Sunny was staring intently at the John Potter lookalike, as though trying to work out a puzzle.
"My name is Harry. I was born on the July thirty-first, 1980. I have a twin brother. I'm sure you can see where this is going."
Jacob's eyes bulged despite himself. "You're the brother of the Boy-Who-Lived? I never heard he had one. I've never seen you. Or heard of you. Ever."
"That is because after Voldemort's"—both he and his wife flinched—"attack, I was abandoned by my parents."
"What!" Sunny shouted. "How could they? Why?"
"Tell me, what are the ways you can acquire a Lordship?"
Jacob thought for a moment. "You have to be male — and blood related within three degrees of relation."
"Other ways?"
"Um… You can be blood adopted, but that's considered dark magic now, and illegal."
"Yes, that's two ways. Any others?"
He sat in silence, stumped.
Sunny spoke up, quietly. "Right of conquest."
Harry sat back and smiled a smile with no warmth. "Exactly."
Something seemed to be passing between Harry and his wife, her eyes were widening, and her breathing had become laboured.
"No," she whispered.
"Yes," said Harry.
"What?" he said, totally in the dark.
"Dear," his wife said, "who was the last of the Slytherin line?"
"Well… Rumour said it was You-Know-Who."
"And what is right of conquest?"
"It says that a line will pass to the conquer of the last of the line, so long as the last of the line initiates the conflict that ends in their death."
"So?"
"But… but Harry didn't defeat You-Know-Who, John Potter did."
"Oh come on, Jacob!" she cried, exasperated. "Can't you see what's going on here? If John were the defeater of You-Know-Who, he'd be Lord Slytherin. He isn't. Harry is."
Jacob's eyes widened. "John Potter isn't the Boy-Who-Lived? You are?"
Harry sighed. "Yes."
"Why did they abandon you then? Wait, why would they abandon you anyway? And why does everyone believe John Potter defeated You-Know-Who?"
"Three answers, Dumbledore, Dumbledore, and Dumbledore."
"What did Dumbledore do?" Sunny asked, she looked to be getting agitated and he couldn't blame her. How could anyone abandon their child, especially when they were so obviously magically powerful? He could understand if a family abandoned a squib, even if he didn't approve of it, but someone like Harry? It was unthinkable, despicable even.
"I could tell you, but it would put both you and your family in very real danger from very powerful people who will want the knowledge. Do you still want me to tell you?"
They looked at each other and nodded.
Jacob looked back at Harry and said, "Yes." They were in too deep to back out now.
"Very well. Some nine years ago, there was a prophecy made. A prophecy which said a child would be born with the power to defeat the Dark Lord — a child who would be marked by the Dark Lord as his equal, and who would have a power that the Dark Lord knows not, and that either must die at the hands of the other."
They both stared at him, wide eyed.
"Dumbledore decided that any wizard who fit the criteria laid down by the prophecy was too dangerous to be allowed to freely develop their abilities, so, when he realised the prophecy referred to me, he arranged for me to grow up with muggles, unaware of my heritage, and unaware of my magic."
Sunny was starting to get teary eyed now.
Jacob just looked on, stony faced.
"I'm still not sure how the bastard managed to convince my parents — they don't seem to know John isn't the true Boy-Who-Lived, but I have a few theories." He sighed again, "Dumbledore's plan was to keep me as weak as possible, all the way through my early years, through my time at Hogwarts, until it was time for me to 'face my destiny,' where upon I'd be rolled out to either kill or be killed."
"Wait," Sunny interjected, "why would you need to do that? You-Know-Who's dead."
Harry gave her a look.
Sunny shrieked. "He's not dead!"
Harry shook his head.
Jacob's mind reeled, but a loose strand tugged at him. Something wasn't quite right here, but he couldn't put his finger on it… "Wait," he finally said, "if You-Know-Who's not dead how did you claim the lordship?"
"That's part of the power he knows not. It's the same reason I'm so much more powerful than most children my age, and is something I am very definitely keeping to myself for the moment."
Jacob collapsed backwards into the sofa, still trying to reconcile the eight-year-old boy sitting in front of him, with the commanding, charismatic, powerful young man he'd fought against not thirty minutes before. "It's all so much to take in. I don't know where to start thinking."
Sunny spoke up. "We should start with the winter solstice Wizengamot session, and work from there."
"Right."
.
.
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