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chapter three
Whatever- whoever- was outside the door of the hut had to be massive, or equipped with a battering ram. The second knock on the door was as deafening as the first, and seemed to make the entire hut shudder. On the sofa, Dudley was awake and confused, rubbing at his eyes and asking where the 'cannon' was. A loud crash sounded behind the twins, and they both jumped. Violet spun around to see Uncle Vernon barge into the room, holding a hunting rifle in his hands.
"You can't just shoot them!" she exclaimed, half indignantly, half in shock, while Harry simply stared.
"Watch me," her uncle snarled in reply.
Whoever was there responded by slamming into the door so hard that it was knocked off of its hinges and hit the floor, rising up a cloud of grey dust. Violet immediately backed up, dragging her trembling brother with her, both of them unable to look away from the looming figure in the doorway.
It was clearly a man, but this man was far bigger than any man Violet had ever seen, and hairier. He looked like a picture of a wild king from a storybook; his hair was a thick mane, and combined with his impressive beard it nearly obscured all of his face. His eyes gleamed in the dim light, like they were used to the dark.
The giant man had to hunch his shoulders and bow his head to just to sidle in through the small doorway, and then, the way a child might pick up a toy, easily picked up the door and set it gently back in its frame like a puzzle piece. The room was utterly silent except for the panicked breathing of the Dursleys and Dudley's whimpering. The raging storm outside had settled into pounding rain and a whispering wind instead, as if it too was listening in to see what happened next.
The giant slowly turned to face them all. The look in his eyes was half amused, half irritated. In spite of her fear Violet warmed to him instantly.
"Couldn't make us a cup o' tea, could yeh? It's not been an easy journey…," he grumbled, and with one swift stride reached the sofa, which looked child-sized in comparison to him.
Dudley huddled into a corner of it, petrified, and Violet couldn't resist a tiny smirk.
"Budge up, yeh great lump," the giant said casually, and with a squeal Dudley scrambled off of the sofa, and reached Aunt Petunia in record time, clinging to her nightgown as he hid behind her, who was in turn behind Uncle Vernon.
The giant sat down with a sigh; the sofa groaned in protest. Now he turned to look at the twins.
"Hello," said Violet, and her voice wavered only slightly. "I'm Violet, and this is Harry. Have you come here looking for us?"
The giant appeared delighted at the question, and his dark eyes seemed to turn up in a smile at their corners as he leaned forward slightly to respond. Violet chanced a small step forward, and Harry shuffled forward as well beside her. Their pajamas were filthy from the floor, and Violet's braid and Harry's hair as disheveled as usual, but if this was how they had to meet the person who'd been trying to find them for so long, Violet thought, than so be it.
"Yeh look an' sound jus' like yer mum, Violet," the giant said. "An' Harry, yeh look a lot like yer dad, but yeh've got yer mum's eyes. The two of yeh together are the very picture of them, yeh are." He sounded thrilled.
Behind them, Uncle Vernon sounded as if he were choking on something. "I demand that you leave at once, sir!" he blustered; he was terrified, Violet could tell. "You are breaking and entering!"
The giant looked less than impressed. "Ah, shut up Dursley, ye great prune," he scoffed, and with a great deal of ease, reached over the back of the sofa and plucked the rifle away from the man, tied it in a knot like a shoelace, and carelessly tossed it into a corner, where it clattered onto the floor. Violet had to forcibly stop herself from clapping her hands together in delight.
"Anyway," the giant turned back to regard them, "A very happy birthday to the two of yeh. Got summat for yeh here- I mighta sat on it at some point, but it'll taste all right," he assured them.
He searched through his long black overcoat before gingerly pulling out a box, and placing it on the broken little table in front of the sofa. Violet immediately crouched down to open it with her brother, revealing a large chocolate cake. Her mouth watered hungrily at there mere sight of it. Written on the top in bright green and purple alternating icing, it said Happy Birthday Harry & Violet in spindly little letters.
Violet immediately stuck a finger out and snagged some of the icing, while Harry asked, dumbfounded, "Who are you?"
The giant just snorted. "True, I haven't introduced meself. Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts." He shook Harry's hand, or rather his whole arm, and then Violet's, her other hand pre-occupied with getting a piece of the cake into her mouth. She hadn't been starving all night to turn down food, and birthday cake at that, when it was presented to her.
"Thank you," she tried to say, but it came out like "Fanf ewe."
"Yer welcome," Rubeus Hagrid said good-naturedly, and then rubbed his large hands together. "What about that tea then, eh? I'd not say no ter summat stronger if yeh've got it, mind."
"We don't have any tea, sorry," Violet said apologetically, after she'd swallowed. She rubbed at a bit of icing on the corner of her mouth. "And we used the food wrappers to try to start a fire, but Uncle Vernon's really awful at this survival sort of stuff." There wasn't a thing her uncle could do to her with Rubeus Hagrid there, she had quickly caught on, and she intended to make the most of it.
Rubeus Hagrid snorted again, and turned to the long since dead fire. He crouched down in front of it, and Violet and Harry watched curiously as he stood up again a moment later, leaving behind a crackling fire. She outstretched her hands towards it eagerly, feeling the warmth hit them and the goose bumps on her arms and legs recede.
"That's brilliant!"
Rubeus Hagrid simply shook his thick mane a little and sat back down on the sofa, presumably to busy himself with making tea. He appeared to be pulling quite a lot of things out of his coat, but Violet was too distracted with warming herself to pay much attention to it, until he started cooking sausages over the fire. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Dudley shift a bit, despondently. He'd never seen food and not immediately been offered it before.
"Don't touch anything he gives to you, Dudley," Uncle Vernon snapped at him.
"Yer great puddin' of a son don't need fattenin' anymore, Dursley, don't worry," Rubeus Hagrid retorted without even looking up, as he passed the sausages to the twins.
This was already quickly becoming the best birthday Violet had ever had. When she and her brother were done gorging themselves, at last Harry finally spoke up tentatively.
"I'm sorry, but we still don't really know who you are?"
"Are you related to us, Mr. Hagrid?" Violet asked immediately. "Are you our great-uncle? Or our second cousin thrice removed? How'd you know our parents?"
Rubeus Hagrid nearly choked on his sip of tea, and wiped the back of his mouth as he managed to set the cup down. "Yeh can call me Hagrid, lass. Everyone does. I'm not related to yeh, though I'd be honored ter be. Like I told yeh, I'm Keeper of the Keys at Hogwarts- that's how I knew yer parents."
Violet and Harry exchanged a confused look. "What's Hogwarts?"
Hagrid looked equally confused.
"Sorry," Harry tacked on hastily.
"Is it a university?" Violet asked, puzzled.
Hagrid's look of confusion was slowly turning to outrage as he glowered over at the Dursleys. Violet sensed an explosion was imminent, and more than ready for it. Her aunt and uncle had never been truthful with them, that much was obvious. It was about time the tables got turned.
"Do yeh mean ter tell me, tha' neither of yeh know a thing about Hogwarts?! I knew yeh weren't gettin' the letters, but yer tellin' me yeh don't even know it's a school?! Yeh never wondered where yer parents learned it all?" He seemed incredulous that anyone could not know about 'Hogwarts'.
"All what?" Harry asked, having grown pale.
Violet was frozen in the firelight, looking between Hagrid and the cowering Dursleys. She had so many things she wanted to say, so much she wanted to ask, but she couldn't get any of it out. "You never even told us how they met," she accused, staring angrily at her aunt and uncle. "You never told us anything about them!"
Hagrid was on his feet, enraged. The Dursleys were mute, all of their nasty looks and sharp tongues useless in the face of this interrogation.
"Ye never told them nothin' abou'- abou' ANYTHING?" he demanded.
"We know some things," Harry spoke up a little reproachfully. "We can do maths and spell and stuff."
"We just don't like school much," Violet added.
Hagrid glanced back at them in disbelief. "About our world, I mean. Yer world. My world. Yer parents' world."
The last time Violet had checked, there was only one world in which everyone lived. "We from another world?!" she exploded.
"What world?" Harry asked desperately.
"DURSLEY!" Hagrid roared, looking caught between exacting some sort of punishment on the Dursleys and answering the twins' questions. As much as Violet wanted to see the former, she really thought the latter was more important at the moment.
He turned back to the twins yet again, looking as if he were almost in shock at their complete and utter lack of knowledge. "Yeh don't know who yer mum an' dad were? They're famous. Yer famous."
"We're famous?" Violet echoed.
"Of course ye are," Hagrid said indignantly. "Everyone knows yer names! And the two of yeh are sittin' here not knowin' what ye are!"
"I forbid you," Uncle Vernon had seemed to regain some of his nerve, however small it might be. "Don't tell them anything- we've spent years trying to raise them right-,"
"Raise them righ'-," Hagrid bellowed, his massive hands curling into massive fists. "I saw Dumbledore leave tha' letter fer them, Dursley! I was there! An' yeh've kept it from them all these years, ye quiverin' pile a-,"
"Keep what from us?" Violet and Harry demanded in unison, Violet nearly on her feet in anticipation.
"I FORBID YOU!" Uncle Vernon shouted desperately, his face alternating between ghostly pale and crimson red. Aunt Petunia looked as though she might faint.
"Go boil yeh heads, both of yeh," Hagrid said in disgust, and then looked at the twins. "Yer wizards."
The hut sank into silence once more.
"-a what?" Harry asked faintly.
Violet elbowed him. "That's why we can do all these things! The whole time, that's been why!" She was in happy shock, if it was possible. The strange things that happened around her had never particularly alarmed or disturbed, even if she'd known they hadn't been normal. She'd enjoyed not being normal. And now they knew why. There was an explanation, finally.
"Yeh'll make thumpin' good uns, once you've been trained up a bit," Hagrid said proudly, sitting back down. "With a mum an' dad like yers, what else would yeh be?"
"They were wizards too?" Violet asked eagerly.
"Two of the bes'. Now I reckon it's abou' time yeh read yer letters."
Violet wanted to hug hers to her chest the moment she held it in her hands, but she was too busy pulling it out of the envelope, as her twin did likewise beside her. She smoothed the paper hurriedly and squinted in the flickering firelight.
HOGWARTS SCHOOL of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY
Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Miss Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment.
Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall,
Deputy Headmistress
Violet devoured the words with her eyes, drinking them in like broth. She reread it a second, then a third time while Harry stammered, asking what they meant by awaiting a owl, and Hagrid hurriedly scrawled a note of some sort, which he handed off to an owl that seemed to have come out from the inside of his coat. At this point, little would have shocked Violet anyways.
"They're not going," Uncle Vernon barked suddenly, regaining some of his former forcefulness, as he took a step closer towards the fire. "I won't have it."
Hagrid made a noise as if he'd just heard a very amusing joke. "I'd like ter see a great Muggle like yerself stop them," he scoffed.
"What's a Muggle?" Violet and Harry chorused.
"Muggle's what we wizards call non-magic folk like yer charmin' relatives," Hagrid said flatly, glancing dismissively at the furious Uncle Vernon, mute Aunt Petunia, and cowering Dudley.
"Wizards," snapped Uncle Vernon. "It's all a load of rubbish- we swore we'd stamp that nonsense out of them when we took them in. I won't have it in my house, alongside my family."
Violet felt a deep loathing rise up in her throat like bile, as she stared at her uncle. "You've known this whole time, haven't you?" she said in a low tone. "Haven't you?"
Aunt Petunia suddenly stepped forward, and her eyes were nearly slits in her fury. Violet drew back, having never seen the woman this enraged before. Her aunt was always annoyed, but usually didn't approach her husband's levels of explosive anger.
"Of course we knew," she hissed. "How could you not be, with my sister for your mother? I remember when she got her letter; couldn't be bothered with anyone Muggle anymore- she was too busy turning teacups into rats with all the other freaks! And my parents were proud! Proud! As if having a witch in the family was something to brag to the neighbors about! I was the only one with any sense in the entire family," her voice wavered in its needle-thin sharpness, "And they all acted as if I were the disappointment! For being perfectly normal! Then she met that Potter at school, and they vanished off the face of the Earth! Had you two and got herself blown up and here we are now!"
She was shaking, she was so angry, but behind the anger was something Violet glimpsed but could not place. Whatever it was, it was raw and naked, like a still-fresh wound that had not yet properly scabbed over.
But Violet was too horrified to identify it- blown up?
"You told us they died in a car crash!" Harry yelled back, his green eyes wide behind his glasses.
"CAR CRASH?!" Hagrid roared in outrage, making both twins flinch. "No car crash coulda killed James an' Lily Potter! Yer tellin' me their kids don't even know their own story when every kid in our world knows their names?!"
Violet felt as if she were about to cry; her eyes and throat had started to ache with something, and she wasn't sure what. "What happened to them?" she choked out. Harry squeezed her hand silently, and she gratefully squeezed his in return.
Hagrid looked taken aback at her and her brother's obvious distress, his anger fading to an uneasy anxiety. "I never thought I'd have ter be the one ter tell yeh," he said far more quietly. "I had no idea ye didn't know anything, only that ye weren't getting' yer letters. But ye can't go off ter Hogwarts not knowin'; it wouldn't be right." He glowered at the Dursleys, who had beat a hasty retreat at his initial roar, for a moment.
He sat down again. "I don't know the whole story- no one does, not really, what happened that night… But it begins wi' someone everyone in our world knows-," he hesitated.
"Who?" Harry pressed anxiously.
"I don't like sayin' the name," Hagrid said defensively. "No one does, not after what he did-,"
"Why not?" Violet interrupted.
"Gulpin' gargoyles, lass, people are still scared! This is a wizard who went bad. Worse than bad. Badder than people thought yeh could go." He tried again to mouth the name, but shook his head.
"Could you write it down?" Harry suggested.
"Can't spell it fer the life of me. Alright. Voldemort," he said it in a rush, looking relieved to have gotten it over with. "I'm not sayin' it again. Anyways, he started gatherin' followers- people who wanted ter be like him, thought he'd take over and change our world fer the better- better of who, I don't know," he said darkly.
"Not any decent folk. No one knew who ter trust or what side anyone was on, but yer parents- they were some of the best. They were good. Only place Voldemort wouldn't dare go after was Hogwarts- scared of Dumbledore, I reckon. Yer parents were Head Boy an' Girl there, back in the day! Maybe You-Know-Who thought he could turn them ter his side- he was good at that. Maybe he just wanted them outta the way. But ten years ago, on All Hallow's Eve, he turned up at yer village."
Here Hagrid began to get noticeably choked up. Violet's stomach turned slightly. Growing up knowing her parents had died tragically and without ever getting to see their children grow up was one thing, but at least she and Harry had believed it had all been an awful accident. Knowing they'd been murdered was much, much worse.
"The two of yeh were only a year old," he sniffled. "Sorry. You-Know-Who killed 'em; cut 'em down right where they stood, tryin' to protect their kids. But then he tried to kill the two of yeh. An' he couldn't. Harry, yeh ever wonder about that scar on yer forehead? It's the mark of where a curse touched yeh, a powerful one. That same curse killed yer parents, even destroyed yer house, but yeh were jus' a baby, and yeh lived. He didn't even get the chance to try an' hurt yeh, Violet. Whatever happened in that house, it hurt him instead. An' it left yeh two all alone."
Violet felt as though all the air had been sucked out of her lungs. She closed her eyes for a moment, trying harder than she ever had to remember; she remembered the green light even clearer now, and two sounds; a cold, hollow laugh, and the wails of a baby. It made her feel sick. The lingering aftertaste of the birthday cake and sausage turned bitter in her mouth.
"I took the both of yeh from the rubble, and brought yeh to this sorry lot. Dumbledore's orders."
"What a load of old tosh," Uncle Vernon cut in abruptly, once again having worked up the nerve- or the pure rage- to move out of the corner and approach the twins once more.
"You listen to me," he snarled at them. "There's no doubt in mind there's something strange about the both of you- especially you, girl. But it's nothing a good beating wouldn't have cured. We were too lax with you. Your parents were freaks, alright? They weren't normal, and if they'd stuck to their own freakish kind we wouldn't have had any problems. But it's no surprise they ended up dead, do you hear me? No surprise. They brought it all on themselves, getting mixed up with a bunch of lunatics-,"
"HOW CAN YOU SAY THAT?!" Violet exploded, jumping to her feet with a furious sob. "They didn't DESERVE to die, and we didn't DESERVE to get stuck with you, and have you treat us like DIRT." She whirled on Aunt Petunia, who looked stunned. "SHE WAS YOUR SISTER! YOUR SISTER! AND YOU TALK ABOUT HER LIKE THAT?! SHE'S DEAD, AND WE'LL NEVER, EVER GET TO SEE HER AGAIN, AND ALL YOU CAN SAY IS THAT SHE WAS A FREAK?!"
The blonde woman's mouth opened, but no sound came out. She was staring at Violet, but Violet felt as though she did not see her at all, but rather someone else entirely, as if she'd suddenly pulled off a mask to reveal a stranger. "She was your sister," Violet sobbed. "And you won't even say her name. You never even told us what she looked like."
Aunt Petunia continued to stare, skinny shoulders heaving up and down, but Uncle Vernon caught Violet roughly by the arm, his grip painful. "That's enough out of you," he growled, twisting her arm viciously. "Don't think you can mouth off just because of a letter, you-,"
"Let go of her!" Harry snapped, scrambling to his feet as well, but Hagrid had leapt up quicker, despite his massive size, and was pointing a bright pink umbrella at Uncle Vernon.
"I'm warnin' yeh, Dursley," he said in a dangerously calm tone.
Uncle Vernon immediately let go of Violet and scurried backwards until his back hit the wall.
Hagrid slowly stowed the umbrella back in his coat, and looked to the twins; Violet was rubbing her arm, while Harry asked very quietly, "So Vol- I mean, You-Know-Who is dead now, right?"
Hagrid exhaled slowly. "He's been gone, that's fer sure. Some will say he's gone fer good, dead, but I dunno if he had enough human in him ter die like a regular man. Some will say he's just waitin' fer the right time to come back, but it's been ten years now. If he was comin' back, he would have already, if ye ask me. Whatever happened with the two of ye- whatever happened ter him when he tried to kill yeh, Harry, it took him out of the picture entirely.
Hagrid was looking at both of them with something Violet could not recognize at first. After a few moments she realized it was pride. No one had ever looked proud of her in her entire life. She wanted very badly to hug the giant man.
"I don't know if we can be wizards." Harry still sounded uncertain.
"Of course we can," Violet said fiercely.
Hagrid just laughed. "Yeh never made anything weird happen when yeh were angry? Or scared? Or excited?"
Violet and her brother shared a look, and slowly they both began to smile.
Hagrid looked as though he was grinning, under his beard. "The two of yeh will be celebrities at Hogwarts."
Uncle Vernon didn't dare move from his position against the wall, but he did cut in once more, clearly not about to let things swing too far in Violet and Harry's favor, lest they begin to get used to it. "They're not going," he sneered. "They're going to Stonewall High, and they should be grateful we even let them go to regular school at all. Do you know how many times we've been called by teachers?! I read those letters- I'm not buying them spell books and wands and robes."
"If they want ter go, they'll go," Hagrid snarled in return. "And yeh can't stop 'em. Their names have been on the list since they were born. Hogwarts is the finest school of witchcraft an' wizardry in the world! Seven years, they'll have, ter be with their own kind fer once in their lives, away from yeh lot. Under the greatest headmaster Hogwarts has ever had, Albus-,"
"I WON'T PAY FOR SOME CRACKPOT OLD FOOL TO TEACH THEM MAGIC TRICKS!" Uncle Vernon shouted, in what seemed like a last-ditch attempt to make a stand.
Hagrid whipped out the umbrella once more. "NEVER- INSULT- ALBUS- DUMBLEDORE- IN-FRONT- OF- ME!" The umbrella came down to point directly at Dudley, who had in the mean time been quite contentedly scarfing down what was left of the cake, in the midst of all the chaos. Something bright violet flashed through the air, a loud bang erupted like a firecracker going off, and Dudley squealed louder than Violet had ever heard him squeal before. He started jumping up and down in pain, as if stepping on hot coals, and when he turned Violet gaped at the little pig tail sticking out his trouser bottom.
Uncle Vernon shouted, and pulled both the screaming Aunt Petunia and shrieking Dudley into the other room, the door slamming shut behind them.
Hagrid put the umbrella away.
"I wish you'd done that sooner," Violet said earnestly, and he chuckled.
"Shouldn'ta lost me temper like that. But yer Muggle family's got a habit of pushin' me buttons."
"They're not our family, not really," Harry muttered.
Hagrid simply cleared his throat. "Be grateful if neither of yeh mention that at Hogwarts. Not really supposed ter be doin' magic, strictly speakin'. I was allowed ter do a bit ter get yeh yer letters and follow yeh here, but aside from that-,"
"Why can't you do magic?" Violet and Harry asked in unison.
He looked sheepish. "I went ter Hogwarts meself, but ah- I was expelled. In me third year. They snapped me wand an' everythin'. But Dumbledore's let me stay on as the school groundskeeper. Great man, he is."
"Why were you expelled?"
Hagrid acted as if he had not heard them. "It mus' be near two in the mornin' by now. Yeh need yer sleep. Gotta get yer school things tomorrow." He yanked off his heavy coat tossed it at the twins, who between the two of them managed to catch it. "Yeh can share it- yer both small enough. If it wriggles around a little, don't worry. Probably just a couple o' dormice in one of me pockets."
"Oh," said Violet faintly.
