I don't own Harry potter and only Circe is mine.

Chapter Three

The Letters From No One

The escape of the Brazilian boa constrictor earned the twins their longest ever punishment. By the time they were allowed out of their cupboard again, the summer holidays had started and Dudley had already broken his new cine camera, crashed his remote-control aeroplane and, first time on his racing bike, knocked down old Mrs Figg as she crossed Privet Drive on her crutches.

The twins were glad school was over, but there was no escaping Dudley's gang, who visited the house every single day. Piers, Dennis, Malcolm and Gordon were all big and stupid, but, as Dudley was the biggest and stupidest of the lot, he was the leader. The rest of them were all quite happy to join in Dudley's favourite sport: Twin hunting.

This was why the twins spent as much time as possible out of the house, wandering around and thinking about the end of the holidays, where they could see a tiny ray of hope. When September they would be going off to secondary school and, for the first time in their lives, they wouldn't be with Dudley. Dudley had a place at Uncle Vernon's old school, Smeltings,. Piers Polkiss was going there, too. The twins, on the other hand, were going to Stonewall High, the local comprehensive. Dudley thought this was very funny.

"They stuff people's heads down the toilet first day at Stonewall," he told the twins. "Want to come upstairs and practise?"

"No thanks," said Harry.

"The poor toilet's never had anything as horrible as your head down it – it might be sick." continued Circe, then they ran before Dudley could figure out what that meant.

One day in early July, Aunt Petunia took Dudley to London to buy his Smeltings uniform, leaving the twins at Mrs Figg's. Mrs Figg wasn't as bad as usual. It turned out that she'd broken her leg tripping over one of her cats and she didn't seem quite so fond of them as before. She let the twins watch television and gave them a bit of chocolate cake that tasted as though she'd had it for several years.

That evening, Dudley paraded around the living room for the family in his brand-new uniform. Smeltings boys wore maroon tailcoats, orange knickerbockers and flat straw hats called boaters. They also carried knobbly sticks for hitting people while the teachers' backs were turned. This was supposed to be good training for later life.

As he looked at Dudley in his new knickerbockers, Uncle Vernon said gruffly that it was the proudest moment of his life. Aunt Petunia burst into tears and said she couldn't believe it was her Ickle Dudleykins, he looked so handsome and grown up. Neither of the twins trusted themselves to speak. They thought a few of their ribs might have already cracked from trying not to laugh.

There was a horrible smell in the kitchen next morning when the twins went in for breakfast. It seemed to be coming from a large metal tub in the sink. The tub was full of what looked like dirty rags swimming in grey water.

"What's this?" Harry asked Aunt Petunia. Her lips tightened as they always did if either of the twins dared to ask a new question.

"Your new school uniform." she said.

Both the twins looked in the bowl again.

"Oh," Circe said. "I didn't realise it had to be so wet."

"Don't be stupid," I'm dying some of Dudley's old things grey for you. It'll look just like everything else when I'm finished."

Both the twins seriously doubted this, but thought it best not to argue. They sat down at the table and tried not to think about how they were going to look on their first day at Stonewall High –like they were wearing bits of old elephant skin, probably.

Dudley and Uncle Vernon came in, both their noses wrinkled because of the smell coming from the twins' new uniforms. Uncle Vernon opened his newspaper as usual and Dudley banged his Smeltings stick, which he carried everywhere, on the table.

They heard the click of the letterbox and the flap of letters falling on the doormat.

"Get the post, Dudley," Uncle Vernon said from behind his paper.

"Make them get it."

"Get the post, you two."

"Make Dudley get it." Circe tried.

"Poke her with your Smeltings stick, Dudley."

Circe dodged the Smeltings stick and went to get the post. Four things lay on the doormat: a postcard from Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge, who was holidaying in the Isle of Wight, a brown envelope that looked like a bill and – a letter each for the twins.

Circe picked them up and stared at it, her heart twanging like a giant elastic band. No one, ever, in their whole lives, had written to either of them. Who would? They had no friends, no other relatives – they didn't belong to the library so they'd never even gotten rude notes asking for books back. Yet here they were, two letters, addressed so plainly, there could be no mistake:

Miss C. Potter

The Cupboard under the Stairs

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

Mr H. Potter

The Cupboard under the Stairs

4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging

Surrey

The envelopes were thick and heavy, made of yellowish parchment and the address was written in emerald green ink. There was no stamp.

Turning the envelope over, her hands trembling, Circe saw a purple wax seal bearing a coat of arms; a lion, an eagle, a badger and a snake surrounding a large letter 'H'.

"Hurry up, girl!" shouted Uncle Vernon from the kitchen. "What are you doing? Checking for letter bombs?" He chuckled at his own joke.

Circe quickly stuffed the two letters addressed to her and her twin brother down her top and went back to the kitchen. She handed Uncle Vernon the bill and the postcard, sat down and hoovered up her breakfast, motioning for Harry to do the same. While they were eating their breakfasts, Uncle Vernon ripped open the bill, snorted in disgust and flipped over the postcard.

"Marge's ill," he informed Aunt Petunia. "Ate a funny whelk..." The twins stood up at the same time and excused themselves before anyone could stop them.

Once they were safely back inside their cupboard, Circe made sure the door was locked and showed Harry the letters.

"Who would write to us?" He asked, startled.

"I don't know. How about we find out?" Circe said grinning and starting to rip open her letter.

"HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY"

she read out, having opened it.

"Headmaster: Albus Dumbledore

(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chief Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. Of Wizards)

Dear Miss Potter,

We are pleased to inform you that you have a place at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

"Oh, it's a prank." sighed Circe, checking Harry's letter. "Yours is the same."

"But what if it's not? You sometimes think the odd things that happen to us are magic, and, as crazy as it sounds, it is the only reasonable explanation for them. I suggest we take these to the Dursleys and ask them about it.

"I don't know. What if they stop us from going, if it's not a prank?"

"They obviously want to be rid of us, and this might be our one-way ticket out of here. What's the worst that could happen?" A million different terrible outcomes raced to get to the front of Circe's mind, but Harry's words beat them.

"Well, I suppose it can't hurt." Circe started unlocking the door when she came to a decision and they started pulling themselves out and walking towards the dining room.

"Uncle Vernon," she said, "Um, have you ever heard of a school called Hogwarts?" Uncle Vernon went from red scowling at being called upon, to green and Aunt Petunia hurried into the room.

"Where did you hear that name?" she demanded and Circe showed her the letter, safely back inside the envelope. Dudley snatched Harry's letter and tried to read it, but Uncle Vernon snatched it off of him before he could and held it high, out of his reach. For a moment, it looked like Aunt Petunia might faint. She clutched her throat and made a choking noise.

"Vernon! Oh my goodness – Vernon!"

They stared at each other, seeming to have forgotten that the twins and Dudey were still in the room. Dudley wasn't used to being ignored. He gave his father a sharp tap on the head with his Smeltings stick.

"I want to read those letters." he said loudly.

"We want them back," said Harry furiously, "As they're ours."

"Get out, all of you," croaked Uncle Vernon, stuffing both the letters back inside their envelopes.

No one moved.

"WE WANT OUR LETTERS!" Circe shouted.

"Let me see them!" demanded Dudley.

"OUT!" roared Uncle Vernon, and he took both Circe and Dudley by the scruffs of their necks while Aunt Petunia took Harry and they threw them all into the hall, slamming the kitchen door behind them. Harry and Dudley promptly had a furious but silent fight over who would listen at the keyhole; Dudley won, so Harry, his glasses dangling from one ear, lay flat on his stomach to listen at the crack between door and floor beside Circe, who had wasted no time fighting and had already heard the start of the conversation.

"Vernon," Aunt Petunia was saying in a quivering voice. "Look at the addresses – how could they possibly know where they sleep? You don't think they're watching the house?"

"Watching - spying – might be following us," muttered Uncle Vernon wildly.

"But what should we do, Vernon? Should we write back? Tell them we don't want -" The twins could see Uncle Vernon's shiny black shoes pacing up and down the kitchen.

"No," he said finally. "No, we'll ignore it. If they don't get an answer... yes, that's best... we won't do anything..."

"But -"

"I'm not having one, let alone two, in the house, Petunia! Didn't we swear when we took them in that we'd stamp out this dangerous nonsense?"

That evening, when he got back from work, Uncle Vernon did something he'd never done before; he visited the twins in their cupboard.

"Where's our letters?" said Harry, the moment Uncle Vernon squeezed through the door. "Who's Albus Dumbledore?"

"No one. They were addressed to you by mistake," said Uncle Vernon shortly. "I have burned them."

"It was not a mistake," Circe said angrily. "We're not stupid. You and Aunt Petunia got into a right fit about them, and the letters were addressed to us, not to mention the fact that they had our cupboard on them."

"SILENCE!" yelled Uncle Vernon, and a couple of spiders fell from the ceiling. He took a few deep breaths and then forced a smile that looked quite painful.

"Er - yes, Harry and, Circe, - about this cupboard. Your Aunt and I have been thinking... you're really getting a bit too big for it... we think it might be nice if you moved into Dudley's second bedroom."

"Why?" the twins asked at the exact same time.

"Don't ask questions!" snapped their uncle. "Take this stuff upstairs, now."

The Dursley's house had four bedrooms: one for Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia to sleep in, one for guests (usually Uncle Vernon's sister, Marge), one for Duley to sleep in and one for Dudley to keep his toys and all the stuff that wouldn't fit into his first bedroom. It only took the twins one trip upstairs to move everything they owned from the cupboard to this room. They sat down on the bed and stared around them. Nearly everything in here was broken. The month-old cine camera was lying on top of a small, working tank Dudley had once run over the next-door neighbour's dog; in the corner was Dudley's first ever television set, which he'd put his foot through when his favourite programme had been cancelled.; there was a large bird cage which had once held a parrot that Dudley had swapped at school for a real air rifle, which was up on a shelf with the end all bent because Dudley had sat on it. Other shelves were full of books. They were the only things in the room that looked as though they had never been touched, despite Circe sometimes taking them off the shelves to read.

From downstairs came the sound of Dudley bawling at his mother: "I don't want them in there... I need that room... make them get out..."

Harry sighed and stretched out on the bed, making Circe laugh and tickle the only place he was ticklish: his feet, but the moment of fun did not last long. Yesterday, they'd have given almost anything to be up here. Today, they'd rather be back in their cupboard and find out more about the letters, rather than up here without that knowledge.

Next morning, at breakfast, everyone was rather quiet. Dudley was in shock. He'd screamed, whacked his father with his Smeltings stick, been sick on purpose, kicked his mother and thrown his tortoise through the greenhouse roof, and he still didn't have his room back. The twins were thinking about this time yesterday and bitterly wishing they hadn't taken the letters to the Dursleys (how could they ever had thought that it was a good idea). Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia kept looking at each other darkly.

When the post arrived, Uncle Vernon, who seemed to be trying to be nicer to the twins, sent Dudley to go and get it. They heard him banging things all down the hall with his Smeltings stick. Then he shouted, "There's another two! Mr H. Potter and Miss C. Potter, the Smallest Bedroom, 4 Privet Drive -"

With a strangled cry, Uncle Vernon leapt from his seat and ran down the hall, both the twins desperately trying to push past him but he took up too much of the hallway for even a kid as skinny as Harry or Circe to get past. Uncle Vernon had to wrestle Dudley to the ground to get the letters off him, which was made difficult by the fact that he had two ten-year-olds grabbing him around the neck from behind. After a minute of confused fighting, in which everyone, including Dudley, somehow, got hit a lot by the Smeltings stick, Uncle Vernon straightened up, gasping for breath, with the twins' letters clutched in his hand.

"Go to your cupboard – I mean your bedroom," he wheezed at Harry and Circe. "Dudley - go – just go."

Harry walked round and round his new room while Circe lay on the bed, staring up at the ceiling. Someone knew they had moved out of their cupboard and they seemed to know they hadn't been able to read the whole of their first letter. Surely that meant they would try again? And this time they'd made sure they didn't fail. They had a plan that they had gone over a million times to check that it was fool proof.

The repaired alarm clock rang at six o'clock the next morning. Circe turned it off quickly and they both dressed silently. They mustn't wake the Dursleys. They stole downstairs without turning on any of the lights.

They were going to wait for the postman on the corner of Privet Drive and get the letters for number four first. Their hearts hammered as they crept along the dark hall towards the front door -

"AAAAARRRRGGGHH"

Circe leapt into the air – she'd trodden on something big and squashy on the doormat – something alive!

Lights clicked on upstairs and to her horror, Circe realised that the big squashy thing had been her uncle's face. Uncle Vernon had been lying in a sleeping bag at the foot of the door, clearly making sure that neither of the twins did exactly what they both just been trying to do. He shouted at the twins for about half an hour and then told them to go and make him a cup of tea. Harry and Circe shuffle miserably off into the kitchen, and by the time the kettle had boiled, the post had already been delivered, right into Uncle Vernon's lap, literally. They could see the letters addressed in green ink.

"We want -" Circe began, but Uncle Vernon was tearing the letters into pieces right before their eyes.

Uncle Vernon didn't go to work that day. He stayed at home and nailed up the letter box.

"See," he explained to Aunt Petunia through a mouthful of nails, "if they can't deliver them, they'll just give up."

"I'm not sure that'll work, Vernon."

"Oh, these people's minds work in mysterious ways, Petunia, they're not like you and me," said Uncle Vernon, trying to hammer in a nail with a piece of fruit cake that Aunt Petunia had just given him.

On Friday, no fewer than twelve letters, each, came through for Harry and Circe. As they couldn't go through the letter box, they had been pushed under the door, slotted in through the windows, and a few were even found in the downstairs toilet, somehow still dry.

Uncle Vernon stayed at home again. After burning all the letters, he got out a hammer and board and nailed up all the cracks around the edge of the front and back doors so no one could go out. He hummed 'Tiptoe through the tulips' as he worked and jumped at small noises.

On Saturday, things really started to get out of hand. Twenty-four letters to each of the twins found their way inside into the house, rolled up and hidden, one each per egg in each of the two dozen eggs that their very confused milkman had had handed Aunt Petunia through the kitchen window. While Uncle Vernon made furious telephone calls to the post office and the dairy office, trying to find someone to complain to, Aunt Petunia shredded the letters in her food mixer.

"Who on earth wants to talk to you two this badly?" Dudley asked the twins in amazement.

On Sunday morning, Uncle Vernon sat down at the breakfast table looking tired and rather ill, but happy.

"No post on Sundays," he reminded them happily as he spread marmalade on his newspapers, "no damn letters today - "

Something came whizzing down the kitchen chimney and hit him sharply in the face. Next moment, sixty or seventy letters came pelting out of the fireplace like bullets. The Dursleys ducked, but Harry leapt into the air to try and catch a few, while Circe grabbed a handful off the floor -

"Out! OUT!"

Uncle Vernon grabbed Harry and Circe around the waist, after ripping the letters out of Circe's hand, and threw them into the hall. When Aunt Petunia and Dudley had run out with their arms over their faces, Uncle Vernon slammed the door shut. They could hear the letters still streaming into the room, bouncing off the walls and floor.

"That does it!" said Uncle Vernon, trying to speak calmly, but pulling great tufts out of his moustache at the same time. "I want you all back here in five minutes, ready to leave. We're going away. Just pack some clothes. No arguments!"

He looked so dangerous with half his moustache missing, that no one dared argue. Ten minutes later, they had wrenched their way through the boarded-up doors and were in the car, speeding towards the motorway. Dudley was in the back, sniffling, because his father had hit him round the back of the head for trying to pack his television, video player and computer in his sports bag and holding them up.

They drove. And they drove. Even Aunt Petunia didn't dare ask where they were going. Every now and then, Uncle Vernon would take a sharp turn and drive in the opposite direction for a while. Every time he did this, he would mutter 'Shake 'em off... Shake 'em off.'

They didn't stop to eat or drink all day. By nightfall, Dudley was howling. He'd never had such a bad day in his life. He was hungry, he'd missed five television programmes he'd wanted to watch and he'd never gone so long without blowing up an alien on his computer.

Uncle Vernon stopped at last at gloomy looking hotel on the outskirts of a big city. Dudley, Harry and Circe shared a bedroom with twin beds and damp, musty sheets. Dudley snored, but the twins stayed awake, sitting on the window sill, staring down at the lights of passing cars and whispering...

They ate stale cornflakes and cold tinned tomatoes on toast for breakfast next day. They had just finished when the owner of the hotel came over to their table.

"Scuse me, but are any of you either Mr H. Potter or Miss C. Potter? Only I got about an 'undred of these at the front desk."

She held up two letters so they could read the green ink addresses:

Mr H. Potter / Miss C. Potter

Room 17

Railview Hotel

Cokeworth

Harry and Circe each made a grab for the letters, but Uncle Vernon knocked their hands out the way. The woman stared.

"I'll take them," said Uncle Vernon, standing up quickly and following her from the dining room.

"Wouldn't it be better to just go home, dear?" Aunt Petunia suggested timidly, hours later, but Uncle Vernon didn't seem to hear her. Exactly what he was looking for, none of them knew. He drove them into the middle of a forest, got out, looked around, shook his head, got back in the car and off they went again. He did the same thing in the middle of a suspension bridge and at the top of a multi storey car park.

"Daddy's gone mad, hasn't he?" Dudley asked Aunt Petunia dully, late that afternoon. Uncle Vernon had parked at the coast, locked them all in the car and disappeared.

It started to rain. Great big drops that beat on the roof of the car. Dudley snivelled.

"It's Monday," he told his mother. "The great Humberto's on tonight. I want to stay somewhere with a television."

Monday. This reminded the twins of something. If it was Monday – and you could usually rely on Dudley to know the days of the week, because of television – then tomorrow, Tuesday, was their eleventh birthday. Of course, their birthdays were never exactly fun – last year, the Dursleys had given Harry a pair of Uncle Vernon's old socks, and Circe, a rusty coat hanger. Still, you weren't eleven every day.

Uncle Vernon came back and he was smiling. He was also carrying a long, thin package and didn't answer Aunt Petunia when she asked what he'd bought.

"Found the perfect place!" he said. "Come on! Everyone out!"

It was very cold outside the car. Uncle Vernon was pointing at what looked like a large rock way out to sea. Perched on top of the rock was the most miserable little shack you could imagine. One thing was for certain; there was no television in there.

"Storm forecast for tonight!" said Uncle Vernon gleefully, clapping his hands together. "And this gentleman's kindly agreed to lend us his boat!"

A toothless old man came ambling up to them, pointing with a rather wicked grin, at an old rowing boat bobbing in the iron grey water below them

"I've already got us some rations," said Uncle Vernon, "So all aboard!"

It was freezing in the boat. Icy sea spray and rain trickled down their necks and a chilly wind whipped their faces. After what seemed like hours, they reached the rock, where Uncle Vernon, slipping and sliding, led the way to the broken-down house.

Inside, it was horrible; it smelled strongly of seaweed, the wind whistled through the gaps in the wooden walls and the fireplace was damp and empty. There were only two rooms.

Uncle Vernon's 'rations' turned out to be a packet of crisps each and seven bananas. He tried to start a fire but the empty crisp packets just smoked and shrivelled up.

"Could do with some of those letters now, eh?" He said cheerfully.

He was in a very good mood. Obviously, he thought nobody had any chance of reaching them here, in a storm, to deliver post. The twins privately agreed, though the thought didn't cheer them up at all.

As night fell, the promised storm blew up around them. Spray from the high waves splattered the walls of the hut and a fierce wind rattled the filthy windows. Aunt Petunia found a few mouldy blankets in the second room and made up a bed for Dudley on the moth-eaten sofa. She and Uncle Vernon went off to the lumpy bed next door and the twins were left to find the softest bit of floor and curl up under the thinnest, most ragged blanket, and each other, for warmth.

The storm raged more and more ferociously as the night went on. The twins couldn't sleep. They twisted and turned over, trying to get comfortable, their stomachs rumbling with hunger and them occasionally whispering to each other. Dudley's snores were drowned by the low rolls of thunder that started near midnight. The lighted dial of Dudley's watch, which was dangling over the edge of the sofa on Dudley's fat wrist, told them they would be eleven in ten minutes time. They lay and watched their birthday tick nearer, wondering if the Dursleys would remember at all, wondering where the letter writer was now.

Five minutes to go. The twins heard something creak outside. They hoped the roof wasn't going to fall in, although they might be warmer if it did. Four minutes to go. Maybe the house in Privet Drive would be so full of letters when they got back that they'd be able to steal a couple somehow.

Three minutes to go. Was that the sea, slapping hard on the rock like that? And (two minutes to go) what was that funny crunching noise? Was that the rock crumbling into the sea?

One minute to go and then they'd be eleven. Thirty seconds... Twenty... Ten... nine... Maybe they'd wake Dudley up, just to annoy him. Three... Two... One

BOOM.

The whole shack shivered and the twins sat bolt upright, staring at the door. Someone was outside, knocking to come in.