That Time Dudley Stole a Book
A/N: This was written for the AO3 exchange Crossovering 2017 for Lauren (notalwaysweak).
"Give that back – ow!"
The words are loud enough to float all the way to the ears of Harry Potter, where he lies nearly half a block away, hidden in the slightly cooler shade of the shrubbery at Number 4 Privet Drive. Done with his outdoor chores for the moment, Harry is hoping to avoid Dudley's gang or further tasks assigned by Aunt Petunia for a few more hours. Petunia should still be too busy gossiping on the telephone to look outside and he's usually perfectly capable of outrunning Dudley, but the heat of the day makes that a last resort he'd prefer to avoid if possible.
As sounds of taunting and cries of outrage continue, Harry realizes that he vaguely recognizes the voice that isn't one of Dudley's gang as one of the kids that lives a few streets over. Relatively new to the area, the boy still should have lived here long enough to know your choices with Dudley were either to outrun him or give up. It's not that Harry has no sympathy for the kid who has become Dudley's chosen target of the day, but it would be a lie to pretend he's not glad that today seems to be someone else's turn.
He waits a few minutes longer, expecting the scuffle to die down as the boy realizes it's hopeless. Despite his expectations the kid continues objecting loudly, and Harry can't contain his curiosity about what exactly they're scuffling over any longer. He carefully sits up enough to peer through a conveniently thin spot between two bushes to see what all the fuss is over. Harry is more than a little perplexed to see that the item Dudley and Piers are playing keep-away with over the head of its red-faced owner is, of all things, a book.
Still curious, but less interested now – it wouldn't be the first time Dudley stole something just for the pure joy of it – Harry settles back down on the ground. He tunes out the noises of the still ongoing conflict in favor of daydreaming about shapes in the clouds, like that one that looks a little like the motorcycle he used to dream about. Eventually he realizes the afternoon has gone quiet, and he looks out to confirm that Dudley and the others must have left at some point while he was distracted. He shrugs the whole incident off as unimportant and goes back to cloud watching.
A few hours later, when Aunt Petunia calls them back into the house, Harry is surprised again to see that the small dark red book is still clutched in one of Dudley's meaty fists. His cousin can read, but generally he actively chooses not to, preferring television and video games. Harry doesn't know if it's laziness about putting in the effort or a lack of imagination or even one of Uncle Vernon's long-winded speeches about proper activities for boys having sunk in – maybe it's just the simple lack of anything exploding. Whatever the reason, considering Dudley's general feeling about books, if Harry had given it any thought, he would have assumed the book would end up in the nearest trash bin once its owner gave up on getting it back. Harry doesn't know enough about the kid in question – he isn't even sure if the kid's name is Edward or Edwin – but maybe he gets a regular allowance Dudley is hoping to ransom the book for later.
Thinking he has Dudley's reasoning figured out, Harry dismisses the book from his thoughts. At least until he sees Dudley sitting with it in the living room, actually appearing to be reading it. Harry stops short in surprise his mouth even dropping open a little, and the suddenness of the movement brings Dudley's head jerking up. His cousin's face flushes and Dudley's eyes narrow dangerously as he spits out, "What're you lookin' at?"
Harry knows he shouldn't, because at best it'll just get him a bruise, but he still can't help but taunt Dudley over the book. "Wow, Dudley, that must be some book. Or wait, is it a picture book?"
Flushing even more red in anger and defensiveness, possibly even some embarrassment at being caught reading, Dudley nonsensically replies, "I wish there were goblins to come and take you away right now, freak."
Confused as to the strangeness of that reply, Harry is about to ask if Dudley's picked up a book of little kids' fairy tales or something (that would explain the extreme embarrassment), but the words are torn away in a gust of wind and strange inhuman giggles as his vision goes dark.
Harry blinks.
So does the man staring back at him. One of his exquisitely sculpted eyebrows slowly raising even above the exaggerated, painted arch of the other.
Harry blinks again, still confused as to where he is and how he got here and a little bewildered by the strange getup of the only other person-shaped being here. The Dursleys have always reacted very harshly to anything Harry said that was remotely fanciful, and it doesn't get more fanciful than the stranger staring back at Harry. Hair of various lengths teased absurdly big like a music video straight from the 80s like Dudley sometimes watches top off a fairly absurd outfit - a high collared sparkly cape, ruffles and knee boots and tights or tight pants. Really tight pants. Harry looks away quickly, partly to avoid laughing at the outfit as he imagines how Uncle Vernon would react to it and partly to take in the rest of the room. Said room is made of stone like an old castle you'd see on history programs on the telly. It's filled with quite a lot of small, strange creatures that don't look like any animal he's ever seen before and are still making odd giggling noises like those that happened just as he was whisked here. Several of them are wearing bits of armour or horned helms. Some of them just have their own horns. The centerpiece of the room is a huge rounded chair framed in gold that he suspects may be a throne from the size and position, though the design is rather crude. Off to one side is a large clock with thirteen rather than twelve hours on it.
"Um," Harry says, articulately, turning his attention back to find the man still staring at him.
"You are rather older than the children usually wished away to me," the man responds, though he addresses the room in general, rather than Harry directly. "And a wizard-child as well. What am I to do with you? Your kind can't become goblins."
"Er, sorry? What?" Harry feels stupidly out of his depth.
"This is the castle beyond the Goblin City. Your cousin wished you away to the goblins, and I am Jareth, King of the Goblins. In thirteen hours, if your cousin doesn't attempt to reclaim you and succeed by defeating my labyrinth, you'll be mine. Forever."
Well that sounds ominous, Harry thinks, his heart beating hard in his chest. He marshals his courage anyway to ask, "What, uh, what are you going to do with me?"
"You don't expect your cousin to try and save you? No words of confidence about how you'll surely escape?"
Harry shrugs, dismissing the man's slightly mocking tone and looks him straight in the eye. "Dudley won't care. Neither will Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon."
Considering how some of the teachers and other people have reacted to similar statements in his life, Harry almost expects the stranger to argue. Instead, he simply replies, "One of the truly unwanted, then. Well, we'll find you a place to belong. Obey the rules of my realm and no harm need come to you here. What's your name then, little wizard?"
"Harry. I'm Harry Potter. But that's the second time you've said that. What do you mean wizard?" Maybe he should be trying to bargain to save himself, or asking about what unspecified rules he's meant to obey, but his burning curiosity won't allow Harry to let the repetition of that strange label and all its possibilities pass.
"You truly don't know?" At least this so-called King of the Goblins doesn't seem angry at Harry for asking questions. That's something it's good to know up front, assuming that he really is in this strange place and not knocked out somehow and dreaming on the floor of the Dursley's front hall.
Harry shakes his head. "My Aunt and Uncle say magic doesn't exist."
The man laughs; it's not just a little chuckle, either, Jareth fully throws his head back and puts his whole body into expressing his mirth. The little creatures around the room burst into their own raucous uproar of laughter in echo. Harry smiles slightly, unable not to, but wishes that somebody would let him in on the joke.
"You stand in the castle of the Goblin King and proclaim that magic doesn't exist?"
"Erm." Okay, put like that, Harry supposes it does sound pretty stupid.
"Harry, Harry. I have so much to teach you." The grin that follows the statement is edged with enough mischievousness to concern Harry, but his trepidation is soon forgotten as Jareth begins his first lesson on magic, creating orbs from thin air.
Harry only knows that the official thirteen hours have passed from the tolling of a bell that rings through the castle deep enough to rattle his bones when the clock lands on the final moment of the final hour. As expected, neither Dudley nor the Dursley's ever made any kind of attempt to get Harry back. Jareth had showed him how he was keeping watch among other fascinating things. Harry had always dreamed of getting away from the Dursleys, but he can't help feeling one last pang deep in his heart that he'd never been enough for them to love. It's the last thought he spares for the life he is leaving behind.
Four years later, it's Sarah that escorts him to Diagon Alley when he gets the letter from Hogwarts Jareth had told him to one day expect as part of the explanation of what a wizard was. She's far more comfortable among the crush of people in the regular world than Jareth is. The goblins at Gringotts great him formally - and yet to his knowing eye, fondly - as Prince Harry. On the first full day at the school, he's not surprised the school's headmaster, Dumbledore, calls him into his office and suggests he should try to reconcile with the Dursleys. This, too, he'd been told to expect. Jareth wasn't a wizard himself, but he knew them and their magic well.
So Harry isn't worried when the subject comes up and the old man waxes lyrical about important bonds and the magic of family. Not at the start, and certainly not once the windows to Dumbledore's tower office blow dramatically open and Jareth wings inside in his owl form. This may be Dumbledore's domain, but Jareth and the rest of the family he has now did teach him many things over the years. Dumbledore has no power over Harry – none but what he grants.