The Old Ways
Chapter 1
Just like the rest of the United Kingdom, Surrey was covered with a roiling grey mist that refused to lift or be dispelled in any fashion. The strange mist blanketed the land, seemingly swallowing all the modern muggle structures and making travel by auto extremely dangerous.
And all across the land there were people, sometimes whole families, found in a catatonic state that defied logic and refused all cures.
A grim mood had gripped the nation, and it was only getting worse.
At the window of the smallest bedroom of number 4, Privet Drive, stood one boy who knew the origin of that strange grey mist that stumped so many muggle scientists.
And he was pissed.
Ron Weasley had been enjoying his summer very much despite the grim state of affairs in the world... He had gotten through his O.W.L.s just fine, and Hermione Granger had been visiting him often at the burrow. Things in that department seemed to be progressing, finally.
And then one day last week an unsettled Albus Dumbledore dropped in on the burrow for a visit. He brought with him grave news.
Harry Potter was missing.
Or to put it more accurately, he had run away. For reasons unknown - or perhaps the Headmaster simply wasn't sharing them - Harry had left the safety of his relatives' home, even taking the time to say goodbye - and then simply disappeared.
A hasty order meeting was called at the Burrow - their new meeting place as the security at Grimmauld Place had been compromised by that blasted house elf - and a decision had been made.
They would scour the country for Harry discreetly, but in the mean time it would threaten the boy's safety should the dark forces that constantly watch his home were to notice he was missing.
So while Harry Potter, the Boy-Who-Ruined-Ronald-Weasley's-Summer was out doing Merlin-knew-what, Ron had taken his place at four, Privet Drive as a decoy.
The polyjuice potion tasted as horrible as it did in his second year, and Ron had to take it twenty-four times a day, every hour on the hour.
Ron hated to admit it, but he made a lousy Harry Potter... the seclusion forced upon him by the many locks on Harry's door was nearly intolerable. The lack of food was DEFINITELY intolerable. But he had learned not to complain to the Dursleys about their treatment of him. He rubbed his bruised jaw absently, cursing that fat muggle cousin of Harry's, Didley was his name?
It didn't matter what the fat bastard's name was, Ron told himself. He would be out of there as soon as they found Harry, and with Albus Dumbledore and the full weight of the Order searching for him, surely that wouldn't be long.
Ron's stomach growled angrily, demanding food, but there was no Molly Weasley there to cook for him... no stash of chocolate frogs or Bertie Bott's Beans. He would just have to wait for the Dursley's to remember to feed him.
Ron cursed Harry to seven hells for putting him in this position. He flopped down onto the thin mattress that was half covered with a threadbare blanket, swearing under his breath. He thought of Hermione, as he often did, and hoped that an owl or SOMETHING would come for him soon, releasing him from this hell that was Harry's life.
The Forbidden Forest was forbidden, Harry remembered with a snicker. It had been a week since he had flown away in the dead of night on his broomstick. The flight had been long and cold, but by dawn he touched down at the edge of Hogsmeade village and proceeded into the forest on foot, prepared to make a life there for the coming months.
The forest was large - how large Harry didn't exactly know. Tall, imposing hills (they seemed like mountains to Harry) surrounded the lake and sheltered Hogwarts castle and Hogsmeade village. It would be impossible to find anyone in the forest, and that's what Harry was counting on.
The forest was home to many plants and animals that had magic of their own, wild and free. He could practically taste it in the air at times, and he knew that amidst all that wild, untamed and unregulated magic his own would not be detectable.
The few days he spent at the Dursley's were the worst he'd ever spent at Privet Drive. His thoughts would not cease their torment of him, and his sadness would not abate. His fifth year at Hogwart's was, by all accounts, a complete disaster.
But not his disaster.
Mistakes had been made by everyone, including himself, but mostly by the Headmaster, Dumbledore... at the end of the term Dumbledore had admitted, close to tears, that he had made several glaring errors. He admitted it was a mistake to distance himself from Harry, abandoning him. He admitted it was a mistake to force him to work with Professor Snape, whose hatred knew no bounds. He admitted it was a mistake to not tell him the prophecy sooner... and he had admitted he loved Harry, like a favorite grandson.
And it was that last confession that saddened Harry the most while he sat there at Privet Drive, alone and ignored, abandoned again...
If Dumbledore knew his mistakes, why was he not correcting them, Harry had wondered. And why, if Dumbledore loved him like a favorite grandson, had he abandoned him again to muggle hell... without so much as a word to him in those last week's after Sirius's death?
And as Harry's sadness grew, he knew what he must do.
And so Harry had set out with nothing but his iron will to survive and a few possessions... he was on a quest, a journey to find himself and perhaps, at last, some peace.