Death's Loyalty Card
by Teddylonglong

All recognizable characters belong to J. K. Rowling, and I am not earning anything by writing this story.
I am not a native speaker of English. Please excuse my mistakes.

Warnings: Completely AU (also means that people's names, birth dates etc. might be changed to fit into this story). Partly OOC. Possible time paradox. Possible character deaths.

'I should try to also become friends with Severus Snape,' Harry thought. 'On the other hand, he must already be friends with Mum, but Mum must in the end get together with James, or I won't even be born. So even if we became friends with Severus, wouldn't the friendship brake over Lily anyway, even if that'll only be in a few years' time?'

The fact that the full moon was on the third day of classes, something that Harry was reminded of by Remus' absence, helped Harry with his decision, as he chose to sit with Severus that morning.

"Hi, I'm Harry," he introduced himself, asking, "Would you mind sitting together today?"

"I'd like that," the other boy replied, shyly. "Soon, my friend is going to come to school, too, though," he added. "She's muggleborn and wasn't invited in the first place."

"Oh, that's nice," Harry replied, smiling. "Thanks for telling her about the school. That was very kind of you."

A small smile played on Severus' face at Harry's words.

HP

From the third week of classes onwards, Lily Evans attended their class. Harry inwardly groaned upon realising that she and Severus were inseparable. 'Well, that probably can't be helped,' he thought, knowing that Lily was only there, because Severus had alerted her to the opportunity. 'In the worst case, I'll have to ask Death to do something about it, so that I'll be born in fifteen or sixteen years,' he resolved, before a sudden idea crossed his mind. 'Even if I'm not going to be born, I'm still alive due to Death's actions, so perhaps it doesn't really matter.' However, he was not sure about it.

'Maybe I can make some more changes also to the Death Eaters,' he thought, and from that time onwards, he tried to approach every single of his classmates, trying to at least get to know everyone.

To his surprise, he found that he liked the Lestrange brothers. While his younger brother Rabastan, whom he had met once, was a little whirlwind, Rodolphus, who was in the class with Harry and James, seemed very nice.

One day, an apparently lost kitten found its way into the primary school, and Rodolphus immediately came over to help Harry care for the small animal. It was a marmalade kitten with white and orange fur, and Harry noticed in surprise that it was not much larger than his hand.

'He's really good with animals,' Harry thought in surprise, unable to imagine Rodolphus as one of the criminals, who had tortured the Longbottoms in his old timeline. 'Maybe I can prevent him from becoming a Death Eater,' he thought.

Between classes, he spent time together with Rodolphus caring for the kitten, who even followed the other boy into the classroom and spent class time curled up in his lap. However, when classes let out for the day, Rodolphus asked Harry, "Can you take the kitten home with you? My father is very strict, and he wouldn't allow me to bring an animal home. It's much too young to leave it alone in the school," he added in a soft voice. "My sister might like it though," he added as an afterthought.

"Of course," Harry replied, smiling, and nodded, when his new friend gently placed the kitten into his arms, instructing him to bring it back to the school in the morning.

"I will," Harry promised, before he sought out James to go home together.

HP

Their parents immediately agreed that the boys could keep the kitten, and Dorea even came up with a name. "Why don't we call it Neko?" she suggested, explaining, "It means cat in Japanese. Don't ask me how I know such a thing, but someone back at Hogwarts told me that."

"May I still take her with me to school?" Harry asked in a small voice, feeling too bad for Rodolphus if he kept the kitten at home. "Rodolphus seemed to adore it, and he seemed to know exactly how to handle it. We went to see Hagrid to ask him for food, because it's still too small to eat normal cat food," he added, eagerly.

"You can do that for the time being," Charlus replied, "however, I believe that as soon as the kitten is old enough, we can just leave her at the school. She'll go hunting in the forest overnight. You just have to make sure that she's not locked in anywhere. Bring her home for at least a month though. She's still a baby."

Harry thoroughly enjoyed himself – at school as well as during his training with the Unspeakables. What he appreciated most was that it did not matter how good he was at school or if he did better in his tests than James. For him, who had already studied up to shortly before his OWLs, everything was extremely easy, and it would have been difficult to do worse than James, for whom everything was new. However, the Potters were not like the Dursleys and did not demand such a thing from him.

When James and Harry returned home from their afternoon activities, they told each other everything about their Quidditch and Unspeakable training, as far as Harry was allowed to share information. Even if Harry spent much time with Remus and Rodolphus at school, while James and Sirius were inseparable, he and James kept their extremely close relationship – one like it was reserved only for twins.

HP

To Harry's relief, he could freely speak with Toth about his worries, as the Head Unspeakable knew everything about him and his arrangement with Death.

"Death, don't fret," he told him one day, when Harry spent several minutes rambling about his necessity to marry a Death Eater. "If Death promised you to get rid of the Horcruxes and you kill Voldemort swiftly, maybe there won't even be Death Eaters in our future."

"Oh, that's true," Harry admitted. "The question is how I am going to kill him. He's much older and more powerful than me."

"Listen Death, you're an Unspeakable," Toth reminded him. "We'll be able to teach you all that you need, before your classmates even notice that he's recruiting followers. Just see to it that you remain friends with the possible future Death Eaters and distract them."

Harry let out a snort. "I don't think that they're going to become Death Eaters by their own free choice," he contradicted. "It's probably their parents who introduce them to Voldemort. Rodolphus, for example, would never become a Death Eater by his own free will."

"That might be true," Toth agreed, pensively. "Still, try to remain friends with them and influence them to a certain extent. That's all you can do at this time."

HP

During the following months, Harry did his best to become friends with his whole primary school class, even if James sometimes asked him why he wanted to be friends with just everyone.

"I just don't like to fight with anyone," Harry replied, lamely, unsure of what to tell his twin.

However, the more he observed Bellatrix, the less he could imagine marrying her. 'Even if she's not a Death Eater yet, she's still a bitch,' he thought after witnessing how Bellatrix had ridiculed Severus for being a half-blood. 'Hasn't she noticed yet that Mum is muggleborn?' he wondered, even if he felt relieved that no one seemed to bother Lily about being muggleborn. 'Maybe Narcissa is less a bitch?' he wondered, however, since the girl was not even a primary school pupil yet, he had no way of getting to know her yet. 'I'll just have to wait and see,' he resolved. 'Perhaps Death can tell me a few names of other Death Eater witches, when he comes to see me the next time.'

HP

Unfortunately, Death was not willing to do such a thing.

On Harry's and James' seventh birthday, Harry was just about to drift off to sleep, when Death made his appearance.

"Good evening, Master, and happy birthday," he greeted him, causing Harry to cast him a half-hearted smile. 'Who knows what he's going to tell me today,' he thought in concern.

"Do you have your stamp card ready?" Death enquired.

Harry nodded and pulled the card out from the drawer of his night table. It looked exactly like it did, when he had received it just a year ago – except for the fact that he had filled his parents' names into the blanks.

A mere instant later, he accepted it back, giving it a curious look. The two fields had been joined by one double field, while the rest of the card was still empty.

"This double field means that you can exchange people," Death explained. "You may save one if you give me the name of another, whom I may take instead. Just write the names in the free fields if you don't get a stamp automatically."

'That's cool,' Harry thought. 'This way, I'll be able to save another person, and I can get rid of someone whom I greatly dislike. Too bad that Voldemort is special and it won't work for him.'

Now fully awake, he got up and stepped over to his desk, where he placed the card and readied himself to fill a first couple into the new fields, while his mind was going haywire.

"Death," he asked in a small voice, "will you tell me the names of a few female Death Eaters, from whom I have to choose for my marriage in the future?"

"No," Death replied, matter-of-factly.

"All right," Harry groaned, racking his mind for something else that he needed to ask, knowing that otherwise, he would have to wait for a whole year.

"One more question, sir," he hesitantly began, when he was interrupted.

"I'm not a sir, I am Death."

"Yes, what I was saying," Harry made another attempt, "will Pandora O'Brien be Luna Lovegood's mother in the future?"

"Yes," Death supplied.

"Oh, then please exchange her with Lucius Malfoy," Harry said in a firm voice and quickly wrote the two names into the double field.

"Very well," Death agreed, nodding in understanding, before he vanished from the spot, leaving Harry very thoughtful.

'I just hope he'll give me more opportunities to save people,' he thought. 'I still need to save Mum and Dad, err well, my grandparents, Sirius, Severus and Hermione of course. Thank Merlin they only die some time into the future.' Letting out a huge yawn, he decided to go back to bed and just dwell on the happy thought of having saved Luna's mother.

HP

By the time when school commenced again after Easter, Harry somehow expected something to happen. However, he told himself that Pandora Lovegood had only died more than twenty years later, so that he could not really expect anything right now. Of course, Lucius was supposed to die at some stage, however, he could not know when that was going to happen.

'Oh no,' he thought, when he pondered the matter more intensely, while he busied himself drawing a picture of a griffin for his art class. 'As it was only one person in exchange, it's only going to happen after Draco will be born; otherwise, it would be two persons.' He let out a deep sigh, thinking, 'Too bad, I really wouldn't have missed Draco.'

However, as much as the seven-year-old pondered the matter, in the end, everything developed much differently from what he expected.

HP

During the summer holidays, when James spent the whole morning with the Chudley Cannons and the afternoon with Harry playing Quidditch, he managed to convince his father to set up a Quidditch tournament between the three classes of the Hogwarts Primary School.

As soon as classes began again after the summer holidays, Mary Greengrass, who was still the teacher of the six and seven-year-olds, set up a Quidditch try-out class for the seven-year-olds, deciding that the youngest pupils had to adjust to school and to Hogwarts before being able to participate in such an event.

Harry was not surprised when his brother ended up as Chaser, while he was chosen as Seeker. 'Thank Merlin, that's what I can do best,' he thought, feeling extremely happy. Marlene Mackinnon and Amelia Bones were the other Chasers, Sirius and Lucius Malfoy the Beaters, and Rodolphus was made Keeper.

In order to be able to practise at any time, James convinced the teacher to set up a reserve team as well, and the class quickly decided on Bellatrix Black, Lily Evans and Peter Pettigrew as Chasers, Crabbe and Goyle as Beaters, Frank Longbottom as Keeper and Severus Snape as Seeker.

When Mrs. Greengrass informed them that they could practise from 1:30 till 2:00 p.m. every Friday afternoon, James took matters into his own hands and convinced his classmates to use the second half of lunch break to practise on a daily basis.

Harry thoroughly enjoyed himself. Like during his time at Hogwarts, as brilliant flyers as the other Seekers were, they were never able to catch the Snitch before Harry caught the moving, golden ball, and their class managed to win the first and the second Quidditch match against the older primary school classes.

"Perhaps we should let the winning team once play against the Hogwarts teams," Charlus said one day during the Christmas holidays, when his sons were at home spending time with their parents.

"Oh yes please," James was all for it.

"That's a brilliant idea," Harry added, grinning in anticipation.

HP

A Sunday in February, the day after the students' Hogsmeade visit for Valentine's Day, was set for the first match of the primary school pupils versus a Hogwarts house team, and the pupils had to play against the Gryffindor team.

"Don't worry, they're bigger than us but maybe not so fast," James, whom everyone silently accepted as something like a captain, encouraged the team. "We'll do as well as we did in every other match so far."

Harry realised that some of the students were much bigger than himself, however, he knew from experience that size did not matter. He cruised above the pitch, glad that the weather, even if cold, was bright but not too sunny, so that it would not be overly difficult to see the Snitch.

Nevertheless, the game went on for two hours, before he first spotted the fast hiding golden ball. He was just about to go into a deep dive, when he heard James' voice shouting, "Harry, be careful, a Bludger."

Unfortunately, he was not able to react fast enough to the warning, and a moment later, he was hit in the head full force.

Just when unconsciousness claimed him and he fell from his broom, his magic reacted to the attack and retaliated in a bout of accidental magic, seeing to it that he was not the only pupil tumbling to the ground in a free fall.

Fortunately, his unconscious mind – used to transform in a dangerous situation like this – automatically made him transform into the raven Animagus form of his former self, and the raven managed to fly off the impeding ground, before it slumped onto the ground in a relatively soft landing a little further ahead.

HP

By the time, Harry's mind returned to awareness, he was sitting in Rodolphus' lap, and the other boy was gently caressing his back feathers. His parents and classmates along with some teachers were sitting in a circle around them.

Harry blinked a couple of times, trying to recall what happened. 'Why am I in my Animagus form?' he wondered, horrified to have his secret out in the open. 'I didn't even know that I could transform after being sent back in time.'

He looked at his friend, glad that Rodolphus seemed to understand his plead and gently placed him onto the floor next to him. Harry took a few steps aside, before he swiftly transformed back into his human form, only to let out a groan upon realising that his head hurt badly.

"Harry, are you all right?" someone asked, and Harry, recognising Madam Pomfrey, admitted, "Headache."

"He was hit with the Bludger full-force," Amelia explained, and Harry noticed that everyone looked at him in apparent concern.

"What exactly happened?" he asked, wondering why everyone seemed so worried.

"Someone attacked you," Sirius supplied, "by hitting you in the head with a Bludger, and you managed to return some very strong magic that made him fall from his broom."

"He didn't survive it," Lily added in a soft voice.

"Harry didn't do anything," Rodolphus emphasized. "He was already unconscious and tumbling from his broom, when that bout of magic left his body. It's not his fault."

Everyone nodded in agreement. "No, it's not your fault," Albus Dumbledore, who had just joined the small group, said in a firm voice.

"Excuse me, sir," Harry replied, giving the healer a grateful look, when his headache subsided, "what exactly is not my fault?"

tbc...?

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