Fleur De Lis

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

"Avada Kedavra!"

Harry Potter blinked as a flash of green echoed through his memory. The young seventeen year old Ravenclaw could tell he had just been lost in the flashback of his final moments of his sixth year. The moment he felt that he had truly taken a life outside of self defense for the first time. Of course there was Quirrel in his fourth year who seemed less than a man by the time he ended his existence, and the shade of Tom Riddle in his seventh year that was only a shadow of the Monster himself, but the taking of Peter Pettigrew's life had affected him differently. Harry may have struck the man down in self defense or as some called it an act of passion, but he knew that he might have been able to spare the man's life in hindsight. The now headboy of Hogwarts was leaps and bounds magically ahead of the rat animagus, but for all the pain and suffering he had caused Harry the young man felt forced to take his life in retaliation.

The train horn sounded off at platform 9 and 3/4s indicating that there were fifteen minutes left till the train departed. Harry surveyed the platform full of families looking out for something that could escalate into violence at a moment's notice. Of course nothing out of the ordinary stood out, so he took a deep breath trying to relax his thoughts and enforce his occlumency shields to hold his focus.

Harry's younger brother, Justin Potter, stormed past him at the site of his recent girlfriend Susan Bones. The young red head girl had captured his little brother's heart about midway through their previous year, and the two had practically become inseparable. Susan had been on vacation with her best friend for the last two weeks so they had not seen each other since the fiasco at the Quidditch World Cup. The two embraced as if it had been years since they had seen each other, or as if Justin had been off at war for years and returned only for her. The older of the Potter brothers rolled his eyes at the scene, and shook his head with a slight smile forming at the edge of his mouth, "Hello to you as well Susan."

The girl blushed as she separated from the dark haired boy she was embracing, "Hello Harry, I didn't see you there."

"Of course you didn't. My brother seems to have distracted you quite well." Harry said cheekily with a straight face.

"Forgive me Harry, that was rude. How was the rest of your Summer?" She asked, but winced as she realized just how awful the last few weeks for Harry Potter had been.

The boy waved it off without notice though, "Eventful as I am sure you have heard. If I was going to spend so much time with a Bones' woman I have to admit I would rather have done it with you. Your aunt is quite the slave driver."

"Well you don't rise to the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement without some of those qualities." Susan said defensively, but her cheeks pinkened a bit at the back handed compliment.

Justin shot his brother a slightly annoyed look, but said nothing. The young shaggy dark haired boy had been through a lot this past Summer, and had done lots of training with his older brother, and knew it was best not to antagonize him in any way. His dark brown eyes that resembled their father's surveyed the train station as Harry had just done moments before. It was clear to Harry that while the boy was just beginning to get good at his situational awareness, he still had a long way to go, "Justin, why don't you and Susan go find seats on the train before all the good ones are taken."

The boy-who-lived nodded as he noticed he was getting long looks from the crowd, and took his girlfriend by the hand, and the two claimed they would catch up with Harry on the train. Harry took a sigh of relief as the two boarded the train with a ten minute warning horn sounding off. Ten minutes to get all the students on the train safely, he could do this, and with his celebrity brother making it onto the train without attracting too much attention meant things were looking fairly promising.