On the Monday our story begins, a young father named Phillip Granger asked his young daughter, Hermione Jean Granger, “Pumpkin, how was your first day at school?” as she and his wife Moira entered their sitting room.

“She’s had a very traumatic day,” said Moira, as Hermione burst into tears.

“What happened to upset her so?” asked Phillip, reaching down to lift his crying daughter into his arms.

“She won’t tell me,” said the teary eyed Moira. “Every time I ask her she starts crying. While I start supper, maybe you can calm her down so she’ll tell us what happened.”

“Hermione, sweetheart, do you want Daddy to continue reading The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe to you?” asked Phillip. After the still crying Hermione nodded her head yes, he added, “Let’s go over here to our favorite chair, and you can sit on my lap while I read to you.”

“Has she calmed down enough to tell us what happened to her at school?” asked Moira, entering the sitting room to call her husband and daughter to supper about forty minutes later.

“She went to sleep in my arms after I only read three pages to her, so I decided to let her sleep until you came to call us to supper,” answered Phillip. As his smiling wife looked on, he began to caress his daughter’s cheeks as he gently said, “Sweetheart it’s time to wake up for supper, now.”

“Daddy, I don’t like school,” Hermione wailed, embracing her father after waking.

“What happened, sweetheart?” asked Phillip, rubbing his daughter’s back.

“A boy in my class took my new pencil box that Uncle Earnest gave me when Mummy took me to his store to buy school clothes,” she answered, as the tears flowed freely down her cheeks onto her father’s chest. “I told him to give it back or I’d tell the teacher, but he took it to his desk and broke all the pencils Mr. Humphries and Miss Brahms gave me to put in my box. Then, I said, they’re give them back to me and everything he tool came right back to me from all the way across the room. That’s when the boy and all the others in my class started saying I was an ugly witch and nobody would be my friend.”

“Did your teachers say anything?” asked Moira, kneeling in front of her husband and daughter.

“No,” replied, the sniffing Hermione. “They didn’t see what happened and nobody called me a witch in front of the teachers.”

“Sweetheart, what did you mean when you said you got your pencil box back from the other side of the room?” asked Phillip.

“I don’t know, Daddy,” answered the bewildered girl just two and a half weeks shy of her sixth birthday. “I just told the boy to give my pencil box back and it came back to me straight away.”

“Was it like the time you said your cousin Abby took your favorite book and you got it back from her?” asked Moira.

“Yeah, Mummy, it was just like that,” answered Hermione, as her stomach rumbled.

“Well, somebody’s hungry, so I say let’s go eat supper and talk about it later,” said Phillip, setting.

“Okay, Daddy,” said Hermione, jumping from her father’s lap and heading for their dining room, as her parents exchanged bewildered and worried glances at each other.

Meanwhile, some fifty kilometers away at Number Four Privet Drive, Little Whinging, Surrey, another family welcomed their child home after his first day at school, as well.

“Diddy, how was your first day at school?” Petunia Dursley asked five year old Dudley Vernon Dursley, hugging her son as he entered their sitting room where she had been watching television with her husband Vernon.

“The fweak fwew the wunch you made him out the window at school, and then at wunch time he took some biscuits from a wittle girl and wied and said I did it,” Dudley lied, pointing at his cringing cousin Harry James Potter, who had just entered the sitting room, as well.

“You threw away the good food your aunt gave you for lunch and then stole food from another student,” accused Vernon, standing up, backhanding the frightened Harry across the face, and breaking his glasses in the process.

“I didn’t do it,” said Harry, shaking with fear with blood pouring out of his broken nose.

“Liar,” spat Vernon, punching Harry in the head, knocking him to the floor, and getting blood on Petunia’s new carpet.

“He’s getting blood all over my new carpet,” shrieked Petunia, grabbing her nephew by the hair and roughly pulling him by his unkempt raven-haired locks into their tiled foyer.

“You broke your new glasses and got blood all over your aunt’s new carpet,” said Vernon, pulling his belt off and striking the defenseless five year old more than twenty times with his buckle. When he finished with a vicious kick to the boy’s ribs while Dudley kicked him in the head, the contemptible brute ordered, “Freak, get in the kitchen, start supper, and don’t you dare burn anything.”

“Vernon, he’s not moving,” said Petunia, cautiously moving the unconscious boy with her foot.

“He’s breathing, so I didn’t hurt him too bad,” said Vernon, shaking the severely injured boy. “I’ll chuck him into the cupboard until he wakes up, and then I’ll make him wash dishes, but I’m not giving him a thing to eat. The nerve of the freak getting our Dudley in trouble on the first day of school, and I say he just got what he deserves.”

“What about school, tomorrow?” asked Petunia, as Vernon grabbed Harry and roughly threw him into his cupboard under the stairs, injuring him even more severely. “We can’t send him to school like this even with my friend Pauline being Diddy’s and the freak’s teacher.”

“We’ll just call the school and tell them the freak’s sick,” said Vernon. “That should satisfy Pauline, anyway.”

“Oh, James, isn’t there something we can do to help Harry?” asked young Harry’s late mother to his late father in their afterlife as they looked upon their unconscious son.

“No, my dear, I’m sorry, but there’s nothing we can do,” answered the teary-eyed James Potter, embracing his weeping wife, Lily.

“Why did Dumbledore have to ignore our will and place Harry with Petunia?” asked Lily.

“It was because of that bloody for the greater good bullshit he believes in,” said James. “Dumbledore completely ignored our wishes for our son, and put our son with the last people we wanted him left with, and now Harry has to pay for his meddling. I just wish there was something we could do to help our son before he comes here to join us well before his time.”

“James Harold Potter and Lily Rose Evans-Potter, Rowena and I have heard your pleas and we shall endeavor to help your son,” said the spirit of a tall wizard with mane-like red hair, green eyes, and a powerful build.

“Godric Gryffindor and Rowena Ravenclaw,” said Lily in awe.

“Yes, dear, we are indeed Godric Gryffindor and Rowena Ravenclaw, and we have come to help you help your son in his time of need,” said Rowena. “Due to his extensive injuries he has less only twenty-four hours to live...”

“He has only twenty-four hours to live; hurry, please hurry,” gasped Lily.

“We will, child, but first we must send a vision to a House-elf who is the present keeper of a great prophecy foretold of by our dear friend, Helga Hufflepuff,” said Godric.

“Why must you use a House-elf?” asked James.

“This House-elf is the direct descendant of the original keeper of the prophecy and he or she is the only one we can send a vision to with the ability to go to your son and to heal his injuries so that he can be moved,” said Rowena.

“Then, why don’t you get on with it?” asked the weeping Lily.

“It is not as simple as that, my dear,” explained Godric. “We can only send visions to the House-elf as he or she sleeps, and this will not occur for at least another eight hours.”

“Is there anything you can do for son before that?” asked the weeping Lily.

“We can visit with him in his dreams and tell him of your love, the keeper of the prophecy we are sending to him, the fact he is the heir of Gryffindor, and of his soul-mate and Rowena’s heir,” said Godric.

“His soul-mate,” said Lily.

“Yes, dear, your son already has a soul mate,” said Rowena. “We originally made plans for them to meet, bond, and become betrothed after they got to Hogwarts, however your son’s abuse at the hands of your sister and her family have forced us to bring our heir together at a much younger age. The bonding of your son and his soul-mate is the only thing that can completely heal your son, and this takes two years to complete and must be concluded before your son and his soul-mate celebrate their eighth birthdays.”

“You mean Harry can still die before he’s eight,” said Lily.

“The House-elf can heal your son’s injuries to prevent his passing, but in doing so, your son’s magical reserves will be almost depleted,” said Godric. “The bond between your son and his soul-mate is required to replenish his magical core or he shall be little more than a squib.”

“However, their may be side-effects from this soul bond,” added Rowena.

“Side-effects; what kind of side-effects?” asked Lily.

“When their soul-bond begins we have no way of stopping the process, and we are not sure how powerful your son and his soul-mate will become,” said Rowena.

“That’s not a bad thing is it?” asked James.

“If the love of his soul-mate and others are enough to overcome the abuse at the hands of Lily’s sister, brother-in-law, and nephew, then this shall pose no threat,” said Godric. “If not, your son could become the most powerful dark wizard in our history. This means we must ensure your son remains hidden from the influence of Albus Dumbledore until he arrives at Hogwarts. Albus Dumbledore is not an evil man, and eventually, he will play a most important role in your son’s and his soul-mate’s development, which is why we need the names of the three people you trust the most with your son’s development.”

“That’s easy,” said James. “The three people we trust the most are Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Minerva McGonagall.”

“We’d like Sirius to be Harry’s primary guardian, as well, but he was framed for crimes he didn’t commit and was sent to Azkaban without a trial,” said Lily. “The real perpetrator of the crimes of which Sirius is accused is Peter Pettigrew.”

“Yeah, and we know where the rat’s hiding out, to boot,” added James. “He’s hiding out as the pet rat at the Weasleys’ place in St. Ottery Catchpole, and I’d like to see him take Sirius’s place in Azkaban.”

“As we can send information to the living through their dreams, we will send knowledge of Peter Pettigrew’s guilt and where to find him to Minerva McGonagall and Remus Lupin,” said Godric. “Together, with the aid of others, we are quite sure they can overcome a most serious miscarriage of justice.”

“As your son is unconscious, we shall now attempt to enter his dreams, and when the time comes we shall do the same for The Messenger House-elf, your son’s soul-mate, the soul-mate’s parents, Minerva McGonagall, Remus Lupin, and Sirius Black,” said Rowena.