Harry: Well, I made a strange dream. I was living with Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon, and they forced me to sleep in their cupboard under the stairs.
Lily: You call this a dream? I'd say it was a nightmare.
Lily: You call this a dream? I'd say it was a nightmare.
Harry Potter and The Mother Who Lived is a Alternate Universe Fic in the Harry Potter universe by Gracques
on FanFiction.Net and Archive of Our Own.
Halloween, 1981. Lord Voldemort goes to Godric's Hollow to kill the only one who could defeat him. Like before, he dispatched James Potter. However, as a "favor" to Severus Snape, he only incapacitates and tortures Lily Potter. Then he turns his wand on Harry Potter. You know the story from there: curse rebounds, found in the rubble, Harry rescued. But now with Lily still very alive despite everything, Harry Potter grows up for 11 years among Muggles with a widowed mom. A chance at a normal life before going off to Hogwarts. Then after 11 years, it was finally time, and while Harry is just excited to learn magic, the presence of Ms. Evans will slowly change this world into one with unexpected changes.
With the series ongoing, spoilers will be off through "book 3" and will be at least 1 book behind as things update.
- Action Girl: Lily decides that for her post boarding school life, she will become an Auror, and so begins training to become just as good a witch as she was before, if not even better.
- Adapted Out:
- Since Sirius wasn't feeling particularly generous to Ron after capturing Peter, Pidwigeon hasn't appeared in the story.
- Also, with the different circumstances regarding Voldemort's return, Bertha Jorkins isn't mentioned at all.
- Adaptational Badass: As Harry is more onto Quirrell chasing to the stone, Quirrell not only captures Harry on entering the final chamber, but ends up fighting a duel with Lily and winning.
- Adaptation Expansion: With the rotating POV employed in the story structure, people from other Houses get much more attention than before.
- Adaptational Explanation: How Fred and George come to have the Marauder's Map and use it gets a little more exploration in this story. Turns out that originally, the Marauders were going to destroy it after they graduated, but James ended up just sneaking it into lost and found as the ultimate prank. And thus how Fred and George got their hands on it.
- Adaptational Early Appearance: With Lily as a POV along with no fixed perspective, we actually begin meeting many people for the first time much earlier than in the novels.
- Thanks to the old familial connections, Remus and Sirius are mentioned right in the first real chapter.
- With Lily going to the Ministry in Harry's first year, Rufus Scrimgeour, Kingsley Shacklebolt and Cornelius Fudge all appear early.
- Cho Chang gets a POV in book 1 during the Quiddich game Harry missed against Ravenclaw.
- Nymphodora Tonks ends up doing Auror training alongside Lily, showing up 4 books early.
- Adaptational Karma: Since Lily was able to vouch for him, Sirius Black only spent a month in Azkaban as opposed to twelve years, allowing him to be an actual godfather for Harry for most of his life.
- Adaptational Upbringing Change: Harry's mother Lily does not die as in canon, and he is raised in a loving single-parent household instead of an abusive home. Harry grows up more well-adjusted, trusting of adults and immersed in the magic world from the start.
- Ambiguously Evil: Snape. While still held as a spy who came to Dumbledore for help, the facts of Lily's survival actually makes his alignment even more murky on how he feels about changing himself. Plus, he still has his prejudice against Harry.
- Ascended Extra: Thanks to the different writing format, several characters from the Harry Potter Universe have greater prominence compared to the books.
- Susan Bones, despite not getting a POV chapter until year 4, is much more prominent at school. As not only a Hufflepuff for Hannah and Cedric to bounce off of, but connected to the ministry and their inner working trying to get things done around Hogwarts. She even has a noticeable character arc playing out alongside everyone else's.
- Hannah Abbott. She does get POV chapters, and she has a Coming of Age Story spread out among many chapters. In fact, she's the one responsible for revealing Lupin is a Werewolf.
- Parvati Patil is elevated thanks to several POV chapters, and is an important stepping stone for Harry's emotional development due to dating for a month.
- Cedric Diggory, being a POV character gets several sympathetic chapters long before his prominence in book 4.
- With all Lily's work now coming underneath her direction, Amelia Bones gets more focus as a professional but highly moral Ministry leader.
- Big Damn Heroes: Lily has a dramatic one near the end of Harry's 1st Year when she comes in to duel Quirrell and save Harry.
- Call-Back: Seeing Cedric's POV in the 3rd task, we find out that he ran into a few of the philosopher's stone guardians in the maze. He fights off the Devil's Snare with a Lumos Maxima, and has to resist thinking he's already won when he find The Mirror of Erised.
- Conflicting Loyalties: Every character has it to some degree, but Rosa Bones has it to a unique degree. As she technically works for a foreign, unrecognized ministry, she has loyalty to her home nation, to the ideals of the group she works for, to the nation she moved to, and to her family. And as things heat up with Voldemort's return, balancing all those parts becomes ever more difficult.
- A Day in the Limelight: Rosa I, which gives a totally different perspective from normal. As she's an international liason for the wizarding world version of Taiwan (in Quebec), and has a unique perspective that differs from others with being open to moving her family around.
- Death by Adaptation:
- Since they weren't allowed to cheat with the Time Turner in this version of events, Buckbeak is actually executed.
- Winky is murdered at the Quidditch World Cup.
- A Death in the Limelight: Though he'd been given a little extra prominence earlier in this story, Cedric Diggory still gets this in his 7th POV chapter. As it gets into his annoyances, hopes, desires and honor right before Barty Crouch Jr. kills him in the graveyard.
- Demoted to Extra:
- As Lily is Harry's stable connection to family, the Dursleys are reduced to the odd mention, though Petunia does appear for a guest appearance in Lily V.
- Without the initial conflict with "Scabbers", Crookshanks has much fewer mentions in the story, with no plot relevance for the most part.
- Dies Differently in Adaptation:
- Peter Pettigrew gets Avada Kedavra'd by Snape in the 3rd year, trying to get Harry's blood.
- Cedric is murdered by Barty Crouch Jr. in this timeline.
- Early-Bird Cameo: The Trial of Peter Pettigrew gets three of these.
- Barty Crouch appears a whole book early presiding over the proceedings.
- Dolores Umbridge gets a mention in the trial, and briefly greets Lily in book 4.
- As does Karkaroff who testifies for the court.
- Has a Type: Harry still pursues a redheaded girl in this fic. Though this time he's dating Susan Bones, at least as of the end of the fourth book.
- Hufflepuff House: Ironically, the eponymous house is an aversion in this fic, as they have at least three major POV characters. It's the Slytherins who fulfill this niche in the fic, as their rivalry with the Gryffindors is downplayed due to the spread POV structure and they're the only house without a POV character.
- I Just Want to Be Normal: Well, "normal" in a relative sense. Lily has no fun in being "the mother who lived", and overall just wants to be seen as an ordinary witch doing normal work and not worry so much about being a culturally important to the wizarding world. She wants this for herself and for Harry.
- In Spite of a Nail: The author talked about this in the comments. That despite building on an adjusted foundation, there's something they call "canon entropy" where the bigger picture isn't going to change as much despite Lily's presence. For example...
- Lily being around doesn't stop Voldemort teaming up with Quirrell to go after the Philosopher's Stone.
- Despite the methods around the mystery changing, the Chamber of Secrets is still opened in Harry's 2nd year.
- Hermione still overcommits herself to classes in 3rd year, and uses a time turner to make up for it.
- There's still a Death Eater attack after the Quidditch World Cup. And the Dark Mark is still cast.
- The Triwizard Tournament largely goes the same, with the only significant change being the identity of Harry's "precious".
- Barty Crouch Jr. still is posing as Mad Eye Moody in order to revive Voldemort in body.
- Cedric Diggory is still the first heroic character to die.
- Fudge still goes into denial with Voldemort's return.
- Percy chooses to remain loyal to the Ministry over his family as in canon.
- Harry still gets tried by the Ministry for using a Patronus Charm in a Muggle area.
- Infodump: While done to explain his own survival, Voldemort giving this to his loyal Death Eaters upon his resurrection is a bit much in recapping everything from his death to his resurrection from his perspective.
- Karma Houdini: Gilderoy Lockhart flees from Hogwarts rather getting obliviated, thus having no comeuppance for being a terrible teacher and a coward.
- The Lost Lenore: James becomes this to Lily. Even after 13 years of him being dead, with no true resolution against Voldemort, Lily still grieves for his death.
- Love Dodecahedron: Rather than Harry's more limited perspective, seeing inside several students' heads creates all kinds of webs of attraction, friendship, crushing and desire. So much so that there's a joke from Parvati and Hannah going into book 3 of trying to match up people in their year to poke fun at how things will only get more complicated.
- Malicious Slander: Rita Skeeter is at it again. Though with the material on hand, she ends up misrepresenting Harry's view of his father vs the tight bond he has with his mother.
- Original Character: Miranda Savage is Lily's first Auror partner. While not directly named in the books, the author based it on an auror Kingsley was talking to at one point.
- Out of Focus: As Sirius Black is no longer The Prisoner of Azkaban, he actually has much less to do in the overall story so far aside from the odd bits of advice to Harry during his years when Lily isn't available.
- Perspective Flip: There are many points of view in this fic, from Lily to the golden trio to Hufflepuffs to Cho.
- Point of Divergence: Lily is the big point of divergence, and her presence in Harry's life slowly begins to chip away an alter what goes on year by year.
- Politeness Judo: Lily brings up the Malfoys' estranged niece as another relative who also made Auror, as a way to force them to grit and smile during the Quidditch World Cup. Cutting their ego to acknowledge the part of the Black family they tried to disown.
- Resigned in Disgrace: Barty Crouch had no illusions that the wizarding world finding out his son is alive and revived Lord Voldemort would be the end of his career, but still spent the last few hours of his career trying to persuade Fudge to stand up and fight this return. Even crashing the head of departments meeting to insist that Voldemort had returned. Fudge in return sacks him, and forces him to resign so as not to make the optics look as bad.
- Revealing Cover Up: When Winky was killed, Barty Crouch Sr. called for a minor investigation from the Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures, with hints that he encouraged the investigation to conclude it as an accident, as well as brushing off a request from Amelia Bones for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement to investigate. This immediately set off her suspicions, as a man like Barty Crouch, so obsessed with reputation, would never let his prized house elf die without a greater investigation. And thus, Lily was put on the trail of connecting her current case with this obvious cover up.
- Shout-Out:
- Harry calls the bruised twins smurfs. Something which brings great amusement to all the muggle-born wizards and witches.
- Marvel Comics and DC Comics are both favorites of Harry's thanks to growing up in the muggle world.
- All the muggles have a familiarity with Darth Vader.
- The author is actually a big fan of the Assassin's Creed games, and so in examining wizarding history, they'll occasionally throw in references to the games.
- For example, Savonarola was a rogue wizard, who was killed as a mercy.
- And the Frye Twins were also a wizard pair.
- Cassandra is a consultant for information at the Ministry.
- The author also likes to throw some pop songs into the mix of events. Like Let it Go.
- And with it being the mid 90's, there's also little nods to things going on in the muggle world at the time. Such as Apollo 13.
- Spared by the Adaptation:
- Bertha Jorkins isn't tortured to death for information by Voldemort in this timeline. In fact, Bertha doesn't make an appearance in person.
- Barty Crouch, having lost track of his son and not being imprisoned due to having no other Death Eaters on hand, makes it all the way through book 4 without dying.
- The Stations of the Canon: As this is a retelling of the Harry Potter series, not everything is going to change just because there's one extra person present. That being said, because there's some twisting of the fine details, things are gradually changing because Lily's influence is moving pieces around.
- Unknown Rival: Ginny is essentially the unknown romantic rival for all the people around Harry romantically. Always a bit jealous and angry at being left out of consideration, even if she doesn't act overtly on her jealousy usually.
- Wham Episode: Ron V through Lily XVI. The summer of year 3 begins not with some ordinary time, but something more dramatic. With Sirius as a private citizen, Peter Pettigrew is recognized, captured, and put on trial for his crimes, drastically changing his trajectory and bringing Harry into contact with the ministry more seriously. This also connects him to Susan Bones in a more serious way due to their shared pain due to the Death Eaters, changing her character arc too.
- Wham Line:
- For Hannah Abbott VIII, Susan reveals why she knows Neville's discomfort with the Cruciatus curse.
- A single line in Susan I changes Harry's romantic dynamics post yule ball. When asking for a favor, Susan asks, "Would you kiss me?"
- Ron XVI: The last spoken line of the chapter confirms everything that had been building for the previous 5 chapters: Susan and I are together.
- Hermione XIII: When Ron and Harry finish up their detention with Snape, this comes up from Ron when discussing his afternoon plans. "You're not the only one who can get a date in Hogsmeade."
- And then, later that evening, someone reveals who Ron's date was: "Hannah Abbott!"
