HARRY POTTER & THE DARKEST WAR
By Nick Garland
CHAPTER ONE: The Last Day
Harry Potter sat at the desk in his bedroom, scribbling notes frantically. It was his last ever day at number four, Privet Drive, where he had lived since he was a baby with his abusive Uncle Vernon; Aunt Petunia, his mother's sister; and Dudley, the Dursley's son, and the most obese and idiotic boy that Harry had ever known, but Harry was not saying farewell to the Dursleys (not that he wished them to); he had not even packed, for Harry Potter was thinking, planning… he sought Horcruxes, the mysterious artefacts endowed with parts of Lord Voldemort's soul, supplying the Dark Lord's immortality.
There was a thud at the door. Harry leapt up and repeated the spell he had seen Nymphodora Tonks use two years previously to instantly pack all of his belongings, when he was still a student at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry… before Voldermort's return and the death of Albus Dumbledore; before Harry Potter had to leave his girlfriend, leave his classmates, leave the Order of the Phoenix, all to search for four of Voldemort's Horcruxes (though one may have been destroyed) and then destroy the Dark Lord, only assisted by his fellow young wizards, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger.
There was a loud crack on the street outside and Harry looked up from a hastily sketched spider diagram of possible locations of Horcruxes. He rose and walked to the window, where he saw the tall, ginger-haired figure of his best friend, Ronald Weasley, standing on the pavement, clutching a very old-fashioned, and surely third or fourth hand, suitcase to his side. Ron wore a scruffy shirt and tie, which reminded Harry of how little wizards knew of the 'Muggle' world; Ron clearly had yet to master the art of doing up a tie, which, Harry recalled, was still something the 100 Muggle Dudley still struggled with, at the age of seventeen.
Beside Ron stood Hermione Granger, his girlfriend. Hermione wore, quite naturally, a pair of jeans and a warm coat, on the chilly morning; very chilly for July, but that was always the case, it had been for over a year now, since the Dementors of Azkaban betrayed the magical community and sided with the insidious Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters.
Harry opened the window and waved frantically as Ron approached the door. He mouthed 'don't' and bombed downstairs, trying to be as quiet as he could while sprinting, and slipped the door open slowly. He didn't fear Vernon Dursley's wrath anymore, but he definitely preferred not having to have a heated conflict with the man.
"H…" Ron opened his mouth to greet his friend, but Harry clapped a hand over his friend's mouth and gestured upstairs. Hermione nodded and Ron put his thumbs up, so the trio crept quietly upstairs and into Harry's room. There, they shut his trunk; seized the cage containing the snowy owl Hedwig; and crept downstairs.
"Where are you going, boy?" Came a positive hiss from the living room. Uncle Vernon stood watching them, red-faced, as Ron's hand rested on the door knob, "What are they doing in my house?"
"I was just leaving," Said Harry, oh so calmly, "For good. Unless you want me to stay? I can perform magic outside school tomorrow… and these two are already seventeen."
Harry spun his phoenix feather wand lazily and tossed it, catching it and slipping it into his trouser pocket.
"Well…" Vernon started angrily, but instantly lost his nerve. He merely said, "Then get out, boy. As though we'll miss you!"
Harry Potter smiled for the first time in months as Ron threw the door wide open, and the terrified face of Dudley Dursley peered around the corner.
"Shazam," Harry said, pointing his wand vaguely at Dudley, before coolly slipping out of the door, hefting his trunk, while Ron carried Hedwig.
"Well," Hermione smiled grimly, "It's off to Bill and Fleur's wedding, and then…" She stopped speaking. None of them wanted to discuss what would come after that… Harry tried to smile reassuringly, but was sure his face appeared to be more of a somewhat fearful grimace. It was time, he knew; time to head out into the wizarding world, away from the Dursleys and their abuse; away from Uncle Vernon's wrath, Aunt Petunia's snotty, but quiet, loathing, and Dudley's childish tantrums.
And then it happened. The nightmare was happening all over again. Evil was on Privet Drive; Harry could feel it, the dark magical aura; like a sixth sense.
"Something's wrong," he said, "We're not alone. We have to get out of here!"
"Harry, what do you mean?" Asked Hermione, "There's no one here… look." And she silently cast the Lumos spell, illuminating the area with her wand tip. No one and nothing threatening seemed to be around.
"We're not alone," he repeated, confidently, "Disapparate… get out of here. I need to…"
"Harry… come on!"
Harry did not move. Instead, he dived down, whipping his wand out a bolt of green magic shot through exactly where he had been standing a millisecond before.
"Who's there?" Gasped Ron.
"Get out of here!" Harry ordered his friends, just before he bellowed, "Expelliarmus!"
A jet of red light illuminated the dark night as it knocked a dark, hooded and cloaked figure flying. Harry ducked, as a second curse sailed at him.
"They're using the killing curse, Ron! Disapparate, for God's Sake!" He yelled, firing off the Impedimenta jinx, to little effect, as his shot was blocked by a familiar-looking enemy, "RON!"
Ron ducked to avoid a skimming hex, then shook his head frantically, as Hermione cursed a Death Eater.
"I'm not leaving you, Harry," Yelled the ginger-headed, lanky young man, aiming his wand rapidly.
"Ron!" Harry saw a bolt of green rocketing at his friend. He ran, stumbled, tripped… and dived, pulling Ron down, "Apparate!"
Harry heard a crack and felt his insides writhing; then he opened his eyes wide, panting. The trio stood at the front of a familiar, ramshackle building; the Burrow. But now it was deserted and wrecked. The door had been blasted in, the house ransacked. When once it was a bright, cheerful; now it was chaos.
"We have to get word to the Order," Hermione said, "Or else…"
There was a shout. They're here! Harry gasped… out of the frying pan, and into the fire! It had been a trap!
Four huge, shrouded wizards loomed over them, wands aimed.
"Stop," Harry whispered, "Let them go. You want me, not them."
"Harry…" muttered Ron, "Look…"
Hope was restored in Harry Potter like fire roaring up in its hearth, as six figures appeared in one conjoined crack! Remus Lupin, Tonks, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Alastor 'Mad Eye' Moody, Professor Minerva McGonagall and Rubeus Hagrid were suddenly there; the first five with their wands raised, Hagrid clutching his pink umbrella in one hand and a club in the other!
"'Arry!" He yelled. Harry was stunned to see his old friend in battle- Hagrid wasn't allowed to use magic by law, for he had been expelled from Hogwarts fifty years previously, having been framed for opening the Chamber of Secrets and releasing the monster of Salazar Slytherin, "Get outta here!"
Hagrid fired a hex, roaring:
"Impedimenta!"
"Hagrid!" Harry roared, diving down to knock a Death Eater reeling away into the aim of Lupin, who knocked the dark wizard out with a nifty 'stupefy' spell.
"Run, dammit!" One of the Death Eaters was hollering, and Harry recognised the voice, with a jolt of horror…
"Lucius Malfoy!"
Moody was upon Malfoy in seconds, firing off a curse that Harry didn't recognise; something resembling a silver fireball. Malfoy dodged and dived to avoid a second shot.
"Ya can't escape me, Lucius," Called Mad-Eye, and then a hex knocked him reeling from behind and Malfoy and a tall, robed figure was running, "That's Augustus Rookwood! He should be in Azkaban… so should Malfoy!"
Lupin and Tonks were examining the two fallen Death Eaters worriedly. It was Lupin who spoke:
"And these… Rabastan LeStrange and Walden McNair… all of these should be imprisoned…"
"The Ministry's failed us," Croaked Moody, "This calls for desperate measures."
But Harry never got to hear of the manic old auror's 'desperate measures', as he, Ron and Hermione were shepherded away by Lupin, as Moody and the other Order of the Phoenix members hastily discussed these measures.
Harry felt a pang of annoyance. He was seventeen tomorrow! HE was the so-called Chosen One to kill Voldemort! He should…
"Harry," Lupin sighed, "We'll tell you everything in good time. Just sit tight." He smiled slightly, reassuringly. Harry nodded, resisting the urge to protest, "For now, we are all going to apparate you back to Grimmauld Place, where we believe some of your other friends await you."
"Who?" Harry was puzzled; surely Ron and Hermione were the only people relevant to the Order, or the Death Eaters, and Lupin clearly didn't refer to other Weasleys.
"Mr. Longbottom and Miss Lovegood, Harry," Lupin looked at him, surprised, "Had you not heard? Both of their guardians are… missing. Presumed dead. Voldemort is striking at you on all sides, Harry."
Harry couldn't believe it. He felt guilty. So guilty. He had brought Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood into this… and now they were like him; without true family. What had he done? Harry wasn't sure what he could ever say to them…