Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.

Chapter 1

The only sounds that came from the fourth house on Privet Drive in the early hours in the morning were the snores of those who lived there. Like many others at this time, the Dursleys were fast asleep in their warm beds, most likely dreaming about nothing in particular as they allowed their minds to wander freely in their sleep.

In this dark and quiet home, none would suspect that there was someone who was not enjoying a peaceful night's sleep. While her relatives slept, the redheaded girl walked slowly around the kitchen preparing a cup of tea in attempt to ease her restless mind from the thoughts that were preventing her from getting any sleep that night. After a cup was prepared, the girl stepped into the sitting room and walked directly out of the window as if she were checking to make sure she wasn't being watched. After she determined that she was alone, she allowed herself to settle down in a nearby armchair as she drank her tea slowly as she allowed her thoughts to wonder around.

This particular girl happened to be me, Emily Potter, a sixteen-year-old witch that was extremely out of place in this exceptionally normal neighborhood. However, I was not the only unusual person in this neighborhood because I was lucky enough to share this abnormality with my twin brother, Harry Potter.

For the two of us, our return to the Dursley's house from school was extraordinarily different this summer. Instead of their usual barks of orders and grunts of disapproval, our relatives were hesitant to speak to us and would usually just curiously stare at us from afar.

When I first got back from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, I had a small part of me that wondered if they somehow knew something bad had happened to us, but that was not the case. They did not ask about it, so we did not tell them. It was as simple as that.

In all honestly, Harry and I hardly talked about the death of Albus Dumbledore and the events that lead up to it. It wasn't necessary and we knew that it wouldn't make any difference. We both knew what the other was going to say and I was in no mood to discuss what happened.

I knew that the Dursleys were not the only ones that watched me. Harry did too and I didn't even have to ask why. On our ride back to Kings Cross Station, I heard my twin brother talking to our friends about me. Harry was worried about my sanity. Just as I was returning to our compartment on the train, I heard him tell Ron and Hermione that he thought that I was not going to be able to keep it together much longer after witnessing the betrayal of Severus Snape. He knew that it hurt me more than I was telling anyone and he was concerned that I was going to lose my mind before too long.

Harry had a right to be concerned about me. When Severus Snape, the one person I trusted above so many people, took the life of Dumbledore in the Astronomy Tower that night, something inside of me felt like it had broken. It wasn't like this incident prevented me from going on from my everyday life, but it was something that I found incredibly difficult to get over.

For a couple of weeks after the incident, I would wake up in the middle of the night crying and shaking after reliving the event in a nightmare. Harry would wake up with me and try to help me when he could, but there really wasn't much he could do to stop the nightmares. After the first couple of weeks, I did my best to remain quiet when waking up in the night and continued to relive those moments repeatedly.

Now that some time had passed, I had nearly become accustomed to being woken up in the night. Having these nightmares had become so routine for me that they hardly even bothered me anymore. Instead of crying and shaking, I just woke up feeling numb and would just walk around the house until I felt tired enough to return to my bed.

It was for this reason that I was awake right now. Unable to find comfort in my own bed, I had come downstairs into the sitting room in attempt to find some solace with a cup of tea as I paced around the room.

However, there was only so much that tea could do after yet another nightmare. Like all of my other dreams since the incident, they all somehow connected to what I saw in the Astronomy Tower that night. The dream that I had awoken from seemed so vivid that I had trouble believing that it wasn't really happening.

Before I woke up in the middle of the night, I had dreamed that I was standing in Hogwarts surrounded by the Death Eaters that I saw on the day Dumbledore was killed. All of them were wearing masks and all of them had their wands pointed toward me. I was standing in the middle of their circle and was begging them to not kill me where I stood.

In the middle of all of this, one of the Death Eaters stepped forward and removed his mask from his head to reveal who he was. Although I had been through this dream before, I was still mortified to see Snape standing in front of me with a twisted grin on his face.

Snape…you have to help me, I begged him in the dream.

All of the Death Eaters laughed at me through my tears and my stomach twisted when I saw that Snape joined in with the mockery.

You didn't honestly think that you mattered to me, you stupid child, Snape mocked me. I never cared about you – how could you be so naive? My loyalty has always been to the Dark Lord.

Every time I had this dream, those words became more twisted until I felt like I was rotting within. While I knew now that this dream was a repeat, what this version of Snape told me always seemed new and horrifying while I was in the dream itself.

I thought I could trust you, I would murmur through the tears that streamed down my face.

It is your own fault, Snape said. You should have listened to your brother while you had the chance to get rid of me, but you're too late now.

After that, Snape pointed his wand directly at me and said the Killing Curse that sent a flash of green light toward me. Every time, without fail, I would wake from my dream in a panic that cannot be described in words. It would take me a moment to realize it was just a dream and then I would somehow manage to calm myself down enough to be able to mobilize myself.

While the dreams always seemed to be different and more drawn out, I slowly began to realize that they all had the same theme. Snape was always there to tell me how idiotic I had been for trusting him and I would always end up nearly dead before waking up and realizing that it was all just a nightmare.

Occasionally things would become different. Sometimes Harry would be there and he would be killed off first so I would have to watch. He would blame me for his torture and tell me how I should have listened to him when he told me that Snape couldn't be trusted. Other times someone else would join me in the dream, but it always turned out to be someone that I deeply cared about.

In the end, I guess it shouldn't have bothered me as much as it did. These dreams were only projecting what I believed myself. I should have never trusted Snape and should have listened to others before everything got out of hand.

Would it have made any difference if I had thought about this before? Would the course of events played out any differently if I wouldn't have trusted Snape like Harry? Honestly, it was difficult to make any assumptions. Considering Dumbledore trusted Snape just as much, if not more, than I did, things probably would have ended up the same either way.

But perhaps I would have been more prepared for what happened.

It wasn't like any of this consideration mattered anyway. All of this already happened and there was no way to go back and change it. Now all Harry and I could do was try to put an end to all of this and live up to our promise to Dumbledore.

We had to find Voldemort's Horcruxes if we wanted to prevent something like this from happening again. It wasn't like we knew where we were starting, but we had a plan to go searching and that was exactly what we were going to be doing.

Our first plan of action was to get as far as we could away from Privet Drive – all of us, not just Harry and me. Before our protection was lifted from the house, Mad-Eye Moody was going to escort us to our protected location, though we were both unsure of where that would be at the moment, in order to keep us out of Voldemort's reach. As far as we knew, the location would just be somewhere that we could be easily protected from Death Eaters for the time being.

All of this we knew was going to be happening in a few days time thanks to a visit from Kingsley and Mr. Weasley in the beginning of the summer. Although their visit was fairly unexpected at this time, I was happy to know that they were completely comfortable explaining what all was happening to our angry relatives about the fact that they were going to have to be removed from their home for their own protection. Although it was incredibly obvious that they didn't have a choice, Uncle Vernon continued to put up an argument regardless. However, in the end, it was understood that no one could remain in this house if they planned on continuing their lives.

Once we were taken to this location, we would remain there for a period of time before Harry and I started our mission to find the Horcruxes. While not everyone that we knew was aware of this fact, we still planned on going beginning our search.

With things going the way they were, there was no way that Harry and I could return to our everyday lives at Hogwarts where Voldemort could easily take us in. Instead, we had to stay hidden from him and his Death Eaters. As soon as they noticed we weren't boarding the Hogwarts Express, we knew that we were going to be on constant watch. Voldemort wouldn't rest until we were murdered at his hand, but we couldn't let him get away with it without at least putting up a fight to give others a chance to get rid of him.

Knowing that all of this was up to Harry and me gave me a sickening feeling in my gut. The entire world depended on the two of us to destroy the one man that could completely take over and put an end to the world as we know it. While we had the help of our friends that were going to be joining us on our trip – including Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, and Neville Longbottom – it would all come down to us in the end.

Either Voldemort dies or we do. As simple as it sounded, it continued to make me want to crawl into a hole and never come back out.

"Emily?"

The sudden noise that went through the room startled me for a moment. Interrupted from my thoughts, I quickly looked over toward the staircase where I saw a person standing. With the lack of lighting in the area, it took me a moment to determine who it was that was talking to me.

"What are you doing awake, Dudley?" I asked him in a monotonous tone.

"I thought I heard someone walking down here earlier," Dudley said. "So I came to check who it was."

"You ought to be more careful," I told him. "I could have been a murderer for all you knew."

Dudley's eyes grew wider as he looked at me. There wasn't any doubt that he wouldn't have considered something like this when he stepped out of his room, but it's something that he should be prepared for. Being in a house with the Potters brought on more dangers than the Dursleys even knew. Luckily, considering we were still underage, we were still being protected and there was less of a chance that we would be found.

"I didn't think about that," Dudley said.

"I figured as much," I murmured.

Much to my surprise, Dudley stepped over and sat down in the chair directly across from me. For a moment, I began to wonder if he would actually speak to me, but I guess he was just figuring out what to say to me because of our lack of actual conversation.

"You haven't been sleeping well," he said.

It wasn't a question – it was a statement.

"No, I haven't," I said to him.

There was a moment of hesitation before he spoke up again. I don't know what it was, but it seemed as though Dudley was afraid to speak of me. Perhaps it wasn't exactly fear of me, but just the uncertainty of our conversation.

We didn't get along when we were younger, that was a fact. However, I have noticed that Dudley seemed to have picked up some genuine interest in Harry and me these last couple of years. I wasn't exactly sure what it was, but he no longer tormented us like he did in our youth. Instead, he just gave us a curious stare most of the time and looked as though he wanted to say something to us all of the time.

"Did something happen at that…school of yours?" he asked. "Something bad?"

"Something bad happens every year at school, Dudley," I told him.

"It was worse this year though, wasn't it?" he asked. "That's why we have to leave the house, right?"

It was true. The Dursleys were told that they were going to have to leave Privet Drive this summer to avoid being found my Voldemort or the Death Eaters. This was going to be the first place they would look as soon as we came of age and we couldn't risk having anyone here when that happened.

"Yes, things are getting worse," I said. "And it's just going to be getting worse from here on out."

"It has to do with that man," Dudley said. "The one that killed your parents."

"Yes," I said. "He's becoming more dangerous and is gaining more followers every day. That's why you all have to leave – we have to make sure that he cannot find you."

"What about you?" he asked. "What happens to Harry and you after we leave?"

"We're going to stay hidden," I told him. "We have a plan."

Of course, we didn't actually have a decent plan at the moment. As far as I knew, we were just going to be doing our best to keep out of sight as long as we could while we went searching for Horcruxes in various locations. As to where those locations were, we were still unsure. All of this, of course, I did not voice aloud to Dudley because I knew that it would all be far above his level of comprehension. He wouldn't understand and, honestly, it was probably for the best that he did not know.

"So…we aren't really going to be seeing much of each other after this, are we?" he asked.

I started to say that there was a high chance of us not even making it out of this alive, but I figured that was slightly inappropriate to add to the conversation. Dudley hardly knew enough as it was, and there was no sense in add more into the mix.

"I don't know, Dudley," I said. "It's difficult to say."

He nodded and, for a moment, he almost seemed to be a bit discouraged to hear this. I started to question whether or not I believed Dudley was truly upset to hear that he might not be seeing us much longer, but I immediately backtracked on the thought.

I couldn't trust my own assumptions anymore – that much was clear. I had already made that mistake with others and I turned out to be wrong. Why should my assumptions now be any different?

"You should go to sleep," I told him. "I'm sorry for waking you."

He didn't respond and just stared at the ground for a moment before standing up from his chair. Even though I knew that it wouldn't be easy for me to go back to sleep at the moment, I figured that I would follow suit and try to make my way back up to my room as well. Knowing that I had woken Dudley in my escapades made me realize that I had not been as quiet as I thought I had been and there would be no use in staying down here for much longer.

As we ascended the staircase, I tried to ease my mind by reminding myself that there was no use in dwelling on the past. Constantly waking up because of my own fright was not only affecting me, but those around me as well. Sometimes even people that I wouldn't have expected like Dudley.

Just as I stepped over toward the smallest bedroom in the house with my cup of tea in hand, I was stopped when Dudley turned back and looked at me as though he wanted to say something again. Keeping my hand on the doorknob as I kept the door slightly opened, I looked over at my cousin expecting him to say something.

"I'm sorry," he blurted out.

His apology caught me off guard. In my surprise, I was unable to respond immediately because of how unsure I was about where this conversation was going.

"For what?" I finally asked.

"For the way that I treated you two when we were younger," Dudley said. "For the way that my parents treat you two now."

"You don't have to apologize, Dudley," I said awkwardly.

"Yes I do," he said, though it seemed like he was straining to let the words out of his mouth. "We've never treated you well…and you never did anything wrong."

I blinked and was unable to form any words. Never in a million years would I have expected Dudley to apologize for not only his actions, but for the actions of his family. This made me wonder how long Dudley had been thinking about this. For once, I no longer saw the little boy that used to terrorize Harry and me through our youth.

"Don't worry about it," I finally responded. "It's all in the past now."

He nodded and then slowly walked into his room and shut the door behind himself before I realized that I was still standing in the same spot. Still holding onto the doorknob to my room, I pushed open the door and quickly stepped into the room that Harry and I shared.

When I closed the door quietly behind me, I turned around and saw that Harry was sitting awake in his bed with his eyes locked on me. Judging by the confused look on his face, I gathered that he heard what Dudley said to me before I stepped into the room.

"He…apologized?" Harry said in disbelief.

"I guess he's smarter than we thought," I said to Harry. "We haven't given him enough credit over the years."

"I guess not," Harry said. "I just can't believe that he admitted to being wrong."

"He has been acting different for a while now," I murmured.

Harry nodded as I walked over and sat down on the side of my bed. When I sat my tea down on the table next to my bed, I noticed that Harry was watching me curiously.

"You're still being woken up, aren't you?" he asked.

My lips remained pressed together as I looked down at my hands in shame. The fact that Harry wasn't as badly affected by all of this as me was embarrassing. I knew that he was still traumatized by what happened in the Astronomy Tower, but it was so much easier for him to hide it than it was for me.

"What was it this time?" he asked.

"Nothing out of the ordinary," I shrugged and looked down. "It was another one where he was trying to murder us to finish off the job he started at Hogwarts."

I didn't have to say Snape's name for Harry to get the hint. Saying his name aloud had become as hard to say for me as saying Voldemort's name aloud was to others. It hurt me to say it because I knew that it was once the name of a person that I cared so much about. In a way, I knew that it was ridiculous that I wouldn't say his name, but I couldn't bring myself to do it.

"It'll get easier," Harry said.

There were those words again. Harry said them all of the time and I knew that he genuinely believed that this was the truth, but I couldn't be so sure. It still hadn't been that long since all of this happened, but it felt like the pain would never subside.

It wasn't as if this was not hard on Harry too, but it was different for him. Losing Dumbledore was a shock and it hurt him more than anything – that became more and more obvious as he read through the Prophet every day to catch up on the latest word about what people were saying about him. And I knew that Snape and Draco's betrayal affected him too, but it was not as personal as it was for me.

Although it sounds dramatic, I knew that this part of it hurt me more than it did him. Harry never like or trusted either one of them the way that I did. My brother understood this and he did everything that he could to help me through it, but there was only so much he could do for me because of his lack of understanding. It wasn't like I didn't appreciate his support, but I knew that he could only go so far if he didn't quite understand the pain I was going through to the fullest extent.

"I'll just try to get some sleep," I said as I pulled the sheets over myself and laid down against my pillow.

"Good night," he said to me as he laid back down in his own bed.

While I turned over to face the wall, I knew that I wouldn't be getting much more sleep that night. The only reason that I was even attempting to go back to sleep was to amuse Harry and attempt to prevent him from worrying about me.

In truth, I knew that I was going to have to try harder to pull myself together while I still could. I could mope around and be sad all I wanted right now, but it couldn't continue to go on like this if I planned on getting anything done.

Once we turned seventeen, Harry and I were going to have to be alert at all times. We were going to be hunted and there isn't going to be any time for me to lose my head over what happened in the past.

What happened in the Astronomy Tower was only the beginning of what is to come and I had to be prepared for much worse if I had any hope of making this out alive.

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