Chapter 1

Harriet Potter was once loved by her parents. A father who always held her close and growled like a proud lion at any male who came close to her. He was possessive of his little girl and vowed no man would ever be good for her. A mother who sung a sweet lullaby as she slept, making sure she had pleasant dreams and happy smiles. But from an early start she learned that the world beyond the comfort from her parents was an ugly place.

The once love, care, and protection she had was ripped away in the dead of night and a light as bright as her emerald green eyes. She now lived in a cupboard so small and dark, under the stairs of three gruff monsters. The big gruff, was a walrus of width and girth. His purple face overshadowed by a bushy moustache. The medium gruff was pencil thin and sickly look. Her horse face pinched at the mouth that forever frowned and sneered at her. The baby gruff was a little piglet, who was quickly growing in size to match that of his father's.

Her name, Harriet Jamie Potter, once given and said with love; was replaced and forgotten with Freak, Girl, Tramp, Thief, That child, and Idiot.

The three were vile and cruel. Her earliest memory with them was of the horse woman dragging her tiny body like a rag doll out of the cupboard and onto a step stool seated in front of a sizzling pan of golden-brown bacon. At the age of three she was given her purpose in the household, a slave to cater to their every needs. At the of three she learnt what happens when she did something wrong or un-Dursley. A frying pan swung at the back of her head, her hands burning as she tries to pull away from the walrus' hold as he held her hand in place. His purple face spitting, shouting, and screaming in her scared and petrified face; while in the background the little piglet squealed and laughed in delight at her tears.

All because she accidently burnt a tiny corner of bacon.

As the years went by her purpose in the household only expanded, while the horse's workload decreased. By the time she was five, she was doing the cooking, cleaning, washing, gardening, ironing and any other chore the gruffs demanded. She tried, she really tried. Hoping beyond hope, that if she tried hard enough to make them happy, they would want her. Sadly, nothing she ever did was good enough, they deliberately sabotage her workload, making them too long to the point there was no time to complete them all, or creating a larger mess and blaming it all on her. Anything to give them a reason to punish her.

And their punishments were never light. Bunches, burns, whip lashes, drowning, locked in the cupboard, locked out in the snow, rain, thunder, hail, or hurricane; salt pored over fresh scars, and no food for weeks on end. Her once white skin was blemished by the scars the gruffs gave her. She never went to school; the gruffs did not want her to learn anything. She could not read, write, or count. The neighbours knew she was in the house but never question why she did not go to school; for they believed the poisonous lies of the gruffs. How she was a no-good troublemaker, a thief and liar. In her life of hell, she had no one to turn to, no one to ask for help.

A then letters came for her. Always the same, green ink on old ivory parchment, addressed to Miss H. J. Potter, the Cupboard Under the Stairs. She first thought it was a prank by the piglet and his gang; but even they were not bright enough to write anything so illogical. She may have never gone to school, but she was still brighter than the piglet was. When the horse and walrus saw the letters and got a hold of them, she had never seen the shade of purple the walrus had turned before or how tightened the pursed lips of the horse's lips become invisible as she sucked her lip in.

They were mad, more so than ever before. She did not have time to run before the walrus got a hold of her. By the time she came to her skin was black, blue, and purple. She was in her cupboard and like always it was locked. Days passed; what day it was she did not fully know. The only times she was allowed out were to have a single trip to the bathroom with a ten-minute limit. It was never enough time but after having a wee and washing her hands she would cup what little water she got from the faucet and guzzle it down.

The house was silent when a giant came knocking. BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! The walrus shouted from up the stairs and thundered down them. Glass shattered as the front door came crashing down. Harriet listened as what sounded like a giant entered the house. The horse cried in fright when he spoke.

"I'm here for Harry Potter."

He was looking for her. Harriet desperately wanted to call out 'I'm here!' but knew that by doing so will only direct the walrus' anger onto her. Though when the giant man leaves the walrus will still lash out at her for what happened, cause she is an unnatural, un-Dursley freak.

"Ah Harry. There you are. My you've gotten big!"

What? No, I am in the cupboard. It is the piglet on the stairs.

"I-I am not Harriet."

"Harriet? No Harry. Harry. Little baby Harry. I brought him here ten years ago as Dumbledore instructed. Good man, Dumbledore is."

"YOU BROUGHT THE FREAK TO US! THAT OLD CROCKPOT…!" The walrus' patience finally snapped.

"DO NOT DARE INSULT THE GREAT ALBUS DUMBLEDORE IN FRONT OF ME, MUGGLE!" The giant shouted back, taking a threatening step forward.

"There is no Harry Potter here. Only the girl, Harriet." The horse interrupted.

"Nonsense." The giant scoff. "James and Lily had a son named Harry."

James… Lily… Was that what her parents called? The horse and walrus had never mentioned them by name before. Like her they replaced their names with Drunken bastard, Whore and Slut, No goods and Nobody's.

"No, they did not. I know because as lily's … sister," she admitted painfully. "She sent me a letter and photo of the child's birth. A little baby girl called Harriet Jamie Potter."

"A girl? Harriet Jamie Potter?" The giant whispered.

The cupboard door opened. The stick hand of the horse clawing inside and hocking Harriet's elbow scooping her out. Emerald eyes peered up at the giant. Black beady eyes staring right back at her through a thick bush of brown-haired curls and beard.

"Oh, dear. Dumbledore is not going to like this. No, he is not. He does not want a girl. He expects a boy." He muttered quickly trying to think what to do.

Harriet's heart sank at the works 'does not want'. Was she so worthless even to a person she has never met before? That they would be disappoint at having Harriet, a girl, and not Harry, the boy. Watching the giant as he scribbled something down on a piece of ivory parchment and tying it to the leg of a raggedy looking owl before looking back at her.

"Well Harriet. I have written to Dumbledore of the situation. Tomorrow I'll take you to get your supplies. I am Hagrid, keeper of the keys."

"Supplies? What for?"

"What for? Why Hogwarts of course. You know about Hogwarts, don't you?" Hagrid frowned as the girl shock her head no

That night, on her eleventh birthday, Harriet learnt of the truth. She was a witch and the only survivor of the killing curse. Her parents were not drunks or whores, they were heroes, and they died protecting her. Yet she did not understand, if she was so famous for surviving and 'defeating' Voldemort, why was she with the Dursley's? why was left to grow outside of the community she was born into?

Hagrid had taken her to Diagon alley. He showed her to the bank where her parents left her with more than enough money to last her a lifetime and more some. She was taken around to collect her books, robes, potion ingredients, cauldron, trunks, owl, and wand. As Hagrid wished her luck on the train home to Surry; Harriet realised that Hagrid forgot to tell her how to get to the platform, she also realised that he never questioned why. Why was she in the cupboard? Why hadn't she appeared to be bathed in days? Why did her too large clothes hung on her like rags? Why was her skin littered with black and blue bruises? Why was her stomach constantly growling in pain and hunger? Did he not see? Did he not care that she was mistreated? She glanced around at the people sitting on the train with her didn't anyone care.

A month later Harriet found herself back at King's Cross Station looking for the platform 9 3/4 . She quietly followed a large red family as they disappeared through the wall between 9 and 10. The train puffed steam and smoke as hundreds and hundreds of children lumbered on with their trunks. Harriet hoped she would make some friends at Hogwarts.

But it was wishful thinking. For the whole journey no one would sit with her. One of the red-haired children she saw before barged in yelling he was looking for Harry Potter. She did not even get a chance to correct him before he stormed out again. A bushy haired girl came in next asking about a toad but then criticized her appearance and left with her nose in the air.

Everything became worse at the house sorting. The deputy headmistress called out 'Harry Potter' and snapped at her when she came forward. So she waited when all the other children were sorted and when they asked for her name, 'I am Harriet Potter' everyone called her a liar. The boy-who-live was not a girl. She was then forcefully dragged in a side room and stripped down. Harriet cried in mortification as they looked over her scared FEMALE body. They cast spells to determine her gender and after thirty minutes of testing they grudgingly accepted she was a Potter; she was Harriet Potter and not Harry Potter as they believed.

She was then left to dress herself and went back out to be sorted. Under the tattered hat, Harriet gazed at all the faces watching her. Confusion, outrage, betrayal, uninterested and disappointed. Finally the hat called Gryffindor, but Harriet felt that was not right. She was not brave or reckless. She was more Hufflepuff, kind, loyal and hardworking; that sounded nicer to her.

"You're supposed to be a boy!" Ron snapped at her. Hermione nodding beside him with frowns on their faces. Harriet flinched and curled into herself, not daring to touch the food spread out before her. Already she knew Hogwarts was going to horrible, and she was right. No one wanted to be her friends. Her first week there she was kicked out of Hogwarts for being a fake. Her robes were destroyed, her books torn up, her homework stolen, they would not let her eat anything, and was attacked constantly by students. None of the teachers tried to help her and even turned a blind eye when Ronald Weasley attacked her in the middle of the great hall. The only honest thing she ever heard an adult say was "Your house is like your family" and that was what Gryffindor was, they were like the Dursley's.

The only ones who tried to help her were the Weasley twins, Neville, and Cedric Diggory. They tried to keep her safe, make sure she got something to eat and help find her a safe place to sleep at night. She got ridiculed and detentions for not doing the work right or read ahead, no one cared she did not know how to read or write. She wanted her torment to end. Yet she knew that if she left, the Dursley's would be no different. But as the year ended and students were preparing to return home for the summer Harriet knew she had to ask, hoping they would help save her. But they did not. they said she deserved every slap, every punch, every verbal attack thrown at her. And she knew that she would not return the following year, that the walrus would kill her long before then.

Harriet stared ghostly out of the window as the scenery flew past, getting closer and closer back to her living hell. Her eyes were dull and she was but an empty shell. As the train pulled up, Harriet numbly tugged onto her trunk and dragged it behind her. She ignored all the happy families around her. Ignored the longing look of her first crush, Cedric Diggory. Ignored the family of red heads watching her in sadness (the twins), indifference (Percy), disappointment, anger, obsession and greed (Ron, his sister and mother). Ignored the bushy haired encyclopaedia bossily shouting at her as they walked through the arch way into the muggle world. Ignored the smack the bushy haired encyclopaedia kept swinging at her head. She ignored it all as she stopped in front of the walrus sneering at her.

If she were to die this summer. Which was a possibility with the walrus around. No one would care. The world, both muggle and wizard, is a horrible place. The adults are the real monsters, not the dragons, bogyman, vampires or werewolves, only adults. Cleaning the horse's best china plates Harriet watched hypnotically as it slowly slipped through her fingers and gravity pulling it downwards.

SMASH!

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE NOW FREAK!?"

Harriet watched in defeat as the walrus stormed in. His face twisted in a murderous rage. His rose high above her head and smashed it down into her skull. Repeatedly. Hit after hit, before getting off her crumpled and broken body. Grabbing a carving knife, he stabbed and cut every inch of body until she was lying in a pool of blood. As she watched the blood cover blade glint over her heart, Harriet realised she was going to die, and closed her eyes ready for death's embrace.

Suddenly she felt, for the first time in years, warm and safe. Opening her eyes Harriet was surprised to see a pair of gold ones staring right back at her. She gasped as she realised she was resting on the lap of a beautiful golden haired woman.

"Hello my child. I am Mother."

"Mother?"

"Mother Magic, dear."

"Am I dead?"

"No. I pulled you away before he could kill you. Oh, my sweet child. You do not deserve this life thrust upon you. If you like I can send you somewhere else where you'll be loved and have the family you've always wished for."

Harriet cried. She could leave? She could have the family she has always craved for.

"What about my parents belongings? I only just learnt and got them and I don't want to lose them."

"Hush child. I have already sorted everything." Waving her hand her trunk appeared. "Everything they've left for you in stored in there. No one will be able to take your money, heirlooms or books from you. I also retrieve items that were stolen and placed them inside. Your wand, stone, and clock as well as a children's book I think you'll like."

Harriet blinked and looked up at the enchanting woman. "Where are you sending me?"

"A parallel world, like yours but does not possess wizards or witches. I will drop you in a place where you will be found and saved." She smiled and planted a small kiss onto her forehead.

Harriet groaned there was a beep, beep going off in the background. Slowly her eyes opened to a hospital room, a large intimidating man was standing by the window.

"Your awake." He had dark skin and a kind smile. "My name is Nick Fury. What is yours?"