Harry awoke the next morning to the sounds of about ten lawnmowers all at work on Privet Drive. The high temperatures had forced many of the road's inhabitants to rise earlier than they normally would so they could attempt to set their gardens in order before the fierce glare of the sun forced them into the shade of their houses.

Pulling on an old pair of shorts and a baggy t-shirt, Harry ambled downstairs thinking dimly of where his cousin was. Dudley had recently taken to leaving the house as early as five o'clock and then only returning for lunch before disappearing again.

Typical. Dudley will go anywhere for food…

Even so, Harry still had not discovered where his cousin was sneaking off to and, if he was brutally honest, he didn't really care either.

Harry absentmindedly opened the Dursleys' fridge to retrieve an apple — it was too hot for anything cooked. Just as Harry sat down at the table, a weary looking barn owl flew in through the window with a Daily Prophet coiled in its beak. Harry glanced at the front page and felt his insides turn to ice.


NINE DEAD AND FOURTEEN MISSING IN ATTACK ON SOUTHAMPTON

The Ministry of Magic released news today that You-Know-Who's followers, known as 'Death Eaters', once again launched an attack although this time they targeted the Wizarding community in the seaside town of Southampton.

Aurors, arriving at the scene shortly after the assault described these recent attacks as 'shocking and pointless'. An Auror, who wishes to remain anonymous for security reasons, described the scene as 'disturbing and brutal. These attacks are proving nothing and achieving nothing. It is strongly advisable that people remain on high alert for any further signs of Death Eater movements'. It is…

"Boy! What are you doing?"

Harry jumped. Aunt Petunia was standing in the doorway with her arms folded and her eyes narrowed.

"Reading the paper," Harry answered tonelessly, not in the mood for his aunt's disgust. "Not a crime, is it?"

"Give that here," she snapped, snatching the paper off him. "What can possibly be so import…" Aunt Petunia stopped abruptly, the unfolded paper falling from her limp hand.

"Yes?" Harry said coolly, picking up the paper from the floor. Harry initially thought his aunt's reaction was solely down the fact the image of the Dark Mark was floating lazily in the sky on the front page but one glance at her wide, horror struck eyes told him otherwise.

"That's his doing, isn't it," she whispered, her face white to her lips.

"If you mean by 'his', Voldemort, then yes, those attacks are because of him."

"Don't say the Dark Lord's name!"

"Oh, grow up," Harry snapped irritably. "I've been saying his name for years and I'm not…"

He stopped suddenly and Aunt Petunia flushed slightly. "Since when have you been afraid of saying Voldemort's name?" he asked in amazement.

Aunt Petunia glared at him in disgust before answering. "Since last year. When he returned. I thought that after my sister, that would be the end…"

Harry frowned. "He returned two years ago, not last year. I told you that!"

"Be quiet boy."

Harry was not about to be put off so easily; he had no intention of being quiet until he had the answers he wanted. After the events of last year, he had resolutely made the decision that he would no longer allow himself to be kept in the dark about what was happening around him.

"What about…"

"How often has this all been happening?" his Aunt interrupted quietly, looking very much like the time she had had a similar 'talk' with him back in the summer of his fifth year.

"Attacks? All year. Deaths, disappearings, kidnappings, tortures…" Harry answered slowly, staring at his aunt's fearful expression.

"Anyone I know?"

"Deaths and disappearings, no. Kidnappings, yes."

"Who?"

"Me. Last month. I was taken to Azkaban — the Wizard prison. One of my teachers was murdered trying to rescue me and another one was hurt." Harry was surprised as to how calm he sounded but his mother's sister looked uncharacteristically terrified.

"Who?" she repeated softly.

"Minerva McGonagall was killed, Snape was hurt," Harry said as he guiltily looked at the floor.

"How badly?"

Harry jerked his head back up at his aunt again, who had an odd expression twisting her face which looked almost like surprise.

"He was unconscious for a couple of weeks and he lost a lot of blood but he's on the mend now. Why?"

"I'm sorry."

Harry's eyes widened in shock.

Aunt Petunia's apologising to me…? What's brought all this on?

Harry was about to say 'How do you know about my world?' but he never got the words out.

"Your mother… I suppose… after what's… you should… I don't think… Vernon won't like it but…"

Harry waited in silence; he'd never seen his aunt looking so awkward in his life. Something told him to stay quiet but he didn't know why his aunt was suddenly telling him this. It seemed that the news of the attacks had jolted her out of her rigorously held mask of feigned ignorance she had used for the years she had known him.

"It was years back now when I first met anyone other than my good for nothing sister from the other world," she murmured, staring at the corner of the table unseeingly. "My sister introduced me to one of her… friends. She was involved with him for a while, I think, when she was about fourteen. She brought him home over the summer for a while. He was nice. Strange; quiet even, but still nice. In control, I suppose, is the best way to describe him. He was never much to look at but he certainly knew how to handle himself. He told me the most about the other world. Some of it seemed a bit more than anything my sister had ever told my parents or me."

Harry was stunned. His aunt was sounding nothing like her usual snappy, bitter self. It was almost as if someone was impersonating her but the way she twisted her face every time she mentioned 'Lily', 'sister' or 'other world' told him otherwise. Lily's son waited in awe for what was coming while pleading silently that Uncle Vernon wouldn't walk in on them. Aunt Petunia's outbursts, and there had only been two of them prior to this one, were always enlightening in the sense that he had long harboured an idea that his aunt knew more about the Wizarding world than she let on she did.

"Anyway, I spent some time with him when Lily was with Mum and Dad being treated like a princess again and I got to know him. He never told me much about himself but seemed interested in me. He wanted to know about how much magic was in the family and I told him there wasn't any. He seemed to go a bit… distant after that and called Lily something which made her upset. She never let me see him again and blamed me for them breaking up. She ran off with that dreadful Potter soon after. I've never seen my Love since."

"Love?!"

His aunt glared at him and seemed to snap out of her almost trance like state as suddenly as she'd fallen into it.

"Go outside and weed the border."

"Who was he?" Harry wasn't about to be put off so easily.

"Go outside and weed the border."

"Who…?"

Harry never finished his sentence as a deafening bang echoed through the room and the floor shook. For a moment, Harry was almost certain that he had done wandless magic again by accident. A second loud bang and several screams told him otherwise. A blinding flash of light illuminated the room despite the fact it was daylight and there was an odd crashing noise. Aunt Petunia recovered first.

No, Harry thought desperately, fumbling for his wand just as Aunt Petunia ran outside. No. Not here…

"Avada Kedavra!" a singsong voice chanted just outside the door.

Aunt Petunia's scream followed along with Uncle Vernon's distant yell of "That's my son, you freak!"

Someone Apparated behind Harry, who spun around with his wand drawn.

"Go, Harry," someone hissed in a voice he didn't recognise. The intruder's face was covered by a dark hood and they seemed surprisingly tall while an aura of power, not unlike Dumbledore, seemed to radiate off them in waves. Aunt Petunia's screams got louder as Vernon's shouts were abruptly silenced.

"Get out, Potter! For Merlin's sake, leave here! The wards will be down any second!"

"Stup-"

Whoever was standing in the Dursleys' kitchen forced a small object into his hand before Harry could finish his spell. The Portkey activated just as Aunt Petunia's screams were stopped by a flash of green light which burnt through the room like a torturous flame. The hooded figure bolted out the room as soon as the Portkey activated and Harry was pulled away from Privet Drive feeling sick to his core. As his feet crashed into the floor of the kitchen at Grimmauld Place, Harry started shaking in horror.

Voldemort had played his finest card against him and there was nothing he could do about it.

There was total silence at Grimmauld Place; even Kreacher was absent, having been ordered to work in Hogwarts' kitchens. Harry lowered himself into a chair slowly and just sat motionless in complete silence. Everything had happened so fast that he wasn't quite sure what had happened.

For a good twenty minutes, there was no movement in the Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix and it gave Harry a chance to collect his thoughts slightly.

Who was that man? Why did he help me? I've never met him before…

Harry replayed the scene in his mind and realised, with a bone shuddering jolt, what had happened to the Dursleys. Anger like nothing he'd ever known coursed through him; Voldemort had just taken the last true link to Harry's family from him. He had no blood relations left.

Please say that this is just a nightmare…

A distant sound brought Harry out of his initial shock and he drew his wand, prepared to fight.

"Harry?" Albus Dumbledore swept into the room looking remarkably calm. Harry nodded as his aged Headmaster crouched next to him but refused to look at the light blue eyes which surveyed him intently.

"They broke the wards," Harry said quietly as he continued to stare at a crack in the floor blankly. Dumbledore looked the Boy-Who-Lived with sorrow etched deeply into his lined face.

"They took your uncle and cousin with her," Dumbledore said gently as Harry looked pained. "I was not sure if you knew. I believe they murdered your cousin first, then your uncle and your aunt last of all. I'm so sorry, Harry."

"Who was it?" Harry asked calmly but with the faintest trace of anger in his words. "Who murdered them?"

"Bellatrix Lestrange," someone said icily behind Dumbledore. "I told you this would happen, Dumbledore, and you refused to listen to me."

"Severus..." Dumbledore started, turning around just as Harry looked up to see the scrawny, greasy haired spy standing in the doorway to the hall with his face completely blank except for a small sneer.

Harry started saying something but Snape overrode him smoothly without even the barest of acknowledgements of his presence.

"By the looks of it, they've taken almost everyone in the area with Potter's relatives," the Potions master continued nastily, his face pale and his expression carefully neutral. "They've blown up the whole street. The squib's gone too."

"Mrs Figg?" Harry asked tightly, staring at the floor again. Snape ignored him.

"How many in total, Severus?" Dumbledore said sharply as he watched the spy intently.

"It is impossible to say."

"An estimate?"

"As I said; everyone within a quarter of a mile radius of Privet Drive. I cannot be more specific than that at this stage."

Harry looked up in time to see the Potions master, unmasked but still hooded with a Death Eater's cloak, with a twisted smirk on his thin face. Harry felt a sickening sensation swoop through him at Snape's look of indifference just as the Potions master twitched his left arm almost imperceptibly.

Snape raised one eyebrow questioningly at Dumbledore, who nodded slightly, looking worried.

"Good luck."

Snape, with a curt nod, Disapparated without another word. Not once did he look at the boy he had spent over a month with in the Hospital Wing a few weeks previously. For some reason, Snape's lack of acknowledgement towards him hurt Harry more than he'd have expected it too. For a moment, he forgot what was happening; it had all been so sudden...

"Harry?" Dumbledore said softly. "I think you should go to the Burrow for the remainder of the summer. It is as safe as anywhere for you now and I know Molly and Arthur are happy to let you stay with them. I believe you have experienced side-along Apparition before, have you not?"

Harry nodded stiffly and held out his hand. The last time he'd apparated was when he'd been kidnapped by Death Eaters...

For some reason, the news he was going to the Burrow didn't seem to sound as welcome as he'd have liked. He just felt numb; almost as if he had forgotten how to feel.

"Ok then?" the Headmaster said calmly and he Disapparated to the door of the Burrow, Harry alongside him. Dumbledore held out his hand and knocked twice and Harry distinctly heard someone come over to the door with slightly shuffling footsteps.

"I'll be there in a moment…" Mrs Weasley said without opening the door.

"No rush, Molly," Dumbledore answered. "You know, I think that it's high time I sampled some of your cooking again. I haven't tried your oatcakes for a long time."

"Albus!" Molly said wrenching open the door. "It's so good to see you, and Harry dear!"

Dumbledore nodded again and steered Harry inside the Burrow before Molly shut the door behind them both.

"I didn't know you like oatcakes, Professor," Harry said as Molly gave him a motherly hug.

"I don't," Dumbledore answered with a smile. "It's the password."

"Harry?" a familiar voice said from the doorway.

"Ron?"

"Good to see you, mate," Ron said brightly, stepping over to Harry and slapping him on the back. "I suggest you enjoy the peace while it lasts. Ginny hasn't stopped talking about you or," he added with a sly smile, "about your goodbye to her at the station."

Harry blushed as Dumbledore chuckled behind him.

"Ronald!" Mrs Weasley scolded. "If you're not careful I'll tell Harry what Hermione said to you last night."

Ron swallowed and took a step back from his mother looking awkward. Harry started laughing but when he saw Mr Weasley walk into the kitchen looking tired and balder than when Harry had last seen him, the reality of what had happened hit Harry like a sledgehammer. Here were the Weasleys; all nine of them were still alive and well. Why did they escape relatively untouched while he lost everyone?

"Harry?"

It was only then, when Ginny walked in close behind her father, that it truly hit home for Harry what had happened. For the first time, he realised that he now had no one left; every last member of his family had been destroyed; annihilated even; by the cruellest wizard who'd ever lived.

"Harry?" Ginny repeated as he went pale.

"What's happened?" Ron said nervously.

"There was an attack on Privet Drive," Dumbledore answered quietly. "Harry's aunt, uncle and cousin have been murdered."

Harry didn't see Molly Weasley start crying, or Ron looking horrified, or Arthur looking shell-shocked. The Boy-Who-Lived was only aware of Ginny's arms wrapped around his neck in comfort as the tears fell from his eyes for the first time since the attack. His tears darkened her pale pink t-shirt to a bitter, bloodlike red in seconds.

As he stood there, his head buried in Ginny's shoulder, Harry vowed that this would be the last time Voldemort took anyone from him, ever again.

Several hundred miles away, Voldemort was grinning broadly. Harry Potter was running out of places to hide and the protection Dumbledore had originally created was now useless.

Not much longer, my dear Nagini, he hissed quietly. He is already wavering and this is only the beginning...

Voldemort looked up as a tall, thin Death Eater stepped into the room and bowed at his feet whispering:

"My Lord, I received your summons and am awaiting your orders."

"Rise, Severus," Voldemort said in his cold voice. The Death Eater stood gracefully and bowed to his master as he did so.

"Severus, are you prepared to risk everything for me?"

There was no detectable hesitation as Snape answered, "Yes, my Lord."

"Good," Voldemort whispered quietly. "I have a task for you which no one else can achieve. When you succeed, you will be greatly honoured among my Death Eaters."

"My life is yours, Master."

Half and hour later, Severus Snape left the Riddle House whiter than an alpine blizzard. If anyone had been there to see, they would have noticed the subtle trace of an emotion darkening his angular features as he Disapparated back to the Order's Headquarters to report to Albus Dumbledore.

For his sake, if nothing else, he hoped they would be alone.

A/N: As always, I hope you enjoyed that and I'd love to know what you think… Thanks to those of you who do!