Title: The Boys Who Lived

Author: Shara Lunison

Beta: Batsutousai

Rating for this Chapter: T

Pairings: Harry/Henry (OMC), several others—none of them canon
Warnings: SLASH, eventual twincest, slightly manipulative!Dumbledore, grey Harry/Henry, OoC-ness, others as I think of them.

Summary: The Potter twins are attacked by Voldemort and somehow defeat him. Now the Dark Lord has returned and they have to choose between light and dark. SLASH, Twincest, rated M for later chapters.

Disclaim Her: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.

A/N: MUWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! (Sorry it's so late.)

Chapter Twenty-One: Return to the Chamber of Secrets

The twins were woken the next morning by raised voices down in the pub. Pounding footsteps quickly followed, and they recognized the speakers with some surprise.

"Severus! Don't blame this on them! Albus would have figured things out on his own eventually."

"But not so soon," their former professor growled darkly. "It was essential to our plans to be within Hogwarts this year, and now we will have to make new arrangements."

The door to their room was thrown open, and they scrambled out of bed as Snape glared at them, his dark ebony wand held in a deceptively light grip.

Time seemed to pause for a moment as they all stared at one another, and then the wand was raised and leveled at them, as Snape cried, "Crucio!" He held the curse for ten seconds, then twenty, then thirty—at last Abe couldn't stand to hear their screams any more and lowered Snape's wand forcibly to his side.

"Enough!" Abe roared, "You have punished them, now leave them be."

The twins clutched at each other and stared up at Snape from where they lay, limp and exhausted, on the floor.

The dark-haired man calmly pulled the chair away from the small table in the room and sat, crossing his legs and staring at them. "Leave us," he ordered Abe.

"But…"

"Now."

With a sigh, the bartender gave an apologetic glance at the twins and then left the room, closing the door behind him.

"So he is a supporter," Henry croaked softly.

Snape sneered. "You brats have cost me my job, and a position of much influence to boot. The Dark Lord has decided to use you where I would have sufficed. You may consider his orders further punishment for your transgressions."

Harry sighed and shakily pulled himself up into a sitting position, leaning heavily on the edge of the bed. "Dumbledore will expel us if the Dark Lord uses us inside the school."

Snape's lips thinned. "That is why you must not get caught. My master is not foolish enough to order either of you to murder or harm the students or the old fool. What he wanted me to do is far simpler, and something that you will actually have an easier time doing than even I."

Harry helped his brother to sit up as well. "And what is that?" he asked.

The man smiled nastily at them. "Recruit the students to his cause. I have been molding the Slytherins for years—we have already won the majority of them—but the other houses are still strongly under Dumbledore's thumb. You will work on them, wear them down, and turn them to the Dark Lord."

"And if we don't?" Henry asked defiantly.

"Crucio," Snape answered calmly.

When the curse was released again, Harry raised his chin defiantly at the Potions Master. "No matter how much you torture us, we won't do as you ask."

"Then I will have to try something else, won't I?" Snape decided. "Imperio."

Harry suddenly felt all of his worries fly out the window. The thin early morning light coming through the window into their room was especially pretty this morning. A little voice whispered in his ear, and he likened it to a bird, telling him to crawl forward and lick the shoes of the dark-haired man sitting in front of him.

Why not? he thought. But his own mind answered him. I don't really feel like licking shoes today. Who does he think he is, anyway?

With a frown, Harry put one hand forward, preparing to crawl, but the voice held him back. Harry Potter doesn't lick anyone's shoes.

"Lick them yourself, Snape," Harry snapped, breaking the spell and settling back into his seated position against the side of the bed.

The man's eyes widened in disbelief, before he closed them and shook his head. "Unbelievable," he muttered. "Only you could break the Imperious Curse at the age of thirteen, Mr. Potter." He sighed and stood. "I will have to discuss your resistance with the Dark Lord, you realize. He will not…be pleased."

Henry nodded silently, knowing that their days may be numbered or that they would soon be called to 'visit' Voldemort.

"Sir?" Harry asked as Snape turned to leave.

He paused, and half-turned to raise an eyebrow at them.

"You said that we could ask our questions when we had had time to think about things. When are you going to allow us to do so?"

"I am surprised you still have questions, considering how free Albus recently seems to be with information. Abe told us that you know of the prophecy. Albus has also clearly revealed his manipulations to you, if he has admitted to being prepared to expel you should the Dark Lord use you within the school. What else could you want to ask of me?"

The twins exchanged a glance, and Henry spoke. "You said that during the first war, Voldemort was a good leader, almost sane enough to actually follow his ideals to reach a set goal. But then he made too many horcruxes, and lost his sanity. But what was he fighting for? What made you follow him, and bring him back to let him try again?"

"Ah." Snape spun fully towards them elegantly and resumed his seat in the chair. "In the first war, his goals were simple. He began to gain followers, purebloods and even some halfbloods, so that he could make a bid for the Ministry. Tom wasn't satisfied by the thought of rising from within the Ministry ranks to become Minister of Magic—he took the idea of campaigning for the position from the Muggles he grew up with, and gained a large amount of support in the process. There was no killing, no fighting during this period. It was purely a political war."

"But then, why did he make the horcruxes?" Harry asked.

"Tom created his first horcrux, the diary, when he was sixteen. I am not entirely sure why, but he has always been obsessed with living forever. There is something very tangible and alarming that he fears from death. I do not know what, or why. But losing half of his soul was not enough for him to go completely mad. His campaign reached its peak, and then out of the blue came Albus Dumbledore and his Order of the Phoenix, to counter Tom and his followers, who were not yet known as Death Eaters. With one speech, Albus undermined the years of hard work that Tom had put into his political career. He told the world that Tom was a deranged, power-hungry madman, bent on destroying the wizarding world once he became Minister. This speech is also where the tales of his hatred of Muggles and muggleborns came from. Part of Tom's campaign was for the complete sealing off of the magical world. No marriage would be allowed with muggles, nor would muggleborns be allowed to remain with non-magical parents. He lobbied repeatedly with the Wizengamot for the creation of an orphanage for wizarding children, so that those like himself would never be persecuted for being what they are."

"It's just like Ariana said," Harry whispered, "Dumbledore is responsible for creating Voldemort."

"Yes," Snape nodded sadly. "They fought a wizard's duel, Tom seeking to refute Dumbledore's claims. Tom lost. Badly. It was immediately after this that he began to travel the world and created more horcruxes, and lost more of his sanity. He returned a few years later to apply for the DADA position at Hogwarts, but of course Albus refused him. So he gathered his followers once more, and declared war on the Ministry and Dumbledore. The rest you should have gleaned from conversations with others over the past several years."

"So what will he do now that he has returned and is more sane?" Henry asked scathingly, not buying the story completely. "He certainly hasn't gone back to seeking political power, nor using his followers to find him support in the Ministry. He's going to continue his little war with Dumbledore, while the Ministry and the rest of the wizarding world gets caught in between and suffers for it."

"Indeed," Snape said softly. "I wish I could tell you differently. I joined him during the first war, after he had lost most of his sanity. But I listened to the older followers, and I learned of what Tom Riddle had once been. That is the reason I brought him back—in the hope that his ideals might be upheld once more. I may yet be proven wrong."

With that, he stood and calmly stalked from the room, leaving two thoughtful boys behind him.

The Dark Lord held two more meetings over the next few weeks, but did not call the boys to punish or kill them. They began to behave in a slightly standoffish manner towards Abe, knowing now that they truly couldn't trust him with their secrets no matter how kind and helpful he might seem. July bled into August, still with no word from the school about whether the twins would be requested to lead a team into the Chamber. The Daily Prophet now posted nearly daily inquiries into the status of the school, and everyone was wondering if school would happen at all.

But then, early in the afternoon a week before school should have started, a red-robed auror arrived at the Hog's Head to "escort" Messirs Potter to the school to lead the Ministry officials to the Chamber and open any doors that might require parseltongue.

The man was a lower level auror, so when he saw the Dark Mark branded into Henry's face and the matching scar on Harry's, he panicked and placed them both under magical bindings before frog-marching them up to the castle.

A very tall woman in the same red robes, this time with a thick band of black around the collar, sleeves, and hem, watched them approach and immediately berated the Auror in question as he led the twins to the group.

"Savage!" she cried, adjusting a monocle in her left eye. "What is the meaning of this? I told you to escort them, not bind them and bring them under wand like prisoners!"

Savage grimaced and motioned them forward with his wand so that this woman, who was clearly in charge, could see the Mark on their faces.

"Dear Merlin…" she breathed, and the monocle fell down on its chain as her face relaxed too much to hold it in place.

The other aurors chose that moment to gather round and there were many shocked faces and many filled with fear, but a few held anger and betrayal.

One man stepped forward belligerently and pointed at them in accusation, "But you're supposed to be the Boys Who Lived! The Chosen Ones who will fight He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named! How could you join that murdering traitor? How did you even get the Mark?"

"It wasn't by choice, I can assure you," Henry said drily.

"Not helping, Hen!" Harry hissed out of the corner of his mouth.

Dumbledore had, of course, been attempting to spread word that the Dark Lord had returned, but not many had believed him, least of all the Ministry. The woman in charge looked at them with speculation, and held up a hand for silence when the man took breath for another rush of blame.

"Perhaps we should actually hear how this happened before we go pointing any fingers, shall we?" It was phrased like a question but was unmistakably an order. "Release them at once, Savage. They're children, not monsters."

There was a general muttering of denial behind her, but one piercing glance over her shoulder shut them all up.

Turning back to the twins, she replaced her monocle in her left eye and leaned a little closer to study the marks in more detail. "Now," she said with satisfaction, "my name is Amelia Bones, and I am the head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Perhaps you would relate the tale of how this happened to you."

Harry sighed. "As if you'll believe us."

"Try me," Amelia said drily.

His lips thinned and he raised his chin a little bit at the challenge. Looking her squarely in the eye the entire time he spoke, he said, "First Severus Snape collected us from the Hog's Head and apparated us to Malfoy Manor where we met Voldemort. He wanted to know which one of us he had originally attacked when we were children, and figured out that it was Henry. Then he gave Henry the Dark Mark on his face, and I received an echo of it through our bond. Snape returned us to the Hog's Head and now we have screaming fits every time Voldemort holds a Death Eater meeting. Oh, and dare I mention that because we have been marked like this we are no longer the so-called 'Chosen Ones'?"

He took entirely too much enjoyment out of watching them flinch every time he said the Dark Lord's name. Let them. When they truly believed that he had returned, perhaps they would grow spines instead of cowering away as they did now.

A stunned silence met his little speech, and Madam Bones herself appeared stunned.

"That's ridiculous!" the same belligerent Auror exclaimed, but Amelia turned and shook her head at him.

"I believe, Proudfoot, that he was telling nothing but the unadulterated truth."

"B-but that means…"

"That You-Know-Who has returned, just as Albus has been trying to tell everyone for these past several months. How can you deny the proof that is before your very eyes? Neither Harry nor Henry Potter was sporting a Dark Mark on their face before the end of the school year, you helped escort them from the school yourself. And now there it is, for all the world to see. Only You-Know-Who knows the spell for the Mark, so what other explanation is there?"

"One of the Death Eaters could have learned the spell and is trying to cause a panic by making everyone think You-Know-Who is back…?"

"That sounds like a question, Proudfoot," Amelia said sternly. "And if you are that unsure of your answer, then even you, stubborn as you are being, believe that I am right." She turned back to the twins. "So. I will deal with the details of You-Know-Who's return later. Right now we have a job to do and a school to make safe. There is only one week until term begins and no one has even been able to buy their supplies. Please, Messirs Potter, do show us the way. Savage, Proudfoot, you will form an advance guard and use your mirrors to check that the hallways are clear before we pass."

The two Aurors and the twins glowered at one another for a moment before Henry spoke. "The entrance is in the girl's loo on the second floor."

"The girl's loo?" a tall black man asked incredulously.

"Yes," Henry said, deadly serious.

"Oh."

They made their way by taking the large double staircase at the back of the Great Hall and followed the long hall that led to the door to the girl's bathroom.

"Hang on," a young-looking witch with pink hair exclaimed, "we're not going to Myrtle's bathroom, are we?"

"What do you think killed her fifty years ago?" Harry asked sarcastically. "Hagrid's acromantula?"

Her jaw gaped open for a moment before snapping shut abruptly. For that was exactly what the Ministry had thought at the time, and the half-giant had been expelled for it.

The armed group swarmed into the bathroom, and Harry approached the sink that would reveal the entrance. "Open," he hissed, ignoring the sharp gasps from the assembled Aurors. Honestly, you'd think they would have been briefed to expect the snake language before coming here. After the various pieces of the sinks had separated and sunk down into the hole, he pulled Henry onto one of the plinths with him and directed the Aurors to do the same. When everyone was ready, he hissed, "Down."

The pink-haired Auror squeaked as the plinth she was sharing with the tall black man started to move and almost lost her balance before he managed to catch her.

"Wotcher, Tonks," he murmured.

"Thanks, Kingsley," Tonks answered shakily, peering over the edge to view the black depths of the pipe as they descended.

At the bottom, everyone stepped off their plinth and out into the bone-strewn cavern beyond. Madam Bones had her monocle up to her eye once more and was eyeing the litter with a raised eyebrow.

"Any idea how big this snake is, boys?"

Henry shrugged. "We've never actually seen it, only heard it in the pipes of the school. Judging by the snakeskin in the next room, it's barely big enough to squeeze through that pipe we just came down."

She nodded as though she had been expecting this, though several of the Aurors began to look a bit pale. "No one really knows how long basilisks live, but if this snake was placed here by Salazar Slytherin as the stories say…it would be the oldest basilisk ever recorded, and therefore the largest."

"If you don't mind my asking," Henry said respectfully, "How are you planning to fight it?"

From inside a bag carried by one of the Aurors, Madam Bones procured a rooster that had clearly been struck in mid crow by a petrificus totalus spell. "This is our main line of attack. We will seek to blind the snake first, then use one of the roosters. Should that fail, we will attack. All of us have vials of phoenix tears should we be struck by the venom. You boys will remain outside the lock that Dumbledore told me of, and leave if the worst happens and our plans fail."

The twins nodded seriously, and led the way past the snakeskin in the next room, which the Aurors studied fearfully, many of them gripping their wands in clammy hands.

They approached the lock and Henry motioned the Aurors forward to stand near the door. Madam Bones gave them some sort of signal and they visibly prepared for battle, tensing in preparation to attack the moment the door opened.

"This is it," Henry murmured, then faced the door. "Open."

The twins dodged back as the ancient gears began to turn in the door, and stood to one side of the entrance where the basilisk's killing gaze would not be able to reach them.

The doors parted, and the Aurors made to dash forward, only to stop with many gasps of surprise. Lying there with her face to the door was the basilisk herself, eyes closed in sleep. Their gasps caused her to stir, and everyone in the doorway quickly lowered their eyes, two of the senior Aurors stepping forward before the basilisk could truly awake and shooting several vicious cutting curses at the eyes. The great snake screamed in pain, fully awakening and rearing back to strike at her tormentors.

"It's blinded!" the man named Kingsley told the others.

"Fall back!" Madam Bones ordered quickly, "It's too big to come through this door." The Aurors retreated through the door quickly and the snake's attack crashed into the frame behind them. The head of their group removed a rooster from the bag and waved a quick finite over it, letting the bird finished its frozen call.

Instantly, the great snake dropped dead on the floor, a large drop of venom falling from one fang to smoke on the floor.

Harry and Henry realized that they had hardly been daring to breathe, and took shuddering breaths as the Aurors stood down from their attack formation.

"Well, that was anticlimactic," Madam Bones said with satisfaction, garnering a few chuckles from some of the veterans on the squad. "Let's get out of here."

The twins led them back to the sink and ordered the plinths to rise once more to the second floor bathroom in the school. The Aurors then escorted them out of the front doors and past the wards to the apparition point. Most of them disappeared with small pops, but Madam Bones turned to speak with them one more time.

"I thank you for your assistance today, boys. Your help was invaluable."

"It was nothing, Madam," Harry said sheepishly. "We just want to go back to school and see our friends again."

She smiled down at them. "Yes, I can understand that. If you boys need anything, anything at all, you get in touch with me first. There are those in the Ministry who might try to undermine you, especially once word gets around about those Marks. And word like that will happen quickly knowing some of the juniors on my staff who saw you today." She closed her eyes and shook her head. "I will see what I can do for you, but I only have control over one department."

"But it is one of the most important," Henry said wisely. "We have been claimed by the Dark, abandoned by the Light—and we belong to neither. Would you be willing to help us find our own way in the war to come?"

She considered them seriously, looking past their thirteen-year-old shells to the men that they would become within. With a nod, she promised, "I'll be in touch."

She backed away and disapparated, leaving the boys to walk slowly back to the Hog's Head.

"Do you think she can help us?" Harry asked.

"It's like I told Snape. The war is between Voldemort and Dumbledore. Aside from the one in the prophecy, no one can hope to intervene. Everyone else is going to get stuck in the middle and suffer for it. We both know Dumbledore is going to be searching for the new subject of the prophecy—maybe we can help the Ministry to protect people, to get everyone else out of the way of their fight."

Harry nodded slowly as they walked into the pub. It sounded like their best bet, and this way they would be able to help people instead of fighting them.

"Messirs Potter," a vacant voice floated to them from across the room. There, sitting in the darkest corner at the back of the room with a mostly empty glass of sherry, was a woman with thick glasses that made her eyes look like those of an owl and gray hair in a wild frizzy halo around her head. "I have been waiting for you."

"For us?" Harry asked in confusion.

"My Inner Eye told me to seek you out, to wait in this pub where my last prophecy was spoken. A prophecy, once begun, cannot be broken. But it can be changed."

Henry drew breath to ask another question, but the woman suddenly threw her head back and clutched the table, making a horrible raspy noise as she inhaled. "The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches, born to those who have thrice denied him, born as the new year dies. And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal and he will have power the Dark Lord knows not. And either must die at the hand of the other, for neither can live while the other survives. The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the new year dies."

Behind them, the door of the pub opened and Abe stepped in. The twins spun and looked at him with alarm, but he just frowned as he looked at them, asking in confusion, "What, did I miss something?"

Breathing a deep sigh of relief, Henry shook his head.

"No, nothing," Harry lied glibly.

The woman straightened and threw back the rest of her sherry before getting shakily to her feet and stumbling past Abe out of the bar.

"Ah, ran into one of your professors, eh? Didn't think you started the electives till this year, though."

"We don't, but I think we've seen her at meals every once in a while. She teaches Divination, right?" Henry asked, grasping at straws to cover up the woman's presence there.

Abe nodded. "A fraud if ever there was one. I've heard she's never told a true prophecy. But, ah well. There aren't many Seers left in the world anyway."

The boys nodded in agreement and quickly dashed up the stairs to their room.

"What do we do!" Harry asked, rubbing his hair as he paced frantically.

"We've gotten some leverage. Neither Dumbledore nor Voldemort knows of the new prophecy, which means we can figure out who it's talking about before them."

"Right." Harry sat heavily beside his brother on the bed. "In the meantime, how are we going to get our school supplies before school starts?"

Henry laughed, shaking his head. "Let's just wait for them to send us our letters, all right?"

"Oh, right." Harry smiled sheepishly.

"I'll make a prefect of you yet!" Henry threatened.

Harry blanched.

A/N: If you can figure out who the new person in the prophecy is, I'll give you a cookie. It's not an OC.

~Shara