"Love me or hate me, both are in my favour... If you love me, I'll always be in your heart... If you hate me, I'll always be in your mind." -William Shakespeare.
-----------------> FOR THE SECOND TIME THAT DAY, Lord Voldemort, formally Tom Marvolo Riddle, was surprised.
He had always praised himself for his near-perfect memory, and the day he 'died' was something he remembered flawlessly.
The black-haired, brown-eyed blood traitor and Lord of House Potter had tried to defend himself and his family by himself, without a wand even! Suffice to say, Lord Voldemort took care of that problem easily. While he did not like spilling pureblood, James Potter stopped being pureblood in his eyes the day he married a mudblood.
For all his worth, the previous Lord Potter, Charlus, had not only a former Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement but was also an efficient Auror and had also fought against the forces of the Dark Lord Grindelwald. He also did justice to his noble heritage and pureblood by marrying a lady of proper social calibre and class, as seen in his marriage to the formidable Dorea Black, a daughter of the Most Ancient and Noble House of Black.
James Potter was of very good heritage, was a prodigy in Transfiguration and Defense and was also an extremely skilled Auror.
Why he had to marry a filthy mudblood of all things was something that Lord Voldemort still failed to comprehend.
Anyway, after finishing off the Potter Lord with quite literally a flick of his wrist, he made his way to a room where he could hear a lot of shuffling noises.
'Muggles! So noisy...' he had thought as he smirked to himself.
According to some of his spies, Lily Potter nee Evans was a prodigy in charms and potions and was a force to be reckoned with.
But the sight he saw in front of him reminded him exactly why he thought that muggles were pathetic and why mudbloods were useless.
The Lady Potter had been standing protectively pathetic in front of a wooden crib with tears streaming down her eyes and her hands clasped together in a prayer-like position as she had started begging him for her precious daughter's life.
Oh boo hoo!
And again, he noticed that there was no wand in her hand!
Did she even remember that she was a witch?
He remembered his inner circle's potion master asking him to spare the mudbloods life. Oh, how sweet! A weakness.
"Step aside girl and I will let you live." He said, hoping that she would do the opposite.
She reached his expectations as she either did not hear him or pretended that he hadn't said anything, and continued pleading for her daughter's life.
"Please, not Rose. Not Rose..."
He sighed in his mind.
Oh well, he tried.
A simple Avada Kedavra did the job. Severus should be extremely grateful that he gave her a quick and painless death and not a long and painful one like he had done to many others before.
He stepped over the mud blood's body and looked at the crying infant, who had a river of tears streaming down her rosy, flushed cheeks.
Even he had to admit that the girl was truly beautiful and would grow up to be quite the looker when she got older.
She had dark hair, rosy skin and emerald eyes.
Shame she had to die.
He smirked and pointed his Yew wand between her sparkling emerald eyes. A strand of dark hair had fallen on her forehead, very close to her eyes.
With great pleasure, he had then said his favourite words, "Avada Kedavra."
He wasn't exactly sure what happened next. But the last thing he remembered was the flashing green light of the killing curse and eyes that seemed to perfectly mirror their colour.
The attractive girl before him did not have the characteristic ebony Potter hair or its famed unruliness.
But she called herself Rosalie Dorea Dursley.
How many people in the world could have the name Rosalie Dorea?
A spy had told him sixteen years ago, a few days before his meeting with the Potters that Lily Potter's sister, Petunia Evans had recently taken on the surname Dursley.
He could feel his brain put two and two together.
The girl did not resemble the late Lord and Lady Potter. Not at all.
In fact, she looked like a near spitting image of her late grandmother and namesake, Dorea Potter nee Black.
Rosalie Potter looked nothing like a Potter. If you ignored the hair and eyes, she would have undoubtedly been a Black.
Those sharp, aristocratic, regal, beautiful features looked so much similar to his faithful Second's before she was sent to Azkaban.
The Black genes from her grandmother were definitely more dominant. Although, he briefly wondered how genes from a grandparent,- who her father did not resemble one bit- could be so prominent. He filed that thought away in the back of his mind for later.
He mentally scolded himself for being so foolish for not having noticed it before.
Even without her being introduced, or without the classic Black looks, she was obviously Rosalie Dorea Potter, the saviour of the wizarding world and the famed girl-who-lived, because of one thing.
Her eyes.
Her beautiful emerald eyes.
So close to the colour of the curse that ended the life of her parents, were definitely a dead give away.
He remembered Severus flinching when they first saw her.
It was without a doubt because the girl's eyes reminded him so much of the eyes of the woman he loved.
'How the blonde hair?' he mused quietly.
It could not be Muggle hair dye. The yellow looked natural.
Not poly-juice or hair potions either.
He doubted the girl knew of the existence of the wizarding world considering she was speaking to him casually and not pleading for her life like her dead mud blood of a mother had done.
It suddenly clicked to him.
She could be a metamorphose. But he quickly exhausted that option.
She couldn't have been a metamorphose. Although she looked like a Black, the amount of Black blood/genes in her body would be too little to activate the metamorphose gene.
He came to the conclusion that it was accidental magic.
He looked at her.
She looked at him expecting and curious.
He remembered that he had still not addressed her.
He put on a trusting, charming smile on his sculpted beautiful face.
"Pleasure to meet you, Miss Dursley. I am Marvolo Slytherin." He said and took her hand and kissed her knuckles. The traditional pureblood greeting.
The girl-who-lived blushed, "It's Rose." She mumbled.
His smile grew bigger, "Alright, Rose," he said as her flush grew deeper, creating a lovely contrast and making her look so very innocent.
"You have a very unique name," she said with smoky, innocent eyes.
He raised a perfect eyebrow and asked, "Unique good or unique bad?"
"Definitely good." She replied with a soft smile.
It was then, it seemed, that she remembered that they were not alone and looked wearily at his followers.
He took the hint and started introducing them to give her a false sense of familiarity and trust, "May I introduce my companions? This is my dear friend, Lucius Malfoy and his sister, Bellatrix. Standing next to Bellatrix is her husband, Rudophous and beside him is his brother, Rabastan. Towards my right, are my friends, Severus Snape and Peter Pettigrew."
Her eyebrows frowned, "Severus Snape... I could swear that I have heard that name before..." she mumbled.
Neither his followers nor he showed any reaction, although he could feel Severus get a tad tense. Still, his face remained perfectly blank and eyes perfectly cold.
She lightly shook her head and smiled, "Never mind, my bad. I'm sorry for earlier, again. Do let me know if you need my help on anything?" she said as she prepared herself to leave.
"Actually, Rose, would you mind accompanying my companions and I and then direct us to a pleasant dining space?" he asked with a devilishly charming smile.
Her face lit up with happiness like a Christmas tree.
"I would love to. Just give me a second to inform my friends, and I will be right back." She said with a smile and ran to talk to her friends.
"Master- My Lord, if you would allow me to enquire about your plan..." Lucius trailed off.
Lord Voldemort smirked, and all his followers became aware that hell was about to be unleashed.
"We, my dear followers," he started with a glint in his eyes, "are going to introduce the precious saviour to the wizarding world."