A/N:

Christmas chapter! I know Chrissy is still a little bit away in RL, but this was just the last little bit I wanted to do before we move toward Hogwarts territory.

Replying to Guest review "Are the Darklings the physical manifestations of his magic?", the answer is NO. The Darkling's are a separate entity bonded to Harry.

Either ways, onwards!

When Christmas arrived the house was decorated ostentatiously with tinsel, angel figurines, Christmas cards, and festive tablecloths and linens. A plastic tree was in the corner of the living room, adorned neatly with tinsel, fairy lights, and baubles. Aunt Petunia was meticulous about decorations, and had spent several hours directing Harry and forcing him to correct and adjust every single branch and trinket until it was absolutely perfect. By the time he was finished with the decorations his arms were sore and aching from holding up items and he was suppressing his annoyance at Petunia's high pitched grating voice.

Afterwards, he'd helped his Aunt with wrapping Dudley's presents of which there were over 20. His reward for his assistance were several nasty paper-cuts thanks to the sharp edges of the shiny thin wrapping paper. Aunt Petunia's constant tutting and reprimands were driving him slowly insane. The gifts were all stacked under the tree for opening on Christmas day, and the unpleasant task of lugging the boxes downstairs and arranging them perfectly had unsurprisingly fallen on him and his aching arms.

None of the presents were marked as being from Santa Clause or Saint Nicholas. Instead they were all signed as being from Mum or Dad, because someone as dodgy as Santa Clause didn't visit the Dursley household. Jolly fat men with white beards that flew through the sky in a sleigh pulled by supernatural reindeer and then came down chimneys to leave presents for children, were obviously nothing but a silly myth. Magical things like that were a forbidden topic in the normal and ordinary Dursley household. Ignoring the fact that children believing in Santa Clause was a perfectly normal thing. The Dursley's seemed to have the idea that anything remotely impossible or improbable would somehow encourage Harry's freakishness. This had been proven true by the Halloween stunt that Dudley had pulled, so Harry, in a twisted way, sort of understood where his relatives were coming from.

Harry knew that Santa was a myth designed to keep children in-line and behaved, which probably explained why Dudley was a such a brat. There was no all-knowing mythological man judging whether he was worthy to receive gifts, so Dudley could keep on being as awful as he wanted without consequence. If Santa, by some miracle, was actually real, then Harry was quite certain that Dudley was far too a nasty a boy to receive a single present from the man, even a sack of coal would be too kind.

On the other hand, despite all the work that was being heaped on him, Harry was lucky that this year Aunt Marge was busy with one of her dogs that had fallen ill, thankfully resulting in her being unable to visit. Aunt Marge was a female version of Uncle Vernon with an impressive moustache of her own. She was obscenely obese with a beefy stature, missing a neck, had beady eyes deep set in a purple face, and an atrociously loud and obnoxious personality. She lived north in Haughton, a small village in the county of Staffordshire where she bred bulldogs.

Harry was glad that one of her wretched dogs had gotten sick. Uncle Vernon had invited her for Christmas this year, and having her vicious dog Ripper tear him to pieces was considered family-friendly entertainment. She often bought Dudley ridiculously expensive gifts, spoiling him even more rotten than Vernon and Petunia did. Naturally, she utterly loathed Harry and took great pleasure cutting him down verbally, mournfully reminiscing on the old days when misbehaving delinquents were brutally caned by strict headmasters

and disciplined in a similar manner at home.

On the day of Christmas Eve Harry was put to work, helping to prepare an extravagant dinner for Christmas day. The sheer amount of food that needed to be made for the special day meant that a significant portion had to be prepared the day before and then refrigerated or frozen until the next day. Many desserts were well suited to this approach, Christmas pudding, mince pies, and biscuits were baked well in advance. Dudley spent most of the day sampling the yields and increasing Harry's workload. Sauces and gravies were also prepared ahead of time, stored in the fridge for reheating on the stove tomorrow. He made a red cabbage salad, the flavour enhanced by the overnight marinating. It was part of the Christmas spread, and Harry knew that he'd end up having a lot of vegetables to eat during Christmas, the Dursley's preferring to gorge themselves on roast turkey with cranberry sauce and mashed potatoes with gravy.

Surprisingly, the Dursley's were not immune to the Christmas spirit, the happy and warm atmosphere of the holiday chipping marginally at their hardened hearts. He was worked like a dog, sure, but was treated with a touch more tolerance the usual. Due to the rare occasion, most years Harry was allowed to have a little of each dish from the Christmas spread, and was even given a small serving of Christmas pudding with butterscotch sauce. On normal days, Harry didn't get to sample most of the food he cooked for the Dursleys. He was an excellent cook, in his own opinion, and he only received complaints when something was burnt.

Sneaking more food than they offered, however, was not recommended. Last year when he had attempted to take more than he had been given it had not ended well. Uncle Vernon didn't shout or scream at him, it had been a quiet anger which was, in some ways, far more terrifying than his usual yelling. Harry had been grabbed roughly by his Uncle and dragged to his cupboard in silence, where he had remained for two days with only one bathroom break each day.

This year Harry was determined to avoid trouble. He'd been cooking and cleaning flawlessly over the past few days, keeping a tight rein on the Darkling's to prevent any mischief. They grumbled a little at the restrictions, but he rewarded them by giving them his full attention in the cupboard late at night. He was the perfect obedient little servant the Dursley's wanted, though it rankled and made him feel ashamed to be so weak and subservient. With every order and demand barked at him, his anger and contempt festered inside of him, a putrid sore in the centre of his being leaking noxious pus into his mind and soul.

He pushed the toxic feelings down, the abscess growing a little more with each day that passed.

As Christmas day dawned, the household was up bright early courtesy of Dudley's excitement for presents. Harry was relegated to serving boy, preparing tea, coffee, and hot chocolate for the family, serving a light breakfast of semi-sweet pastries to tide them over until the Christmas feast beginning mid-afternoon.

Harry sat on the floor at the edge of the living room, watching Dudley rip into his presents with glee as his doting parents watched on. They were all at ease and relaxed, lounging in their pyjamas and dressing gowns. Dudley showed no appreciation for the effort that had been put into wrapping each gift, tearing into the paper like a wild animal. His eyes were filled with delight as each new item was revealed to him. Some items were obvious, like the large bicycle which was impossible to disguise (a replacement for Dudley's last bike which he had crashed and now refused to ride even though Vernon had fixed the misaligned wheel). Other presents included stacks of cd's (that would probably never be listened to), computer games, a shiny new watch, a remote-control car, a new computer, and so it kept going in a blur.

As soon as one thing was unwrapped and admired, it was thrown aside in preparation for the next gift. Harry was disgusted by the casual disregard Dudley had for the multiple gifts, many of which he suspected were quite expensive. His Aunt and Uncle always complained that he was burden on them and the he should be grateful for all that he received from them. Harry thought it was ridiculous that he was considered such a burden, when surely all of Dudley's presents for Christmas were worth several years of his own meagre existence.

Harry's ill-tempered musings were interrupted by Dudley's wailing. Aunt Petunia was immediately at her blubbering son's side.

"Oh what's wrong baby? Mummy will fix it, tell mummy what's wrong, sweetums." She pleaded with the boy.

Fat tears were rolling down Dudley's red and blotchy face, entire countenance screwed up tightly as if afflicted by some terrible physical pain.

"My game!" he wailed out, a tone so high pitched it threatened to burst Harry's eardrums. "I-i-it's the wrong, the wrong e-e-edition!" he eventually managed to splutter through his sobs.

Harry rolled his eyes, Dudley managed to make a drama out of something. Every. Single. Year. Last year the sixteen packs of Football Cards he'd gotten hadn't had his favourite player, and the year before that his Optimus Prime model was too small. Every year something was not good enough.

"That's my boy!" cried out Uncle Vernon jovially, "Always knows what he wants, clever tyke."

'Trust Uncle Vernon to find something good about Dudley's stupid tantrum.' thought Harry.

"Don't you worry Duddykins, Mummy will take you to the shops and get you the right one." Aunt Petunia said, trying to placate her distressed son.

Dudley, the spoilt brat, didn't think that was good enough.

"You don't care about me!" Dudley bemoaned, "you never listen to me!". It was incredibly stupid, because the Dursley's did care about Dudley, very much, and always went to great lengths to get him exactly what he wanted. Unfortunately, they weren't very knowledgeable about things like video-games, and Harry could recognise Dudley's hysterics for what they really were. A guilt trip. Dudley was the master of guilt trips, and when an opportunity like this one presented itself he would do anything to milk it for all it was worth. He was doing a rather admirable job, Harry had to concede, Aunt Petunia had fallen for it hook, line, and sinker.

"Mummy loves you very much, sweetums! How about I get you anything you want, hmm? We'll go take this game back to the shop and find the right one, and then you can choose a whole two other games too. Won't that be nice, two new games?" Aunt Petunia was practically pleading with Dudley, enticing him with the prospect of even more presents.

Dudley's eyes lit up in victory, "Really, mummy? You're the best!" he exclaimed, thrilled with the success of his outburst at extorting more presents and giving his mum a grateful hug. Uncle Vernon chuckled, and Petunia looked relieved at having averting what she perceived to be a disaster. Both were completely, and perhaps even intentionally, oblivious to Dudley's manipulation.

When Harry didn't end up with a single gift from under the tree, he told himself that it wasn't upsetting at all. He never got anything anyway, not for his birthday and not for Christmas, so why would it bother him this year? Still, he felt the anger in his mind flare briefly, and he struggled to smother it. Concentrating on his emotions, he pushed down the fire, trying to choke or smother it. In the end, he envisioned trapping his anger in a tiny black box, the flames stubbornly refusing to be dowsed.

Christmas day progressed at a snail's pace. Harry was sequestered in the kitchen where cooked and supervised the remaining dishes for the feast that was scheduled later in the afternoon. Aunt Petunia would regularly come in to check on his progress, and take up the any task that she thought needed her particular brand of fussiness.

By noon Harry was taking quick breaks to take deep breaths and try to calm himself down. Every little ounce of happiness and laughter that he could hear from the living room annoyed the hell out of him. When Aunt Petunia came into the kitchen, her snooty critiques and haughty sniffs made his teeth grind in aggravation.

Sensing the deterioration of his already poor disposition, the Darkling's surrounding him became restless, crawling over him and flitting around him in wild, jerky movements, feeding on his negative emotions and becoming frenzied whenever his anger intensified to near unbearable levels.

By the time Christmas dinner was being served, Harry was tense and in a visibly bad mood. He received sharp glares from his Aunt and Uncle, but they had no effect on him, and they changed tactics, choosing instead to ignore him as much as possible. He spent the rest of Christmas dinner gripping his cutlery in white knuckled hands, gritting his teeth and biting his tongue to avoid saying something inflammatory about the repulsive pig-like noises Vernon and Dudley were making. The sounds were insufferable, slurping and chewing with their mouths open like some sort of slack-jawed mouth breathers. It was the least enjoyable Christmas dinner he had ever sat through, and by the time it was over, Harry was seriously thinking that spending the rest of his life in prison for murdering the Dursley's wouldn't be so bad.

The mess left on the table after the drawn-out meal was exactly as Harry expected considering the atrocious (lack of) table manners he had just experienced. Half-chewed food was sprayed all over the table, the tablecloth unsalvageable with all the stains covering it. After enjoying the food that he had so "lovingly" prepared, sarcasm intended, he now had to clean up the revolting mess left by the animals that were his uncle and cousin.

He cleared the table and turned his focus to the stacks of dirty dishes piling up in the sink. He decided to start with everything that was dishwasher safe, and rinsed everything so it was free of food scraps, organising them in the rack carefully so as to maximise the space available. The dishes he had left over were large pots and pans, as well as a selection of cutlery, some crystal wine glasses, and Aunt Petunia's hideous vintage pink floral plates with gold trimming. The vintage plates could absolutely never go in the dishwasher. Aunt Petunia would have his head if the gold trim was destroyed by the washer.

The carefree laughter that floated into the living room caused Harry to treat he kitchenware with a harshness he wouldn't have used if he was in the right state of mind. He could feel a tight pressure building up in his chest, forcing his breath to come in short, sharp bursts.

The anger that he stuffed into the little black box was burning fiercely through its container, consuming it whole.

Like a grassfire, the flames rushed through his body with frightening speed, the inferno roaring in his ears and the intense flames blinding him. Having overwhelmed Harry entirely, the blaze kept moving, needing more fuel to maintain its terrifying ferocity. Having burned through Harry in mere seconds the pressure of the inferno grew inside of him with nowhere to go. The only way was out.

Harry was startled out his scorching haze as the flames burst free from his body, sending a gargantuan shock wave through the entire room. Cupboards and windows rattled, and all the plates in the drying rack smashed into thousands of pieces. The vintage, gold trimmed, priceless plates. In pieces.

The house was dead silent.

Pure, unbridled panic hit him like a sledgehammer to gut. He was going to be murdered. Horrifically and painfully. His body would never be found.

"BOY!" Vernon roared, but the sound was faint and far away to Harry, "WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?"

Harry could only stand there in shock as thumping was heard from the living room, Vernon was probably trying to lift his huge weight up from the couch as quickly as possible.

'Oh god, oh god, oh god. This needs to disappear. I need to disappear, oh my god I'm gonna die.'

Harry's mental thoughts must have been broadcasting loud and clear because in a flash the agitated Darkling's had acted. The swarm descended on the mess of smashed plates, and Harry watched on stunned and paralysed. Time seemed to pass in slow motion. He watched the Darkling's knit the plates back to perfect condition. There was a strong tugging on their connection, as if they were drawing on some invisible spool of thread inside of him, using it to sew and bind the shards together. As each plate was formed anew, there were no visible signs of breakage. Not a single crack or flaw was visible eye. Like nothing had happened at all.

At the very last moment a plate was carried by Spiderlegs (so named because they had spindly spider-like legs. Yes, Harry was aware he was being terribly original with his naming scheme) back onto the drying rack. Uncle Vernon stormed in, his face purple and enraged, directed at Harry. The malicious intent coming from his Uncle was so palpable that he broke out in a fear induced cold sweat. Aunt Petunia and Dudley were peeking into the kitchen from the hallway, looking shaken by Vernon's rage.

"What in the bloody hell was the god-forsaken noise, boy?" barked Uncle Vernon angrily, spittle flying from his mouth and hitting Harry in the face.

"I-I-I d-don't kn-kn-ow, U-Uncle." Harry whispered out, stuttering so severely it was almost incomprehensible.

Vernon grabbed the collar of Harry's shirt with a meaty fist "Don't lie to me, boy!" he shouted into Harry's face, dousing him in more spit.

The pit of anger in Harry had burned out, exhausting its fuel and leaving nothing but an empty void in his chest.

Now that void was filling with icy cold water, submerging him in terror so pure it was like drowning beneath a frozen lake, futilely banging on the surface.

"P-p-p-please. I-I-I-I d-don –" Harry tried to explain himself, but the his voice was struggling to escape him, trapped beneath the ice in his chest. He didn't get to finish his pointless explanation anyway.

"SHUT UP!" Vernon shouted, gripping Harry by the hair and wrenching him to the back door. Harry was shoved out onto the cold patio forcefully, sending an excruciating jolt through his left wrist when he landed having used it to shield his head instinctively as he fell.

"Stay out!" Vernon whispered furiously slamming the door shut violently. Harry whimpered at the pain in his wrist, and his despair was punctuated by the sound of a click. The back door had been locked.

Injured and traumatised, Harry curled up in the spot, shivering in the cold of the winter night.

The Darkling's crooned mournfully, settling over him like a warm blanket, trying to comfort their injured master. Harry was thankful for their presence, and for their help. As the fear of his Uncle subsided, he could only think at the horrors that would have faced him had Vernon seen all the precious vintage plates in smithereens.

The lights in the Dursley household eventually went out many hours later, the only lights left on were the fairy lights on the Christmas tree. Harry was tempted to wait another hour, and then risk sneaking into the house, maybe with the help of his little ink army. In the end the fear at being caught won out over his desperation to escape the night-time chill.

The Darkling's were wrapped close around him, but they did not have everlasting body heat, and were noticeably more sluggish in their movements. The night had rapidly cooled to below zero temperatures, and from experience, Harry knew he would not be let into house again until tomorrow morning. If he didn't freeze to death first.

He wondered if the Dursley's would even feel guilty if they found his dead body the next morning.

Deciding that staying out on the cold patio was a direct path to death, Harry painfully lifted himself off the ground, avoiding jostling his left wrist which was sore and swollen. He desperately hoped it wasn't broken.

There was a very light dusting of snow over the ground. Surrey wasn't known for heavy snowfall, and even such a small amount would be a source of fun for the neighbourhood children come morning.

Feet crunching over the snow, Harry made his way to the garden shed. It didn't have a heater or any blankets, but it would shield him from the cold wind. Releasing the latch, he shuffled into the cramped and cluttered shed. Softly closing the door behind him, he assessed his dark surroundings, a difficult undertaking with no light. The moon was a thin sliver in the sky, barely visible and worthless as a source of light on an overcast night such as this. The Darkling's had much better night vision than he did, so he prodded and poked the connection. It was draining to do so, but he got a better impression of the room from their perspective.

Moving forward with his right arm out in front of him, Harry stumbled forward, accidentally hitting his shin on an empty pot that had been right in front of him. It tipped over noisily. He stilled and strained his ears, turning his head to look through the small window on the shed door. For the next few minutes he stood completely still and waited to see if the lights in the house would switch on. They didn't.

Breathing a sound of relief and feeling foolish about his paranoia, he bent down to move the pot to the side and out of the way. The dark room was giving him flashbacks to the last time he was in a shed at night-time, but there were no satanic circles or dead foxes in sight, something that made him calmer despite how unlikely it would have been to find those things in this shed in the first place.

Making his way very slowly to the back of the shed, Harry avoided any additional confrontations with misplaced pots. At the very back was a work bench, and he kneeled down to crawl beneath the bench. There were large bags of soil and fertiliser flat on the ground. Not wanting to lay on top of them, he gripped one of the bags with his uninjured right hand to drag it to side and stack it on top of another bag. Catching onto his plan, the Darkling's unfurled themselves from around him to help with the effort. Hummingbird and other flying types attached themselves to the top of the bag while Spiderlegs squeezed underneath to lift it. Working in tandem, they made two stacks with three bags in each stack, leaving enough space for Harry to crawl in under the workbench.

It wasn't very clean, and it smelt awful, but the enclosed space was comforting, and Harry felt safe. Uncle Vernon's huge size would never reach so far in the shed, not without the time-consuming task of removing all its contents.

"Wake me up in the morning?" he asked his Darkling's. They responded with a hum that sounded like agreeance, and Harry relaxed in his hidey-hole. The Darkling swarm wrapped around him, cocooning him in its protective folds. Gingerly caressing his wrist, he relaxed and let the oblivion of sleep take him into its depths.

Harry was woken up by a persistent tickling on his nose. As he groggily woke up, a fairy Darkling was the first thing to appear in his vision. Trying to focus on the creature made his eyes cross, it was perched happily on his nose wriggling around and waving at him. The little humanoid was one that he had named Moth, based on its large wings that folded and fluttered like those a moth. The inky blankness of the wings also seemed to be translucent, with various patterns flowing and shifting within the wings. Tiny antennas extended from its face, and its glowing eyes were bulbous and had the appearance of a multi-faceted jewel. She was rather lovely, or at least Harry got the impression it was 'she', there wasn't anything to indicate that individual Darkling's had a gender, but this one was sending him an impression that it was a female. Strange. Harry didn't know how he knew, he just did. Another perk of the bond.

Shaking his head, he yawned and crawled out from under the workbench. He jerked his left hand abruptly up to his chest. He had just used it crawl out from under the table, and it hadn't even hurt! Dubiously, he inspected his arm, looking for evidence of swelling or injury. It was flawless, nothing except for his honey sun-kissed skin.

Upon exiting the shed he was hit with the cold and crisp air, the shining winter sun rising lazily in the east, warming the earth with its gentle rays. He brushed himself off as best possible, and scrubbed his filthy hands under the garden tap. When he was satisfied that he wouldn't get any cleaner, he made his way warily to the patio where he sat down by the doors and waited to be let back in.

Harry shivered, even with shelter and the Darkling's, the night had been freezing. He'd gotten a good look at his reflection in the window of the shed door, and he looked pale and maybe even a little blue. It was miracle he wasn't dead, being locked out all night in the middle of winter.

A gust of cold wind made his body shiver violently. Aunt Petunia was always up early, and Harry would do anything for her to appear and let him that very moment.

His wish for her to appear came true twenty minutes later. It had felt like an eternity, but the sound of the door clicking open was heaven to his ears. Aunt Petunia had her usual terse expression, mouth pursed tightly as if she had just swallowed a lemon. Disapproval and disdain shone in her eyes. Still, she opened the door wider and beckoned him inside silently.

He didn't waste time, scrambling in as fast as possible. The house was a perfect toasty temperature thanks to the gas heater that ran most of the day and all of the night.

"Go take a shower, you're filthy. You have ten minutes." Aunt Petunia told him shortly. Harry looked up at her, gob-smacked. A whole ten minutes, normally he got five. Her scornful sniff jerked him back into reality, and he rushed to cupboard for some clean clothing. Bounding up the stairs Harry ran to the bathroom, intent on taking a scalding hot shower.

Dudley and Vernon would be sleeping in today, so Harry wasn't too worried if he went a little overtime, although Aunt Petunia would probably be annoyed.

Turning the shower on, Harry stripped down in record speed and thrust his arm under the spray to check the temperature. When the water started to grow warm, he jumped in and sighed deeply, the sensation of hot water cascading over him could only be described as wholly blissful.

Feeling started to come back to his frozen limbs, and he reached for his soap and shampoo, both reluctantly purchased from a clearance shelf. The Darkling's were just as elated as he was to be under the hot spray. Some of them looked to be melting all over him, but all-in-all they seemed to be having a splendid time with the soap, making bubbles, sliding around, and letting the water splash over them.

The first time in the shower with the Darkling's had been weird and he had tried to send them away, but now it was perfectly natural for him to have them there. They were hilarious and gave the best shampoo massages imaginable. His hair was getting a bit long, falling into his eyes and curling around his neck. He was loath to cut it when the Darkling's enjoyed the long strands so thoroughly. Especially in moments like these when they were working up a thick foam and styling it into a ridiculous Mohawk.

When he estimated that he was reaching the ten-minute mark, Harry wistfully shut off the water and dried off using his worn ratty towel. Dressing into his clean clothing, he centred himself and took deep breaths, conscious that the rest of the day was likely to be quite taxing. He subtly began to close the bond between himself and the Darkling's, their simple joy was infectious, and he needed to appear adequately subdued to Aunt Petunia. Closing his eyes, he focused on smoothing out his expression and let his smile fade. Hunching himself over, he made his way downstairs, trying to make himself look small. His behaviour after being let indoors could be excused as desperation to be back in the house, and now he had to appear as if he was appropriately subdued by the punishment that he had been given.

Shuffling downstairs with a manufactured air of dejection, he deposited his grimy clothes in the laundry room and hovered in the kitchen. Aunt Petunia's eye briefly flickered in his direction, but she didn't say anything. Since he was not being expressly forbidden from eating breakfast, Harry made himself two slices of toast and ate them with a very small amount of jam. Dudley and Vernon wouldn't be up until late morning, so he could take his time.

Now that he was calm, at an acceptable temperature, and having something to ease his hunger pangs, he had time to think about the whole disastrous experience in peace. 'One day,' he thought 'they'll pay and they'll be the ones freezing out in the cold.'
With that dark line of thought something is his chest sparked; once more the flames of anger had ignited in his chest, burning hotter and brighter than ever before.

A/N: Next chapter we start to hit on canon events, although I won't be copying down whole paragraphs from the books, just hitting on key points and events and adding the demon Darkling twist.

Next update will be delayed due to RL commitments.

Please fave and follow, review and leave comments to let me know what you think.

Ideas for pairings or plot elements you would like to see? I have a main plot outline but it's flexible and open to new ideas.

Have a good week everyone :)

Light edits 14-11-17