Author's Note: I'm going to tweak a bit with birthdays and time and dates for the purposes of my story, so please don't dwell on the many errors I'll probably make with dates and such. Some of the contents of this chapter might be a little disturbing and deals with references of physical abuse and character deaths. Please review I will appreciate praise and constructive criticism equally and if you have any suggestions or questions please let me know.
AN/ I do not own anything all characters and the world of Harry Potter belong to J.K Rowling. Not Mine::weeps:
Meadows Farm House, Wiltshire.
Dorcas Meadows wept with happiness, it was over at last. As the first rays of the morning sunlight broke through her window its golden rays shone on the face of her first-born daughter. Poppy leaned over mother and daughter fussing and making sure both were healthy and fine. The door to the bright room cracked open and Gideon peered round the frame. Poppy nodded and he came in, carrying a small wrapped package.
"Dorcas?.. He stopped, her beauty was heartbreaking to behold and he was sure that he had never seen a more breathtaking site than his love and their new daughter.
"Oh Gideon, isn't she wonderful, so bright and I swear she's smiling already!" She exclaimed. He moved closer and tentatively touched the soft rose petal cheek. Huge honey coloured eyes looked up at him glowing with intelligence and light.
"Well love, with your brains and beauty and my brains she'll be unstoppable. She almost looks as though she recognises us already." Gideon smiled and sat down his expression turning graver.
"Dear heart, there's been another attack, the McKinnon's, the whole family, dead, I've been called by the Order, they're still asking for you. It's becoming harder to palm them off with more excuses for your absence. Dumbledore keeps asking if there's something I want to tell him, he knows something is going on, but what… I'm not certain. Fabian and I have a mission tonight, I can't go into detail…. But if we're caught…" the words hung in the air like the blade of the guillotine. Dorcas' eyes welled with tears.
"Will this never be over? Are we not allowed even one moment of joy? I.. I won't think of it, lets just spend the hours we have, no more war or death just us, our family."
He nodded in agreement and turned to hold her and their daughter close to him.
"What shall we name her?" Gideon asked.
"I think, after my great grandmother, she was quite the character. She was always playing and talking with us when I was young. The stories she told us were always so powerful, she gave me belief in myself, her name was Hermione."
"Hermione Janica Meadows Prewett, Such a big name for such a tiny witch, do you know, I rather think she'll grow into it nicely."
So together the family sat dreaming of a future that they would never have, a daughter that would never be told of and a prophecy that only two people knew of.
Knockturn Alley
"Fabian, NO!" Gideon cried as he ran, casting hexes and repelling curses, to his brother's body.
"Enough of this lets finish it" a cold voice spoke from behind him. And as Gideon Prewett tried valiantly to save himself from the remaining two death eaters, Antonin Dolohov cast the final curse.
"Avada Kedavra!" A narrow beam of green light, shot from his wand and struck the last Prewett brother in the chest. He fell beside his brother eyes glassy, but glistening with a final tear for all that might have been.
Seven weeks later:
Dorcas Meadows looked on the sleeping face of her child, knowing that it might be the last time she ever saw her. But she felt reassured, that was she captured before she reached Dumbledore, then the information on how to finally destroy the Dark Lord would live on.
Her work for the Order of the Phoenix had been a closely guarded secret, one of the brightest witches of her time she excelled at arithmancy and charms. Dumbledore had known that with her amazing mind for research, she was the only one he could entrust with the knowledge of the horcruxes.
At that time, trying to find a way of working round the ancient magic, she knew that even without them to support him, and his immortality, that he could still come back if he could possess another's body.
Her mission had been what many would have deemed impossible, to create a curse so powerful, that not only could it kill the body, but also separate and destroy the soul in order to ensure that it could not seek another place to reside. From all the intelligence that they had been gathering, she had been working on a curse that would defeat the Dark lord once the final Horcrux had been destroyed.
And right at this very minute she had the information in her hands. A newly created curse, one so powerful that it could destroy a soul, sever it from existence and obliterate it as though it had never been, it was a terrible curse, it made her sick just thinking of it. But it would rid the world of him forever, If they could only find the horcruxes they could end the war.
Gathering her things she was just about to floo Poppy to baby-sit while she went to meet in secret with Dumbledore. Closing the nursery door and casting a silencing charm on the room to prevent any noise waking little Hermione, she went down the stairs.
A coldness crept into her veins as she entered the kitchen. Her breath caught in her throat and her heart skipped about under her ribcage as her greatest fears entered into her consciousness. HE was there, she could feel him, a cold hand came down on her shoulder.
"Dearest Dorcas, how lovely to find you once more. How cruel to have forgotten to forward your new address to me. I think you would have remembered to let all your family know where you are?" Dorcas whipped round her long curly hair flaring in the firelight like molten gold.
"How did you find me Tom?" She asked trying to keep her mind closed and locked against his. He glared at her menacingly and stepped closer; raising her wand she directed it at herself and did the only thing she could think of.
"Obliviate!"
All the memories of the spells she had found were gone and while he was casting crucio on her she managed to lock away in her mind her most precious memory, Hermione.
Lord Voldemort, once know as Tom Riddle raged at his whimpering cousin. Finally letting her free of the curse he pointed his wand at her once more.
"Now I put an end to the last of my mother's family. Your great pure blood line ends here."
"Avada Kedavra" Then Dorcas Meadows was no more, her last thought of her child and the fervent wish that she not be found.
Voldemort pressed the mark on his arm. Two of his most loyal Death Eaters appeared before him.
"Search the house, find what she was working on, and destroy all the evidence. Bring this house to the ground!"
Lucius Malfoy turned to his friend. "Well, shall we see what the little blood traitor was up to?" Malfoy sneered at Severus, ordering him to check up stairs.
Severus was shaking on the inside, he knew her work was important and some how Voldemort had found her location and killed her. How was it even possible? There must be a spy with in the Order, but who? Scanning the first room and bathroom he found nothing, turning he caught sight of a light coming from under the last door. Pulling his wand he entered the room, his eyes widening in disbelief. In a wooden cot lay a small child. Her halo of honey gold curls glinted in the candlelight, she was perhaps two months old but no more. It all suddenly made sense, she had been pregnant and hiding the child from everyone, now she was gone and this nameless little girl had no one. A pop behind him startled him into action, he pivoted round ready to hex whoever it was into oblivion when he realised it was a house elf. A very, very old house elf.
"What is dark man wanting with child of light?" it asked suspiciously.
Severus narrowed his eyes he did not have time for this.
"Listen carefully, I will say this only once. Your mistress has been killed and no one knows of the child. I will take her and place her somewhere safe, but you must tell no one of this not even under torture or pain of death. Do you understand me?"
The elf looked deep into his, yes this one would protect the little miss, what other choice did she have. Gathering her courage she pulled herself up to her full 3 foot and 1 inch and replied.
"I is understanding you, but you must be understanding me also. Little miss very special child and mistress left the key to the darkest ones defeat in her. Hide her where they will never find her until the time comes, her name is Hermione Janica Meadows Prewett. I will distract the other dark one, you must be getting little miss away, now!"
With a pop the elf vanished and he could hear the sound of house elf wailing at its worst from down stairs. Snatching the child into his arms he cradled her gently and apperated to a muggle town. A dark location charm later and he had found a house where a small sickly female child had just been born and died.
Jane Gallagher cradled her lifeless daughter in her arms wondering how it could have happened like this. Her daughter should have been born next week. In a pool of her own blood and birth water she cried and screamed, no one to hear her in the cold lifeless night. Her worthless husband had beaten her to a bloody pulp after throwing her down the stairs earlier that night. The bleeding had started almost right away and the pain had made her feel as though she was being ripped in two. He'd locked her in a room and left the house. At that moment she wanted nothing more than to kill the bastard and gain her revenge for the death of their daughter. Too weak to stand, she battered her hands against the door, knowing it was useless and that no one would hear her. Their house was too far from any others and off a quiet country lane. Her own death she knew would come soon, a cold was creeping into her muscles, her life flowing from her. But at that moment nothing was colder than her heart. I'd make a deal with the devil himself to make that bastard pay, she thought hungrily.
Then as though he'd answered her request a loud crack sounded in the room and a glowing light appeared. A man in black robes and silver mask stood by her an unreadable expression on his lips. He slipped off the mask and knelt beside her.
Half delirious she whispered to him. "Make him pay for killing my baby, make him suffer and you can have my soul."
"That madam, we will discuss once we have you cleaned up."
His clipped tones and emotionless voice snapped her from her haze of anger and pain.
Muttering cleaning charms under his breath, Severus levitated her upstairs onto the bed then pulled some vials from his robes, urging her to take the healing and blood replenishing potions. Taking the small lifeless body of her child he carefully wrapped the body in a blanket and carried it to her.
"Your child is dead. But I have an offer to make you right now. I cannot change what has occurred but I can grant your request of revenge if you can grant me one favor."
Jane's eyes widened in astonishment and fear. This, was no dream, it was real. She nodded urging him to continue.
"What I am about to tell you, can never pass from this room until the time is right. I am a wizard. My kind exist hidden from the eyes of your own kind and right now we are in a great war. I cannot convey to you how important the boon I request of you now is. Only know this, a woman was murdered tonight and her child that no one knew of, is in great danger. This child will one day perhaps have the means to dispel the dark forever from this world, but she must be protected and hidden. That is why I found you tonight. In return for destroying your husband you must take this child and raise her as your own, no one can ever know the truth. What is your answer?"
Jane eyed him numbly. Her baby was dead, but he offered to replace her. Her husband was a murderer; he offered to give her revenge. If he had not come here, she too would be dead right now.
"What about my baby…"
"I will bury her wherever you request and no questions will ever be asked."
She nodded her head, then glanced around at the sound of a light cry.
In a small basket by the dresser under the window, a tiny bundle squirmed and cried.
He crossed to it and lifted it. Holding the small child close and muttering soothing sounds she was shocked at his quick change in character. He brought the baby to her and laid her in her arms.
Despite the grief and pain of her own loss, her heart went out to the tiny infant in her arms. Surely it was only right. This night she had lost a daughter and this baby her mother. Hermione quieted at the familiar smell of flowers surrounding the woman and closed her eyes in contentment.
"The graveyard on the other side of town, my sister is buried there…" Jane trailed off, the tall man nodded in understanding.
"The name? He enquired.
"Larkin."
"And your husband, do you have a picture?"
"Living room mantle piece, wedding photo."
"Very well, perhaps we shall meet again, if not, protect her, let no harm come to her and when the owl comes tapping, make sure she comes, it is her birth right."
Not quite understanding what he meant she nodded anyway, he whirled around and carefully picked up her poor lifeless child.
"Wait!" She cried, "her name, what is her name"
"Hermione Janica…. And do not worry about your healers, call them now and let them know you have given birth, a small deceiving charm upon her will make them think she is newly born, it will wear off in a few months." With that there was a loud crack and he was gone once more. The door was open and Jane Gallagher gathered her baby close and made her way to the phone.
If people ever whispered about the tragedy that 19th of September, they only ever knew that poor Jane had given birth at home while her husband was in a terrible car crash that eventually, after six long months, took his life. If people whispered again three months later when she remarried to Keith Granger the local dentist, it was only to say that poor Jane had to have someone there for her, to help her with that poor child. The whispers were eventfully lost when less than a year later the dentist and his wife moved clear across the country and poor Jane and her poor baby were forgotten.