Author: PoisonedChuugoku
Summary: Just as he was about to board the Hogwarts Express, eleven year old Hary Potter accidently bumped into a strange boy with stunning blue eyes and a smile that drew him in.
Features: Harry/Multi, Yaoi, Creature!Harry, Submissive!Harry, other species, OCs
Rating: T
Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. I do, however, own any OCs that might appear in this fic.
When he was a young boy, strange things would happen around him. Changing his teacher's hair blue, his own hair growing back over night after his aunt had cut it all off, small things like that. To his family, they weren't small things.
To his family, they were freakish.
He believed that his name had been Freak until the first day he went to primary school. That had been what his relatives had called him up until that point after all.
Little Harry Potter, treated as a slave within his own "home". Little Harry Potter, starved of affection and love. Little Harry Potter, who's history he did not know of aside from his life at the Dursleys'.
Over time, however, Harry became quiet and withdrawn. He never tried to seek attention, he never tried to get into trouble. He listened and hardly spoke.
But he did dream.
Harry dreamed of a large black dog that played with him, a dog he called "Pa'foo". He dreamed of flying broomsticks, smiling faces. However, he also dreamed of screams and green light. It frightened him. It scared him. But he couldn't tell anyone, now could he?
No, he couldn't. Because he was just a freak.
But in his dreams, a woman and a man were always present. They gave him smiles, holding him tightly as they whispered comforting words into his ears. "You aren't a freak," they would say, "You are simply different."
The woman was a beautiful red head with stunning green eyes, much like his own. The man, he noticed, looked almost exactly like him, glasses included. He always had a grin on as he made faces at him. Whenever Harry laughed, the grin seemed to get even wider. Harry never wanted these dreams to end.
Whenever he would wake up, he always felt something wet on his cheeks.
Tears? He was never sure.
But he always felt protected, happy, accepted whenever he had those dreams.
Every year on his birthday, Harry would get these dreams. He loved them and cherished them. But the dream on his tenth birthday was different.
In that dream, the man and woman were there. And they simply talked.
They talked about the word the Dursleys had forbade him from saying; magic. They spoke about the flying broomsticks and smiling faces. They spoke about the green light. And just when Harry was more frightened then he had ever been, they smiled and then spoke about the mark.
Harry never really acknowledged the mark. He accepted that it was a part of him, just like the lightning scar on his forehead.
The woman told him that the mark was a number (Harry knew that she spoke the truth since she had never lied to him before). The Roman numeral four was something that he knew from simply glancing at the Dursleys' clock on the fireplace mantle. She had then pointed to a similar mark under her own left eye; a crisp number one. She said that the mark couldn't be seen by anyone other than himself.
But that would all change on the night of his fifteenth birthday.
On the day of his eleventh, the woman told him to "take the envelope and hide it under your clothes so no one can see it. Then, once you've read it, run out into the front yard. And continue running. Don't look back". Harry couldn't ask why since the woman then patted him on the head.
The man had then said to him, "Don't stop running until you reach someplace far away. Then, simply call out for Lola. Don't be surprised when she comes to you". He hugged him and then the dream ended.
Harry couldn't remember what it was about when he woke up the next morning. However, several days before his eleventh birthday, everything changed.
There was the click of the letter-box and flop of letters on the doormat. Harry was at the stove and was just flipping the bacon when Vernon's voice rang out from behind his newspaper.
"Get the post, Dudley."
"Make Harry get it," Harry's cousin immediately replied as he pounded his Smelting's stick on the kitchen floor.
"Get the post, Harry," Vernon said, turning the page of his paper. With a quiet sigh, Harry made sure that the bacon wouldn't burn before turning and making his way to the front door, making sure to dodge Dudley's stick as he passed. Harry wrinkled his nose at the smell in the hall that came from the bathroom upstairs but quickly knelt beside the doormat and picked up the mail.
As he checked to see what was there, his heart stopped upon reaching the largest letter in the lot. No one, in his whole life, had ever written to him. Surely there was some kind of mistake. Yet, it was addressed so plainly and was clear as day.
Mr H. Potter
The Cupboard under the Stairs
4 Privet Drive
Little Whinging
Surrey
The envelope was thick and heavy as Harry held it. He felt as if it had the entire weight of the world's problems inside it. The address was written in an emerald green ink. There was no stamp. Harry turned the envelope over and saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger, and a snake surrounding a large letter "H".
"Hurry up, boy!" Vernon shouted from the kitchen. "What are you doing, checking for letter bombs?" Harry heard him quietly laugh at his own joke.
He felt a strange compulsion come over him and Harry hurriedly stuffed the large envelope under his even larger shirt. It used to be Dudley's and the green-eyed boy knew that his relatives wouldn't notice. He then returned to the kitchen, handed the bill and the postcard to his uncle before returning to the bacon on the stove.
Silently, he vowed to read the letter in the privacy of his cupboard later when the Dursleys' had fallen prey to sleep.
Petunia shut the cupboard door behind him just as Harry sat down onto his cot. With a click, his aunt then placed the padlock onto it before padding up the stairs to her and Vernon's shared room. Harry quietly turned to the clock on the only makeshift shelf inside the cupboard and waited.
Finally, half an hour after the Dursleys' had gone to sleep, the green-eyed boy took out the letter that he had hidden under his pillow and opened it.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore (Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Mr. Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.
Term begins on 1 September. We await your owl by no later than 31 July.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall
Deputy Headmistress
Harry couldn't move. He didn't know how long he sat there simply staring at the letter in his hands, the parchment crinkling under his fingertips as he shook, eyes wide. The letter fell from his grasp as he then pulled out the second parchment and read:
HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
Uniform
First-year students will require:
1. Three sets of plain work robes (black)
2. One plain pointed hat (black) for day wear
3. One pair of protective gloves (dragon hide or similar)
4. On winter cloak (black, silver fastenings)
Please note that all pupils' clothes should carry name tags
Set Books
All students should have a copy of each of the following:
The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1) by Miranda Goshawk
A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot
Magical Theory by Adalbert Waffling
A Beginner's Guide to Transfiguration by Emeric Switch
One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi by Phyllida Spore
Magical Drafts and Potions by Arsenius Jigger
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them by Newt Scamander
The Dark Forces: A Guide to Self-Protection by Quentin Trimble
Other Equipment
1 wand
1 cauldron (pewter, standard size 2)
1 set glass or crystal phials
1 telescope
1 set brass scales
Students may also bring an owl OR a cat OR a toad
PARENTS ARE REMINDED THAT FIRST-YEARS ARE NOT ALLOWED THEIR OWN BROOMSTICKS
Harry couldn't believe what he was reading. However, the dream that he had forgotten, the one from his tenth birthday, sent his thoughts spiraling as he remembered what those two were talking about. He took in a deep breath before raising a hand to the door.
When he was five, Harry had been almost starved within this very cupboard. That was the first time though that he had attempted to sneak out from within its confines to get food from the kitchen. It had taken a lot of practice, but he had found a way to unlock the padlock that his aunt and uncle had put on the door. He had been successfully several other times as well.
After taking a deep breath, Harry let his hand slowly slide down the door. His brow was crinkled in concentration. He smiled happily when he heard the soft click of the padlock when he unlocked it before slowly lowering it to the floor. Its landing on the carpet was quiet and wouldn't have alerted the Dursleys' of Harry's escape.
Harry cautiously opened the door, glancing back and forth before stepping out into the hallway. He took his blanket, made it into a backpack of sorts, and then grabbed all the things that were important to him; a few of Dudley's old toy soldiers, a few crayon stumps, and a small ball. He quietly tip toed to the kitchen and grabbed one of the loaves of bread before putting that in the makeshift backpack along with everything else. Then, he grabbed the papers from the letter, stuffed them back into the envelope, and was out the front door into the night.
He ran and ran and ran, never looking back once.
It was rather late at night when the great Albus Dumbledore's wards around 4 Privet Drive went off. The most powerful wizard of history rose from bed, picked up his wand from the bedside table, before turning them off with a wave. He then returned to sleep.
It would only be several hours later that Dumbledore would realize that Harry Potter was no longer within the confines of the wards. He would use tracking spell after tracking spell, but only when he reached a deserted alley did the trail vanish. His fears grew and grew as his attempts to find the young Potter heir failed. It was his only consolation that his devices told him that Harry Potter was alive.
Harry finally stopped running, hands falling to rest on his knees. He had run as far as he could from the Dursleys' house without so much as taking a deep breath. Now, he was under the impression that he could rest a little easier. But there was one thing that he still needed to do.
Standing up straight, he glanced around before opening his mouth.
"Lola!"