Chapter One: Apparating Home
Harry Potter lay on his bed, a large, leather-bound book resting open next to him, its pages partially illuminated by the soft glow of the moon. As he stared up at the ceiling, thinking about the previous year at Hogwarts, a wizarding school that he attended, he felt an all too familiar sting and blinked his eyes rapidly. He sat up and wiped his eyes with the back of his hand, then looked out the window, hoping for some kind of answer.
During Harry's sixth year at Hogwarts, the headmaster, Albus Dumbledore had taught him about Lord Voldemort's past and also about the magical artifacts – called Horcruxes – that he had to destroy in order to defeat him once and for all. Dumbledore had taken him to a place where he believed one of the Horcruxes was hidden. Everything went horribly wrong after the moment they entered the cave, and, at one point, Harry even felt as if he were sentencing Dumbledore to death, something that in the end would ultimately happen.
After retrieving the Horcrux from the cave, Harry and Dumbledore Apparated to Hogsmeade, an all-wizarding village not too far from Hogwarts, and then flew the rest of the way to Hogwarts, for they could never Apparate into the halls of Hogwarts. Once they arrived at Hogwarts, the night got even worse. Harry was hidden under an Invisibility Cloak – a magical item which concealed the wearer from anyone and everyone, though Dumbledore was visible to all who chose to look at him.
Harry was astonished when Draco Malfoy, a fellow student at Hogwarts, arrived to kill Dumbledore. Harry could do nothing at all, for at the instant the door to the top of the castle had opened, he had frozen, though the spell Malfoy had shouted was not used to freeze anything, it was just to disarm an opponent. Malfoy, however, had not been able to kill Dumbledore, but Severus Snape, a teacher at Hogwarts, did, at which point Harry was unfrozen. Suddenly, he had understood – Dumbledore had sacrificed his life to save Harry's, though why he needed to be frozen when he was already under the Cloak, he couldn't tell.
As Harry looked out the window at the stars – the same stars that he had looked at that horrible night, he felt a tear roll down his cheek. He did nothing to wipe it away, for he had just seen something very odd flying towards his bedroom window. Cautiously, he stood up and pulled his wand out of his waistband and moved towards the closed window. As the thing got closer, he realized just what it was and flung his window open, then stood back to allow the owls to fly in through the open window.
The three owls landed on his bed and stood patiently, waiting for Harry to relieve them of their bundles. After he had collected all of the parcels and letters, the owls left Harry's room in rapid succession. Harry sat down on his bed and opened the nearest letter, which was attached to an oblong, lumpy package. Harry quickly read:
Dear Harry,
Happy Birthday! Just thought you might like something to cheer you up, seeing as the muggles probably going to do nothing for you this year. Hermione's with us at the Burrow right now, and tomorrow, we're planning on coming for you. I can't wait until the Apparition tests, Hermione's had to take me anywhere I want to go. There is a plus side to that though, she smells really nice. Just don't tell her I said that, okay?
Ron
P.S. Make sure you have all of your stuff packed, Hermione's gotten really impatient lately, and I don't know why.
Harry sat down on his bed and smiled. HE WAS SEVENTEEN! Finally, he could use magic outside of Hogwarts, something he had been waiting six years to do. Maybe, just maybe, now the Dursleys wouldn't mess around with him anymore…