Harry Potter and the Keeper of Time.
Disclaimer - I do not own Harry Potter.
The morning that Harry awoke to was nothing out of the ordinary. It was Sunday and, as usual, he was awake as soon as the sun rose, as the curtains covering the window were not sufficiently large enough to cover it. The shaft of light would not have bothered him, as much if he lived in the house during the winter months but as it came to pass, he did not for which he was extremely grateful.
Harry was a 15-year old boy belonging to a world that most people on Privet Drive did not know of. Harry was a wizard and considered to be a pretty good one as well as he had managed to escape several attacks on his life over the past few years and still lived to tell the tales. Not that he ever wanted to but whenever he entered the wizarding world, the stories were always dragged out of him…it was as if he had no choice.
Not that he would ever complain, he would gladly face a whole mob of wizards anxious to hear the story of how he escaped He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named than stay at the Dursley's for every day of the year.
The Dursley's were the only family that Harry had, aside from his godfather whom he had met 2 years ago. Harry had been forced to live with the Dursley's for most of his life because of the fact that his mother and father had both been killed by the deadly Avada Kedavra curse when he was only a year old. The same curse that Harry himself had managed to survive, despite the fact that he was only a year old, and the same curse that had in turn backfired onto Voldermort himself, leaving him weak and without a body.
However, Harry knew that that was no longer the case. After the terrifying ordeal he had faced at the end of the Triwizard Tournament last year, Harry knew that Voldermort had returned. And this time, it was for good. He had his own body back after taking a bone from his dead father, flesh from a servant and blood from Harry himself…Harry was worried. The years before he had been born had been perilous ones when no one could tell who was friend and who was foe. Harry hoped that these days would not return.
Dismissing the thoughts of the Dark Lord from his mind, he started to think about his godfather, Sirius. Harry had discovered that Sirius was his godfather in the third year. There had been a world-wide search to try and capture him after he escaped from Azkaban (the wizard prison) but the search had now dwindled down to a halt. Few people knew that Sirius had been put in Azkaban for a crime that he did not commit (the Ministry of Magic believed him to be a Voldermort supporter and also believed that he had let Voldermort kill Harry's parents) and Harry was included amongst those people. Few people also knew that his godfather was an Amimagus and could turn into a large black dog at will. This had been the only thing that had kept him sane and had helped him escape from the Azkaban prison, where the Demetors ruled over all. Harry shivered as he recalled the first time that he had met the cloaked beings, how cold he had felt and then how past events had entered his mind; how his mother had pleaded to Voldermort to kill her and not to kill Harry. He shivered again.
Looking over at the clock, he noted the time. 6:30am. The Dursley's would not be awake for a couple of hours yet so he decided that he had plenty of time to finish some of his homework before school would start again. Since last year, the Dursley's had taken to locking Harry's wizard things in the cupboard under the stairs, which used to be his sleeping quarters, and would not let him have them back until he was due to return to Hogwarts. Just as he had done last year, Harry had picked the lock on the door and had removed some of the things from the cupboard and placed them under the loose floorboard in his bedroom. He knew that if he was ever caught 'practising wizardry' he would be in trouble but he also knew that he would be in trouble if he didn't complete his homework. He had tried to complete most of it during the first half of the holidays, as he was expecting his best friend Ron to invite him round to 'The Burrow' for the reminder of the holidays. As of yet Ron had not contacted Harry about any such visit and Harry was beginning to wonder whether it would ever occur. He fondly recalled last year when the Weasley's had used 'Floo Powder' to try and get to Harry but everything had fallen apart when they got stuck in the 'grate' and realised that the Dursley's did not, in fact, own a proper fire. Harry wondered whether that experience had put them off trying to reach himself again.
He sighed and returned his attention back to his Divination homework…the last piece he had to complete. Harry disliked Divination as the teacher, Professor Trelawney, predicated his near and certain death almost every lesson he attended. Every homework piece he completed for her now was completely made up…Professor Trelawney loved any miserable predications and the like so he always wrote very tragic situations down for each piece of homework he was given. The homework he had been asked to complete was a full week's forecast and as usual Harry wrote down several unpleasant situations (he would drown or lose a bet) and threw in a couple of planets to give the reasons why these things were going to happen to him. Professor Trelawney always lapped the stuff up.
Looking at his clock again he saw that it was nearly seven o'clock. Hedwig would be back soon from her nightly hunt and would probably fall straight to sleep on the perch in her large cage. At the Dursley's, Hedwig was Harry's only companion and although she was a lovely and intelligent creature, Harry always missed the human company of his friends Ron and Hermione.
Carefully placing his finished predictions under the loose floorboard, Harry rose carefully out from under the duvet that he had been curled up in and proceeded towards the window. Opening one side of it carefully to allow Hedwig to fly inside, he looked out onto the road and noted how peaceful everything was. Privet Drive was just like any other suburb and that was what Harry found so boring about it. No body awoke before 8:30am on a Saturday morning, no loud noises or commotion was ever heard and when Harry looked at the front gardens, not a glade of grass or a leaf stood out of place. It just wasn't natural.
Looking up towards the sky, Harry noted and small dot moving closer towards the house. He recognised it straight away as Hedwig and stepped away from the window to allow her entrance to the room. He was glad she was back. The room always seemed eerily quiet when she went away…her soft hooting noises always comforted him.
Upon arriving in the room, Hedwig gave Harry an affectionate nip on his right ear and held out her right leg proudly. Harry eagerly tore off the piece of parchment tied to the snowy owl's leg and stroked her head softly to thank her. She hooted quietly and flew over to her cage and rested comfortably inside of it.
Harry hands shook as he held the parchment. It had been a few days since he had last heard from anyone of the wizarding world and he couldn't wait to see what the piece of parchment contained. His happiness climbed several notches when he read the letter and a big smile appeared on his face. It was from Ron…he was to spend the last week of the holidays at 'The Burrow' before he returned to Hogwarts on the 1st of September. A small part of him worried about how he was going to get there but decided that whatever happened, he could not stop. Now all he had to do was to inform the Dursley's about the return of the Weasley's to Privet Drive. Harry could already imagine what their reactions would be…Dudley would probably hide in a corner clutching both his bottom and his mouth for fear that the Weasley twins Fred and George would bewitch him.
Harry reminded himself to ask the pair how their joke shop was going.
Deciding to try and get a few minutes more sleep before he would be awoken by a sharp tapping on the door by his aunt Petunia, Harry returned to his bed and curled up again underneath the thin duvet.
Devilvidel