Thank you to the people who favorited/alerted this. And thank you to rheana, who reviewed.

Disclaimer - I do not own Harry Potter.

Chapter 2

"Why did you contact me?" Harry asked, he intended to say it softly, but it came out sounding harsher than he meant.

"Well, I don't exactly know anybody else that can do m-" he bit the word off with a gurgle, as if he were choking on it.

"Say it." Harry said, his hands clenched around the edge of the table "Fear of a name only increases fear of the thing itself."

There was a tense moment; Dudley worked his jaw open and closed, much like a landed fish, he swallowed and clenched and unclenched his fists "Magic." He finally said, his voice barely even a whisper.

Harry smiled at him, just the corners of his lips quirking, really, before he sighed and rubbed tiredly at his eyes. "What do you want me to do, Dud?"

"I don't want to be afraid any more."

Harry stared at the table, tracing the whorls in the wood with one finger. "Is there a cupboard?" He asked softly; it was hard, but he knew that it had to be done.

The sound of smashing glass made Harry jerk his head up. Dudley had frozen, jaw clenched, right hand hovering half way to his mouth. The glass lay, shattered, on the table where he had dropped it.

"God Harry." He gasped. "No; I'd never…no." Harry could tell from the anguish as he choked out the words that his cousin meant it. He loved his daughter; like the Dursley's had never loved him. "Not Pip."

Harry twitched his arm and his wand slid down to his hand. A few muttered words and a privacy shield had been cast around them; nobody would see or hear anything untoward, just the image of two cousins talking. "Reparo." Harry said, loud enough that Dudley could hear, the twirl of his wand precise for his benefit. The fragments of glass sprang back together, the fibres re-knitting until the damaged object was whole once again.

Dudley looked shocked and pale faced, but he wasn't shaking, so that was a good thing.

"See, magic can be used for good things. Now we don't have to pay to replace the glass."

Dudley smiled; it was watery, and disappeared quickly, but it was a smile nonetheless. Thinking of Ron on their first ride of The Hogwarts Express, he changed the glass to green. Then, with a Swish and Flick, and a Wingardium Leviosa, the thought of Hermione making him want to squirm in his seat, he levitated the glass above the table.

"See Dudley, there's nothing wrong with magic." His cousin nodded shakily. "I'm proud of you." The words tasted acidic in his mouth, after all, nobody had ever uttered them to him, but he knew that sometimes you just needed encouragement.

Harry looked at the clock on the wall; it was almost one in the morning. "Look, how about you go home and get some sleep; I've got the day off tomorrow, it's Saturday, I'll see you again then."

Dudley nodded tiredly.

Back at Grimmauld Place Harry threw a handful of floo powder into the fire that he had built in the grate there. "Auror Department Head Office, Ministry of Magic." He shouted and pushed his head into the green flames.

He had to wait a minute before legs came into view and then a head tilted into his field of vision. "Harry?" Gawain Robards' gruff voice asked. He heaved a sigh of relief that it was Robards doing office hours. "Is everything ok?"

"Yeah. I was just wondering if I could have the day off tomorrow?"

"Of course." Harry could see the relief in the man's eyes; he was always telling him that he worked too hard. He nodded once in thanks and pulled his head out of the fireplace.

Harry woke up only a few hours later to a strangled cry bubbling from his lips. The final battle continued to rage on in his head even once he was awake; the image of the sightless eyes of his friends staring at him in the cold, dark night. Staring at the ceiling for a while, he waited for his heartbeat to slow down at least a tad. Tiredly, he shuffled out of bed to shower, having been too tired to do so the night before. It felt good, the warm water splashing down his back and washing the caked on blood of his pale skin. The gash on his arm was long and the raised edges, which were a raw red, was inflamed and hot to the touch.

Stomach rumbling, he went to his kitchen, a towel slung over his shoulders. The kitchen was situated in one of the first floor rooms that had been unused when the Order had used the building. He had had it put in place immediately upon return to Grimmauld Place and so shuffled through life using only these three rooms. He ambled through the morning tensely, ate some cereal and toast for breakfast, tidied the three rooms and eventually, at seven, left London for Surrey.

He sat on a picnic bench outside of The Red Lion, a glass of lemonade on the table before him. He'd been sat there for almost an hour before Dudley trudged up to him, his hands plunged into the depths of his pockets.

"Hi Harry." He said with a small smile. "Thanks for coming again."

"No problem." There was an awkward silence for a while; Dudley stared at the dusty floor, Harry the bottom of his drink. "Let's go for a walk."

They ambled along slowly. Harry took a deep breath and did something that he had never expected to do; it was significantly harder than he had thought it would be. "Here, hold my wand." He flipped the stick of wood over in his hand, so that he was holding the tip and the handle was offered out to his cousin. Dudley looked at it with wide eyes before a shaking hand stretched out, grasping it.

Harry held his breath. He didn't know what he was expecting but there were no fireworks, no sparks, and no bunch of flowers sprouting from the tip. Nothing happened. Nothing at all. Dudley looked at him and the fear had gone.

"Magic." He said and the word was not a whisper. The wand was suddenly thrust back into Harry's hand and the fear was back in place. But for a moment, just a short one, it had gone and so Harry knew that it could go forever.

"You should come and meet my family." Dudley said. He was shocked when he saw Harry's already pale face blanch drastically. "It's ok, it's not mum and dad; they kind of kicked me out when Yvonne got pregnant, you know, we were teenagers and unmarried, it just didn't fit in with their perfect picture of life." Harry could sense just a note of bitterness, but far less than was to be expected. But when he continued speaking, it was with a burning passion. "Anyway, the Addison's are not at all like mum and dad were. The house is full of laughter and love. I've changed there, I really have."

That didn't convince Harry any, it sounded too much like the Dursley's. "I don't know, Dud." It was just too painful and he knew it.

"Please Harry. At some point I'm gonna have to tell them about all of this and I don't want to do it on my own. It would be a lot easier if you had at least met them."

Harry sighed; he couldn't resist the pleading note in his voice. He took a deep breath, grabbed his Gryffindor courage by the horns and nodded jerkily. Dudley led him through the winding streets of Dorking until they were stood in front of what was obviously Dudley's home. It was a large cottage with a front door painted bright red and a front garden whose flowers tumbled onto the street. As Dudley unlatched the little wooden gate that led to a short, winding path, Harry paused.

"Come on Harry." Dudley said and he was more confident then he'd been once in the past two days. "They don't bite."

Smiling shakily, knowing that he didn't mean it, Harry followed Dudley up the garden path to the front door.

"I'm home!" He called. A woman who looked to be about fifty, with greying mousy brown hair came through a door, wiping her hands on a dish towel.

"Hello Dudley dear." She said, her eyes crinkling as she smiled. "oh," she said, stopping in her tracks "and who might this be?"

"This is my cousin. Harry." Nervously Harry stretched his hand out. The woman just laughed and gathered him into a hug.

"Well, any family of Dudley is family of mine." Pulling away she looked at him shrewdly, "Boy, you need fattening up."

Harry shivered, he couldn't help it, she sounded far too much like Molly Weasley.

"But look at us, stood in the doorway. Come in, come in."

Harry shuffled in and closed the door behind him. He followed Dudley through to a cosy sitting room; it had a four seater sofa, a two seater sofa and two armchairs, a fireplace on one wall and a television in the corner. A man with a full head of silver hair sat, reclining, on the sofa.

"Hey Dud'." He said without looking up.

"Hey John, who's winning?" He asked.

"Bolton." The man, John, grumbled.

"Shame." Dudley said, chuckling. "This is my cousin, Harry."

At this the man did look up. He had a kind face; soft blue eyes and a strong nose and jaw that reminded him painfully of Dumbledore. "Why don't you come and sit down." He invited, gesturing to the chairs. Harry perched on the edge, hands squeezed between his knees.

"So you're Dudley's cousin, eh?" Harry nodded mutely in response. "Can't say that I knew Dudley had a cousin. But then he doesn't talk about family much." He smiled sadly. "So which side of the family are you on?"

"His mothers. My mother was her younger sister."

"And were you close growing up?"

"You could say that. I went to boarding school, so we didn't see each other much once I turned eleven."

"Ah, I see."

Harry shifted uncomfortably.

"You must be Harry." He turned around to find a young woman in the doorway, Dudley next to her, a toddler in his arms; Harry hadn't even seen him leave the room, which was strange for him. The woman was slender, with brown hair that tumbled over one shoulder and brown eyes that sparkled.

"And you must be Yvonne." She nodded and shook his hand.

"And this is Pippa." Dudley said, jiggling the giggling toddler on his hip.

"I can't believe that over the last two years Dudley didn't mention you." She glared lightly at Dudley, who held his hands up bashfully.

"We, uh, fell out of touch." He scratched the back of his head nervously.

She laughed. "But here you are, out of the blue."

"How about some lunch?" Yvonne's mother, whose name Harry was yet to catch, asked.

"That's alright I…"

"Nonsense." She said, cutting him off before he could protest.

"But –"

"It seemed you misunderstood me; lunch is on the table." She smiled with a steely determination that reminded Harry of Poppy Pomfrey.

There was plate of cheese sandwiches on the big wooden table in the kitchen and a bowl of crisps. "Tuck in everyone."

Harry took a cheese sandwich and a plate and, stood in the corner of the kitchen, began to eat.

"So Harry, what do you do for a living?" Yvonne asked; out of the corner of his eye he saw Dudley freeze.

"I'm a police man." He said.

"Oh yeah; got any stories for us? Caught any really nasty bad guys?" she asked, her eyes glinting in the light.

"You could say that." Harry mumbled cryptically.

As if they could sense that he didn't want to talk about it, the matter was dropped.

Harry stayed for a view hours that day, listening to the Addison family joke back and forth, making fun of each other. He discovered that Yvonne had an older brother, Michael, who had a wife and child, when they dropped in for a cup of tea, and a younger sister, Matilda, who was out at a friend's. By the time he left he was exhausted.

He slept badly that night; he kept seeing the Weasley family, their eyes full of maggots, their faces decomposing, their dead screams filling his ears. They sat around the table in the true kitchen of Grimmauld Place, Sirius, Remus and Tonks joining them, their faces gaunt and grey. He woke up in a cold sweat, the bed covers twisted around his limbs, his breath coming in pained gasps.

He knew that he would never get to sleep again, so he decided to head to work early.

That night, after Harry had left, Dudley's family discussed the new arrival.

"It was nice to meet Harry." Susan said as the door closed. Dudley nodded, sensing that there was more coming. "He seems sad, though."

"And he didn't say very much." Yvonne added.

"He was always shy." Dudley said frowning, glossing over the truth slightly. His cousin was all sharp lines and jagged edges; brittle and hard at the same time.

"But he seemed so sad."

"I don't know." Dudley said, unsure of what exactly it was that he didn't know.

"What are you doing here Potter?" Robards asked sharply. "Today is your day off."

"But I had yesterday off." He protested.

"I don't care, you're not scheduled to work today."

"But –"

"No Harry, go home." He watched sadly as the boy, for he was still a boy, flooed home.

Reviews would be lovely, they help me write, but if not, I hope that you enjoyed it.

Until the next installment, friends.