Author's Note:

Welcome Back!

This story did not want to get written, let me tell you. It was a 150,000 word bitch from the third chapter almost to the end, but it's here!

Normal warnings: the Valerians are, at their core, animals and fighters and there is violence in that.

Also, for anyone who has read the previous incarnation of this story, while much of it has changed, that one, rather painful part, in the beginning is still there. To anyone with a weak metaphorical heart (like myself) bring tissues.

Unlike the last story in the series, I'm going to be posting this one on Saturdays on a weekly basis, time and real life permitting.

I work a job that I enjoy but doesn't pay me much, so obviously, most of these characters are not my own, otherwise I'd be making a great deal more and living a far more lavish lifestyle.

And finally, while I don't mind reviews, which can include constructive criticism, I'm rather not find of downright hate and as I mentioned in my last story, it really doesn't belong on this site, or any other fanfiction site, and you are welcome to take that hate, and yourself, and go somewhere with an atmosphere that best suits you. Preferably a very warm one. With pits and fires.

For everyone else, please enjoy,

Harry Potter, the Valerians, and the Chamber of Secrets

Chapter One: Dinner Party

Fallen and Tarana investigate the reason Harry's mail is being intercepted, and the Dursleys plan a dinner party, which sends Tarana away from the house and her charge.


Tarana, Queen of Valeria, was already awake when the sharp, perfunctory knock came on the bedroom door of her charge, young wizard Harry Potter, who blissfully slept through the noise.

The woman on the other side of the door informed Tarana that breakfast was ready and, without waiting for a response from the Queen, promptly turned and went back downstairs.

Tarana looked at her sleeping charge and weighed the pros and cons of letting the boy sleep in on his birthday or getting him up so he could have a hot, fresh breakfast instead.

"Harry," she prompted, perhaps a little more forcefully than one should with a newly-turned-twelve-year-old, but the boy had gotten into the questionable bad habit of sleeping through his alarm clock, be it his Aunt Petunia hammering on the door, his guardian poking relentlessly at him, or the actual alarm clock that he'd 'inherited' from his cousin, where half the numbers didn't properly light up.

The boy was no less difficult to wake today than he was any other day.

"Harry, wake up, child, or you will miss breakfast."

The dark-haired child, burritoed in his blankets, grumbled mutinously, and somehow managed to duck his head even further into his cocoon.

Tarana tilted her head with a slightly aggravated sigh. "Harry Potter, I am well aware of what today is, and hiding away in your blankets will not make this evening go away."

"Why does he have to make you go?" Harry asked, his telepathic voice coming to Tarana's mind as though the words had a soft echo to them.

"Because while I am responsible for your physical wellbeing and child care, this is Vernon's home and he has every right to protect potential customers and investors from knowing about the magical panther living in his nephew's bedroom," Tarana told the boy drily. "Stop this moping and get up."

Harry grumbled a little more but did move to detangle himself from his blankets.

Harry's uncle, Vernon Dursley, and his wife Petunia were outwardly Harry's legal guardians, as his parents had died over a decade earlier in defense of their son from the Wizarding World's darkest Dark Lord.

As far as Tarana, Harry, and the Wizarding World were concerned, however, it was Tarana, not the Dursleys, who was responsible for Harry. And Queen or not, Tarana was in a rather difficult position to be openly responsible for Harry outside of the Wizarding World, as she did not have a humanoid form.

She was one hundred and fifty pounds of muscle, fur, claws, and fangs.

Tarana was a panther.

Once Harry had freed himself of his bedclothes and begun to dress for the day, he turned the conversation to a no less important topic.

"Does Fallen have any news?"

Tarana shook her head.

"Not since his last letter to us," she told him. "I imagine that he's still questioning his suspect list."

Fallen was the Valerian General, and as Tarana was the Bound Family Guardian for the Potter family, the General was the equivalent to the Malfoy family.

Harry had made friends with the Malfoy family heir the day he'd entered the Wizarding World. He was not the only friend he'd made, but he was the only friend that Harry was receiving mail from over the summer.

It had taken only two weeks for the discrepancy to be discovered when mutual friends could get their letters to Draco Malfoy, but not to Harry.

Harry had been, understandably, upset.

Though he had been raised in the Muggle World, what the wizards called the non-magical counterpart to their own, he had no friends there, and his blood family did not often treat him kindly, if they acknowledged his existence at all.

This loss of contact with the friends he'd made at Hogwarts made his summer at the Dursleys very lonely and was highly concerning for the Valerians on either end of Harry and Draco's mail.

Tarana had quickly ruled out the cause to be on Harry's end, and further investigation on Fallen's part gave them all the impression that, because Draco's mail was making it to the Dursleys unscathed, that there was a magical reason that prevented whoever was responsible from doing the same to Draco's mail.

Harry hesitated at his desk, where an empty birdcage sat and lay a hand on the metal. "Why couldn't me getting friends make things easy?" he asked the panther.

Tarana averted her gaze sadly. "I know, child." She whispered. "I swear we'll figure this out and it will never happen again."

Harry turned to her, green eyes bright. "I know," he told her. "I have faith in you."

Tarana felt a complex mix of guilt and pride in her charge's faith.

For Tarana, though she had many secrets, kept only major one from both her fellow Valerians and her charge.

A secret that she knew might have the potential to destroy them all.

Tarana and Harry both had shrugged off their melancholy emotions by the time they reached the Dursley kitchen.

The table was a tense affair, as it always was, because the two adult Dursleys barely tolerated Harry's presence in their home, and outright hated Tarana's. The tension was ignored only by Harry's cousin, Dudley, who was too busy shoveling bacon and eggs into his mouth to notice it.

"Pass the bacon," the overweight twelve-year-old said through a full mouth.

Harry, who had grown up being taught to have and utilize his manners, made a rather foolish mistake.

"You forgot to say the magic word," he muttered, not nearly as unaffected by the tension as his cousin was.

If there was one thing that was worse than any swear or curse in the entire English language as far as the Dursleys were concerned, it was that word.

The magic word.

Dudley gasped, jerking as far from his cousin as he possibly could, dropping himself off the chair with a crash that, due to the sheer level of his obesity, caused the entire kitchen to shake.

His mother shrieked and clasped her hands over her mouth as though her poor nephew had slit the throat of the neighbors' cat there on the kitchen table.

But his uncle, his uncle, just as morbidly obese as his son, pushed himself so violently to his feet that the table moved, and his veins were throbbing in, what Harry though, was a seriously unhealthy manner.

"WHAT HAVE I TOLD YOU," Vernon thundered, spraying spit across the table as he forced each word out of his mouth. "ABOUT SAYING THE 'M' WORD IN THIS HOUSE?"

"But I-"

"HOW DARE YOU THREATEN DUDLEY?!" he roared.

The man's words were eclipsed by Tarana's own, far more impressive, roar.

The sudden noise and the fierceness that backed it, dropped Vernon back into this chair hard enough that it cracked ominously.

"Perhaps, Dursley," Tarana rumbled, the threat of the form she'd taken vibrated in the room in such a way that hadn't been since Vernon first met the Queen. "If you had taught your son the manners Harry has obviously learned, through no help from you, I'm sure, his cousin, a child, mind you, would see no need to correct him. I will warn you only once, mortal, watch your tongue."

There was dead silence for several long, heavy seconds.

It was broken by Dudley laboriously pulling himself to his feet, beefy face flushed red with embarrassment and nerves.

Vernon gathered his courage as Tarana's red hot rage cooled.

"When do you leave?" he asked her coldly.

Harry glanced down at Tarana, no happier now than he had been earlier that morning.

"As soon as Harry is through weeding the garden after lunch," the panther answered.

One of the many changes that Tarana had begun to enforce, was the equality between Dudley and Harry.

In the years before Tarana openly lived with the Dursley family, Harry was often given long lists of chores to complete, while Dudley was allowed to sit and watch television, play his video games, or hang out with his friends.

It had stopped nearly as soon as the panther's paws had passed through the doors.

She had claimed that it wasn't exactly fair if the Dursleys were going to leave all of Harry's raising to her, but then claim the child when there was something around the house to be done. If Dudley wasn't going to help around the house, even though he was the same age as his cousin, give or take a few weeks, then Tarana would ensure that neither would Harry.

But ensuring that both boys had chores to do, didn't mean that the workload was even.

Harry was given the more laborious tasks, while Dudley was given the simpler ones.

It was a battle that Tarana chose not to engage in.

"And before you get your oversized knickers in a twist, Dursley, I will be out of your hair with plenty of time before your guests arrive tonight," she added before he could say another word. "And since you've been so kind to remind me that I need to leave, I will return the favor. At midnight, I will be back at this house. If those important clients of yours are still on the property, it is of no fault of mine."

Vernon's lips were pressed so tightly together that they turned white.

After a deep breath in through his nose and out again, a sound that eerily resembled that of an angry bull, he turned back to his family, putting the Queen from his view and attempted to do the same with his mind.

"While we're on the subject," he told them as though he'd planned to bring it up all along, "I think we should run through the schedule one more time. We should all be in position at eight o'clock. Petunia, you will be?"

Petunia drew herself together, though she was still a sickly pale and her hands shook as she reached for her teacup. "In the lounge," she said promptly. No one mentioned the waver in her tone, and it was gone by the time she finished speaking. "Waiting to welcome them graciously to our home."

Vernon nodded. "Good, good." He said, turning to his son. "And Dudley?"

Dudley recovered far faster than his parents did, likely because, for some reason, he and Tarana had a sort of unspoken respect for one another. Respect that did not translate over to Harry (on Dudley's behalf) or the rest of the Dursleys (on Tarana's).

"I'll be waiting to open the door," he told his father. The pre-teen put on a false, simpering smile that did his facial structure no favors. "May I take your coats, Mr. and Mrs. Mason?"

Harry was sure that he and his aunt weren't seeing the same face when she said, "They'll love him!" in a rapturous tone.

Harry had been with the Dursleys too long, however, to let any of his real feelings on the family dynamic show on his face, so Vernon was none the wiser when he turned a vile glare on his nephew. "And you?"

Harry looked him in the eye, something he never would have thought to do only a year earlier. "I'll be out of the way and silent, working on my homework in my room."

"Exactly," Vernon hissed at him.

"Keep in mind that this boy is in your care," Tarana warned them. "I expect him to be fed before you try and lock him out of sight, or someone will bleed."

"We'll take care of him," Petunia assured her.

After breakfast, and a more rigid social timeline than anything Tarana had seen out of her own military, Dudley was left to do the few dishes that his mother hadn't cleaned once she'd finished cooking breakfast, while Harry followed his aunt around the first floor and cleaned anything she pointed to, regardless of its current state of cleanliness.

With Vernon out of the house picking up a few last-minute things, it was just the two boys and Petunia for lunch.

As Vernon was often at work during the afternoon, it was a normal occurrence and far less tense than any other meal in the Dursley home.

Once lunch had been cleared away, Harry brought down his homework and followed Tarana into the back garden.

Before Tarana and Harry had formally met, Petunia had been the only one aware of Tarana and her connection to her nephew, and to keep the nosy eyes of her neighbors, a trait that the woman herself shared, off the panther, she'd had the entire backyard fenced in with high hedges, and beneath the windows had thick, healthy rose bushes that had hidden Tarana even further from anyone who happened to get a look over said hedges.

Even now, it was a place that Tarana escaped to when the confines of the Dursleys four walls began to grate on the animal within her, and as such, Harry often joined her.

Weeding the garden, as far as Harry was concerned, wasn't really a chore but a pleasure to ensure Tarana's comfort and was mostly done when the two of them slipped out the backdoor.

As such, Harry had plenty of time to bring the parts of his summer homework that he was having difficulty with to the only one who had any idea of how to help him overcome those problems.

Harry and Tarana were engrossed in Harry's Transfiguration assignment when the regal eagle owl soared over the hedges and landed on Tarana's back.

Tarana wasn't at all surprised that Harry abandoned the essay in favor of the owl.

"Archimedes!" Harry breathed, reaching out with one hand to rub the feathered down between its two ears, and the other for the letter tied to his talon.

Archimedes chirped gamely at the gentle touch, dropping the cards in a messy pile on the ground between them.

The rolled-up piece of parchment was a letter from Draco.

Happy Birthday, Harry!

Sorry we couldn't all be there in person, but we wanted to make sure you knew we didn't forget you.

After we realized that only Archimedes was getting past whoever was blocking your mail, Ron and Hermione sent their birthday cards to the Manor so Fallen and I could send them on to you.

We hope you and Tarana are well, we can't wait to meet up with you in Diagon Alley in a couple of months.

Katelyn's being her usual self, strutting around like one of our peacocks because Uncle Nathaniel was put on the Board of Governors for Hogwarts. As if Father wasn't the very reason he was there in the first place.

Hope those horrible muggles of yours are treating you decent,

Draco Malfoy

After reading the letter aloud to Tarana, he all but threw it aside, reaching instead for the cards.

Probably because Archimedes was only one owl, the cards each held a gift certificate.

Hermione Granger, a muggle born-that is a witch or wizard born to muggle parents-had sent him a certificate to a popular London clothing store. Harry was sure that it was because he was still wearing his cousin's hand-me-down clothes, which nearly swallowed him because Dudley was almost three times his size.

Ron Weasley, a pureblood wizard, had sent him nothing but the card, but Harry wasn't offended. The Weasley family was a large one, with seven children, and they were not very well off.

Draco had gotten him a certificate to Quality Quidditch Supplies.

Quidditch was the most popular sport in the Wizarding World, and Harry was on his House team at Hogwarts.

Early in his school year, Harry had found that he was a natural on a broomstick and very much enjoyed the sport, even though he'd nearly been killed in one match by a professor that had been trying to steal an artifact hidden at Hogwarts.

Tarana basked, more in the pleasure that radiated from her charge than from the rays of the sun.

"Happy Birthday, Harry," she said, with no little amount of fondness. "My gift is awaiting you at the Leaky Cauldron. I didn't want to risk it getting broken in transit."

Harry wrapped his arms around her neck, grinning. "Best birthday, ever!" he told her.

Tarana laughed, wrapping a paw around his waist to return the hug.

Despite plans made on Tarana's behalf, neither Valerian nor wizard knew how wrong Harry's words would turn out to be.

Harry's good mood had long faded by the time the panther, slipping on a Notice-Me-Not spell as she disappeared from the backyard, headed toward the woods several miles away from the suburbs that housed Privet Drive.

Even though it was only for five or six hours, this was going to be the longest Harry had been apart from Tarana since they'd met a year ago.

It wasn't that he thought the Dursleys would hit him or anything while she wasn't home. They'd never done that-except for Dudley, who had crafted a game called 'Harry Hunting', that was exactly what it sounded like, for the amusement of he and his school friends-but they did have a habit of 'forgetting' that he existed, and he wasn't sure if they would conveniently do so to avoid feeding him his dinner before he was locked away like a princess in his 'tower'.

Thankfully, Petunia had years of practice in remembering that, even though she wasn't physically doing so, Tarana always had an eye on her charge, and Harry's fears and worries were for naught.

While Harry ate his, rather dry, sandwich, Petunia came into the kitchen to check on the roast she was cooking in the over and saw him eyeing the large truffle she'd made for dessert that night.

She made it clear that he wouldn't be getting any of it.

After helping his aunt set the dining room table for the dinner party, Vernon ordered his nephew up to his room.

He caught the boy by the arm with a rough grip at the base of the stairs and shoved a meaty finger in his face as he warned him, "Not. One. Sound." He growled.

Harry swallowed, averted his gaze, and nodded.

With a rough jerk to remind Harry of his place, Vernon released him to continue up to his bedroom.

Once he got there, however, he found it not nearly as empty as he'd left it that morning.

And the intruder was not Tarana.


Author's Note:

The following story is turning out to be twice as difficult to force out as this one was, and though I'd hoped to use the last week to get a head start-and I did-it wasn't quite as much of one as I'd hoped. Erring on the side of caution, The Prisoner of Azkaban may not be ready at the end of this story. We'll see how it goes :)