintegrated the sacrificial dagger the woman had used and vanished all the blood. Then, just to be safe, he transfigured her body into a brick and cast his three most powerful countercharms into the air.

A sniffling noise reminded the Dark Lord of his purpose, and he turned to meet the child—the "prophesied one." A girl barely able to walk, clutching the bars of her crib as bright green eyes brimmed with unshed tears. Those eyes had just seen her mother die.

"Do you understand death, child?" he whispered, reaching out with a finger to stroke her cheek. With his other hand, he lifted his wand.

"Mum-mummy?"

"Forgive me," he said, not particularly caring whether she did or not.

Then he cast the spell that made everything go terribly, awfully wrong.

Voldemort's eyes widened as the green light struck the girl in the forehead but did little more than start her wailing.

'The ritual!' he thought, darting back as his mind raced. 'It—'

The child's eyes began to glow brightly enough to nearly blind the Dark Lord. He lifted his wand, conjured a defensive shield, and then—

The room exploded.

In a small bundle of cloth clutched in a giant's hand, a war was being waged. A war for a body.

An insidious red serpent writhed amidst the pale blue lake of a girl's soul. As the girl breathed in and out, whimpering weakly, the serpent ravaged its surroundings, swallowing pieces of the girl into its gullet. The hungry reptile seemed to grow with each bite. Originally, it was only a fraction the size of this nascent pool, but it soon doubled and then tripled in size, showing no signs of slowing. The gentle blue soul had no means to defend itself.

At the rate things were going, the girl's soul would vanish, absorbed into the evil snake.

Then, something happened. A glow began to permeate the perimeter of this soul-space as a third entity arrived: a strange, massive magic. The snake, sensing the alien entity, stopped. This third existence was overwhelmingly powerful, greater by far than the two souls combined—but it was not a soul. It couldn't exist here, in this soul-space. It was Blood, and incompatible with Soul.

The magic had no true intelligence, but it did have intent—the intent to save this infant child. Unfortunately, if it directly intervened it would crush both the souls like an elephant trampling seedlings.

The red snake, quick to realize the Blood's limitations, knew it could not be harmed so long as it was sequestered in the child's soul. It could continue to eat, and once it had consumed the girl, perhaps the Blood would work to protect it instead.

The Blood did not feel concern or doubt, but it sensed the conundrum. The battleground was confined, and the serpent—the Threat—had tenaciously wound around the soul of its charge. It could not destroy the Threat itself. Neither could it shield the blue soul, because while this solution might work for a time, it would ultimately prove too taxing. The sacrifices fuelling it would run out eventually, possibly years from now, and at that point the Threat would devour the girl whole.

So it decided on another way. It wasn't the ideal solution, but it would preserve the girl.

Mostly.

The serpent, a horcrux of limited intelligence, did not understand all the complexities of Blood and Soul. The two magics shared a complicated relationship with one-another. They existed in tandem yet were diametrically opposed. In almost all instances, they fought. However, there was one instance where they did not—when one fed the other with a piece of itself. In that case, the opposite could temporarily be empowered, as wind fuelled flame.

As soon as the Blood reached a decision, it acted. A portion of its power merged with the girl's soul, turning it the colour of a radiant sapphire.

The serpent suddenly recoiled, whipping its head back and forth as a crushing pressure enveloped it from all sides. Shaking and convulsing, it started to regurgitate the broken pieces of the girl's soul, dwindling back to its original size. Once it shrank ten times over, its scales began flaking off and disintegrating into the blue mass. As all this happened, the girl's soul slowly recovered its former size.

Now it was her soul devouring the horcrux.

A pitiful wail rang out as the serpent dwindled to a worm, then to a speck, then nothing. The Blood, somewhat diminished in size after feeding the girl a piece of itself, retreated into her body, preserving itself until it was next needed to fight the Threat. For it was not yet defeated, only inconvenienced.

Left alone, the blue pool shivered, as if suffering indigestion. The girl's colour had changed—no longer did it shine with the pure blue from before. Instead, it gleamed the faintest shade of purple.

Clutched to Hagrid's chest, Harriet Potter let out a burp and grimaced.

Notes

I've read a lot of Slytherin Harry fictions, and while I will be borrowing from their collective canon (and specific canons at times), I hope to add a lot of my own revisions. Expect significant changes to the setting and magic system, for side characters to have revised and major roles, and for a different story from the books. I'm not a fan of the same exact events that already happened in canon playing out in the same manner every year. I assume you've all read the original series already. We can move on from that.

The initial pre-Hogwarts arc will be rather long, but not for the reasons you expect. Enjoy!