Black Eden

Seven - The First Memory

All was dark. Cold and foggy. The clothes Harry wore, a Weasley Christmas jumper, green and complete with the stitched in \'H\' on the front, and jeans with his usual shoes. Nothing special. The jumper was plastered to his skin by a coldness that seeped into the air, like the cloth was trying to crawl into his skin for warmth.

The jagged rock beneath him suddenly appeared through the fog; Harry could not see a thing but for his hand about 4 inches away from his face.

He took in all this without complaint, or wonder, as to what was happening. Some part of his mind, he knew that he should not be here. Not be somewhere Draco was not, and could not reach. He did not question why he knew this. Or how.

The heavy, chilling fog parted and he was shown that his surroundings were water and a lone stretch of land, like a crudely made path through the water leading to his rock. Where the other end lead, Harry did not know.

A dark figure shrouded in shadow and cloud appeared a few feet away from Harry. A hood was covering the face. Harry desperately wanted to know who the person was.

The hood descended backwards, revealing a boy about his age with somber blue eyes and shoulder length black hair.

Harry had seen this person before. In photographs of moving crowds, pranks gone awry, and one of the famous Marauders.

\"Sirius?\" his voice cracked on the name. It had been years. Two long, harsh years without grieving.

\"Yes, Harry,\" the boy said, not sounding much like the Sirius that Harry had known. His voice was innocent and pure unlike that of the older Sirius, the escaped Azkaban prisoner who\'d had the happiness sucked from his very soul each and every day.

The dark clouds in the skies parted suddenly and revealed a beautiful sunrise that shot the now clear waters around him with orange and pink streaks. The rock he had been perched on became sun warmed instantly and Harry jumped up in surprise and alarm, almost toppling into the beautiful waters.

\"You wouldn\'t want to fall into the lake,\" the calm boy in front of him said. Harry could not bring himself to refer to him as Sirius. \"They are your memories, forgotten and not, and irreplaceable. If you were to fall in, you would be consumed by them like piranhas. They can be quite nasty, you know.\"

\"Right,\" Harry said, dumbfounded. His memories? Forgotten and not? He had forgotten things?

\"You have memories from when you were a baby, Harry. Conversations that happened around you. And ... the death of Lily and James. I don\'t wish for you to have that. At least unprepared,\" Young-Sirius said wisely, falsifying the innocent face he wore.

\"Now, I suppose you\'re wondering what the hell, right? You\'re not here of your own choice, really, but it\'s because of your choices. You do remember Draco, right?\" Harry shook his head, still confused. \"He fell off his broom and you tried to save him. Snivellus,\" Harry slightly smiled at the poison spat word, \"saved Draco from the fall, but you ... well. You\'re not dead!\" he said quickly as he saw Harry pale quickly, thinking of why Sirius would be with him.

\"Uhn hnnn,\" he murmured faintly. \"So what happened then if I\'m not dead?\" Young-Sirius just shook his head.

\"I cannot tell you, because you would no longer be with me and I have much to show you,\" he said almost sadly, before turning and walking down the narrow path of the earthen bridge that spanned the water, almost but not quite consumed by it. The water was the exact height of the path, without quite being flooded. \"You\'ll want to follow me, Harry. Getting lost would not be something you\'d like.\" How he could get lost on a narrow path surrounded by water, Harry had no idea, but followed anyway.

They walked in silence, Harry\'s eyes riveted on the form of his godfather ... or was it his godfather? Could this all be some twisted nightmare? Or a prank? Or a sick DE way of saying \"howdy\"? Young-Sirius abruptly stopped after about a quarter of an hour. Just stopped. Said nothing, did nothing.

\"You will see some things here, that will change you forever,\" Young-Sirius said without turning. \"If there is anything you would like to know now, ask me please. Some I cannot answer until after you have seen what you need to.\"

Harry\'s mouth opened, but nothing came out. He shook his head, no, and Young-Sirius, still not facing Harry, started walking away again. Harry followed.

\"Now, Harry, I\'m going to show you things that will change you. I\'ve said this already, I know. Your impressions of me, your parents, your past and future, they all will be altered significantly. What you knew will not be truthful, and you will have to question everything around you once this ordeal is over. Harry,\" Young-Sirius tone never changed, a slight lilt in his accent that Harry never heard from Sirius caused a weak smile to appear briefly on Harry\'s face as he continued following the black garbed boy, \"you have always been a person of magnificent importance in the lives of millions of people. You have allowed yourself to blindly follow the Light, and be unquestionably Gryffindor in your motives. Your ideas and thoughts about the Wizarding World had already been formed for you before you came to acknowledge us, Harry. You will question where your loyalties lie and decide whether there is really a Light and Dark side, or if there are only shades of gray. The people who you\'ve trusted, without question, will now be questioned for ulterior motives. It will be up to you, to decide. It will be up to you whether the Dark is subsided and conquered by the Light, or if the Light will be overshadowed by the Dark. Only you, Harry.\"

During this impressive and thought provoking speech, they had been walking along the narrow path, that now wound about in the water in odd patterns. Sometimes it seemed as though they were walking in the opposite direction. Young-Sirius stopped, raised a hand over the water, palm down, and spoke : \"There is no way back once you have seen your memories. You can forget them in time, but they will haunt you. An Obliviate charm will be useless. Step forward and face me.\"

Harry did so, and Young-Sirius hand touched the surface of the water without causing ripples. Then, he took one of Harry\'s hands and cupped it, bringing it into the water beneath his hand. A rush sounded throughout his mind and through his ears, a loud sound like that of a waterfall. He had the instinct to clap his hands over his ears to drown out the sound, but Young-Sirius still held his wrist beneath the water.

All of a sudden, it was gone. Everything. Harry looked around. Blackness enveloped him, and then a light parted the darkness. Like a muggle flashlight. Or someones wand with a lumos spell in place. He jumped a little when he felt a tightening on his wrist; Young-Sirius was beside him, still holding on and smiled faintly when the somewhat flickering light shone on them. \"They can\'t see us, or hear us. No matter what happens, Harry, it is in the past. The images resurfacing, the memories, are like a pensieve. You cannot interact with anything. I will not let you run away from this. Stand up, use the Gryffindor pride and bravery everyone always blathered on about, and face this.\" With those words, the grip on Harry\'s wrist was moved down to clasp around his hand in a comforting gesture. With the application of a bit of force, and gentleness edged with firmness, Harry knew he would not escape the hand nor Young-Sirius.

The floating light came closer, and revealed the face of a younger Severus Snape garbed in all-out Death Eater wear. A contemplative look on his face, he whispered behind him to what now was obviously a group of Death Eater\'s on a raid, or a spy mission or something equally unpleasant. \"They\'re in here,\" Severus said before raising a hand to firmly place the DE mask on his face; the rest of the group, probably about 20 or so, did the same.

Suddenly with a raise of wands, the entire room (for that was what it was revealed to be) was lit and it was shown to be a type of living room. Not unlike that of the Dursley\'s, but much nicer and larger. With no muggle utensils to be seen.

Harry\'s eyes followed a few of the DE\'s more carefully than others, Severus of course, and there was a certain blond-haired masked man that held his attention. That was the same shade of hair that he\'d woken up to in the middle of the night to have his nose buried in, with strands of it in his mouth. Lucius Malfoy.

\"Nott,\" Severus said quietly with a slightly less refined voice than Harry had known him to have, \"you take the upstairs with yours, we\'ll scour the grounds.\" With nods all around, half of the group departed and went up a set of stairs with no noise what-so-ever. Must be a silencing charm around them.

The second group of men with staffs spread apart and looked around the room, then each disappeared into other doors and areas. Harry followed after Lucius Malfoy, who had gone into one room with Severus. Young-Sirius followed him without complaint.

The two men were in a nursery. Harry recoiled when he realized exactly where he was. He was in his nursery! With wild and unbelieving eyes, he turned to Young-Sirius, who noticed this and nodded sadly. His blue eyes turned back and were riveted to the form of Lucius Malfoy, who was pawing through the room, and came to a halt above the crib.

The black haired, green eyed baby awoke and stared up at the masked man, with a smile on his cherubic young face. Harry really was an adorable baby. Harry reached up a small hand and tried to reach at Malfoy. The Harry that was watching the scene, could only hope that Malfoy did nothing too horrible, like defile his young self. That would be the end of his world.

Malfoy did something completely unexpected. He took off his mask, and with a wave of his wand, shut the door with a quiet slam. Baby-Harry started to cry, wailing, his big green eyes looking finally frightened. With a glare to the other man occupying the room, Severus, Malfoy scooped up the baby and held him like it was the only natural thing to do.

\"If you tell ANYONE about this, you will never have children, I will make sure of it. Although, who would procreate with you anyway?\" The Malfoy smirk appeared even as the blond man cooed and soothed the crying child in his arms. Severus also took his mask off and walked to the other side of the crib, leaning against it on his forearms.

\"Lucius,\" Severus said with a tired annoyance, \"we\'re supposed to kidnap the baby, you know. Not coddle it when it cries!\"

\"But, Sev!\" Severus\' mouth twitched at the nickname. \"You don\'t understand. It\'s hard to see a baby cry and not comfort it. You already know how hard it is for me not to be with Draco every fucking second! Sorry, baby,\" he apologized to the wailing baby as his voice went up. Whispering, he continued his rant, walking around the room with Harry in his arms. \"You know, it is really hard to believe this tiny thing is something Our Lord wants dead. It\'s sick, almost, to think about it. He and Draco would be in the same year, might even bcome friends. And here we are, sent to secure the grounds for a raid, and this innocent little baby has to die!\"

Severus sighed. \"I know.\" Malfoy\'s eyes sparked, the gray lighting up with an idea.

\"Sev,\" the man in question\'s mouth twitched again, and a smile burst forth. A gasp at the change in the mans appearance came from the Harry that was watching the scene unfold before him. Smiling, you could hardly tell who he was, it was such a difference. \"You know, he looks kind of like you ... \" Severus\'s smile faded rapidly.

\"No. No, no. I am NOT going to take that - that THING and pretend it\'s mine!\"

\"But, Sev!\" Malfoy whined quietly, as the baby in his arms was snuggled close wearing ducky footy pajamas and was close to sleep again. \"Look at him!\" Severus averted his eyes until Malfoy thrust the baby in front of him so he could not look anywhere but at Harry. \"He\'s got your hair, and with a quick spell - boom! - he could have your eyes. I think he\'d make a rather dashing young man. And you could tutor him in potions, he could be your protege, and you\'d get to see him and Draco play on playdates! Honestly, it is so cute.\" The Harry watching was almost blown out of his mind at the prospect the was seeing; he could have been a Snape! Lucius Malfoy was a kind man. Wrapping his mind around that alone was hard enough, but the fact that he wanted his son and Harry to grow up friends was ... insane. He watched as Severus watched Malfoy lay Harry down in the crib again, covering him up with a cute snakes-in-hats blanket (snakes and ducks? honestly, were his parents mental?) and tucked him in.

\"Have you forgotten WHY we\'re here? We. Have. To. Kill. Him. Our Lord will notice! And don\'t you think it\'d be odd if I suddenly had a baby?\" Severus logic didn\'t appear to have any effect on the Malfoy softly gazing down at the tiny body in the crib.

\"Say you knocked some bird up when you were drunk and tada, a baby appears on your doorstep nine months later. No one would question it, and you know it. And about Our Lord, he only told us that there were two adults here. No baby. So he either doesn\'t know about this little thing, or he doesn\'t care about it. Either would suit our purposes! I could help you raise him, and \'Cissa would, too. I would take him, but it would be too hard to turn him into a blond. And Draco, the little snob he is,\" this was said affectionately, \"would likely get jealous. Couldn\'t have that, now could we? So take the little bugger and we can leave! You have enough space to create a hundred bloody nurseries at your home, so you could manage to make one.\"

\"What about the family?\"

\"They\'re going to die,\" the uncaring tone in Malfoy\'s voice spoke of a weariness of the same kind of thing; dealing with killing people, and causing death. \"He doesn\'t have to, though. In this world of death, can\'t we at least save one life?\"

\"No,\" Severus\'s tone wasn\'t quite as firm as it had been before. \"We can\'t. We are meant to destroy, to do Our Lords bidding. And wouldn\'t - we don\'t know his name,\" Severus stopped his train of thought to reflect.

A knock at the closed door brought their attention away from the subject at hand. With a flick of the wrist, the door opened and a man came in, stiffly. When he saw the two men, relaxed and with their masks off, he too took his off. Nott was revealed.

\"They are the Potter\'s, sirs,\" the man said. Severus blanched, wildly looking to Malfoy. \"Lily and James Potter, lying upstairs under a sleeping spell at the moment. What is your wish?\"

\"Nott. You are to take everyone back, to report to Our Lord of your findings. You are not, under any torture, to tell of what you have seen in this room.\" Nott\'s eyes widened as they honed in on the crib and the two men leaning against it. He nodded and retreated quietly, not wishing to irk his leader\'s ire. Malfoy was second in command beneath the Dark Lord.

\"Lucius,\" Severus\'s voice was dangerously low and frighteningly cold, \"I will not take Lily\'s baby, to see her die. I could not keep it. Not knowing that it was Lily\'s. He has her eyes,\" his voice was desperate, sad, longing.

\"Oh, stuff it, Sev. I know you two were friends back in school, and that fuckwad Potter drove her away from you, but think; it\'s her baby. You can save him, a part of her. I know that Black fellow is the godfather,\" Severus eyes darkened, if possible, for the obsidian was already inpenetrable. \"And I also know that he would be getting baby Potter. Now, how the hell do you think he would turn out with that odd ball as a father? Not too well. But, with you and I as fatherly figures, \'Cissa as a motherly type, and Draco as a sort-of brother, how could he go wrong?\" Malfoy\'s logic was twisted, but semi-reasonable.

There was a soft growl from beside him, and Harry looked to Young-Sirius, who\'s nostrils were flared and his teeth bared. \"I would have raised you perfectly fine!\" he snarled. Harry looked back to the two Death Eaters discussing him.

\"He would grow up to be a Death Eater. Something Lily never would want. Now, we are going ot leave here after I take off the sleeping spell on Lily and Potter. Leave, without the baby. And I mean it. No tricks. Although somehow I doubt even you could hide a baby in your robes.\" Malfoy chuckled a bit and looked wistfully at the sleeping form in the crib. With a soft look back over his shoulder as he left through the open doorway, Lucius Malfoy was gone.

Severus Snape looked down at the face of the Potter-spawn, and sighed. It could be different, he thought, if he took the baby. Lucius was a perfect father and wouldn\'t let Severus fuck it up. But only if things were different, he would take Lily\'s baby. Instead, as the way things were, the baby would die and His Lord would reign His Darkness over the world.

\"I\'m sorry,\" he whispered softly to the baby as he retreated. \"I wish things were different. I pray for your death to be swift.\" And with that, Severus Snape left the home of the Potters with a visit upstairs to undo the sleeping spell.




MENOTES!

-- hmm? what say you, my fine readers?

-- if you haven\'t realize, then i\'ll tell you: HARRY IS IN A COMA. or something like that.

-- next chapter will be from the outside world, and Draco

-- chapter after that, we get more glimpses of Harry\'s memories and such

-- reviews make it faster!

-- i wrote all this chapter listening to the \"Le Fableux Destin D\'Amelie Poulin\" soundtrack. or, for we americans and such, the \"Amelie\" soundtrack, by Yann Tiersen. GENIUS! watch movie, if possible. the music is brilliant, as is the movie.

thank you to those who have reviewed - you make my days happier and my fingers type faster. i hug you all!