A/N: This is a canon-compliant story of the Marauders' friendship, including the Hogwarts years and Voldemort's rise to power with multiple POVs. As a psychotherapist, I love writing about character development, but what I hope to share most in my story is the power of friendship and how Voldemort (with no nose and who knows nothing) can never be a true match for its magic. I hope you will enjoy it x

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Chapter One - Leaving for Hogwarts

Wednesday 1st September 1971 was a perfectly normal day in muggle Britain, thank you very much. It was raining, which was of course no surprise to anyone, and the paper headlines continued to update on the latest from the IRA and the news that The Rolling Stones were suing their famous manager (a surprise to many people).

In The Daily Prophet, the news was rather less routine. Fleamont Potter frowned as he read the headline over his breakfast: Muggle Mass Murder: Ministry Mystified. It had been a family in Oxfordshire, killed instantly in their beds as they slept with some sort of green victory sign cast into the sky above their home.

"Of course the muggles won't have it in their papers." He told his wife, Euphemia, as she poured him more coffee. "The undercover aurors in their police department will have confunded them all into thinking it was a gas leak. Those poor people." He said, shaking his head as he read the loving tributes for the family of five.

Euphemia was looking grim. "I don't like it." She said. "And this isn't the first muggle attack we've had this year. I hope it's not a sign of anything worse to come."

"It won't be." Fleamont said reassuringly, kissing her on the forehead. "It'll be just a few lunatics messing around. There won't be another war."

...

Upstairs, Fleamont and Euphemia's son, James, had his own concerns. He hadn't packed. While his school trunk was open, there was very little actually in it as most of his life's possessions lay on the surrounding carpet. There were Bertie Botts' Every Flavour Beans, school textbooks, stuffed animals and owl treats, all scattered around like the aftermath of some giant explosion. He might have told his parents he'd do it last night, but then the European quidditch final had been on and he hadn't been able to resist torturing himself with yet another English defeat. Now though, gazing around at the mess on the floor with increasing dismay, he wondered if he might not have been better off missing the match after all.

There was a knock on the door and James' dad poked his head around it. "Nearly ready?" He smiled.

Fleamont Potter was a tall, distinguished-looking wizard with silver hair, glasses and a slightly quirky dress sense (which probably went with the territory of being an inventor). In his younger years he'd been famous for his duelling abilities and then later found more fame in creating Sleekeazy's Hair Tonic in a desperate (and very successful) attempt to keep his hair from sticking up at the back, as James' always did.

"I know I left it a bit late." James said, looking guiltily at the mess on the floor.

"It's alright." His dad said, ruffling his hair and coming into the room. He waved his wand once, causing the surrounding items to fly into the air and rearrange themselves, either falling neatly into James' trunk or else zooming back to their place of origin. Fleamont held out a stuffed lion which seemed not to have been able to make up its mind with a questioning smile at James.

"Better not." James said, taking Godric from his father and placing him on a shelf. "I won't need him at Hogwarts." The truth was that he didn't want any of the boys in his dormitory to laugh at him. It wasn't very brave to still need a stuffed animal to sleep with, was it?

"When did you get so grown up?" His dad said with a sad smile.

James wrapped his arms tightly around the man. He knew he had been both his parents' entire world for the last eleven years. Surely they would miss him desperately when he was gone.

"You'll be OK." Fleamont said thickly, and James wondered if perhaps he was telling himself this as much as he was saying it to James.

His dad helped him carry his school trunk downstairs, to where his mother was fastening her pearl necklace in the hall mirror. She smiled when she saw them. She was always smiling when she saw them. "Ready, darlings?" She asked.

James took a long look around the grand gold hallway of the house he'd known since babyhood and felt a sudden wave of sadness. This would be the last he'd see of his loving family home for a very long time.

But he knew it was time to go. He was ready. "When you are." He smiled back at her.

...

There was a tense, prickly atmosphere in the stone halls of number twelve, Grimmauld Place that morning, as though someone had covered the whole place with those muggle trip wires that went off explosively without warning.

Sirius had already been on the receiving end of his mother's vicious rage twice that morning and, not wanting to give her another reason to shout at him, had gone downstairs to wait out the rest of the morning in the kitchen. No family but plenty of cauldron cakes. That was about the best it ever got for him in the dark, oppressive house he called home.

He glanced again at the clock on the stone wall and wondered if perhaps his mother had charmed it to move extra slowly. Time was moving impossibly slowly. He'd been counting down the minutes until he'd be at Hogwarts since his cousin Andromeda had started six years ago. Even Bellatrix's tales of how the sixth and seventh years practiced curses on the first years didn't bother him too much. His eldest cousin already cursed him and she was a fully qualified witch. How much worse could it really get?

His thoughts were interrupted by the arrival in the kitchen of his brother, Regulus. Nine years old and their father in miniature, Regulus was the apple of both their parents' eye.

"Here you are!" He said, coming over to sit by his brother on the wooden table. "You mustn't hide away." He pouted. "Not on your last morning at home."

"I'm not hiding from you, I'm hiding from them." Sirius said, jerking his thumb at the ceiling from where they could just about make out the sound of their mother bellowing at someone else (presumably their father).

"She's a bit cross." Regulus said, frowning down at his hands in his lap. "But I wish she hadn't shouted at you when we won't see you now 'til Christmas."

Sirius laughed humourlessly. "Why break traditions?" When wasn't she shouting at him?!

"She'll miss you when you're gone."

Sirius stared at his brother. Sometimes he wondered if the two of them lived on entirely different planets. "Reg." He said hoarsely. "She hates me."

As if to prove this very point, there was the sound of heels on stone tiles and the door swung inwards to reveal the witch herself.

Walburga Black was a tall witch with dark hair and high cheekbones. She had donned a black muggle dress for the occasion and painted her lips a blood red. Sirius had once heard someone refer to her as a 'great beauty' which he'd found so funny he'd spat out his drink. No one else in his family got the joke.

Regulus leapt off the table at once at the sight of her, brushing invisible crumbs from the front of his robes and staring imploringly at Sirius to do the same. Sirius remained where he sat, blinking at her impassively.

"What are you doing down here?" She snapped, the words more of an accusation than a question.

Sirius held up the packet of cauldron cakes. "Eating cauldron cakes." He explained, quite obviously.

She glared at him but could clearly not find anything so offensive in the act that she could reasonably punish him for it so turned her attention instead to his brother.

And how quickly the dragon was gone. Though quite familiar with her 'Jekyll and Hyde routine by now, it still sent his head spinning at times. How could she be two such different people with him and his brother? And why was the bad side always reserved for him?!

She snapped her eyes back to him and he drew in a quick breath as the dragon returned.

"I hope you know how important it is for you to make the right connections at Hogwarts." She said, coming forwards now so that they were inches apart.

Sirius thought he could just imagine who these 'right connections' were in his mother's eyes. He'd met the unfortunate children of his parents' friends; boring, snobby boys like Edwin Mulciber and Atticus Avery or stuck-up princesses like Roma Lestrange. If these were the sorts of people his parents expected him to hang around with he'd sooner spend the next seven years in Kreacher's bedroom. With Kreacher.

"I know how important it is for you." He said, meeting her black eyes without blinking.

"Do not disappoint me." She hissed.

Sirius smiled. "As if I could ever do that." He said.

She opened her mouth to retort but Regulus cut across her. "You'll be proud of Sirius when he's in Slytherin, won't you mother?" He said quickly. "Won't you be happy then?"

Sirius wondered vaguely how his brother could think the events of one day might achieve something eleven years (and however many more his mother had been alive for) never had, but he said nothing.

His mother turned back to him and he wondered if perhaps she was wondering the same thing. But then her lip curled and she tossed her dark shawl over her shoulder. "We shall see." Was all she said before turning her back on them and leaving the kitchen.

"Still think she'll miss me?" He asked his brother.

Regulus said nothing.

...

Remus Lupin had packed two weeks ago, determined to leave absolutely nothing to chance. If he packed, he would be going, and it really was quite as simple as that.

He sat alone in the family's small front room re-reading his Hogwarts letter for what was surely the thousandth time. He was amazed the ink hadn't worn out from the number of times he'd read it now!

Dear Mr Lupin,

We are delighted to offer you…

He read each line slowly (though he already knew it by heart), drinking in the words and savouring their meaning. They had called him 'Mr Lupin', as though he was important, like someone who mattered. They were 'delighted' to offer him a place at Hogwarts. They were delighted?!

And, best of all, he re-read the date he would be going: September 1st. Just like it said on his dad's Daily Prophet.

"It's really happening!"

Remus looked up as his father entered the room. Lyall Lupin was wearing a muggle suit and had combed his brown hair for the occasion. He came into the room and took a seat beside Remus. "How are you feeling?" He asked him.

"Nervous." Remus admitted.

"You mustn't doubt." Lyall told him. "You're entitled to an education, Remus. As good an education as everyone else."

"But I'm not like everyone else." Remus whispered, the words tumbling from his mouth before he could stop them, but now they were out he could feel their truth again.

He wasn't being self-pitying. It really was quite a strange life being a werewolf. Especially as he knew how much the wizarding world hated werewolves. He knew Dumbledore had promised he would take care of it and that no one would find out, but there were times, and this was one of them, when Remus felt it was the most foolish, naïve, reckless idea in the world.

His father looked at him and there was again that strange expression Remus sometimes saw in the man's brown eyes. It looked almost like guilt, but that didn't make any sense to Remus as absolutely none of this was his father's fault.

"No, you're not like everyone else." His dad said gently. "You're stronger."

"I'm not strong." Remus said quietly, looking at the floor. "I'm terrified."

"Yes." Lyall said. "That's why you're strong."

Though it didn't make a whole lot of sense to Remus, he gave his father a weak smile anyway.

"Are you boys ready?" Remus' mother, Hope said, coming into the room with a lunchbox which she handed to him. Remus recognised it as one they took on their family picnics in the Yorkshire Dales. He was sure he'd be too homesick to take a single bite.

"Gosh Remus, it's ever so exciting, isn't it?!" His mother said, speaking fast as she brushed invisible dust off his shoulders. "You'll be in another country by nightfall! I wonder if you'll pick up a Scottish accent? You must promise to write!"

Remus smiled back at her and promised that he would. He knew his mother was dreading his departure. She'd never been apart from him for so much as a day before. But as her spirit was as true as her name, she never let her fears or doubts show.

"We ought to go." Lyall said, getting to his feet and taking his and Remus' coats from the rack in the hallway. They were taking a portkey to London from their nearest city and as a muggle, Hope was sadly unable to join them.

Lyall kissed his wife and told her he'd be back for lunch and then waited outside for Remus to say goodbye.

The two of them embraced for a very long time and then, a little tearfully, they broke apart.

"Goodbye, darling." Hope said. "Be safe."

Remus waved back to her all the way down the road. He thought he was going to miss her more than anything in the world.

...

Peter Pettigrew was avoiding his family. They had been irritating him as usual with his mother fussing and his two sisters, Clara and Annabelle, bouncing off the walls with excitement. Honestly, anyone would think it was those girls starting at wizards school rather than their younger brother.

"Ooh let me see it again!" Clara cried, grabbing the official parchment and gazing at it as though hypnotised.

"I can't believe we've been sworn to secrecy." Annabelle sighed, falling dramatically back onto the sofa. "We have evidence here that magic really does exist and we can't tell anyone! Just think how jealous Margaret Johnson in upper fourth would be? Oh!" She clutched a hand to her chest as a giddying realisation struck. "Think what Paul Geoffreys would say!"

"Paul Geoffreys wouldn't fancy you even if you could do magic." Clara said, throwing a pillow at her sister. "He wouldn't date someone still in lower school."

"He wouldn't date you either!" Annabelle shot back hotly. "The last I heard he was going out with Joan Matthews."

"Well we all know what he sees in Joan Matthews..." Clara said and the pair of them fell about giggling and clutching one another.

Peter had been so disgusted with the whole scene that he'd stomped straight out of the living room and into his mercifully girl-free bedroom, slamming the door behind him.

The Pettigrews lived in a small but cosy cottage in the rural Midlands. Peter's bedroom was on the ground floor, next to the old fashioned kitchen, which was handy if he wanted a snack in the night.

Since Peter's dad had left, his mother had kept herself busy working for charities and helping organise bake sales at Peter's old primary school. She'd sometimes bring Peter along to one of these events, which he'd hated as it meant seeing his old teachers or, worse, other kids from his class. Though his mother had told everyone he'd been accepted to an exclusive boarding school in the Highlands, he longed to tell them all where he was really going. That would wipe the smirk of Richard Davidson's smug git face alright.

When it was time to leave, Annabelle came into his room to fetch him. "I know you think we're just silly girls sometimes, but we really will miss you." She said, pulling him into a hug before handing him a small present wrapped in pink tissue. "Here. I got you this. Something for school, but don't open it now! It's 'top secret'." She said meaningfully and winked at him. Then she hurried out of the room calling "coming mum!" In response to their mother's calls.

Ignoring them both, Peter tore open his sister's gift. He frowned. It was a notebook. No, a journal. It was made of brown leather and had the words 'Peter's diary. Top secret!' Written in gold italics on the front.

Peter stared at it, dumbfounded. What on earth could his stupid sister possibly think he'd want something like that for?! He threw the book onto his bed, not bothering to consider whether it might hurt her feelings should she find it later, and took a last look around his small bedroom.

It hadn't been much, this room and this house and he congratulated himself on making it this far - a wizard in a muggle's world. But today, at long last, he was taking the first step of his destiny. He was going to be someone important, famous even, he just knew it. Maybe his face would be in the papers one day. Wouldn't that be something? All that was left for him to do now was take the next step.