Prologue.

Dorea Black has lived a very interesting life, she fell for a Gryffindor even when the world told her she was a fool for doing so. But Charlus had been something of a dish and she couldn't resist keeping him to herself after the taste of him she should never have been given. He was everything she had been taught not to want and she found him all the more delicious for it. So she had married him and they had had a very happy life and had a wonderful son. He was the apple of my eye, and eventually he brought us two more stray boys to love, and they two became like sons to us.

But then as all fairy tales really end, tragedy struck. Charlus had been looking into the disappearance of Delilah Horton, a young witch who worked in the department of mysteries and aurors arrived on my doorstep. Charlus was dead, and with him gone my whole life shattered. For forty-three years that man had been the center of my world and in a moment he was taken from me. My brave foolhardy Gryffindor had sacrificed himself to save Delilah Horton and her children from death-eaters. I never felt true hate until that moment, felt the all-consuming rage that my house is renowned for and all I wanted was a justice I knew would never come.

The funeral passed in a daze, day to day life had become an almost unbearable tedium and if it was not for my boys I would not have chosen to live without him. And so I did something I regret unto this very day, I joined the Order of the Phoenix and became Albus Dumbledore's spy amongst my old circles, disguised of course. I found my way into the darkest of death-eater revels and it took all my willpower not to run and the things that I witnessed them do to those poor muggles. Then in my grief, I agreed to something I should never have done.

It was meant to be simple, a date during which I probe his mind for anything that would have helped with the fight against Voldemort. I should have known better, should have known his mind would be a trap, and it would take so much more that I should have given. But the order was desperate and my son and his young bride had enlisted themselves in a battle I wish they had stayed away from. He was young enough to be my son and yet he made me feel alive when I had felt dead inside for so long. I should not have given into his charms, his quick wit and insatiable thirst for knowledge.

He was the kind of man my family wished I would have married, a warning sign for me not to go there and yet, even now I find myself unable to fully regret my actions. As he told me about his fears about his wife, his place in the new world his master wanted to build I saw something in him that I wanted for myself, and I took it. I had refused the glamours and potions to make me into someone else for this night, tonight I was myself, just forty years younger. The body I had had before childbirth and time had ravaged away some of my suppleness and beauty, I was twenty again with all the rushing hormones that came with it.

He smelled like sandalwood and citrus and something undeniably manly that had me aching to sink my teeth into him every time he got closer than was proper. My heart raced with every utterance of the word darling and the way his accent would roll those Rs of his. When his lips found mine, instead of resisting as I knew I should have, I pulled him closer. When his hands wandered under the hem of my skirt, instead of pulling away I guided his fingers where I ached for him to touch. It wasn't long before we found a secluded room and he was inside me. The walls of the rather dreary manner seemed to echo with the cries of our lust and he attempted to pound our way through them.

It was a constant battle for dominance and control until at dawn finally spent he fell to slumber on the rug beneath me, his chest rising and falling in utter peace. I searched his mind for what the order needed and as the cold light of day washed over my skin, I left him with a kiss and left that manor for good. I never saw him again and the information I got from his mind saved many lives. He left me with something I did not expect. Something I knew should he ever find out, he would be ceaseless in his quest to possess and offer up to his deranged dark-lord.

And so after my son's wedding, I did something that I have regretted every day since then, I gave my daughter up and hid her away in the muggle world. The couple I found lived in Oxford and were some kind of teeth healers. They had long struggled to have a child and so I altered their memories so they would believe that she was their own. It broke my heart to leave her, to hide her in such a way, but the order needed something of me that would be too dangerous for her to ever survive the undertaking of.

On September 28th, 1980 in the early hours of the morning, Dorea Potter, mother To James Charlus Potter and adopted sons Sirius Orion Black and Remus Lyall Lupin was reported to all but Albus Dumbledore to have died suddenly from a rather aggressive form of Dragonpox. Her illness was said to have been a fatal exposure during her visit to the St Mungos Hospital for magical Maladies where she had just donated a significant amount to the long term spell damage ward.

Her sons were never informed of the ruse, for Dorea knew they would never have let her go otherwise. Although it hurt her to break their hearts in such a manner she acted in what she felt had their best interests at heart. She made her way to the heart of her childhood home, down to the rooms that no one other than her grandfather had dared enter in the last three centuries and paid the price of blood for her entry. He hand had throbbed with a heavy pulse as her magic was recognized by the room.

The surroundings were humble by pureblood standards, made for practicality and not the opulence the rest of the Black properties. The walls were painted black with silver runes that covered almost every surface. The spells in runic were designed to protect the Black bloodline but they also served a darker purpose. From this room, blood vendettas could be sworn and entire lines eradicated with mere words. It was this kind of magic that her family was famous for, they had even named this magic after themselves, not just dark magic, but black magic.

She moved into the room, and with a whisper lit a candle in all four corners and a firepit in the center of the room. It was here that she would do what needed to be done to save her family should things go very badly wrong. She would entomb herself within these walls, encased in the familial magic that had birthed her and let go of her ties to the mortal world. She would not be woken until Albus called for her or he dies and leaves the order without a leader.

It was not necessary but vanity is a terrible thing, and so Dorea had permanently de-aged herself until she appeared to be around forty years old, older than when she had seduced her death-eater lover but younger that her true age but nearly thirty years. Her dark hair and storm gray eyes shone back at her within the ancient looking glass and Dorea wondered when she would be brought back from this entombment. She added the contents of the vial that Dumbledore had passed her and set to add them to the potion of living death that she had brewed herself. She did not know what Albus had handed her, only that the smell was vile and it contained the spell that would wake her when required.

As the potion simmered she looked upon the few items that she had brought with her. Her son's wedding photo of him and his dear Lily, dancing and laughing made her smile and her heart ache. He was a terrible dancer but the happiness shone from him like a beacon of light one couldn't help but want to bask in. Her Charlus was the same, such a dear man that even after decades together one look from him could make her heart race.

She had some of her favorite pieces of the poetry her little Remus would write for her, something new for every special occasion. Sush heartbreaking prose she knew one lucky woman would have the joy of turning such somber tones into joyful rhymes. Of her naughtiest son Sirius she had his leather jacket, adorned with a paw print on the left lapel that he insisted his ma keep safe for him whilst he saved the world by day in the auror office. She looked them dearly and it made her heart ache to leave them so.

Lastly, she had a small pair of the palest pink booties and a blanket that still held her daughter's unique baby scent. Inhaling she felt tears prick her eyes and she swallowed back the emotion she knew she could not give into. She was a Slytherin and a Black, she had better control than this. She took a steadying breath and reached for the now steaming potion and without hesitation cast a cloaking spell and drank the mixture in one. She was briefly reminded of Bertie Botts vomit flavor bean in the taste before she felt the poison quickly take effect. She slid down the wall behind her and struggled to take one last glimpse at the reminders of her children before darkness took her.

In his office in Hogwarts Albus Dumbledore felt the tie of magic latch around his very magical core to let him know that Dorea had made the sacrifice that she had asked of him. He was more disturbed however by the newest name on the list of magical children that would one day be a student at this school as it flittered between three names. Baby Girl Lestrange daughter to Rodolphus Lestrange one moment, then Cassiopeia Charlotte Black and finally upon Hermione Jean Granger. He did not know what had happened to cause such a strange confusion upon the list but he knew for certain that this child would be one to watch when the time came.