Disclaimer: Absolutely not mine.

Written for the Potions and Snitches 2009 Challenge Fest. Blame this on Jan_AQ, who issued the challenge, and Obsidian Embrace, who assigned it to me :)

This story badly wanted to become a novel but I managed to stamp it down (I wouldn't have a hope of writing and editing a novel in one month!). The story centres on Snape, Harry, and Neville, with a lot of Hermione as well. Minerva unexpectedly wriggled her way in and of course there’s plenty of Voldemort (but probably not in a way you’re expecting). Dumbledore isn’t a good guy or a bad guy in this story, just a human who’s gotten a bit lost on the way and refuses to listen to anyone (and actually started to really irritate me). And this turned into a Weasley-free fic, though not on purpose. Though this is a first year AU the plot is not related to Philosopher’s Stone. It also involves hero!Harry and there’s a bit of child abuse.

In fact, this story doesn’t bear a great deal of resemblance to canon. If it became canon in HBP or DH you can pretty safely assume it’s not in this story. If it became canon in one of the earlier books then maybe I stuck to it. But maybe I didn’t. The horcruxes do not exist in this story and I have ignored JKR’s rendition of Tom Riddle’s childhood. I was never fond of what she revealed in HBP because it gave me the impression he was basically born evil and I like my bad guys more complex than that. Also, most people don’t decide “Ooh, I’m going to be evil, that’ll be fun!”, it just sort of happens and they don’t usually think of themselves as the bad guys, they think they’re the good guys and everyone who opposes them is a bad guy. So that’s some of where I was coming from in this story.

Basically, if you want a story that adheres strictly to canon you’ll have to look elsewhere. Nor are these JKR’s characters; this story is the literary equivalent of a funhouse mirror so that while it’s based on the familiar everything has become distorted and new.