Hadrian's Childhood
Since the Lestranges took Harry Potter — now Hadrian Severus Lestrange — it became quite obvious that the boy was a naughty one. Because of the Dursleys’ abuse, Hadrian’s development got a bit restrained, but after just a few weeks he was as fast as his Cousin Draco. The two boys wanted to reach everything in their houses and even tried a bet race in their wobbly legs. It didn’t turn out well and they got an earful, but at least they didn’t get hurt.
Most of the Inner Circle allowed themselves to grow some affections for the boy, although he was still referred as "The Boy Who Lived" in the wizarding world. Hadrian was a cute baby and it was hard to not love him.
Bellatrix and Rodolphus decided to announce his existence to the Daily Prophet on his anniversary. Narcissa, Bellatrix’s sister, was a great photographer, even though she didn’t work with it, but Cissy always saw Draco and Hadrian as her perfect models. She had lots of photobooks only with the pictures she took of them playing around.
Rabastan, Rodolphus’s younger brother, was quite charismatic, so he was the one to contact the press and he, along with Bellatrix, Rodolphus, Severus, Lucius, Narcissa and Mrs. Nikole Parkinson were the ones to choose the photo. They decided on using the one where Hadrian was giving a slight smirk to the camera while playing with his toys. The Lestrange heir shoulder length hair was combed in slight waves and his Avada Kedavra green eyes with spikes of grey glowed with mischievousness. Hadrian was dressing a sweater in Slytherin green and silver. In resume, he looked like the little perfect pureblood heir.
On 31st July 1982 several people fell in love with the Lestrange baby, even though they didn’t like his parents. The story divulged in the Daily Prophet was that Bellatrix kept her pregnancy in secret due to You-Know-Who’s insanity and then because of the hate received during the trials, but on Hadrian’s second birthday they decided to announce it.
(Nobody even suspected that Hadrian Severus Lestrange was actually Harry James Potter. This thought never even crossed anyone’s mind.)
Hadrian's birthday was one of the best children’s parties of the pureblood circle. It actually just rivalled his cousin Draco because Narcissa was the one that planned both of the parties.
Life was good to Lord Voldemort’s Inner Circle, until their Lord’s plans came back with rigor when Hadrian was seven years old.
When Hadrian was five years old he received a gift from his grandmother Druella: a small and brown Cavalier King Charles Spaniel puppy. He named her Daphné and they fell in love with each other instantly. Draco started to roam Lestrange Manor even more so he could play with his cousin and Daphné.
He always used to say to Hadrian, “It’s so not fair, Harry! Father has peacocks, but Mother doesn’t let me have anything!”
“Mother also didn't want me to have a puppy. Grandma Druella convinced her. But now Mother actually likes Daphné, just like Father and Uncle Rabastan. You should talk to her, you know.”
Draco asked a puppy from their grandmother and she immediately talked with Narcissa and gave him a Yorkshire Terrier. Draco named him Hercules.
Two years later Hadrian, Draco, Pansy Parkinson, Theodore Nott and Blaise Zabini were at Mrs. Isabelle Zabini’s summer manor on a warm day of August. All of them — except Theo, who had a pony — were playing with their little animals. Pansy had a little kitchen named Dory and Blaise had an adventurous guinea pig named Chanel. Everything was great for the kids, playing with their toys and animals and talking about the latest brooms until Chanel started to shake in Blaise’s arms and Daphné and Hercules started to bark.
"Chanel! What is going on?"
Their answer was easily found: a giant snake with black and light brown scales was slithering through the garden. Draco, Pansy, Theo and Blaise all gasped, while Hadrian looked fascinated by the snake.
“Food... like a ratss…”
“Chanel isssn’t a rat. He isss a guinea pigs,” hissed Hadrian. If it was possible the snake looked surprised, but then hissed pleasantly. Draco, Pansy and Theo gasped again while Blaise ran away to find his mother with Chanel in his hand.
“A ssspeaker. How luckys I am. Could yous give me sssome foods?” asked the snake.
Hadrian nodded eagerly. “Of coursse. I'll asssk Mrsss. Zabini, but yous can't eat Chanel. Blaissse will be very sssssad if you do thats.”
“Hadrian!” exclaimed Mrs. Zabini when she entered her garden. The boy in question turned to look at her and only then noticed that his friends and cousin were all looking shocked. “Were you talking to the snake?”
“Yes, Mrs. Zabini. It-well... Ssssnake, are you a male or female?” asked Hadrian and was answered with a “I’m not either”, so he then proceeded to say, “They don’t want to be either gender, but they’re really cool. They only thought that Chanel was a rat, but I told them that it wasn’t and they shouldn’t eat him. Why? Didn’t you guys hear what I said?”
“Oh, my lovely boy…” muttered Mrs. Zabini while caressing Hadrian’s curly hair. “You’re a parseltongue and didn't even know that! Have you always talked to snakes?”
“No! I always heard the snakes garden, but never talked back to them. Mrs Zabini, does this mean that only I can do that?”
“No, cousin,” said Draco and he lightly shook Hadrian's hand. “Our Lord could do that too. We need to talk to Aunt Bella and discover why you can do this!”
Mrs. Zabini nodded thoughtfully and went to floo call the Dark Lord’s Inner Circle while the children warily started to pet the snake as soon as Harry talked to them. “Hey, I think I’m gonna call them Cobra. What do you guys think?”
After putting their children to sleep the Inner Circle was talking about the recents events in the Zabinis’ summer manor.
“How is Hadrian a parseltongue? That’s what I cannot understand” said Caspian Rosier, Evans Rosier’s uncle and one of Voldemort’s very first followers.
“Well, everyone is asking this same question, Caspian,” retorted Reed Avery.
Barty Crouch Jnr hummed, making everyone’s eyes look at him. “Whoa! Calm down, I’m just thinking... Dumbledore always talks about The Boy Who Lived bullshit and his scar, right? And this scar was made by our Lord.”
“So you think that... well, it probably makes sense…” hummed Augustus Rookwood.
“What makes sense?” roared Bellatrix.
“Bella, calm down. Maybe the scar somehow made Hadrian also a parseltongue. Merlin knows how much Dumbledore always talks about his scar and the importance of it.”
By this moment everyone hummed. They were able to hide the scar for six years because of Hadrian’s long fridge, so nobody knew about it. And well, Barty and Severus theory made some sense, although it still felt like something wasn’t right.
“Dophy, Cissy... remember what I told you both? This is one more reason!”
“Bella, you surely don't think that…” started Narcissa.
“Yes!! My son would be the best bet to our Lord’s Consort. He’ll grow to be so pretty, we all know that, and now the fact that he’s parseltongue... I still think that our Lord hinted at that.”
Everyone widened their eyes at that, but...
“Our Lord needs an heir. Little Hadrian is powerful, surely he can carry the Slytherin line heirs and heiress when the time comes.” That was all that Abraxas Malfoy said the whole night. He was the Dark Lord’s first follower and his right hand, so everyone started to wonder the possibilities of what he said.
Maybe... maybe, Hadrian could really be the Dark Lord’s Consort.
Bellatrix and Rodolphus let their son stay with the large snake and he indeed named it Cobra. Unknown to Hadrian, Bellatrix and the Inner Circle started to actually consider the idea of him being the Dark Lord’s Consort. Due to that Hadrian got more tutors besides the usual magical and pureblood heir tutoring.
In 1990 Hadrian, Draco, Bellatrix and Narcissa went to visit Grimmauld Place where the boys’ great-grandfather, Pollux Black, was enjoying his last days. First Hadrian and Draco said their goodbyes so after that they could roam the house while the two sisters were saying theirs.
“Hey, Drake, look what I found!” shouted Hadrian to Draco. He was holding a large and heavy gold locket with a S in glittering green stone inlay on the front. His cousin gasped when he saw the jewellery. “It must be used by a real Slytherin!”
“Yeah, definitely, Cousin. You should use it, you know, it combines with your eyes.”
“Really? But what if Mother and Aunt Narcissa don’t like it if we get it?”
“Well, we're still Blacks, aren’t we? If it’s laid anywhere it’s ours too. But I don’t think it would look good on me, I think you look fine wearing it.”
Hadrian hummed and absently caressed the locket, feeling a calm wave from the jewellery. This made him pause in his thoughts. Every Dark family always warns about the dangers of unknown magical artifacts, but it still felt so good...
Hadrian keeps the locket.