The Myth of Innocence

31st October 1981
Godric's Hollow, Exmoor.

A sudden explosion shattered the peaceful night sky over the village of Godric's Hollow, a harbinger of great personal tragedy and profound national joy, a pit of despair and a beacon of hope.

At the epicentre of the blast a house lay open to the elements a scene of devastation with half of its upper floor strewn across the neighbouring street a maelstrom of disorientation and debris. The windows of the surrounding muggles' houses shatter at the energy let loose, glass flung from there frames like shrapnel, wards on the wizarding houses fared better as they rocked and rippled with an aurora only visible to those with the ability of arcane perception. The townsfolk, shocked, rattled from whatever activity they were partaking in began to panic. This wasn’t the first strange event the Exmoor village had witnessed over the last eleven years and each though the pulsing of energy though their wards ment this attack was directed specifically at them.

Of the eight beings stood on the property not less than five minutes ago only one had been left truly alive.

Watching the events that lead up to this unfold a small man with thinning hair and an unassuming appearance had stood lookout from the shadows across the street. Above the din of shouting he could see the green light that filled the cramped hallway, it lit the pram pushed against the wall, it made the bannisters glow like lightning rods, and James Potter fell like a marionette whose strings were cut...

Time seemed to slow down and the air hung still as the realisation of the weight of his betrayal struck home. Emotionally it would begin to hang over him like an anchor dragging at the frayed edges of his soul, the encounter proving the pivot about which his entire life turned.
He had irrevocably stuck a dagger at the heart of his friendships in the lure of power and for personal gain. Somehow the torture endures, out of earshot the lightshow continues illuminating the window of the front bedroom, a single flash followed by a pause and the beginnings of another.

Suddenly lifted from his feet he’s thrown, tumbling around the cobblestone street at some point striking his head off the curb during the chaos he's left laying in the gutter for thirty seconds as he recovers his senses. Gingerly he flexes his arms and pushes himself up, almost faltering at the mid way point as his arms shake under the strain and almost falter. He gets to his feet and brushes bits of dust and brick from his robe before turning back to the house and taking in the sight in front of him. Ears still ringing he hits his temple with the flat of his palm, the focus returning slightly only to replace the ring with the sound of a caterwauil alarm.

He takes two steps towards the house to investigate the cause of the commotion before stopping and staring towards the stars as the low hum of an engine getting closer pierces the tranquillity of a serene night sky. Focusing on the unknown point, the urgency of the situation overwhelmed him, a sense of overwhelming panic setting in before a soft whisper to himself “Shit!” and with a ‘Crack!’ he disappeared into thin air.

A roof tile hangs off the roof visible through the gaping hole in the front bedroom of the house precariously teetering directly above the head of the boy at the centre of tonight's momentous events. Of the four entities standing in the corner of the room, one, Emotion, turns to Fortune and exclaims “Can you do nothing for the boy! If he's killed at this stage by a tile after centuries of waiting it’s just incompetence on our part.”

“There’s nowhere you can be that isn’t where you’re meant to be.” Fate extols exacerbated at the people whose company she's being forced to put up with.

The man in black looking out of place among his peers with a long unwieldy scythe in his right hand gives up staring at the tile and turns to Fate shouting “I’ve already had to listen to John Lennon at his own death. I won't listen to you quote him in one that doesn’t bloody involve him. Can somebody fucking do something! I was hoping I wouldn’t have to touch the child for decades, never mind straight away.”

A quite muttering could still be heard coming from the side as Death starred at a well used children's toy that played animal noises if you pushed a button as the tile finally slid of the roof falling at an unnatural angle onto it and a rooster crowing noise whispered into the night “One of the most annoying deaths I’ve done, stood in the street and I couldn't tell if Yoko was screaming in shock at the body or if she was singing. He was just annoying, couldn't get over the fact he’d been shot despite having a hole in him. Told him it’s exactly what he gets for telling people to imagine a world with no war in it, used to be half my job a few centuries ago wars were. Battlefields are much more interesting than lounging about waiting in hospitals!”

As his rant reaches a crescendo a guttural lament can be heard coming from below in the hallway startling the child out of his stupor into tears that are quickly followed by the loud footfall of a man running upstairs bounding two with each stride.

Had the door not already been blown off its hinges, now resting against the far wall in splinters from the explosion, the man clad in aurors robes would have shattered it with the force of his entrance. Yet, he abruptly halted, taking a moment to absorb the scene unfolding before him.

As the shaggy-haired man stands almost catatonic with grief, the child's cries gradually weaken, eventually ceasing altogether as he topples forward against the railings of the crib. The minor cuts and the sizable gash on his forehead finally take their toll, causing him to lose consciousness due to blood loss.

Shaken by the possibility of further tragedy he bursts into action with well drilled training finally taking over from shock, rapidly shouting ‘Episkey!’ pointing his wand at every cut he can see and frowning when the wound on the forehead refuses to close followed by a half dozen diagnostic charms that leave him at a complete loss.

At this, Emotion, still standing watching this scene play out in the corner of the room looks at Death and complains “Can you not take the intruder from the boy?”

Death points a black velvet glove overlain with hand bones at the boy's head before taking an hourglass out of his pocket turning it in his hand seven times then lamenting “The fragment slips from my grasp, I continue to be cheated of a soul, even if just a fragment promised to my embrace.”

Emotion, getting visibly more upset, turns to a glare and says “If you're incapable of ferrying a soul to the other side, what is the point of you?”.

The others couldn’t help but think they always had been incapable of understanding one another, their roles too dissimilar and their goals in other tasks too often competing. It’s why they didn't have Yule or New Year parties, every time they got together it just devolved into arguing.

The shaggy man finally giving up the boy’s forehead as beyond his ability pulls a vial out of his robe pocket forcing it into the child before casting ‘Ferula’, bandages suddenly leaping from thin air quickly wrap around the wound. After quickly taking in his surroundings again the man leans over and scoops the child's body into his arms before beginning to move towards the hall.

Stumbling carefully over the broken furniture and plaster littering the hallway the man tried his best to keep the infant from seeing the body that lay there, to preserve the last of his innocence, whispering that he’ll keep him safe.

As he approaches the porch the sound of approaching crashing in the garden can be heard over the wails of a caterwauled siren echoing into the night.

‘Sirius!’

‘Hagrid!’

Sirius lowered his wand from the imposing tall figure whose frame rose slightly above the well maintained ten foot hedge at the back of the garden and was rapidly approaching the step onto the porch with a large pink umbrella pointed directly between Sirius' eyes.

“What are you doing here Hagrid?” Sirius had immediately dismissed Hagrid as a threat; the gentle soul's loyalty was unimpeachable but while Hagrid was the best person in the world to help in a bar fight he wasn’t much use in a duel due to his unfinished education in wanded magic.

“Dumbledore sent me. Told me to take Harry to him until it’s safe…” as his bushy eyebrows shifted in rapid succession as he took in the scene around him conveying a wide range of emotions.

“I'll protect him, Hagrid. No matter what. I owe that to James and Lily.” Sirius said softly before he steeled himself and picked up more confidence as he spoke “I’m taking him to Frank and Alice's place like Lily planned.”

Hagrid slowly lowered his umbrella, hand shaking violently as he did it. Sirius was caught imagining just how many litres of adrenaline it would take to do that to the man. The two started to move down the path towards the gate into the street.

"Dumbledore told me Harry's gotta go see him. Says he needs a check-up to make sure he's alright. Can't trust St Mungo's; he reckons it's been infiltrated."

Sirius was torn, it was a sensible enough thing to say he already knew the wound on Harry's head was a curse wound that could cause untold problems. If it was beyond his ability to heal it was almost certainly above Franks too, the both of them only had auror training first aid, Harry needed a healer.

Hagrid peering up and down the street stepped towards the motorbike and sidecar parked haphazardly half on the footpath half on the road in front of the house before looking back towards Sirius nodding “Coasts clear.”

Stepping into the street, Sirius' gaze was drawn away by a smattering of blood on the curb of the footpath opposite.“Hagrid, hold Harry a second.” gently passing him off to the other man then pulling a thin brass cylinder from his inside pocket into his hand before unscrewing the top quarter off, striding over the street and prodding it with the item.

Sirius took one final look at the pair, a combined sense of urgency, rage and grief so palpable that Emotion could tell even Fate and Fortune would see it, could feel the magic pulsing around them before shouting “Take the bike Hagrid I won’t be needing it, make sure Harry’s alright” apparating away with a loud crack.

“Why do we even have prophecies when everyone is free to ignore them? I thought the boy was to be raised by the Grim. An entire realm meant to bow to our embrace and they just ignore it even when the biggest fool of the lot of us spends her time dropping multiple prophecies and cryptic hints.” Death growled, his voice raised even further. “Sometimes it’s bloody hard to tell between a slither of divinity and an unemployed bohemian poet. They cracked the enigma machine but can’t decipher your spiel!”

Fate always despaired that everyone assumed the nature of prophecy was written in stone, despite feeling as if she was repeating herself she couldn’t contain the lesson about her inability to directly get involved and influence “Prophecy is not a guarantee, there is no destiny or she would be talking to us now complaining like the rest of you! I cannot railroad the boy to achieve what we wish, only provide him a few paths of opportunity to achieve it. He cannot be good if we can never fear him becoming wicked.”

“It was already a fool's hope that the boy would make the decisions required at every fork in the road, that his heart not be corrupted by the journey. Never mind making the most of any potential ability he might have.”

“It hasn’t even been an hour and I fear with how the other players have already started to move against us, the number of paths that lead to the child's victory are already reduced, the opportunity is getting away from our grasp.”

Fortune, usually considered annoyingly jovial by most of the company surrounding her, especially Death who she often provided mortals lucky escapes from let go of a long held sigh “It’s a fool's gambit, even I cannot guarantee rolling six’s every time the die is cast and the starting hand we’ve been dealt doesn’t leave much to work with.”

“One of the reasons we’re all here is because one of the fools keeps using people's lives as if they’re pieces on a chess board instead of being empathetic and just. Now you two are using terminology that makes it seem like you're falling into the same traps. Treating lives like they’re just part of some grand game.” Emotion snapped back.

Death had had enough of being lectured too and couldn’t hold the sarcastic retort “I thought you were supposed to be the gentle and loving one and here you are snapping at us like an angry Kelpie.”

“Anger is an emotion, it's just not as strong as love and at the minute I’m pissed with the lot of you.”

Fortune suddenly struck with a moment of inspiration that might salvage the situation slightly saw this as her opportunity to slink off and quietly enact her plan without the rest of them bumbling about and ruining it, turning on her heels and walking briskly off towards the nearest alley.

Fate mused that she had always known she would be around at the end of the world because she was immortal despite not actually being alive and that meant she didn’t have any alternative in the matter. Still she hoped that as much as it was inevitable that it was all a long way off. Thankfully Time and Space had not got themselves involved watching over Harry so things might not be as dire as she feared but they always had been illusive, only keeping themselves for company, they could be watching quietly from further afield.

In a moment of introspection they all quietly and separately came to an agreement that they’d been building to this point for the better part of a millennium, a few centuries of gradual decline clearly visible behind them.

The royal line had barely survived the violence leading up to the Norman Conquest; its number of heirs reduced from dozens to a couple. The death of Henry the firsts heir William Adelin along with three hundred of the country's flower in the drunken debacle of the White Ship disaster of 1180 saw the breaking of magics blessing of the line of Arthurs successors leaving the country to anarchy. The nation's hopes proverbially drown along with its nobility in the English Channel, dashed upon rocks in a turbulent sea not even a long wizarding lifetime past the death of the last of the founders, the strength of magic gradually fading along with its memory it’s muggle heirs making do as best they could.