"Normal speech, and parseltongue"

"A snake is speaking"

Thoughts

SNAKE SPAWN

CHAPTER TWO

Harry found himself in Diagon Alley, with one precocious, slightly-evil (by her own, possible exaggerated description) child and one stuck-up, bigmouthed snake. Knowing the kind of trouble that precocious children and snakes can get into, particularly together, this fact filled him with depression. He knew, he just knew that something horrible and chaotic was going to happen some time today. After all, on the rare occasions that Lily and her familiar were taken to Diagon Alley (or anywhere, really) something always did.

Lily, still in her muggle clothes, tugged impatiently on his arm.

"The Magical Menangerie!" she declared, and set off in that direction, Emperor wound around her neck and sitting proudly on her shoulder. Harry groaned and followed.

The dead rats were purchased, much to Emperor's satisfaction.

"School robes now," Harry said firmly, knowing that Lily would get out of buying clothing if she could.

Lily glowered but obediently followed her father into Madam Malkin's. Harry didn't blame her for being sulky about it; he hated clothes shopping as well.

Several sets of redheads looked up as they entered, and Harry suppressed yet another groan, while Lily looked as though she wanted to bolt.

The Weasley family was, by now, quite enormous. Each of the six Weasley boys had continued the tradition of several children, so that there were no less than nineteen Weasley children aged eighteen or under.

Bill and Fleur had four girls, Emily (18), Darcy (17), Madeleine (15), and Gabrielle (14), with Madeleine being a Gryffindor while the other three were Ravenclaws;

Charlie and Grace (a fellow dragon-handler) had three children, Christian (15), Elisabeth (12) and Arthur (11), the elder two in Gryffindor with Arthur yet to receive his Hogwarts letter;

Percy and Penelope were the parents of fourteen year old Gryffindor twins Persephone and Annelise, while Gideon was too young to begin Hogwarts at only ten years old;

Fred and Angelina had twins as well, thirteen year old Pepita and George (Gryffindor), Kyle (12) and young Andrew (8);

George and Alicia had Frederick (7), Robert (6), and Gladys (4);

While Harry's good friends Ron and Hermione had only two children, eleven year old Athena, (presumably starting at Hogwarts in September like young Arthur Weasley, Kyle Weasley and Harry's own Lily), and Adam (9). Frankly, the only ones among his many nephews and nieces that Harry could actually recall the names of (how Ginny did it she refused to say, although Harry suspected she knew some obscure spell) were Athena and Adam, because they visited with Ron and Hermione so often, and Pepita and George, because the twins were even worse than Fred and George had been (a fact which made the two very proud, although it made Angelina extremely frazzled).

The fact that there were so many Weasley children with the potential to need new school robes at this time meant that Ron, Hermione, Athena, Fred, Angelina, Pepita, George (the younger), Kyle, Andrew, and oddly Madeleine were all crowded into the small store.

"Ah," said Harry helplessly. Ron grinned at him.

"Harry!"

"Good to see you," Fred beamed, while Angelina smiled and Hermione waved and the air was filled with a chorus of "Uncle Harry!" and "Lily!" from Harry's numerous nieces and nephews.

"Hello, Weasleys," Lily greeted them. She never bothered trying to list them all off by name. She saw Kyle and Athena, but –

"Where's Arthur?"

The noise stilled, then started up again.

"Didn't you hear?"

"I thought Uncle Charlie would have owled you."

"Or fire-called,"

"Or Auntie Grace would."

"'Ee izz a squib," Madeleine explained matter-of-factly, tucking some of her amazing hair behind one ear. "'Ee did not get 'izz 'Ogwarts letter."

Harry heard, and looked at the other adults for explanation.

"Terrible," said Fred, shaking his head.

"What happened?"

"No one had checked," Hermione explained before Ron could do more than open his mouth, "everyone had just assumed he was a wizard. When everyone else got their letters this morning Charlie called Albus about it, and it turns out that Arthur's name wasn't on the Hogwarts list. Albus came over, of course, and did a magic test, but unfortunately the list was right. Arthur doesn't have nearly enough magic to be considered a wizard. He might be able to do a simple charm, like 'Lumos,' but nothing more than that."

"Charlie and Grace are crushed," Ron said, "and of course you can imagine what it did to the little bloke. Went tearing off to his room in tears, and Elisabeth got herself grounded by saying something unkind to him about it."

Meanwhile, Lily was talking to her cousins as Madam Malkin fussed over her with tape measures and fabric and pins.

"I'm going to be Gryffindor or Ravenclaw, I think," Athena said thoughtfully, "although of course no one can be sure. I borrowed Mum's copy of Hogwarts: A History and it says that there's been several cases of people being Sorted and later being re-Sorted because they believed that they had been put in the wrong house. And after all, Mum was a Gryffindor herself, although she really should have been in Ravenclaw, don't you think?"

"No guessing," Pepita began.

"Which house you'll be in," continued George.

"Ravenclaw for sure!" Pepita finished.

Kyle looked thoughtful.

"I guess I'll be in Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw," he decided. "I don't really fit in Gryffindor, and of course a Weasley would never end up in Slytherin."

"Don't be so sure," Lily warned. "There'd never been a Potter in Slytherin either, but the Hat wanted to put Dad there. He only ended up in Gryffindor because he flat-out argued with it."

The others looked disbelieving.

"No way," piped up Andrew. Lily shrugged, making Madam Malkin cluck in annoyance.

"Stand still, dear."

"Which 'ouse do you think zzat you will be in?" Madeleine asked curiously. Houses didn't really matter much to her, although she steered clear of the Slytherins after an annoyed delegation of her fellow Gryffindors told her that she was disgracing their house.

"Oh, Slytherin, no question," Lily replied airily.

"Of course," Emperor announced, puffing himself up with pride. "Nothing but the house of snakes for my dear hatchling."

Madame Malkin screamed at the appearance of the snake. The adults turned and Harry, seeing the cause of the disruption, hastily scooped up the snake and found himself facing a frightened and wrathful Madam Malkin while the Weasleys watched in anticipation.

"He's my daughter's, um, pet," Harry explained weakly, ignoring Emperor's outraged shouts of "Pet! Bah!" and Fred and Ron's sniggers. "I'm afraid she must have set him down earlier."

He couldn't resist sending Lily an I'll deal with you later look that she returned with wide, innocent eyes.

"Bringing a snake into my shop!" fumed the proprietress. "The idea!" But she only turned away, muttering angrily; the Potters were one of her largest accounts. Lily smirked at her outraged father.

Harry spent a moment getting control of himself, aware that his eyes had flashed red and that the Weasley children were making exlamations of "cool!" and "that's creepy." When Harry had deflected the killing curse as a baby a fragment of Voldemort's soul had come to rest in him, and the death of Voldemort some thirteen years earlier had activated that fragment, dormant until now. Harry was usually capable of squashing the little voice that suggested doing unscrupulous and/or unpleasant things, but whenever something really tried his patience he had to suppress the urge to begin shooting avada kedavra or crucio in all directions. His eyes also had a tendency to go red.

Control regained, Harry opened his once-again green eyes to find the adults watching him with expressions of varying degrees of nervousness. There was a collective sigh of relief as they saw that he was himself again.

"You needn't worry so much," he told them, irritated. "I only lost control that one time, and it was only because I didn't know it could happen."

"Mate, you screamed that we were mudbloods and blood-traitors and tried to kill us all," Ron reminded him. "I think we have a right to worry."

"Yeah, Harry, if we're not careful you might start sacrificing infants and trying to take over the world," Fred said with a straight face. Angelina poked him hard in the side. Harry glared as Fred winced.

"Not funny," he said flatly. Seeing the slight reddish tinge to Harry's eyes, Lily interposed smoothly.

"I've got my robes, Dad," she informed him. "Bookstore, then Ollivander's and the quidditch supplies store?"

Harry's (entirely green) eyes lit up at the mention of quidditch.

"Alright," he agreed. The two Potter's made their farewells and left the store. Once outside Harry dumped Emperor on Lily's shoulder where the snake curled happily around her neck.

Once in Flourish and Blott's, Harry settled himself down near the counter as Lily disappeared into the rows of shelves. Twenty-five minutes later she reappeared, staggering slightly, and carrying a large stack of books. Harry put down the cup of tea he'd cadged off the salesgirl and took the pile from her. He looked through, reading out the titles as he went, and his eyebrows rose until they were almost level with this hairline. He turned and looked hard at his daughter, who stared back. Harry shrugged, muttering about dark-lords-in-training, to pay for the pile of books.

"If I catch you using any of these," Harry said warningly, as he paid for her purchases, "then you'll be in big trouble."

Lily nodded obediently, and Harry knew resignedly that she was thinking to herself that she simply wouldn't get caught using them.

The problem with children, Harry thought, ignoring many other possible endings for that phrase, is that they end up with all your worst habits.

As the pair entered Ollivander's a small bell rang somewhere and a moment later the man himself appeared.

"Ah, Mr and Miss Potter," he said in his dry, papery voice. "here for your wand I assume, Miss Potter?"

Lily nodded, fixing him with an unblinking stare that matched his own.

"Yes, sir."

"Hmm, let me see," he muttered, pulling a box down from the stacks on the shelves. "Unicorn hair, holly, twelves inches," he noted, handing the wand to Lily. She gave it a wave.

"No," he observed, snatching it out of her hands and handing her another wand instead. "Try this one. Powdered dragon scale, yew, thirteen inches."

Yet again nothing happened. Putting the second wand away, Ollivander sent he a sharp glance and his hands stilled. "I wonder…" he said to. Harry stiffened, knowing what had happened when that phrase was last uttered…

Ollivander disappeared into the bowels of the shop, returning with a rather dusty box and pulling out a dark, slim wand.

"Phoenix feather in basilisk venom," he stated, making Harry do a double-take and Lily blink at him. "An unusual combination and difficult to obtain, and usually somewhat unstable. Elder, thirteen inches."

Lily waved the wand cautiously, and suddenly there was tension swelling in the room, slowly focusing around her, gathering strength and taking shape…

"Yes," said Ollivander, sounding almost awed, his voice shattering the magic and leaving everything ordinary once more, although Lily's eyes looked blacker than usual. "Yes, most definitely your wand. It takes a rare witch or wizard to control the wand with of such a particular double-core, Miss Potter. We can certainly expect great things from you." His eyes flicked to Harry, standing as stiff as a board, eyes like hard emeralds. "It may interest you to know that the phoenix whose feather is contained in your wand gave only two other feathers. As for the basilisk venom… I purchased it from a Severus Snape, who I believe obtained it from a basilisk slain by none other than your own father."

Lily turned in astonishment to look at her father.

"It was supposed to be for Hogwarts use only," Harry said in a strained, grating voice. His eyes flickered, and Lily's eyes widened.

"Uh-oh," she uttered as Harry's eyes turned a brilliant crimson.

"Traitor!" Harry hissed. I will deal with him!"

Lily had a flash of Ollivander's face, filled with consternation, as she launched herself forward to cling to her father's arm, and there was a great BOOM of displaced air as the two of them Disapparated through Apparition wards.

Ollivander sighed. He really wouldn't want to be at Hogwarts right now.