The street in Ealing was quiet, lined with semi-detached houses with freshly painted doors and the faint smell of cut grass drifting on the breeze. Dumbledore and Remus stopped in front of a modest white-bricked home with flowerpots arranged neatly along the steps.
"Are you certain this is the right house?" Dumbledore asked, his sharp blue gaze scanning the surroundings.
"I'm sure," Remus replied. "This is where the girl lives—the one who was with Harry the day I saw him." He stepped forward, raising his hand to press the doorbell.
As they waited, Remus gave Dumbledore a sideways glance. "You could have at least worn something… muggle." His eyes flicked to the elder wizard's deep plum cloak, embroidered subtly with golden runes.
Dumbledore's lips curled into the faintest of smiles. "Muggle fashion has never been my strong suit, my dear boy."
Before Remus could reply, the door swung open. A middle-aged woman stood there, her hair neatly styled, her expression warm but puzzled. She looked first at Remus, then at the tall, bearded man beside him.
Her eyes widened. "Albus Dumbledore?"
Dumbledore inclined his head politely. "At your service, madam."
"You'd better come in," she said, stepping aside.
The two wizards entered the cosy, well-kept living room. Dumbledore took in the surroundings—a stack of newspapers on the coffee table, family photographs along the mantel, a faint scent of fresh tea in the air.
He studied the woman's face, trying to place her. It troubled him that he could not recall the name, though he was certain she looked faintly familiar. "Forgive me… Were you a Hufflepuff, perhaps?" he asked with genuine curiosity.
The woman blinked in surprise, then shook her head. "Oh, no. I'm not a witch at all. My daughter Hermione is the magical one in the family—first we've ever had. I'm Emma Granger."
"Ah," Dumbledore said slowly, but his brow furrowed further. "I do not recall a Miss Granger."
"That would be because she hasn't started Hogwarts yet," Emma said with a small smile. "She's ten."
"I see," Dumbledore replied. "And yet… you recognised me instantly?"
Emma gestured toward a folded stack of wizarding newspapers on the coffee table. "We have a subscription to the Daily Prophet. Hermione insists on it—wants to know as much about the magical world as she can before she goes."
Remus, who had been quietly taking in the exchange, finally cleared his throat. "Mrs. Granger, we didn't come here about your daughter." His voice was polite but carried a hint of urgency. "We're looking for someone—a boy. My… old friend's son. I believe your daughter knows him."
Emma's brows knit together. "And who would that be?"
"Harry," Remus said simply. "Dark hair, green eyes. Sometimes wears glasses."
Emma's expression shifted subtly—hesitation flickered in her eyes. "Hermione does have a friend named Harry," she said slowly.
Remus leaned forward slightly. "Could we speak with Hermione?"
"I'm afraid Hermione isn't home," she said. "She's at Harry's house for the day." Emma replied.
Remus and Dumbledore exchanged a quick glance.
Dumbledore adjusted his half-moon spectacles. "And… where exactly does Harry live?"
Emma hesitated, then said, "Somewhere in Scotland, I believe. I've never driven there—Hermione and Harry usually travel by… well, that odd purple bus. The Knight Bus, I think it's called."
"The Knight Bus," Remus repeated under his breath.
Emma went on, "The last time we all went to visit Harry, it was by… what was it called? Ah, yes—a portkey. A very strange way to travel, I might add." She gave a small, almost amused smile at the memory. "One moment you're standing in our garden, the next you're being pulled through the air like a fish on a line."
Dumbledore's voice remained calm, but his eyes sharpened. "A portkey, you say? That is… unusual for someone Harry's age."
Remus leaned forward slightly. "Mrs. Granger, may I ask—how long have Hermione and Harry been friends?"
"Oh, couple of years," Emma said without hesitation. He's been a big influence on her—encouraged her love for reading, for learning new things."
Dumbledore folded his hands in his lap. "And… forgive me for asking, but how did your daughter—being a Muggle-born—come to know about magic before a Hogwarts professor visited your home?"
Emma's brows lifted slightly at the question. "That's simple. Hermione had one of those… incidents. What do you call them? Accidental magic?. Harry saw it happen. He told her she was a witch—he seemed to know straight away—and then he explained the basics of the magical world to us."
Remus's gaze sharpened. "So you met his family?"
"Yes," Emma said warmly. "His mother, Stepfather and elder sister. They are lovely."
At the word mother, Remus stiffened ever so slightly. "You met her more than once?"
"Oh, many times," Emma said. "Always very polite, very protective of Harry. She clearly adores him."
Dumbledore's tone was even, but there was an undercurrent of tension. "And… her name?"
"Lily," Emma replied without hesitation.
Both wizards reacted at once—Remus's shoulders went rigid, Dumbledore's eyes darkened with sudden gravity.
Remus leaned forward. "What does she look like?"
Emma smiled faintly at the memory. "Red hair, green eyes. Quite striking, really. She's one of those people you can't help but notice in a room."
Remus exchanged a troubled glance with Dumbledore.
"Mrs. Granger," Dumbledore said carefully, "do you happen to know anything more about her personal life? Where she lives? Her work?"
Emma shook her head. "I'm afraid not. She's always been polite but private. We never asked too many personal questions—it didn't seem our place."
Remus sat back in his chair, his mind turning. He knew that description. He knew the name. But he also knew the real Lily Potter was dead…
And yet Emma spoke with absolute certainty, as though she had been meeting her for years.
The night was ink-black. Clouds smothered the stars, and the absence of moonlight wrapped the world in shadows. The air was heavy with damp earth and the faint scent of rain to come—perfect for someone who didn't want to be seen.
Remus Lupin stood among the leaning, weather-worn gravestones of Godric's Hollow. His breath misted in the cold air as he stared at the two headstones before him, side by side.
James Potter.
Lily Potter.
The dates carved beneath their names had been etched into his memory long ago.
He swallowed hard, his fingers curling into fists inside his worn coat pockets.
Emma Granger's words keep echoing… Red hair. Green eyes. Lily. Alive.
It shouldn't have been possible. He had mourned her. He had stood at this very spot years ago, grief hollowing him out like a knife. He had believed—as Dumbledore had told him—that her body lay beneath this stone.
But doubt had taken root, and it had been gnawing at him ever since.
"This is mad," he muttered to himself, though the words had no conviction.
Drawing his wand, Remus knelt before Lily's grave. With a whispered incantation and a careful twist of his wrist, the earth began to shift silently. The soil didn't fly or scatter; it simply parted, sliding away like water from stone, as though the night itself was complicit in his trespass.
He glanced around the graveyard—no lights in the windows, no rustle of footsteps. Only the whisper of wind through the trees.
The coffin emerged slowly, wood pale and dry from years underground. His pulse thundered in his ears as he muttered another charm, the lid unlocking with a faint click.
For a moment, he hesitated. Some part of him almost hoped to see her there, at peace, so he could call Emma's words a misunderstanding and bury his suspicion with the coffin.
But when he finally lifted the lid—
Empty.
Completely, utterly empty.
Not even a scrap of fabric. Not even dust.
Remus's breath caught, his eyes wide. He felt his knees weaken, and for a moment he just stared, the truth slamming into him like a physical blow.
"She's not here…" he whispered. "Merlin—she's not here."
He closed the coffin with trembling hands, resealed it, and murmured the charm to return the soil as if it had never been disturbed. Within moments, the grave looked untouched, silent as the rest of the cemetery.
But Remus's heart was anything but calm. His mind spun—if Lily's body wasn't here, then what had they buried? Who had been in that coffin on the day of the funeral?
There was only one person who might be able to piece this together, and he was not going to wait until morning.
With a sharp crack, he Apparated to the outskirts of Hogsmeade. The village was quiet at this hour, the dim glow from the Three Broomsticks the only sign of life. He moved quickly, his boots crunching lightly over the frosted ground until he reached the back entrance of the Hog's Head Inn.
Aberforth Dumbledore opened the door after a moment, giving him a skeptical once-over. "You're here late, Lupin."
"I need to use the Floo to speak with your brother," Remus said shortly.
Aberforth grunted but stepped aside. "Don't wake the castle unless it's worth it."
Remus stepped to the fireplace, taking a pinch of Floo powder from the jar on the mantel. "Headmaster's Office, Hogwarts," he said clearly before tossing it into the flames.
The fire flared green, and the swirling view of stone walls and tall windows appeared.
Dumbledore's calm voice greeted him almost immediately from within the office. "Remus… at this hour?"
"May I step through?"
"By all means."
Remus stepped into the emerald flames and, in a whirl of spinning ash and heat, emerged in the Headmaster's office. The familiar scent of parchment and old wood surrounded him, and Fawkes the phoenix let out a soft trill from his perch.
Dumbledore stood by his desk, wearing midnight-blue robes, eyes sharp with curiosity. "This seems urgent."
Remus's face was pale, his jaw set. "I went to Godric's Hollow tonight."
Dumbledore arched an eyebrow. "And?"
"I opened Lily's coffin."
The room went very still.
"It's empty, Albus," Remus said, voice low but shaking. "There's no body. None. Either she never died… or someone took her long ago."
For a moment, Dumbledore said nothing, but the flicker in his eyes betrayed that this was not wholly unexpected.
"Then," the Headmaster said quietly, "it would seem, Remus… that our mystery is far deeper than I feared."
The fire in the Headmaster's office burned low, casting long shadows across the walls. The silence between Remus and Dumbledore stretched, both men lost in their own thoughts.
"With magic," Remus said at last, his voice rough, "anything is possible. She could be alive. She could be an imposter. Or—" he hesitated, "—something else entirely."
Dumbledore's expression was unreadable, but his blue eyes seemed darker than usual. "And with possibilities so numerous, we must tread very carefully. We cannot act without proof. Nor can we confront Harry without certainty of what we are dealing with."
"So who do we trust?" Remus pressed.
Dumbledore shook his head slightly. "For now… no one outside the Order. And even then, we must be selective."
He moved to the desk, drawing a sheet of parchment toward him. His quill scratched across it, the strokes sharp and deliberate. "If Harry is missing from the home we believed him to be in, if the woman with him is indeed Lily—or someone wearing her face—then the stakes are far higher than we imagined. We will need the full resources of the Order of the Phoenix."
Remus's brow furrowed. "After the war, most of them drifted apart. Some barely speak to each other anymore."
"Which is why," Dumbledore said, sealing the parchment with a quick charm, "I will make this a matter they cannot ignore."
Two nights later, the secret meeting room in Hogwarts was ready. The air buzzed with voices—familiar voices that had not shared a roof in years. Witches and wizards who had once faced death together now filled the room, many of them with lines of age or weariness in their faces, but their eyes alight with something that had been missing for too long: purpose.
Kingsley Shacklebolt leaned against the far wall, his deep voice carrying as he greeted old comrades. "Feels strange being back in the thick of it, doesn't it?"
"Better than paperwork at the Ministry," Catherine Gibbs replied. "You can only fill out so many forms before you start to wish for a good curse fight."
At the head of the table, Dumbledore raised his hand, and the room fell silent.
"My friends," he began, his tone solemn but warm, "I did not call you here lightly. The war may be over, but a new mystery has arisen—one that touches the very heart of what we fought to protect."
The murmurs began immediately, but Dumbledore continued over them.
"Harry Potter—the Boy Who Lived—has been missing from the home where I placed him. We have reason to believe he is alive and well… but in the company of someone claiming to be his mother."
Gasps broke out around the table.
"That's impossible," muttered Dedalus Diggle. "She's been dead since—"
"Since the night Voldemort fell, yes," Dumbledore said. "Yet our investigation has revealed… certain inconsistencies. Her grave is empty. And those who have seen this woman describe her as Lily in every way—appearance, voice, manner. We cannot dismiss the possibility of deception, nor the possibility that she truly lives."
Remus stepped forward, his face tight. "I saw Harry myself. He recognized me, then bolted. He's different now—older in bearing, stronger somehow. And he wasn't alone. He was with a Muggleborn girl, Hermione Granger."
This sparked another round of murmurs, the name unfamiliar to most.
"The task before us," Dumbledore said, letting his voice carry, "is to determine the truth—quietly. No Ministry involvement. We station members at key locations: the Grangers' home, Diagon Alley, and other places Harry might frequent. We must find him before… others do."
Mundungus Fletcher smirked faintly. "And what do we do when we find him? Drag him back?"
Dumbledore's eyes hardened, the light within them suddenly sharp. "We do not drag him anywhere. We speak to him. We learn the truth from his own lips—if he will give it."
By the following evening, the plan was in motion.
At the Grangers' quiet suburban street, a pair of Order members sat in a parked car under a Disillusionment Charm, watching the house with patient eyes. Catherine Gibbs, disguised as a young blonde, wandered the block with a shopping bag, her eyes flicking toward the front door every time it opened.
In Diagon Alley, Kingsley Shacklebolt lingered near Flourish and Blotts, pretending to browse the latest Auror manuals while keeping a clear view of the street.
Even in the Leaky Cauldron, a quiet hum of Order activity had returned—old friends sitting in corners with tankards of butterbeer, eyes sharp for a tall boy with messy black hair.
The old thrill of purpose was back. The boredom of post-war life was replaced by whispered updates, coded messages, and the knowledge that they were part of something bigger again.
For Harry Potter, the boy they had once protected with their lives, was out there.
And they were going to find him.
___________________________________________
Details about bonus content can be found on my profile page.