Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter. Please don't sue.
Harry was lying on his bed, thinking about the fun he had over at the Boot residence. Why couldn't I have grown up like that? Harry wondered, Somewhere where I wasn't treated like vermin?
Harry sighed, and went back to reading 'Standard Book of Spells (Grade 7)'. As he had just started a new chapter, Harry heard a yelp of alarm from Petunia. It's probably nothing, Harry thought. But suddenly, Petunia let out a full bodied scream and Vernon shouted in alarm. What the? Harry thought.
To be on the safe side, Harry drew his wand and crept out of his room, careful not to make a sound. He almost failed on the latter, as he noticed the state of the Dursleys down below. Dudley looked completely normal, except he was on all fours making large piggish grunts. Aunt Petunia had sprouted an extra arm at the top of her head. And Uncle Vernon had goat legs and a beak!
Harry's gaze flew past the unfortunate Dursleys and saw three black robed figures on the far side of the room. Harry was about ready to stun them, when he noticed something odd. Two of them weren't even holding wands! One was holding what appeared to be a baton, and the other was just wriggling their fingers like the muggle depiction of a witch. Harry smiled, as he saw the third figure had what looked like Terry's sneakers. Harry silently laughed – it was Steven, Carol, and Terry!
Harry lowered his wand – he certainly was going to enjoy watching the Dursleys' comeuppance! Harry had to control himself when Terry made Petunia switch language. Suddenly, Aunt Petunia was throwing around nasty adjectives in fluent French. Maybe I should invite Fleur next time this happens! Harry thought.
However, Harry decided the Dursleys had enough when Terry cast Tarantallegra on Uncle Vernon, causing him to dance like crazy all around the room. Screwing on a straight face, Harry called, "What are you three doing!" Harry cast some fake spells at the 'intruders'. Terry got the point and yelled, "Retreat!" and the Boots left the house.
Harry undid the curses on his relatives, although not nearly as quickly as he was capable of. He rather enjoyed seeing Uncle Vernon in goat legs. After finishing, Harry walked back up to his room without a word. The Dursleys were clearly speechless, and didn't say a word either.
One unfortunate side effect of the Boots' escapade was that Vernon refused to let Harry out of the house. Harry didn't know whether this was an unprecedented show of concern for Harry's welfare, or the usual show of selfishness by making Harry stay to protect them in case any other black robed wizards showed up.
Two days after the incident, Harry grew alarmed as the fireplace suddenly roared up, and a robed figure burst from the flames. Before Harry could do anything, the figure grabbed Harry and ran back to the fireplace.
"Umph!" Harry yelled through the attacker's hand.
"Harry, quiet! I'm here to rescue you!" Harry recognized the voice as belonging to Arnold Weasley. Within seconds, Mr. Weasley grabbed a bit of Floo Powder, and the two quickly found themselves at the Weasley residence.
Mrs. Weasley ran up to him and hugged him, sobbing, "Oh, Harry dear! We were so worried about you! Attacked in your own home, no less!"
Harry was confused, but then had to hide his smile as he realized what she was referring to. Mrs. Weasley continued, "You can imagine our horror when your owl shows up with this note."
HELP!
This is Vernon Dursley, and there's been an attack inside my house by wizards in black robes. Harry managed to drive them back, but I'm sure they'll return. Please help!
- Vernon Dursley
It took all of Harry's effort to avoid smiling or breaking out into laughter. "Thank you!" Harry managed, "I, er, well, I'd rather not talk about it." Harry stammered.
Ginny seemed to be worried about him, and put her arm around him. "Come on," she said softly, "it will be alright." She then led him to her room, which he had never actually been in before.
Harry was surprised by the room. He had honestly expected, well, the stereotypical girl's room. Instead, a lot of posters on the wall were of Quidditch. There were several magical artifacts lying around the room, and Harry spotted a pair of omniculars and a sneakoscope.
Ginny smiled and shut the door. Harry gasped. Filling the entire back half of the door was a poster of him. Or rather, his effigy from two years ago. Harry looked at the burning fireball and pumped up upper body, and shook his head.
"I told you I had another copy of that photo," Ginny whispered conspiratorially. Despite her banter, Harry could see she was worried.
"You're worried about the attack," Harry said. Ginny nodded, and Harry started, "Well, I found out that Terry Boot lived in the same town as me. So anyway, his brother and sister found out that the Dursleys don't treat me very well in the summer. They decided to get Terry to play a joke on them. All three dressed up in black robes, and began cursing Vernon, Petunia, and Dudley."
Ginny looked torn between amusement and disgust, "That's not very nice, hurting the Dursleys like that."
Harry quickly said, "No, they weren't bad – they were more like prank spells. For instance, he transfigured my uncle to have goat legs, a beak, and made him dance across the room. None of them were actually hurt. So I pretended to drive the 'attackers' away, and then reversed the spells on the Dursleys. Well, apparently, Vernon panicked, and used Hedwig to send a message out. I guess I should consider myself lucky that Hedwig didn't fly to Dumbledore instead.
Ginny looked at Harry, and finally burst out laughing. "Oh, you should have seen mum!" she chortled, "when she found out you were attacked! You were lucky she wasn't there, or Terry Boot would be coming back to Hogwarts in a box!"
Harry laughed as well, and Ginny asked, "How did you find out that Terry lived in your town?" while scooting close to him.
Harry put his arm around her and said, "Well, I was playing the trumpet, when his younger brother and sister heard. It turns out that Terry is muggle-born."
"Oh, how is the trumpet coming along?" Ginny asked.
Harry laughed and said, "Ok, I guess. I really haven't spent too much time on it. I mainly do it when there's nothing else to do." Harry suddenly realized that Fred and George weren't downstairs with the rest of the family, "Ginny, what are Fred and George up to?"
Ginny chuckled and said, "Despite mum's attempts, they finally opened up shop for the Wizard Weasley Wheezes out at Hogsmeade. It turns out they developed a massive list of products. I don't know how they came up with all the galleons to afford the raw materials and store, though."
Harry grinned sheepishly and said, "Er, that would be my doing."
Ginny looked at him and said, "What?"
Harry admitted, "You remember the Tri-Wizard tournament my fourth year? Well, I gave the twins the 1000 Galleon prize. I told them I wanted it to be used for them to open their joke shop."
Ginny laughed and gave Harry a kiss; neither seemed willing to break away. After several minutes, Harry finally came up for air and said, "I think I better sleep in Ron's room. I wouldn't want your parents to worry."
Ginny looked disappointed. Harry gave her a smile and ran his hand through her hair. "It's ok, Ginny. I'm going to be here the rest of the summer."
Ginny gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, stood up and opened the door for him. Harry gave her one last smile and headed up to Ron's room.
Harry fell asleep, with the memory of Ginny's kiss happily on his mind. However, he soon found himself in a dark field. He was surrounded by a large number of cloaked figures, and the darkly cloaked form of Padma. For one brief moment, Harry panicked, thinking that the death eaters had got him somehow. But he slowly realized that it was a dream.
"What?" screamed Padma at one of the Death Eaters, and then yelled, "Crucio!" Harry briefly thought, Well! That's got to be the quickest scar dream yet, while bracing himself for the pain. However, the pain seemed to be muted somehow, and Harry looked back up at the scene before him. The Death Eater didn't appear to be in much pain either, and was merely biting his lip.
Suddenly, Harry's attention was drawn to one of the death eaters, who was looking back and forth between Padma and her Cruciatus victim. After a moment, the death eater slowly pulled off his mask to reveal Lucius Malfoy's face.
Padma let down the Cruciatus curse and hissed, "I said I don't want any muggle killings, at least not yet! The ministry has not yet admitted I have returned, and I certainly don't wish to hasten their decision!"
Lucius boldly stepped forward and said, "Why? Are you afraid of the ministry? Are you afraid of Fudge?"
Harry gasped, never imagining that Lucius would dare talk down to Voldemort, or even Voldemort in another body.
"CRUCIO!" Padma yelled.
Lucius blocked the spell, and yelled, "Maybe you are afraid of Fudge. After all, even a spineless weakling like him is probably a stronger wizard than you!"
Padma drew herself up, and assumed the standard dueling position. Lucius did the same, although his movements were flamboyant and mocking. Harry gasped as Lucius dueled Padma. Padma gave it her complete effort, but Lucius seemed to go out of his way to humiliate her. Instead of crisp enunciated words, he used a slow drawl, as though playing down to her level. And instead of direct spells, he used minor incapacitating spells. Harry grew amazed as Padma was first disoriented, then frozen from the knees down, and finally disarmed with a low powered expelliarmus
"Well, well, it appears the great Voldemort isn't quite so great anymore," Lucius drawled.
Padma hissed, "Do you think I'll be weak forever? After all, I am immortal!" and disapparated.
Harry grew disoriented as his view immediately shifted to another hilly terrain. A few minutes later, several Death Eaters apparated in as well, although Harry could tell it was a mere fraction of the ones who remained with Lucius.
Harry had the definite impression that Voldemort wanted to punish them for their obvious reluctance, but didn't. He watched as Padma quaked in silent, impotent fury, while the Death Eaters were looking at her with what appeared to be pity.
Harry suddenly woke up. He wasn't screaming, and only had mild twinges from his scar, but he knew that the dream had to be real. "I'll owl Dumbledore in the morning," Harry resolved, and tried to go back to sleep. And failed.
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I've started the action up a little earlier in this story …
Garina, Fire Mistress – I'm glad you like the story so far!
Jocelyn – I understand what you mean about Snape's anger fizzling. Well, it really didn't fizzle out, I just portrayed it badly. Keep in mind, when Ron found out about Potions being 2 ½ hours long last story, he shrieked like a little girl. Ron, Neville, and most of the Gyrffindors shuddered at this. Snape still is nasty – he's just not nasty to Harry. It's my fault for not putting in a potions class scene that set everything straight. Well, if I ever re-write, I've got something else to change…
Also, you're right about the Harry/Ginny thing. I'm going to bring them even closer together, for a couple of different reasons which I can't tell you (I don't want to ruin the ending…)
Anyone, please review!