disclaimer in first chapter
warnings: unbeta'd, cracking author, crappy story
edit: um..."marred the strange puckered curse" yeah, glad i caught that one. fixed now.
swept away
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Shaking off the effects of the strange dream, Harry moved quietly and pushed his ear to the door. There definitely was someone else in the house, the noises that had woken him up were from unnaturally deft footsteps making their way up the stairs so lightly that not a singly speck of dusk fell from the ceiling of his cupboard. Through the grate on the door he could hear whoever it was moving around in one of the bedrooms upstairs.
The person finished going through all the rooms, from what it sounded like to Harry, and proceeded back downstairs. The person paused in the hall, and in fact, Harry could just make out dark, dishevelled clothing through the slats of the grate on his door. He covered his mouth with his hand and held very still. Presently, the person spoke, confirming, at least, that he/she was male.
"He's here…smell…so powerful, especially…but where…?" Harry could see enough to make out that the man was pacing up and down the length of the hall, and he could hear strange snuffling noises.
Smell him? The man could smell him, like a dog? Normal people couldn't do stuff like that! Surprisingly, or maybe unsurprisingly if his lack of outside life and Dursleys were factored in, Harry never thought to fear the strange man pacing up down the hallway outside his cupboard muttering about smelling people.
Harry was of course, curious about the man, but he knew what he was do to around strangers in the Dursley house – and that was to stay completely out of sight and pretend he didn't exist. But...he reasoned to himself, the Dursleys weren't there, and besides, if the man did anything, he'd be blamed! Harry swallowed thickly around the lump that had lodged itself in his throat. He moved off his little cot and pushed at the door to open it, as there wasn't a handle on his side. But he didn't even think about what sort of trouble he might get into with the Dursleys (he didn't know to fear any from the strange man). Something else was guiding him, very much like that strange feeling he'd had to let the dog in from his dream.
The door opened, and the man swivelled quickly and animal-like to Harry's form, as the boy stepped out into the hallway.
"Harry? Is that you! What are you doing here? Look how you've grown! Oh, come here, my boy!" The man crossed the distance of the hall between them and enveloped him in a suffocating embrace. "Thank god I found you Harry."
Harry, unsure as to exactly why this strange man was hugging him (he'd only seen people hug, no one had ever hugged him before, he didn't deserve it). He tried pushing weekly at the strong, skinny arms around him, but the man seemed bent on squishing him and Harry sighed and gave into it as it felt nice in a way that brought tears to his eyes and made him think of those exhilarating dreams about green light and flying motorcycles that he never told the Dursleys about.
In no time, Harry found himself back on his feet and enshrouded in the man's warm winter cloak (it was cold in the house, the Dursleys never let the heat on just for Harry). The man knelt down in front of him, looking past him for a moment into the cupboard. Anger and sorrow, and something Harry couldn't name but was actually regret crossed through his widened eyes.
"I'm going to take you away from here, Harry, like I should have years ago. Your parents would have wanted it. I'm going to take a look around the house again, so I want you to go into your bedroom and pack anything you want to bring with you in this bag." The man pulled a strange dark brown rucksack off of his shoulder and handed it to Harry. Then, impulsively, he smoothed Harry's hair down gently, so it covered his scar.
Harry still didn't know what to think of this strange man, was he really going to take him away? Really? Like all those daydreams he fantasized about when things got really bad… but, would the man really want him, or did the…But he had mentioned Harry's parents. The Dursleys had never told Harry what happened to them. Maybe this man knew. Harry hoped he would find out before the man got bored and hated him too.
"Harry, Harry! Look at me." The man shook him slightly, knocking him from his thoughts. "You are never coming back here. I will not allow it. Now pack what you want and we shall leave." The man smiled and stood up, pushing him gently towards the cupboard door, before leaving in his earlier mentioned perusal of the house.
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After Harry had finished packing the few meagre, broken possessions he owned, he crept slowly upstairs to join the funny man that seemed to be growling lowly at the door to Dudley's second bedroom. Harry giggled lightly because it sounded sort of like a dog protecting it's food but not really, and moved forward to curl his hand in the man's strange robe-like clothing at his side.
"Ah, Harry, done then? Okay, we'll be leaving now." He cast one last dangerous look at the room as he took the rucksack from Harry and carefully herded the small boy at his side down the stairs and out the back door he'd come through earlier.
They walked for a long time, farther away from Privet Drive than Harry had ever dreamed to be. But, while used to physical labour of a sort, Harry wasn't used to walking for any length of time, and he lagged behind as far as he could while still clutching at the strange robe-like sleeve. The man, of course, noticed quickly enough that Harry wasn't fairing so well, and picked the boy up, apologising.
"Well, this seems far enough." He walked off to the side of the road. The boy and the man disappeared from sight behind a large, overgrown privacy hedge. "Okay, I want you to close your eyes and hold tight to me."
And they were gone with a soft crack
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The reappeared in what Harry found out quickly enough, was a broken train station bathroom. He looked around curiously at all the people as they emerged, but felt strangely safe and comfortable in the man's arms as they weaved through the throng.
"I would have gone straight there, but I don't want to set anyone on our trail. I'll have to deal with… Never mind. Look Harry, there's the train we'll be taking." Harry listened raptly as the man continued to speak about where they were going and what they'd be doing to get there, among other things. He knew he should be scared, having been essentially kidnapped from the Dursleys house that morning. But really, Harry thought, didn't you have to be unwilling to be kidnapped? Yes, he'd wanted to go with the strange man that said he had known Harry's parents and that growled at Dudley's second bedroom.
Presently the two boarded the train, and Harry found himself sat down carefully on a bench in their own private compartment. The man sat beside him and watched too, as Harry looked out the window at the crowds on the platform. A sign over a distant archway told him he was at King's Cross.
"Harry." The man smiled warmly down at him and fussed with his hair again. "Now that we're here, how about you and I have a little chat?"
"Um…okay." He said quietly. Hadn't that been what they were doing all the way to this point, talking? The man frowned, marring a strange scar that crossed his face diagonally.
"How about this, you ask a question, then I'll ask a question, and we trade off?" Harry nodded at that. "Now, do you want to go first, then?" Harry shook his head. "Well, if you're sure. Hmmm." There was silence for a few moments.
"How about…what did you do today?"
Harry knew he wasn't supposed to talk about the stuff he did for the Dursleys…with anyone, but they weren't here, and that something in his stomach that always led him right told him to trust this man. So he found himself rattling off everything that had happened since he woke up. The chores, the watching the window, the sneaking food, the man, the dream about the dog. The man beside him frowned again, and muttered something to himself, but didn't say anything to Harry beyond, "Well, that is certainly a busy day, no? Okay, your turn."
"…you said you knew my parents, right…well…um, who're you?" Harry nervously looked at his hands, watching the fingers twist in the thick fabric of the cloak he was wrapped in.
The man smiled down at him this time, puckering that scar again, but in a way that was much more friendly than the frown from earlier. His amber eyes were warm and the corners crinkled a little, but a strange sense of loss surrounded them as they turned to look off into some distance yet unseen.
"Well, Harry, I was a friend of your parents. My name is Remus Lupin."
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