September 1992, 2nd year
"Alright," Lynea said, looking at her fellow Slytherins.
It was very cramped in their compartment, but this was necessary for the privacy spells to do their work – it would be rather obvious had they used them in the open seating area.
"We all know my grand-aunt is not a kind-hearted person, who would take some in out of the goodness of her heart."
Draco huffed and the corner of Theodore's lips twitched.
"But she decided to take Harry in after just one glance at the house he was living in and that is a very significant action."
"So it's true," Draco said solemnly. "They are mistreating him."
Harry spluttered.
"I'm sorry, Harry," Lynea said gently, "but this conversation was long overdue. We all noticed something was wrong with your homelife and when my grand-aunt offered to take over guardianship of you, I knew for certain how serious this issue truly is."
"She offered what?" Draco exclaimed.
"Harry," Pansy said softly, ignoring Draco. "We are your friends and we are very worried about your well-being."
"You don't have to be," Harry said. "I'm fine."
"You don't even like your relatives," Draco said. "Why are you defending them?"
"I'm not," Harry said. "I just don't think there's anything to be done about it. It's not like any adult ever cared about what living with the Dursleys meant, no one ever asked. They won't do anything about it, because they don't care … And there are the protections my mother left."
"Naenia Lémure does not make empty promises," Lynea said. "You have lived with her for a month, Harry. My grand-aunt – the whole Lémure family, really – is one of the most powerful people of the whole world. She offered you a choice and she meant every word of it."
Harry gave her a conflicted look. "Your grand-aunt is –"
"Nearly sixty-seven years old," Lynea cut him off. "That is about the same age as Professor McGonagall, the age most of our grand-parents are. She has contacts in the Ministry, she knew the Dark Lord personally, even Dumbledore respects her. If Naenia says she would take you in, then she sure as hell can and will do so. But only if you wish to actually come and live with us instead of the Durselys."
Harry opened and closed his mouth wordlessly. Then he averted his eyes. "She said I could take as long to think about it as I wanted to."
"I know you don't want to talk about it," Lynea said gently. "I know I am putting you on the spot and for that I sincerely apologize. But you don't want to talk to anyone about this, Harry, and that is not good. We are your friends and we are here for you. And you know that we will not tell this to anyone unless you give us your permission to do so."
"What good would talking do me?"
"Having people to confide in always helps," Pansy said. "Talking about things helps you work through them. It gives you a new perspective."
"It takes a weight off of your chest," Theodore said quietly.
"Harry," Lynea said and her tone made him look at her. "We told you that Slytherins need to keep their emotions under control, that they cannot afford to show any weakness in front of others. But that does not make us emotionless creatures. That does not mean we do not ever show any emotions nor that we can never allow ourselves to have a moment of weakness. We are only human, after all. You can trust us just as we trust you."
"Harry," Theodore said in a low voice. "What are the Muggles doing to you?"
"They feed me," Harry groused. "They give me a roof over my head."
"That is what they are doing for you," Blaise said. "What are they doing to you?"
"They –" Harry faltered. "They hate magic. They hate everything that has to do with magic."
"Including you?" Draco asked quietly.
"Yes," Harry whispered.
And then Harry told them. He told them about his aunt always making him wake up early and cook breakfast, about doing chores and pruning the garden in the scorching summer heat. He told them that all his clothes were too big for him, because they had belonged to his cousin once, and how he couldn't see distant things well, because new lenses for his glasses were apparently too expensive.
"They only allowed me to use Dudley's second bedroom, because my first Hogwarts letter was addressed to the cupboard under the stairs and they feared some consequences would follow if they continued locking me in there."
"You lived in a cupboard under the stairs?" Daphne said incredulously and Harry ducked his head as the rest of the first-year Slytherins expressed their outrage at that.
Lynea remembered the cupboard that Harry's things had been locked in and how tiny it was. How could anyone be so cruel and force a child to live in that tiny and dark space?
"That's it," Draco said. "We will go to uncle Severus the moment we arrive at Hogwarts and then you will tell him all you have told us. This needs to stop. Once the public finds out that the Boy Who Lived was forced to reside in a cupboard –"
"It's fine," Harry interrupted him. "It's not that bad. They took me in and provided for me all these years. I can manage. Just because I'm famous in the wizarding world, doesn't mean I need special treatment."
"Harry," Draco said. "I might be a spoiled brat that had a very comfortable life so far and does not know what it is like to live in poverty –"
"The Dursleys aren't poor," Harry mumbled.
Draco shot him a glare at the interruption. "– but trust me when I say this: No one should be forced to live in a tiny cupboard and do all the chores around the house as a twelve-year-old child."
There was a pause.
Then Pansy said, "This is all terrible and we will go to Professor Snape as soon as possible, but there's something else that bothers me. You said that your first Hogwarts letter was addressed to the cupboard under the stairs – does that mean you received several?"
"Uhm," Harry seemed completely thrown off by the sudden change of subject. "Yes. Uncle Vernon didn't let me read the first one, nor the one after that or the one after that or, well, there were a lot of Hogwarts Letters – it got so out of hand that my uncle shoved us all into his car and drove off to some shack on a rock. That's where Hagrid found me."
Theodore furrowed his brows. "They send the groundskeeper … after they realized you didn't receive any of your letters?"
"They usually send a teacher with the letter to those that live with Muggles," Lynea told Harry, "to explain everything to them."
"Well, Hagrid thought I already knew about everything." Harry shrugged. "He said Dumbledore left a letter with me that should have explained everything. But the Dursleys didn't tell me anything. They even led me to believe my parents had died in a car crash."
"A car crash?" Tracey said. "Even though they knew that they died protecting you from the most evil wizard of all time?"
"I wouldn't call the Dark Lord 'the most evil wizard of all time'" Lynea said. "That title should go to –"
"Not the point, Lynea."
"Right."
"Hagrid was also the one who brought me to the Dursleys as a baby," Harry continued. "And it was my birthday." He paused. "He also had an errant to run in Diagon Alley on that day, so I suppose it was convenient for him to pay me a visit while he was at it."
"And that's why you like that oaf so much?" Draco said, barely keeping the distain from his voice.
"Hagrid has been very nice to me," Harry said defensively.
The first person to do so since his horrible relatives had taken him in, apparently.
"It's still odd," Theodore mused.
Draco shook his head. "It doesn't matter now. Dumbledore is known for making irrational decisions. Like putting Harry with those horrible Muggles. We have more important matters to attend to. We shall talk to uncle Severus right after the feast."
"Do we really have to go to Snape?" Harry said, hunching his shoulders and avoiding their eyes. "He hates me."
Draco sighed. "That won't matter, Harry. Even if he hated you, he wouldn't let you suffer abuse."
"It's not abuse."
"It is, Harry," Lynea said softly. "And we won't let you go through this ever again."
It didn't matter whether Harry wanted to accept Naenia's offer anymore. (She was, in the end, still a Necromancer and most people would not willingly live with someone who worshipped Death). One way or another, Lynea would make sure that Harry would never have to return to the Dursleys ever again.
"Slytherins protect each other," Draco said.
They spent the rest of the train ride trying to maintain awkward small talk.
o
"They do look exactly like you described them," Hermione said, looking at the Thestrals that were waiting for them with the carriages. "I can't decide whether to be fascinated or horrified. But I do wonder why they are only visible to those who have seen death. How does that work?"
"It's a kind of Necromancy," Lynea said, stroking the snout of one of the creatures.
"Necromancy?" Hermione asked. "But doesn't Necromancy aim for raising the dead?"
Lynea smiled faintly. "The Forbidden Arts are a wide field of magic. I could lend you a book or two, if you would like to get a better overview of what is regarded as Necromancy."
"I did not look forward to this," Draco said, eyeing the Thestrals warily. "I do not envy you, Theodore, for being able to see them all this time."
"Thanks," Theodore replied dryly.
"Oh, hello," a soft voice said and they all turned around to find a girl with dirty blonde hair and big eyes standing behind them. "Are you waiting for the Wrackspurts to disappear?"
"We are waiting for a friend," Lynea replied. "Did you miss the boats for the first-years?"
"Oh, a Blibbering Humdinger told me to simply follow the other students. Was I not supposed to?"
Lynea sighed and looked around for a prefect. She spotted Neville first – whom they had been waiting for – and called him over, before her eyes landed on Percy Weasley.
Lynea paused.
Well, that specific Weasley was known to be a responsible person, she thought. It was better than what she could expect from most of the other students.
"Weasley," she called. "We have a lost first-year here."
"Hello," Weasley said as he approached, eyeing the Slytherins warily. He bent down to the girl's height. "I'm Percy Weasley. What is your name?"
The girl smiled. "I'm Luna Lovegood."
Weasley returned her smile. "Nice to meet you, Luna. Now, come along. Let's take you to the other first-years. I'm sure Hagrid is already worried about your absence."
"What a weird girl," Hermione commented as they watched them leave.
"She could see the Thestrals, too," Lynea said. "I saw it in the way her eyes lingered on them."
"Can – can we go now, please?" Neville asked timidly, looking at the Thestrals with a frightened expression. "Harry, are you okay?"
Harry, who hadn't said a single word since the conversation on the train, looked away from the Thestral he had been staring at and turned to Neville. He mustered a weak smile and shrugged. Neville furrowed his brows, but didn't probe.
The ride to the castle was as subdued as most of the train ride with the Slytherins had been.
When they entered the Great Hall, where Hermione and Neville split off for their respective house tables, Lynea instantly spotted Lockhart at the teacher's table and inwardly groaned. But then Hagrid waved at them and Harry managed a real smile this time as he returned the gesture.
The Welcoming Feast was not very different from the one the year before, only that Lynea and the others weren't the ones to be sorted this time. Dumbledore started it with some nonsense. Then the new first-years were sorted. There was another red-head that joined the part of the Gryffindor table occupied solely by Weasleys, a girl this time, and the girl they had met by the carriages was sorted into Ravenclaw, but there were no other people of interest. The 'score', as Theodore had started calling it, was more evenly split between the houses this year. It was almost balanced.
When the food appeared, only Lynea was brazen enough to put food on Harry's plate and then quietly chide him for not taking proper care of himself. He didn't comment on the fact that she didn't even finish her own meal.
There was a restlessness among the second-year Slytherins as they waited for the feast to end so they could go to Professor Snape. They had agreed that it might be rather late in the evening, but they couldn't wait around until they got another chance to talk to their Head of House. Not everyone among them was that patient – and Harry might have tried to get out of it and withdraw his permission to let them do this, given enough time.
It was even worse than what Harry had told them on the train.
The Dursleys had not only let him work more than his tiny body should have been able to manage, they had also locked him into the tiny, dark cupboard numerous times – whenever he had been 'out of line' for doing accidental magic, for instance. They had nearly starved him on several occasions. His aunt had swung a frying pan at him sometimes (but missed, thankfully), his uncle and cousin had beaten him rather often. They had humiliated him in front of the neighbours, the teachers of his old school and other children.
And the headmaster had apparently known the whole time and yet he still insisted it was necessary for Harry's protection.
Professor Snape had listened very quietly to what the Slytherins had to tell him, then had taken Harry aside to listen to what the boy, himself, had to say. His reaction had seemed cold and distant on the outside, but they could tell their Head of House was truly enraged by the story. This was validated by the fact that he had apparently shouted at Professor Dumbledore – according to Harry, who had been waiting in front of the headmaster's office and been unable to make out any specific words.
Furthermore, it seemed as if Snape had lost most of the hatred he usually expressed around Harry. He had been, well, not nice but certainly not hostile, either, when they had been going after Quirrel at the end of their first-year and rescued Harry from the man's clutches. No one knew what Snape's problem with Harry actually was, and it had obviously not been resolved in the slightest, but at least the professor was not outright hostile towards Harry anymore. And that was only the change of one night. (A night they all stayed up late, but they refused to regret doing so the next day.)
Harry returned well after midnight, looking very exhausted and drained and not at all happy.
Draco immediately got up and pulled Harry over to the couch he had been sitting on with Lynea. "Are you alright? What did the headmaster say?"
"Mister Potter can tell you all about that in the morning," Snape drawled. "The gravity of this situation might grate on your patience, but you are children in need of sleep."
Harry sacked into himself.
"Professor?" Lynea piped up.
Snape's eyes turned to her. "Yes, Miss Fawley?"
"You might want to talk to my grand-aunt. She has already expressed her interest in taking over guardianship of Harry."
Lynea observed Snape carefully – the slight widening of his eyes and the small twitch of his shoulders told her he knew the implications behind that. Her grand-aunt being infamous had its advantages.
"I shall write to her," Snape said and then narrowed his eyes at them all. "Now go to bed, all of you." Then he turned on his heel and left the common room.