Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of it's characters.
Warnings: None
This story is part of the A Bond of Family series, but can be read alone.
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Vernon Dursley had always prided himself on being scared of nothing. At least he wasn't scared of any natural things. The whole freakishness that possessed his wife's unnatural sister and offspring did not count as a natural thing. Unnatural things were freaky and not normal and thus Vernon was in his good right to be frightened by it.
And that is why he felt himself entitled to wave this one fear he recently found himself overwhelmed with again away.
After all, if a rifle couldn't make a difference against the giant freak, how could he ever hope to stand up against THAT man? The one man capable of making Vernon feel like an annoying fly on the wall, waiting to be squashed. The man with the piercing eyes, whose cold gaze froze Vernon's entire being. The man who's voice had brought him such terror.
And it weren't even the words he had spoken that had terrified Vernon so. He was used to being threatened by wannabe bullies. But Vernon had never been afraid of those. After all, he himself was the biggest bully of them and darn proud of it.
But this one man's voice did not give just worthless threats. His tone gave a promise. A promise of pain. Not a simple and easily ignored harmless threat but a sure promise of bodily harm if he did not heed his warning. And that had terrified the otherwise fearless Vernon Dursley till he very core.
For how could this twig of a man, who Vernon would be able to crush with his bare hands, be so sure of what he could do to a man like Vernon that he was capable of making such a threat, that promise.
Only one of those freaks could, one of those unnatural lot.
And if Vernon could save his own skin by keeping a low profile around that man…no…he wasn't even a man yet when Vernon had last seen him. A mere teenage boy had managed to do what even the biggest bullies in the neighbourhood hadn't been able to do. A mere boy with piercing grey eyes that radiated power and such a dark promise of pain upon staring at him the day his wife's sister and her friends had come help clean our their childhood home after their parent's death. A boy whose quiet voice had uttered those words, his tone would have easily cut through steel.
"Call him freak ever again and I will rip you apart."
Vernon had wet his pants in that exact moment and the boy had merely huffed in distain at his humiliation before turning back to the brown haired boy Vernon had just moments before uttered the word freak to, as if Vernon was no longer worth noticing.
It had been fifteen years since that day and Vernon had never seen that boy again, believing him to have been killed in the same so called war that got the boy's parents killed and had saddled him with the freak child. Fifteen years in which he had not thought about that boy until the boy had held that slip of unnatural paper and uttered those words.
"He was my mum and dad's best friend. He's a convicted murderer, but he's broken out of wizard prison and he's on the run. He likes to keep in touch with me, though...keep up with my news...check if I'm happy..."
Vernon had known. Had been absolutely sure just who this godfather was and suddenly realized something.
The previous summer a man had escaped and Vernon had known the man had looked familiar. Not the face that had been beyond recognition of the eerie beauty it had once held. But those piercing grey eyes that stared right through to him.
He hadn't been able to place them back then, for he didn't know any criminals and it had been fifteen years.
But now he knew.
He also knew that if a mere nasty word could get him a promise of harm, directed at a scarred friend, what would he do if he heard the same word being uttered to his godson. A godson he'd check on to see if he was happy, a godson he cared for.
Convicted murderer.
Vernon had no doubt that the man had been convicted for the murder of someone who meant harm to his friends. Possible even the one who had gotten the freak's parents killed. Though Vernon had never seen the boy again outside that one occasion, he had no doubt that the man that boy had become was even more dangerous than he had been as a teenager. And if that teenager had managed to terrify him so deeply, who knew what the adult version of him would be capable of.
Vernon did not think he ever wanted to find out.
If anything, he just found himself lucky that he had never actually hit the boy left with them. Had threatened, sure, but the mere memory of that boy's promise had stopped him and for that he was now glad as he vowed to himself to never give that man any reason to come anywhere near number four Privet Drive.
No reason at all.
After all, Vernon Dursley had always prided himself of being a fearless man. Unnatural things like THAT man were not natural and there for Vernon did not believe it counted.
But just to be sure, he'd make sure he'd never give that man any reason to come anywhere near number Four Privet Drive.
And if it meant giving the boy a reason to be happy he'd just tell himself he only did it to get rid of him early for a year.
After all, it would not do for Vernon if that man heard the boy was unhappy.
It wouldn't do at all.
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I wrote this on the bus after having re-read Goblet of Fire and wondering just why Vernon never questioned if Harry might have lied about Sirius. He must have had some kind of evidence of what Sirius was supposedly capable of for him to believe Harry's words so easily. This is the result of that wondering.