Chapter 2 (reloaded, I've added some more and change a few minor things.)

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. You know that and I know that but I still have to write the disclaimer, even though the site is called FAN fiction. I have read many fanfictions and consequently may have "borrowed" other people's ideas so if you recognise something it probably isn't mine. Finally if I am aware that I have taken somebody's idea I will put their pen name in brackets after it or acknowledge them at the end of the appropriate chapter, this is only if I know the name. If you recognize something of yours that has not been acknowledged, tell me and I will acknowledge it. I am not making any money out of this so don't sue. I don't know why I bothered to write this as no one reads these anyway…

Immortal Rose: The Beauxbatons students expect him to be a muggle because their dad is and he would have told them that his sisters were. Also it is unlikely that they knew that The Harry Potter's mum was called Lily. Finally, is he as well known out of the UK? AND Harry's year hasn't been taught about him so maybe they would think of Harry Potter not really being a person you would/could meet? Good question though, and I've changed it in the previous chapter to just 'Harry' rather than 'Harry Potter' to prevent confusion. Thanks for reviewing.

Dark Jewel and Lady Cinnibar: I'm glad you like it! You are really nice

Professor Mayvero: Thanks for reviewing.

Waking up, Harry groaned and rolled over to the wall in hope of going back to sleep. Unfortunately in his new bedroom the bed was against the opposite wall, and instead of curling up against a surface Harry found himself on the floor completely entangled in his quilt.

After extracting himself he glanced at the clock- 6AM, and groaned again. Pinkish light from the rising sun entered his room and he looked around his new room cursing himself for stupidity, he should have checked the entire room before going to sleep, not afterwards. If Moody ever found out he'd roast him alive. However, the room seemed perfectly safe after a through inspection. It was a big room, round with several doors coming off it. One led to a small en-suite shower room, another to a big cupboard and the final one opened onto a narrow, unlit stairwell that would have looked unused had there not been a distinct set of three pairs of footprints in the dust.

"That explains the spiders in the bath, drawers and cupboard then", Harry said randomly to the stairs before turning back up them, and locking the door, and dragging the chest of drawers in front of it. Smiling a little he wondered how he could find out who was trying to scare him. One spider in the bath wouldn't be strange, two even, but seven! What is more he was not even bothered by spiders. Harry almost laughed, but the door opened unceremoniously and Petunia entered, somewhat nervously.

This knocked Harry's mood and he wondered what he had done wrong this time.

"Claudia and Rowan don't know about your freakishness and I intend for it to stay that way. Rowan left home before Lily got her letter to that dreadful place so he has no idea about what she was."

"OK" was Harry's reply, he thought briefly about telling her that the three girls were witches, but decided against it. She wouldn't believe him and he wasn't really bothered that the shock would be worse later. For all he knew Claudia might be a witch too.

Petunia seemed slightly unnerved by the ease that Harry agreed with her demand and told him to go downstairs since breakfast was starting.

Rowan seemed to be a very happy in general, for three days everyone stayed at the house and seemed to get along fine. However, something didn't seem to fit, and Harry didn't notice what it was until the end of the third day [Wednesday for anyone who is interested]. Mark seemed to be close to his dad, but actually Mark was simply acting in the way his father wanted him to, to make up for the fact that Rowan did not actually understand his son at all. Another thing was that Rowan was very generous and extravagant with his money; by Wednesday Harry began to suspect that it was a mechanism to make up for his long absences.

Harry wasn't complaining though. He had to do no chores, aside from tidying and cleaning his own room "when he saw fit", and he had someone to talk to, Mark. After their first meeting things only got better, it seemed as though Mark wanted someone on his side as much as Harry wanted someone on his.  This is what led to Harry realizing that Rowan didn't really understand Mark, or realise that his sisters bullied him.

Harry had found that the girls had left the spiders by a process of trial and error. It either couldn't or wouldn't have been anyone else. When he realized that they were also ganging up against Mark he decided to help Mark get his own back, and by using magical pranks, most originating from Fred and George, thus eliminating both of them from the suspects list, since he was a muggle and Mark had never been to Diagon Alley, or whatever the French equivalent was. Neither Rowan nor Claudia seemed to notice Hazel and Holly (Rose was sometimes standing unobtrusively in the background, sometimes she was not around at all) tormenting Mark, but as soon as Harry started turning the tide Claudia seemed to notice immediately. But due to the nature of the pranks (i.e. magical) it seemed as though it was one of the girls turning against the others, Harry and Mark found this very funny, but managed to keep a straight face whilst being interrogated as to where they were whenever anyone entered Holly/Hazel's room.

There were lots of advantages to living here, firstly the grounds meant that he could do some fitness training without others noticing, ditto for Quidditch, although he was even more careful about that, he was teaching Mark how to play, but it was difficult when they only had one broom, and there were lots of places to sit and know you wouldn't be disturbed.

Then there were the gifts, on the Tuesday Rowan had retuned with a mobile phone for both Dudley and Harry, saying that "this way if you're going to be late home to won't worry anyone". This was a Godsend for Harry for after the first few letters from his friends he told them to stop writing, the most they could write was a couple of lines and it was vague and pointless information since they could not risk information getting out if he letters were intercepted.  However, considering the fact that most, if not all Deatheaters despised and mistrusted, as well as being absolutely clueless about, muggle technology, and that he knew he had Hermione's phone number somewhere, a huge bubble of happiness welled up inside him. Neither Deatheater, nor members of the Order would realise if he spoke to Hermione. Another 'gift' was given to him a couple of days later when Harry was feeling completely miserable.

Harry received a letter, by owl, early Thursday morning. Remus was going to take him to Grimmauld Place to be present at the reading of Sirius' Will at 9 O'clock. Reading that, albeit very brief, message made tears well up in his eyes, it was another example of the finality that Sirius was dead, and Harry still desperately wanted to have Sirius back. Saying 'goodbye' hurt too much.

Before the reading started Remus put his arm across Harry's shoulders, and told him gently that he was here if Harry needed to talk, about Sirius, or anything else, Remus reminded him that he had lots of people who cared about him and wanted him to be safe, and he also warned Harry that Narcissa Malfoy might be there, and consequently her son might be too. Harry of course had forgotten, but just nodded his head miserably, the pain of being here was eating away at Harry, and this hurt Remus almost as much as his own pain of losing Sirius.

When they entered there were few people in there, Dumbledore sat at the head, he was going to actually 'read the Will', Narcissa was there, as predicted, but Draco was not, Tonks and a couple who Harry presumed to be her parents Andromeda and Ted. Andromeda was another of Sirius' cousins. Several other members of the Order were there, Shacklebolt, Moody, and Mr. & Mrs. Weasley as well as a few Harry didn't know. As he and Remus sat down Mrs Weasley sent a concerned look over to them, her gaze lingering on Harry until he looked up and gave her a weak smile. The occasion was solemn but short, the house was Harry's, but Dumbledore could use it until he no longer needed it, several books and pieces of furniture, as well as 10% of the gold in his Gringotts vault were to go to Remus, a sum of money went to the Tonks' and the rest was Harry's, including a parchment containing details of other hidden properties and the motorbike which had been recovered recently.

Mrs Weasley did not look happy at that. However, she did not get a chance to talk to Harry as Dumbledore told Moody to get Harry back to his family as fast as possible, and Moody took him at his word- forcing the portkey into Harry's hands. He had barely enough time to yell goodbye to Mrs Weasley and Remus before feeling the sharp tug at his navel, signifying that the portkey had been activated.

The first thing Harry did was call Hermione and tell her what had happened. The emotions that had been held inside him began to spill forth. It took Hermione by surprise, as he had refused point blank to speak about Sirius and the events in the department of mysteries when she had tried to get him to open up before, but she recovered quickly as she could tell how much he needed someone to talk to. She comforted Harry as best she could, the pain in his voice hurt her, and she wondered if being alone was the best thing for Harry at the moment. After about ten minutes of this Harry seemed to be cried out, his voice was snufflely and unhappy but he changed the subject. He told her about Mark and the strange way that the family worked, Hermione too thought that something was up, but she couldn't guess what.

After calling Hermione, Harry felt a little better, and was pleased to see Mark when he came in. Mark took him down to Rowan's 'study' and said that his dad had asked to see him, Harry looked at him queryingly [is this a word? my spell checker doesn't think it is, but it is logical.] but Mark just shook his head and shrugged.

"Come in" said Rowan happily; he seemed completely unaware that the Will reading had shaken Harry completely. Although, had Harry been feeling normal he would have realised that this was not out of character at all. Harry pushed open the heavy wood door and found himself in a teak panelled room; all furniture was either dark, polished wood, leather of velvet. However, nothing seemed used. The room did not feel like a room that was used regularly, or like a room that was enjoyed; despite the size of the room it felt claustrophobic, uncomfortable and staged; the ceiling was too low and the carpet/rugs too thick, they muffled the sounds made by the old clock in the corner and the creaking of the chair in which Rowan sat.

"I hear that you were left a motorbike" said Rowan, Harry looked warily at him; he did not trust his uncle enough to want a conversation with him involving Sirius. "Yes", came Harry's hesitant reply.

"You know I'm not going to eat you," joked Rowan, Harry smiled grimly, so Rowan got to the point.

"You know that you can't drive anything above a 50cc until you're 17 right…"

Harry nodded.

"… And your only 16 in a couple of days…"

Harry nodded again, wondering how Rowan knew his birthday, his Aunt Petunia didn't tell him, did she?

"… So you won't be able to drive it."

Harry looked at Rowan in a confused way. Why tell him something that he already knew. But Rowan started again.

"There is one way around it, but only if your happy to and I'd advise you not to tell Petunia and Vernon…"

Harry was starting to get annoyed.

"… I can get hold of a fake licence if you want."

That was it, he had said it, Harry couldn't believe it, he agreed, naturally, but adults just don't do that sort of thing. He left the room slightly dazed with confusion, 'why?' was the word that kept running through his brain, as he approached the tower it occurred to him that Mrs Weasley would not know that he wasn't allowed to drive yet, most of the Order were not from muggle families, and Tonks would, hopefully, be OK about it, and as long as he told Hermione soon she would probably get over it before she saw Mrs Weasley.

Harry went up to his room and called Hermione for the second time that day.

She answered the phone quietly and asked whether he was all right, Harry replied that he was OK, recalling the earlier phone call and realizing that the unusual behaviour of his uncle had distracted him from remembering Sirius, and told her about the bike. She seemed shocked and suspicious, shocked that his uncle had offered to get the licence and shocked that Harry had agreed. She was suspicious as to why Rowan had offered. Hermione advised him to be careful, and if he must ride the thing, to learn the basics first and that he should not try flying it until there were other witches and wizards around. The last statement was a mistake, Harry had completely forgotten that it could fly, and now couldn't help thinking he hoped it would feel more like a broom than a Thestral, and he really hoped it was not like a Hippogriff.

Hermione was also going to the Weasley's the next day, by portkey and wished him a happy birthday for tomorrow

OK, how was it? Any good? Do you have any suggestions as to how I could improve it? If you do please Review!

The story is going a bit slower than I expected, there is a lot to write before the first main thing happens, I thought I would get to it at the end of the first chapter, but now I think it will be more like the end of the next chapter, or even the fourth chapter.

Thank you in advance for reviewing, if you leave a signed review, I do normally read work done by the reviewer, [and yes, this is a bribe].

Fire Tempest