Loving Lily: A Snily Story

Chapter 23 - October 31

Thank you for reading! I don't own any of Harry Potter! Please let me know if you enjoy! Updates every Saturday!
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The preparation work it took for All Hallow's Eve had been exhausting, but Severus looked forward to the liberation from the threat that James Potter posed to his happy life.

One enemy less would make his and Lily's situation that much simpler.

With Dumbledore's help, Severus had secured an abandoned house in Godric's Hollow to use as the location for his meeting with James.

Through a complex, yet brilliant spell, Severus had managed to form a doll that replicated baby Harriet exactly.

On All Hallow's Eve, Severus wrapped that realistic doll in a carrier and covered it up to its chin in thick blankets.

After he cast a charm to make the blankets rise and fall as if the carrier's inanimate inhabitant breathed, the notion of the doll being a real baby was easily believable.

Severus arrived with the doll at the house in Godric's Hollow at seven o' clock.

He wanted to give himself an entire hour to prepare.

Severus placed the carrier that held the doll on a table in an upstairs bedroom.

While he waited for James to arrive, he silently rehearsed what he would say.

As much as it would hurt him to slander himself, he was more than willing to do so if it would protect Lily and Harriet.

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James arrived outside of the house in Godric's Hollow at two minutes until eight.

He felt his heart clench as he walked forward and knocked on the door.

When no answer came, he reached out and tried the knob.

He scowled suspiciously when the unlocked door swung open.

James kept his scowl as he stepped into the dark house and followed the only light inside past the empty rooms of the first level up the stairs to a bedroom on the left.

As James stepped into the room with that small glowing light, he frowned when he saw Severus standing beside the doll in the baby carrier.

In the dim light of the room, it was nearly impossible to tell that the doll was not, in fact, a living infant.

"Snivelly...." James snarled.

"Potter." Severus greeted as he ignored the insult that his enemy hurled at him, "......I see that you received my invitation after all."

"So it was you who's been writing those letters?!" James hissed. His eyes narrowed as his gaze fell onto the doll in the baby carrier.

Severus watched James gasp before he rushed forward and spat, "I knew it! Give me my son, Snivelly!"

Severus stepped in front of James, determined not to let him come close enough to notice the truth about the baby in the carrier.

"You have no son, Potter." Severus retorted, "That's why I've asked you to come and meet me.........perhaps if you learn the truth, you'll abandon this ridiculous pursuit of yours."

"What do you mean I have no son?!" James shouted, "The casket was empty! Lily bore a child, I know she did! She was far enough along that there should have been remains at the very least! She-"

"-Your wife did....in fact....birth a child in the moments before she lost her life." Severus coldly replied, "..........My child, Potter, not yours."

"........What?" James gasped incredulously.