Vitality [ Harry Potter ]

|| Prologue

Prologue:

Halloween, 1981:

Muggles. Sirens. Lights.

The crowd filing outside of the now destroyed Potter home was growing by the second, the loud sounds of chatter and sirens of every kind filling the air. Whether those sirens were coming from Muggle defense forces or Wizarding ones, Rubeus Hagrid did not know.

All Rubeus Hagrid knew was that he had to find a way to sneak past the yellow caution tape that was now being strung up around the ruins of the house and up what stairs were remaining to the nursery. His orders: to find and collect the living children of James and Lily Potter, both of whom had just been brutally murdered by a fellow wizard.

Fellow. What a strange way to explain the nature of a known mass-murdering-wizard. What a strange way to explain the nature of someone who had killed and tortured tens of thousands of witches, wizards, and magical beings over the years.

He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's kill streak was growing larger by the minute, no one in the Wizarding world could deny that. However, the one thing everyone in the Wizarding world was trying to deny at that precise moment was the fact that two unsuspecting and untrained infants had just possibly defeated He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, the darkest wizard of the time, for good.

It had only been just over a half-hour and it seemed as if the entire Wizarding world had heard the news of what was going on in Godric's Hollow that night. Mingled in with the Muggles, Rubeus Hagrid could spot a few witches and wizards in their nightclothes staring up at the half-demolished house.

Deciding he'd better act before the crowd grew too large, Hagrid pushed his way past a group of stunned-looking Muggle women to the front gate of the home where a strand of yellow tape with the words 'Caution -- Crime Scene' written in bold black lettering made him hesitate. While he was stood there, towering taller than any other man on site, a small Muggle man in a blue uniform approached him.

"E-excuse me, sir?" the man called up to him over the blaring sirens. "I'm going to have to a-ask you to-to step back j-ust a-"

"Confundus," Hagrid muttered under his breath, jerking the pink umbrella he had clutched in his large hand towards the Muggle man. As if his head had been cleared of all thoughts and feelings, the Muggle man's face became relaxed, and then, as if all of his thoughts and feelings had rushed back at once, the man's expression grew to be perplexed.

The man looked around himself as if he had forgotten where he was or why he was even there in the first place, and then smiled widely up at Hagrid. "You have yourself a nice day," he said with a large, goofy smile. He then turned around and walking in the opposite direction of the house.

Hagrid strode through the caution tape and up the rubble-strewn path to the front door, which was hanging off of its hinges. He pushed into the hallway where James Potter's body lied limply, his back on the floor, his face white as a ghost. His round glasses had been blasted off of his face and now laid merely feet away from his body. Hagrid, trying his hardest not to shed a tear, stepped over the body of James Potter to the staircase that awaited him.

The old wooden stairs creaked loudly under his weight as he took them two at a time, racing to the open door he saw at the end of the hall. He could see the red and blue lights from the Muggle defense cars flashing against the walls of the nursery as he approached it. He could hear the loud lashings of the wind as it got tied up in the draperies set around the windows. And then he heard them; the Potter twins.

Their cries rang out louder than any sirens or shrieks from outside. Their cries were the only thing Hagrid could hear. He walked slowly into the nursery and finally let some of the tears building up in his eyes go. There, on the carpeted floor, lay the kindest witch he had ever met. The beautiful emerald eyes of Lily Potter stared up at him, blank and lost. Her left hand was outstretched to a set of cribs that lay underneath an open window, but she was not reaching for the infants that inhabited them. She was dead, after all.

Hagrid stepped over Lily Potter's body as well and reached a large hand out to each of the twins, saying, "It's alrigh' now... Yer safe with me..." The infants looked up at him with the large doe eyes they had each acquired from their mother, tears streaming from them. Hagrid let his beady black eyes travel up the foreheads of the infants and found that each now had an identical looking lightning bolt-shaped scar. The cries of the twins grew softer the longer Hagrid stood there with his hands in their cribs, staring from lightning bolt to lightning bolt.

"How did this happen...?" A distraught voice rang through Hagrid's ears; a familiar voice.

"Yeh shouldn' be here, Sirius," Hagrid said over his shoulder to the man now standing behind him.

Sirius Black had snuck past the Muggle defenses the same way as Hagrid had done. His face was wet with sweat and tears and his breathing had become more radical. His long, dark hair looked untidy as if he had been tugging at it endlessly or trying to pull it out.

"Let me take them, Hagrid," Sirius said after a long pause. "I'm the only family they've got."

"I can't, Sirius. Dumbledore's orders," Hagrid replied, his voice growing curter.

Sirius slammed his hand against the wall. "Dammit, Hagrid, forget Dumbledore! They are my godchildren! They won't be going to live with Lily's horrible Muggle family! They can't! I won't al-"

"On'y one o' them is going ter Privet Drive, Sirius," Hagrid said briskly. A shocked expression spread across Sirius's face for the second time that night.

"Only one of- But then where is the other going?" he inquired.

Hagrid hesitated before speaking again. "I've been told tha' the Ministry o' Magic is out lookin' fer yeh. Ter arrest yeh..."

"Arrest me? For what?" Sirius spat, his eyebrows crinkling.

"You need ter go an' hide. Somewhere where they can't find yeh. Now, Sirius," Hagrid pleaded. "Don't do it fer yerself, do it fer the twins."

Sirius's dark eyes scanned Hagrid's large frame. "Tell me where the other is going. Please, Hagrid, I'm begging you."

Hagrid hesitated once more before answering Sirius's question. "Ter live with Remus."

Sirius locked his jaw and curtly nodded his head. "Take my motorbike. The feel of the engine calms them down. Goodbye now, I have a rat to kill." Without another word, he turned and left the room, leaving Hagrid in a semi-confused state. What rat was he talking about? Hagrid didn't see any rats around...

He listened as Sirius walked down the stairs and back through the creaky, un-hinged front door. Once more, Hagrid was alone.

Hagrid took both infants in his arms and quickly Apparated out of the house and into a dark alleyway across the street from the ruins, where he then found himself face to face with Sirius Black's infamous motorbike. He wrapped each twin in the blankets he had found in their cribs, started the engine of the motorbike, and took off into the night's clouds, leaving behind the parents and the home of Harry and Grace Potter.

[+]

[A/N]:

Ahh!! Okay, so I've finally finished writing the prologue and I've finally figured out the way I want Grace's story to go. I've planned out characters and plots and backstories, so now I feel like I know what I'm doing.

For those of you who have been reading this story since I published it first four years ago, this is just a warning that almost everything is completely different. Also, this book takes place in Harry's third year at Hogwarts, not the first, not the fourth, but the third.

Sorry for all of the confusion surrounding this book, but here it is now. I hope you guys enjoy the story as it unfolds for you, I know that I enjoy planning and writing it.

Thanks for reading! Remember to vote, comment, or share this story with your friends [I mean, I'm not forcing you to do so]! Bye, guys.

|| Grace ||