Lily Potter.
October 1981 – Godric’s Hollow. Another Reality.
Lily walked to the table and placed the dish in the centre, James followed and laid out the three bowls, as Sirius placed the basket with the freshly baked rolls alongside the casserole. James served everyone a generous portion and the three of them set about their bowls of food.
“Are you two sure that Peter being our secret keeper is the best idea?” she asked.
Sirius replied, “I am too obvious, if the Death Eaters got me, they would eventually learn where you are hiding. As it is I can’t reveal the location as I am not the secret keeper.”
“I know the theory Siri, and if it was just James and I, I would be fine with it, but it’s Harry. He is defenceless against almost anything, and, well I am pregnant again.”
“Oh Merlin, congratulations you two, when?”
James replied, “Early April. Lily is just about three months at the moment.”
“My magic is going to be all over the place soon.” Liliy continued, “I believe that you would take our family’s secret to the grave with you. I don’t think anything would make you give us up to those monsters. I just don’t think Peter is that strong. I mean, where is he tonight? I did ask him over.”
Sirius shrugged, “maybe he got a date?” Lily snorted, and shook her head.
“Look, I am not saying he will go out and betray us, but I just don’t feel safe having Peter being the keeper. Our lives literally are in his hands. I want to slip away to Europe, or better America. I want to let Harry grow up in safety, and that is not going to happen in England, not with Moldy and his minions all trying to kill him and anyone that stands in their way.”
“How would you get out of the country?” Sirius enquired.
“Muggle style. Go to Manchester Airport, climb on a Jumbo Jet and go to America. James’s family has some properties out there, and I am pretty sure we can disappear in a country of 250 million plus people. We can settle somewhere out of the way, at some point these idiots will go too far and either the ICW, or Merlin forbid, the Muggle Government will step in and sort it. I just don’t feel safe here anymore.”
“When would you go?” Lily looked at James, and a silent conversation took place.
“After Samhain, Dumbledore has something he says will clarify the situation by then, if it hasn’t then we go.”
“I will miss you both terribly.” Sirius admitted.
“We want you to come with us Sirius. You are family, you are my brother-in-law in every way it matters. You might as well be Harry’s third parent the amount you dote over him.” she laughed, “I am not sure what that says about me, but you know what I mean.” Sirius nodded and broke a bit of bread off, chewing it as he mulled over the idea.
“OK. I am in, do you need money for tickets or anything?”
“No. I am going to slip away to town tomorrow and sort them, you have passports and such?” He nodded. “Pack a go bag, but this stays between the three of us, no one else is to know. Not Peter, not Albus, no one.” She pointed her fork at them as she spoke.
“Lily, Albus isn’t the bad guy.” James admonished her. She snorted in response, and returned to her food.
Later as Sirius made his way into the back garden to apparate away, Lily wrapped him into a hug. “Be careful Sirius Black, do not go getting hurt before we leave. You are a part of this family, you know how much we both love you, I can’t bear the thought of losing you. Stay safe.” She kissed him on the cheek and walked back into the cottage as the soft pop of his departure sounded in the night.
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The following night as they settled in front of the fire to read, Lily muttered, “two more days, I can’t get out of here soon enough.” She heard her son crying upstairs and as he rarely cried at night padded up to his room to see what was bothering him. As she reached over the edge of the cot to check on her son, she felt the slight hum of magic from the ritual circle painted onto the floor under the round rug his cot was centred on. It had been her last ditch protection for Harry, but now she knew she was carrying a life within her, she wasn’t sure she could do it. How could she choose on child over another, they had to leave.
The bang as the front door exploded brought her up sharp. James shouted from below, “Lily. It’s him, grab Harry and go, I will hold him off and meet you later.” The sound of spellfire filled the air and Lily grabbed Harry and tried to apparate. Nothing happened and she realised she was trapped, they were trapped. She saw the green flash and heard the body fall. Her wand was in the living room, there was nothing she could do.
The footsteps came up the stairs, perhaps one of the three of them could live? She thought. Lily placed Harry in his cot and turned to face Voldemort, to bargain, to offer her life for Harry’s. She did not get the chance he stunned her where she stood.
When she was revived, she looked into a face she had grown to despise. Severus Snape looked at her with barely concealed glee. She sat up, the lifeless eyes of her son met her through the bars of his cot. Their bright green dimmed and soulless. Her sob choked in her throat and she turned to her one-time friend. “You are part of this?”
“You are mine now, Lily. The Ministry will fall before the week is out. Dumbledore will be dispatched and all your friends. You are my reward, willingly, or I can potion you into compliance, it’s your choice.”
She looked at him, her mind racing, potions would harm her little one, and if she faked it, she could plan something. “No potions. I want to keep my mind. It’s all I have left.” He smiled, standing he pulled her to her feet and led her from the cottage, past the corpse of her husband. Away from the body of her son. She vowed on every deity she knew of for revenge. She would play along, until the opportunity arose, and then she would kill this man, she would look him in the eyes as he died, so he knew why. She had been a hat stall, and had refused Slytherin because of her blood, not because of any lack of cunning.
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She played her part, Severus allowed her time to grieve her son and her husband, by which time she was showing her condition. Thankfully this kept his ardour cool and she didn’t have to welcome him into her bed. She planned, and researched, and waited. Dumbledore was betrayed and killed in the school. Sirius was arrested chasing after Peter, and died ‘attempting to escape’ custody. The Ministry fell, and Magical Britain entered the age of Lord Voldemort’s rule.
Lily knew she couldn’t simply kill Severus, she didn’t care if she lived on, but her daughter needed her. She was wavering, considering sacrificing her dignity, her freedom and giving Severus what he desired, in order to protect her newborn daughter. He found her that night, breast feeding her barely week old girl. “You are going to give up the brat for adoption, the Carrow’s can raise her. Then you will bear me children,” he drawled in the voice she had grown to hate, the sound and sight of him filled her with revulsion, he expected her to surrender her daughter, and spread her legs for his pleasure. Her decision was made.
“She needs my milk for at least another two weeks, for her immune system.” She fixed him with a look. He nodded. She had no idea if that was true, but it bought her a little time. The full moon was two nights hence, she made plans.
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The night of the full moon she was once more in what had been Harry’s nursery, the ritual circle reworked to it’s new purpose. She had collected her wand from the room downstairs and laid her daughter, Jasmine Rose Potter in the centre of the pentagram and placed all the required objects at each point. She sat and waited, she heard Severus arrive with a crack of apparition, she was only wearing a thin silk camisole, and stood at the top of the stairs, in the doorway to her old bedroom, the light behind her illuminating her silhouette, she knew Severus was still probably a virgin, the site of her would confound him. He would be so eager, he would be careless.
He rushed to the top of the stairs and she let the camisole fall, he stepped forward as she posed with her hands behind her head, he didn’t see the knife in her hand as she wrapped her arms around his head as if to kiss him she stabbed his carotid and then cut his windpipe, as he died she pulled him to the circle and used his death to power her ritual. As he choked out his dying breath, “You killed my son, and my love. Good luck in the afterlife, there is no love for you here.” She filled the cups with his blood and placed them around the pentagram and finished the ritual.
Godric’s Hollow November 1981. This Reality.
Jasmine’s crying brought Lily back to the here and now, she picked her daughter form the floor and looked around, most of the roof of the nursery was open to the stars, and it was cold. She settled the girl, and cast a quick cleaning charm to remove the copious blood from her naked form. She walked over to what had been their bedroom, thanking the gods that her clothes were still in the drawers and her preservation charms had kept everything clean. Correction she thought, that the charms cast by this world’s Lily had worked. Dressed, she packed a go bag, and used her wand to cast a Tempus. It told her it was November the fourth, 1981, and it was seven thirty two. She packed a second bag for Jasmine, the supplies for Harry were still in their drawers. She summoned her trunk form the loft, and shrank it, she paused, and apparated over to Alice and Frank Longbottom’s she needed friends and information, on this new world where she now was going to live.
She arrived outside the wards, thankful that she had learned silent apparition, Sirius liked to arrive with a bang, and did, she always prided herself that not even Dumbledore was as quiet. In front of her were four Death Eaters busy attacking the wards, Bellatrix, and three in masks. She hid Jasmine and the bags behind a wall with a silencing charm and stood. She fired her reducto’s as hard and fast as she could, Bellatrix first, her heart blown through the front of her chest, she picked off two more before the last of them apparated away from the house.
Ten minutes later she was standing looking at Alice, her best friend, who was crying and holding her wand over Lily. “You are dead, they told me, he killed you?”
“Alice, what can I say, reports of my demise have been sorely exaggerated.” She smiled. “Alice, I am standing here holding my daughter, it’s freezing cold, at least allow us in until any possible Polyjuice would have worn off.” She looked pointedly at the bundle in her arms. “Even if you don’t believe me, the baby at least deserves some warmth.” Alice lowered her wand and stepped back into the house, Frank kept his up and covered her as they walked in. “How is Neville, is he OK? Is Harry settled in with him?”
Alice looked at her, “Harry. We don’t have Harry?”
“No, has Sirius got him then, we left very clear instructions, James’s will and mine. If everyone believed me dead as well, they should have brought him here. Where is he?” She looked around.
“I don’t, we don’t know Lily. If you are Lily. We were under our fidelious until after You-know-who was killed by Harry. We heard they buried both you and James. We heard you were dead. Can you prove who you are,”
“I don’t know Alice, I am actually from a different version of this world, in my world, Voldy stunned me and then killed Harry. I was three months pregnant and as you can see, I have my daughter with me, so I came back in time a little as well. He won in that world, everyone I loved was dead, I was kept as a love toy for Severus. He betrayed us, him and Peter.” Alice stood clearly trying to decide. “Alice, I need to find Harry, which means tracking down Sirius, can I at least leave Jasmine with you, she is Harry’s younger sister, I am going to find my son.”
Alice came to a decision, “OK. Sirius is living in Remus’s old place, his flat was being watched.”
Lily passed the baby over, “she was fed less than an hour ago, she’s still on the boob, so no milk to leave you. She should sleep for at least an hour, I will be back to feed her. Hopefully with the mutt and my son.” She dropped off the bag of baby supplies and the go bag of her stuff. “I will be back in about forty five minutes regardless.”
As she walked out of the house the Aurors were milling about talking to Frank, “Excuse me,” one of them called, just as she twisted away. She arrived in the carpark and jogged across to the stairs up to the first floor flat that Mooney had rented, a light was on inside, she unlocked the door without thinking about it and walked straight in. Sirius was slumped on the sofa. An empty bottle of firewhisky on the floor next to him. “Sirius Orion Black.” She shouted at him.
He jumped awake, saw her, croaked out the word, “Lily?” and promptly became Padfoot. The dog immediately barfed over the floor and sat down shaking its head. Lily vanished the vomit. “Human, now.” She growled. He shifted back into his form. “Where is Harry, you daft dog? Where is my son?”
“Lily, you were dead. I saw your body. I closed the eyes on your corpse. I cried like a baby over you and James. How is this possible?” He collapsed back into the chair.
“You believe I am who I say?”
Sirius tapped his nose. “Padfoot knows your scent. You also stink of blood, and breastmilk.”
“Long story Siri, I will tell you. After I find Harry. Where is my son?”
“Hagrid turned up, he got there before me, I thought, Hagrid would keep him safe, he was taking him to Hogwarts, I went after Peter, I haven’t caught the little fucking rat yet.”
“Why did Hagrid turn up? how did he know? He can barely do magic, how would he fare against a bunch of Death Eaters. Albus is up to something. I do not trust that old goat at all.” She looked around, “Get yourself cleaned up, I don’t need an animagus nose to know you need a shower. I will be back with Harry, he needs you now, he needs a father, and you are up. Leave Peter to the Aurors, we can hunt the little fuck down at our leisure, once my son is safe with his sister.”
“Sister?” Sirius croaked.
Lily nodded, “Long story, but yes, Jasmine arrived a week ago in my life.” She stepped back, “I am going to go scare the shit out of a half giant, I will be back in half an hour regardless, Alice is minding Jasmine, and she will be due a feed.” She twisted away and appeared at the Shrieking Shack. Diving through the dilapidated old house she ran the length of the tunnel and out to Hagrid’s Hut. Banging on the door, she stood arms folded, coming steadily to the boil.
The door swung open and her half giant friend stood and stared. “Oh Merlin, Lily.” He dropped to his knees. “I only did what Professor Dumbledore asked, I thought he was acting for the best. Don’t haunt me, I will go fetch him back, right away.”
“Hagrid. Stop.” The massive manchild dropped back to his knees. “I am not dead.” She tugged on his beard. “Where did Albus send Harry?”
“To your sisters, he said that he would be safest there, he said that…” she had already gone, in her anger blasting right through the wards and arriving with an uncharacteristic crack in her sister’s driveway. Lily looked around, the walrus’s car was missing, so at least that was one less murder on her conscience she thought as she walked to the door and knocked loudly.
The door opened and the pinched horse face of her estranged sister greeted her, Lily pushed her straight into the house. “Where is my son?” she demanded. She caught the flick of Petunia’s eyes to the understairs cupboard. Somewhere people kept vacuums or boots. “Homo Revello” the small shape glowed. Lily looked at her sister, “Tuney. My son is in that cupboard. You bitch.” With a wand flick she bound and silenced her sister and sent her crashing into her sofa, ripping the door open she levitated the small child out of the space. He smelled. He needed a change, and he was soaked. She used a bit of magic to clean him, and turned to face her sister. “I will be back Tuney, not tomorrow, but sometime, and there will be a price to pay for this. He is your family and you did this?” Lily heard the sound of apparition and the door opened, an Auror stepped into the hall.
The Auror’s wand was scanning around, then he saw Lily holding the baby, he didn’t notice her wand. “What is going on here. Who are you, what are you doing to this muggle.”
“This is my son, that is my sister, nothing to do with you, Dawlish.”
Recognition bloomed over the man’s face, a one-time colleague of her husbands, she had hexed him for being a bit over familiar a year earlier. “You are an imposter, Lily Potter is dead.” Her petrificus hex hit him before he said any more and he toppled to the ground, with a flick she cut his sleeve open. His faded, but still visible dark mark there for all to see. She removed his wand and placed hers on his badge and sent the correct magic pulse to summon his superior.
A few minutes later Amelia Bones appeared in the room, wand drawn, “Careful Amy, you could have someone’s eye out with that.” She snarked at her friend.
“Lily?”
“Well I am not James am I?”
“But, we have your body? She stood, her wand still on Lily. “What was the first thing you ever said to me?”
“I believe it was ‘Oof,” followed by, “Please watch where you are going,” after you knocked me on my arse on the express.”
Amy nodded, Lily just hoped that her other memories would match, “What did I catch you doing?”
“Trick question, I caught you and Sirius shagging in the prefect’s bath. In point of fact, James was stood behind me under the cloak, and you two had beaten us to it.” Amy dropped the wand.
“How?”
“Parallel worlds. Long story, for later. Today,” she pointed at the floor, “Death Eater. My advice, toss them through the veil. Voldypants has made Horcruxes, he might be back in a few years.” She smiled, “Part of the long story. I am here to collect my son, Dumbledore kidnapped him.” Amy looked at Dawlish’s arm, and back at Lily, back at the man on the floor.
“We need to talk.” She said. Lily nodded and apparated back to Mooney’s flat.
“Sirius, you had better be ready.” He appeared out of the bedroom, dressed in an AC/DC teeshirt, jeans and boots, towelling his hair dry.
“You got him, where? Who?”
“Dumbledore left him with Petunia. I may kill my sister later for what she had done to this boy already, Merlin knows what life he would have lived if he had been left there.” She nodded towards the clock, “Get your stuff, we are going back to Alice’s, to collect my daughter, then we are going to re-open the Manor, no more faffing about, the wards there are what we properly need.” She held Harry out to Sirius. “Now dad, time to carry your weight and look after your son, and collect our daughter.”
They arrived outside the Longbottom’s house just after eight oclock and Lily marched straight in ignoring the Aurors, she thanked Alice, and was back outside with her daughter inside two minutes. With a nod to each other they apparated once more, to the front steps of Potter Manor. She stood as the wards washed over them, Lily worried, would they reject her or Jasmine. Her concern ended when the doors opened and a House elf stood in the opening. “Mistress Lilly, and family. Master Sirius. Come in, we shall prepare rooms, it is good to have you home. We felt the loss of Master James, we thought you gone as well.” They followed the elves into the building and she made her way to the master bedroom and the nursery within.
Lily sat and took a moment to settle. The elves took care of Harry and sorted Sirius with a room. Tippy, the Mistress’s elf arrived to help with Jasmine. “Mistress Lily, is different?” she fetched her a shawl and settled as Lily fed her daughter. “Where did you go, you were gone from here for four days?”
“Tippy, I came from another realm, in my world, I lived and Harry and James both died, but it was a cruel world, one where Jasmine would have been killed, and I would have suffered. I used a ritual from the same book that your Lily used to save Harry. She cannot have realised she was pregnant, I could not sacrifice myself and my daughter for my son, I could not choose between my children and my hesitation cost my Harry his life. I performed a ritual to travel to a version of my world, where my son lived, without me, and where Voldemort had been vanquished. It brought me here. I will be Harry’s mother now, he will grow up with his sister, and we shall live here. We should not have been persuaded to leave.”
“No, bearded fool gave Potters bad advice. Tippy knew it was half truths but Master James banned me from speaking against beardy.”
“Well Tippy, Mistress Lily gives you full permission to defend the Potters from anyone like Albus Dumbledore in anyway you see fit. If Severus Snape or Peter Pettigrew turn up, kill them if you can, freeze them if you cannot. They are enemies of this family.”
Tippy smiled, “I like new Mistress Lily, but you needs a bath.”
“I do Tippy, I certainly do. I could eat as well, is there food in the house?”
“Tippy, will tell cooky to get food sorted for after Mistresses bath. Dogboy is back in his old room.” Master Harry is in Master James room, is this acceptable?” Lily lifted the sleeping form of Jasmine into the crib near her bed, and smiled at the elf.
“That sounds just fine, Tippy. You are a star.” Tippy smiled and with a bob popped away.
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Lily and Sirius were sitting at a small table in one of the downstairs rooms, finishing the meal that the elves had prepared. “I need to tell you what I know, and well, who I am. Where I am from. I need to tell Amelia the same, if I ask her here will she kill you on sight?”
“No, we are OK, Lily. She eventually accepted that I really was under the influence of a potion. We are not enemies anymore, we shall never be close again, but we are civil to one another.”
“Good.” Lily flicked out her wand and sent her Patronus off to tell Amelia where she was and see if she was available.”
“Your patronus, it’s a lioness?”
“Hmm’mm. Why?”
“Our Lily’s was a doe, it changed to match James Stag.”
“My James Patronus was a Lion. Gryffindor through and through. I hope Amelia believes its message then.”
Amelia arrived fifteen minutes later, and Lily sat and told her tale of woe, explaining everything she knew from her world, including the fact that Voldemort had made a Horcrux from the murder of her son, one of six. Amelia took lots of notes. When she eventually left she placed an arrest on sight order on both Peter Pettigrew and Severus Snape. She also had a list of Death Eaters and houses to raid.
Lily was up feeding Jasmine every few hours, so was up early and equally already tired and in a bad mood, when the first message from Albus Dumbledore arrived. She looked at Sirius, across the table as he sat feeding Harry his breakfast. “Time to go pull an old fool’s beard. Put a pot of tea on, this will not take me long.”
She crashed through Albus’s floo straight into his office, catching him completely off guard. His Floo permissions did not refuse her, as the current Regent for the Earl of Gryffindor, she owned the place, as far as the school itself was concerned.
“Albus. You lying old goat. Would you care to attempt to explain why you kidnapped my son?” Albus whipped his wand around and Lily disarmed him without a word. The Elder wand flying into her hand, as it bonded with it’s new master she bound him and removed all of his trinkets. Recognising the do-dads as trackers on Harry, she pulled them to her and flicked them into the fire.
“Well, I am waiting for the convoluted pile of hippogriff crap you are going to attempt to justify as to why you set James and myself up to die, so you could kidnap my son. Over Sybill Trelawny’s drunken gibberish. A prophecy that owes more to the sherry she has been consuming than any actual divination.”
Albus’s glower was slowly fading into a questioning look. “Kneezle got your tongue Albus?” She hit him with a mild stinging hex.
“You are not Lily Potter, she has died, she sacrificed her life for her son.”
“Nope, wrong, pull your head out of your arse Albus, Lily was pregnant with her daughter. You believe she would sacrifice one child for another? Or did you make her forget she was pregnant again.” She caught the flash of guilt across his face. She hit him with a medical reviving charm. A legal and very painful relative of the cruciatus curse.
“Unforgivables, Lily Potter would never be so dark.” He replied panting for breath.
“Nope Albus, you are not wrong often, but you are again. That’s a revivo, medical hex to restart a heart in fibrillation. Hurts like a bitch though, doesn’t it.” She paced the room. “You call me dark, you would sentence my son to a life of hell, over some stupid plan that spans fifteen years, rather than just clean up Voldemort’s shit now and finish the job off.”
“Your son carries a part of Vodemort, he will have to die eventually to defeat him at the end.”
“Merlin, you are worse than Voldemort, you can expel a pissant shard like that with a ten minute ritual. In all that is wrong in this world, the first time he kissed a girl he really loved it would die. You really are an arrogant old blowhard. Your time is over Albus.” She sent her patronus off through the school.
Ten minutes later Minerva McGonagall entered the room, to stop and draw a breath, “Lily, is that really you?”
“It is Minnie. Back from the grave. I needed to come back to protect Harry from Albus’s schemes. How do you feel about becoming the new Head Mistress, Albus is about to retire.”
“I can assure you I mast certainly am not.” He spoke from behind his desk.
“You are going to Azkaban, or through the veil if I have my way. Either that or I will kill you myself.” She turned to Minerva and glancing at the Elder wand for a moment, cast a reversal charm on Minerva’s memories, undoing any blocks, she followed it up with a scan for potions. “You need to see Poppy, in fact you probably both need to go to St. Mungo’s.
Minerva sat down. Her mind was reeling. She looked at Lily. “How was Harry being treated?”
“He was in a shoe cupboard under the stairs, wearing the same clothes he had on when you collected him. He has a rash and needs a bit of care, but he won’t remember any of it. Unlike me.”
“A shoe cupboard?”
“Yes, and you two left him on the doorstep like a milk bottle. In November.”
Minerva trembled, “Lily, I don’t know how. Why?” Her face hardened, she looked at Albus, “You cast an imperious on me?”
She walked to the floo, “Amelia Bones.” She called. After a few moments an image of the woman appeared in the fire.
“Is that you Minerva?”
“It is Amy, I need you to pop through and arrest Albus, for kidnapping, use of an unforgivable and I imagine a slew of other charges including involvement in the death of James Potter.” As she finished speaking the woman in question appeared in the office.
“I wish I was surprised, but we were reaching the same conclusions, the prophecy Lily told us, we think it refers to Dumbledore. We think Lily is the ‘power’” she laughed. Pulling a set of suppression cuffs she walked around Albus’s desk and slapped them on his wrists. “Can you unfreeze him Lily. I can take it from here.”
“Just one thing first,” she looked at the phoenix sat watching the scene with interest. “Fawkes. Would you like to come home with me?” The bird trilled and promptly caught fire, its ash landing in the dish at the perch’s base and the bald chick squawking from the ashes. Lily released Albus with a wand flick, and picked up the chick, pushing some magic into the bird, before scooping the bird and it’s ashes into her space expanded purse.
Amelia pulled a loop of rope out of her robe, twisting it around one of Albus’s wrists she portkeyed away to the DMLE. Lily turned to Minerva, well Headmistress, you have a school to run, Sirius is decent at Transfiguration if you think he could take your lower years. He has two kids now, so no more Auror work for him.” Leaving Minerva looking shocked she walked back to the floo and returned to Potter Manor.