2 in 1
Raven the Night Owl
"I'm sorry Lily, James but Harry is a Squib", Dumbledore's damning words rang throughout the room, punctuated by two shocked gasps. His spindly finger left little Harry's chest when he couldn't detect any magic.
Harry giggled at the Headmaster's long, white beard and curled his fingers into it, oblivious to his mother's weeping and his father's grim expression.
"W-what about Charlus?" James whispered, hoping it wasn't something wrong with him and Lily that caused this transgression.
"He will be powerful", Dumbledore declared softly as he looked at the other Potter child. He was sound asleep.
"What shall we do with Harry?" James asked as relief washed over him.
"He should be sent to a muggle orphanage" Dumbledore said, recalling how Squibs were always cast out of the family.
"No", Lily finally spoke up still sniffling slightly. "He's my child, I will raise him".
"Are you sure?" James asked, wrapping an arm around his wife.
"Yes, for now at least", Lily sighed, gazing at both her sons.
Lightning flashed, making creepy blood red eyes shine and glimmer in the light, a feral smile on the Slytherin Lord's face.
Tom Marvolo Riddle.
Voldemort.
The man glided towards the building in the distance with the intent of bloodshed. Death.
A maniacal laugh escaped his snake-like lips as he approached Godric's Hollow.
A sound of a slam alerted the house occupants that he was here. That he was here to kill.
Frantic footsteps and screaming soon followed as Lord Voldemort laughed once more. He loved screams of suffering. Panic. Pain.
He slowly glided towards the staircase where he was sure Lily, James, and both potential children of the prophecy were up.
Well, he was sure of that until he felt a small tug at his robes.
Staring at him, sitting on the first step of the staircase was a little boy of 1. He was obviously one of the Potter children.
Lord Voldemort let out a cruel smile and knelt down to face him, the full expanse and creepiness of his snake-like face on display.
The boy didn't even flinch. He just looked on in curiosity at the Dark Lord.
"Oh hello there", Lord Voldemort hissed in a quiet voice. "Did Mommy and Daddy forget you, little boy?" He mocked. "Forget to take you away from the big bad snake?"
The boy cocked his head to one side, before reaching up with a chubby hand and proceeding to poke him in the eye.
Lord Voldemort not at all expecting that, roared with anger at the pain and discomfort that a child caused him. Something that not even his best Death Eaters were able to do.
"It seemed like you have a Death Wish little boy", he seethed, taking out his wand. Pointing it right at his forehead, he whispered the words.
Avada Kadavra.
And he knew no more than pain.
That day the symbols of a lightning bolt and wave were branded on the right and left side of Harry Potter's forehead. Sowilo and Poseidon.
The entire house went crashing down. The Dark Lord was reduced to a pitiful spirit as he flew up the stairs, trying to find refuge from the pain. Flying through Charlus's cheek, he tried to use his magic to stay rooted but with no body to sustain it, he could only leave the symbol of the Dark Mark as proof that he passed through. Eventually, he fled as the destruction rang throughout the house.
Lily and James were in the hallway with their wands drawn when the house came crashing. They were frantic to search for Charlus whom they had left in the nursery behind them.
Finding and protecting him from the debris, they stood over him as a golden protego shined and shimmered around them.
Eventually it was over.
"Charlus is the Boy-who-lived", Dumbledore brushed a wrinkled finger over his cheek, detecting the vile Dark Magic in the Dark Mark there. "Look at this cut on his cheek. It is the Dark Mark. Lord Voldemort has declared him as an equal. And when the time comes, he will bring him down again".
The smile on Lily's and James's faces could have lit up an entire city.
Harry woke up to banging and shouting. It sounded happy. Excited.
Harry was confused. Just 2 minutes ago, his parent were screaming and shouting and now they were laughing.
And what about the snake man?
What happened to him?
Who was he?
He crawled out of the mountain of debris he was under using a small hole in between two stone pillars.
Harry was surprised. Since when was he strong enough for crawling? He shrugged. Whatever.
Seeing his mother's back, he tugged on her robe and she whipped around to face him. A big smile on her face.
The smile drooped slightly at the sight of him.
"Hello Harry. Can you go to your Daddy? He has a Portkey ready", Lily patted him on the head before turning away.
Cocking his head in confusion, Harry shrugged. Better go to Daddy. But why was Mommy acting like this?
Daddy was holding Charlus bouncing him on his hip. Harry liked that and wanted that too so he tugged on his Daddy's robe and when he looked down, Harry raised his arms in a universal pick-me-up gesture.
But he was once again confused when Daddy scowled at him and threw him a muggle soda can.
He was whisked away to Potter Manor before he could comprehend what happened.
PERCY WAKE UP! PERCY! Harry shouted in his head.
Alright I'm up. Stop your shouting. It's annoying Percy grumbled, opening his eye on the left side of the face.
On the faithful night of Halloween 1981, Harry and Percy weren't sure what happened.
Well, from then on, they knew that Percy's soul had joined Harry's. And then they were stuck in the same body.
They had the same thoughts. The same knowledge. The same body. The same magical reserves.
But at the same time they didn't.
For example, they shared the same brain.
Harry had eidetic memory and that meant Percy did too although the ability wasn't originally his.
Same thing with the magical reserves.
They both knew they were Percy's as Harry was a squib but Harry was able to use the reserves to the same extent.
And their face.
It had Percy's jawline and nose while they had Harry's lips and hair.
But the right eye was Harry's and the left was Percy's.
It was all very confusing. They were two different people but they were the same person.
In effect, they had the same body and mind and both could control both.
But that would get messy so they would alternate the days of who controlled what.
Today was Percy's turn to control their body.
As they got up and waddled to their kitchen, they saw red and gold party streamers and balloons every which way they looked. On the counter was a humongous white, gold, and red cake.
They knew it wasn't theirs
It said "Happy 5th birthday Charlus!"
Not Charlus and Harry.
They remembered on their 2nd birthday, Charlus had a cake and Harry and Percy had tried some of it.
But James saw and had whipped them.
Now, they didn't bother with any sort of luxury like cake and presents.
"Pippy!" They called and a small house elf popped into existence.
"Harry and Percy!" Pippy nodded at them. Pippy would have called them young masters and bowed if she could but she was ordered not to and she of course, had to obey her masters.
"Hello Pippy. May I have some breakfast?" They asked.
"Pippy will get the breakfasts, Harry and Percy", Pippy popped out.
Percy and Harry let out a small smile at the sight of their friend before dropping it as they stared at the cake.
Their mother had forgotten about their existence.
Their father treated them like dirt.
Oh well. They had each other.
So Harry. Exercise or reading first? Percy asked as they sat on the floor. They weren't allowed on the stools. There were charms or something on them that didn't let them sit
Exercise first. We'll come back inside when the party starts Harry replied.
Great. Well, I'm increasing pushups and situps. I'm undoing the glamour now to see progress Harry mentally nodded in affirmation as Pippy popped back in with cereal.
Snapping a finger, the glamour dropped, leaving two muscular arms, chest, and legs on display. If they didn't have the glamour, James would beat them for trying to be more muscular than Charlus.
But James didn't get out of bed until at least 2 hours later.
Snapping another finger, a mirror was conjured.
Pretty good but I think we should get more arm strength before we can do archery well without magic Harry mused.
Right-O. Let's go They finished up breakfast and vaporated (used water vapor in the air to apparate. It works everywhere, even through wards) outside, to their favorite and dirtiest training room. No one went to this one.
They trained until the party started.
They were in the library a minute later, looking they didn't even go outside.
Severus Snape wasn't sure what he was doing at the Potter brat's birthday party. He was forced to come on Dumbledore's orders because he was supposed to be teaching the boy potions when he was older.
Just the sight of the chubby fat thing and Severus wanted to punch him. Forget that he was Lily's child, as a five-year-old the boy was needy and spoiled, just like his father.
Wonderful.
And Lily was doing nothing to stop the boy from wanting everything and anything.
"Mommy, I want a new broom. And cake. And every candy from Honeydukes. And a wand. And a-", Severus's head hurt from the damn spawn of Satan.
"Now, Severus my boy, this is Charlus, the Boy-who-lived", Dumbledore's voice sounded as he led Severus over to the brat.
Severus wanted to bang his head on a table.
"Who are you", the boy didn't sound curious or courteous. He demanded Severus to introduce himself.
"Charlus, my boy, this is Severus Snape. And he will teach you potions when you are older", Dumbledore introduced as Snape tried hard not to sneer.
"Potions. Yuck. Don't wanna learn that", Charlus said and Lily giggled.
Severus was appalled. Lily had loved potions when she was younger. Severus himself had tutored her.
That was when he really did let out a sneer.
Dumbledore was still talking to Charlus about the importance of potions and Severus rolled his eyes. Good luck convincing him Dumbledore.
He decided to go inside. Maybe check out the Potter library. Severus heard it had an extensive amount of potions books due to Dorea being a potions mistress.
Severus wasn't sure if James threw them out or not.
Slowly walking the halls of Potter Manor, he came face to face with an oak door. Potter Library written on the door label in proud, golden letters.
He pushed the doors open.
Walking along the shelves, he made his way to the back of the room where most potions books resided and came across a black-haired green eyed boy.
He was reading two thick tomes that Severus himself had read a million times over. They included the whole list of potion ingredients and their properties from two of the potions categories. Bases and herbs.
He watched the boy. He seemed to be around five-years-old and looked a lot like James Potter. But he had Lily's green eyes.
Eyes.
His eyes were the oddest thing. They weren't in synch with each other. It was obvious that the boy read a lot by the speed the eyes were going but the eye on the right read faster and practically flew across the page while the one on the left read slightly slower.
The boy started pointing at the text as if telling someone about what he was reading. But he didn't open his mouth.
Severus was intrigued by this odd boy.
He walked over to him and just stood there, watching.
After about 5 minutes, the boy mumbled, "I know you're there" not even lifting his eyes off the page.
Severus was sort of startled and so came the unintelligent question of "How?".
"Wards. I'm heir so I can ask the wards who is where. Everyone except you is at the party right now", the boy spoke eloquently for a five-year-old and Severus was kind of impressed. Though he was even more impressed that the boy was reading such thick books.
"So what can I help you with?" The boy bookmarked his page on the tomes and looked up at Severus.
He almost gasped. The boy's eyes were different colors!
Sure they were both green but one was a swirling mess of blue and green while the other was the color of Avada Kadavra.
"Sorry about that sir. I have an eye disorder", the boy said. "the glamour charm doesn't work on my eyes".
Severus was startled, "You know the glamour charm?".
The boy shook his head, "No, I ask the house elves and they aren't able to glamour them".
Severus nodded. That made sense.
"I'm Harry Potter", he stood up and held out his hand to shake.
"Severus Snape", Severus clasped Harry's tiny hand. He vaguely remembered the Potters having twins at birth. He wondered why this one wasn't at the party.
"Severus Snape? The youngest potions master in the last century?" Harry sounded excited. Severus was startled. He was not at all used to that.
"I suppose", he replied.
"May I ask you a question professor?" Harry asked, looking even more enthused.
"I suppose", he said again.
"Sir, do you think that the water base for potions would be more stable if you were to use Aquamenti rather than using the tap? Would the potion only be effective for the person who cast the Aquamenti because it has their magical signature? Or would it only be effective for those who had the same core as the caster with gray cores as middle ground?"
Severus opened his mouth to answer before snapping it closed. Huh, he never thought about that. Magic would theoretically make potions stronger. But light magic with a dark core could potentially kill the person consuming. And vice versa.
He'd have to test this theory.
Severus looked at the black-haired boy with wonder.
"I believe so. Theoretically. I will have to test it when I am back in my potions lab", Severus was slightly excited at this prospect of testing this theory but kept up a cool exterior.
"Please owl the results sir!", the boy exclaimed happily.
"Of course", Severus let out a ghost of a smile.
He had testing to do.
I wish I had access to a potions lab, Perce Harry sighed.
Me too, Harry. Me too Percy watched the professor leave through the doors of Potter Library.
Percy opened up the books for them and shot a translator spell on his tome, watching the scrambled letters morph into Greek.
He tapped a tune on his knee.
RNL