I know that it has been awhile since my last update. I got sidetracked by the DCAU.
TW for light references to sexual violence pertaining to a supporting OFC.
"These students will be the death of me", Severus mutters to himself as he assesses the first pile of written essays on his desk. Might as well begin this now.
However, he doesn't even start at the tap tap tap on the door to his office. "Enter," he starts irritably. Though it subsides when he sees that it is Reg at the other side of the door.
"Three years, and I still think you should wait until morning to begin going over the examinations." Regulus closes the door behind him.
"Of course, you would say that." Severus begins pouring over the first essay on the pile. "Your concerns differ from mine. Likewise, I still remember how it was said that you went through five cauldrons in Potions."
Severus didn't need to look up from his papers to be aware of the small smile on Regulus' face. "I could never get into Potions. It wasn't my best subject. I wouldn't hear the end of it from mother."
Severus remembered the day when Regulus Black came to Hogwarts. How everything from his surname to his near resemblance to his blasted brother made him wary. How uncomfortable he felt when he was put in Slytherin. He was certain that Black had put his young brother to spy on him.
"Sirius talks a lot about you," was the first thing Regulus said to him.
"What about it?" Severus had asked, instinctively defensive. Of course, what did Black spew from his mouth during the summer holidays? He wouldn't be surprised if Black boasted how he and his friends broke into the Slytherin boys' dormitory to put rosehip on their beds. Which Severus was allergic to.
"You seem alright to me." Regulus shrugged. "I mean, he says you hang around with the boys that mother thinks Sirius should surround himself with instead of those other lions he favors."
Even after that interaction, Severus was still wary of Regulus. It might have taken half of the year for him to become comfortable with him. Regulus would often bemoan that he couldn't invite him over for the Christmas holidays due to his family despising half-bloods along with Muggle-Borns.
After that dreadful day where he did his Defense OWL, Regulus proved how much of a valuable friend he was. When those awful Marauders walked into the Great Hall appearing to be wearing nothing but their underwear, Regulus didn't hesitate to take the credit. "Just because I wasn't there, doesn't mean that I didn't hear about it and wouldn't desire to give them a taste of their own medicine," he said.
He hears one of the cabinets open, and of course, it had to be the one containing the elf made wine. "So, Lucius Malfoy is pulling strings to have Victoria start a year early, you said."
"Yes," Severus answered him as he hears Reg pour a glass. "He believes it to be best for her to start the same year as his son. However, the Headmaster has yet to approve the motion. He wants to speak to her first."
Victoria Prince (Mulciber was her surname before he took her under his roof) was a ward of his ever since the Dark Lord's fall. When Lucretia Mulciber delegitimized her following her son's and husband's incarceration to Azkaban for the incapacitation of Frank and Alice Longbottom. Only because Albus Dumbledore and Eleanora Black had insisted on it, that it was better that way. As Severus saw it, even if he detested children, he agreed that he was a safer option, considering her parentage.
Albus Dumbledore had been wanting to speak to her for a few years now, and now it seemed he had the opportunity. For he wants to speak with her a few days after the end of the school year. Probably to feel her out before he could, in good faith, have her start Hogwarts the same year as Harry Potter.
Potter.
Severus had never seen the boy and despite his promise to keep tabs on the Potters to ensure their safety even in the Dark Lord's absence, he had kept his distance. Having given the hovel in the slums he grew up in to the council and purchased a cottage from the esteemed Belby in a hamlet just outside of Hogsmeade. Perhaps it was a good thing, as he heard the Potters moved to Bournville just a few minutes away from Cokeworth. It was best for both him and Potter that way, for who knows what would happen should they cross during a simple trip to Tescos during the summer holidays.
He had never seen the boy, so he had no idea what he was like. In fact, he dreaded the moment the Potter boy sat in his class. For who knows what sort of influence his bloody father had been even if he grew up away from his fame. It didn't even help that Andrew Black and Emily Lupin were starting the same year as well. Though maybe he shouldn't worry too much about the latter as he should the former.
It was rather dicey regarding Harry Potter and Andrew Black. For Harry wasn't just the son of the man he despised but also the son of a former friend. Not only was Andrew Black his father's spawn, but he was also Regulus' nephew. A nephew that he probably hoped to reel in, and perhaps give the Dark Lord a new follower for his return.
"I suspect he has suspicions regarding her parentage," Regulus spoke up, tearing him from his thoughts. "When you consider how high up the elder Mulciber was before his incarceration, and that he would figure that the Dark Lord would want to pass his heir off as a child of one of his followers for matters of safety."
Of course, he didn't tell Regulus that Albus knew about Victoria's parentage from the moment Eleanora was freed from captivity that October night.
When Harry had gotten up for breakfast in the morning, he could tell that something was peculiar the moment he went to the kitchen. It wasn't often that his parents carried on with breakfast without speaking to one another, and only if they seemed upset with each other.
Only problem was, this wasn't a angry silence. This seemed to be a 'don't say anything around Harry yet' type of silence. In fact, Harry had wondered what they had wanted to tell him. Whatever it was, he had a feeling that this was about what had happened yesterday. Though, he couldn't be in any sort of trouble. If he was, they probably would have talked to him last night.
Finally, when he had scraped clean his plate, he had asked, "Is there something you want to tell me?"
"Um, sure, Harry," dad answered before turning to his mum. "Um, Lily, why don't you take Harry to the living room. I just need to check on something first."
Huh, didn't dad seem to want to talk about this matter with him as well. If mum thought it was strange, she didn't show it as she took Harry to the living room. Harry swallowed hard as he wiped his sweaty palms onto his pajama bottoms.
"Now, Harry," mum began as they sat on the sofa. Hesitating before continuing, "This might be a shock to you. In fact, we had planned to tell you in a month. Though, due to what happened yesterday, your father and I don't see another reason to keep you in the dark for longer."
Keep me in the dark from what? Harry thinks when he thinks he hears the clacking of hooves on the kitchen linoleum. Hoping he was merely hearing things, he turned to see what it was. He couldn't believe his eyes.
Standing at the doorway into the kitchen appeared to be what a stag. How did it get in here, and if it did, why didn't he hear it.
"Mum, there's a stag in the house," Harry had managed to say as the stag morphs into his dad. What? Harry shook his head, hoping that he was seeing things.
"No, Harry, you're not dreaming," his dad tells him with a wide grin.
It was as if a ball was stuck inside his throat as dad strode towards them. "Um, I…." is what he could manage to say.
"That's alright, Harry," his mum vocalized as if in assurance. "This is going to be shock for you either way. So, your father felt that this was the best way to start the conversation."
"Ordinary people don't just find themselves on the school roofs and hold conversations with snakes, Harry." His dad was pulling out two sticks from inside his night robe, and was handing one of them to his mum.
"You see, Harry. I'm a witch," mum continued. "And you and your father are wizards."
Harry could hear nothing but the ticking of the clock in the living room.
"A what?" Harry gasped. He was hoping that this was some dream. That maybe yesterday was a dream as well, only it felt too real for it to even be a dream.
As if sensing his disbelief, his dad winks as he flicks the stick in his hand. He jumps in his seat as the bookshelf by the telly catches on fire.
"Dad!" Harry exclaims in panic, watching his tapes go up in flames.
"It's just a freeze flame charm, Harry," dad says in assurance. With a wave of the stick in his hand, the flames went away and everything on the shelf appeared intact. As if they weren't on fire earlier.
Mum uses her stick to point at a lamp on the end tables. Gives it a flick and in it's place sat a pigeon before mum gave her wand another flick and the lamp came back.
Alright, maybe this wasn't a dream. However, there was one problem.
"I," Harry shook his head. His face becoming hot. "You two were a witch and wizard all this time, and you didn't tell me?"
"We wanted to tell you," his dad said. "In fact, if we had it our way, we would have raised you in the wizarding world if it weren't for…" dad drifts off and turns to mum.
"Should we tell him now?" mum asks. As if she was guessing what he was thinking.
"We can't leave him hanging." Dad takes a deep breath, before taking a seat next to Harry. "Son, there is something you need to know."
"Some of it, you probably won't understand until you are older," mum continued. Understand what? Harry thinks as mum continues. "This started before you were born, and when your father and I were children. There was this wizard who called himself Lord Voldemort who was amassing power. Gathering followers who flocked to him from believing in everything he stood for to only wanting power. It started out small. A few disappearances and deaths here and there. I heard that in the beginning, people didn't believe it would escalate."
"'He'll go away', they said," dad continued. "'His group will fizzle out and fade into obscurity'. Except that those looking at the right places saw the writing on the wall. That he was not going to go away, and it pretty much escalated when a prominent ministry figure, one who was advocating to change the status quo in favor of Muggles, was found dead in her flat."
"Muggles?" Harry asked.
"A Muggle is what one would call someone who can't perform magic," mum explained. "As it escalated, it had gotten to the point where people, entire families were wiped out for opposing him." Mum's eyes glistened, as if she was holding back tears. "We didn't know who to trust. Before entering a house, we had to ask the person what we last spoke about to make sure we weren't meeting an imposter. That we weren't walking into a trap. By the time he met his downfall, he was on the verge on winning. We were outnumbered by twenty death eaters to one."
"Some families went into hiding, like us," dad continued. "We hid because we knew it would be a matter of time before we were targeted because we refused to join him. When he found out where we lived, well, to say that he chosen Halloween to strike was rather clever."
Mum then frowns, as if something had made her head hurt. "There was speculation as to how he orchestrated the attack in our home. Most think he had wanted to capture us with the hope of one last offer of recruit, and that he wanted to make the effort to," mum pauses, as if trying to find the words "…silence you before you could make any noise. No matter what people think happened, he wasn't able to go through with it. It backfired on him, and he disappeared just like that."
Even if his mum had tried to skirt around it, it was as if ice coated his stomach as Harry comprehended what she was trying to say. "Me? Voldemort tried to kill me?"
"That cut on your forehead isn't what you get from like bumping your head after falling from a tree," dad answers. "You're the only one to sport a scar of that sort of curse he inflicted on you."
You're the only one to sport a scar of that sort of curse he inflicted on you.
Harry swallowed, feeling his chest ache and his stomach twist itself into knots. He survived when no one else hadn't. His family survived, while so many others didn't. He, especially, wasn't supposed to survive it seemed like.
"May I go upstairs?" he asks.
"Yes, Harry." Mum nods, and Harry goes up the steps. His legs feel like lead as he makes the trip up. Collapsing on his bed and wishing that this was all a dream he could wake up from.
Harry didn't know how long he lay on his bed when he heard pebbles being thrown at his window. The noise tears him from his thoughts and prompts him to jump out of his bed to gaze out.
Andrew and Alfie were outside the house, their bikes resting against the siding of his house. Maybe he could be able to take his mind off of the second part of that conversation with his parents, even if it was for a little bit.
He changes into a shirt and jeans. Tying his trainers at the top of the stairs before running down the stairs. He could hear his parents talking softly in the living room, but he didn't want to stay long enough to hear what it was.
"Mum, dad, I got to go!" Harry grabs his raincoat. "Andy and Alfie are outside!"
"Alright! Oh, Harry?"
Harry stops to look at his dad as he continues, "Not a word to Andrew and Alfie about what we talked about this morning. Well, at least not to Andrew yet, but you especially shouldn't tell Alfie."
"Why?" he asks. More confusing yet, why would he tell Andrew at a later date and not Alfie? They are both his friends. Though, maybe he shouldn't have been surprised. Since they refused to tell him about being magical until this morning. Even if he understood why.
"Muggles are not supposed to know about the existence of witches and wizards," dad explains. "It's been that way since the eighteenth century. People would be wanting magic to solve their problems, and you'll get those that…well, it is rather tacky. Just don't say anything, okay?"
"I won't, dad." Harry turns the knob and runs out of the house. Hastily untying his bike, before following his two friends.
The three of them ride their bikes down to the next block and as they tie their bikes in front of Andrew's house, Andrew says, "It's going to be a blimey mess inside. Sorry."
Harry and Alfie exchange confused glances as they follow Andrew into the house. Only when stepping through the door did Harry understand what Andrew meant by it being a mess. There were open boxes in the living room, with two of them stacked against the wall. A David Bowie song playing in the background as he spotted Andrew's sister Rowena, Andrew's Uncle Remus, and Andrew's cousin Emily Lupin packing some things in boxes. Harry had only seen Emily on weekends such as this one, for she primarily lived with her mother and her "friend" in London.
"Hello, Harry, Alfie," Mr. Lupin greets pleasantly when he looks up from his task. "Having a good day so far, I hope?"
"Um, yes," Harry answered, though it was far from the truth.
"Yes, Mr. Lupin," Alfie answered.
Mr. Lupin smiled, though it seemed strained with his sickly features. Mr. Lupin had gone to the same school as Harry's dad and apparently, he had been sickly even then. Even if he wasn't present on Harry's visits to the Black residence, he would be holed up in his room.
Mrs. Black came striding in the room. Her hands full of books.
"Oh, Harry, Alfie." She puts them in one of the open boxes on the couch. Brushing loose strands of brown hair behind her ear. "I apologize for the mess. We are starting to move some of our belongings to our new residence in Bath."
"You're…moving?" Harry asked Andrew.
"I didn't know until yesterday afternoon," Andrew answered. "She had to wait until it was for certain that she got the place."
"When will you be going?" Alfie asks, and Harry could hear the panicked surprise in his voice. As if he'll never see him again, though Harry had a feeling that they might just hang out at either his or Alfie's house.
"At the end of the first week of next month." Mrs. Black nods at them. "Now, Andrew, I believe your friends can help you gather the things you want out of your room first."
Harry and Alfie follow Andrew up the stairs as he hears Mrs. Black exclaim, "No, Rowena! It goes in that box!"
"Did your mum get a new job?" Alfie had asked as they traveled up the steps. "Is that why you are moving?"
"No, she's still going to work in the same place," Andrew answered. He shrugs. "I mean, it's the house where she and Uncle Moony used to live when they were growing up. I don't know why she didn't live there then instead of here. Anyway, at least it means that mum would be happy that I'll be cleaning my room."
Moony is also what he heard dad refer to Mr. Lupin as. Though he had heard Mr. Lupin call him 'Prongs' from time to time. He used to think it was the nicknames they gave each other as kids, though maybe he seemed to discover the meaning of 'Prongs' due to the events of this morning?
What does Moony mean, anyway?
Harry wondered if Mrs. Black kept Andrew in the dark too. Given that dad said something about not telling Andrew yet.
He hoped Andrew's mum doesn't give him the same type of news his parents did.
What a way to make yourself a parent of the year, Prongs, James scolds himself. It was never in the plans to tell him the circumstances why he was given that scar. What parent tells a kid, "This man tried to kill us and failed."
"It would be enough to turn any boy's head," Albus had said regarding the decision to raise Harry in the Muggle world. "Famous before he can walk and talk! Famous for something he won't even remember! Can you see how much better off he'll be, growing up away from all that until he's ready to take it?"
Perhaps he was better off not knowing at all, though that would have only happened had he had the option of going to a magical school. Though at least he heard it from them rather than his peers.
"The conversation would have had ended so well if on Halloween nearly ten years ago…you know," Lily had said when their son left the house to join his friends.
"Be fortunate that you are alive," Remus had said to them once years ago. "People tend to die when Voldemort comes to their homes with the sole purpose of killing them."
James had tried to take Moony's words to heart, though what made it hard was when he thought about others that weren't so lucky. The Death Eaters slaughtered Marlene's entire family as their way to send her a message about her opposition. The entire Moore family was found dead by their friends. More tragic were Frank and Alice Longbottom, the two of them incapacitated by Mulciber and his father a month after Voldemort's Fall, when everyone else thought they were supposed to be safe with him gone.
Voldemort had only refused to kill him at the moment because he was wandless, and Lily was stunned because she was in his way. Whatever spell Voldemort tried to use to kill their son (he was known for using the Killing Curse most of the time. Though it was said that he would sometimes use a suffocation curse) backfired on him due to some ancient blood ward that Lily put on the crib. They weren't supposed to have lived.
Had Harry been more like him at his age, he would have thought it was cool that he was the reason why a Dark Lord vanished. He had seemed to get his humility from his grandfather, for he often heard, "How Fleamont and Euphemia Potter managed to have such a boisterous son is beyond me," from a few of their friends.
To top it off, maybe it didn't help that they kept Harry in the dark about everything. That he might not tell them everything because they didn't tell him what they were.
When the afternoon had arrived, Nora and Moony had arrived with Harry and Andrew in tow. Alfie was absent, for maybe his parents wanted him home. Emily Lupin was too not present. Either Marlene or Dorcas had probably collected her so she could go to school tomorrow.
It was common practice for Harry to sleepover with one or both of his friends and vice versa during the weekends. Andrew and Harry went to the same primary school, so James would have no problem taking them to school before going on his way to London for his shift at the Ministry's Auror Office.
Eight thirty came and with both boys asleep in Harry's room, Lily had put on the privacy wards while James went to get a bottle of mead for a night cap.
"When are you going to tell Andrew about the world he'll be stepping into and about…you know," James pauses as he pours some mead into Lily's glass. It was hard to think about everything that had happened with Sirius, who was on that prison on the rock in the middle of the sea.
I'll get you out of here, were his words to him when he visited his best friend right after his incarceration. He and Nora were still collecting the materials needed to grant Sirius a trial and a pardon. A slow process that was made more difficult when Bellatrix Lestrange nee Black was promoted as Head of the Auror Office two years prior.
"After we get settled in," Nora sighs, picking up her glass. "The only thing he knows is that his father is in prison, but I haven't told him what for. I doubt it will be pleasant."
"You might have to explain to him that his father wouldn't have killed thirteen other people," Moony explained. "Peter, I would understand, but twelve bystanders." Remus shakes his head. "If anything, Peter was probably the one who cast the blasting spell and took those people with him."
Next to James, Lily swallowed. "We had told Harry today the truth why we chose to raise him in the Muggle world. Some things had happened yesterday that we couldn't wait until we got his Hogwarts letter. For example, the glamor that we put to cover that scar expired."
Good old Moony, being so well read as always, noted, "It sounds like he didn't take it well."
"Why would he?" Lily pointed out as James noticed Eleanora shifting in her seat. "Everyone only knows his name because that snake-face rotter tried to kill him and failed."
"Is there something you wish to share, Nora?" James asked.
Nora bites her lip before clearing her throat. "Albus had written to me this week."
"Well, considering everything that had happened with Sirius…" James drifts off. "Maybe he wants to assure you that he'll make sure that everything would be alright."
"No, Prongs." Nora shakes her head 'no'. "It had nothing to do with Andrew. Actually…" she drifts off, as if pondering what to say next, "well, only Albus, Sirius, and Remus knew what had happened in the early days when I was captured in that botched operation to capture low ranking Death Eaters."
Lily paled and James could feel his intestines curdle. Eleanora had been captured by the Death Eaters and held captive for eleven months in the latter years of the Great Wizarding War. Of course, Albus had said that there were things that happened of a sensitive nature that weren't in his place to share regarding the first months of her captivity, and James had an uncomfortable feeling about what it was that happened.
Only he didn't tell Padfoot what he guessed what it was. It was nothing he wanted to dwell on either. Who dwells on the thought of their best mate's wife being raped?
Lily holds Nora hand. "You don't have to tell us if you're not ready."
Nora sighs and begins speaking. Starting from when she was captured and even if she never said the gory details, ("He said that I wasn't worthy of the Cruciatus Curse due to my biological relations with a werewolf." Nora's eyes gazing far away. "Voldemort wouldn't let any of his other followers touch me. It happened two times every few days"), James had the urge to make sure he didn't bring back up his lunch. By the time Sirius managed to successfully infiltrate, she was already pregnant. "The condition was to wait until I gave birth before I could be set free. Because Voldemort didn't trust him taking me back home while I was pregnant. That was why it took so long for me to come home."
After she had given birth, she had woken up in the home where she and Sirius first lived.
"What about the child he forced you to carry?" Lily asked, her voice dry. "Have you heard anything?"
"Voldemort handed her to the care of the Mulcibers." Nora laughs bitterly. "Of course, he be a idiot to allow his enemies to obtain leverage against him. However, Gaius Mulciber never told his wife her true parentage, because after Gaius and Dominic Mulciber's incarceration following Voldemort's fall, Lucretia Mulciber sought to have Victoria delegitimized."
Delegitimized. That had often happened when a pureblood had a child with a woman that wasn't his wife, often one of Muggle descent. Those children were bereaved of their surname and sent to live with the caretakers of the filer's choice, and often times they weren't treated well by their guardians.
"Where is she now?" James couldn't help but ask.
Remus shifted in his seat while Nora averted her eyes. Almost as if she knew the answer she was going to give wasn't going to be something he wouldn't like. It didn't help James that it was someone he wouldn't like.
"I thought about the both of you being her guardians when I found out she was going to be delegitimized, but it would have been selfish given what was going on with Harry and all," she answered. "With her parentage, it wouldn't have been safe for anyone on our side to look after her, even if it wasn't her fault. Severus Snape felt like the safest choice, given he was the only one on the opposing side the Headmaster trusted to take up teaching at Hogwarts. After all, Snape told me himself that Albus was the first one to suggest he step in to take her in."
Lily had waited until Remus and Nora left and were away from their house when she turned to the backdoor.
"Of the two of us to do this, I rather have it be me than you," she told James. "Besides, it shouldn't be the woman's job all the time to stay here so the children wouldn't be alone."
Also, it was because even with James's insistence that he had grown past that, she didn't know whether he had the actual discipline when in a dwelling owned by her former friend. Of the two of them, he was more likely to make it apparent that someone had been in his residence.
Without another word, she left the house. Walking down the street and waiting until she reached a alleyway to apparate to the Scottish Highlands.
It was when she and James moved to Bournville that she found out that Severus Snape had no longer resided in that dingy neighborhood near the derelict Morgan & Co textile mill. It was on that rainy afternoon when she traveled to Ten Spinner's End with the intention to confront him with the question if it was him who gave the information to Voldemort (for who else among the Death Eaters that could have informed Dumbledore. Part of her didn't want to believe that it was him, even if the other options were more less likely than the next) when she was surprised when a woman a decade older than her at the time answered the door. Apparently, he had handed the house over to the Cokeworth council. Almost as if he didn't need to be prompted to keep his distance.
Something he had been doing ever since that day in 1976.
"Watch, he'll find ways to guilt you into talking with him again," Mary predicted when she told her part of the conversation at the Fat Lady's portrait. "Slimy snakes like him always do."
Except, he had never made a attempt to speak with her again. When she expected him to take his usual seat next to her (to which she planned on moving to the seat next to Mary), his eyes skirted past her, as if she wasn't there and he sat next to Evan Rosier. Determinedly not looking at her. In fact, when she started dating James, he seemed more determined to pretend that she didn't exist.
Lily didn't know whether to be relieved he received the message or to feel unpleasantly surprised that she made her message to him too clear to the point where he was pretending that she didn't exist. To say that a part of her felt guilty for their exchange at the Fat Lady's portrait wasn't a lie. Maybe she was too harsh, though when she considered speaking with him again, she often changed her mind when she saw him comfortable in the company of Mulciber and his crew. On their final excursion to Hogsmeade before graduation, she remembered seeing him laughing to whatever one of those snakes were saying.
After she had gotten her job in the Ministry at the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office, she managed to look through the directory of the British Wizarding Population. Apparently, he had bought a cottage from Potioneer Damocles Belby in a hamlet just outside of Hogsmeade.
Even at this time of night, it was not hard to find the cottage, for it was at the very back of the hamlet. The address carved on the wooden plaque on the fence, and as Lily unlocked the gate with a flick of her wand, she could see a barn at the back of the residence.
Probably where he did his potions.
What are you doing, Lily? part of her mind scolded her as she dispelled the wards on the front door of the cottage. You are doing what Snape isn't doing: violating his boundaries. Besides, she's your friend's daughter too. Not just Voldemort's.
While that was true, Lily didn't want to wait to hear what would come out of Dumbledore's conversation with her to determine whether she should start a year early. The same year as her son. Most likely, she was in the care of the Malfoys' during the Hogwarts terms given how Snape was close to Lucius to the point where she heard that he had spent his summer holidays after fifth year in his Manor, and she didn't doubt that Snape still retained his interest in dark magic. So, this girl was surrounded by former Death Eaters and their families. There was even the disturbing possibility they that told her of her parentage.
After all, one of the ways to get to know someone was going through what they owned.
"Alohomora," she whispered, and the wooden, iron-hinged door creaked open.
The living area appeared more like a library. With bookshelves lining nearly every inch of the wall. Lily had a temptation to browse through them. To see if they were anything like the disturbing texts he immersed himself in. However, she was on a mission.
"Point me," and she allowed the wand to lead her up the steps and towards a room at the end of the hallway. The lavender curtains were open, allowing the light from the crescent moon to illuminate the room, though Lily lit the lamps with a wave of her wand before closing the curtains.
On surface level, Victoria Prince's bedroom didn't seem out of the ordinary for a child the age of ten soon to be eleven in October. The walls – which were plastered with Holyhead Harpies paraphernalia – were a crème color. Porcelain dolls with painted faces and stuffed animals with embroidered faces sat on her bed, and above a painted wooden desk was a portrait of a mermaid sitting on a rock. The mermaid jumped into the water at the sight of her.
Though what may look like one thing on the surface, maybe something else entirely on deeper inspect. Lily rifled through the girls' desk and later the drawers under her bed. Most of the contents innocuous, like past cards and other things like that. Nothing particularly alarming. If she had a diary, it was probably with her.
Lily makes sure everything was in it's place before scanning the bookshelves in the room. There were empty spaces, leading Lily to believe that whoever looks after her during the school terms takes her here to rotate her books. She recognized a set of Britannica Encyclopedias along with what appear to be Snape's old textbooks. There was Wizarding Literature along with some Muggle titles that Lily had grown up with: all of Tolkien's Lord of the Rings books, C.S Lewis' Narnia books, though there were some Dickens' titles that she was never familiar with (Lily had only read A Christmas Carol and Oliver Twist), and two of Frances Hodgson Burnett's books. The binding of one of them catching her eye.
Almost as if it was familiar.
Lily pulls it out of the bookshelf and notices that it looked exactly like the paperback copy that Grammy Rose had given her for Christmas before she started Hogwarts. Only it was a little more frayed and wrinkled at the edges from frequent use compared to the copy that she lent to Snape a couple months before their fallout. He had never given it back.
Why would he? He stopped making any attempt at interaction after that day and to give her back her book would be a form of interaction.
She opens the book and her eyes widened. For it was the very copy she had lent to Snape.
To my best granddaughter Lily J. Evans, who would always be my princess. Gramma Rose. Christmas 1970.
Her fingers tremble as she closes the book, taking a second gaze of the novels before her. This child owned a lot of Bronte and Austen. Due to his leanings, the cautious part of her mind wondered if they were ill-gotten from Muggle victims. Another part scolded her for even entertaining that possibility, that he must have gotten them from a second-book shop.
Was Victoria Prince aware of her guardian's connection with this Lily J. Evans, or was she kept in the dark? Assuming that she was simply the previous owner of the book she now owns?
"Madame Potter," drawls a deep voice from a few yards behind. As if he was at the threshold of the room.
Lily drops the book on the floor in response.
I know a lot of Jily lives fics have Sirius not in Azkaban, but in a AU where Sirius infiltrated the DEs on behalf of the Order, Peter would probably use that against him. Make people think that he killed him out of vengeance for giving him information that led to the Dark Lord's demise.
And like in real life, it takes a while for innocent people to be let free.