He was flying. High above the ground, the wind in his hair and he was flying. Treetops and houses passed in a blur beneath him; he'd never flown so fast. He couldn't help the silly grin that broke out on his face. He was free; radiant joy filled his heart. He had no worries or cares, no haunting memories plaguing his every second, no dark wizard seeking to kill him. He was free.
He knew he shouldn't feel this way. He was supposed to be sad, angry, guilt ridden. How could he be flying at a time like this? How dare he be happy, after everything that had happened? After everything he had lost?
But Harry left his guilt and despair behind him with a great burst of speed. He soared higher now – up into the night sky. Higher, so high his outstretched fingers brushed the tiny stars like golden snitches waiting to be caught.
How long had he been flying? He didn't know; he didn't care. In fact, he fully intended to stay up in the air forever. He was free now, and he wasn't going back.
However, the jagged scar on his forehead suddenly tingled and soon he found himself being pulled back down to earth. Dark houses and tall trees came nearer but he didn't recognize them; he had never been here before.
His Firebolt slowed against his will as if some other force was acting on it. He came to a stop outside of an old, derelict house. There were no lights in the street and the run down neighborhood appeared to have been long abandoned.
He was directed to a boarded up window on the second story. He could just make out voices from the other side of the thick wooden slats. He froze. His scar flared painfully. One of those voices was terrifyingly familiar. With a deep breath, he peered through a large crack between the boards.
A fire roared brightly in a large room. White candles added to the brilliance and Harry blinked rapidly. As his eyes grew accustomed to the light, he looked around the room, taking mental notes. A large plush armchair sat in the sparsely furnished room. Sitting upon it like a king on a throne was a man, very pale, who had a wide flat nose with flaring nostrils. And staring out from slits of skin were two red eyes.
"Voldemort," Harry whispered through a fresh surge of pain in his scar.
And so it was the dark wizard Voldemort. He was joined by a half dozen men in black hooded robes; his followers, the Death Eaters. And standing before him, unnaturally rigid, was a woman.
A gasp of surprise escaped Harry's lips. He tensed and clamped his hand over his mouth. Fortunately, it seemed that no one heard him and he took a second look at the woman.
A thin woman, she was covered in shimmering scarves and shawls. Glittering bangles dangled from her wrists and her fingers were covered in sparkling rings. He could see her eyes behind the large glasses she wore. They were wide and stared blankly; glassy.
Harry would know those eyes anywhere. How many times had they stared at him while she made some gruesome prediction of his death? For the woman was Sybil Trelawney, Professor of Divination at Hogwarts.
Before Harry could even wonder what Professor Trelawney was doing in there, Voldemort spoke.
"My dear Professor, I am so glad you could join us." His soft voice was silkily smooth despite being eerily high pitched. His words slithered in the air. A snake charmer at work.
"And now, Professor Trelawney, why don't you tell me what I want to hear."
There was a long pause while the professor simply stood there, that same vacant expression on her face. Harry had seen that look before; on Barty Crouch at the end of fourth year. Professor Trelawney was under Veritaserum.
Harry had just realized this when the professor opened her mouth. But instead of her usual soft, misty voice, came a voice Harry had heard only twice before. It was deeper, harsh, and soon Harry realized that it wasn't only the voice he'd heard before, but her very words as well. She was reciting the prophecy regarding Harry's birth. The very prophecy Voldemort had spent all last year trying to get to. And now he was hearing it, to Harry's deep dismay.
"The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord approaches. Born to those who have thrice defied him, born as the seventh month dies….And the Dark Lord will mark him as his equal, but he will have power the Dark Lord knows not. And either must die at the hands of the other for neither can live while the other survives. The one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be born as the seventh month dies."
Harry's eyes shot to Voldemort to gauge his response. Voldemort's beady scarlet eyes were twinkling.
"And either must die at the hands of the other…" he mused aloud. He clapped his hands together. "Do you hear that? One must kill the other, but it doesn't say whom. The outcome is undecided."
"B-but, my Lord," a small squeaky voice spoke up. Harry recognized the speaker as Wormtail. Wormtail, who had betrayed his parents to their deaths. Wormtail, who had revived Voldemort nearly at the cost of Harry's life, and at the cost of Cedric's. Wormtail, the reason why Harry's godfather spent 12 years in Azkaban hell.
Harry seethed with hot rage. How dare Wormtail be alive when Sirius was dead? It wasn't right, it wasn't fair!
But Harry spoke none of this aloud. He concentrated instead on what the rat traitor was saying.
"He-he has the power to v-vanquish you."
"He has the power, yes, but the prophecy doesn't say if he gets to use it. I intend to deny him that chance."
"That won't be easy, my Lord," said another Death Eater whom Harry recognized as Lucius Malfoy.
"Yes, I know. The boy is protected in ways he doesn't even know about. It's almost comical, the number of people involved in keeping him alive. If he knew, how many people would die for him, have already died for him…"
Harry froze at this. People dying – what? He was still reeling from learning about the prophecy last June. The idea of him having some great important destiny was overwhelming…terrifying. In fact, it was only now, during his dreams, that he even allowed himself to think of the prophecy or of Sirius. His waking mind had yet to accept what his subconscious had; that Sirius was gone, and that Harry was a marked man. He didn't want to hear about people sacrificing themselves for him, like his parents did, like Sirius did. He didn't deserve it. He didn't deserve any of it.
He turned back to Voldemort who was still talking. "Well, so how to get him out from under Dumbledore's watchful eyes? Tell me, Seer, how do I kill Harry Potter?"
"Love….His greatest weakness but also his greatest strength….It is the power the One possesses…the power to vanquish the Dark Lord."
"Love? I see."
Panic rose like a thick lump in Harry's throat. He already knew what Voldemort was thinking; the best way to get to Harry was through the people he loved. Just like last year. Just like Sirius.
But there was no time for guilt and self-hatred, for Trelawney had begun speaking again, still in that same dark voice.
"The Dark Lord will seek to kill the One….But she with hair of fire…Child of Phoenix…will lay down her life for the One….And the power to vanquish the Dark Lord will be unleashed….And the Dark Lord will be no more."
Silence lay heavy in the room as every eye turned to Voldemort, whose red eyes remained fixed on Trelawney. "Hair of fire? Phoenix?" He laughed then. "You're talking about Potter's mother – that has already happened, Seer. I want to know the future, not the past."
"The Dark Lord will seek to kill the One….But she with hair of fire…Child of Phoenix…." Trelawney repeated the prophecy and fell silent.
"We'll get nothing further from her, my Lord," said Malfoy.
Voldemort was staring at Trelawney with thoughtful eyes. A pale bony forefinger stroked his chin and then he snapped back to attention. "Yes, I suppose you're right." Then, to Harry's horror, those red, snakelike eyes were now fixed on Harry where he was positioned at the window.
"Are you watching this, Potter?" he asked with a large smile as if unsurprised to see him there. "Good." And lifting his wand, he pointed it at Trelawney. "Enjoy. CRUCIO!"
And with a searing blast of pain in his scar, Harry jerked awake in his bed many, many miles away.
Pain. Fear. Racing pulse, gasping breath. Harry reached a trembling hand up to his scar and found his forehead slick with cold sweat. He replayed the dream in his mind, determined not to let any of it slip away. He hadn't had a dream like this since the vision he'd had of S-, since last June, and he knew this dream was terribly important. I've got to tell someone – Dumbledore!
He reached for his glasses and put them on. He brushed the damp bangs out of his face and got out of bed. The beaten, battered, sat upon alarm clock told him it was just after four in the morning. Harry had a feeling he wouldn't be getting anymore sleep that night.
He stumbled across the room toward his desk and clicked on the small desk lamp. He saw Hedwig's empty cage and knew his pet owl must have been out hunting. He decided to write his dream down first, so none of it could escape his memory. Even now, as he sat writing, some of the details had become hazy. By the time he got to the end he had forgotten much of the last proph- last part. He could only remember that it had been about his mother sacrificing herself for him and Voldemort's subsequent defeat.
But that doesn't make sense. Why repeat a prophecy that's already come true? Unless….Harry shook his head. "A mystery for another time." He glanced over the parchment and when he was satisfied that he'd written down all he could remember, he folded it into thirds. He set this aside; he wasn't going to risk the dream being intercepted in the mail. He grabbed another sheet of parchment and jotted down a quick message.
Professor,
I need to talk to you as soon as possible. It happened again.
Harry
He addressed the message to Professor Albus Dumbledore; Headmaster, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, and set it aside to await Hedwig's return.
Harry sat staring out the open window onto the dark street below. A slight breeze ruffled his hair and provided some relief from the warm, humid night. It was calm and peaceful on Privet Drive. Harry snorted. It was always calm and peaceful on Privet Drive. With the exception of the occasional dementor attack, of course.
So he knows now. He knows he can kill me. And he's going to use my friends to get to me. His mind drifted back, as it had done so many times that summer, to the end of last term.
Harry closed his eyes against the onslaught of images. He and five of his friends –surrounded by Death Eaters – trapped in the bowels of the Ministry of Magic building. Hermione – hit with a curse, lying as if dead, unconscious. Ron attacked by brains while a white-faced Ginny looked on helplessly until she too was hit by a curse. Luna – flying through the air, also unconscious. And Neville, loyal Neville, who never left his side, being tortured with the Cruciatus Curse.
It was a miracle they all made it out alive. If reinforcements in the form of Order members hadn't come, they wouldn't have.
Well, I might have, Harry thought bitterly. His friends would have died, but he would've made it. That was his talent; surviving where others had died. The bloody Boy Who Lived.
He shook his head, as if to shake his very thoughts. He wasn't going to think about that. He cast his eyes about, looking for a welcome distraction. They landed on a yellowed bit of parchment on desk. He smiled as he picked it up.
His O.W.L. results had come in mid July. He had been astounded by his scores; he'd read them over and over and was the happiest he'd been all summer. He had achieved 7 O.W.L.s, and while nowhere near Hermione's score of 10 perfect O.W.L.s, it was still a very respectable score. An accompanying letter from Professor McGonagall asked him to mark which classes he would be taking at N.E.W.T. level. He was surprised to find that Potions was on the list, as Professor Snape only allowed those students who had scored Outstanding to continue in his N.E.W.T class.
He thought back to his Potions exam. While he felt that he had performed decently, much better than he had expected to, he didn't think he had done nearly so well as to earn an Outstanding. He then noticed that Professor McGonagall had made a notation beside the choice for Potions; "Due to a lack of qualifying students, the admissions requirements for N.E.W.T. level Potions has been expanded to include those students who scored Exceeds Expectations on the Potions O.W.L."
Harry had smiled at this. I sense the involvement of a certain Transfiguration professor. He thought of Professor McGonagall and her promise to help him become an auror "no matter what." He would need to take Potions if he wanted to be a dark wizard catcher.
He not only scored an Outstanding in Defense Against the Dark Arts, but in Charms, Herbology, and Care of Magical Creatures as well. He scored Exceeds Expectations level in Transfiguration and Potions. His Potions score blew his mind; it was much higher than he had even hoped for. But still, it wasn't an Outstanding and he knew "someone" must have persuaded Snape to allow him into NEWT Potions.
He just barely passed Astronomy with an Acceptable. He did fail two of his exams, though, but he had expected to. He received a Dreadful in Divination. No surprise there; his failing grade was the only thing he had accurately predicted in that class. He had also received a Poor in History of Magic, but was amazed he had done as well as that. History as taught by Professor Binns, a man who hadn't even let his own death keep him from teaching, was boring at best, mind-numbing torture at worst.
Harry shook his head. How Hermione manages to stay awake in that class…. It also didn't help when he missed half the exam because he had fallen asleep and had the vision of S- Don't! So, all in all, a Poor wasn't that bad. It's not like I'm going to need to know about the goblin rebellion of 1452 when I go up against Voldemort, Harry scoffed.
Harry looked up from gazing out the window. His eyes fell on a stack of letters and cards. His friends, still feeling bad about the lack of communication during the previous summer, went overboard in the opposite direction with a never ending stream of letters, visits, and even an occasional telephone call. Not a day went by in which he didn't have some sort of contact with the wizarding world.
And not only was he receiving more letters than ever, but he was hearing from more people than ever, as well. Lupin was a frequent correspondent, (and visitor) as was Mrs. Weasley, who always took care to send a pie or some biscuits with her letters. He had even received a few notes from Fred and George, and Neville wrote thanking him for his Outstanding O.W.L in Defense Against the Dark Arts. His gran was so pleased that she went right out and bought him a new wand to replace the one that had been broken in the Department of…No – stop it! And the first time he received a letter from Ginny, he nearly fell out of his chair.
But no matter who the author was, the missive was usually the same. Lighthearted tales and anecdotes designed to keep his spirits up before always alluding to that thing that he wasn't going to think about and always reminding him that (fill in the blank) would be there for him whenever he was ready "to talk." He usually skipped over these portions of the letters, instead choosing to focus on the lighter segments. His responses were the same; he was doing fine, it was the typical summer at Privet Drive; quiet and boring. He regaled his audience with tales of What Dudley Ate for Breakfast; Volume Two, or the very popular, critically acclaimed, Name That Color; A Guide to the Many Moods of Vernon Dursley. Why, just yesterday, his face had turned an impressive shade of fuchsia upon seeing his disheveled nephew coming in from weeding the regimented testament to uniformity that was the Dursley flower garden.
Harry smiled as he leafed through the letters. Ron excitedly relating the latest Quidditch league standings; the Chudley Cannons had won three games! Of course, they had lost ten games, but still! Hermione was off on one of her summer expeditions; Timbuktu? Or something like that. She had sent back exotic postcards so crammed with "interesting" information about "exciting people and cultures" that her neat handwriting was almost illegible. Yet, no matter how little space she had, she always managed to fit in a I'm-here-for-you-if-you-want-to-talk. Ginny's letters were full of mischief; so-bad-they're-almost-funny jokes and stories of the twins' latest antics. Fred and George kept him informed of their latest creations. They'd spent most of the summer working on something called Double Delights that they were surprisingly tight-lipped about except for a weird comment that the Double Delights would be a "bust" unless they could get all of the problems "in hand."
Harry chuckled as he thought of the twins. I bet Dad would have liked them. A sudden sadness came over him at that thought. He could still see the ugly sneer on his father's face as he tormented a teenaged Snape in Snape's memories. He had always wanted to be like his Dad, but now he wasn't so sure.
He wanted to talk to S-, and actually found himself starting several letters to his godfather, but then he remembered that he couldn't send letters to him, or talk to him, because he was dead. Dead. He was having a hard time understanding that concept. Sirius is dead. He kept waiting for it to sink in but it never did. He didn't understand. The words were in English and individually he understood them. Sirius. Is. Dead. But put them together and they might as well have been in Gobbledegook for all that Harry comprehended them.
It wasn't that Harry didn't understand death. His parents had been murdered when he was a baby and he'd witnessed Cedric's murder just over a year ago. He was no stranger to death. But in Cedric's case, he had seen the killing curse, had seen it strike Cedric, had seen it steal the very life from his body, and had held the body that remained. It's hard to be in denial when someone's lifeless, glazed eyes are staring at you from within a stone cold body. There is no question in that instance – Cedric was dead.
But Sirius….One minute he's battling his cousin and looking more alive since…ever. Taunting her with a trademark cockiness that was reminiscent of younger years and Harry could just imagine what he was like before Azkaban and the murders of his friends robbed him of his youth and beauty. But that was one minute. The next minute had him hurtling backwards through the air struck by a curse. A non-fatal curse at that. Harry seethed at the twisted irony of it. After everything that Sirius had endured, after spending minutes fighting in a life or death battle with several of Voldemort's most powerful Death Eaters, it wasn't the curse that killed him, but falling through the mysterious Veil in the middle of the room. That's it. No Avada Kedavra, no body, no glassy eyes staring vacantly, nothing but a fluttering curtain and Remus's word that he was gone. After everything he had done, everything he had been, that was how he died. Killed by drapery.
And of course because it wasn't bad enough that he and his friends had narrowly escaped death while his godfather hadn't, Dumbledore afterwards informed him of the prophecy that said he would either have to kill Voldemort (thereby saving the wizarding world) or be killed by Voldemort (thereby condemning the wizarding world to a horrible fate.) Nope, no pressure there. He could actually hear Oliver Wood saying, "Save the world or die trying!" Nice bloke for motivation, that one.
And so, what with one thing another, it is no surprise that when Harry stepped into the smallest bedroom on Number Four, Privet Drive, that he was feeling a bit… numb from the shock of it all. Several weeks later, he was still feeling much the same.
He swallowed, trying to force down the lump in his throat. He looked back at the cards on his desk wanting to think of something else. He smiled at the many colorful birthday cards. His birthday had come at the end of July and he was now sixteen.
Sixteen, he mused. In a year he would be of age and the Decree for the Reasonable Restriction of Underage Sorcery would no longer apply to him. I think I'll celebrate by turning the Dursleys into pigs, he thought with a wicked grin. Of course, Uncle Vernon and Dudley are almost there. He entertained himself with imagining their round pink bodies and curly tails running all over Privet Drive, their squeals echoing down the street.
He laughed out loud at the thought, even as he knew he would never actually do it. Anyway, there's still probably a Decree against the Turning of Muggles into Pigs. And also, his coming of age was still a whole year off.
As if sensing how much Harry needed to celebrate his birthday this year, his friends had really come through for him. At the stroke of midnight, a flurry of owls descended on house #4, flying through his open window in a rush of beating wings. Amazingly, Uncle Vernon slept through the whole thing. By the time they were gone, Harry was left with any number of cards and a few presents from his best friends.
Hermione had sent him a couple of books that would help him with an idea he'd secretly hatched. He smiled, thinking of those books; he couldn't wait to put his plan into action.
Ron had given him a large assortment of Honeyduke's Best Chocolate. His brothers George and Fred had sent him a box filled with some of their candy creations labeled, "For Dudley." Harry chuckled at the idea of his porcine cousin "accidentally" discovering one of the prank treats – but decided instead to save them for another time, like when he was of age and no longer had to stay under the Dursleys' roof.
Their card simply read, "Happy Birthday, Harry, from Gred and Forge." Inside of the card was a wizarding photo of the twins, who were identical in every way, from the bright red hair on their heads, to their many freckles, to the large breasts they both sported under their shirts. What? It took a second glance to convince Harry that his eyes weren't playing tricks on him. Harry turned the picture over, hoping to find some explanation. But all it said was, "Love from the Twins." Harry filed it away as something to ask about later.
He'd received cards from all the Weasley children, minus Percy, and had laughed at Ginny's handmade card. The front bore the image of a disgruntled dwarf dressed in a cotton diaper, with wings sticking out of his back, and carrying a bow and arrow. Beneath him was a simple message:
Happy Birthday, Harry,
It's no singing dwarf, but I think it will do,
Love, Ginny
He opened the card and a shrill singing erupted from it. Fortunately, the singing was quite soft; otherwise, he would have to deal with his Uncle's rants about Harry and "all that ruddy noise." Harry smiled and shook his head. Ginny and her singing cards.
It was obviously a joke, playing off the time in his second year when she (suffering from an acute crush on Mr. Potter) sent him a singing Valentine by way of costumed dwarf. Harry laughed as he listened to the song:
His eyes are as green as an algae covered pond
His hair, the blackest of black
I wish he were here
To give Ron some cheer,
And get my brothers off my back!
Mrs. Weasley had also sent a card, along with several mincemeat pies, which Harry had happily devoured. He'd also received cards from various Order of Phoenix members such as Tonks and Mad Eye Moody. Moody's card wasn't so much a card as a long rambling warning about the dangers of birthdays; poisoned cakes, exploding presents, drunken guests who wont leave.
Remus's card had been the hardest for Harry to open. He had been a good friend of both his father and S-, his godfather. Harry didn't think he could take another reminder of that. It was almost comical the way he sat, eyes closed tightly, card in his hand, trying to screw up the Gryffindor courage to open the card. Finally, he opened it quickly and ran his eyes over the letters so fast they were an incomprehensible blur, just so he could say to himself that he had read it. He still didn't know what the card had said beyond Happy Birthday. I'm going to read it. Just, not yet.
And that had been the extent of his birthday. The Dursleys' of course didn't even acknowledge it. It was just another ordinary day and since then seven ordinary days had passed. There were now three more weeks before term began.
A soft hooting snapped him out of his thoughts. He looked up to see his snowy white owl Hedwig returning from her outing.
"Morning, girl. Good hunting? I hate to send you out again but I need you to deliver this message to Dumbledore as quick as you can." He tied the letter to her outstretched leg and with a playful nip at his fingers, she was off.
He glanced at the clock again. It was still early, just before dawn, but Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia would be up soon. He crawled back into bed. Resting would do him good even if he couldn't sleep.
Two hours later, he was still lying on his bed, waiting for the loud slam that would signal his Uncle's departure for work. He smiled when his cousin's whines floated up the stairs. That summer Uncle Vernon had decided it would be good if Dudley came to work with him, working in a type of entry-level, intern capacity. He had declared that it was time Dudley learned something of the business, as he would be running it one day. Dudley's expression upon hearing the news had been one of pure horror. His small beady eyes bulged out of their fleshy sockets and his round ball of a face turned a frightening shade of purple. Harry tried to keep a straight face as he saw another one of Dudley's tantrums coming on.
Oh, how he bawled and bawled, big fat tears dripping over his six chins. But he was on holiday, he cried. He needed to rest from his grueling year at Smeltings. He wanted to visit with his friends and work on his boxing – how was he supposed to maintain his Junior Heavyweight title if he didn't practice?
"There, there, Dudley, my boy," Uncle Vernon had rushed to calm his wailing son. "You can still do all those things. It's just, I need someone at work I can depend on. Someone smart, who will keep a sharp eye on the goings on among the staff. You'll get to help me make important decisions like hirings and firings."
This seemed to have cheered Dudley for his screams had quieted. Even Dudley had recognized the opportunity to bully a whole new set of victims. He was further pleased to learn that he would be working out of a large corner office complete with top of the line computer equipment. Which meant that he would probably spend the whole of the day playing computer games and checking out adult sites on the Internet, Harry wisely surmised.
"And you, boy," Uncle Vernon turned to Harry, his moustache bristling with barely contained animosity, "are going to work very hard for your Aunt this holiday. No more free rides for you, no sir. You're going to earn the room and board we've so graciously provided." Uncle Vernon stared very hard at Harry as if daring him to argue.
But Harry just shrugged his shoulders. "Yes sir," he replied indifferently. After everything he had faced at the end of the school year, he just couldn't muster the emotions necessary for an angry response. He couldn't even bring himself to remind his portly uncle that he didn't have to take this treatment, that all he'd have to do was send one letter to his friends and a handful of the oddest people Privet Drive had ever seen would descend on house # 4 in a flash.
Harry straightened in his bed, hearing the front door slam below and the bassy rumble of his uncle's car pulling out of the drive. He waited a few minutes, ignoring the increasing growls of his stomach and headed downstairs.
He stopped in the absurdly clean kitchen. He was surprised to see his aunt cooking breakfast. This was odd; usually Harry grabbed a leftover piece of toast or just sneaked something out of the refrigerator, since his desire to avoid his uncle and cousin in the mornings meant that he missed out on breakfast.
But sure enough, Aunt Petunia was standing in front of the stove, turning over several fat sausages while eggs fried in another pan. He paused in confusion before slowly sinking down at the kitchen table. Surely she wasn't cooking for him. He held his breath, knowing at any minute she would snap at him and ask what he was waiting for. But she never did. Minutes passed in this tense, awkward silence and then suddenly there was a plate of steaming food in front of him.
Harry was stunned. While nowhere near the amount of food Mrs. Weasley tried to feed him, it was still much more than his aunt had ever fixed for him before. He was almost afraid to say something, afraid words would break the spell and the plate of sausages and eggs would change into a piece of moldy bread and a glass of water. But still he managed a weak "thank you" before setting to.
To his additional surprise, his aunt took a seat beside him at the square table. Harry ate in silence for a few minutes while Aunt Petunia examined the nonexistent dirt on the tabletop. Finally she broke the silence.
"You've been rather quiet this summer." It was a simple statement and void of the accusatory tone it normally would have carried.
"Um, yeah, I guess so." There was another long pause.
"He's still out there, isn't he? Voldemort."
Harry's insides froze and it wasn't from hearing the dark wizard's name, as was the case with most of the wizarding community. It was from hearing the name from his muggle aunt's mouth.
It was strangely surreal, much like last summer, when dementors had attacked Harry and Dudley in this same neighborhood and a conversation about Voldemort had taken place in this very kitchen. And the fear that had been in his aunt's voice then was the same as now.
For she alone, of all of Harry's so called family, knew enough to fear Voldemort. For this was the same dark wizard who had murdered her sister. A sister she had detested, a sister she liked to pretend never existed, but a sister nonetheless.
Harry sneaked a glance at his aunt's thin horsy face. She was staring fixedly at a cupboard drawer and seemed to be fighting some internal battle. Finally she stood up quickly and walked to the drawer, yanking it out. She dropped something on the table in front of Harry.
His eyes nearly popped forward when he saw the small photograph of his mother and Aunt Petunia, taken when they were very young. He half expected the figures to move before reminding himself that only wizarding photos moved. Harry was speechless; nowhere else in the entire house, had there ever been a picture of his parents.
He looked up at his aunt, who shook away the unspoken question on his lips. "I found this while going through an old box the other day. Just thought I might as well give it to you as throw it away."
For some reason he didn't believe his aunt's story. Maybe he was just grasping – trying to find some semblance of humanity in his cold cruel aunt, but he wanted to believe that she had been holding onto the photo for all these years, that maybe there was a part of her – a small part to be sure – that had cared for her sister.
He wanted to argue the point, but thought better of it and simply said, "Thank you." He shook his head, still trying to wrap his brain around the sudden turn of events. Just as he was beginning to fear that some Death Eater had taken the guise of his aunt, she snapped at him, bringing him back to reality.
"Now eat up! I've got a lot of work for you today. You can start by mowing the lawn, weeding the garden, pruning the hedges, painting the fence, paving the driveway, fixing the shingles on the roof…."
Hours later,an endless sea of green stretched before his weary eyes. The Dursleys' yard had never seemed so vast as it did whenever Harry mowed it. As he was doing on this particular afternoon. The hard way.
He waved politely at the next door neighbor who rode past on a riding lawnmower. The man's yard was the size of a postage stamp yet he had a riding lawnmower. Meanwhile, Harry was stuck using the Dursleys' old push lawnmower. Not only that, but this lawnmower didn't have a motor of any kind; the relic pre-dated the machine age. It was simply made up of two wheels and a rotating blade. A very dull, rusted blade.
Harry wiped the sweat from his brow as he went back over the section for the fifth time. This fossil belongs in a museum with other antiquities. People would queue up and pay money to see it. But instead Harry got to mow their giant lawn with it. He wondered what the Dursleys did during the school year when he wasn't there to do the yard work. He couldn't imagine Uncle Vernon mowing the yard like this. They probably hire some neighbor kid to do it, Harry surmised with a wry smile.
He thought back to that morning's bizarre encounter with his aunt. When he got off the train at King's Cross last term he had been looking forward to a rough and dismal summer. His time with the Dursleys was always difficult as they chose not to see him as a nephew, but rather an unwanted pest, or a slave, or both. He expected this summer to be even worse.
However, Harry had to admit, as he started on a new section of lawn, the summer hadn't been…that bad. The Dursleys had actually managed to be…bearable. Even his uncle Vernon.
There seemed to be an unspoken rule in the house: Leave Harry alone. The Dursleys went to great lengths to avoid him. In fact, Harry suspected that the reason behind Dudley going to work wasn't to gain him "valuable real life experience," but rather to get him out of Harry's hair. Uncle Vernon and Dudley left very early every morning and worked until late every night. Nearly every weekend the family (minus Harry) went away on vacation.
And Harry's rare encounters with the family weren't terrible. Uncle Vernon seemed to go out of his way to be…not mean to Harry. They had even given Harry one of Dudley's old TV's (Oh, how he cried!) so that Harry could keep up with the news without bothering the rest of the family.
The only thing that remained constant was the workload, but for once Harry didn't mind the grueling labor. It kept him busy, killed time, and kept his mind off of things he'd rather not think about. It also wore him out so that hours later as he trudged up the stairs toward his room he knew he'd sleep soundly that night. He was too exhausted to dream.
He hopped into the bathroom for a quick shower to wash away the sweat and grime. The Dursleys were still eating dinner so Harry could count on a pleasant five minutes before Uncle Vernon began making thinly veiled comments about "people using up all the hot water."
He stood there and let the hot water roll off his tense, knotted shoulders and down his back. He sighed and imagined all of his cares and worries washing away with the dirt, swirling down the drain. He thought of his dream – how good it had felt to be flying in the air. He hung onto that feeling like a drowning man clutching a lifeline.
Later, in his room he pulled on a pair of sweatpants and grimaced when they only came down to his calves. He'd had another growth spurt and Dudley's old castoffs just couldn't cut it anymore. They wouldn't fit at all if it weren't for Dudley being five times as big around as Harry.
Despite the extra inches he'd gained, he still wasn't what one would call tall. Tallish, maybe, on the tall side, but not tall. Perhaps it was spending 10 years living in a cupboard, or the fact that the Dursleys never fed him enough, but he'd always been small for his age. Of the boys in his dorm, only Neville was shorter. He'd sprouted up quite a bit since coming to Hogwarts though. Good food and Quidditch had filled him out and he no longer had that 'runt' look about him. Still, he wasn't likely to surpass Ron's height anytime soon.
Realizing the time, he switched on the TV just as the news was coming on. He plopped onto the bed, his taut muscles relaxing as he reclined. The television set was small, black & white, and barely picked up three channels. But it got the news and that was all Harry cared about. He was watching, as was his evening ritual, for absolutely no reason at all and certainly not to keep an eye on any suspicious activity that might be the work of a certain Dark Lord that he wasn't thinking about. He also wasn't receiving the Daily Prophet everyday and reading it from cover to cover looking for mention of said Dark Lord.
Still, it was quite the relief when day after day passed with no news of dark activity.
He turned his attention back to the news. The first segment had passed and there had been no mention of murders or unexplained deaths. Harry let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. So everything was okay. For now. They moved onto the weather and Harry turned off the TV.
It was still fairly early and despite his body's exhaustion his mind was wide-awake. So he reached under his bed and pulled out the books Hermione had gotten him: Fighting Techniques from Around the World, and Basic Martial Arts and Self-Defense. The former was more of a history of the world's martial arts disciplines and the theories behind them, while the latter was more of a practical study of basic skills.
One night toward the beginning of holiday he had fallen asleep with the TV. on. He'd woken up hours later to find an old kung-fu movie on. He had watched the skilled fighters throw kicks and punches at each other, seeming to fly through the air. At the time though, he simply thought it was "cool" and had gone back to bed. It wasn't until he had dreamt of himself as the young hero, Flying Dragon, battling the evil sorcerer, Slithering Serpent, using the near mystical kung-fu fighting skills, that the idea had come to him.
It was so simple, yet made so much sense. He had learned from his previous encounters with Voldemort, that one couldn't always count on magic; he had to be able to draw on other sources. Sources that dark wizards wouldn't be expecting, like muggle fighting skills. So Harry had gotten the idea to augment the D.A. training with martial arts.
He was thinking of Dumbledore's Army, the defense club he had started last year to teach students how to defend themselves, since the new curriculum under Dolores Umbridge didn't allow for Defense Against the Dark Arts students to actually learn defense against the Dark Arts.
Harry supposed that now that Umbridge was gone that the D.A. wouldn't be needed, but he really didn't want to see it go. He envisioned the club as being a kind of elite force of the best students at Hogwarts, a secondary line of defense in case of attack. He found himself planning new lessons; for example, he was going to focus heavily on the Patronus Charm, since it was the only thing that would fend off the hundreds of dementors that Voldemort now had at his disposal.
He hoped he'd be able to continue with the club. He was filled with such energy when he made plans and thought about its members. It gave him drive, purpose, and was the one thing that truly made him feel alive.
Finally, his eyelids began to droop and a pleasant drowsiness crept over him. He crawled into bed and got out the picture of his mother and Aunt Petunia from the bedside table. He stared at the picture, memorizing his mother's lovely smile. Her green eyes twinkled back at him and her expression was one of joy and love. Thick, dark red hair framed her young face.
And that was the last he saw as his eyes closed and his body succumbed to his exhaustion. He slept deeply that night, lost in dreams of a red headed woman holding him, shielding him as a blast of green light erupted around them.