Timeline:

1960: The Marauders are born.

1971-77: Marauders go to Hogwarts

1978: Lily and James are married.

July 31st, 1980: Harry is born.

September 30th, 1981: Arianrhod is captured.

October 1st, 1981: Remus discovers Ari's 'body' on his doorstep.

October 10th, 1981: Mel is captured.

October 17th, 1981: The Potter's appoint a Secret Keeper; Sirius.

October 24th, 1981: The Potters switch Secret Keepers.

October 31st, 1981: The Potters are attacked.

November 1st, 1981: Sirius attacks Peter and is sent to Azkaban without a trial.

November 3rd, 1981: Harry is sent to the Dursleys'.

June 28th, 1982: Nimi is born.

1991: Harry begins his first year at Hogwarts.

Summer of 1996: Harry is sent to Azkaban.

July 8th, 1997 : The Battle of Hogwarts, aka the Final Battle; Harry falls into some sort of gold light and disappears.

A/N: Here it is, the sequel to Hero, Villain, Saviour, Conqueror! To new readers, I'd read that first… otherwise this will make about more sense. I won't give a description of the first, as that would take up too much time and I am horrible at writing consice summaries about something that's already happened, if that made any sense. This is a darker installment, for the people who've read the first. I would say much darker, but it's not entirely dark… not really…

Prologue: Lullabye

In a dark corner of a thick forest, a man groaned as he came to. He slowly sat up, looked around, moaned again, and scooted back against a tree, pinching the bridge of his nose with his left hand. Screwing up his face in concentration, he squeezed his eyes tightly as though thinking very, very hard. After a moment he recoiled with shock, pain and horror, along with a small cry.

"I can't reach her," he murmured in a hoarse voice. "Does that mean she's…" The man squeezed his eyes once more, and a single tear leaked out. "Oh no…" He bit his lip and took a moment to compose himself before standing with a small groan, stretching his back. "I ache all over…" he muttered, stretching again.

Pulling a gold circlet off his head and tucking it into his pocket, he shook his head and screwed up his face once more, but in a mildly different way; this time, there was a barely noticeable 'pop' as his characteristics rearranged themselves. The slightly crooked nose was replaced with a straight one, his skin darkened a few shades, his eyes reshaped themselves slightly and turned a bright blue from a startling emerald green, and his messy black hair was gone, curly brown in its place. A silver rune on his palm faded to leave only a slight glow.

He had grown a few inches, from a rather tall height of 5'11" to an imposing height of 6'3", and his slim form had filled out to a more average one. His ears stuck out a bit more from his head, and his neck had shortened somewhat to a more average length than the elegant long neck he had had before. With a satisfied lopsided smirk that was still recognizedly his, the man set off throuh the woods to try and find some sort of shelter, to get his bearings, pulling a cold mask over his face… but not even that could quite hide the sorrow and loss in his eyes.

Harry James Potter set off through the depths of the black woods and walked towards a castle, absentmindedly humming a lullabye.

Once upon a december…