Title: The Boys Who Lived
Author: Shara Lunison
Beta: Batsutousai
Rating for this Chapter: K+
Pairings: Harry/Henry (OMC)
Warnings: SLASH, Eventual twincest!
Summary: The Potter twins are attacked by Voldemort and somehow defeat him. Now the Dark Lord has returned and they have to choose between light and dark. SLASH, Twincest, rated M for later chapters.
Disclaim Her: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
A/N: I know I'm deviating from some of the plot in these first few chapters, and things are going rather quickly, but let's be honest. We all know how Harry's story begins so well, that we all at this point tend to skim over the basics. So I'm trying to keep it original but still recognizable and get through it quickly so that we get into the real meat of the plot without the long wait for all this preliminary work. That was probably long-winded, but oh well. On with the story!
Chapter Two: Wizards!?
Harry stirred the bacon, being sure to keep it from burning, all the while stealthily lifting a piece of toast from the top of a buttered stack and stuffing it into the pocket of his oversized sweatpants. A small tin of tomatoes and a chunk of cheese soon followed before the bacon was finished and he began serving his relatives. Dudley and Vernon always received the largest portions, while he and Aunt Petunia generally got the same amount, Harry because he was the "freak" and Petunia because she didn't want to ruin her slim figure.
As soon as he was finished, the ten-year-old boy rinsed his plates in the sink and took the empty plates and pans from the rest of the table and began to clean them. Only when he was finished could he safely escape the notice of his uncle and cousin as they watched the telly and Petunia as she perused the latest issue of Housewives.
Quickly and silently, Harry returned to his cupboard where his twin was waiting for him. Henry pounced as soon as the door was closed on their narrow hideaway. "What did you get?"
Harry quickly produced the fruits of his labors, breakfast for his brother who was being punished for daring to bring a book on magic home from the library to read. The book had, of course, been destroyed, which meant the pair now had to find some way to get the money to replace it. There was no way Vernon would ever give them the money to pay library fines when, "it was their own fault, anyway."
"It's not much, but Uncle Vernon was watching me like a hawk, so I didn't dare take anything else," Harry explained.
Henry patted him on the shoulder as he quietly pried open the tin of tomatoes, spreading them on his toast as he devoured the chunk of cheese in two bites. "S'all right. I reckon we've done worse."
Harry grinned and leaned back against the lone pillow in their dingy cell. The string from the single light bulb overhead tickled his nose and he batted it away every few moments as he studied the collection of elementary school drawings they had decorated their room with. Each one depicted the both of them in various situations, most of which involved them escaping the Dursleys. His favorite was a picture, well hidden in the corner nearest the door because of what it represented, of them riding a flying motorcycle across a beautiful nighttime sky. The unnaturalness of it would have seen it destroyed immediately, but it was his prize possession and he had protected it well when he brought it home from third grade.
"Hey, Hen?"
His brother grunted, laying the opposite direction on their narrow mattress.
"Our birthday is next week. Do you think anything good will happen?"
"What, like the Dursleys suddenly striking it rich and leaving us in this house to care for ourselves while they move to Majorca to live in a vacation home with Aunt Marge?" Henry asked.
Harry giggled. "That would be wicked."
His brother laughed. "Nothing could be better, I think. I just hope nothing can get worse."
"Yeah." Harry agreed.
They lay like that for another thirty minutes or so, until the distinct sound of the mail coming through the slot in the door could be heard. "Boy!" Vernon yelled, "Get the mail!"
The twins rolled their eyes. As far as their Uncle was concerned, there might as well be one of them. Together, they left the cupboard, hoping they wouldn't get punished again, considering one of them was supposed to be grounded. The mat beside the door held a postcard from their Aunt Marge, two white envelopes that looked like bills, and…
A letter for them.
It was addressed in emerald green ink and said:
Messirs H. J. Potter
The Cupboard Under the Stairs
4 Privet Drive
Little Whinging
Surrey
On the back there was a strange coat of arms depicting an eagle, a lion, a snake, and a badger and large letter 'H'.
They exchanged glances. "Wicked."
"Boy!" Vernon yelled from the next room. "Where's my mail? Dudley, go find out what he's doing to the mail!"
They gasped, trying to hide the letter, but they kept shuffling it back and forth between them and in the few moments it took Dudley to smack his way into the foyer with his Smeltings stick, they had done no hiding of it at all.
Their cousin immediately noticed what they were doing and gasped in outrage. "DAD!" he yelled, "THEY'VE GOT A LETTER!"
Pounding footsteps came in from the living room and Harry desperately tried to hide the letter behind his back as his Uncle came within inches of them, his hot breath fogging their glasses with his proximity.
"Letter? Why would you get a letter?" Vernon whispered dangerously.
"Er… it was addressed to us," Henry said.
"Let me see it." Their Uncle held out his hand expectantly and Harry reluctantly handed over the strange parchment that had come for them.
By this time, Petunia had come in to see what the commotion was about and gasped at the sight of the letter. She came forward and the pair read the address on the letter and then flipped it over to see the seal.
"P-P-Petunia!" Dursley gasped.
"It's them!" she cried.
"Who's 'them,'" cried Harry and Henry in unison. "Yeah!" Dudley added lamely.
"GO TO YOUR CUPBOARD!" Vernon thundered, taking Petunia by the shoulders as they disappeared into the living room, shutting the door behind them. Dudley tried to follow, only to be yelled at, probably for the first time in his memory, "Dudley, leave, just leave!"
The three boys immediately had a rough but quiet tumble over who was going to listen at the keyhole, which the twins lost very quickly simply because of Dudley's Smeltings stick. Instead, they enjoyed the larger hole at the bottom of the door and began listening in time to hear:
"Petunia, we swore when we took them in that we would stamp out that nonsense! I won't have it, not under my roof!"
"But Vernon, look! They have the cupboard on here. What if they're watching?"
"Ha, ha! Even they can't keep watch on us all the time! You mark my words, I'll put a stop to this!"
The boys scuttled away from the door as Uncle Vernon reappeared, looking rather frazzled. He took the parchment in his hands and ripped it into tiny pieces before their eyes.
"Get your things together, boys. You're moving!"
Harry and Henry exchanged looks of horror. Leaving the Dursleys was the thing they had always hoped for, but this new mystery of the letter made them want to stick around a bit longer to find out who 'they' were and what it meant for them! There was also the fear that their Uncle would separate them through spite or by accident, and they absolutely couldn't let that happen!
But years of experience had taught them that arguing rarely worked with Vernon Dursley, so they disappeared into the cupboard and grabbed their meager possessions (Harry didn't dare to take the drawings, it would be best to try and return for them at a later date) before reconvening beside the front door.
Vernon surveyed them, looking pleased. "Right, follow me."
And to their surprise, he led them up the stairs and not out the door as they had been expecting. Dudley followed out of curiosity and the four of them arrived into Dudley's second bedroom. The room was called such because of the extraordinary quantity of presents that Dudley had broken or just never used over the years. As soon as he realized what was going on, though, their cousin broke into wails. "But this is my room, Daddy! I need it!"
"Silence, Dudley!" Vernon barked, yelling at his son for the second time ever. "There's nothing to be done about it!" He rounded on the twins. "You two. You will sleep here from now on. And no funny business! Do I make myself clear?"
"Yes, Uncle Vernon," they answered obediently.
As soon as he was gone of course, they proceeded to demolish Dudley's carefully disorganized mess, keeping interesting tidbits here and there as they discussed the latest series of events.
"Har, I know I was just joking about the Dursleys leaving us to go live somewhere else, but I feel like that letter was something important. And it was addressed to us. Which means someone out there knows we exist and wants something to do with us." He shuffled through a section of the pile, filling a bin with some of the things that were beyond help and setting aside others, like a broken alarm clock that had probably met with a wall the first time Dudley had used it.
"I know. I just hope whatever they want, it's something good. At the very least, I suppose they can't separate us, or won't want to. Otherwise, it wouldn't have been addressed to both of us." Harry smiled over the mountain of toys at his brother. He had already found a somewhat reparable tin car in the pile. It was only missing a wheel, and he was sure there would be something else with wheels in the pile that might fit.
A wail from downstairs made them pause in their sorting for a few moments. Dudley was clearly throwing a tantrum over the loss of his room, most likely complete with fake tears and kicking and screaming on the floor. Their cousin hadn't thrown a real tantrum in years, but he was still rather good at pretending to have them. They were gleeful to hear Petunia taking him to task: "They are going to live in that room, and that is final. They were getting too big for the cupboard, anyway." This last was said a tad louder than necessary, almost as if it were intended for prying ears. Whoever 'they' were, the Dursleys weren't taking any chances.
"Do you suppose whoever it was will try again, Hen?"
"I hope so. If they don't, we'll have to find out more about that crest somehow. I'll check the library at school when we start up again in September."
Little did they know that further research would be unnecessary.
"Henry, get the mail!" Petunia snapped at them the next morning. Harry was cooking a late brunch as it was Saturday, which left a pair of idle hands. Idle hands was one thing Petunia could not abide from them.
He obliged, secretly hoping that there would be another letter. Their Aunt and Uncle had apparently put the incident behind them after the destruction of the letter the day before and the subsequent relocation of their wards. So it was that Henry found the three letters sitting on the mat that morning. Quickly, he picked one up and stuffed it into his pants, carrying the other two and a bill back into the kitchen.
"There's two more, Harry!" he cried, silently begging his twin to forgive him for the mild fib.
Vernon made an inarticulate roar and snatched the mail from his hands before the twins could rip open the letters. The two thick pieces of parchment were tossed into the small kitchen fireplace that Petunia used to bake crusty bread. A quick light of a match and the flames curled around the green ink. Harry and Henry watched on sadly as their hopes were burned up.
"Go to your cupboard… gah, room!" Dursley cried at them.
Henry hurried to oblige, dragging his brother from the room and up the stairs before he could protest.
"Hen, what?"
"Shh, Har. Look!" He pulled the third letter from the waistband of his pants, licking his lips as he held it out to the other boy. "You open it!"
Nodding, Harry slid his finger along the flap, ripping the thick paper quickly, just in case Vernon was going to come and give them a talking to. Shoulder to shoulder, the pair started to read:
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 Messirs 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
"What does it mean, they await our owl?" Harry decided to ask first.
Henry shook his head, reading the letter a second time. "Harry, do you think this is real? Do you think we've really been invited to learn magic someplace?"
Feeling the heavy parchment between his fingers, reading the light scratch of the green ink on the paper, all he could do was nod. "Stranger things have happened to us, remember?"
His brother nodded, too. A lifetime of torment with the Dursleys had led to several unexplained things happening to the both of them. There was the time they were being chased by Dudley and his gang and they jumped behind the bin near the school cafeteria, and the next moment found themselves on the roof. Or more recently, when they had spoken to a snake at the zoo on Dudley's birthday. Vernon always punished them by making them go hungry and stay in their cupboard when these things happened.
"But what if those things are magic?" Harry whispered, afraid to believe it was true.
"Well, if they are, then we have a problem. Whatever the owl thing means, they're expecting us to acknowledge attendance before the end of the month! Not to mention, we have no idea how to get these supplies." Henry was looking at the second piece of paper, which looked to detail the books and other things they would need. "Books, uniforms, wands, cauldrons?" He scoffed at the list in disgust.
"We haven't any money, either," Harry reminded him reluctantly.
"We need help," his twin acknowledged grudgingly. "It's clear our relatives won't help. Think, Harry. Is there anyone we know who's just a little bit strange, a little bit magical?"
Harry pondered for a moment and named the only person he could think of, "Mrs. Figg?"
Henry looked at him with amazement for a moment before kissing his brother on the forehead. "You're brill, Har! Come on, let's see if we can sneak out and go see her."
"Go see her?" Harry asked, aghast. "But she'll feed us stale cake and make us look at pictures of her cats and…"
"It's a small price to pay if she's actually a witch," Henry pointed out.
Pausing, Harry nodded a little to himself and followed his brother downstairs where they exploded out the front door to Uncle Vernon's yelling, "Get back here!" A few lawns over and they were ready to knock on Mrs. Figg's front door.
"Ready?" Henry asked, his hand poised.
Harry nodded and watched as his brother knocked. They waited in silence, their breaths held as they listened to see if she was coming.