Princeps by Lomonaaeren

Princeps

Summary:

Harry has worked for years as an Unspeakable to identify the best point where he might go back in time to change the impact of Voldemort's war. Now he knows: he will have to return to his parents' Hogwarts years and encourage the Slytherins to stand on their own instead of following a leader. He knows how to assume the post of Defense professor and how to reach the Slytherins. And from there, well, surely nothing can go too wrong.

Notes:

This is one of "From Samhain to the Solstice" fics for this year. The title comes from a Latin word for the leader of the Senate, and also "first, foremost," sometimes considered as "first among equals." There will be three parts.

Chapter 1

Harry walks slowly to the middle of the ritual chamber. He's moving slowly from sheer shock. All of this preparation and time and struggle, and now the ritual is done. The circle awaits him on the floor.

Well, not a circle. A pentagram. And instead of the bowls of earth and water, the contained spells for water and fire, he has bowls of cobalt and iron instead, a diamond lying alone in the bottom of a silver basin and an emerald pried from a piece of Black jewelry on a small pedestal. Harry himself will stand at the fifth point of the pentagram.

It's strange, but it's what his research uncovered as the best way to travel in time.

Harry lets his grey robe drape around himself as he folds his arms. He'll appear in the middle of the past Department of Mysteries if all goes well, and he'll need the other Unspeakables then and there to know he's an Unspeakable. He shudders a little at the thought of what they might do otherwise.

He bows his head. The research was what took so long. The actual ritual itself is simple, but it had to be constructed in a certain way to meet the requirements of time, space, ingredients, and incantation.

"Vade retro."

The world around him blurs. Something like a great pendulum made of white light swings back and forth in front of him. Harry feels the taste of iron in his mouth, and he thinks he sees the diamond and the emerald slam violently into each other before his sight becomes entirely unreliable. He doesn't see what happens with the cobalt.

He's too occupied with the sensation of his body being played like a harpstring.

*

When he opens his eyes, he's in the middle of the stone ritual chamber, but surrounded by other Unspeakables. All of them have their hoods back, and he notes that he doesn't know any of their faces. Harry waits, and then a tall woman with long blonde hair in three braids steps forwards and bows her head to him.

"It is July 31st of the year 1975, Unspeakable. We assume that you have achieved what you wished from your time travel?"

Harry conceals a thin smile. Yes, they would assume that, since otherwise, his body would probably be a three-dimensional portrait of organs along corridors of time that no one ever treads.

"Yes, Unspeakable." Harry nods to her and reaches up to touch his hair. It's straight and dark, the way the ritual also mandated and that he searched for a way to do. He doesn't want to look too much like a Potter. He reaches up and traces his fingers over his chin and cheeks, and they're also reshaped. He relaxes.

"Your eyes, Unspeakable?"

"No," Harry says, shaking his head. He wasn't able to bring himself to give up that link to his mum, and he couldn't find an Arithmantic equation that would tell him how to do it anyway, but it doesn't matter. Few people will be looking for a link between a Muggleborn fifth-year, as Lily Evans will be right now, and the new Hogwarts Defense Against the Dark Arts professor.