The Other Way Round

Chapter 1: Prologue

The night wet and windy, two children dressed as pumpkins waddling across the square, and the shop windows covered in paper spiders, all the tawdry Muggle trappings of a world in which they did not believe ... and he was gliding along, that sense of purpose and power and rightness in him that he always knew on these occasions ... not anger ... that was for weaker souls than he ... but triumph, yes ... he had waited for this, he had hoped for it ... 'Nice costume, Mister!' He saw the small boy's smile falter as he ran near enough to see beneath the hood of the cloak, saw the fear cloud his painted face: then the child turned and ran away ... beneath the robe he fingered the handle of his wand ... one simple movement and the child would never reach his mother ... but unnecessary, quite unnecessary ... 

And along a new and darker street he moved, and now his destination was in sight at last, the Fidelius Charm broken, though they did not know it yet ... and he made less noise than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement as he drew level with the dark hedge, and stared over it ... They had not drawn the curtains, he saw them quite clearly in their little sitting room, the tall, blackhaired man, making puffs of coloured smoke erupt from his wand for the amusement of the small black-haired boy in his red pyjamas. The child was laughing and trying to catch the smoke, to grab it in his small fist ... A door opened and the mother entered, saying words he could not hear, her long, locks of light brown hair falling over her face. Now the father scooped up the son and handed him to the mother. He threw his wand down upon the sofa ... The gate creaked a little as he pushed it open, but Frank did not hear neither did Alice. His white hand pulled out the wand beneath his cloak and pointed it at the door, which burst open. 

He was over the threshold as Frank came sprinting into the hall. It was easy, too easy, he had not even picked up his wand ... 'Alice, take Neville and go! It's him! Go! Run! I'll hold him off –' Hold him off, without a wand in his hand! ... He laughed before casting the curse ... 'Avada Kedavra!' The green light filled the cramped hallway, it lit the pram pushed against the wall, it made the banisters glare like lightning rods, and Frank Longbottom fell like a marionette whose strings were cut ... He could hear her screaming from the upper floor, trapped, but as long as she was sensible she, at least, had nothing to fear ... he climbed the steps, listening with faint amusement to her attempts to barricade herself in ... she had no wand upon her either ... how stupid they were, and how trusting, thinking that their safety lay in the Order of the Pheonix, especially such a cowardly man as Wormtail, that weapons could be discarded even for moments ... 

He forced the door open, cast aside the chair and boxes hastily piled against it with one lazy wave of his wand ... and there she stood, the child in her arms. At the sight of him, she dropped her son into the cot behind her and threw her arms wide, as if this would help, as if in shielding him from sight she hoped to be chosen instead ... 'Not Neville, not Neville, please not Neville!' 'Stand aside, you silly girl ... stand aside, now ...' 'Not Neville, please no, take me, kill me instead –' 'This is my last warning –' 'Not Neville! Please ... have mercy ... have mercy ... Not Neville! Not Neville! Please – I'll do anything –' 'Stand aside – stand aside, girl –' He could have forced her away from the cot, but it seemed more prudent to finish them all ... 

The green light flashed around the room and she dropped like her husband. The child had not cried all this time: he could stand, clutching the bars of his cot, and he looked up into the intruder's face with a kind of bright interest, perhaps thinking that it was his father who hid beneath the cloak, making more pretty lights, and his mother would pop up any moment, laughing – He pointed the wand very carefully into the boy's face: he wanted to see it happen, the destruction of this one, inexplicable danger. The child began to cry: it had seen that he was not Frank. He did not like it crying, he had never been able to stomach the small ones' whining in the orphanage – 'Avada Kedavra!

And then he broke: he was nothing, nothing but pain and terror, and he must hide himself, not here in the rubble of the ruined house, where the child was trapped and screaming, but far away ... far away ...