Deathly Hallowed

The Tale of Three Brothers was not a legend. It was a warning. No one cheats Death. Luckily for Lily Potter, the promise of the Cloak's return in exchange for her son's life was a fair deal.

How does one hallow something deathly? To hallow is to make sacred, make holy, to venerate. To christen with death perhaps? How does that work? Who does it? The Wand, the Cloak, the Stone. I'm missing something, I'm sure of it. - Lily Potter

Dudley Dursely was seven years old when he realized that his cousin really was a freak. This revelation did not come easily. His mother insisted that the smaller boy wasn't normal and if Dudley wasn't careful he might catch it and then he wouldn't be normal either and then where would they be? But no matter how long or how hard Dudley stared at him after he had arrived, looking small and lost, Harry Potter didn't do anything strange.

Well. Harry did put ketchup on his eggs for breakfast but for some reason Dudley didn't think that was what his mom was talking about. But seriously though, who does that?

The black haired boy was okay, he supposed. He liked reading far too much, was scrawny, wore glasses and thought Superman could beat Batman, but he wasn't bad. However it seemed like every time he even thought about being nice to the other boy, his mum's voice would get all high pitched and loud and it just wasn't worth it. They kicked him out of the house after breakfast anyway.

The little bugger was fast though.

"C'mere Four-Eyes," Eddy sneered and Dudley rolled his eyes. He'd used that one to exhaustion already. It got old. "Just give it back and this won't get ugly!"

"He's gone, moron," he said, eyeing the trees. Everyone knew that if you let Harry get to the forest, you weren't going to catch him. "He won it fair and square anyway." That was another thing; his cousin was absolutely brilliant at card games. He'd have to ask Harry if he could play with his newest Wolverine action figure later.

"He cheated!" Eddy snarled, bunching up his fists. "He wins all the time! There's just no way!"

"Hey, man," Thomas, one of the older boys started to look around nervously. "It's getting kind of late and I'm technically grounded so…" The dam broke and all the other kids started making excuses for why they needed to go home too. Eddy's family was the wealthiest in the neighborhood. Everyone wanted to be his friend if only so they could get invited to his birthday parties. Last year, his parents had taken everyone out for laser tag in London.

Or so he'd heard. Harry had been sick that day and Aunt Lily made him promise that he'd look out for him. Harry never like Eddy anyway.

Disgusted, Eddy spat at the ground. "Fine, ok, I'll see you guys tomorrow," and then under his breath "I still say he cheated."

Dudley snorted. "It's your own fault." He knew from experience that accusing Harry of cheating just got him really hacked off. "I gotta go find him, see ya."

"Later, Dursely."

Easier said than done.

Usually, Harry just disappeared into the forest, and then when the rest of them skived off Dudley would just call him out and they'd go home for supper. Dudley had stood there for what must have been at least ten minutes feeling stupid shouting at shrubs and tree trunks before venturing into the forest himself.

"Harry!"

The sun was hanging low in the sky, a deep pink that filtered through the leaves and left spots of red on the ground. It was quiet. Dudley tried straining his ears to hear something, anything, but his own footsteps. Nothing. A crinkled brown leaf and a few dust motes swirled lazily in the air as he watched.

There wasn't even wind.

"Harry?" A clearing. Full of dead leaves and stripped branches and Harry's bright green top stood out among the endless brown. "Harry, come on. We gotta go home." The other boy looked like he was slumped against a particularly gnarled and dead looking tree and Dudley frowned. What was he doing, sleeping? "Harry?" he called again, louder.

A chill ran down his spine as he crept closer. Details popped up. Harry's left shoe was half way off, its red shoelaces loose. Some pine needles dusted the boy's shoulders and a pine cone was nestled in Harry's hair, looking like it had just dropped from the sky onto him. And Harry's head was twisted in an odd direction.

"Harr-" His cousin's green eyes were still open behind the frames of his glasses. A broken branch. Harry's head. Blood was sluggishly dripping. Face frozen in a rictus of surprise and pain. Dudley stumbled backwards trying to get away from that blank stare and nearly threw up on himself.

He's dead.

His first instinct was to run. Dad would be home soon. He would know what to do. He always knew what to do.

He's dead. Your cousin is dead.

His second was to pull on his cousin's body, free him from the tree. He didn't actually see if the branch really was in Harry's head, there was always a chance he could be ok. They could call the hospital and he'd be ok.

He's dead. You're supposed to look after him. Aunt Lily asked you to. It's your fault.

"Harry?" Dudley could barely hear his own voice. He couldn't just leave Harry here. But the very thought of touching the body made his skin crawl. This wasn't like when the boys had come across the cat that had been hit by a car, stiff on the side of the road. They had poked it with sticks for what seemed like hours and even then it had given him the creeps.

This was Harry.

Dudley took a deep breath and then screamed at the top of his lungs. "HARRY!"

The body jerked. The branch came free with a slight squelching noise as Harry fell backwards and landed on the leaf surface with a thud.

Dudley stared.

"Harry?"

The body groaned. "Dud? Wha-" Harry's limbs moved erratically and he heard the other boy hiss. "My head…"

"Don't touch it!" The sheer vehemence in his tone caught them both off guard. "You…" Dudley wasn't entirely sure what to say. "You've got a hole in your head," he finished lamely. Now that Harry wasn't right up against the tree, it was a really obvious puncture wound. The blood had congealed, almost black, and crusting around slivers of wood. He couldn't tear his eyes away.

"Oh," Harry said quietly. "Is it bad?"

"It-it's pretty nasty looking, yeah. You've got wood in it."

Harry sat up gingerly. "Do I have to go to the doctor? Is it bleeding a lot?"

Harry," Dudley said carefully, retrieving his cousin's sneaker and kneeling down next to him. "I think you died. It-It looks really bad." He tried to demonstrate how big the hole was by making a circle with his fingers. "It's this big and there is a lot of blood." He swallowed. "A lot."

"Oh." Harry reached up and despite Dudley's protests, prodded at his forehead. "It doesn't hurt that bad anymore."

"What happened?"

Harry flushed a little. "I tripped." He moved on quickly. "We gotta get home before your dad does."

"Mum's gonna flip when she sees you," Dudley pointed out, watching Harry get up with hawk like precision, ready to jump in if it looked like he needed help. "I think you're gonna have to sneak in."

"Bugger."

Both boys made the walk home in silence.

Number 7 St. Edward's Lane was a handsome house among handsome houses, with its own flair and appeal to audacity. Most of it was a deep red, interspersed brick and siding with highlights of green that perfectly matched the shade of Petunia Dursely's bane: climbing vines that scrawled up the right side of the house. Every wall more than two feet across had a window and at the very top was a little tower typical of the Victorian style. The garden was prize winning, the sidewalk was tidy and not one thing was out of place.

Perfect. Impressive. Spacious. Normal.

Had any of their neighbors looked out their windows just then, they might have seen a black haired boy prop a ladder against the side of the house leading to a second story window. They would have seen him wait around for a few minutes before that window opened from the inside and seen him scamper up the ladder into the house.

And then a few minutes later, see a larger blonde boy come out, yelling something to his mother about having left a toy outside, to take the ladder down and stash it back in the shed before running back in through the front door.

Dudley and Harry had it down to a science.

"Owwww…."

They were in the bathroom trying to clean out Harry's head wound with the shower head and some tweezers. It was just like the time Harry had tried Dudley's skateboard on a hill and wiped spectacularly at the bottom, except not, because there was no easy way to explain a hole in the head. They had certainly tried to come up with a working excuse why it really wasn't as bad as it looked. But then Harry mentioned he could see bits of his skull in the mirror so he was certain Petunia could too.

They gave up.

"Stop moving!"

The first time Dudley had broken off some dried blood and watched it swirl down the drain, he had thrown up. The second time he did it, Harry threw up. The third time, they both gagged. They kept at it.

"But it hurts!"

"Ok, got it." With a small plop, a wood splinter was dropped into the toilet. Dudley took a step back and eyed his handiwork critically. "I think it's smaller now."

"Let me see." Harry straightened from underneath the flow of water and stepped onto the stool in order to peer into the small bathroom mirror. He turned his head this way and that, pinkish water dripping down his face. "I can't see bone anymore, that's good right?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Dudley said snappishly. "Get down, I still have a few more."

Once he gave the pass, Harry dabbed a cotton swab with alcohol. Aunt Petunia usually used the white and red bottle downstairs with io-something in it, but it was in the top cupboard and none of them wanted the adults to ask just why Dudley wanted to get into the first aid kit. Harry insisted that he read alcohol was good to use too, so his cousin left him to it, being sure to only smile a little when Harry's eyes bugged out.

"It burns! Ow, ow, ow, ow…."

Dudley wrapped his head with makeshift bandages they mutilated a shirt with scissors for. "I'll get you food, ok?"

"Thanks, Dud."

During supper, his mum only glanced at the empty spot on the table, lips thinning until they almost disappeared but she didn't say anything. His dad didn't even notice, having stopped in to get his plate, kiss him mum on the cheek and ruffle his hair, before retreating to his study. Dudley picked at his food, pork chops, peas and mashed potatoes, uncertain.

If Harry was still out there slumped against that tree with a blank stare and broken glasses, how long would it have taken them to notice?

His mum didn't question him when he asked her to make a plate for Harry, putting one of the smallest pieces of meat on it and half as many potatoes.

"Now Dudley, Mrs. Pelletier is having a salon at her home tonight so I have to go. Be good, don't disturb your father, he's working hard tonight."

Dudley shoved some peas around. "He's always working hard," he muttered. He made a face when she kissed him, smelling like some kind of flower.

"Don't be like that. He wants you to have the best and Potter-" She checked the time and grabbed her bag. "Potter doesn't have anything to do with it," she finished hurriedly. "Be good." He knew she didn't really mean it. Be good. It was just something she said. She always tried to blame Harry anyway.

"Ok. Have fun, mum."

She stopped and gave him an odd, wistful look. "I will."

As soon as he heard the car drive away, Dudley dumped his uneaten food onto Harry's plate and carried it upstairs. Harry's room was at the far end of the hall and up a half flight of stairs, the smallest one in the house. Harry himself was lying on his bed, watching the ceiling and fiddling with his girlish piece of jewelry.

"It's pork chops tonight."

Harry turned his head a little. "Do you think she's ok?"

Dudley blinked and set the food on the small desk in the corner. There was really only one person he'd ask about like that. He wondered how it would feel to know your mum was out there, somewhere, sending letters to say she loved you but just couldn't be there for you yet. Not yet. Next week, next month. He thought he'd..he'd hate it. "It's been months. Hard to say." He shrugged and picked at an old scar on this thumb. "What brought this on?"

"I thought I saw her." His voice was very tiny. "Just for a bit, talked to me and everything."

"You mean while you were…"

"Yeah."

There was silence as Dudley tried to figure out what to say. "What about?" His own voice mimicked Harry's, becoming very quiet.

Harry rolled onto his side, propping his head up with a hand. His brow furrowed and Dudley could see a bit of red speckling the bandages on his head. "I'm not sure. Something about a door," he looked up towards the ceiling, chewing on his lip. "She kept saying I was too young, that I haven't even gotten my letter yet, and…" Harry was really thinking now. "Death is mine," he murmured.

Death is mine.

"What?" Dudley choked. That phrase pulsed in his head. "What?"

"She said death was mine, but the door, the door was still open and others could come through."

Dudley tried not to look as confused as he felt. "What others?"

"I don't know!" Harry flung himself back down onto his bed and flopped an arm across his eyes. After a bit, he lifted his arm just enough so that he could sneak a peek at his cousin. "Was I really dead?"

"You looked dead."

Harry prodded his forehead again. "That's so cool!"

The wound was gone by the very next day.

Harry Potter was eight and a half years old when he made his first magical friend. Granted, she was a girl and everyone knew that girls weren't as good as boys, but she could do magic. She also never tried to braid his hair or make him do girl things, so Harry was quite willing to make an exception. She was his age with black hair like him, eyes that were this really neat shade of blue and a wicked sense of humour.

Their first meeting hadn't exactly been the best but in Harry's defense, she had kind of come across like a know-it-all, messed with his Snake-Eyes action figure without permission and had broken his window.

Why'd she have to break the window?

"My window is broken," was the first thing that came out of Harry's mouth that morning. After a vaguely disturbing dream where he was watching a shed burn down and felt like something was watching him he'd woken up freezing with pieces of his window all over the floor.

Aunt Petunia was going to go absolutely bloody barmy.

"Why's my window broken?" Harry asked the room fuzzily, still half asleep.

"I do that, sorry" an unfamiliar voice said not sounding the slightest bit apologetic. "What's this?"

Harry looked out of half lidded eyes around his room and then snapped wide awake when he saw a girl with his collector's edition Snake-Eyes action figure in her hand. "Hey! Don't touch that!" He tried jumping out of bed in order to take it from her but ended up getting his foot caught in the sheets. He went down, pin wheeling his arms desperately, caught on to the girl and took her down with him.

Harry froze for a second, straining his ears. He expected to hear either his aunt or uncle getting up to investigate the noise. Nothing.

Whew.

"Gimme that," he hissed, swiping it from her hand before getting up.

"I was just looking at it!" she retorted and crossed her arms angrily. "What's wrong with that?"

"You didn't ask!" Harry snapped, gently placing Snake-Eyes back with his other GI Joe friends on the bookshelf. He painfully swallowed his first answer. His mother had gotten it for him. Everything else was fair game, but not these. Not even Dudley would touch these. "Who are you anyway? How'd you get in here?"

The girl rolled her eyes and Harry was struck by how blue they were. "What, you can't remember?" She huffed, still sitting on the floor. "I'm Thana, you're Harry."

"What do you mean, 'you're Harry?'" he said suspiciously, starting to get really irritated. "I don't know you."

She goggled. "You don't know your name?"

"Of course I know my name!" Harry could feel his face warm up and hoped he wasn't turning purple like Uncle Vernon. "Why do you know what my name is?"

She put a hand behind her and-Harry realized with a start- sunk into her shadow. It gathered around her arm and when she pulled her hand back it, it was clutching a small toy of a stuffed wolf. She placed it in front of him then looked up expectantly. "Well?"

Harry picked it up and looked over it. "It's a stuffed animal." He said flatly, trying to ignore just how she got it. That certainly wasn't normal. "What am I supposed to do with this?"

The girl flushed a fetching pink. "I think I liked you better when you could barely talk," she grumped before retrieving three other animal toys from her shadow. A black dog. A rat that squeaked when squeezed. A deer. She introduced them, pausing in between each name as if waiting for him to do…something. "Moony. Padfoot. Wormtail. Prongs."

Harry just stared. "Ok."

"I saved them, you know, from the house after…" she trailed off as she watched Harry put 'Moony' down with the other animals. "They're your favorite toys," she insisted.

Harry glared. "I don't play with stuffed animals," he sneered. "That's for girls and babies."

She glared right back at him. "Oh, so you play with dolls instead?"

He wasn't going to let that one slide. "They aren't dolls! They're action figures!"

"They are too!"

"They are not!"

"Are too!"

"Are not!"

At some point she had gotten right up in his face, blue eyes practically glowing. "Are too," she whispered.

"Are. Not."

She eyed him for a moment. "You're a right berk, you know that?"

"Are not," Harry said immediately, insulted. Her lips twitched. Once. Twice. She stepped back, giggling.

"Are too."

The knot of righteous anger in his chest eased. Now that he thought about, the argument was kind of funny…he felt himself smile slightly. "Are not."

She laughed out loud. "Let's start over, ok? I'm Thana. Wanna be friends?" She held out an expectant hand.

He took it.

"Blue octopus."

From that day on, the three of them were inseparable. Dudley would try his hardest to keep Harry out of trouble while Thana tried her best to get him into it and Harry enjoyed the attention from both of them. A certain clearing in the forest became 'their' spot, right under a large pine tree that had a shard of a low hanging branch sticking out. It still had blood on it.

"Go fish."

"Aww."

It had taken Dudley a while to accept the newest addition, turning a duo into a trio and he refused to tell Harry why he had so much trouble with that. Harry personally thought it was because she was a girl, so he made her promise not to try anything with their hair or makeup or play house or anything like that in front of Dudley. A man's promise, where they spit on their hands and shake too so he knew she was taking it seriously. She really wasn't like other girls. They all thought doing that was gross. She had seemed fascinated.

"Red crab."

"Go fish."

"Yellow starfish?"

"Go fish."

"You picked up two cards! Put one back."

"Sorry, purple octopus."

Sigh. "Here."

It had taken a lot of arguing over two weeks before Dudley agreed to let him tell Thana what happened that day with the tree. She had sat still through all of it, eyes as large as dinner plates. She asked a ton of questions but even as he satisfied her curiosity, he got the odd feeling that she knew all the answers already. Maybe not all of them, the fact that it had hurt had seemed like news, but everything else.

"Harry, got any blue crabs?"

"Go fish. Green jellyfish."

"Damn!"

Then she had showed Dudley her shadow trick and it was his turn to have big eyes. Harry had already seen it, of course, and that made him feel a little bit superior. He hadn't reacted like that. The feeling faded when he remembered that he had been a bit mean instead. He had pulled Thana aside afterwards and apologized. She laughed it off, saying that he owed her a game.

Weeks passed, and she had yet to call it in. Harry couldn't help but wonder what kind of game she meant, considering they had to teach her all of their games.

"Green starfish!"

"No. Go fish. Purple whale."

"Yup. Red crab?"

Dudley groaned as he handed the card over and Harry triumphantly laid out all his pairs. Thana fell backwards onto the leaf cushion of the forest floor, letting her cards spill out of her hands.

"That's the third time in a row!" She whined. Harry cackled as he collected his winnings: a Jolly Roger from each of them. Already he had Thana's Mars bar and ate half of her last cookie and Dudley's KitKat.

"I've never beaten him at cards," Dudley admitted sourly as he collected everyone's hands. "It doesn't even matter which game. He's just really lucky."

"Or you guys are pants at this." Harry laughed as Thana threw a handful of leaves at him. "I'm kidding!" He leaned back against the tree, casting an eye over the games they had brought with them. Several sandwich wrappers and empty juice boxes had been tossed carelessly into a trash pile off to the side along with a paper plate that had once carried a small batch of chocolate chip cookies.

Thana hadn't known what to do with the juice box until Dudley showed her and Harry had a sneaking suspicion that she never had cookies before either. Not for the first time, Harry wondered where she came from.

What kind of awful place didn't have cookies?

"We can play Monopoly." Dudley scratched a bug bite on his arm. "Or Jurassic Park. Harry's not gonna win those."

Harry swatted at a mosquito and ignored his cousin's jab. "Board games are always a bit long, do we have time before Uncle Vernon gets home?"

All three of them looked up at the sky. It was a darkening blue of summer with a hint of orange near the horizon. Every so often a bird call would sound out deeper in the forest, deep and warbling and a breeze kicked up around them. Dudley shook his head and started to wrap a rubber band around the Go Fish deck.

"I don't think so, Harry."

The boy nodded, brushing his hair out of his eyes. "Yeah, alright." He stuffed his candy into his pants and started picking up the games. "See you tomorrow, Thana." She helped pack up and followed them out of the forest to the edge of the street.

"Bye," Dudley started tromping down the street. Harry followed. "Today was fun."

Harry

The black haired boy stopped, and turned back to her. "Yeah?"

Thana had an odd half smile on her face. "You owe me a game, remember?"

Harry looked uncertainly down the street where Dudley was getting further and further away. "I have to go home for supper…"

"Not now, silly." She rocked back and forth on her heels. "I go hunting at night and I thought you might want to come along?"

"Hunting?" He'd heard some of the older boys talking about going on hunting trips with their dads and bragging about how wide the antlers were on some of the deer they killed, or how many pelts they got. "What are we hunting?" There was no way he was passing this up.

Her smile had widened at the word 'we.' "A bit of everything really. I'll get you."

Harry smiled happily. "Great! See you!"

She came to get him in the dead of night, tossing rocks through his still broken window and jerking him awake.

"Harry!"

He rushed to the window. "Shhh! Keep it down!" he said in a harsh whisper. "I'm up!" He ran a weary hand across his face. "Now?"

He could hear her giggle. "Come on, Potter!"

Turning away from the window, Harry sighed. This was weird. Shrugging, he got to it, putting on canvas pants and sneakers and a flannel jacket. He snuck downstairs, pressed tightly against the wall so that the steps wouldn't creak and nabbed an electric torch from underneath the sink. And then, after a second thought, grabbed a cookie and stuffed it into his mouth. Unlatching the front door, he slipped outside.

She met him at the side of the house, looking far to chipper. "Finally."

"What's this all about then?" Harry frowned slightly. For some reason, his torch light wasn't nearly as bright as it should have been. Were the batteries going? He jiggled it as a breeze tickled the air by his ears. No good. "Sorry," he muttered. "I'll get some fresh batteries-"

She stopped him. "It's alright. Look, I want you to meet my pets."

Harry raised an eyebrow at her. "So…we're going to your house?" This was really weird. If she wanted to show off a puppy or something, couldn't it have waited for a more reasonable time?

She rolled her eyes. "Just close your eyes for a sec."

Harry drew back, suddenly wary. "You aren't going to kiss me, are you?" Harry Potter didn't do kisses. And 'just close your eyes' was a suspicious line if he ever heard one.

Thana shrugged off the question. "Or you can watch." As she spoke, his light continued to dim until it was just a pin prick and the half-moon slipped behind a cloud. And then the shadows of his house moved.

"Wha-" Thana caught him as he tried to back away. Her grip was like steel.

Watch

They twisted, undulating and deepened, crawling, expanding. It slipped down from the side of the house like some thick liquid, pooling in front of them. A ripple spread across it like someone had thrown a pebble. Then another. Harry leaned forward as much as he dared, looking into it. It was dark and for a moment Harry felt like he would lean too far and fall forever into an abyss.

Listen

Something spoke. A deep reverb shook all the way through him. The surface of the pool became agitated, shifting.

Look

An eye opened gigantically within the shadow—a planet taking notice—and it saw him.

The pool erupted.

Things rose from it, almost canine shaped but when he tried to really look his vision blurred and the blood rushed through his ears. He could hear them barking, snapping, growling. The shadowy mess coagulated into three varying forms, dozens of eyes peered out at him and found him wanting.

"It's not a hunt without hunting dogs, right?" Thana said cheerfully. "War, Famine and Plague."

Harry swallowed. He was gripping his torch so tight he was surprised the plastic casing wasn't cracking under the pressure. "What are we hunting?" he whispered.

She laughed. "What else?"

She brought him to what must have been the scummiest part of London and he wasn't even sure how she did it. One moment he was outside of his house, the next moment there was a shade of black leaving his eyes and he was somewhere else. Her hand was firmly holding on to his shoulder and the…dogs were somewhere behind them from the sounds. She was looking around the alley curiously.

"Alright, there's this man that's dodged the coppers for years," she was whispering into his ear. "Murderer." Footsteps approached the alley. "Dumps the bodies here. I say we catch him ourselves."

Harry was shaking his head. This wasn't what he wanted. "No, no, no, no.."

The silhouette of an adult male appeared at the entrance to the alley way. Harry froze. Only his eyes moved as the man hauled something off his shoulders and dropped it onto the street. Job done, the man left and Harry could feel himself shaking. Thana let go of him and he stumbled forward.

It was a body.

A small body.

'No, no, no, no…" It was a girl with golden curls and still wearing footsie pajamas with red rabbits on them. One of the rabbits on her chest looked like it had exploded, red was everywhere. Harry couldn't breathe.

Harry.

He looked up. Thana jerked her head towards the alleyway exit. "He's getting away."

"Why?" Harry choked out. "Why would-."

"Do you want him to do this to someone else?" Thana snapped, irritated. "To another family?"

Go.

Harry was already moving.

One of the dogs ran beside him, wuffing as it nudged him. Its fur felt like solid ink and down feathers. It bumped him again.

"Get on!"

He rode with her dogs and he could feel how much they enjoyed the chase. They moved like greased lightning, from one shadow to another tracking the prey down. Warmth bubbled in his chest when they caught the scent, adrenaline rushed through him as they ran it down. Thana's laughter was infectious. He felt light headed and weightless, moving with them, like he could do anything.

Like a super hero, taking out the bad guys.

"I love being on this side!" Thana whooped loudly, riding War. Harry grinned at her.

She never let him watch the catch, distracting him with a touch or whisking him away to another location. They coordinated. He would take War and cut him or her off here…Plague was the fastest runner so it could carry Harry to here…Famine could double back and wait in ambush here…and every time one of Harry's plans succeeded he felt a rush of satisfaction.

Taking out the bad guys.

And he made sure it was only bad guys too. Making sure to ask before they marked someone for the chase:

What did they do?

Did they deserve it, having War, Famine and Plague hunt them down through the streets? Did they deserve being pursued by rippling and snarling shadows? The screams, wet tearing, pleading oh God what is that but he didn't think any of them actually died-The fear when they realized that something was out to get them?

Did they deserve it?

Harry wouldn't be able to pin down the exact moment Thana began to distract him before the chase as well. He wouldn't be able to tell when her answers to his questions started getting vague and generic until it could have described just about anyone. He didn't know why he was so in tune with the dogs, why they seemed to leak ever so slightly into him, when he felt flushed and breathed hard like he ran a marathon without moving. His pendant hung on his neck and shone brightly.

Did they deserve it?

Of course, of course. They all deserved it.

When he stumbled into his bed that night, the memories were already fading. He wouldn't be able to say what it was exactly their targets did, what was so terrible about them that justified the Hunt. Who they hurt, what they hid.

Or when he stopped asking and just enjoyed the ride.

And Death, being an accomplished liar, appeared to congratulate the brothers offering to give them a gift of their own choosing for being clever enough to evade him. The eldest brother, a combative man, asked for a wand more powerful than any in existence: a wand that must always win duels for its owner, a wand worthy of a wizard who had conquered Death!