Chapter Text
Rose Lily Potter, daughter of James Charlus Potter and Lily Marie Evans Potter, was a witch. An honest to goodness broom flying, wand waving, potion brewing, robe wearing witch. Well, technically she wasn’t all that since she would have to wait another month before receiving her Hogwarts letter, but still, you get the idea.
Now Rose lives with her walrus of an uncle, horse of an aunt, and pig of a cousin, The Dursley’s. Some of the most boring, ‘normal’ (yeah ‘cause normal people locked children in cupboards), magic-hating muggles she had ever met, not that she had met many. They didn’t encourage her to excel in school, didn’t let her watch the telly, let her read fantasy books, play with toys, or let her do anything a normal ten year old girl would do. That’s because they are abusive, neglectful bastards.
Her Aunt Petunia, her mother’s older sister, was a gossiping old hag that had nothing better to do during the day than spy on the neighbors. She taught Rose her ‘womanly’ duties like cleaning, cooking, and gardening. But she also took on harder jobs, like mowing the grass, washing the car, fixing stuff, painting, et cetera, et cetera. She was practically a human house elf. She got up early every morning, cooked breakfast for her relatives (she refused to call them family), often not getting much for herself, tidied up the kitchen, then headed off to school.
Her cousin was fat, unathletic, and had the stamina of a 17 year old dog. She was his favorite punching bag, even though it’s generally frowned upon to beat up little girls (though you’re not supposed to beat up anybody really). She was quite fast and nimble, so she could usually escape unless his gang (seriously, what ten year old has a gang) was with him. He didn’t dare do anything in front of teachers though. In school he settles on poking, prodding, and pinching her arms while the other boys tug on her pigtails. Hard.
Her uncle wasn’t much better. Dudley seemed to have learned everything from his father, not that either of them had very big brains to begin with (really, she did his homework for Merlin’s sake!). He didn’t punch or kick her, but he did slap her silly sometimes. Other times he settled on cuffing her on the head or gripping her arm painfully.
Thankfully her baggy clothing hid most of the bruises. One time, she had a red handprint on her cheeks from earlier that morning. She had burned the toast slightly and Vernon was not happy with her. Rose was quite resourceful when she wanted to be, and simply stated that she had fallen asleep on her hand in the car. As if to prove her point, the handprint had faded after a few minutes. That was one of her first bursts of accidental magic.
The only reason Rose protected her relatives and their abuse was because of the blood wards. She knew that was the only thing keeping her safe from Voldemort and other Death Eaters. If she really concentrated, she could faintly see the glow of the wards, red for the shared blood, gold for her magic, ice blue for the creator’s magic (she presumed that was Dumbledore’s) and a faint murky brown that showed her squib neighbor Mrs. Figg, who was assigned to watch over her. Obviously she didn’t do a very good job of it. Aura seeing was one of her many talents. Among those were her perfect memory and her Occlumency barriers. The barriers were created instinctively after she learned muggle mediation. Rose was also a passive Legilimens, which meant that most of the time she could tell if someone was lying and could read people’s emotions if they were strong enough. Her skills were quite honed as there really isn’t much to do spending half your life locked in a cupboard under the stairs.
There was something very special about her memory, though. She could remember everything roughly after the age of one. Rose could remember her mother Lily, with her emerald green eyes, flaming red hair, and kindly smile, watching over her as she fell asleep. She remembered her father with his wire rim glasses, and wild black hair. She had the same hair sadly, though hers was a bit wavyer and ran slightly past her shoulders. She also remembered Uncle Siri, better known as Padfoot the dog, with his twinkling eyes and barking laughter. Or Uncle Moony, a lanky man with tawny hair flecked with grey and pale scars running down his cheeks. Not that they scared her mind you, in fact, she had loved to gently trace them with her tiny little finger whenever he held her. And then there was Peter, the rat. She never liked him. Whenever he babysat her by himself he would get this glint in his eye and talk about how he would be rewarded for handing her over. He was the one who was Secret Keeper for her family’s cottage, and he was the one who sold them out to Voldemort.
She always wondered what happened to him, was he caught or did he escape somehow? She also wondered whatever happened to Siri and Moony. Why didn’t they come for her at the Dursleys? Why did Siri hand her off to that giant, Hagrid? Were they killed? Did they forget about her? Were they looking for her but couldn’t find her? Hundreds of questions swirled through her head but they wouldn’t be answered for another few months when she went to Hogwarts.
Hogwarts was one thing she remembered quite vividly. Her parents would show her pictures of the grand castle, and her dad spoke of all the secret passages him and the Marauders discovered during their tenure there. One of Rose’s favorite things to do as a child was look at her parents old school books. All the illustrations in the Fantastic Beasts, the complex diagrams in the transfiguration texts, and the rough sketches in Herbology books.
But thinking about Hogwarts always brought her to a big problem. How was she going to convince her relatives to let her attend? They despised anything ‘freakish’ (their words not her’s), anything abnormal.
I guess I just have to play it by ear when the letter comes.