In the Shadows

AN-Yes, I know that I have yet to finish Mask, or even put up a new chapter, but I am currently at an impasse with that particular story, so I decided that it was time to work on another one. This particular fic was inspired by the Inuyasha/Harry Potter challenge on AFF, http://inu.adult-fanfiction.org/story.php?no=600092135 but it doesn’t follow all the rules and specifications put out by said author. Still, credit for the idea does go to her. I hope that someone can take up the challenge and do it the justice that I couldn’t.

This is SLASH! Meaning that there will be a male/male pairing; in fact there will be more than one. This also is not a story that is nice to the character of Kagome, so if you don’t like slight character bashing, please find another fic instead of flaming me. Thank you and please Read and Review!

Disclaimer- I own nothing in this story. The characters of Inuyasha and Harry Potter belong to their respective owners….which sadly are not me. So, no suing me…not that you would get much. Not even a laptop that works correctly.

Chapter One- Present on the Stoop

It was harder than he thought it was going to be. As he looked down at the tiny baby in his arms, he felt his heart breaking into more pieces than the Shikon no Tama when Kagome shot it.

But he knew that he couldn’t turn back. It would mean killing the one thing in his life that he knew was right, and as much as he wanted to keep him close, it was just not possible.

That didn’t mean it didn’t hurt like hell.

Inuyasha crept towards the house he had long ago staked out, holding the baby closer to his chest to protect him from the cold winter chill that spread through the air. At least, that’s what he told himself, along wit hthe mantra “It would all be over with soon” It would all be over in a few moments, and he could go back to a miserable existence where he had no one he loved.

Was it his fault that he wanted any other choice other than the only one available?

The baby in his arm made a strange cooing sound, and Inuyasha looked down, smiling slightly. He brought a finger up and tickled the baby under the chin, making the infant grin and laugh. His golden eyes, so like his father’s, lit up with glee and he reached a pudgy little hand out to grab his Papa’s, bringing it into his mouth and sucking on it. Inuyasha winced as he felt the baby’s tiny fangs sink into his skin, and smiled. Yes, his little boy was going to be a fine warrior when he grew up.

That thought, supposed to have been a happy one, caused the half-demon to frown and his ears to drop. He would never get to see his son grow up, he would not be there for first steps, first words, first anything’s.

He had to keep in his mind that this was what was best for Takehiko.

That was all that mattered.

Cooing to the baby, who still had his Papa’s finger stuck firmly in his mouth, Inuyasha placed him down on the stoop outside the house and wrapped the blankets tighter around him. He tugged his finger out with a smile and wiped it off, bringing a sealed letter out of the inside of his Fire Rat Kimono and tucked it into the blanket, making sure it was tight and that a gust of wind wouldn’t blow it out. If the letter disappeared, then his entire plan was worthless, and he really would be separated from his child forever.

It wasn’t a risk that he was willing to take.

He leaned down, a tear slowly making its way down his left cheek, and kissed the little boy on the top of the head, taking a deep breath and imprinting the child’s scent on his brain. He would need the memory of it to face the long years that he would be alone.

With that final thought he stood up and turned his back and walked away, muttering the spell under his breath. He couldn’t stay any longer, the longer that he did the more likely he was to forget that this was the only course of action and take the boy back with him, damn the consequences.

It would be fifteen long years before he saw the little boy again…and by that time, he wouldn’t be a little boy any longer.

The only consolation that he had was that the little boy would grow up in peace, with parents who would love him and protect him in a peaceful environment. It was all that he could ask for.

~*~*~*~*~
Lily Potter was having one of those nights. James was hogging most of the bed, beyond asleep, and something was bugging at her, making it hard for her to sleep.

So she got up and paced the house.

Lilly had long ago learned to trust her instincts, they hadn’t led her wrong yet, but this time, she wasn’t sure what they were trying to tell her.

Whatever it was, she had the feeling that her life was never going to be the same again.

It was as she was making her third circuit of the front foyer when she heard the sound. It was faint, as if it was coming from a considerable distance, and the petite redhead cocked her head to the side, listening hard.

What in the name of Merlin could that be?

It came again and Lily began following it, sliding her wand out of the sleeve of her night robe. While she highly doubted that anything wishing her husband or herself harm would be able to make it past the strong wards that James had erected at the bounds of their property, but in these Dark Days she wasn’t going to take a chance with her life or her husbands. He was all she had left, and she wasn’t going to lose him if she could in anyway prevent it.

She pulled the wooden door open, listening to it creak as it inched open, the bottom of it scraping the wood and making that sound that she absolutely hated, and she made a mental note to remind James, yet again, to fix it. If she had told him once, she had told him a million times to renew the charm on the ancient door, which due to her lack of Potter blood she couldn’t do herself.

But men never listened. She grinned softly to herself. James might have grown up in the year that they had been married, but he was still a little boy who didn’t want to leave Never Neverland…..shirking household chores was his way of making sure that at least part of him didn’t grow up. But, Lily had to admit, that she wouldn’t have her husband any other way. Even if she did have to deal with annoying creaking doors.

She put her wand out the door, her head following slowly after it. All her senses were alert, but she didn’t sense anything amiss….or at least not evil amiss.

The baby on her doorstep, however, was completely out of the ordinary, and completely unexpected. She blinked her green eyes at the baby, her wand hand falling forgotten to her side. Even in her shocked stupor, she wasn’t foolish enough to lose the one weapon that she possessed. She knelt down and pulled the blanket covering the baby’s face away, gasping as she caught sight of the bright golden eyes that stared at her without blinking, and the….little puppy dog ears on the top of his head? She pulled her hand away quickly, a gasp escaping her lips. She had seen many strange things during her tenure in the Wizarding World, but she had never seen a baby with puppy dog ears on top of his head….nor had she ever seen Golden eyes, when she stopped to think about it.

So that brought the question…what was the baby, since it clearly wasn’t human?

“WAAAAAAAH!” The baby, seemingly bored with the introspective adult that was studying him like he was an insect that had just been discovered, let out a wail that pierced her ears….and brought her motherly instincts to the forefront. She swooped down and picked the little boy up, cuddling him close to her chest. At the moment, it didn’t matter that she couldn’t figure out exactly what species the child was, what mattered was the fact that it was a CHILD left on her DOORSTEP….and in the middle of winter at that! The poor thing had to be freezing! She cooed at him and walked inside the house, kicking the door shut behind her absent mindedly. It gave a screech of protest, reminding Lily sharply of her Grandmother-in-law, and she gave a giggle. She would have loved to slam that door on the old hags face, but unfortunately since James had married a Mudblood, the old woman had never set foot in the house again. She might have married into a Light family, but Lily knew that just because people were Light did not mean that they were free from all Prejudices.

The sound of the door slamming behind her must have woken her sleeping-like-the-dead husband, for a few minutes later he came padding into the living room in his pajama’s, his unruly hair sticking up all over his head like the business end of a porcupine. If this wasn’t such a strange situation, Lily would have laughed her head off at the look of the normally suave James Potter, the most Shaggable man in Hogwarts History…except for his best friend Sirius Black.

“Love, what’s with the kid?” James was still half asleep, she could tell by the sound of his voice and the fact that he hadn’t seemed to register the sentence that he had just uttered. She sat back with the baby in her arms, smirking and waiting for him to notice. It only took a few seconds and then he was blinking rapidly and staring at the ‘kid’ like a fish out of water. “Lily, you’re holding a kid!” She nodded simply and looked down at the little boy, who in the middle of all the commotion had slipped his eyes shut and fallen back asleep, a letter curled tightly in his little pudgy fist.

Wait…a letter? Lily frowned, having not noticed the piece of parchment in her haste to get the baby inside and out of the biting wind. She reached out a hand and tried to pry it from the infants grasp, but the child held it too tightly for her to pull it out without ripping it, and she didn’t want to risk that, who knew what information the one seemingly innocuous letter held. She stared at the boy, the thought that he could not be human running through her brain again. No normal child had that strong of a grip, Wizarding or Muggle.

“Lily? What’s going on?” She felt rather than saw James sit on the couch beside her, his weight causing the cushions to sink towards him. He leaned towards her, peering at the baby in her arms. “Now isn’t he just a cutie!” She laughed loudly. James had always had a weak spot for children, and he wanted a child almost more than she did. Unfortunately, no matter how much they tried, she had yet to become pregnant. “Where’d you find him?” James was tickling the boy under his chin, a smile on his face, and Lily felt herself leaning back into the couch, a smile growing over her face. This was what it was supposed to be like, a family.

The only problem was that the child wasn’t theirs.

“He was on the doorstep.” She didn’t know why she was whispering, but it just seemed like the right ting to do at the time, and James looked up at her, shocked.

“The Doorstep? What kind of parent leaves their infant on some stranger’s doorstep?!” She could hear the righteous indignation in his voice that made him the poster boy Gryffindor and she couldn’t help but smile. Even though he had been a right prat when they were in school, she couldn’t help but admire the way that he jumped to someones defense.

“Yes, James, the doorstep. And I don’t know, the only clue is this letter, but the little guy doesn’t seem to be inclined to let it go.” She tried pulling the letter away again, with the same result. The baby just tightened his grip on it and snuggled tighter into the blankets. Looked like it was going to take an act of Merlin himself to get the boy to let go.

James laughed and held out his arms, giving her the grin that she had fallen in love with.

“Hand him over love, we’ll get the tyke to let go.” Lily frowned but did as she was asked, feeling a stab of jealousy as she placed the little boy in her husbands arms. James took him carefully and cuddled him close. “All we have to do is wake him up, and get him more interested in something else….and are those puppy ears?!” James once again did an impression of a fish, and he fingered the ears in shock, tweaking them a little bit.

That got a reaction. The boy’s eyes snapped open, and with a growl he latched his mouth onto the closest thing….which happened to be James’ arm. Her husband yelped and reached down with the other hand and pried the boys mouth of his arm, wincing at the blood that welled from the four little punctures in his skin.

“Bloody Hell that hurt!” But, no matter the way that it happened, the letter was now free and Lily grabbed it, snickering to herself as James now had to deal with both a wound and a crying baby.

And the baby had a set of lungs on him. James stood up and walked around the room, bouncing the kid and trying every trip he could think of to get the little boy to stop crying, while Lily sat back on the couch and opened the letter that she hoped held the key to the conundrum that had been dropped so neatly into their laps…er, doorstep.

The paper was unlike the parchment that was used in the Wizarding world, and she ran a hand along it in wonder.

But what surprised her the most, even beyond the stationary used to hold the information that she most definitely needed, was the language it was in.

Japanese was unfortunately not one of the many languages that Lily Potter nee Evans could understand. She frowned and sighed, cursing yet another stumbling block in her way to finding out what was going on. And if there was one thing that she really hated, it was not being able to understand what was going on in a situation.

But luckily, she was rather handy with Charms, and just so happened to have a translation spell that she thought would work on the paper, and she slid her wand out again, whispering it under her breath. The characters on the page rearranged themselves into the English letters that was used to seeing, and she settled back again. This time she was going to get some answers.

James and Lily Potter,

I know that you may think less of me because I have left the one thing that I should have cared for more than life itself on your doorstep, but I assure you that I have my reasons.

The place I come from is currently caught in a War, several if you want to be exceedingly particular, and I am a key figure in almost all of them. I love my child, do not doubt that for a fleeting second, and leaving him is the hardest thing that I have ever had to do in a lifetime of hard decisions, but I am unable to protect him as much as he needs, and I do not want to lose my child when I could possibly prevent.

I have watched the two of you for several months, since finding out that I was pregnant, and you are exactly the sort of parents that I wish my Mate and I could be. That is why I have picked you to be the guardians of my child until they reach the age of majority in my land. I trust that you will protect him to the best of your ability, and love him as if he was your own. I wish I could do the same, but it is too dangerous.

His name is Takehiko, born on July 31 and he is 3/4 demon. If you do nothing else, I want you to make sure that he understands that his true parents love him, though they are unable to be with him. His Father will come for him when he is fifteen.

Take care of my child, Mr. and Mrs. Potter, or I will make sure that you live to regret the way that you treat him.

Inuyasha.

Lily blinked as she finished the letter.

That had to be the strangest thing that she had ever read.

But she was inclined to believe them. Her instincts were telling her to trust the letter, even if it would kill her when they had to give him up. Wordlessly she motioned James over and handed him the letter, taking Takehiko in the same motion. She settled back on the couch with him as James read, looking down at him in awe. This was her child now. Not by blood, or even design, but he was hers.

It was a nice feeling.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Two weeks later, everything was official. Takehiko was now Harry James Potter, the heir to the Potter Line, and James and Lily couldn’t have been happier. The little boy, adopted by blood, looked nothing like he did when he first landed on their doorstep, and now sported the same cursedly messy hair as James, his father, and the golden eyes had been replaced with her own green. He was a perfect mix of the two of them, and Lily grinned every time that she saw him.

Harry was hers, and she was never giving him back. In her mind, his father and mother had given up any rights to him when they left him on her doorstep. When they came back for him in fifteen years, she wouldn’t give him up. He would never know that he wasn’t their biological child, and he would have no reason to doubt the fact that he was a Potter. As she stood at the ceremony that formally recognized Harry as a Pureblood Heir, James and Sirius proudly holding the little boy in front of the Potter patriarch as Father and Godfather, she felt like her life was complete.

She had no idea that in seven months, her little family would be ripped apart by the monster that she had spent six years fighting, and that her little boy would be left to a life of cruelty.

After all, nothing stays perfect.