Disclaimers: Harry Potter belongs to J. K. Rowling and Warner Brothers Studios. Highlander belongs to Davis/Panzer Productions, Rysher Entertainment, and Gaumont Télèvision. Any copyright infringements were not intended. This story was written for entertainment and not for profit.

This is a Highlander/Harry Potter/Darmian Family crossover. The Darmians are the sole property of myself and they may not be borrowed without my permission.

Spoilers and Timing: This is a possible way that Harry Potter's fifth year could go. There are spoilers for…oh, what isn't there a spoiler for? Read the four Harry Potter books and familiarize yourself with Highlander: The Series and you shouldn't have anything to worry about. I also took a passage out of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Also, there are spoilers for my Darmian Family series of stories, all of which are WIP's and can be found at my site at https://www.angelfire.com/hi2/HighlanderDanielle/stories/darmian/darmians.html.

Summary: The Dark Lord is going to make his appearance, and he plans to do it with a bang. No part of the wizard world is safe and nothing is spared - Gringotts Vaults in several countries are attacked, owlries in North America, Europe, and Africa are destroyed, and it doesn't stop there. Great wizards like Albus Dumbledore and Harry Potter might not stand a chance in stopping Voldemort from taking over. The good side's only advantages may lie in a really old bastard with a love for beer and a group of muggles who are anything but ordinary.

Note: I have no doubt that my Latin sucks. I will gladly welcome tips of improving it. If you notice anything wrong with it, please e-mail me at sword_girl@lycos.com.

Note #2: Like I said above, this features characters/concepts from a group of stories of mine, the Darmians. I've developed a rather complex background for that family. I'm pretty sure I explain everything you need to know as the story progresses, but in case I didn't, here's some background:

The Darmians are a family of psychics. Every one of them has not only a dominant red allele in eye color, but each of them also possesses telepathy, the ability to teleport, and the ability to cast illusions. Other powers are also common but are divided among the family members. They are healing powers, an empathic power, telekinesis, pyrokinesis, Visions, and one of two others.

The Darmians are a very tight-knit group, and although they are spread out all over the world, teleportation allows them to stay close. They have kept their eye color, and their abilities, a secret for thousands of years. Darmians have their own religion, the Dittrian/Darmayan Faith, named after the high god and goddess, Dittrias and Darmaya. Each god and goddess represents an aspect of their lives. An example is the Goddess Aeriel. She is the Darmian's Goddess of the Future and Continuity, and therefore, she is also the Goddess of Visions. Alia, the Goddess of Travel, is also the Goddess of Teleportation. Although they have their own codes and traditions, they are not above local laws; they apply their own laws only when the situation involves something that they can't let the outside world know about.

There was a recent internal war between Nola, Atalanta, and all the family members on their side and Toshi, Nola and Atalanta's triplet brother, and all the family members on his side. The war ended only after many Darmians had been killed, including Toshi.

Only in this story are Melanie and Blake half-witch and half-wizard. Pathic magic is something I made up only for this story, also.

It was time.

Horrid smiles lit up their faces at the thought. If any living thing had a desire to pull up the dementors' hoods, they would have seen those smiles, but they wouldn't have recognized them as such. The dirty, unsanitary halls of Azkaban were filled with excited dementors. They were as excited as they always got whenever one of the prisoners under their guard was on the brink of death. They loved to drain humans of happy memories and were always thrilled whenever one of their charges died because of it. The other prisoners, the ones not trapped within their minds from madness, knew that another prisoner was dying when the dementors got excited.

This time, however, the dementors were more excited than they had ever been. None of their sane charges knew what to make of it. One minute, the dementors were going about their duties as usual, and the next, they'd worked themselves up to a frenzy. It was as if they heard something pleasing that only they could hear.

Voldemort's magical Summons pulled on them. They did not try to resist. They abandoned their duties and posts and walked out of Azkaban, then off of the prison grounds. They didn't even spare a backward glance at the prison whose inmates they'd been so intent on killing only a few minutes beforehand. They were willing to let go of a few humans, after all, for the multitude of prey that the Dark Lord promised them.

Slowly, the prisoners they left behind came out of their stupor. They could remember happy things again, and suddenly they no longer felt as depressed. Once their senses had returned to them, many had enough reason to make for the hills. If they didn't find hills, another hiding place would do.

A medium-sized group gathered together just outside the front gates. They subconsciously formed a circle and glanced at each other. They were the Death Eaters that had been sent to Azkaban so many years ago. Some of those sentenced to rot in that horrid place were long dead, but the rest had somehow survived. None of them spoke a word. They were waiting for something./

They didn't wait long. The Dark Mark tattoos along their left arms burned with great intensity. It was the signal they'd been waiting for. Their master was calling them.

One by one, each man or woman Disapparated, leaving behind a prison that had never been emptier.

It was all over the news. The Wizard Wireless Network, along with many wizard newspapers across the globe, couldn't stop talking about it. The dementors' disappearance, along with their prisoners, was, in everyone's minds, one of the worst things that could have happened to the wizarding world.

Bill Wesley saw it everyday when he came to work. Three weeks had passed since they discovered that Azkaban was deserted. He remembered the chill that ran down his spine when he'd first heard about it in the Daily Prophet. Having dementors that no longer worked for the Ministry was bad enough, but combine them with the criminals…a number of them had been Death Eaters. What if all of the rumors that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named were true? What if the Death Eaters had answered the call of their master?

Bill could remember the last time that the Dark Lord had been in power. It had been horrible. Most of the bank's clientele could also remember that time, and their agitation was clear every time they stepped inside Gringotts. Although Voldemort had left Egypt almost unscathed the last time, the Egyptians were still worried; after all, no one knew where those dementors were hiding. They could have gone anywhere. The goblins he worked with at the bank were also on edge, although they could hide it a lot better than most creatures. Bill suspected that he was the only one at the bank who could tell that they were afraid since he'd spent so much time around them.

"Excuse me."

The voice, spoken right above him, startled Bill a little. He turned away from his desk and glanced up into the face of a tall man of about six feet two inches. Other than his height, there was little about the man that Bill could easily make out. He stood in a shady spot next to Bill's desk. Bill would wonder later if the lighting effect had been intentional or not. "Yes?" he required. "May I help you?"

The man extended his hand. Bill froze. The wizard had his wand pointed straight at Bill, and his voice was full of contempt. "Yes, you may." His voice hardened. "Get up."

Bill glared at the face hidden in shadows. He slowly and carefully pushed his chair back from his desk and stood, tense. The goblin at the closest desk gave him a disapproving stare; after all, Bill was supposed to be working, not standing up. Then the goblin's line of sight fell on the unknown wizard's wand and he gasped.

"Hostile wizard!" the goblin screamed, alerting everyone in the large marble room. "Hostile wizard in the-"

"Excrucio Totallus!" the wizard exclaimed with his wand aimed at the goblin. The goblin clasped into the ground with a scream with a great resounding thud. Even as he hit the ground, he never ceased to scream. Bill looked down at him in horror. The poor goblin was as stiff as cardboard, but his eyes were wide and his mouth was opened wide as he continued to scream. His facial expression was the only clue that he was in pain.

Several clientele standing in a line in front of the main counter screamed and ran for the doors. Bill watched in horror as several robed, masked figures stepped through the front door, blocking their progress. Bill, the clients, and the goblins stared at them.

If any of the Muggles passing by on the street outside had been able to see through the anti-muggle charms to the windows of the Egyptian Gringotts branch bank, they would have seen a lot of brilliant, flashing green light.

They also would have seen, if they had glanced up at the roof, the image of a snake crawling out of the mouth of a human skull illuminated clearly against the twilight sky.

Harry started awake. The memory-turned-dream faded from his thoughts as he became aware of burning pain shooting through his forehead from his scar. He knew well enough by then that his scar hurt for only two reasons: either Voldemort was near or Voldemort was doing something evil. There was no possible way that Voldemort was nearby; Dumbledore had seen to it when Harry was only a baby that Harry was protected on 4 Privet Drive. Pain from his scar could only mean that Voldemort was on the move.

He got up and glanced at his reflection in the wall mirror. He lifted his bangs and glanced at his scar. It looked the same way it always had; a thin, jagged scar in the shape of a lightning bolt, which stood out on the left side of his forehead. The pain seemed to intensify simply because Harry was looking at it. He recalled what Dumbledore had told him to do whenever his scar burned again: "If your scar gives you any trouble, I want you to owl me immediately about it. It is very important that you do so, Harry; alerting me whenever your scar hurts may prove critical in stopping Voldemort's plans."

Harry sat down at his desk, took out a quill and some parchment, and began to write by the thin beam of his flashlight.

Harry paused, wondering if he should include the sense of foreboding in his stomach. Even though he had no idea what Voldemort was up to that time, he was still certain that something terrible had happened…or was happening, at that very moment.

The scar continued to throb. Harry dipped his quill into his ink again and wrote:

Once he was finished, he turned to Hedwig's cage and placed the letter in her beak. He watched her fly off into the night sky. He couldn't shake off the dread that Hedwig would arrive too late.

Harry managed to fall asleep several hours later. Even so, he felt considerably tired when a pounding on his door awakened him. He felt like ignoring it, just this once, and would have fallen asleep again when Aunt Petunia's voice filtered through the door. "Get up! It's Dudley's birthday today, and you're supposed to cook the bacon!"

Harry groaned. For a wonderful moment, he'd forgotten that his cousin, Dudley Dursley, turned fifteen that day. Harry hated Dudley's birthdays. His Muggle relatives never trusted him enough to leave him in the house by himself, so while they took Dudley somewhere for his birthday, Harry spent the day with one of their neighbors, Mrs. Figg. He couldn't think of anything more boring than having to sit through a detailed description of all of Mrs. Figg's picture albums or her cats. Still, he knew there'd be hell to pay if he didn't get out of bed soon. As he warily got dressed, he glanced out the window at the morning sky. Harry knew already that whatever had happened yesterday was over; his scar had stopped hurting some time during the night. He hoped Hedwig had gotten to Dumbledore in time to stop Voldemort doing whatever it was he did.

As usual, Dudley received a ridiculous amount of presents. For the boy who had everything at least twice, there always seemed to be something else that he wanted, and he would throw tantrums if he didn't get it. The bad thing about it was that his tantrums usually got him what he wanted. Four years ago, for Dudley's eleventh birthday, Harry's cousin had received a total of thirty-nine presents, and that wasn't counting the trip to the zoo. Every year, the pile's number increased by two or three, and for his latest birthday the huge pile of presents heaped onto the table and around the living room was closer to fifty.

The phone rang and Harry's Aunt Petunia stood up to answer it. While she was gone, Dudley unwrapped a cell phone, twenty multi-colored cell phone covers, and at least ten new Nintendo 64 video games. When Aunt Petunia came back, she looked a little angry. "Bad news, Vernon. Mrs. Figg's out of town. Apparently she's gone away for the summer to visit friends just outside of London. I've tried calling Hanna but she's at work."

Harry's eyes widened while his uncle frowned. The good news was that he wouldn't have to spend the day at Mrs. Figg's. The bad news was that he'd have to spend the day with the Dursleys.

Dudley gave him a look of pure contempt. Harry knew Dudley was already thinking up all sorts of ways to torment him. They knew he couldn't do magic out of school, and while threatening to mail Sirius Black, his godfather, that he was being mistreated kept the Dursleys from doing anything too harsh, Harry had feeling that the more he used that as a defense, the less effective it would be. He'd have to watch his back that day. It could have been worse.

After Dudley's best friend Piers had arrived, the five of them climbed into the car and headed off to the zoo. They'd gone to the zoo the last time Harry had been allowed to come with them on Dudley's birthday. Back then, it had been the best day of his life. Four years later, he was too worried about what was going on in the wizard world to concentrate on having much fun. He also missed his best friends, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. He hadn't heard from either of them in days and hoped they were all right.

After seeing the tigers, alligators, bears, birds, and guerillas, they entered the reptile house. Harry looked around in interest. He'd set the boa constrictor free last time. It had been unintentional, but it had been worth it to see Dudley's face. He glanced at the cage it had lived in. A new boa constrictor occupied it. Harry glanced around. The reptile house was less crowded than it had been outside. Piers and the Dursleys were all the way on the other end of the room. Harry approached the boa constrictor's cage. "Hello," he greeted it. He wondered if he said it in Parseltongue or English. He never could tell the difference.

The great snake lifted its head. "Harry Potter," it said.

Harry started. His hand reached up and touched his scar. He realized his bangs had parted enough to leave the scar visible. "Yes," he said. "Have you heard of me?"

The snake bobbed his head up and down in an affirmative. "You are not safe, Harry Potter. The Dark Lord wishes to inflict great pain on you, as it has done to my brothers."

"Your…brothers? You were captured?"

"Yesss. The Dark Lord is using the Imperius Curse on my brothers as we speak. We can resist, but it weakens us greatly."

"What is he doing?"

The great snake seemed to shudder. "I will not speak of it anymore!" it said. "I allowed myself to be captured to escape him. I am much safer here than I was in my homeland. So far, the Dark Lord has kept away from Muggle museums. He has attacked only wizard dwellings."

The blood seemed to drain out of Harry's face. "Only-only attacked-"

A hand landed on his shoulder. "Time to go, boy," growled Uncle Vernon. Harry didn't resist as he was led away. His head spun. A lump formed in his stomach as he thought once again about his friends.

What was going on in the wizard world?

He got his answer when he got back to his room. He found Ron's owl, Pigwidgeon, sitting on his desk. The oddest thing was that Pig wasn't acting as overexcited as usual. Pig actually managed to stay still while Harry extracted the letter from the tiny owl's beak. Even after he did that, Pig didn't work himself into a frenzy from the excitement of delivering a letter. Amazed, Harry wondered if Ron had managed to knock some sense into the bird. He gave Pig some food and opened Ron's letter.

Gringotts was attacked? When? Had it happened last night? Was that what his scar had tried to warn him about? Was Bill all right? So many questions swam through his thoughts.

Another owl flew into the room, landing on his desk. He recognized it as one of the owls from Hogwarts. He took the letter from its beak and watched as it flew back out the window. Harry tore open the official Hogwarts seal and pulled out Dumbledore's letter.

"So it's true? You're really going to be a teacher? You?" MacLeod asked, looking like he was stuck between complete shock and a laughing fit.

Adam Pierson, otherwise known as the Immortal Methos, rolled his eyes. "What is so hard to believe? I've taught school before."

"Any history position ought to be right up your alley," Dawson remarked in agreement, although merriment sparkled in his eyes.

Joe Dawson and Duncan MacLeod, currently Methos' closest friends, stood near the wall of Methos' mostly vacant apartment. He'd already sent most of his belongings to storage, and when he left the building that day that apartment would no longer belong to him. MacLeod and Methos watched as he hurried about the room, picking up odds and ends stacked here and there and stuffing them into a trunk. Joe couldn't help wondering how Methos could fit all of it in the small trunk. The trunk would have to be bigger on the inside that it was on the outside. Little did he know that his assessment was absolutely correct.

"What's the address?" Joe asked. "In case we need to contact you."

"Not sure," Methos answered. Hogwarts was, after all, unplottable.

"You're not sure?" MacLeod repeated in utter disbelief.

Joe looked concerned as well. "Are you sure about this school, Adam?"

"Yes," Methos answered with some irritation, "I'm sure."

It had been over a month since Albus Dumbledore, Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, had owled Methos. Dumbledore had offered Methos a teaching position. It seemed that Hogwarts need a new Muggle Studies teacher, and Dumbledore thought that Methos was the best candidate for the job. After all, who else could explain the telephone to a group of wizards than someone who knew what it was like to live most of his life without one?

Albus had also wanted to start a Defense Class. Albus had enclosed in the letter his fears of Voldemort rising to power again and wanted his students to be as fully prepared as possible.

The idea had been appealing. He had missed the wizard world, and enough time had passed that, even if people recognized him, they would assume that he was the son of the man that killed Voracnar. It would be nice to walk through Diagon Alley without being stopped by fans at every turn on the path.

If there was war, as Dumbledore seemed to fear, Immortals were also in danger, and that was perhaps the best incentive Albus could have ever used to convince Methos to take the job. Therefore, with only one more week to go before the start of the term, he'd bought a plane ticket to London. He would stay at the Leaky Cauldron until the first of September when he would travel to Hogwarts on the train to Hogsmeade Station with the student body.

Methos had told MacLeod and Dawson that he would be teaching European History at a remote boarding school several miles outside of London. So far, he had avoided making up a name. He couldn't very well tell them that he would be going to Hogwarts. What sort of school that his friends would be familiar with would be named that, after all?

He picked up his trunk, thankful for the lightening spell that was performed on it before he purchased it. "Look, I'm sure the two of you will get along fine without me. Anyway, I'd better go or I'll miss my flight. Don't lose your head while I’m gone, MacLeod."

"Don’t plan to," MacLeod answered with a small smile.

After saying his farewells, Methos let the two of them out and handed in his key before getting into his car and heading for the airport.