It was the end of his fifth year and Harry had just disembarked from the train and was currently looking for the Dursley's. All of his friends and the members of the Order of the Phoenix had already left leaving Harry all alone. Harry waited for over an hour until he finally got tired of waiting and took the Knight Bus to Number 4. Privet Drive. Entering the house he noticed that it was completely silent and almost all of the furniture had gone, a heavy coat of dust lay on the open surfaces suggesting that no-one had been there for quite some time. Upon the kitchen table lay a single envelope with the simple message of: Harry. Frowning slightly he took the letter and sat down against one of the walls to support his back and opened it.
Dear Harry,
If you are reading this letter then things have gone to plan and we have left. During our attic clear out we came across some interesting documents. It seems that we are not the legal owners of the house…you are. Your mother bought it despite our knowledge and my parents passed the ownership to me. However there was a stipulation that we could only live in this house whilst you lived here and we realised that sooner or later we were going to lose it. Fortunately due to Vernon's long time commitment to Grunning's he has been offered a managing position overseas. We decided to take it and so we have left. On a more personal note I would like to apologise for the way my family and I treated you, I allowed my jealousy over my sisters' gift to cloud my judgement. In the end I took out all my anger on you…I realise now that it was unfair of me.
On another note we also came across some important information regarding why you needed to stay with us. The blood wards when at full power would stop anyone trying to do you harm inside its boundary. The ward however is powered by emotion; more importantly, love. Due to the way we treated you the blood ward failed within a week. It also seems that your headmaster would have been immediately alerted to this fact due to him being the caster of the ward. This gave us suspicions and so I contacted an old squib friend of mine who put me in contact with Gringotts who sent round a representative. After a quick scan it turns out that the only wards on the property are as follows: Anti-Apparition, Anti-Portkey, A variety of monitoring charms (Illegal and so Gringotts suspended them until you speak with a representative yourself) and a standard anti-burglar ward. Hopefully all of these will mean more to you than they do to me.
The goblins apparently charmed this paper into a two-way portkey between here and Diagon Alley; they say to go as soon as possible to get things sorted out. I'm sorry that things haven't worked out between us but I hope that you find happiness that we denied you sometime in the future. Stay strong Harry & do your mother proud
Petunia Evans-Dursley
Harry didn't know how long he sat just staring at the letter but when he finally overcame his shock night had fallen and his stomach was giving out almost constant growls. After eating the few remaining snacks he had left in his trunk he went to bed planning on going to Grinngotts first thing tomorrow to get this sorted out. Harry woke at dawn the following day and after a quick shower took the port-key to Diagon Alley arriving just outside of Gringotts. He quickly went inside.
When Harry left he was quite simply furious, it seems that Dumbledore kept him at the Dursley's so that he would be free to dig into the Potter family fortune, since his parents death Dumbledore had managed to embezzle more than 20 million galleons. It also seems that the Weasleys' and Hermione were being paid to spy on him. This betrayal hurt him more than all of Dumbledore's manipulations combined as they had taken him into their home professing their love for him and how he was a 7th son to them. Dumbledore's manipulations however went far beyond simple embezzlement. It seems that Dumbledore had placed power restriction charms on him as a baby that he has still yet to lift. This stunted his growth, his eyesight and his mind.
Harry would have to break the charms himself; they were beyond the Goblins, but thanks to Dumbledore's manipulations he was able to file for immediate emancipation. Harry decided not to press charges for the moment but instead become the best wizard that he could possibly be so that one day he would be able to defeat both Dumbledore and Voldemort. Harry had spent a fair amount of money on employing a squad of Goblins to go round to his new home and ward it to the best of his ability. He had paid for anti-apparition, Anti-portkey, monitoring ward, blocking ward (would hide the use of magic on the property), Owl monitoring ward (would disable and mail with portkey included until he accepted it, would also scramble any and all tracking charms), Specialised Animagus ward (would stop any animagus by forcing them to revert into their true form, only those Harry allowed would be able to cross). The most advanced one he ordered though was the time dilation field (time inside the ward would run four times quicker than outside. Instead of a three month holiday he had a whole year). After that he included all the standard household ward such as fire ward and basic defensive wards; he would add more complex ones later on.
He could feel the Goblins working even as he was shopping he had provided them with his blood so they could bind the wards to him, as each one was added he became more and more aware of the house, when the monitoring ward was set up he instantly became aware of every being inside of them and what they were doing. Strangely this new flow of information didn't affect his concentration and Harry finally realised exactly how Dumbledore knew of everything going in inside Hogwarts and how he always knew who was outside of his door.
After almost a full day of shopping and so many books that Harry wondered if he would ever read them all and many clothes as well an exhausted Harry returned home. Despite being exhausted after he had dropped his things off Harry immediately left the house yet again to go shopping for his food. Fortunately Harry got everything he needed and thanks to magic he would never need to buy them again as he could charm the refrigerator to copy everything that he put in their. True it would have a little less energy then it would have if it was natural but Harry could always eat a little more to make that up. That night despite his exhaustion Harry found a 'muggleborn introduction pack', it contained all of the basic information that muggleborn's didn't know such as how magic worked and why certain spells needed certain wand movements. Suddenly things Harry had been struggling with for years suddenly became in his mind ridiculously simple.
Trying a transfiguration that he spent most of his fifth year struggling with it suddenly morphed before he could even say the spell and Harry felt an elation fill him that he hadn't felt for years. This was partly due to Ron's laziness rubbing off on him and Hermione's intellect, he knew now that he suppressed his gifts and ability so that he wouldn't stand to lose what he thought was his friends. Harry decided no more, he would become a wizard that his parents would be proud of. The next day Harry sat down with his curse-breaking books and after almost five hours of reading he had finally got the basics down and so turned to one of the more advanced books and looked for the strongest counter-charm to remove and block on ones magic. Finally he found it and after three hours worth of practising he finally managed to perform it.
Thankfully he read the warning on the spell and understood that when he unblocked his power it would quite literally explode from him so he needed to protect the room he was in. This lead him to basic warding books and after an intensive two hour study found an inverse ward. The more power that was fed into it from the inside the stronger it got. This was good because when his power exploded it wouldn't damage the rest of the house; it would instead power the ward to protect the rest of the house. Finally performing the complex wand movement needed he flicked his wand at himself and intense pain far superior to the Cruciatus curse flowed through him. An agonised scream tore itself from his lips. His vision flashed white as his power exploded outwards before he slipped into the blissful blackness of unconsciousness.