Harry spent the following week creating temporary plans and sorting out what was most important. He kept his head down and did what he was told, trying to avoid any confrontations.
The first point on his agenda was finding out the date. He was still unsure exactly when he had arrived, all he knew was that his body was young and it was pre primary school.
So much of what had happened in his original childhood had been suppressed to protect himself that he couldn't rely on his memories. In addition, it had been more than six years since he slept in his cupboard last and he'd forgotten just how awful it was.
Living the abuse again made him wonder why nobody at his primary school had ever called child protection services on the Dursleys. Sure, they couldn't have known about his cupboard, but coming to school in ratty clothes several sizes too large, and his skin covered in bruises was entirely commonplace. It should have sent up some red flags. Sometimes the injuries were courtesy of Vernon and sometimes Dudley and his gang of delinquents.
Someone should have spoken up to the authorities. Unless… could Dumbledore be the reason why they didn't? He was a wizard, a powerful one at that, and using a Confundus here, or a little Obliviation there, wouldn't be too difficult for someone like him.
Harry swallowed away the lump forming in his throat and rubbed at his moistening eyes. Yes, he felt extremely angry and betrayed by Dumbledore, someone he had seen as a grandfather or a mentor, but that didn't mean he would have gone that far to make Harry miserable, right? He decided that the topic was something he'd rather not deal with and moved on. Bottling up his emotions was something he was really good at
Later that day, Harry was locked back in his cupboard after dinner, it had become routine. Harry had come to the conclusion that the reason for him being a child again didn't really matter. Whether it was all a feverish dream, a hallucination, or if he had really died and come back again, he still felt like he was alive, and therefore he was. He now had knowledge of the future that he could use to his advantage. He made a mental list of what needed to be done first.
Find out the year and date.
Convince (threaten?) the Dursleys into letting him have Dudley's second bedroom. The cupboard was highly inappropriate for anything living.
Make the Dursleys feed him properly. He refused to be starved again.
Figure out if he still had his magic.
Harry rubbed his eyes and felt something hard brush against his cheek. Green eyes opened and stared at his hands in surprise. Silvery metal glinted in the dim lighting provided by the lightbulb hanging overhead. The ring Death had given him was still there. Just like on the train, it fit him perfectly, despite currently being a midget. He blinked, once, twice. How had he forgotten about it? And more importantly, how come the Dursleys hadn't noticed and tried to take it away from him? Maybe it had some sort of Notice-Me-Not or Disillusion charm on it?
Seeing the ring and feeling it's weight on his hand made him curious about the being that gave it to him. He had so many questions he wished to ask. Their conversation on the train was far from enough. His whole existence had been turned upside down and he felt like he had no control over anything. Not that he had much control to begin with, but still.
While thinking about Death and the consequences of his own choice to 'move on', Harry rubbed his right thumb over the engraved symbol of the Deathly Hallows. Just like with the Resurrection Stone in the forest, the action felt right.
"Hello again, young Master," Death's velvety voice came from inside the cupboard.
Harry startled at the sound. His head twirled around, trying to find where the voice had come from, but the cupboard still only contained him, dust, and the spiders hanging in their webs.
"Death?" He hissed out under his breath, careful not to make too much noise. He didn't want the Dursleys to hear him and decide that they needed to punish him for existing.
The ancient deity materialised out of thin air, taking on a shadowy form of the one he'd sported at the train. The man was tall and definitely too large to fit, so it was just as well that he didn't become solid, Harry thought.
"I have to say, this sleeping arrangement is rather unsuitable. It is common for children to have their own room is it not?" Death answered and looked curiously around the cramped, dusty space.
"Yeah." Harry grumbled "The Dursleys aren't exactly responsible people. They wouldn't waste the space on an ungrateful freak like me." He rolled his eyes and snorted. They were the freaks, not him.
Death stared intently, making the boy squirm slightly on his mattress. "Then why do you not make them give you a proper room? This is highly inappropriate." The older man certainly didn't look impressed. The cocked eyebrow reminded Harry distinctly of his old potions professor. Yes, definitely not impressed.
"What am I supposed to do? I'm a child again. I'm bloody tiny! How exactly am I going to make them give me a room?" Harry bit back and glared. The whole child situation was his fault after all.
Death seemed entirely unaffected by Harry's combative behaviour and simply smiled indulgently. He was being treated like a child with a tantrum, Harry realised.
"You are a wizard, are you not? I believe magic is something you should be quite sufficient at." Death replied.
Harry took a deep breath to calm himself so he didn't shout. "First of all I don't have a wand." Harry groused. "Secondly, I'm not allowed to use magic outside of Hogwarts. And even if I could use magic, what would I do with it? I'm not going to Imperio my relatives despite how tempting it is."
"Oh but you do have a wand," Death said. " You have mastered the Deathly Hallows. They are, and will always be, a part of you." He looked intently at the child.
"Did you think I would send my Master back entirely defenceless? No. You merely have to think about the wand and it shall appear."
"Wh- really?" Harry said with disbelief. How could the Hallows be a part of him when he didn't feel any different than before? Well, aside from being a child.
Death nodded and gestured to the ring on Harry's left hand. "That ring is the physical representation of your status as my Master. It will allow you to draw forth the powers within the Hallows. If you wish to use the actual Hallows themselves, you merely have to will them forth."
Harry looked down at the ring. It was nice to know that he hadn't lost his Cloak, it was probably the most important thing he had left of his family's heritage. He didn't know a lot about the Potters, but that Cloak had been a part of the family for hundreds of years. It made him feel like he belonged in a way.
From what Death said, it sounded like the signet ring worked as a sort of storage device as well as a conductor for the Hallows' powers. Thinking about that brought up the question of what would happen to the original Hallows of this timeline. Would they simply disappear from where they were? Dumbledore suddenly finding himself without his wand could cause some problems, Harry thought.
"What's gonna happen if I decide to summon the Wand or Cloak? Will they just vanish from where they are now? I'm pretty sure Dumbledore has them at the moment…" The wizard questioned with a frown.
"Ah, I thought you might ask something like that," The elderly gentleman hummed. "The answer is no. They will not vanish. However, there can only be one set of Hallows. The ones belonging to you are the real ones, so to speak. Their powers are unique. Because of that, the Hallows of this timeline will become ordinary artefacts. The cloak will still be an invisibility cloak, but over time it will deteriorate like all normal cloaks would. The wand will still be powerful but it has lost its edge. And finally, the stone will revert to being just that, a stone."
Harry pondered the implications. If he could use the Hallows without having to worry about Dumbledore or anyone else figuring out that he owned them, then that would be a great boon.
"Okay, good." Harry said with a nod. He had thought a bit about not being able to use magic out of school. Getting caught was something that frightened him at this point. He wasn't ready to go on the run from the Ministry again. But then it hit him, he was a child, and that meant that any magic he did should be considered accidental magic right? He had done plenty of accidental magic when he was young without the Ministry interfering. Like the time he Apparated onto the school roof or turned his teacher's wig blue.
"The Trace isn't active yet is it?" Harry pondered out loud. If anyone would know it was Death.
"Not yet, no. It is normally activated once first year students board onto the Hogwarts express for the first time. The wands are then automatically registered with the British Ministry of Magic. Most purebloods get around the rule of no magic during the holidays by having strong familial wards around their properties, or by letting the children borrow an adults' wand. This is however not something you need to worry about when it comes to the Elder Wand. As it is my own creation, no outside magic will stick to it." Death seemed exceedingly smug about his final revelation. The being certainly took pride in the artefacts he had created.
"Oh. Good," Harry muttered to himself. It was one problem less to worry about. He let a tiny hand run through the messy black curls at the top of his head.
"Wait, you said purebloods get to use magic during the holidays, that's not fair!" Harry said in outrage, his voice rising as he thought about all the things he could have done during the summers to make his life with the Dursleys easier if only he'd been allowed to use magic.
"No. I suppose it is not." Death replied with a shrug.
"QUIET IN THERE!" Vernon's voice roared as a fat fist thundered hard enough on the cupboard door to make dust fall from the ceiling and into Harry's hair.
Harry sucked in a breath, his body instinctively pulling as far away from the door as he could, hoping the walrus of a man wouldn't open it.
Death glared murderously at the door.
"What will you do with them? I have no problem should you wish to dispose of them. I unfortunately cannot do the deed myself, but you are free to do whatever you so desire. " The being said with an eerily cold voice, still staring daggers at the door. The shadows in the small room seemed to grow longer and darker, twisting and snapping like angry snakes at the light. Death took a deep breath to get himself under control.
"I can't just kill them." Harry whispered.
"Yes you could. Quite easily I might add." Death replied, nonchalantly waving his hand.
That shut him up. It was true of course, but Harry liked to think of himself as a good person. He didn't want to kill Vernon. But was it because he didn't want to do the deed, or because he wanted him to suffer for all that had been done to him first? Harry swallowed away the bile threatening to claw its way up his throat. There had always been a dark and ugly side of himself that he'd tried to push away, one that was eerily similar to Tom Riddle. Sometimes he wondered if the Horcrux had actually been able to change him, or if he had always been that way.
"No." He sighed. "I'll get my revenge eventually. I'll figure out what to do. I won't let them treat me the same this time around."
"As you wish" The deity bowed his head to Harry's decision.
Harry rubbed his face tiredly. The day felt like it had lasted forever. This body wasn't built for great stamina. He needed a nap. He thought back at the points on his mental list. He had his magic, check. He could use said magic to make the Dursleys behave and give him a room and more food, check. The last point was figuring out the date.
"What's the date? Also… why now? Why not send me back to when I was, I don't know, eleven or something?" Harry asked.
"Do you remember how I said that your soul and the soul shard inside of you had become too intertwined to separate without you dying?" Death asked.
Harry nodded.
"Well, this was the latest point in which I could safely do so. In addition you had caught pneumonia and was so close to death that I could force your soul and magic into that of your younger self. The magical backlash is essentially what exorcised the soul shard from your scar." Death explained.
Memories of being locked out in the cold at night sometime after Christmas forced themselves to the front of his mind. Once back inside he'd gotten sicker and sicker until eventually Petunia, worried he might die, had given him some medicine. For most of it he'd been locked in his cupboard, alone, scared and in pain. Harry grimaced. It would have been a sad way to go.
"Today's date is January 3rd 1985." Death continued.
"That means I'll be five in a few months and start primary school in September." Merlin, he'd completely forgotten about that fact. He'd have to socialise with annoying children and trudge through his muggle education once more. Maybe if he scored above average he'd be able to move up a few years. The first few years of primary school promised to be mind-numbingly boring.
Death was quiet. He almost seemed uncomfortable where he sat. Harry gave him a peculiar look, waiting for the deity to spit out whatever was bothering him.
"Unfortunately, these gifts you have been given come with a price. There has to be balance. Therefore, as long as you are bound to me you will not be able to die. Or rather, you will not be able to stay dead. The afterlife has been barred to you I'm afraid." Death paused and gazed at Harry with apologetic eyes. His shadowy hand lifted and gently caressed the child's face in a paternal gesture of comfort.
"I realise that this is not what you had in mind, and for that I apologise, but the dead are not lost to you. With the ring you will always be able to call their spirits to you. I understand that it is not the same, but it will have to be enough." Death said softly.
Harry felt like the world had been pulled away from underneath his feet again. Wide, green eyes stared up at the ancient being with horror. He had come to accept that he'd have to live his life again, even started to look forward to it, but to be told that he would never have an afterlife, never rest peacefully with his family, it was like a sucker punch to the gut. He felt like crying and screaming about how unfair it was, but was too stupefied to speak.
Death sighed quietly. He hadn't meant to distress the human so, but he knew it was better to get it out of the way now. He would have to come to terms with it sooner rather than later.
"I will have to leave you now, young Harry. But remember, if you ever wish to speak with me, or another dead soul, simply use your ring. "
Death lovingly ran his hand through Harry's curls before vanishing into his own realm.
That night Harry cried himself silently to sleep for the first time in years. He cried for the loss of his family and his own mortality. He would be alright eventually, he always was, but right now he would let himself grieve over the unfairness of it all.
