Raisa worked very quickly and the car was unloaded in no time. Vernon and Petunia treated her as if she had a deadly and contagious disease. Indeed, they regarded Raisa in much the same way they did Harry. They were even leery of the luggage she brought in, looking at it as if it might explode. Vernon carried very little. Dudley carried his own luggage in. After watching Raisa for several minutes, he decided that Harry would have helped, so Dudley helped to carry the luggage up to the rooms. Two bedrooms had been given to the Dursleys. After everyone had been settled in, there were two spare bedrooms left. Dudley was quite impressed by the size of this house. He had never been in one quite this big.

There were mountains of books in every room. "The Most Arcane Arte of Alchemie" by Nicholas Flamel sat upon a table at the back of the living room with several notebooks. "Learn to Speak Gobbledegook In Twelve Easy Lessons" by Grosnok sat atop one of the book piles. Some of the books had subjects on the covers that were moving, such as "The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore", by Rita Skeeter, the cover of which featured the very wizard that had so imposingly visited the Dursleys during the previous summer.

Most of the books that Dudley saw were about alchemy: "The Alchemist: Water and Fire" by Hermes Trismegistus, an updated translation by Bathilda Bagshot was also prominently displayed. "The Philosopher's Quest" also by Nicholas Flamel, sat beside this last book. A sign that hung upon a locked door in the east section of the house read, "My Lab. Trespassers Will Be Toad."

Everybody was assembled in the living room. Vera sat upon the red velvet couch in the center of the room. Dedalus sat upon an armchair nearby. Hestia stood in a corner, while Vernon and Petunia stood in the middle of the room, looking like trapped animals. Dudley was to busy examining the peculiar books to be interested in anything else. He couldn't recall ever having been interested in books in his life, but if his parents had provided him with books bearing titles like "Dragon Taming for the Student, Enthusiast, and Professional", he just might have become an avid reader.

"Well," said Magellan, walking through the front door, "welcome to my humble abode, all of you. I expect that we will all quickly become the best of friends." Vernon snorted. "Dinner is in one hour. If you wish to go to your rooms, they have already been prepared." He walked briskly out of the room.

"I think the Dursleys may all need something to calm their nerves," said Hestia, startling everybody. She was so well concealed in her corner that it was easy to forget she was there. With her wand, she drew six glasses in the air and filled each of them with an amber liquid. Five of them flew across the room, one to each person present. Hestia took the last glass for herself. "It's just a bit of mead." She glared indignantly at Vernon and Petunia, who were cowering from glasses.

Dudley elected to try it. Taking a sip of the sweet liquid, he found it warmed his insides quite pleasantly. He continued to browse the books around the room. He hardly noticed Vera walk up behind him.

"You're not what Harry described," she said.

Dudley felt his face go red. "I used to be," he said quietly.

"Oh? Why is that?"

"I don't know. I guess I still am, a little bit. I wasn't very nice. A bit of a jerk, actually." He finally looked around. "You weren't what I expected. Well, you see what my parents are like, I s'pose you can guess what I expected."

"We're all raised with our parent's prejudices. It takes a better man to leave them behind. My parents were Muggles. They came here from Saudi Arabia years ago. My brothers hadn't even been born. I have two older brothers and one younger sister. My sister and I each got a note from Hogwarts. Me mum said it was unnatural. Me dad said it was an abomination. Professor Dumbledore was so nice. He explained why it was better that I go to Hogwarts, that it's dangerous to try and make the magic go away. Eventually they accepted it. Well, actually I should say they accepted that I really had to learn how to control it. They never really accepted me or my sister again. I suppose I'm lucky that they loved me enough not to turn me away." She grinned quite broadly. "Why am I telling you this?"

Dudley suddenly felt embarrassed, but he didn't know why. "One of my friends says that it's good to talk about things that bother you. It helps you feel better."

"I expect that your parents would cringe at the first three sentences I said."

Dudley laughed, but said nothing. He picked up a book called "Quintessence and the Sorcerer's Stone" and thumbed through the pages. "My parents were always afraid of this stuff. So did I. I never knew what Harry did was magic until that big bloke told me. He was ten feet tall and had black hair like a rag mop."

"Hagrid."

"Mum and dad told me that Harry would do all these awful things to me once he knew how."

"But he never did."

Dudley shook his head and continued to read what he could. He found that he stumbled over a number of the larger words. The pages were of a thick type of paper with lines in the material, more like a cloth than paper, but the language wasn't quite so archaic. Dudley found it at least comprehensible.

"The Philosopher's Stone, otherwise known as the Sorcerer's Stone, is the ultimate goal of the alchemist; that one perfect substance that hovers just beyond grasp. It is the ultimate element, the element that is all things and yet is the basic thing that all things come from. It is a paradox, believed to be unachievable. The alchemist can achieve miracles without the waving of a wand, without the use of an incantation, without the imbibing of a sweet or bitter potion and he that finds his ultimate goal shall find him master of all elements and shall have no need for magic. For alchemy is the non-wizard's magic and it is greater than magic."

Dudley closed the book and said, "So alchemy isn't magic?"

Vera shrugged, "You're asking the wrong one. I never got into it."

Dudley's imagination had already carried him away. His parents had always hated imagination and so always hated magic. Dudley always thought that it was because magic users were more dangerous, but he came to think there was a deeper reason. His father had always been obsessed with his public image and his mother had always vehemently supported his hatred of magic, but now Dudley wondered if perhaps, his mother wasn't a bit jealous of Lily. How would she feel if another of her flesh and blood were to follow that dreaded path? The phrase "the non-wizard's magic" swam back into his consciousness and Dudley became enamored of a sudden, dangerous, rebellious idea. After all, why couldn't he do magic? It all had to be a matter of mind and if there was a way to do it without wands and spells, then why not?

Later that evening found the house guests in the main dining room and seated before a meal of cottage pie, toad-in-the-hole, with various vegetables and a dessert of spotted dick. The meal was accompanied by mugs of something called butterbeer. A chandelier hung from the ceiling with a hundred candles lit. The walls were drab green and there were two china cabinets each containing expensive silver sets and porcelain dishes. The table was long enough to comfortably seat twice as many people as who were there.

Vernon and Petunia sat stiffly, eating slowly, and cautiously. Vernon took his first bite of toad-in-the-hole as though expecting poison. He and Petunia were actually half way through their meal before they became comfortable enough to eat normally. The atmosphere uncomfortably formal as muggles looked to witch and wizard and vice versa with equal trepidation. Dudley exchanged glances with Vera, who found the whole situation quite as amusing as he did.

Magellan was the first to break the silence. "Well we're a lively bunch tonight. Who's funeral are you all attending?" Everybody sat rigid in their seats, not willing to look Magellan in the eye. "Now honestly, Mister and Missus Dursley, Hestia; the three of you don't even know each other. Can't you try learning to like each other?"

Petunia looked scandalous. "It's...it's..."

"Unnatural? Petunia, does it not occur to you that your behavior might not be just a bit bigoted. How would you act in the presence of a group of people of different race and color? Please. Everybody is just trying to get through the day, just like you, magic or no magic."

Petunia bit her lip, looking very much like she wanted to argue, but an expression of shame very briefly flitted across her face. This seemed to enough to stop her from retorting. Indeed, she simply looked down in her plate, as though it was consoling her of some deep disappointment.

"Mister Haydn," said Dudley, "Is there Missus Haydn?"

"That's the spirit! Start a little mealtime chitchat!" said Magellan. "There used to be, Dudley, but there hasn't been for a long time, and please, Mag or Magellan will do fine."

Dudley ignored the looks of horror that his mother and father were shooting in his direction. "Who were those people that attacked us?"

Magellan smiled broadly. "Ah, that lot there. Those were Death Eaters. New by the looks of them. Voldemort has probably been filling his ranks." Dedalus and Hestia flinched at the mention of the name. Vera glanced around nervously. "Lord knows we killed enough of his followers in the old days that he'd have to."

Hestia said, "The woman was Abigail Bulstrode. Don't know the other two. Bulstrode, as I understand it that she was trying to join You-Know-Who's ranks back in the old days. I went to Hogwarts with her and You-Know-Who fell before I even made it through my fourth year. Bulstrode would have been too young for the Death Eaters then. Me mum was in the Order of the Phoenix and I was determined I was going to fight, too. Didn't happen."

"So Dudley," said Magellan, "what about you? I understand you're a somewhat talented boxer." Dudley must have failed to conceal his surprise because Magellan said, "Mad-Eye likes to know everything he can about the people the Order is going to be looking after. He acquired your school records." He pulled a pocket watch out and looked at it with a concerned expression on his face. "Speaking of Mad-Eye, we should have heard from him by now."

He replaced the pocket watch. Next, Vera engaged Dudley in conversation. Apparently her brother was quite a skilled boxer and she expressed a hope that Dudley could meet him. Vernon and Petunia were eying their son in a most venomous manner and it was obvious that they didn't approve of Dudley's interaction with the wizards or witches and even less so in the way Dudley fawned over Vera.

After dinner, Dudley found his room and Vernon and Petunia entered behind him. "We'd like to talk to you son," said Vernon. He looked uneasy, as if he was trying to find a way to tell a friend that he was dying. "Well, you know that we disapprove of this-er, what I mean is that...this lot, they're not like us, Dudders."

"Diddydum, what your father is trying to say is that-"

"Is that you hate them as much as you hate Harry. That's it, right?" Dudley stared at each of them blandly.

"No, no, no," Petunia said, having gone quite pale, "we didn't hate Harry. It's just that...well...the things he did, they were...well...unnatural and you know that in any respectable family, such unnaturalness cannot be tolerated."

"Ah," said Dudley in a voice of dawning comprehension, "so you were just more concerned about your image than in the welfare of my cousin."

"Everything we did was for his welfare!" Petunia was indignant.

"Son, how can you say that?" Vernon had become quite as pale as a ghost.

"No, it was for your welfare. Why else would you call your sister a freak?"

Vernon and Petunia looked quite affronted. They looked at each other and then glared at Dudley for several seconds. Vernon finally said, "Now look, Dudley, when all of this is normal, things are going to go back to normal, right?"

"Sure. You'll go back to having a nephew you hate and I'll go back to barely scraping a pass in high school. Harry'll be free to do what he wants, being of age and all." He turned around and began pulling cloths out of his suitcase. "Maybe you'll have me selling drills, like you."

"It's kept a roof over your head."

"Now, Vernon," said Petunia, "don't get your temper up. Our Diddydum won't be foolish enough to actually get close to these freaks."

"What about that girl?" Vernon snarled. "Dudley, we have never been hard on you. We have made sure you had the best of everything, and that said, it's time you considered what's due your family."

"I guess Harry didn't count as family," said Dudley.

"Just what is this? You've never sounded off like this before. What is bothering you, Dudders?"

Dudley began to throw cloths into the drawer of a large dresser on the wall away from his bed. "Nothing. I'm tired. I want to get some sleep."

His parents looked as if they wanted to say something more, but accepted the dismissal, leaving and closing the door behind them. Dudley pulled out his weights and began to do some curls. He could hear his mother and father talking but couldn't make out what they were saying. Sometimes, Dudley wished he could do magic. If he could, he would change a great deal. These days when he looked in the mirror, he couldn't find the handsome young boy that his mother doted on. All he saw was somebody resembling a beached whale. Had he always looked like that? That would be the first thing he would change.

Then he realized that magic wouldn't change those things he wanted to change most. He and his friends were nothing more than street gang terrorizing Magnolia Crescent. He was a hooligan that closely resembled a walrus. What chance would he have at romance? He set the weights upon the floor with a thud. Falling upon the mattress, he noted that it was very comfortable but could not keep his mind off these depressing thoughts. He stared up at the ceiling, which was black with glowing stars painted upon it.

Harry was at the foot of his bed and told him that he had better hope the rescuers get him to the ocean soon. Dudley jumped in surpise and found himself flopping helplessly upon a beach with people pushing him. Magellan showed up with his bus and hooked Dudley to it, saying, "Here's how you do it," and then drove into the ocean, where Dudley was finally happy and free, until he realized that he couldn't swim. Vera stood at the shoreline and held out Harry's broomstick, which disintigrated when Dudley touched it. She grabbed him and started pulling him. Then she started shaking him. Why was she shaking him? She shook harder and Dudley found he was staring into the face of Magellan's house elf, Raisa.

"Wake up, sir," she said in a squeaky voice. "Your breakfast is ready." As Raisa left, Dudley fell back to the mattress and looked up at the starry ceiling. Sunlight poured in from the windows, which revealed plains surrounded by woods. Grudgingly, he got up. As he had fallen asleep in his clothes, he opted to change into something fresh. He took a quick bath and decided to put on one of the smart outfits his mother usually bought for him.

Sleep had not improved Dudley's mood. Indeed, he was quite sure that this was earlier than he usually woke for summer vacation, and indeed, during school. He drew a curtain and clearly saw that the sun hadn't even risen. He cursed under his breath and stalked downstairs.