Chapter Text
*July 31, 1991*
Harry watches as Hagrid makes a brisk escape from the cart, muttering something about a pint at the Leaky Cauldron. He is still a bit stunned himself so upon leaving the cart himself, it is not until he gets out the front doors of Gringotts that he realises he has been left alone.
He looks around but doesn’t see Hagrid anywhere among the brightly clothed witches and wizards crowding the Alley.
Furrowing his brows, Harry pulls out his list.
Clothes, books, wand, cauldron, phials, scales, a telescope?
Seems simple enough.
I think.
Looking up and around Diagon Alley, Harry realized it would in fact not be simple. Not with all the displays showing weird and wonderful things and magical things.
So he went into the first shop that caught his eye just a few doors down from Gringotts.
It wasn’t much but there was a singular stick of wood on a purple cushion in the dusty window of a narrow shabby little shop and in gold painted letters above the door it read simply:
Ollivander’s: Makers of Fine Wands since 382 B.C.
I need a wand, don’t I?
Harry pushed the door open, a faint ching sounding from above the door, to a dust covered shop with narrow boxes lining the walls from floor to ceiling. A girl with short wavy black hair, contrasting sharply with Harry’s own birds’ nest of hair, in faded green overalls with a crème jumper on stands with her back to Harry at an old wooden counter. There had to be over forty of the narrow boxes upon it all stacked precariously one on the other and, from the looks of it, even more stacked up behind the counter.
The girl must have heard him come in as she turns to look at him.
Bright yellow amber eyes meet emerald green as a man comes out from the many shelves behind the counter with several more boxes.
A knowing smile dawns on the man’s face. “I wondered when I would be seeing you Mr. Potter,” the man says drawing Harry’s attention from the girl.
She seems to startle at this slightly, eyebrows shooting up. Tilting her head to the side she asks, “You’re Harry Potter?”
Harry shrinks a bit in on himself. “Uh- Yes… um,” he says his found courage evaporating in the face of his apparent fame.
He had been more then uncomfortable with how everyone had treated him in the Leaky Cauldron and did not want a repeat of that if at all possible.
The girl frowns, the man watches him with curiosity.
“It okay I won’t treat you differently for being famous. I am from the muggle world too and I’m sure it is overwhelming to come to the wizarding one. You are only human after all too,” she says, smiling brightly by the end of it.
Relief washes through Harry as he gives a small smile back. Confusion follows.
“How did you know that?” he questioned.
The girl giggles softly in cheery amusement. “You’re wearing muggle clothes silly.”
He looks down at Dudley’s too large cast-offs that practically swallow him. “Oh.”
She gives him a thoughtful once over grinning again.
“I believe I have just the wand for you Ms. Peverell.”
Harry jumps slightly at the man’s voice having forgotten he was there too.
The girl, Peverell she had been called, turned to the man who had moved to retrieve a very dusty looking box. Open curiosity shone on her face as he presents a light-coloured wand with that has small bulges running its length, a design is carved in spirals down the smooth poker straight handle from said box.
Peverell’s face pinches as if she is trying to figure out a puzzle, glancing up at the man.
She takes it and almost immediately the calming smell of lavender and earl grey flood the shop, bright purple sparks shoot off the tip of the wand lighting up her face in the coloured glow.
Heat rises to Harry’s cheeks as he watches the girl in a trance.
A smug smirk breaks out across Peverell’s face as she looks at the wand clearly pleased.
“About damn time in’t it?” she speaks, an American accent coming through, breaking Harry out of his reverie.
The man chuckles shaking his head. “Elder wood and dragon heartstring. Thirteen and a half inches. Reasonably supple flexibility. You, my dear, are destined for interesting things.”
Peverell tilts her head to the side, warm amusement on her face. “Interesting indeed. And her perhaps a bit ironic.” She laughs to herself at something she only appears to be in on. The man raises an eyebrow but says nothing.
‘She’s odd,’ Harry thinks passively.
Odd but Harry thinks he may like her brand of oddness.
“Now then it is your turn Mr. Potter. Come, come. You may have a seat over there Ms. Peverell,” the man gestures to a single wore wooden chair beside the door.
And thus begins the next half hour of Harry trying wands. Well more like Mr. Ollivander, as Harry found out his name is, giving him a wand only to snatch it back saying, ‘no not that one’ or ‘two difficult customers in one day’ and variations of them, grinning a bit like a madman all the while.
By the end several lamps had burst, boxes had come flying off the shelves leaving several feathers still on the floor, and Harry was sure there was not going to be a wand for him.
He had felt like giving up about ten wands back but the encouraging looks that Renae Peverell or Rae as she insisted, he call her had kept Harry going.
Finally Mr. Ollivander seemed to think of something, bringing only one box out instead of six.
“I wonder,” he muttered to himself as he took out the wand out of its box. “Holly, phoenix feather core, eleven inches, nice and supple,” Mr. Ollivander presents.
Something inside Harry perked up at the sight of the wand being presented to him.
Taking it warmth spread up through arms into the rest of him. A sense of home and rightness bringing a smile to his face as bright yellow and red sparks shot from the end of his wand.
Harry shared an excited look with Rae who whooped and jumped up to have a closer look at his wand.
“Oh bravo Mr. Potter! Yes, very good indeed. And how very curious… very curious indeed…” Mr. Ollivander trails off in thought.
“Sorry sir, but what’s curious?” Harry asks, confusion and suspicion intertwining. Renae raises looks up at Mr. Ollivander with curiosity.
The older wizard pauses for a beat before telling Harry and Renae, “I remember every wand I've ever sold, Mr. Potter. It so happens that the phoenix whose tail feather resides in your wand gave another feather... just one other. It is curious that you should be destined for this wand when its brother gave you that scar.”
On reflex Harry’s hand comes up to brush over the jagged lines of lighting that spread from his hairline to just above his eyebrow.
“And who owned that wand?”
Mr. Ollivander shakes his head looking at Harry’s scar more then him. “We do not speak his name. The wand chooses the wizard, Mr. Potter. It's not always clear why. But I think we can expect great things from you. After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things. Terrible, oh yes… but great.”
A reverent look crosses Mr. Ollivander’s face before he turns sharply, sending the boxes of wand that had piled up away with a flick of his own wand, making his way behind the counter to assumedly ring them up.
Harry and Renae share a look as they pay for their wands. They also each get a holster at the suggestion of Mr. Ollivander. Each a simple black dragonhide.
They leave the shop quietly walking down the Alley a little way before Harry is stopped by Renae.
Rae has a nervousness about her as she looks at Harry. She seems to struggle with her words until she finally quickly says, “Do you want help navigating the Alley?”
Harry looks at her surprised that she would offer. “Uh…”
“It’s not that I don’t think you totally could, and you probably don’t really need my help but I don’t have a lot of friends and so I was sort of hoping maybe you would like to be my um… friend?” Rae rushes out quickly waving her hands around as she talks. She takes a breath, ploughing forward, “You probably are here with your guardians anyways…” She looks down a her feet, fidgeting with her hands.
He blinks at her confession, a tentative smile on his face. “I- I would like um- that. My uh,” Harry cringes, “relatives didn’t bring me. Hagrid did but he left me alone at Gringotts looking a bit pale.”
“Oh,” she says looking up at him, the barest hint of surprise in her face. “Right well then, we best get you sorted, yes? I’m assuming you are going to Hogwarts.”
“Yeah,” he says with a shy smile. Harry quickly asks a thought occurring to him, “Are you?”
It would be nice to already have a friend.
Rae’s face drops a little as she shakes her head no. “I only just moved here and besides I’m twelve not eleven so I don’t think they would take me now.”
“Oh.” He tries to not let his disappointment show.
“Hey, we can still spend the day together,” Rae comforts with a gentle smile. Her face suddenly lights up as she then excitedly says, “We should get ice cream! There’s this place here that sells a bunch of weird flavours that I’ve wanted to try. Come on I’ll show you!” She grabs Harry’s hand dragging him through the crowds.
A warm feeling comparable to the way Harry’s wand made him feel settles over Renae and Harry as they shop. Laughing and talking about whatever they think of, making silly faces at one another, it was a good birthday for Harry.
The best birthday.
Unfortunately the day came to an end when they finally ran into Hagrid at the Owl Emporium.
They had tried to keep up the easy atmosphere they had created but things got awkward after that, so they instead parted ways with the hope to see each other again.
That was the last time Harry saw Renae for the coming years.
That is until his fifth year at Hogwarts came around.
-.~*~.-
*July 1995*
Voldemort would never willingly voice his thoughts to anyone, but he had missed having a body. Even if that body was snake like in appearance and not his original visage like it was supposed to be.
Incompetent rat.
The years as a wraith drifting and worse yet, the year he spent as a homunculus did him no favours in the areas of his mind. He had been practically unable to form a coherent thought while a wraith and then barely able to maintain a complex one as a homunculus.
It was humiliating having been, what he considers, a Master of the mind arts.
Voldemort scowls as he stalks through the halls of his Hogwarts noting the damage. It was practically in ruins. Long cracks ran up and down the walls, paintings shredded in their frames, tapestries hanging by threads. His mind was destroyed.
Utterly destroyed.
He scoffs as he begins to mend the cracks, the painting, the tapestries. It is a slow and tedious process.
Perhaps he should have seen this coming.
Perhaps splitting his soul six times had not been his most brilliant idea.
Voldemort makes his way through the halls into the dungeons lighting the scones on the walls as he goes. He follows a particular hall down past the Slytherin common room that appears to come to a dead end.
“Open,” he hisses to the wall.
The stone bricks shift and move revealing a passage of stairs lined with torches descending deep below the castle. Down to the Chamber of Secrets.
Voldemort swiftly steps down into the passage.
He arrives in the chamber hardly sparing it a glance as he walks confidently into the open mouth of his ancestor. A single round door sits at the end, but Voldemort turns suddenly and sharply into the wall adjacent walking through it.
The door is a nasty trap after all.
An office awaits him on the other side of the wall, but he does not stop his brisk pace as Voldemort crosses the office to the shelves opposite, pulling two books off and then tilting the third.
He did not survive this long not taking precaution even if they perhaps edged on paranoia.
The shelf rotates showing a room with seven white marble pedestals. Each one meant for each of the horcruxes he had intended to make. Each oddly empty save for one.
Voldemort’s eyes narrow on the first pedestal.
His diary sits upon it, a gaping hole through the centre, the marble below was blackened cracked under it.
He walks over, the first licks of anger burning in his chest darkening the shadows of his mind.
His hands shake with white hot anger as he his fingers pick up the ruined diary before him.
LUCIUS!
He sees red and before he can clamp down on his anger, Voldemort is harshly thrown out of his mind palace.
Teeth grit, hands shaking in clenched anger, he comes to sitting in his study at Riddle Manor. His magic whips around him like writhing vipers ready to strike.
The anger bleeds out of him as he breathes deeply in an effort to settle back into his meditative state.
It does not quite work but the anger quiets allowing Voldemort’s thoughts to flow more freely. And something strikes him as odd.
Voldemort should have felt when the horcrux was destroyed and yet he had no recollection.
Curiosity peaked; he tried reaching out to any of his horcruxes finding a distant sort of awareness but not any specific location much less which pieces of his soul remained intact.
But he had the damaged diary.
He was unsure.
And what a curious thing it was to be unsure.
-.~*~.-
Far away in a cottage in the middle of the Sätra Forest in Sweden hidden away from muggles and wizard kind alike, Renae Peverell tends to her garden.
She had grown to be in all terms beautiful. Just turned sixteen, she looked almost fairylike with her sharpened features and lithe body, flowers and herb alike surrounding her in her corner of the forest. The plain blue overalls, white t-shirt, and brown leather gloves she wears somehow only adding to the look. Cropped black hair twisting this way in and that, frames a pale face with soft, loose curls in a messy yet stylish sort of way. Grace and steadiness practically radiated from her movements as she pulled, pruned, and cared for the varied plants, both dangerous and harmless, with deft hands.
Her eyes though. Amber gold in colour like twin suns or smooth stones of citrine, shone with a peacefulness and depth well beyond her years.
And her aura. It creeped out from her in a cool, almost suffocating blanket like morning fog among the twigs and branches of the forest floor.
Just like the death hanging in the air, waiting.
Exactly like Death.
Renae paused her movements feeling a similar aura to her own. She smiled quickly realizing who it was, golden eyes warming to reflect the afternoon sunshine coming through the tall pines surrounding her.
“Well hello, Death. Is it 3 o’clock already?” she says, her voice light, a vague British accent overlapping her native American accent. She turns, wiping her dirt covered hands on the front of her overalls, looking at the being before her.
“Hello Renae. Yes, it is. Lose track of time again?” a voice sounding like several layering each other in an unnatural sort of harmony replies.
Renae smiles a mischievous grin at the deity. “Perhaps.”
Death huffs a laugh.
“What?” she says, humour in her voice.
“Come. We have souls to put to rest,” Death says holding out a thin almost skeletal hand to her.
Renae rolls her eyes, using the offered hand to pull herself up, chills involuntarily going up her arm from the coldness of it. “More like you do and I get to play assistant and do all your paperwork.”
Humour radiates from Death. “And you simply do a wonderful job.”
“Uh-huh sure. Whatever you say.” She mockingly rolls her eyes, a smile playing at her lips.
-.~*~.-
Harry was fed up with the people in his life.
He could not contact his friends because of Dumbledore, he was more anxious than ever every time the evening news came on expecting disaster and destruction to be broadcasted only for there to be nothing, and the nightmares of that night meant he got practically no sleep.
Harry was angry and tired.
Perhaps that’s what led to the decision to go to Diagon Alley against Dumbledore’s orders to not leave the house.
Not that it had been a hard decision.
Last few years, the most recent especially, upon reflection had only showed how little Harry knew about the world he was supposed to save or something like that. He was going to change that.
Taking only his wand and cloak, the latter tucked into a backpack, and dawning a grey beanie he found behind a dumpster to cover the disastrous black mop he called his hair with a dark hoodie to match, he made his way to London using the bit of English currency he had to take a bus.
The Dursley’s had mostly just left Harry alone this summer so thankfully they wouldn’t notice his absence as he mostly stayed in his room anyways.
Reaching the Leaky Cauldron, he kept his eyes casted downward not wanting to draw attention to himself. He passed through the bar both surprisingly and not easily coming to the brick wall leading to Diagon Alley.
Harry tapped the bricks, and they shuffled open for him revealing the long cramped colourful Alley.
Nostalgia brought out a smile that didn’t quite meet his eyes as amber eyes flashed through his memories.
Not wanting to waste time Harry walked down the Alley keeping an eye out for Death Eaters or other suspicious persons.
Flourish & Blotts was his first stop. He meandered the shelves not knowing exactly what he was looking for. Harry picked up a few books that seem to talk of wizard politics and because he was curious, he also bought a book on wizard customs and manners. He internally laughed to himself because when he would have to use it was beyond him.
Harry then against even his own judgement decided to glance around Knockturn Alley.
He knew it was a bad idea but upon stepping into the only shop with books in the window and finding a disguised book on parselmagic of all things, Harry couldn’t help but be glad it was worth it. Not that he risked it any long after that, immediately vacating the Alley and returning to Privet Drive less he be found out.
The book proved to be a fruitful find as he now had a way around the Trace which while it did not stop the mounting anxiety he felt as the summer progress with still no news of Voldemort or his followers, it did make Harry feel a bit better that he was not completely defenceless.
Harry smiled at the thought as he worked on his transfiguration essay.
Because of the book he had been able to sneak his things upstairs and disillusion them under his bed.
Smug satisfaction of getting one over the Vernon Dursley course through him.
Perhaps this summer wouldn’t be so bad.
-.~*~.-
“Careful with the fairy wings.”
“I’ve got it.”
“You added the doxy eggs?”
“…”
“Renae.”
“Yes Sev?”
“What is it you are supposed to be doing?”
“Making Griding Potion.”
“Then pray tell why there are yellow fumes.”
Renae grins at Severus Snape cheekily.
He sighs heavily, pinching the bridge of nose.
“Why did I decide you would make a good apprentice.”
“Because of my winning personality and amazing potion skills,” she chirps.
“Oh really?” Severus deadpans.
He opens his mouth, probably about to berate her for experimenting while trying to make the potion stock for the upcoming year at Hogwarts, when he stiffens instead, a slight wince flashing too quick for most to notice over his features.
Renae’s mood drops immediately.
“He’s calling you insist he?”
“I must go. Do not experiment while I am gone,” he says with a pointed look at her.
“Fine, fine,” Renae answers with an eye roll.
Without further fanfare, he sweeps out of the room.
Renae heaves a sigh at her mentor, running a potion-stained hand through her hair, mussing it.
She knew she knew too much and that it would come to bite her in the ass one day.
It had been an accident that she had found out about Severus’ position as a spy.
Though it led to Sev offering Renae an apprenticeship and a trust being formed between them so she really couldn’t be unhappy with how it turned out.
It had started last year, December 29, 1994, when Renae had written to Severus asking if an idea for a potion, she had at the time would work. A potion to resurrect someone.
Things had spiralled from there into Severus investigating her. Upon finding Renae’s lack of background it led to a confrontation between them.
It had defiantly been an experience to say the least having someone you saw on occasion at the apothecary in Diagon Alley and traded letters of scientific interest with back and forth show up on your doorstep out of the apparent blue levelling a wand at her.
Somehow, they talked it out though. Well more like they each took veritaserum and then talked as Severus did not trust her word and Renae did not trust his anymore at the time.
It had been… Enlightening.
But here they were six months later somehow having not sassed each other to death with the Dark Lord walking again from her stolen potion idea.
And Severus knew of her ‘friendship’ with Death.
Honestly, she felt she was more Death’s secretary than anything doing all his paperwork for him as he went and collected the souls of the dead. Plus he still refused to tell her why he hung around Renae and has been for the past four years of her life.
She scoffed at the reminder as she worked on the potions Renae and Sev had been brewing this time without the ‘experimenting’. Hardly her fault if she got a bit to curious what would happen if she added the fairy wings first.
Okay perhaps it was a bit.
Severus returned sooner than Renae had expected. He would not meet her eyes, his jaw was tense, and he appeared to be occluding his emotions hard.
Worry for her mentor bloomed in her chest, a feeling of dread growing in her gut.
“Sev?” Renae asked, eyebrows knitted together.
He took a breath seeming to stabilize himself sending Renae’s level of concern through the roof, the dread through the floor.
“What’s wrong? What did he want?” she asks with the beings of panic in her voice, making her way over to Severus still standing in the doorway.
“He wants to meet you.”
Renae’s thought process stalled hard. She blinked at her mentor once. Twice.
“What?”
Severus grits his teeth, swallowing. “He wants to meet you. Apparently, he wants to meet the person that I found worthy to offer an apprenticeship to whatever that means.”
Surprised, her brows shot to her hairline. The beginnings of a pleased smile tugged the corners of her mouth upward before halfway through changing to a grimace. “Lucky me,” Renae said sarcastically. She bit her lip furrowing her eyebrows again. “When does he want to meet me?”
A sigh could be heard from behind the hand Severus dragged over his face. “Tomorrow.”
Renae sharply inhaled.
“Right,” she says exhaling heavily. “Maybe he’ll like me,” Renae comments attempting to lighten the conversation.
A startled laugh comes from Severus as he gives her a look. “Maybe,” he says appearing to be humouring her.
She gives one of her mischievous grins and his face drops in horror.
“No. Whatever you are thinking no. You will not get yourself killed or tortured you hear me?” Severus says urgently and a bit harshly.
“Oh please I’ll be fine. Besides, he should be looking out for me not the other way ‘round,” Renae replies as ideas to mess with the Dark Lord flash through her head.
“Merlin give me strength,” he mutters under his breath, looking at the ceiling. Severus looks back down at her, sighing in exasperation. “You are a menace.”
Her grin widens showing to many teeth as she says, “You only live once, right? The average person that is.”
By now the exasperation coming from Sev is almost palpable as he deadpans her a look.
Renae laughs at his expense moving to check on the potions.
“He also wants us to come up with a potion to reverse the… adverse effects of the ritual.”
She stops in her tracks tilting her head to the side. “Adverse effects?” Renae asks turning back to her mentor, scientific intrigue sparking in her mind. It was her potion that was used in the ritual.
“Yes. He came out the cauldron looking like a humanized snake,” Severus says callously.
Renae’s brows shoot up. “Well that’s curious and defiantly not supposed to happen.” She begins to mull over the causes as she resumes moving to the brewing cauldrons in Severus’ potion lab. “I shall be interested to see him myself tomorrow. Perhaps he would even allow me a glimpse at his follower’s memory to see what went wrong,” she muses.
He gives her a non-committal hum. “Before we do anything to attempt to reverse this, I will have to inform the Headmaster.”
Severus receives a single nod of Renae’s head.
“Yes, I suppose you will,” she concedes with a sigh. Renae was not the biggest fan of Albus Dumbledore given how he had allowed Severus to be treated during his time at Hogwarts.
She had always known he was not as perfect as everyone in the British wizarding world makes him out to be, but she also knew just how human he was too.
Humans made mistakes. They are not set in stone.
An idea suddenly pops into Renae’s head as Severus is about to leave probably to call Dumbledore.
“Hey Sev?”
He stops in the doorway looking to her. “Yes?”
“Okay hear me out-“ She starts to be cut off.
“Renae whatever it is you're planning no,” Severus states narrowing his eyes.
“No. Wait. Hear me out, okay? What if I came to Hogwarts? What if I, oh I don’t know, transferred or something. You know damn well my OWLs are more then up to snuff. I could help you with classes. Be your ‘assistant’. Hell, I could get a proper education for my NEWTs,” Renae rants, gesturing her hands around her.
Severus seems to study her, digesting her words. A sigh leaves him, and Renae knows she’s convinced him, a small victorious smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.
“I suppose you want me to talk to the Headmaster,” he states rather than asks looking very tired.
Renae twists the victorious smile she had been suppressing into something that could be read as sheepish. “If it is not too much to ask.”
Another sigh comes from Severus as he runs a hand over his face.
“Fine but I expect these potions to be done when I return,” he tells her with a pointed glance at the simmering cauldrons.
The sheepishness vanishes and the victorious smile breaks across her face. “Oh but of course! Wouldn’t have it any other way.”
She catches the eye roll from the corner of hers as Severus leaves the potion lab. A smirk settles into place as he does.