Harry Potter and the Time of Shadows

- Chapter One-

The Plot

"MORSMODRE!"

Harry Potter woke up in his bed, clutching his scar. He stared up at the ceiling, running his fingers over his forehead, an unpleasant tingling still running over it.

He sat up in his bed, trying to remember the details of the dream he had just had. A circle of about thirty masked figures, their leader in the centre, pointing his wand at a huge green skull in the air.

Harry sat up and turned on a lamp on his bedside table, sending a dim, feeble light over the room. He got out of bed, accidentally putting his foot inside a cauldron on the floor. Silently cursing as he pulled it off, he reached for his glasses and tiptoed out through the corridor, and into the bathroom. He was careful not to creak any floorboards on his way, as he did not want to wake everyone else.

He looked at himself in the mirror over the sink, he was sweating. As he splashed cold water over his face, he looked out of the small bathroom window; the sun was rising, but the moon was still up. He checked the clock on the wall, it was almost five o'clock in the morning.

Quiet snores could be heard from his cousin's room. Harry tiptoed back to his room. The desk in the corner caught his eye, and he decided what he needed to do. He sat down and tried to wake himself up. He pushed his half-finished homework aside and began writing:

Dear Sirius,

It happened again. I had another dream and my scar hurt when I woke up, but it didn't hurt as much as before. The dream I had was Voldemort meeting with the Death Eaters. He wants them to help him kill me. I can feel him getting stronger all the time, I don't know how to describe it, but I feel it.

I hope you're OK, wherever you are and whatever you're doing. I wish you were here.

Harry

Harry folded up the letter and walked over to where his owl, Hedwig, usually slept, she wasn't there. This didn't worry Harry, she had been out at night before, sometimes she was gone for days. He would just have to send the letter when she got back. But he wished he could send the letter sooner, maybe the normal way, through the postman, but he couldn't. In fact, Harry Potter didn't do a lot of things in what most people would call 'the normal way'.

Harry Potter was a wizard. He was more than half way through Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and that was probably the least strange thing about him.

On Halloween fourteen years ago, the Dark wizard Voldemort had turned up at Harry's home and murdered his parents. But when he had tried to murder Harry, the sacrifice Harry's mother had made gave him protection from the Killing curse, and it had backfired on Voldemort, who was reduced to a barely alive being, less than spirit.

The wizarding world had had thirteen years of peace because of Harry Potter, but less than two weeks ago, June twenty-fourth, Voldemort had returned. Harry pulled back his pyjama sleeve, and examined a small cut on his upper arm. Voldemort had taken Harry's blood, and added it to the potion that revived him.

But that wasn't the only strange thing about Harry Potter. The lightning-shaped scar on his forehead, relic of the failed Killing curse, linked him to Voldemort, so that Harry felt a pain in his scar whenever Voldemort was close, or feeling murderous. He could also sometimes see what Voldemort was doing, as he just had, in dreams.

He had had several dreams like that, the first was a year ago, in the last summer holiday, the next was last May. He laid down on his bed and replayed the dream he had just had:

They were in a wide open field, Harry wasn't sure where it was. Untidy, overgrown grass covered the ground along with the occasional tree. The Death Eaters stood in a tight circle with almost no space between each person. They were all cloaked and masked, only their eyes were visible behind each mass of black clothing.

Voldemort was inside the circle, walking past all his followers, surveying them eye to eye. A gigantic snake followed him on his way. He walked to the centre of the circle and started speaking:

"Welcome Death Eaters," his voice made Harry's insides go cold. It was ice in the form of sound.

"Today is the eighth of July. Two weeks since my rebirth, and I trust you have all been busy, spreading the news of my return. I hope you all have done my work, eliminating those who oppose me, but there is one who stands out of my reach: Potter." The last word carried through the early morning air.

"That doddering old fool, Dumbledore, has placed many protections on the boy while he is out of school, and I cannot touch him once he is back at Hogwarts. This will not do.

"The Death Eater who brings me Potter, alive, will be rewarded beyond all others. I felt sure that young Crouch could have brought him to me again, but that excuse for a Minister, Fudge, has disposed of him. My cleverest and most loyal supporter." Voldemort sounded almost sentimental at this point, many Death Eaters stirred, aching to prove to their master that they were just as loyal as Barty Crouch.

"I have spent most of my time since my return researching new ways to spread my evil further than ever before! I am supremely confidant that we shall be in power once more very soon indeed. I shall be more powerful than when I had fallen.

"I want to all to put maximum effort into helping me capture the boy. I want a plan that can break the enchantments placed on him that you are all aware of. And I expect results!"

Every one of the Death Eaters flinched as their master raised his voice. One of them took a step forward, and Voldemort turned his head to face him.

"What is it Avery?" he demanded.

"My Lord," Avery's voice trembled, as though he only just dared to speak to his master directly.

"Out with it!" Voldemort raged, taking out his wand.

"Why are you so desperate to see Potter dead? He is only a boy."

Voldemort laughed a cold, merciless laugh. He pointed his wand at Avery and cried "CRUCIO!"

Avery screamed in agony. He fell to his knees, and raised his arms, silently begging his master to stop the torture. Voldemort lowered his wand, and bent down ever so slightly to look Avery in the eye.

"Why do I want Potter dead? What kind of an idiotic question is that? I have no use for idiots as my servants! I should simply kill you now! But I shall not. Lord Voldemort is a gracious leader."

"Thank you My Lord," Avery stuttered. "I am not worthy to serve you." He then got onto his feet and stepped back into the circle.

"You have never spoken a truer word. For your question has such a ludicrously obvious answer. Potter is the one who robbed me of my powers thirteen years ago. He is the one who is responsible for my downfall. He thwarted my attempt at resurrection and immortality four years ago. He escaped me once more two weeks ago.

"Potter is the one that I have never yet successfully beaten. I admit that. He is my unobtainable goal, my unicorn. But mark my words, I shall defeat him. He will be mine. I have been given a second chance and I will not waste it. I will protect myself against death once more. I will reclaim my chained followers. I will seek out powerful magical creatures to join me. And I will initiate many new Death Eaters, every parent in this circle knows that they have promised their child to me once they have left school. We have returned. We are stronger than ever!"

Several Death Eaters nodded. The snake circling Voldemort's feet lifted its head and hissed. Voldemort turned to face it, he hissed back.

"My dear Nagini is just as excited at finally catching Potter as I am. After all, it is she who will have the pleasure of devouring Potter after his death. She has not had such a worthy meal in a while.

"However," Voldemort suddenly called, speaking in an almost business-like fashion. "Potter is not our only enemy. There is still the matter of the traitor. I want him found. I want him to pay for his lack of loyalty. I am confident that many of you wish to see his death as well. It is because of him that many of my faithful supporters are locked away in Azkaban.

"Also, we must deal with the one who turned his back on us, the deserter. He is our biggest threat. He alone knows things that only the Death Eaters know and he can tell others. He is the only one of Dumbledore's supporters who wears the Dark Mark. He knows whenever I call you to me. He even knows that you are with me now.

"I want him dead as much as Potter. He must be taught a lesson. We have to show him that the Dark Lord is not someone that you can walk away from. I am to be worshipped, to be feared."

Another man stepped forward.

"They will be ours My Lord," he said, bowing. "All of your enemies will be defeated. We will make sure of it."

Voldemort gave a satisfied smirk.

"Thank you Lucius. I appreciate your loyalty."

"I am not worthy of your praise."

Lucius stepped back and bowed again.

"Wormtail!" Voldemort yelled to the man standing to the left of Lucius. He was a short man and was quite fat. A silver hand was visible under the sleeve of his robe.

"Yes my Lord?" Wormtail asked, keeping his head bowed.

"It is time for us to go. Death Eaters, you know where to find me."

The other Death Eaters sank to their knees and crawled to their master and each kissed his robes.

"Remember," said Voldemort when they had all got back up. "We are all united under the Dark Mark."

The others nodded and spoke their agreements. Voldemort pointed his wand into the sky.

"MORSMODRE!" he yelled.

An enormous green skull shot from the wand and settled against the cloudy sky. A serpent came out of the skull's mouth, and they all disappeared with vague 'pops'.

Harry sat bolt upright on his bed. While he was dreaming, he had no sense of who any of the people were, but as he thought back to it, it was clear who each person was.

He scanned the landscape out of his window for any sign of Hedwig, she was still nowhere to be seen. It was now daylight outside. Harry checked the clock again, it was now quarter past seven. Feeling he should probably eat breakfast, Harry went downstairs.

*

His Uncle Vernon and cousin were at the table, but his aunt wasn't there yet, Harry assumed she was still in bed. His cousin, Dudley, who had once been incredibly fat, was now just slightly fatter than a normal boy his age. He had been on a diet for a year now, and it was definitely taking effect. Harry fully expected the whole family to still be on this diet as they had been last summer, but as soon as he had got there, he saw his aunt had made her husband a huge roast dinner; they were off the diet at last! But then she handed him a salad, and he realised he was still supposed to follow the diet. But at least the diet was more manageable this year, instead of a grapefruit quarter, Harry helped himself to some bran flakes, as Dudley did the same.

The dream still in his mind, Harry ate his cereal, one particular sentence from it was going through his head: "Every parent in this circle knows that they have promised their child to me once they have left school." Harry thought of the sons of Death Eaters he knew of: Vincent Crabbe, Gregory Goyle, Draco Malfoy.

Malfoy! Malfoy would become a Death Eater! Harry didn't like that one bit. Draco Malfoy, son of Lucius Malfoy, was Harry's arch-enemy, a pointed-faced, spiteful boy, who considered himself better than others because he was a pure-blood. The idea of him as a Death Eater was frightening.

Harry got up from the kitchen table, and got some orange juice from the fridge. His aunt, Petunia, came in, his mother's sister, blonde, horsy, and extremely nosy. After her usual kiss with her husband, then with her son, and her usual "Get a haircut!" to Harry, she too sat down and took some bacon for herself.

Another sentence came to mind from the vision: "Two weeks since my rebirth, and I trust you have all been busy, spreading the news of my return."

Harry hated to think how the Death Eaters had been 'spreading the news'. If it was anything like what Voldemort had been doing, the wizarding world was in for a time of darkness indeed. Two weeks, it had been two weeks since the Triwizard Tournament final and Voldemort's resurrection. Two weeks since Cedric Diggory had died. Harry could still see his body on the ground, his unseeing eyes, the echo of him asking to be returned to Hogwarts.

Harry felt a tear begin to form in his eye, he quickly wiped it away, he didn't want the Dursleys to see him cry. They had no idea of the ordeal Harry had been through at the end of the school year, he had to shoulder the burden on his own.

He wished his two best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger could be there with him. They had been so supportive during the time after Voldemort's return. For a brief second, Harry thought about writing to them, but then remembered that Hedwig was away.

Having finished breakfast, Harry went back up to his room and sat down on his bed.

"I am not going to be killed," he said aloud.

The most evil wizard alive wanted Harry dead, but that was nothing new, he had wanted Harry dead since he was one. But now that Voldemort was back, it felt much more likely. Stop thinking like that, he thought to himself. He tried to think of something more positive, when something almost as frightening as Voldemort came into his head: O.W.Ls! The wizarding tests that they had to take in fifth year. Harry never exactly did badly in tests, but these were much more important. He had no idea how many O.W.Ls it was possible to get, but he knew that twelve was very good, he had heard Percy Weasley, Ron's pompous older brother, bragging about getting twelve O.W.Ls. Fred and George Weasley had both got five O.W.Ls, which their mother was not very pleased about.

Harry tried again to find a positive subject to think about : Prefects! He might become a Prefect this year, at fifth year one pupil in each house is made a Prefect, sometimes two, he remembered his mum and dad were both Prefects, and Head Boy and Girl. Obviously Hermione would be a Prefect, she was top of the year, but hopefully he would be too.

His birthday! Yes, that was a positive subject alright. Before he came to Hogwarts it never was, (the best one being when he got a pair of second-hand yellow socks from his uncle) but now he got cards and presents from all his friends. In just over three weeks he would be fifteen, and maybe he would be able to go to Ron's house for the rest of the holidays, Dumbledore said he might, but he could not go straight there after school ended.

Dudley had come upstairs and poked his head around the open door to Harry's bedroom.

"Hi Harry," he said in a fake, innocent voice.

"What?" was all Harry could reply with.

"Just came to see how you're doing," his sarcastic, friendliness was more annoying than when he was being nasty.

"Well I'm fine, now you can go." Harry really wasn't in the mood for pointless conversations with his cousin.

"Is that any way to talk to family?" Dudley came in and sat down next to Harry on the bed. "Don't I look great?" he added. So that was why he was here, to show off his 'thinner' self.

"Well I have to admit, you look less porky than you used to." Harry retorted, putting on a fake, friendly voice himself. Dudley instantly dropped his.

"At least I'm not a bag of bones,"

"I could turn you into one," Harry threatened, picking up his wand from his bedside table and pointing it at his cousin.

"You're not allowed to do magic here," Harry heard a definite note of panic in Dudley's voice.

"You think I care?" Harry got up, hoping he sounded dangerous and not like he was lying through his teeth. "Or maybe I could make you fat again, would you like that? You could go back to the old diet, grapefruit for breakfast, salad for lunch, and a nice fat free yoghurt for dinner."

"No! Please no!" Dudley got up and fled from the room. Smiling to himself, Harry laid down on his bed, and closed his eyes...

He was inside an old house, decaying and broken-windowed, Harry had the feeling he had been there before. There was moss visible outside the empty window panes, and the floor was covered in a thin layer of dust.

There were three men standing in a small room, one short and fat, the others tall and thin. The short one was pacing the floor while the others spoke, barely in a whisper. Finally the tallest one raised the volume of their conversation, so Harry could hear.

"Excellent plan, and you come to me with it so soon, it has been only hours since we last met." His voice was cold, and high pitched, familiar...

"Thank you My Lord," said the other tall man. "I hoped you would approve of it."

"Yes, well your plan shall be put into action. With any luck, it shall be accomplished very soon."

"I will not let you down."

The second man turned his head, and looked straight at Harry. Harry's heart leapt, but the man did not say anything.

"If you succeed, I shall give you powers you can only dream of."

"Thank you my Lord."

"You shall be my deputy, my second in command. You will be a kind of son to me."

The man smiled, then pulled a hood up over his face.

"You are too kind to us My Lord."

"Go, and do my work."

"I shall not disappoint you."

The hooded man vanished into thin air. The tallest and shortest men remained.

"Wormtail, he will soon be ours,"

"I am delighted, my Lord." Wormtail shuddered. He seemed very afraid of his master.

"I shall take great pleasure in killing the boy who has escaped me, three times," Nothing seemed to excite this man like the thought of killing this boy.

"It is not for me to question you, Master, but does he need to be killed?"

"Of course he needs to be killed, you fool!" The man's voice rose terribly, and the one called Wormtail backed away. "This is not the first time you have defended him, are you growing soft?"

"No, my Lord! The boy means nothing to me!" Wormtail looked as though he were doing some very quick thinking. "It just seems he is a powerful wizard, of course you are the most powerful wizard in the world," he added fearfully. "But he has managed to run from you, it seems he would do well as your servant."

The other man's lipless mouth curled into a smile.

"Wormtail, you astound me, what a brilliant idea. Genius I would not have thought capable of you."

"Thank you, my Lord."

"Yes," the master hissed. "I shall turn Harry Potter into my servant, my puppet."

Harry listened, only vaguely aware that he was Harry Potter.

"Nagini!" the tall man called, and his voice changed into a series of hisses, but Harry heard them, as if they were English:

"I am very sorry Nagini, there has been a change of plan, I shall not be feeding you Harry Potter, however, one of my servants has just suggested a plan to me, and if it succeeds, you shall have a much larger feast before long."

The snake nodded to its owner, and its head pointed towards the fatter man.

"No, not him," the master hissed. "He is hardly worthy of your venom."

He laughed, a terrible, high, cold laugh, and Harry felt a burning pain in his forehead...

"Will you shut up boy! What are you yelling about?"

Harry sat up, holding his hand to his lightning-shaped scar. He was in his room, and by the feeling in his throat, he had been yelling very loudly.

His uncle had stormed up the stairs and burst through Harry's door, Dudley close behind.

"What was that about? It's bad enough we have to put up with you in this house, without you screaming like a maniac first thing in the morning!"

His moustached face had turned red, and Harry thought it best to look sorry.

"I, er, felt this horrible pain in my head. Sorry."

Uncle Vernon left the room, grumbling, but Dudley stayed, apparently trying not to laugh.

"You know, I reckon you've gone crazy. That freak-school's made you more warped than you were before."

Harry, still worrying about the dream, picked up his wand again and whispered. "How fat d'you want to be, three-hundred pounds, four-hundred?"

Dudley fled from the room again, screaming "Sorry!".

Harry now had time to think about the dream, one of the Death Eaters had given Voldemort a plan to get Harry, they said it could be done. They would get him at Hogwarts? Well, it has happened before, Harry reminded himself.

Which Death Eater was it, he didn't remember any of the faces, but he knew the cold voiced one was Voldemort, and remembered him calling the short one "Wormtail", but who was the Death Eater? It was someone tall and thin, then it's not the enormous Crabbe or Goyle, or the tiny Nott, Harry thought.

And Harry would be made into Voldemort's servant! How would they do that? He could resist Imperious, if they did that. Would they torture him?

No, Harry told himself firmly, he will not become a Death Eater. He would die before he went over to the Dark Side.

He would die before he betrayed his friends.