Author's Note: Yes, I am finally updating this story! Woo! This chapter is done in a different style than anything else that I've done. I hope you all like it. The beginning is written as if the character is writing a journal entry. I thought it was an interesting concept to try, tell me what you all think of it!

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Chapter Three: Jumping to the Future

Hi.

My name is Mikael Lamia. I’m sixteen years old, with black hair and green eyes. Physically, I’m fit enough – nothing special. My mother, of course, tells me I’m a “hottie.” I’m not sure I believe her; after all, she is a bit biased.

I’m good at most sports and I’m on the quadpod and quidditch teams at Broihm School of Witchcraft and Wizardry in El Diamante, California (1). I do alright in my classes, although I’m hopeless in potions. I have plenty of friends, but only one best friend. Alynna Nakashima – I could rant about her for hours, but that’s not the point of this.

I’m not actually American.

I have a bit of my original accent, British. My mother moved here a few weeks after I met her during my stay in the hospital. I was four, and she was the only person I remember being kind to me in my entire life. She comforted me, held me when I cried. She even gave me a name. Before then, I was just Boy. At least, that’s what my aunt and uncle used to call me.

If you haven’t figured out by now, they were the reason I was in the hospital in the first place. They hurt me for no other reason than being alive. I used to think it was my fault; now I know better.

But I’m getting sidetracked, aren’t I?

Just because the Dursleys refused to call me by my birth name doesn’t mean that I didn’t have one. The name I was born with, you see, is rather important. Even though it’s not the name I use now, it’s significant.

Harry Potter. Yes, you heard right. The Boy-Who-Lived. That’s me. Are you over your shock yet?

Good.

Most people think I’m dead. That’s a bit of an understatement, really. Only three people in the world know my ‘true’ identity. Me, mom, and ‘Lynna. I like it that way. There are no expectations, no hero-worshipping. I got to grow up happy – like any kid should. I reckon being proclaimed dead is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.

As you’ve probably figured out, my birth mother is dead. My real mother, however, is very much alive. Her name is Contessa Lamia; she can be a bit rough around the edges to others, but she’s never been cruel to me. No matter how rude or sarcastic she gets, all the guys from school think she’s hot. Long black hair, caramel skin, deep blue eyes – a real knockout. A couple of days ago, three guys from the quidditch team came to the house to give me a pencil one of them had borrowed just to catch a glimpse of her.

Pitiful, they are.

But it’s not her outward appearance that’s truly extraordinary. It’s what she’s done for me. She’s the reason that everyone thinks I’m dead, the reason I can walk down a street without being hassled for doing something I don’t even remember.

Years ago, she was a physician. When I was brought into Murine Regional Hospital bloodied, bruised, starved, and dehydrated, she became my mother. Not immediately, of course. Not even legally, as a matter of fact. She took me from England, and raised me here.

She risked her reputation as a respected doctor, even her life, to give me the childhood she thought I deserved. She stole me under the nose of one the most powerful wizards of all time.

Albus Dumbledore.

Just his name makes me shiver in the way most people do when talking of the Dark Lord. That man left me in a home with those monsters and let me get abused. He knew what was happening. In fact, he encouraged their abuse, thinking I would be easy to control once I reached Hogwarts.

When mom told me what she’d found out from her digging when I was thirteen, I was shocked. Enraged. But most of all, I felt a cold type of fear. A man that could cast a one year old off to be beaten and starved for no other reason than to make a perfect tool is a man capable of anything. I fear Albus Dumbledore, but most times my loathing of him overshadows it. One day he will need to be stopped, and somehow I know that I’m going to be the one do it.

He’ll regret the day he put his own agenda before my wellbeing.

Dammit, I’m off topic again.

Anyhow, the life that my mother took me from for my safety is soon to be the life that I’m going to enter again. You heard correctly. I’m going to Britain, going to Hogwarts. It isn’t so much a choice; at least I don’t think so. Necessity is what makes me leave the place in which I grew up.

I had no intention of ever being Harry Potter – Mikael Lamia is just fine with me. I don’t need fame, fortune, and the like… I was content with my life. The operative word being ‘was.’

A few months before I turned 15, something happened to me. I woke up screaming, in agony, my head feeling as if it were about to burst open from the scar that’s been hidden since I was four. I’m no sissy, having had a couple of broken bones from quadpod, but I’d never felt anything that compared to that night.

I’ve always been grateful that Mom gave me a second chance at life, but in that moment, I would have given in to death to stop the pain. The vision that accompanied the pain was even worse, a vision of a pale snake like man with red eyes rising from a cauldron. A vision of a boy screaming as he was cut, beaten, and bludgeoned to death. A vision of men in black cloaks wearing horrifying masks. A vision of death. A vision of Voldemort, the wizard who killed my birth parents, rise again.

Since that day, my scar has pained me occasionally. Every once and a while, I’ll get another vision of horror.

The point is I have to go back. I have to face this monster.

Only three people may know the truth of my identity, but Voldemort will stop at nothing to find me.

You see, He doesn’t think I’m dead. He can feel me through my scar, and sometimes at night, I can hear whispers seeping through our twisted bond. Whispers of what He’ll do when He finds me. How He’ll murder and slaughter until I show myself. Of how He’ll hurt my mother because she refused Him once, and because she keeps me hidden. How His wand will be the last thing I see before I died.

The whispers have stopped, largely because Mom has been teaching me Occulumency. But I know that Voldemort won’t stop until he finds me. So, I’m going to do the last thing he expects. I’m going to bring the fight to him.

Mom and ‘Lynna think I’m a few Knuts short of a Sickle (2), but they’re coming along as well. They claim that I’m to dumb to take care of myself, but really I know it’s because they want to stop me from going to Him as soon as I reach British shores. Because although Mom has trained me well, I’m not His equal… not yet.

But there are ways to change that. Ways I’m not entirely comfortable with.

But this is a war. A war I will end.

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She was in a field, long grass brushing against her thighs. The hilly field stretched as long as the eye can see; a beautiful but forlorn picture as the moon cast soft sad shadows against the sea of grass, making it glow almost blue in color. She would have liked to see such a beautiful place in real life.

But, of course, this vision of sad beauty wasn’t real – only the carefully manipulated dreams of a Master of Occulumns.

She didn’t see him, not yet, although she was sure he was somewhere near. It was his dream, after all. For all she knew, he could be standing next to her, invisible to her dreams’ eye –

“Ms. Lamia.” – Or he could be standing right behind her.

Turning to look into his intriguing dark eyes she replied, “Contessa. Not Ms. Lamia. I feel like a misbehaving student when you say my name like that.”

“As you wish… Contessa,” the man said in a soft cold voice as if he’d never been familiar enough with another human to call them by their first name.

What an intriguing man he was. Pity he was such an arse. “We’ve met in the realm of dreams three times; this is the final time. You have made your decision?”

The man’s mouth quirked up in an odd gesture, half-smile half-smirk. “And if I said no?”

Forcing herself not to react outwardly, she replied, “Then you would not be allowed to remember the secrets I have shared with you.”

This time he snorted as if he’d just heard the most amusing joke. “Not even the Dark Lord could dream of Oblivating me. I know secrets of the mind that you could not even fathom.”

“And I know secrets about the human body that would make even the likes of you squirm. I didn’t realize this was a contest of intimidation. What is your decision? Will you assist me?”

“Yes.”

Contessa blinked for a moment, almost confused. That was not the answer she’d been expecting. “Oh.”

“Oh, indeed. I shall see you in Britain, Contessa.”

“Until next time Severus!” She called out as he began to fade away, not even sure he’d heard her.

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(1) El Diamante is a fictional magical settlement in California I created.

(2) In my fic, all of the magical settlements in Europe and North America use the same currency; as part of a coalition between them made fifty years prior. The Muggle world, however, still has their individual currencies.