Harry Potter – Hunter
By : Andor Swiftblade
Disclaimer : Harry Potter belongs to the beautiful blonde lady famously known as J K Rowling. No monetary gain is being made from this story. Any non-Canon characters belong to me. Certain creative terms which have been used probably belong to some of my brilliant fellow fan fiction authors. (I don't really know to whom, so please forgive me.)
Summary : After the DoM Mayhem, Harry decides that he is tired of the Dursleys and figures that he wants to take a unique summer job. Follow him as in his bid for freedom, he has the adventure of a lifetime. Post OotP. Probably AU. Might include crossovers.
With patience, you are more likely to get the things you want.
Learn to listen. Opportunity sometimes knocks very softly.
The harder you work at new skills, the luckier you will become.
Often getting started is the most difficult part of a task. It's easier from then onwards.
The nice thing about meditation is that it makes doing nothing quite respectable.
* * * * * Chapter 4 * * * * *
*|* The Thief's Downfall *|*
Petunia Dursley was sitting in the armchair in the sitting room reading one of her favorite magazine when she heard soft footsteps descending from the upstairs. (Her hearing was exceptional. It was, after all, a necessary skill for her favorite past time, that being spying on her neighbors.) She instantly identified them as her nephew's. Also, a fact to be taken into consideration was that no one else would be walking that lightly and quietly in the house other that boy. Vernon and Dudley made quite some noise whenever they moved anywhere in the house. (Which everyone had to admit was very strong structurally, to be able to bear such weight without collapsing.)
She looked up slightly from her magazine, quietly informing the boy that she was aware of his presence in the room. When the boy did not speak to her, she went back to her reading, but she was distracted by the noise of the door to the kitchen being opened. She looked from above the rim of her book and noticed that the boy was entering her kitchen.
Just as he was about to enter the kitchen, Petunia spoke up. "What are you doing down here now, Boy? We just had our lunch, didn't we?"
"Yes, Aunt Petunia. I was just thirsty and needed some water. Can I have a glass?" the boy asked her, to which she responded with a sharp nod.
The boy slowly turned around and entered the kitchen. After some time, he came out of the kitchen holding a glass of cool water and moved towards the front door of the house. Just as he was about to open it, Petunia spoke up again, her voice somewhat muffled now.
"Where are you going, Boy? Go to your room right now!" she said, tone superbly disdainful, all the while wondering if he was going to cause more trouble for her by doing something idiotic with his freakishness like last year.
"I'm just going outside to sit in the lawn for sometime, Aunt Petunia," came the reply from the useless boy.
"Alright. Return before your cousin does or you will be locked out. And don't go around causing trouble with your ma . . . thing!" she corrected herself quickly, just in time to avoid saying the M-word.
"Alright, Aunt Petunia. I'll be back soon!" Then she heard the sound of the door being opened and closed quickly.
'Oh how I wish that you wouldn't!' Petunia thought to herself vindictively. 'Why can't you just go away and leave us to our normal lives!'
Petunia didn't know why, but suddenly she had a feeling that her wish was going to be fulfilled at last.
. . . "How come he is in the Order?" . . .
. . . "He's useful. Knows all the crooks – well, he would, seeing as he's one himself. But he's also very loyal to Dumbledore, who helped him out of a tight spot once. It pays to have someone like Dung around, he hears things we don't." . . .
As Harry walked out of the house and into the lawn, he reflected on a conversation he had once had with Sirius. And now as he was casually strolling towards the topic of his previous recollection, he contemplated about the plan he had quickly assembled in his mind, the one he was now about to execute. But he had not yet completely made up his mind about carrying out the plan. And so he continued his mental debate.
Harry had no idea how Dumbledore had justified Mundungus Fletcher's inductance in the Order. It might have something to do with the man's contacts in different places, as Sirius had once informed him. But Harry had never fully believed that piece of information. The man hadn't proved himself to be much helpful to Harry, other than when he had provided his business partners – Fred and George Weasley – with some questionable supplies for their Joke Shop.
(When Harry had questioned them once, Fred and George had confided in him that they only had dealings with Dung because he provided them with rather illegal – not to mention dangerous – work materials at a cheap rate, and also because he didn't inform their mother of their activities.)
Harry had no idea why someone would agree to work willingly with Fletcher. He always smelled strongly of booze, and he was constantly smoking that ugly tobacco pipe of his, which made him smell even nastier. He always looked like he had a hangover and Harry could not work out how the man went about dealing in the black market in such an inebriated state.
The man was a thief and a coward; even Mrs. Figg had intimidated the worthless man. If the spineless cretin was ever captured by the Death Munchers, Harry knew that the man would babble all the information he had even before he was threatened at wand-point.
Last year, the thief had been sniffing around Grimmauld Place looking for various objects he could trade in; and more than once, Harry had heard the Dealer talking with his Godfather and inquiring off-handedly about the price of various paraphernalia scattered across the house in various shelves. And on a few occasions during the holidays, Harry had seen Fletcher look at those objects with a glimmer in his eyes, similar to what he had seen in Dudley's piggy-eyes before he stole something from anyone. Harry had concluded that when Fletcher got the chance, he was going to completely ransack the place, and Harry couldn't have any of that. It was his Godfather's house after all. And no petty thief was going to steal from there, not on his account.
Harry had never really liked Mundungus Fletcher; the man had jeopardized his life with his carelessness and greed. Though he never openly said it, the man disgusted him. Fletcher willingly admitted that he had left his guard post the previous year for a business opportunity; during which he had met someone regarding a batch of cauldrons that fell of the back of someone's broom. The man had no value for life, and he had already proven that a batch of cheap cauldrons mattered more to him than the life of his own comrades.
A person who does not value life does not deserve it.
And that was the final – and most important – reason why Harry resolved to himself that Mundungus Fletcher was not going to be a resident of this world for long.
Mundungus Fletcher was currently sitting under the window sill behind an ornamental bush, hidden beneath an Invisibility Cloak provided by the Order. He was smoking his grimy black pipe and was breathing out greenish smoke which had the pungent smell of tobacco. He was obscured by the greenish smoke, not that he had been any more visible before. If anyone looked his way, it would have looked like there was a house fire, what with all the smoke coming from under the window sill.
And that was how Harry found the man. Harry had no idea how the man thought that smoking a pipe which emitted green smoke was a good idea when he was supposed to be undercover during his guard shift. But he concluded that wizards considered being invisible as being completely untraceable; they were so sure that they would not be detected when invisible, and hence they could do anything when invisible. That was another reason why wizards were stupid. But Harry was not one of them.
Having decided on his course of action, Harry walked to the somewhat smoke-obscured bush and whispered out, "Hey, Dung, what're you doing out here in this heat?"
Though he had spoken very quietly, his low voice scared the filthy man to Hell. Fletcher was so scared that he did not notice his Invisibility Cloak falling off him as he shakily stood up.
Now visible for the world to see was a squat, unshaven man covered in rags who smelled of drink mingled with the strong scent of stale tobacco. He had short, bandy legs, long straggly ginger hair and bloodshot, baggy eyes. And at his feet was a silvery bundle that was one of the most precious and costly commodity in the Wizarding World, one that Harry recognized at once as an Invisibility Cloak.
"Who's there? Whaddya want?" blustered the tobacco-smelling man, his voice sounding a bit slurry.
"It's just me, Dung, it's me, Harry," said Harry quietly, just to make sure that the still drowsy man understood him.
"'Arry? Whatcha doin' out 'ere? Yar supposed to be in tha house!" grunted Dung, his voice somewhat less slurred now.
"Well, this lawn is a part of the house, so technically, I'm still inside the boundaries of my house," explained Harry bluntly.
"Oh. . . " said Fletcher rather stupidly, still not fully aware of his surrounding.
"Hey, I wanted to ask if you needed a drink. You know, it's hot out here, so you might be thirsty," said Harry, holding out the glass in front of him.
"Ah, thank ye, lad. Thank ye very much!" exclaimed the Dealer, now feeling a bit better since he now had a small comfort in his 'punishment'.
"No thanks necessary, Dung. You are here guarding me. It's the least I could do for you," said Harry sincerely; at least he hoped it came out sincerely.
"Even then, thank ye just tha same!" said Dung eagerly, which satisfied Harry that his acting had worked well enough. But he doubted it would work with anyone else. This was, after all, the stupidest Order member he knew of.
Harry just smiled at the man as he greedily gulped down the water. After smacking his lips in pleasure, the man smiled – which revealed his yellow rotten teeth – and looked at Harry. Harry just looked back, as though waiting for something.
"S'up, Harry? How did ya find me? I was undercover, ya know," said Dung, trying to start a conversation. He was a bit nervous that he had been found out. If anyone else from the Order found out, he knew that he was going to be hanged from the ceiling by his fingers and toes. The Order bitches, namely McGonagall, Molly and Vance, had still not forgotten about last year's incident. Nor had many others as well.
"I just thought I heard something here as I was walking by, so I thought I'd check," replied Harry calmly.
"Oh. . . " Dung trailed off. "'Ey, Harry, is there something special in the water?"
"No, why'd you ask?" inquired Harry while raising an eyebrow.
"Nathing, it just tasted odd, ya know, a bit spicy," said Dung, "Like Firewhisky, just a bit more diluted." He shook his head sadly, imagining the strong taste of Firewhisky on his tongue. It had been so long since he had a proper drink, nearly two hours!
"Oh, I never knew that Firewhisky tasted spicy," said Harry softly, as though he was admitting a secret.
Dung looked scandalized. "Wha. . . Ne'er had Firewhisky! I don't believe it!"
"It's the truth though," admitted Harry.
"Aha! I know! I think we'll. . . "
Suddenly, Dung became quiet. He had just been standing there when all of a sudden, he began to feel a bit lethargic. He had the feeling of vertigo; it was as if his entire world was turning upside down. He could not see properly for his vision became hazy, and the noise in his years was suddenly muffled. His entire mind was full of a sort of buzzing and it was making him a bit light-headed. The dizziness increased and he quickly collapsed onto the ground, holding his head in his hand as he began feeling a bit light-headed.
Harry just stood there for a few moments, looking at the downed man and smiling grimly to himself. After a few seconds, he quickly molded his face to fake a look of concern as he knelt by the dazed man.
"What happened, Dung? Are you alright? Do you need some help? C'mon, Dung, speak up!" inquired Harry hurriedly, taking care to make his voice sound a little panicked.
"Nothin', lad. I think its just tha heat that got ta me!" muttered Dung, sounding slightly drunken.
"We need to get help for you, Dung. Do you have a Portkey to Grimmauld Place? Or maybe an extra wand so that I can call the Knight Bus?" enquired Harry, looking around to make sure that no one was watching the scene.
"Yeah, check mah pockets, I got a Portkey to that place," said Dung quietly.
"Why do you have a Portkey to Grimmauld Place? I thought that the Order left the place. At least that's what Remus told me," said Harry.
Though Dung was not feeling well, he was not as stupid as everyone assumed him to be. He knew that Harry was Sirius' Heir, and if he admitted that he was going to loot the place, Harry would not help him now. This could be potentially problematic. So he decided to improvise.
"It's the emergency Portkey Dumbledore gave us Order members, Tap it twice," he said, sure that Harry would believe his lie.
"Oh. . . "
Harry knew that Fletcher was lying and now his suspicions about the cretin had been confirmed. Harry knew that Dung had been saving that Portkey for a proper opportunity to loot the place. Storing that little piece of information in the back of his mind for later use, Harry quickly checked the asinine man's pockets for any useful items. He quickly found a few pouches containing tobacco, a few gold coins along with a few silver and bronze ones. The man also had a few items which were in various stages of disintegration, and then a slightly bent piece of wood that Harry deduced to be Dung's proper wand.
Harry continued searching and found a few more miscellaneous articles until finally he found a small pendant in the shape of a Phoenix made of ruby. Harry knew what it was. Sirius had informed him that Dumbledore had provided every Order member with a pendent to contact them in case of an emergency, but it was not a Portkey. Dumbledore had suspected that the Pendent could fall in the wrong hands and then the Headquarters of the Order would be compromised. But Dung must have had it made into a Portkey by someone, and he would be the only one able to activate it.
"Harry, help. . . " croaked Dung, feeling more and more weak with every passing minute.
"Just a second. . . "
Harry swiftly organized the junk from Dung's pockets into two piles, the useful items and the waste. The now folded Invisibility Cloak he had collected from it place on the ground was also added to the pile. It was too priceless to let it be wasted with a thief like Fletcher, and he could use this one instead of his own, so that one of his precious items would be safe from any damage if he got into any scuffles.
"Quick. . . " came the faint voice from the pile of rags.
Pocketing the little money Dung carried with him along with the Invisibility Cloak, Harry quickly returned the useless items into Dung's pockets. Dung's wand gripped in one hand and his own Holly-and-Phoenix-feather wand still stowed inside his back pocket, Harry quickly rushed to the fallen man.
Dung's breathing was a bit shallow, as if he was having trouble breathing properly. Breaths of air escaped his mouth in harsh gaps and his eyes were slowly losing focus.
Harry quickly handed the erratically breathing Dung the slightly bent wand while he held the chain of the Order Pendant in one hand and wound it slightly around Dung's hand. His eyes were darting sideways every now and then to make sure that they weren't being noticed by anyone.
"Dung, is this your wand?" Harry demanded, roughly grabbing hold of Fletcher's robe collar to make him look at the piece of wood held loosely in the man's clammy hands.
The dazed man nodded as his eyes focused for a brief moment at the question before glazing over again. Harry figured that Dung had understood his question and answered as best as he could in his current condition. His question confirmed, he quickly took hold of Dung's wand hand – with the wand in a loose grip within the Dealer's hand – and quickly tapped the Order Pendant twice with it.
With a flash of blue that was nearly invisible in the bright sunlight, and the feeling of a hook attached to his navel jerking him irresistibly forward, both Harry and Dung disappeared from Privet Drive.
(I had first decided to end the chapter here, but then I thought that it was rather small and so I decided to continue.)
A flash of blue deposited Harry and Mundungus on the worn stone steps of Number Twelve, Grimmauld Place. The black painted shabby and scratched door materialized in front of them as soon as they shuffled forward, Harry keeping a hold on his tipsy companion to keep him from collapsing on the hard steps and injuring himself further. The man had to be in a good-enough condition until Harry was through with him.
As they walked up the stone – more like Harry dragging Dung along with him – Harry noticed that Dung was still holding onto the wand. Harry knew that he needed a wand to open the front door locks and that he could not use his own because of the Ministry Trace, so he snatched the wand from the man's hand in order to use it, knowing that the Dealer would have no further use of it.
Reaching the door, Harry tapped the front door once, with the borrowed wand. He heard a series of metallic clicks and the clatter of a chair, and then the door swung open with a creak. Gripping the crook's crooked wand tightly, he stepped over the threshold into the almost total darkness of the hall. Harry pulled Dung inside and quickly closed the door before someone noticed them, and the room was submerged into darkness as the light from the streetlamps vanished. Then a soft hissing noise was heard and old-fashioned gas lamps sprang into life, casting flickering light along the length of the hallway.
The place looked just like Harry remembered it to be : eerie, cobwebbed and the House Elf heads on the walls throwing odd shadows up the staircase. Long, dark, moth-eaten curtains concealed the portrait of Walburga Black, Sirius's mother. The Troll's leg umbrella stand – Tonks' mortal enemy in this house – was lying on its side. Harry reckoned that Tonks had probably knocked it over when leaving the place for the final time and neglected to pick it back up. She probably intentionally left it like that as a revenge for all the embarrassing tripping caused by the stand. There was certainly no love lost between the two.
Harry held Dung's wand in front of him while supporting Dung with the other. He quickly wanted to reach the Drawing Room on the first floor of the house. Sirius had once told him that there was a cabinet in the room near the fireplace where various Healing Potions were kept by the Order in case there was an emergency. Harry hoped that while leaving, the Order had not completely emptied the shelf. If they had, Harry was going to lose his fountain of information very quickly. And that was not a scenario he wanted to imagine at this moment.
Harry quickly placed a hand over the man's mouth in case he had a sudden urge to make some weird noise. He knew that Dung was still awake and alive, just very weak, and that he might let out a moan or groan, like he had done in the lawn at Privet Drive, which right now could cause a big problem for him. Because right at the moment, he was walking past the portrait of Mrs. Black. And if the old hag woke up, he knew that she would make a huge racket. And he did not know if there was anyone else present in this hovel other him and Fletcher.
Quietly tiptoeing past the black threadbare curtains with Fletcher in tow, Harry cursed his stupidity. He had forgotten that he held Mundungus ' wand in his hand, a wand that belonged to an adult wizard, a wand that had no Ministry Trace placed on it.
"Homenum revelio!" whispered Harry, as he moved the wand in a circle around himself. It was a spell he had found in the Library. The charm was used to detect and reveal human presence in the surrounding environment. And right now, according to the charm, there was no other human present in the house, other than himself and Fletcher.
Feeling a bit relieved after conforming that the house was empty, Harry used the wand to levitate Dung so that he would not have to carry the dirty and smelly man. The old gas lamps illuminated the staircase which led to the upper floors of the house. Holding the crooked wand a bit more tightly, Harry proceeded to climb the stairs to the first floor with Dung floating in the air a bit ahead of him, where the Drawing Room was located.
The heads of the past snout-nosed House Elves mounted on plaques were still there on the wall of the staircase. The staircase became darker as the climb continued and here there were no lamps to be lit. So Harry pulled out his own wand from the back pocket and used the one spell that all underage witches and wizards were allowed to use without a warning note from the Ministry.
"Lumos!"
The wand tip ignited with a soft white light, and the rest of the darkened stairs slowly revealed themselves to Harry. Both wands held in front of him, Harry continued to walk up the stairs while levitating Dung.
The stairs finally ended and the first floor landing revealed three doors. One of the doors led to a bathroom and the one besides it led to Hermione and Ginny's previously occupied shared bedroom. The lone door on the opposite side of the staircase led to the one room that Harry wanted to enter.
Canceling the Levitation Charm on Dung, Harry deposited the now-groaning man next to the bathroom door. With a quietly whispered "Nox!" Harry cancelled the Lumos Spell and again pocketed his own wand. Now holding Dung's wand in front of him, he approached the Drawing Room door. Cautiously touching the doorknob and sighing when nothing happened, Harry turned the doorknob. But the doorknob did not turn and the door steadily refused to budge from its position. Thinking that the door must have been locked with magic, Harry held the wand near the doorknob.
"Alohomora!"
There was a flash of white and then silence. Harry once again tried to turn the doorknob and open the door, but the door decided not to comply, again. Growling in frustration, Harry slammed his fist into the wall. This brought him nothing but an intense jolt of pain.
Trying to come up with an idea of how to open the door, Harry became more and more frustrated. Without realizing what he was doing, he swung the wand, held it in front of the doorknob, and quietly muttered, "Reducto."
The spell erupted from the wand and traveled the short distance from its origin to its target. The target – which was the doorknob – was blown away and the door of the Drawing Room swung inwards.
Harry did not have any time to waste being shocked and so he rushed to Dung, levitated the groaning man and quickly entered the room, ignoring the scattered debris near the door. He settled the man on an arm chair and quickly sprinted to the black cabinet located near the fireplace.
Forcefully heaving the cabinet door open, Harry peaked inside and groaned. The cabinet was empty and the only thing residing inside the shelf was dust. Not wanting to give up so easily, Harry properly searched through every shelf of the cabinet. Every nook and corner was checked. Both the wands were now lit and were emitting a bright white light, which was brighter than normal due to the heightened emotions of the caster.
Harry was on the verge of giving up, as the topmost shelf that he was checking also turned out to be empty. But suddenly he spotted a box lying on the top of the cabinet when the light from the wands was suddenly reflected by something. That something happened to be the metal clasp of a box. It had not been visible until now because it had been covered with dust.
Quickly levitating the box from it place, Harry gently lowered it onto the table so as to not disturb the contents of the box. As he dusted the box with a stray piece of cloth lying on the table, Harry noticed the make of the box. The box was ornately carved and appeared to be of Oakwood, if he recognized the type of wood correctly, closed securely with a somewhat shiny metal clasp. The box was the size of one of the large tomes that Hermione sometimes borrowed from the Hogwarts Library. It was polished, but some of the luster of the polish had faded, so the box now appeared to be made of a dull brown wood. On touching the box, Harry could feel the magic on the box and concluded that the box was enchanted to some degree.
Deciding to see if the box had Anti-Theft Charms and to see if he could open it, Harry flipped the clasp of the box and was surprised when the box opened without a sound. Still rather surprised that such a costly box had no proper Protection Spells on it, Harry looked inside to see what the box contained.
To say that the contents of the box surprised him would be an understatement. Harry was beyond amazed to see nearly hundred vials of various completed potions and several boxes full of different ingredients that were used in potion making.
Harry considered himself to be lucky that he had found this box, and that too when he had needed it the most. Searching through the different boxes and trying to find what he currently needed, Harry noted that though the box appeared to be small from the outside, it was rather big on the inside. He surmised that the box had Space-Expansion Charms to make it larger on the inside. He had the same charm on his school bag, so that he could carry all his class books for the day at one time.
Rooting through the boxes, Harry found the item he had been searching for. Snape had mentioned it in his first Potions Class, and that class was not something that Harry could easily forget anytime soon. Especially when Snape had made sure that Harry saw that particular many times during their "Remedial Potions".
Swiftly walking back to the chair that Dung was currently occupying, Harry gripped Dung's crooked wand in one hand while his other hand held the one thing that could save the thief's life; and along with the man's life, it would save his one chance of securing freedom without alerting the Order, the old coot Dumbledore, the Ministry of Mismanagement, the Moronic Munchers, and finally their Master, ole Tommy Boy.
Dung was mumbling to himself and making odd noises. He was jerking every now and then as if something was constantly pinching and poking him. His eves were glazed over and his breathes were coming in short, ragged, rattling gasps. Harry knew that if this was allowed to continue for one more hour, Dung Fletcher would be dead. And that was something he could not allow to happen, at least for now. After he had coerced all the useful information from the Dealer's mind, Dung could go to Hell for all he cared.
Drawing the borrowed wand in a flash, Harry quickly cast "Petrificus totalus!" and "Incarcerous!" one after another in quick succession. The rambling man's whole body went rigid and he lay on the chair stiff as a board. The second spell quickly bound the man in magical ropes that could not be easily cut.
Reaching for the man, Harry caught hold of Dung's jaw and forced his mouth open. Though the horrible breath nearly caused Harry to vomit, he held his stomach and continued with his task. Now that the mouth was open, Harry could see the rotten yellow teeth as well as a few golden ones in place of some of the fallen teeth. The tongue was slightly swollen and the man had a very severe case of halitosis. Holding the jaw open with one hand, Harry quickly shoved the thing inside Dung's mouth and moved back.
After a few minutes of watching the man, Harry noticed that Dung's opened eyes were quickly becoming clearer by the minute as the haze in his mind cleared. Deciding to avoid any trouble, Harry held out the wand over Dung's motionless body.
"Stupefy!"
A jet of red light hit Dung in the head and his eyes widened slightly in recognition before he was Stunned.
Special Disclaimer : Some descriptions of people and locations have been written from the HP books, but have been slightly altered. Some amount of information has also been taken from the HP films.
AN : Sorry for the delay! Had quite a busy week! Maybe I can manage one more update, on Sunday most likely.
I've decided that Harry's first prey will be Dung Fletcher, though it will happen in the next one or two chapters. (For reasons, see my ProPage. Few details regarding the story have also been posted there.) The next chapter may contain an omake.
Can someone guess what happened to Dung and what Harry gave him as the cure? Both those answers are rather easy, but still. And to just whom did the potion making box belong to? All these questions will be clearly answered in the next chapter.
Thank you, all my dear readers, for reading and reviewing my story. But I can do with some more reviews! Just joking.
There is a pairing poll on my profile page! Please visit and Vote!
May your swords stay sharp!