Summary: Harry Potter is just an eccentric school boy with some unusual talents. Lord Peverell-Black, on the other hand, is a magically and politically powerful man with the world at his fingertips and a war at his doorstep. [Time travel, no pairings.]

Shards of Time: The Master of Death

Chapter I
The Zoo

"You have to accept the past to change the future." - unknown

"Up! Get up! Now!"

Panting harshly, Harry stared wide-eyed at the the door that was the source of the thumping that had been ringing in his ears. He nearly jumped when, after a pause, it was rapped on again.

"Up!" the voice on the other side screeched again.

Harry just continued to stare at the door, eyes wide and mouth gapping. He knew that voice. He'd heard it all of his life, except for the past year.

His heart starting to pound, Harry slowly moved his head to survey the small space that he was in, and instantly recognized it. How could he not? It had been his room for the first half of his life. It was the cupboard under the stairs.

Harry closed his eyes tightly, blocking out the familiar sight of the dusty corners and fighting the hysteria building within him. No! This wasn't possible! His mind scrambled around for some kind of an explanation to this madness—after all, he'd been away from the Dursley's household for at least a year and hadn't been in the cupboard for nearly seven years.

The last thing that Harry could fully remember was being hit by the killing curse. Bloody hell, that was weird to even think—being hit by the killing curse. After that, everything was kind of fuzzy. He remembered the white...space...but that seemed like such a fanciful, unrealistic dream, and he had only been there a few seconds ago! Or at least it felt like a few seconds. Considering that he'd blacked out and woken up in here, it could have just as well been a century.

But if he'd been hit with the killing curse...Was he dead? He certainly hadn't expected to live past his stupid stunt. If he was then this must be hell. But then again...If it really was hell, then why was it "starting" just before he left the Dursleys instead of when he was younger? It didn't make any sense at all...

Unwilling to follow that train of thought, Harry reached out once more, and his hands felt the old wood that created the opening to his childhood prison. Cobwebs sat in the back corners of the space, familiar old toys and papers littering the floor, and small shelves were built into the wall. Below these was a small pile of child's clothing.

Suddenly Harry became aware that his aunt was standing outside the door again. "Are you up yet?" she demanded once again banging on the door to his old room. Dust from the stairs fell on his head as someone up above stomped their way down.

"Nearly," Harry replied weakly, his mind reeling.

"Well get a move on, I want you to look after the bacon. And don't you dare let it burn, I want everything to be perfect on Duddy's birthday."

Harry couldn't help the choked noise that escaped his throat. Merlin, he hadn't heard that nickname in so long. Not since he was a kid. Just how old was he? Obviously he had to be fairly young; he wouldn't be able to fit into the cupboard otherwise.

"What did you say?" his aunt snapped through the door.

"Nothing, nothing..." Harry replied quickly.

Hesitantly, Harry shifted so that he was on his knees and then moved over to the door. He paused with his hand on the old golden handle, staring down at the small, bony hand that belonged to him. It fit so easily on the worn handle that the door almost seemed giant next him. Taking a deep breath, he turned the handle and stepped outside.

The hall that ran the length of the house looked just as it always had, Harry noted. He slowly walked along it toward the kitchen, his mind still in turmoil. He half expected to wake up at any moment, either to death or to Voldemort and his group of Death Eaters. Nothing happened as he walked though, and after only a moment he reached the kitchen.

Inside, the usually bare kitchen table was almost completely hidden beneath all of Dudley's bright wrapped birthday presents. Among them Harry noticed a new computer, television, and racing bike.

Eleven. Harry sudden realized. He was eleven. Or at least nearly eleven; Dudley had received his racing bike on his eleventh birthday. Why Harry could remember this was a complete mystery to him, but it helped out nonetheless.

Harry easily slipped back into the routine that he'd lived by almost all of his life as he stepped up to the stove and gripped onto the frying pan and began to turn over the bacon. It'd been a while since he'd last really cooked, but some things you just don't forget.

It was, of course, at that moment that his Uncle Vernon entered the kitchen.

"Comb your hair!" he barked by way of morning greeting.

Harry just continued to silently turn over the bacon. The greeting didn't even sound strange to him, so used to it he'd been. For a moment he could almost believe that he really was just eleven and that his time at Hogwarts had never existed.

Abruptly a cold fear gripped Harry and he swallowed thickly. What if it had just been a dream? What if magic didn't really exist? If Hogwarts didn't really exist? If everyone had really just been...

It was only when Harry felt himself breathe in sharply, lungs burning, that he realized that he hadn't been breathing. Carefully, he relaxed the iron grip that he had on the frying pan and turned his attention back on the bacon even as his wild thoughts flew through his head.

No, he thought franticly, it couldn't be a dream. There was no way that he could dream up all that. There was no way that he could dream up a full seven years of his life—he just wasn't that creative, or desperate. Besides if he ever needed to dream how his life could have been, why make it so every year was shadowed with peril and danger? He wasn't masochistic.

As Harry's thoughts trailed off, he fell back into the monotony of cooking. He didn't think—didn't want to think, honestly. He just worked on breakfast, quietly taking in the sounds of activity around him. He didn't know what to think about his situation right now so, quite simply, he wouldn't think of anything at all.

Once he was done with both the bacon and the eggs, Harry carried the plates to the table. By now Dudley had already arrived and was in an argument with his parents, though a rather one sided one, as his parents always did anything to appease him. He was whining loudly about the number of his presents, saying that there was one less than last year. Harry had to stop himself from rolling his eyes.

Suddenly, when Dudley was half way through unwrapping the presents, Aunt Petunia entered the room looking both angry and worried. Harry gave a start upon seeing her; he'd been so out of it that he hadn't even noticed her leave the room in the first place.

"Bad news, Vernon," she said roughly. "Mrs. Figg's broken her leg. She can't take him." She jerked her head in Harry's direction. "Now what?" she continued after a pause.

"We could phone Marge," Uncle Vernon suggested.

"Don't be silly, Vernon, she hates the boy."

"What about what's-her-name, your friend—Yvonne?"

From there, Harry tuned out his relatives conversation. He vaguely remembered that something important had happened on Dudley's eleventh birthday, but because of the excitement surrounding his own birthday that year, it was all kind of blurry. It couldn't have been too important though, if he really couldn't remember it.

When Harry looked up again, he saw that Dudley had begun to cry shrilly. He wasn't really crying of course—it was that fake, wailing cry that he'd used to get whatever he wanted when he was younger.

Of course, Aunt Petunia immediately fell for it. "Dinky Duddydums, don't cry, Mummy won't let him spoil your special day!" she cried, flinging her arms around him.

"I...don't...want...him...t-t-to come!" Dudley yelled between huge, pretend sobs. "He always sp-spoils everything!" He shot Harry a nasty grin through the gap in his mother's arms.

Offhandedly, Harry wondered if Dudley had really been this immature when he was younger—he couldn't quite remember. The image of his cousin that he had stuck in his head was of the mature Dudley that had said goodbye to him just before he'd left the Dursley's permanently.

Just then, the doorbell rang—"Oh, good Lord, they're here!" said Aunt Petunia frantically—and a moment later, Dudley's best friend, Piers Polkiss, walked in with his mother. Dudley stopped pretending to cry at once.

Half an hour later found Harry sitting in the back of the Dursley's car with Piers and Dudley, on the way to the zoo. Harry rested his head against the cool glass of the car window and proceeded to zone out once more.

It was a very sunny day and the zoo was crowded with families. As they walked along Harry could hazily remember coming here before, though it definitely didn't stand out in his mind. They spent hours just walking around, staring at the animals, and then, after eating lunch, they went into the reptile house.

As Harry shivered in the dampness of the dark building, he felt something tugging at the corners of his memories. Attempting to remember, he watched as Dudley and Piers knocked on the glass of the cage of the largest snake in the place. Harry waited until the two got bored with the unresponsive snake and left before heading over to the tank himself.

As soon as he laid eyes on the snake, a memory of Harry's came rushing back to him. This was the first snake that he'd ever talked to! He'd even made the glass of the tank vanish and set the snake free.

As Harry stared at the snake it suddenly opened its beady eyes. Slowly, very slowly, it raised its head until its eyes were on level with Harry's. Then it winked and Harry couldn't help but grin in reply. He had the urge to look around to make sure that no one was watching, but he already knew that no one was.

Harry leaned forward, closer to the glass. "I bet you'd like to get out of here," he murmured in parsletongue. At the same time he glanced over at the sign next to the tank that read: This specimen was bred in the zoo.

The boa constrictor titled its head slightly, studying Harry, and then slowly nodded its head.

Harry opened his mouth to speak further, when suddenly a deafening shout came from behind him. "DUDLEY! MR. DURSLEY! COME AND LOOK AT THIS SNAKE! YOU WON'T BELIEVE WHAT IT'S DOING!"

Dudley came waddling toward them as fast as he could.

"Out of the way, you," he said, punching Harry in the ribs. Not expecting the blow from his cousin, Harry was caught by surprise and fell hard onto the concrete floor. Instantly, Harry felt feelings of annoyance bubbling up within him. Before he could rein the emotions in however, he felt his magic raise up, wilder than he could ever remember it being. The effects were instantaneous—one second, Piers and Dudley were leaning right up close to the glass, the next they had leapt back with howls of horror.

As soon as this occurred people started screaming and leaping away as the great snake uncoiled itself rapidly and slithered out onto the floor. The snake stopped in front of Harry, raising his head up to the boy's eye level. Understanding the snake's questioning gaze, Harry spoke rapidly in parsletongue.

"Follow my scent out to the parking lot. Get onto the car there, but keep out of sight."

The snake nodded its head once more and then quickly moved out of the building and into the shadows.

Harry was locked in his cupboard with the punishment of no meals. Normally he'd be annoyed and hungry, but he wasn't at the moment. No, instead there was small smile plastered across his face.

After returning to the Dursleys—for he didn't think that he could ever really call it home—Harry had managed to get a quick word into the boa constrictor that had managed to wrap itself around the exhaust pipe under the car. It was now hanging out under the house, waiting until Harry could talk to it. And Harry knew that he would as soon as he had the chance. He'd wondered what had happened to it originally, and now he had a chance to help it.

Harry's mind was once again racing, but he was no longer as confused as he'd been before. After the whole zoo fiasco and the reassurance that he had his parsletongue abilities, Harry had started to really think about what was happening to him.

Harry knew that it was definitely real and he was pretty sure that it wasn't death. The closest thing that he could relate it to was his experience with a time turner during his third year. The only difference was that he was younger instead of having a younger counterpart running about. Still, it was the only real idea that he had, so Harry latched onto it.

And indeed, the idea that he could be in the past made Harry almost giddy. It was just the idea that he could change things, could make things turn out differently. All the needless deaths didn't have to happen. Voldemort didn't have to return. He could stop it all. He'd never considered the possibility of changing the past before, but now that such an idea was laid out before him, it seemed too obvious.

And now all he had to do was wait for his Hogwarts letter to come.

A/N: No, the snake isn't going to become Harry's familiar like you see in so many stories—it won't even be his pet for, that matter. I have important plans for that snake; you'll see.

And as for the Death scene in the prologue: Death will be a very important character. However, you won't get to see him again, nor understand what he was talking about in terms of "owing" Harry, for quite a while yet.

Other than that, not much happened in this chapter and it hasn't diverged from canon much yet...This was more of a "setting up" chapter than anything else. The next one should prove to be much more interesting, and it'll also be a fair bit longer.

Please review to let me know what you think!

[Shi]