Disclaimer: Everything you recognize belongs to JK Rowling.
From the last chapter...
Ollivander's teeth flashed in a broad smile. "That may have changed over the last few weeks. Surely your aunt has noticed what she's doing."
Harry gritted his jaw as he remembered long years of stubborn denial by his aunt due to her efforts to seem normal. "I doubt it. I'm sure they've found some way to explain away the odd coincidences."
"Perhaps then, we should offer them food. That, combined with your presence, would surely persuade them to listen."
Listen to what, Harry didn't know, but he nodded his head in agreement, twisted the doorknob and opened the silent door. With light feet he slipped into the hallway and placed himself before the parlor door that he could now see. Keeping his hand tight on his wand, he raised his voice. "Aunt Petunia, I've brought you food. It's me, Harry."
Chapter 48
"Freak!" The piercing shriek reverberated down the narrow hallway from the kitchen to the backdoor of Lily's childhood home.
Harry turned to the side and ducked, snagging a tin of pears out of the air as it passed overhead. His aunt couldn't feel too threatened by him, else she wouldn't have chucked her last bit of food at him.
He stepped to the side, years of experience coming to the fore as he dodged the quick hand darting in to pinch his ear. How could she see well enough in the dark hall to accomplish that? His vision was clear, since part of his mind focused on his need to see while holding his wand in one hand.
Flicking a glance over his shoulder answered that question. Ollivander had cast lumos, and the light spell illuminated the tip of his regular wand. Pity. His relatives could have used the calm and peace from the goblin wand.
Harry held out both hands in front of him, wand still clenched in one fist. "Aunt Petunia, I'm here to help -"
"Well you're a mite bit late, aren't you?" Withering sarcasm filled Petunia's voice. "After that hoodlum – that freak – kicked us out of our own home!" Indignation reduced her to speechlessness, her body shuddering with anger hardly contained.
"Who?" Harry asked. A death eater wouldn't have left his relatives alive, and none of the order would have abandoned them to their own devices.
Petunia ignored his question. "The nerve of that man – taking a respectable, normal woman's home away from her! What was Lily thinking of when she took up with him? Trash, that's what he was. Freakish trash!"
Harry wiped the spittle from off his face with a grimace. He would have expected that level of fury from Uncle Vernon. "But if he kicked you out - " he was sure Snape had done the dastardly deed since he lived close by, "Why did you come here and take food from him, then?"
Petunia raised her nose high in the air and sniffed before looking away. "We ran out of food, and he promised Lily to help us if we needed it. I heard her make him promise!" A triumphant smile stretched across her face. "He was always besotted with her. That beastly boy kicked us out when I knew he could just as easily transport us here. We had to walk forty kilometers! My poor Dudder's feet are covered with blisters."
Harry watched, fascinated, as Aunt Petunia's nostrils narrowed and widened with each impassioned declaration. Snape had that affect on people, although that "beastly boy" had clearly made arrangements to deliver them food. Not much, a part of him noted with glee, but enough to keep them alive.
"Where's Uncle Vernon and Dudley?" Harry asked.
"Snoring away, no doubt. The end of the world wouldn't wake those two. They fall asleep at all hours of the day these days."
How odd. He was sure he'd heard Dudley's voice complaining only minutes ago. Perhaps Petunia's magic sent them to sleep when she'd heard Harry's voice call out to her. He suspected she sent Harry and Ollivander to sleep at the playground. Awe he had no trouble hiding spilled through him. Her magic was tremendous when it came to hiding and protecting her family. Did she even know she was doing it?
Harry peered closer at his aunt's face, noting new, deep lines underscored by weariness. He'd never heard her speak ill her husband and son before. No doubt the burden of dragging those two along behind her had soured their perfect image in her eyes. Their best use would be as a pair of meaty fists, but they would most likely pick the wrong fight and end up dead anyway.
Harry cocked his head to the side, sifting through the sounds of night time to find the rip-roaring snore he knew both male Dursleys possessed. Nothing.
He looked askance at his aunt, and her lips tightened at his impertinence.
"The parlor has excellent sound-proofing qualities."
Or does it? Harry wondered while they opened the the door and looked inside. The room was hardly worthy of the name. Ramshackle furniture had been pushed to the side to make way for two large lumps in the center. The stench of rotting carpet mixed with human urine and feces rose to his nose, making Harry's gorge rise in his throat. He swallowed hard and continued surveying the room.
Broken bookshelves held worthless knickknacks, and no pictures adorned the tattered wall. His aunt must have been desperate to accept these living conditions. Still, it was the biggest room in the house, and that allowed her to keep a protective eye on her two erstwhile charges.
Vernon turned onto his side, and his buzzing snore turned to a whistle. Dudley moaned and whimpered in his sleep, begging for more food.
Harry glanced back at Ollivander standing in the doorway, searching for guidance, but the man seemed content to let Harry take the lead in dealing with his family.
"We've got to take all of you to a safe place," Harry said, not looking at his aunt. He didn't want to deal with the thunderous look he knew crossed her face. His muscles tensed, and his left hand clenched into a ball.
Several seconds passed without the expected explosion, and Harry looked at her out of the corner of his eye. His aunt's lips were pursed, and she drummed her fingers on the pants of her filthy trousers. Harry couldn't distinguish any particular stench coming from her, but that didn't say much considering the reek of this house.
He turned his body a few inches to the side to catch more visible details, interested in how these last few weeks had changed his aunt. Her hair wasn't particularly greasy. Maybe she washed it in water from the river not too far away, though he doubted it was clean enough to drink. Her nails, previously manicured to perfection, looked ragged, like they'd been bitten down to the nail bed. Her clothes hung on her, evidence of the weight she'd lost, but so did his.
Aunt Petunia had done well for her family, all things considered.
"Will there be food to eat where you would take us?" Petunia's stiff reply brought the worst out in Harry.
He opened his mouth to say no, as a partial, spiteful revenge for all the years she'd refused him decent food. But he closed his mouth again, imagining Hermione's horrified gasp if she'd learned he'd lost the Dursleys due to childish taunting.
Harry sighed. "Yes, there's food. It's often not good, but it's enough to keep us alive." He remembered the blob of slimy, slippery seaweed from this morning. Yesterday morning, by now.
"Us?" The suspicious word held layers of meaning.
"Yes, freaks like me, but there are a few muggles, er, normal people like you," Harry said. Not that you'll be seeing them. No doubt if allowed free reign in the Manor, Vernon and Dudley would rampage through it in a desperate bid to eat enough to support their rotund bodies. At least they would try. Harry would love to see what would happen to those two when confronted with Molly's or Ginny's tempers.
Petunia's fingers drummed faster on her pants before coming to an abrupt halt. "We'll come," she announced, as if bestowing an enormous favor.
And she was, even if she didn't know it. With her safe, Harry's protection from his mother would last longer.
Ollivander stepped forward now. "Gather any items you might wish from this room. We have only a few short minutes we can spare from our mission."
Harry shot the man a questioning glance while Petunia lumped their few belongings – ragged blankets, a few tins of carefully hoarded food, and three dented and dinged water bottles. Petunia wrapped these meager items in a comforter she pulled from the third pallet on the floor and stood up straight.
"Take these two first," She pointed a bony finger at the piles of rising and falling blankets.
Harry blinked with surprise that his aunt knew wizards could only side-apparate one person at a time. Harry dug through the blankets nearest him and closed a hand around Dudley's fleshy shoulder. A hint of hardness under the flab bespoke of the hours his cousin spent at a training gym in months gone by, and Harry restrained an impulse to squeeze it to see just how much was flab and how much was muscle.
Magic or no magic, though, he didn't want to deal with an awake Dudley tonight. His aunt could deal with their inevitable rage later.
Harry and Ollivander popped away in rapid succession, Harry appearing in his cousin's bedroom. Judging by the crash from downstairs, Ollivander had landed near the fireplace and knocked the poker over. Harry flew down the stairs two at a time and locked the front and back doors with a spell. They'd never fit through the windows on their own, and he trusted Petunia to not jeopardize her one source of food by stealing. She must know they were here on his sufferance.
He cast a glance around the sitting room. Sure enough, his uncle had landed on the brick just in front of their fireplace and was groaning in his sleep. Harry smiled at that cheerful sight.
With a nod of appreciation to Ollivander, Harry apparated back to his aunt. The lone sound of her tapping foot on the cement peeking through the disintegrating carpet met his ears. Harry approached his aunt with caution.
Her hand, quick as a snake, darted out and snagged his wrist in a tight grip. "Save my family and give us food to eat and water to drink, and you'll always have a place with us, I swear. As I promised Dumbledore." Her lips twisted at the mention of the headmaster.
Her words sent a unnatural warmth thrumming through Harry. "I will," he promised, and that warmth turned into a fire that scoured him from the roots of his hair down to his toenails. His mind filled with memories of Dumbledore explaining how his mother's protection worked: a relative of hers had to take him in and provide him shelter, but Petunia had done so grudgingly.
But now, she'd changed that to a willing offer. Had that strengthened his mother's protection beyond what it had ever been? Harry took a cool breath of air in through his nose and blew it out through his mouth. He'd learn more the next time he visited the Njarishka. Right now he had to concentrate on learning how to destroy horcruxes while leaving the object intact, a necessary step before returning to the goblin nation.
He just hoped Hermione and Ron had made progress on finding the horcrux from Hogwarts. If they were lucky, they'd also find Tom's resources on how to create those horcruxes. There had to be something in there on how to destroy them! Something that wouldn't leave a hole in the middle of Hufflepuff's cup.
With Aunt Petunia's hand still wrapped around his wrist, Harry apparated back to the Dursley's house in the Manor.
Aunt Petunia's mouth fell open in a silent 'o' before she backed up to a chair by the fireplace and sat down with a heavy thump. "My house," she whispered, and then looked out the front window at the stone surrounding the house. "How?" She leaned back, looking faint and close to fainting.
"I moved it to a safer place," Harry said, "with the help of some friends." He glanced at the wandmaker, knowing time must be short for whatever the man had planned next.
Ollivander cleared his voice and stepped into the conversation. "We'll deliver three meals a day, beginning in the morning. I'm afraid for now we must keep the doors locked until we can be sure your husband and son can cope with living in a magical environment."
Petunia laid a long, bony hand over her heart. "Magical?"
Ollivander nodded. "You're surrounded by it, I'm afraid." He smiled apologetically.
Harry jumped in. "But if you stay here, you won't be reminded of that."
Petunia nodded as if in a daze, looking at neither of them. Her shoulders slumped.
"It's time to return to your mother's childhood home," Ollivander spoke to Harry. "That's close enough to where we need to go next. We mustn't lose any time."
Harry straightened and disapparated in response. Judging by the flash of silver in Ollivander's eyes when he spoke, he guessed Ollivander's ability to see general impressions of the future was coming into play. He was already heading out the back door when the wandmaker appeared.
"Put this rock at the base of the tree," Ollivander handed Harry a smooth brown stone.
"What tree?" Harry asked, his eyebrows drawing together with confusion. Ollivander hadn't been forthcoming about their destination, although their trip through the tree roots had been relatively short. All the wandmaker said was that he didn't know the precise location they were going, just that it was in London. Ollivander had seemed worried by what they were going to do next.
"The tree in the Minister of Magic's office. It was your idea to listen in on death eater conversations through trees. I've anchored eavesdropping charms into this pebble and connected it to my favorite quick quotes quill," Ollivander patted one of his pockets, "one with never-ending ink." He smiled broadly, pleased with himself. "But we won't be able to activate the charm till we return to the Manor, unfortunately, since I didn't bring the quill with me."
"So I'll squeeze up through the trunk of the potted tree in Tom's office and put the rock in the pot?" Harry reiterated the plan to make sure he understood. He'd have to hope Tom wasn't looking in the tree's direction. Fingers popping out of a trunk would alarm him. He'd probably blast the tree to smithereens, and Harry didn't want to find out what happened to someone inside it.
His stomach flipped and then flopped. Why isn't Ollivander doing this? Surely he has more experience with getting in and out of trees! It's not like I could ever travel this way on my own. Harry forced the hand grasping Ollivander's to relax.
Ollivander must have noticed Harry's flash of resentment. "I'll be better able to pull us to safety if I'm lower in the tree trunk," he explained.
Harry nodded and accepted the pebble. As they moved from the roots into the base of the tree, Ollivander shifted lower and grabbed Harry's ankle.
A blank mist covered the bark of the tree from the inside. He'd traveled this way enough tonight that he knew mist represented the inside of the tree – the space they were sharing. In reality it was cold, hard wood, but magic had made it insubstantial. Harry reached one hand out to the bark.
Scratchy splinters of wood met his hand as it floated in the barrier separating the tree from the rest of the world. He'd felt this before, although passing through it quickly allowed him to feel less of this rather unpleasant texture. His body shifted closer to the edge of the tree, and he put his face into the bark, though he was careful to not push all the way through.
Harry blinked at the sight in front of him. Tom Riddle was laughing – laughing! - at something Snape said. The potions master crushed up the three ripe hops flowers and placing them in the uncorked bottle he'd taken from his house that night. Snape's eyes flicked to the tree and met Harry's. No expression crossed his face, and Harry wasn't sure if he'd been seen.
Frustration ran through Harry. He couldn't hear a thing! Seeing was hardly useful in this case. He shook his head with frustration, and when his ear passed the bark in front of him, he caught a slice of sound. This might be like making a floo call. If he failed to put his ears into the fire, then he couldn't hear a thing the other person said. Harry shifted his head to the right, allowing his ear to gain full contact with the bark without popping out into the room.
"My father boasted that his homemade beer had restorative power. If there's any truth to that, no doubt it comes from the special variety of hops he planted and I still cultivate at my house."
"Severus, you have served me well tonight."
Liquid swished around in a bottle, and Harry surmised that Tom had drank the beer.
"Excellent quality. I would tell you to send your father my congratulations, but the sod is dead. Just as well." Tom laughed again. "I commend you on the strides you've made with the wit sharpening potion, but you must make those effects long-lasting! I loathe stuttering, and I'm certain I was almost drooling before you came in."
Harry heard the clear distress in Tom's voice beneath the flippancy, as well as the flap of his robes when he drew near the plant. He must be pacing! Harry's heart jumped into his throat, and he pulled his head back, breaking the connection. He might be spotted. What if this was exactly like a floo call, and the imprint of his face or ear could be seen in the bark?
Deciding the risk wasn't worth it, Harry carefully pushed the pebble through the barrier at the base of the tree. He placed one eye against the bark to see if the tiny change had been spotted, and both of his eyes opened with surprise. In the minute he'd been debating, Snape had left, and Bellatrix Lestrange was now giving a report to her master. The adoration on her face sent a wave of nausea rolling through him.
Harry swallowed hard and turned his head, sliding it against the bark to allow his ear to press against it.
"Where is the item I requested, Bellatrix?" The words laced with warning were all the more dangerous for their soft tones.
The rustle of robes sweeping the floor met his ears, and Harry guessed Bellatrix had bowed. "Master, the goblins refused direct access to the vaults. Those filthy varmints dared quote some pathetic rule about emergency procedures. Your order required secrecy above all, and I dared not take them to task as I would have wish. " Her words became muffled at the last, as if she'd bowed so low her head almost touched the floor.
Whoosh! The sound of a spell traveling through the air was loud and close.
Harry started and almost lost his grip on the bark as the plant shook. The clunk of falling plaster told Harry it was most likely a blasting curse. She must be talking about a horcrux – that's why he didn't kill her for failing! He needs her to access it! But why does he need his horcrux? Wouldn't it be safer isolated in a goblin-controlled vault? His frowned. No matter the cause, he at least had an idea of where to start his search in Gringotts.
A sibilant hiss full of delight, hate, and rage sang out. "Those goblins dare defy me! Those beasts will rue the day they were born. I will take over their bank and eradicate their race...after we celebrate Harry Potter's birthday."
"Your early birthday surprise for Harry Potter," she spat Harry's name out as if it burned her tongue, "will be ready tomorrow. Announcements go out in the Daily Prophet's evening edition."
Dread formed an icy ball in the pit of Harry's stomach, freezing the rest of him in place.
"And who will be the face of this movement by the ministry designed to protect the common, magical people?" Sarcasm dripped from every word Tom uttered.
"Percy Weasley. A wizard from such a respectable wizarding family will no doubt persuade hundreds of fools to seek protection within the ministry walls." Bellatrix laughed, a simpering, disgusting thing as she fawned over her master.
"And how much draught of living death have you assembled?" The question held a warning note.
A more subdued Bellatrix answered, "We've hundreds of beds ready for those who already have it, but only a few scores of vials prepared. If you would only let us have Snape to brew the rest of the potion..." Her voice ended on a whining note.
Harry heard a body slam into a wall.
"I will decide who brews what!" Tom shouted, enraged. "Tell Slughorn to brew around the clock. I will brook no disobedience. I want hundreds of witches and wizards sleeping in the living death by the middle of next week. Harry's birthday will not go uncelebrated, and this is only the beginning. He becomes of age this year, after all." A high laugh ripped through the room.
Harry shuddered and pulled away. Tom Riddle was planning to take the whole magical world hostage under his guise as minister, at least as many as still trusted the Ministry of Magic. If this was the beginning, what was he planning for his birthday, less than ten days away?
To be continued...
