Prolouge

You've just gotten to sleep, but something that doesn't make sense is happening. A bright light is forcing your eyelids open. You squint your eyes, but the light is still there. Giving up, you open your eyes, only to see that you are floating in the air. You would have screamed, but the scenery is too strange.

In the middle of a huge pillar (which is what it looks like) made of circulating candles, there is a platform. On that platform, there is a stand, on which a book is placed. This, is the Book of Life.

Sure, if you've watched the movie, you'd expect an old man with a happy grin, flowy beard and golden robes to be standing in front of the book, exclaiming over every new life.

Nope.

Instead, there's the old man, slouching on a couch, frowning at the beeping video game in his hands. He's so absorbed in the game he doesn't realise a black silhouette is circling around the pillar, getting dangerously close every second. What's peculiar about it is that the shadow it casts resembles a broken heart.

Suddenly, an annoying beep-beep sound goes off. It seems to have no origin. The Happy Guy (I think?) sighs, sits up and starts fumbling around the couch for something. Shouden't have let that spirit install the stupid detector, he mutters. Every time an imp crossed within a ten mile radius the stupid thing went off. Finding a remote, he presses the button in the middle.

It won't stop. In fact, the beeping becomes louder, sounding more insistent and important.

And Boy, does that old man get the shock of his immortal life when a person materializes in front of the Book of Life

Well, not exactly a person. Our uninvited guest is handsome… or pretty, though it's hard to tell their features. All you can seem to look at is their eyes, which are black hearts with a red line in the middle of each one. Staring into their eyes, you think that if this person was your friend, you'd never be lonely.

But the Happy Guy doesn't seem to think so. He backs up. Why are you here? The pact, says the being. What pact? gulps the Happy Guy. You remember, it smirks.

You remember.

Fine. The Happy Guy gestures towards the candle. Choose.

The stranger flicks a hand towards the longest candles. A single candle trembles, then moves towards them. They catch it, and inspect it slowly. As you watch, the flame turns from a reddish orange to a kind of black in the centre.

No, the Happy Guy whispers, his voice cracking. That life is bound of a pair.

The stranger laughs, which is both a horrible and lovely sound. Aren't they all?

The Book of Life turns to a page that is all written on. As if ink has been dropped on the page, a blot starts out from the middle and spreads outwards.

Soon, two pages are covered in black. At the same time, the black fire candle glides over to another one and then merges the wax together. It is now stuck to the other candle like a parasite.

And if you understand what this all is about, then you're probably praying like hell this is a dream. Because whoever's life the demon melded to, theirs will never be happy.

St Mungo's, 1980 2:30 p.m.

An Assistant Healer ran out of Lily Potter's ward, screaming that one of her twins was a devil. "It had bloody real horns, and a tail, mind you," she'd say a million times to Healer Rose in the Mentally Ill Ward.

Taking no notice of this strange(?) happening Lily and James Potter took their bouncing baby twins home.

They named them Harry James Potter and Christine Lily Potter.

Both were identical, but Christine had a streak of red at the very front, which was about the only way to differentiate them. Except for that, both of them were opposites. Harry was a mummy's boy and liked Moony the best. Christine was a bold, fierce little thing and loved to play with Padfoot, that is , when she wasn't breaking something in the house. They both loved flying on toy broomsticks, although Christine (or Chrissy as James called her) seemed to break each and every one of Petunia's Christmas presents.

Together, they were a happy family.

When they had to go into hiding, Chrissy was the only thing that kept James from going mad. Keeping up with her various accomplishments (such as magically changing the colour of the couch) gave him excuses to do magic.

October 31, 1981

Voldemort stood; now nothing remained between him and the boy.

but wait, where was the other one

A little girl stood in front of the Dark Lord, who had killed many gifted, fully grown wizards in his time.

it was irrelevant, weak

He raised his wand

the boy was the one of the prophecy, he did not need the girl, Bella would enjoy torturing it later

"AVADA KEDRAVA!"

The baby girl's eyes glowed red, the boy escaped with a scar

he could not stay here, must go, hide, less than spirit, less than body

Severus came, to plead , to beg to the Dark Lord to spare her, leave her, take the child, but spare her.

it was too late, too late, she lay dead, but the child sat up in the cot, crying.

he rocked her body in his arms, blank sightless eyes and soft hair he cried into.

if she thought (had thought) he had lost his way- he had lost his heart now, she had taken it with her, tied as it was to her like a stubborn rag.

He heard a movement that was shatteringly loud and it wasn't the lightning. When he looked up, his eyes fell on a little girl, the spitting image of lily evans staring at him.

The child had to be one of Lily's children, although he'd doubted her existence. The cursed prophecy had only mentioned one child, as had Dumbledore. Lily however, had, in her letter, hinted at her twins, calling them her 'joys'. It had rankled him then- he had assumed she was referring to Potter, the salt raw in his wounds, but it made sense now.

She didn't have her eyes, but her face shape and hair were the very same, her brown eyes the only inheritance from her father. He looked at Lily- then at Harry Potter, the saviour of the Wizarding World, and finally, at Lily's daughter. She stared at him with interest, unlike her bawling brother.

Severus lay Lily against the cot and closed her eyes for her. He pressed a kiss to her forehead- a bittersweet thing- and bent down to the toddler.

"I don't suppose you would appreciate living in Potter's shadow, would you?" he muttered. The girl looked at him blankly, perhaps questioning why a grown man was projecting onto a toddler. "I wonder . ."

He picked her up in his arms, slowly. She didn't protest, gripping onto his neck with the accuracy of practice. He looked around at the room and his love one last time.

"I'm sorry, Lily," he said to the corpse. The boy in the crib began to wail harder. In his arms, he felt the girl tense up, as if preparing to cry as well, even though she had been unaffected so far.

Before his resolve gave out and his cursed morality gave in, he turned and apparated on the spot.

When they arrived at their destination, the girl had begun to cry loudly, which was expected of anyone who experienced the horror that was apparation. He half-heartedly tried to shush her as he contemplated the imposing shilouette of Malfoy Manor.