Hello and welcome to The Memento!

The idea for this story began bouncing around in my head several years ago when the illustrated edition of the first Harry Potter book came out. I've been working on it slowly ever since, and have finally decided to start posting it. The first few chapters have gone through their final-final round of editing and will be spaced out over the next few weeks to give me time to catch up on writing new material (which is more likely to happen now that I won't be going back and re-editing the first few chapters over and over and over...).

This story will diverge from canon to a point. While many of the main events from the books will take place, I'm doing my best to put a unique, plot-relevant, spin on each of them. I know this is a dangerous claim to make when there's well over 700k stories in the fandom on this site alone, but during my years of lurking I've never come across one that alters the events in quite this way. If you've come across a similar story in your own travels I'd very much like to read it, because goodness knows I've seen enough bathroom troll encounters to last me a lifetime. :)

Despite being rated M, this story isn't overly dark or violent. There will be instances of abuse, neglect, bullying, and graphic violence, however I've tried to keep them realistic given the situation the characters find themselves in. There will be no gore for the sake of gore, and characters will not be maimed for no better reason than that they needed something to angst over.

But that's enough rambling from me, so without further ado...

Key:
"Speech"
"Parseltongue"
Thoughts

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. If I did, Voldemort would have won.

This story is cross-posted on AO3.

~Chapter One: Harry Hunting~

Peaceful mornings at Number Four Privet Drive were a rare commodity for Harry Potter. At six o'clock sharp his aunt would undo the latch on his cupboard and rap her bony knuckles against the door hard enough to rattle the frame. If he slept through her initial barrage she would shriek at him as well, which was unpleasant on the best of days and often an omen of worse to come.

From there he navigated an obstacle course of snide remarks and dodged the occasional rolling pin in a race to prepare enough food to sate his uncle and whale of a cousin. As the clock ticked relentlessly overhead he scrambled eggs, fried bacon, roasted hash browns, and buttered a mountain of toast. At the end of the hour he would set the kitchen table with a feast fit for six, then stand aside and wait. His uncle and cousin would roll down the stairs shortly after and inhale the food he'd spent an hour preparing in less than fifteen minutes.

In Harry's opinion his uncle and cousin would do well with a little less bacon and eggs — they were both round as they were tall, with flabby stomachs and rolling double chins — but no one wanted Harry's opinion.

No one wanted Harry at all.

Harry was sure the Dursleys would give him away to the first person who came knocking — blood relatives or not. Unfortunately for them, scraggly orphans with untameable black hair, bad eyes, and an inexplicable tendency to make lightbulbs explode with his mere presence weren't in high demand. So they were stuck with him, and he with them.

The Dursleys made the best of the situation by setting Harry chores that kept him out of the way. Harry made the best of the situation by keeping his head down and mouth shut. He had learned long ago that to do otherwise would only result in punishment.

That's why, when his aunt had ushered him outside one bright June morning and pointed vaguely in the direction of the garden shed, he'd set to work without complaint. In the past three hours he'd mown the lawn, swept the walk, and watered his aunt's prized hydrangea. The sun was making its final ascent as he moved to his last task — weeding. He picked his way from the flowerbeds flanking the front door to the garden tucked against the whitewashed fence out back, decimating every unidentified shoot and sprout he could lay his hands on.

Currently, Harry was sitting at the edge of the lawn, his hands stained green and a pail full of weeds at his side. He tossed a stubborn dandelion into the pail, then wiped his brow, leaving a streak of dirt running from temple to temple beneath his fringe.

His morning had been blissfully incident free thus far. His aunt hadn't yelled at him, the neighbours were keeping their suspicious glares to themselves, and all the plants were alive and exactly the same size they'd been when he was first tossed out the back door.

It was the best he could expect while living with his relatives — and that was why he knew it wouldn't last.

The hissing swish of the patio door sliding open to release his cousin's gang from afternoon tea and cakes sounded the death knell for his moment of peace.

He paused in the act of pulling up another dandelion and peeked over his shoulder.

Dudley was the first to waddle out into the stuffy summer air. His fingers were sticky with icing and crumbs cascaded down the jersey stretched taut around his bulging stomach. He popped each pudgy digit into his mouth one by one and licked them clean as he looked around the yard with a bored expression.

Dudley didn't like the outdoors — as he often reminded his parents with loud and tear-filled protests. He much preferred to sit inside and blow up aliens on his computer.

Harry preferred when Dudley remained inside as well. For as long as he could remember, his cousin had been his constant tormentor, and every hour Dudley spent sitting in front of his desktop was one less spent on his other favourite pastime: Harry Hunting.

Harry eased onto the balls of his feet as a trio of human bulldogs shuffled from the house at Dudley's heels. Dennis, Gordon, and Malcolm were all thickset, with dull eyes and heavy jowls better adapted to barking than polite conversation. They'd been Dudley's cronies since second grade, much to Harry's dismay. It was harder to run from a pack, and it hurt more when they caught him.

Behind the quartet of heavies was a fifth boy, Piers, who was wiry and quick as a greyhound. He was Dudley's right hand man, and had more brains than the rest put together. It was his job to catch Dudley's targets and hold them until the others caught up. A role he excelled at.

Harry hated the lot of them.

"Run along and play," Harry's aunt Petunia called through the open kitchen window. "And don't forget to come back for lemonade if you get thirsty."

She would offer them lemonade, Harry thought, bitterness lodging in his throat. If he complained of thirst she'd tell him to get a drink from the garden hose.

Malcolm nudged Dudley with his elbow and tipped his chin in Harry's direction. The silent question was met with toothy smirks that made Harry's blood run cold.

He rounded his shoulders and gave the dandelion another tug. He doubted they'd leave him to his chores. He was a 'safe' target. No one ever reprimanded Dudley and his gang for roughing him up. Harry wasn't their child, after all, and therefore wasn't their problem.

As the years went by, the silence became permission — and that permission twisted into encouragement.

"Get him!" Dudley bellowed, sounding the hunt.

The five boys lunged, Piers in the lead, their arms outstretched and lips pulled back in savage glee.

Harry sprang away from the grasping hands, leaving the dandelion clinging to the soil by the tips of its milky white roots. There was a dull thud and the slosh of water behind him as Piers skidded into a decorative birdbath at the edge of the garden.

Harry didn't look back as the hunt reoriented itself and raced in pursuit.

He sprinted down the walkway beside the house, his callused feet striking a drumroll against the interlocking bricks. Stopping wasn't an option. When his legs screamed in protest he pushed them to go faster, throwing himself around the corner of the house and into the front yard — arms wheeling to shift his momentum.

A misstep.

His right foot slid off the walkway and his knee twisted inward, then folded. A startled yelp leapt from his throat as he tumbled to the lawn, scraping his knees and elbows.

Dudley's gang was close behind him, their heavy footfalls shaking the ground beneath his palms. Or perhaps the shaking was his own as he scrambled onto the balls of his feet and dove headlong into the flowerbed below the sitting room window.

His shoulder grazed the stuccoed wall, which tore his already threadbare shirt and rubbed the skin beneath it raw. Harry bit his lips, not making a sound even as a trickle of hot blood ran down his arm. The pain was only a fraction of what he'd feel if caught, and thus easy to ignore.

The soil was damp from watering and stank of manure, but he didn't hesitate going to ground behind his aunt's hydrangea. He tucked himself away behind its thick screen of leaves and periwinkle blue blossoms, and hoped it would be enough.

The leaves were still rustling when Dudley's gang rounded the corner. Harry watched through the narrow gap beneath the branches as five pairs of trainers fanned out across the front lawn, circling.

"Where'd he go?" whined Piers. "We was right behind him!"

Dudley was already bent over panting. "Can't. Have. Gotten. Far," he said between puffs. Harry didn't need to see his cousin's eyes to know they were scanning the block with its perfect, identical houses and their perfect, identical lawns.

A pair of black trainers advanced towards his hiding place and stopped on the other side of the hydrangea. Harry's breath caught in his throat and he pressed himself deeper into the soil.

No, don't look over here, he pleaded silently as a knee the size of a softball sunk into view. Turn around! Go away!

In a few seconds the boy would peer beneath the shrub and find him. Harry looked around, frantic for an escape route, but the house and thick foliage hemmed him in. His only option was to back out the way he'd come and hope that Dudley didn't pounce on him before he could extract himself from the garden and run.

He scrambled to his hands and knees, doing his best not to disturb the leaves close overhead, and his left hand landed on the sprinkler hose. This brief moment of contact would have been unremarkable if the hose hadn't shifted against his palm. Startled, he snatched his hand away and looked down at the sentient appliance, only to discover that it was something much worse.

Coiled next to the wall was a snake.

He locked up, unable to tear his eyes away. To Harry, who had always been scrawny for his age, the snake seemed monstrously huge. Its dusty olive body was as thick as his arm, and broken only by a yellow collar around the base of its triangular head.

Harry knew it was one thing to get beat up by his cousin, but quite another to be bitten by a snake.

What if it was venomous? His breathing grew shallow as his imagination careened out of control. Would uncle Vernon bother taking him to the hospital? Or would he recline in his armchair and watch Harry expire at his feet on the living room floor?

As Harry sat petrified, the boy on the other side of the hydrangea suffered a moment of vertigo. When it passed he could no longer remember why he was kneeling on the lawn with his nose pressed to the ground. He sat up and scratched his head. When nothing explaining his strange posture came to him he decided not to dwell on it. Lumbering back to his feet he turned away.

"Split up!" Dudley ordered, having recovered his breath. "He's around here somewhere."

The hunt resumed, oblivious to Harry's dilemma as he faced down a pair of open jaws and did his best to look unthreatening. His hunched posture must have rung true, because the snake didn't strike him immediately. As the seconds turned into minutes with no break in their stalemate, he couldn't help but notice how the snake's large round pupils made it look as terrified of him as he was of it.

The snake's head drew back, dragging a pair of dirt brown appendages with it. Harry ogled the out of place limbs. He was pretty sure snakes weren't supposed to have legs, but there they were — jutting out the sides of its mouth like web-toed tusks. He floundered for a moment, but then his mind connected the dots and he sagged against the wall of the house, letting out a huge breath.

The snake couldn't bite him if it tried. Not with a frog stuffed halfway down its throat.

He pressed a hand against his mouth, smothering a hysterical giggle before it could burst from his lips and give away his position. Dudley's gang were still nearby. He could hear them calling to one another as they searched all the usual hiding places around Number Four.

If he was lucky their hunt would carry them to the far end of the block before the snake regained the use of its mouth. Allowing him to escape to the nearby park for the rest of the afternoon without risking life or limb. It would mean abandoning his chores, and through extension his supper — as his aunt wouldn't feed him until they were completed to her satisfaction — but Harry would rather be hungry than bloodied.

Once the boys' voices faded away, Harry counted to twenty then began to ease backwards. Turning around wasn't an option. Even if there were enough space, Dudley had taught him the dangers of exposing his back to a threat long ago. No one would hesitate to kick him while he was down or off his guard. Fighting with honour was for fools and fictional heroes.

Harry had been a fool once upon a time, and he'd paid the price in blood. He knew better now.

"Sorry for interrupting your supper," he whispered, the apology rolling off his tongue. It was habit by now, the only way to blunt the Dursleys' wrath, even if it was rarely effective.

He never expected the snake would understand him.

It twitched, then went rigid, as though struck by lightning. Harry shuffled another step back. He was nearly free of the hydrangea when the snake began to writhe. Its pale belly flashed against the soil as it twisted in loops and threw its head from side to side.

"Umph!" it went.

Harry felt like a radio set to the wrong frequency. There was a faint drone tickling his ears that didn't stop even when he raised his hands and pressed them against the sides of his head. He frowned and lowered his arms. For a moment it sounded like the snake had spoken, but he knew that couldn't be right. Animals couldn't talk, his aunt and uncle were always firm about such things.

Animals couldn't talk, and there was no such thing as magic.

Still, he lingered over the writhing body and watched as the frog was drawn down the snake's throat until there was only one leg free, then only the tip of a webbed foot.

The snake stilled. "You can Speak!" it said in a sibilant voice.

Harry's mind unravelled like a ball of yarn. His thoughts tangled together without coherent beginning or end, knotting into a jumble of whats, hows, and whys that left him reeling. He opened and closed his mouth, but no words made it past his lips.

He plopped down on the ground, paying no attention to the leaves that rustled and batted his head. This is a dream, he told himself. Aunt Petunia will knock on the door and I'll wake up in my cupboard.

It wouldn't be the first time he'd dreamt of doing chores. Sometimes he spent the entire night weeding and dusting his dreamscape only to wake the next morning and do it all over again in reality. It was monotonous work, but Harry had resigned himself to a life of domestic drudgery long ago. At least until he was old enough to leave the Dursleys behind for good.

He pinched his arm hard, but the world didn't dissolve into the dark interior of the cupboard under the stairs. The dirt remained damp against his knees, and the air heavy with the fragrance of flowers and dung; and it dawned on Harry that perhaps he wasn't dreaming after all.

His tongue recovered before his wits. "You can speak!" he exclaimed.

The snake propped its head up on a thick coil. "Of course I can Speak," it said. "All my kind can."

"Do you..." he said. "Well, do you speak to people often?"

"No. I've never met a people who could Speak before."

Harry couldn't refute this claim as he didn't know much about snakes — or people for that matter. This was the first time he'd seen a snake outside of picture books, and his cousin had made sure he couldn't make any friends at school. It wasn't hard, even the kindest of Harry's classmates avoided him after having their heads dunked in a toilet a few times.

If his teachers noticed how he was always chosen last for team sports, or pushed to the fringes in group work, they ignored it. Strange things happened around him, things that defied explanation, and it was easier for them to label him a black sheep and avert their eyes. Sometimes Harry wished they would hate him as his relatives did. At least then he would have an excuse to hate them back. He didn't know what to do with apathy.

The snake uncoiled and slithered up to his hand while he was brooding. Its forked tongue flicked at the blood drying on his wrist, tasting it. It tickled, and Harry let out a small, startled laugh. He eased his hand up, moving slowly so as not to scare the snake, and reached out a finger to run along its back.

"Shh!" hissed a familiar voice. "Did you hear that?"

Harry flinched and whipped his head towards the lawn, his stomach plummeting. He'd forgotten all about the hunt in his shock at meeting a talking snake, but the hunt hadn't forgotten him.

The hydrangea rustled and a small gap opened in the leaves, illuminating the thin stalks spiderwebbing within the bush. Then a shadow moved across the light and Harry saw Piers's dark eye peering in at him. It widened with excitement.

"It's him! He's behind the bush!"

The hunt had found him.

The hydrangea bucked as Dudley threw himself against the branches. Its leaves closed in around Harry's head, battering him and knocking his glasses from his nose as he struggled to stand. He felt the crack of a lens breaking beneath his heel, and before he could try to retrieve them a pudgy hand burst through the leaves and clipped his cheek. After a moment of blind groping it clamped down on his shoulder like a pair of jaws, sharp nails cutting crescent moons into the tender skin of his shoulder. Harry struggled, but his arms were tangled in the branches and he couldn't stop his cousin from dragging him out of the bush.

Piers was on him in an instant, wrestling his arms behind his back and locking them in place with a cruel twist that forced Harry to arch into Dudley's first punch, which connected low on his belly.

The air left his lungs with a whoosh and Harry coughed weakly, feeling sick. A familiar dread coiled inside him, winding his body taut in anticipation of the pain that would follow. He grit his teeth and glowered at the fuzzy peach blob he assumed was his cousin, eliciting laughter from the other boys.

"Ooh, so scary!" Dudley mocked, landing another hit on Harry's stomach. Then he stepped back, giving the others room to move in. "Take him around the side," he ordered.

Harry threw his body back and forth in a desperate bid for freedom, but other hands clamped around his arms and propelled him into the walkway beside the house.

As much as Harry insulted his cousin's intelligence, not even Dudley was stupid enough to beat him up on the front lawn in broad daylight. The windows of Privet Drive were full of eyes spying through gaps between curtains. Housewives like circling vultures, waiting for a moment of weakness — their pecking order built on the illusion of perfection and wealth.

"Let me go!" Harry shouted, though he knew it was futile. Tears gathered in the corners of his eyes, clouding his already blurry vision. He blinked them away furiously. He wouldn't give Dudley the satisfaction of seeing him cry. Not now. Not ever.

Once they were hidden from sight, Dudley kicked him hard on the shin and Harry's leg collapsed. He would have fallen, but Piers hauled him back up, presenting him to Dudley's fists.

"What's the matter Freak?" — a blow connected on Harry's left side — "Not going to scream for us?" Dudley asked. His friends laughed raucously. Gordon, Malcolm, and Dennis were slapping their fists against their palms in anticipation of getting their own turns.

Dudley's fists rained down on him. "Nobody wants you! You're nothing but a waste of space!" A blow to his jaw left Harry seeing stars. "Come on, scream for us you freak! See if anyone comes to help you."

Harry grit his teeth and twisted away from the blows, his hands clenching into fists. He couldn't deny Dudley's words, they were all true. Every. Single. One. Nobody wanted him. Nobody would ever want him. Arguing about it would only get him beaten worse — as punishment for lying.

He had nearly worked one arm free when Piers kneed him in the tailbone, sending a jolt up his spine that stole the strength from his limbs. Piers hauled him back around and tightened his grip until their bodies pressed together and Harry could feel the other boy's warmth sinking through his shirt. It made his skin crawl.

Dudley's next punch sent both Harry and Piers back against the side of the house.

"Ow!" Piers whined, having acted as a cushion between Harry and the wall. "Careful Big D! Don't forget I'm here too."

The other boys roared with laughter and patted Piers on the shoulders. The short reprieve was enough for Harry to gather his bearings and brace himself for the next blow.

It never landed.

The low drone was in his ears once again as a small, sibilant voice cried, "Release the Speaker!"

Piers jerked sideways. "S-s-snake!" he yowled, dropping Harry's arms in favour of scrambling away. Dennis, Malcolm and Gordon followed close on his tail, all four of them bolting towards the safety of the back yard.

Dudley held his ground, and even without his glasses Harry could see him winding up for another punch.

Harry lashed out, channelling his pain and anger into a ringing backhand that caught his cousin across the face. He knew he wasn't strong enough to do any real damage — Dudley was a foot taller and five times his weight. Yet, as his hand connected he felt a spark, like static electricity, pass from him to his cousin.

Dudley yelped and fell back against the ornamental fence with the weight of a wreaking ball. There was a deafening crack as two of the thin whitewashed boards gave way, half dumping him into the neighbours' yard.

Dudley staggered to his feet, eyes wide and hands clutching his fat cheek. Harry couldn't make out his expression, but took a brief moment to revel at getting his cousin back. It ended up being one moment too long. Before he could run away, Dudley bellowed in rage and bodychecked him into the side of the house.

Stars burst across Harry's vision as his head slammed against the wall and the breath left his lungs with a whoosh.

"Dudley?" his aunt called, her voice swimming at the edges of his fading consciousness. "Diddikins?" There was a moment of silence, then she shrieked. "What happened to your face?"

Harry barely felt her bony hand close over his arm.

He couldn't breathe.

He wove like a drunk as she dragged him into the muggy house, his feet slipping on the kitchen tiles. He bounced against a wall, then the door to his cupboard loomed large before his eyes. It flew open and he pitched forward into the dark space beneath the stairs.

He couldn't breathe!

He landed hard on his cot, his head bumping against the shelves on the far wall. The door slammed shut behind him and there was a click as his aunt drew the latch home.

Curling into a ball he threw his head back, gulping like a fish out of water. It felt like an eternity before his chest expanded, sucking in a hot, stuffy breath. The air burned in his lungs, and the veins along the sides of his neck throbbed.

Oblivion tugged at him, beckoning him away from his pain and into its dark embrace. He tried to follow, but his mind was still wired for flight and fought off the encroaching darkness long enough for him to hear raised voices beyond the door.

"It's the freak that's done it!"

"Yeah, he hit Big D right in the face!"

"Come here pumpkin, sit down and I'll get you a cool cloth. When your father sees what that wretched child did—"

"I want ice cream!"

"Of course love, you can have anything you want!"

An emotion rose up in his chest, darker than anger, but it was snuffed out as unconsciousness claimed him.

~End Chapter One~

For everyone who read to the end of the first chapter, thank you! I hope you enjoyed it and that you'll stick around for chapter two, in which Harry makes a friend and learns a secret!

If you enjoyed this first chapter I'd be forever grateful if you left a review with your first impressions, what you liked, what you didn't like, or guesses as to where we're going from here. Each follow and review I receive inspires me to carve out more time from my schedule to keep writing and editing!

Stay magical,
-Theine