FAN FICTION AU AND TIME TRAVEL
Flipped
Summary
Female Harry Potter (Juniper) wins the war but the cost is too much so she performs a ritual and performs dimension travel after much research when she is 24. Her counterpart is Cordelia Faye Black, the daughter of Altair Black and Adelaide Malfoy. Has memories of both the worlds. Lives in France. When Juniper (Harry) seeps into consciousness, she is 14. Born on Beltane. Thus even though she is a girl, she has a high standing among the Blacks. Has gone to Beauxabatons for her first three years. Born on May 1, 1927. Start school in 1938. Goes to Hogwarts in 1942. Meets Tom Riddle. (Romance and power play)
Disclaimer: The characters and the world in the story belong to J.K. Rowling. I am not earning any profit from it.
Note: I have been a fanfiction reader for quite a lot of years before I gave this fic a shot, so if you see any ideas seeping in that I do not openly acknowledge, just let me know and I will add the credits. I have read too many to keep a track of them but I will try my best.
1) The idea of totems belongs to Catsarecool who is writing A Maurader's plan .
2) The basic idea of dimension travel comes from Hollow Thunder, Vital Lightning by Aariya07. You will see quite a few similarities in the first couple of chapters but it diverges after that.
3) This is a gender bender. Harry was born a girl as Juniper Anastasia Potter. Everything is as it is in canon except for her romances. This is not because I don't read slash or like it. You will see a lot of them in my favorites but because I don't think that I could do justice to that genre and because I want to do this. If you do not like such fics, do not read. Please do not flame. I will welcome criticisms, I know I am not perfect, just don't meaninglessly bash me for nothing.
For your references
"Talk"
"Thought"
"Parseltongue"
Previously…
"No, no, wake up. I woke up an hour ago and even took a shower. I have news." Cordelia was quite persistent and very excited.
Chapter11: Toujours Pur
Tom's POV
"What's with the rush?" Tom said as the doors to the Room of Requirement closed.
"If I remember correctly, you wanted to know why I needed the book on family magic." She said distractedly, she was pulling her trunk out and unshrinking it.
"Yeah and I was quite peeved that no one including you with give me a straight answer." Tom pointed out with a composed face.
"We couldn't. Our Head of House explicitly forbid any member of the house to talk about it." She said, "Uncle gave me free will to reveal my parseltongue abilities but not this. And he does not trust my cousins half as much he trusts me. Abraxas didn't know but I think he guessed but he has been forbidden to reveal anything about me without my explicit permission and I could not give him my permission because I was forbidden." She turned around to face me.
"That explains it. You can tell it to me now?" He asked.
"In a bit. I will have to ask you to be patient and not ask me questions for the next few minutes or interrupt me even though you are tempted to. I will answer everything I want to after that." She said, "I can't say anything until then but you will know once you see me doing it," She took out a ritual bowl and a silver knife.
"You don't have to break an oath or try and find a way around it if it is going to hurt you." Tom began to say very urgently, his eyes very worried.
"It's not that. It's a good thing, believe me." She said, kicking off her shoes and socks.
She must have thought of something because the next moment, a thick rug came on the empty floor and a cushioned chair appeared by his side.
"Sit and you will know and don't be mad, I sincerely can't talk about it." She requested.
Tom nodded though he was a bit confused.
Cordelia cut her hand and let out a unhealthy amount of blood drop out to fill the ritual bowl, "Familus Magicus" She intoned.
Tom instantly recognized the spell, the spell to call the family totem, but how could Cordelia have control over it.
A silvery Runespoon appeared, "Mistress," It hissed.
Cordelia inclined her head in recognition, "I, Cordelia Faye Black, hereby claim the heirship of the House of Black by the permission of Arcturus Regulus Black. So I say, so mote it be." She said with a straight face.
The totem disappeared within her, Cordelia's eyes glowed in power and then a ring, a silver one with Black crest appeared on her right hand and her cut healed away and she murmured in a daze of power, 'Toujours Pur."
"Thank you dear serpent" Cordelia hissed. Soon, the glow ebbed away.
She stood up, muttered an Evanesco at the bowl and picked it up and looked at Tom.
"Orion was not the Heir Apparent." Tom said. It was not a question.
Cordelia shook her head, "He isn't. I have a very strong affinity for family magic. I am also magically stronger and our totem likes me the best, even apart from the fact that I can speak to it. The decision was made during Lucretia's coming of age. The totem worked with me to bless her. Uncle has been grooming me for the role ever since. He said he didn't really need to because I was very interested in the family history, lore and political alliances from the start. We were going to do the ritual with family over Winter, but the dementor attack changed his mind. He gave me permission with an owl this morning. He expressly forbid us to say it outside of the family so no one could speak, not even me. He instructed me to carry out the ritual in secrecy from the rest of my cousins for time being. The less people know, the better. He did not forbid me about anybody else. The trick with family magic is that you have to be extremely precise with instructions so I could call you since you are not family and let you witness it this time. It's a surprising decision considering I am a woman but Uncle knows that he needs an heir who can withstand the wrath of Grindelwald, and Orion cannot do that. He is a bit childish for that."
"This explains a lot." Tom sighed.
Cordelia smiled, "It does and it helps us move our plans forward at a faster pace. As the heiress of House of Black, I have considerable pull at Gringotts, which I do without it too but, the title helps and the heir is allowed to use their discretion in revealing information to anybody for forming allies until the Head explicitly forbids it, so we can talk a lot more about what I know."
"You are putting a hell lot of trust in me!" Tom pointed out.
"I would not if I you did not deserve it." She shot back.
"Would you like to meet the totem?" She asked a little softly.
Tom nodded, he was a bit curious.
Cordelia summoned the totem wordlessly this time.
"Hello dear serpent." She hissed.
"Mistress..." The totem bowed all his three heads but the one in center spoke.
"My friend would like to meet you. He speaks your tongue too." She hissed back.
The totem eyed him.
"Hello, serpent." Tom hissed to the totem with a slight bow of his head.
One of the heads came closer to him and almost sniffed him.
It gave out a wordless hiss and Cordelia chuckled, "He likes you. You may go serpent, thank you for coming. "
"Totems can speak in your mind. Another benefit of Occulumency. It gives better control over totems." She informed.
"He is quite something." Tom said.
"Totems are very ..." She chose the word carefully, "Temperamental. They are an extension of your magic but they have a will of their own on the basis of what the family's guiding principles have been since the beginning. It is ambivalent, neither just nor moral, but ambiguous in that sense. They can resist an heir even a lord if they deem it unsafe for the family or against the best interest of the family. But mostly, they listen and guide and let you pick the best path. I wasn't lying when I said that your totem is within you. You were born with your family magic." She looked at him.
"I know that now!" Tom said a bit irritably.
Cordelia gave a light smile and ducked her head, "You can try it once you are comfortable with its idea. But be prepared. The first impression matters with the actual calling of the totem."
Tom nodded.
"The Animagus potion is ready, we can save that for tomorrow though." She said. Tom was lost in his thoughts.
"Before I forget, " She interrupted his trail of thoughts, " The transformation reminded me, I could not tell you this before as it is a family secret but being the heir, as I told you, gives me leeway." She looked at him.
"What?" Tom asked.
"Look at my eyes." She murmured.
Tom did not understand her request but complied anyway. He did not see anything, her eyes were just as vivid green as they were before, but then they changed, to midnight blue, his color.
"I am what they call a metamorphmagus, a shape shifter. It is a Black family gift, a recessive trait, the last person in the family had it 300 years ago. I am, though, stronger than the last wielder and have better control. I can change my physical attributes, eyes shape, size, color, my hair, their length, my facial structure, even my limbs, though I try not to do the latter very frequently, it gives rise to severe balance issues. I have only tried it once." She informed.
"That's..." Tom began.
"That's a lot to take in, I know. I am sorry, but I didn't want to keep secrets." She bit her lower lip nervously, her eyes slowly transforming back to her green orbs.
Tom got up and crushed her in a hug, pulling her off the ground and kissing her hair, quite uncharacteristically "Thank you. I haven't been able to voice it. How much this means to me? You being so utterly nice and good to me. I know for a fact that I don't deserve it, I was very mean to you, downright hostile. And" He shook his head.
"Don't say that about my friend. He is quite misunderstood, even by himself." She muttered softly, her lips pressed on his neck and her head resting on the crook of his shoulder.
Tom smiled and hugged her tighter.
Tom's POV
"So, what do we have?" Tom asked. They were sitting in the court meeting.
Cordelia was sitting on his chair arm, as usual and everybody else was around.
"Well, I and Cordelia found concrete evidence for lineage. We asked for books from both Black and Malfoy libraries as corroboration to the school library book. Our information checks out." Abraxas spoke.
"The other houses are interested. Charlie was a bit put off by losing a free class but when I presented the difference in ICW material and what Binns teaches us, he caved in." Dorea added her bit.
"Same for my brother. And they are spreading the word." Anastius said.
"I and Dorea played this game with Charlie, The worst things Binns have said on the Gryffindor table. It was quite popular. We might have a way of getting people to give us consensual statements about the same that should be admissible in court or the board meeting." Cordelia said.
"We have probed out possible candidates for the position. There are three that really matter in terms of their resume. One is a pureblood, his stance is similar to Binns though, the other is a relative to a muggleborn who does not value the history as much as we would like, The third is a halfblood, who is British but studied elsewhere and loves to research history and is quite neutral. We wanted to go for him." Rosier spoke out.
"That is an obvious and good choice but it is out of our hands." Tom shared a look with Cordelia.
"We can recommend the person on our levels if it will be alright with our parents, but otherwise students don't have a say, unless there is a school court. Even Heads' and prefects don't count for much." Cordelia stated, " but we have a Black seat, a Malfoy seat, a Longbottom seat and a Potter seat on the board of governors and all of them are inclined to listen to our side of story, at least if presented properly by a student whose opinion they consider legitimate."
"In short, you" Tom said, a little amused.
"Well, I won't be that forward," Cordelia began and Tom silenced her with a look.
"Okay, I will stop being modest and just do it." Cordelia looked miffed, "I just need Dorea's help to convince Charlie. Shouldn't be too hard, Sebastian is there to help us out and that we are championing a halfblood cause so that should encourage the Gryffindors. That leaves the House of Rowle, Bones, Odgen and Burke. House of Rowle will likely align itself with the Black and Malfoy. Burke has a mind of its own but from what Herbert tells me his father would go with cool logic which is our stance. We need to reach out to the Hufflepuffs in some way, try and pass the message along, perhaps Abraxas could reach out as the Heir to the Malfoys and Charlie and Ian could help but we have the majority, so yeah we should be fine." Cordelia finished with a flourish though she looked unhappy about it. She gave Tom a look and mouthed moodily, "Are you happy now?" and he just rolled his eyes at her, quite openly.
"That settles the Binns matter. We can only push it next term since the board is busy with the matter of wards. How are the first years fairing?" He began and the meeting went on.
Tom's POV
Both of them were sitting in the Room of Requirement.
"Are you sure?" She asked Tom.
"Yes Cordelia. I checked your potion twice. It is good and exactly how it should be." Tom stated, "I helped in making it too so if you doubt your abilities, trust me." Tom was downright annoyed.
"Okay, okay! I am just checking. If we made it wrong then we can be stuck as animals with no one to turn to." She said a little defensively.
"That was low." Tom gritted his teeth.
"What?" She looked at him in confusion.
Tom narrowed his eyes at her.
"Oh, the cat incident. You were stupid and you know that. But that jab was not intentional, if that makes you feel any better." She rolled her eyes.
"You are annoying me Cordelia." Tom said in a much clipped tone.
"Well, really. I didn't know that. You annoy me all the time, do you see me complaining?" She said unconcerned.
Tom growled and set a silencio at her which she dodged.
"That was not very nice!" She said, narrowing her eyes.
"Really?" Tom asked sarcastically.
"What's got you in such a twist?" Cordelia asked with concern.
"Nothing" he gritted his teeth, "Can we please get this over with?"
"No, tell me, you were fine till last night." She persisted, "If something about me is bothering you, you should voice it rather than keep it. We need to communicate if we are working together. Did I do something? I am sorry if my paranoia is bothersome, I was just double-checking. I am usually more confident about stuff but I have not whipped this potion ever, so I was just a bit concerned."
Tom looked guilty after her small speech. He sighed, "It's nothing, not what you did. I just didn't sleep well last night." He confessed. He was expecting her to burst in anger because he had been the one who insisted that he could sleep just fine without her.
She didn't react as he expected because he was instantly wrapped in the hug. He slowly hugged her back, "It doesn't sit well you with, does it? Being dependent on someone?" She softly asked.
"People are not always this dependable or reliable!" He softly replied.
"I am sorry." She muttered.
"Why are you being sorry? It's not something that you have control over." He muttered back. Her closeness and her fragrance calmed him down.
She looked at him a bit morosely, "Doesn't mean I have to like it?"
Tom smiled.
"You should sleep for a bit. It is dangerous to take the potion when you are fatigued or distracted. You can take a nap and we will do it in evening before dinner and we are working out a schedule right after that!" She softly said.
Tom almost protested but then he sighed and nodded.
Tom's POV
"I didn't see a single animal. It was constantly changing forms." Tom spoke groggily as both of them opened their eyes after the limbo they went into after drinking the animagus potion.
"Something similar happened to me" She muttered, rubbing her eyes.
She shook her head to shatter the haze. She poured some water for both of them from the pitcher that she had placed on a table provided by the room before she and Tom took the potion.
"What does that mean?" Tom wondered, though there was an edge to his voice, "Do we not have forms? What?"
"Not really, no. People who don't have forms just sleep and wake up. They do not even enter the limbo. The fact that we entered and saw something means that we have forms. We just have to figure out what those shifting shapes mean." Cordelia said.
"Multiple Animagi. It is not unheard of even though there is only a myth about it. But people only see the animals that they can transform into. It doesn't quite tally." Tom said, his brain whirring.
"Multiple animagi." Cordelia said it slowly, thoughtfully. Tom didn't even need to glance at her face to know how hard she was thinking.
Off a sudden, she grabbed his hand and dragged him to where her Trunk lay open. She closed the apartment and instead opened another compartment, her library. She climbed down and he didn't need to be told and she expected him to follow.
Her library had a whole catalogue, which even the Hogwarts library did not. Tom agreed, she had quite a convenient life. Surprisingly, he didn't resent her for it. Of all the people he had met, if anybody deserved privilege, it was her.
"Once when I was 12, I got an idea that I wanted to read all the journals of my ancestors, even the obscure ones that my uncle did not know about. I went to the main black vault and withdrew all of them with my Uncle's permission." She said with a little struggle as she pulled the ladder to a specific shelf. The library was not huge, just about the size of their Slytherin rooms but Tom knew that it was very well stocked.
Tom decided to help her, but she had lifted the ladder and placed it on the shelf and was climbing, "I first thought that this particular ancestor was on something, some sort of drug, or whatever, he talked about myth as it was reality. But I still liked his journal because it talked about arcane pieces of magic that no one has heard about. I thought most of it were conspiracies, or too far fetched… but this one journal of him described something akin to what we saw. Veritas." She hissed the last word.
A whole shelf of books appeared. She pulled one out. It was an old journal alright, but thick and almost like a tome.
"I kept it because I was fascinated by this idea of a potion that he had, but I remember correctly, it was this journal only that talked about the phenomena that we both witnessed." She said hurriedly, quickly climbing back down.
She quickly placed it on the long desk that was placed against one wall, it had only one chair. She quickly patted on the chair," Sit," and plopped herself over the desk.
"I won't be able to read it anyway." He pointed out.
"Normally, no." She said, but then she looked up at him and smiled with exhilaration, "but since I am the heiress, I can give you temporary access. It does not last for more than 45 minutes. Heads can give complete access, but whatever, but you can read it."
She opened the journal, "If I remember it correctly, it was towards the end of this journal. It's a fascinating idea. He theorized about a tribe that could be anything, any beast, magical creature, animal. It sounds a bit far-fetched, because he described a fourth person source who spoke about how the tribe meditated, went into limbo and those who had the ability to shape shift into anything, they saw shifting animals, never a clear image. He calls them shape shifter. It is not a reliable source and a very long shot, but maybe just maybe…." She was quickly turning the pages, "here." She exclaimed.
All Tom saw blotted ink. He could not read anything and then Cordelia intoned, "I permit Tom Riddle to read journal number 10 of Caleb Black." and he saw words, a neat old calligraphy.
They quietly read through it. The language was archaic and a mix of different languages.
But Tom got the basic gist before his permission ended. The information was barely spread over 5 pages.
Cordelia immediately took out a parchment and begun translating it in common tongue. She wrote quite fast, and neatly. Then she took out ink pots of different colors and begun highlighting the main points with his help.
In the end they had the following points of their boiled down summary of whatever the ages old tome/journal was saying, "
· The tribe could transform into anything. What does 'anything' mean? Does it count trees?
· They used meditation to achieve each form. The more familiar you were with the form and how it worked, the easier it was to transform. What kind of familiarity is he talking about? Do we have to see the animal or know its anatomy or its other powers? Or maybe it just works like animagus, MORE READING.
· Most of the tribe didn't have the gift. It showed up once a century. Recessive gene like Metamorphmagus?
· Most of the people did not try more than 30 forms in their lifetime because it took a while to control and adapt to a particular body. This seems clear, sort of. Metamorphmagus works the same way. If you transform too quickly or frequently, it takes a while to get used to that particular limb structure. It may also be linked to other powers or features of the creature
· Once you master a particular type of form, aerial, land, water, it becomes easier to change into other similar forms. Okay, does that mean, once I master say a type of bird, it will be easier to convert into other kinds of birds? Seems like it!
· It was possible to convert from one form to another without turning back into a human. That's quite clear and handy. So the name he gives is apt, shape shifter and not just multiple animagi.
· Magical forms were possible. Since there is a mention of Shadow panther. I am not sure how much I buy into that!"
"I think it would be safe to presume that we cannot transform into trees. We are talking about a whole different level of metabolism there." Tom said a little carefully and Cordelia let out a tinkling laughter, "I wasn't serious you know. You really should learn to appreciate common humor."
"Okay." Tom said, nodding seriously in a very fake way.
Cordelia stuck out her tongue to him, then shook her head with a pinched nose and huffed but then said normally, "I still think we should begin with a form that both of us like for ourselves and is useful to us lest we be stuck with a single form as a safety."
Tom nodded.
"I mean what we get stuck as a cat?" She began airily and Tom groaned, "Are you ever going to let that go?"
"Grow a thicker skin. It's just the two of us. It's not like I am outing you to world. And that's a payback mister, you rolled your eyes at me in front of the entire court." She said nonchalantly and then poked a finger in his chest towards the end.
"I thought you appreciated when I am candid with you." He grimaced.
"I do, but in return, I get to be candid with you too." She said, raising a brow, "And yes, I will let you live that down. It is the last time, I swear. I just like seeing you act non-smug once in a while."
"I am not smug." Tom's eyes blazoned, he particularly enhanced his 'not'.
"You are." Cordelia said, lifting a piece of parchment from another and making a small note on it. Tom just had lines on his forehead and a very unhappy expression.
She finished the note and placed the scroll back, "You have every right to be in most cases. But I was referring to Slughorn's last class."
"I was playing a role." He argued.
"Sometimes you go that far playing a role that you do not understand what is the real you and what is the role. The boundary between them is very fickle." Cordelia looked him right in the eye, "Playing roles is a part of life. We constantly play them. It is not a bad thing, but the roles are us and sometimes I feel it is better to realize that some roles are not just suited to us or what we stand for. Smugness is not necessarily bad. It's a good thing to be proud of what you are and have unless it's getting to your head. That's why we have friends who can pull us down back to ourselves when we are flying in the air."
Tom looked a bit confused.
"Like you should pull me down when I am acting all-knowing on what's life and what you should be." Cordelia bit her lip to try and control her laughter.
Tom's emotion changed and he was caught between laughing and hitting her, "Am I supposed to be amused?" He asked very calmly.
"Ahmm."She nodded, suppressing a smile.
"Is this another attempt to get me to 'appreciate' humor?" He asked, narrowing his eyes.
She again nodded playfully, biting her lips again.
Tom just stared at her, using one of his death looks.
She stopped smiling after a bit, and it quickly morphed into worried and she blurted out, "Tom, I am sorry. I didn't mean to offend you. I won't do it again." She looked quite apologetic and she hung her head in trepidation until she heard muffled laughter and she looked above to Tom's face with widened eyes.
He had his hands on his mouth, trying to control his laughter and there were tears in his eyes.
"You meanie!" Cordelia literally jumped onto his lap to hit him. Tom just grabbed her wrists and struggled until she huffed.
Cordelia was sitting right on his lap, her cheeks were tinged with pink and red, in embarrassment and anger respectively. Tom was panting by laughing too much, but his laughter gave way to light chuckles until he was just breathing heavily with a smile. Cordelia was still glaring at him.
He just pecked her cheek. She flushed more.
"I learned it from you!" He said a little smugly.
"I am not mean!" She stated indignantly.
"You are not." He agreed.
She just gave him this look, "I won't underestimate your humor again."
"Well, you would be better off if you don't." He flashed that smug smile again.
"Smug." She muttered under her breath.
Tom gave a low chuckle and mussed her hair.
"I am not a puppy!" She narrowed her eyes.
"Could have fooled me!" He continued his tirade.
"You know what, I have decided that I am a bad influence on you." She stated with her nose lifted in air and her hands folded under her breasts.
"Don't say that about my friend." He said quite seriously, repeating her line word to word from a few days ago.
"See!" She poked her finger on his nose indignantly.
Tom let out a chuckle, "Okay, okay, shall we proceed to dinner? If we leave now, we will barely make it."
She still stared at him with a suspicious expression.
"This stops when we go out of this room" He raised his hands in surrender, "Won't do it again, unless we are alone."
She suddenly gave a radiant smile, pecked him on the forehead and got off him.
"Okay, then" Tom said, not quite understanding it.
"Mood swings." She shrugged.
Tom merely raised a brow and let it die there.
Another chapter out.
My, my! Doesn't everyone in my reviews hate Siddharth! He is such a nice OC, people.
Warning: He is not going to be brotherly or friendly. He was a lover, a serious lover.
Give me one reason apart from possessiveness of Tom as to why Cordelia should not have a Harem.
But by harem, I meant harem of mates. If you go back to the interlude on mates of child of magic, you will realize that the relation does not mean that she is romantically involved with all her mates.
Also, love is of different kinds, there is passion and there is companionship. She had both with Siddharth, she will have more of it with Tom. Might not have any with her other mates!
But just because I am nice, I will give all of you a spoiler to rest your anxious mind. If I do go ahead with the arc about Siddharth entering this world, then he and Cordelia would be platonically involved only. She will rely on him, she will care for him, but Tom is too important to her. But she was involved with him before her time travel.
And by Merlin, Tom will be jealous. But big deal, he needs to deal with it. Cordelia is not his possession.
So yes, Cordelia might only have a platonic harem, but it is because she will make an active choice to prioritize Tom. Not because Tom is too jealous.
Give women some agency people!
Evelyn's pairing is already decided. It is not with any characters from future. But that is for way later if I extend this fic. Right now, I am focusing on a short period closure, maybe till the end of the fourth year. And Siddharth is not in picture for that one (except for Flashbacks), so rest easy. I might write sequels later, a very weak 'might'.
Please Review.
