31 August 1997
Hestia and Dedalus often switched who guarded the Dursleys in the day and who took night shift. Dudley hadn't determined a pattern yet, and Vernon often made comments about how neither of them must need to work a real job.
Everyone except Dedalus was happier when Hestia had the night shift. Dudley's middle finger now sported a callus from all the essays he'd had to write when she was on day shift. Dedalus had put a stop to the cupboard punishment – mostly – although Vernon still had to sleep in his at night. Hestia was still angry at Vernon, and Dedalus seemed to believe that Muggles just loved sleeping in odd places. The snores from the cupboard bounced off the wooden walls, and Dudley suspected his mother might be sleeping better now.
On his days, Dedalus brought them the newspapers every morning and then read through The Daily Prophet himself. At the start of their time together, he'd whistled and popped about the kitchen brewing up tea, but now he was a mopey wreck who dropped into chairs and stared out the window. Most days now, like today, he'd barely make it through the Prophet before tossing it aside and dropping his head onto his arms for a good sob.
He raised his tear-stained face from the table and mentioned how nice his own table had been, before it had been burned. "It's still sinking in, you know – how I've lost my dear old house forever."
Dudley passed the sobbing wizard a cup of tea and avoided looking at him.
Dedalus picked up the teacup, took a sip, and then choked on another sob. "This cup with the orange flowers – I had a set just like it, but with purple nifflers." He took out a violet handkerchief and blew into it. "And hundreds of hankies, just like this one, all burnt to ash!" He sniffed. "Of course, your poor home is invaded – but you'll get yours back someday! You'll see! When Harry Potter – bless him – finally sets things to rights, you'll get to move back in, whereas I – I'll have nowhere! And nothing!" His sobs turned to wails.
Vernon rolled his eyes and picked up one of the other newspapers. He dropped it with a start. "Petunia! Look at this!"
She peered over her mixing bowl, where she was blending eggs together with a fork. She'd refused the complicated whisks that Dedalus had attempted to conjure on the second day of what she called their confinement.
Her husband held up one newspaper front page, then another.
Petunia gasped and dropped her fork. She didn't even notice when the handle sank under the frothy yolks. She crossed the kitchen, in a daze, and started reading the newspaper without even sitting down. The minutes passed in silence.
Dudley, who still did not enjoy reading the newspapers, cast a longing eye at the bowl of eggs.
Then, Petunia's mood changed from shock to rage. She crunched a corner of the newspaper in one hand, and leapt on the slouched Dedalus, whacking him over and over the head. "YOU!" she cried. "YOU DID THIS! I KNOW IT!"
Dedalus raised a hand to fend her off, and she started back, gasped, and then collapsed to the floor, sobbing. Vernon crouched down on the floor to comfort her. He glared up at the wizard.
Dudley picked up the crumpled newspaper. "Di's dead?" He was bewildered.
Death didn't seem to apply to people like her. Death seemed off-limits, somehow, for celebrities.
Vernon helped Petunia into a chair and started yelling at Dedalus, who was also reading the paper now. "Car accident, is it? A LIKELY STORY!" Dedalus offered a handkerchief to Petunia and patted her back. She flinched away.
Disturbed, Dudley poured the eggs into a pan. Dedalus had already lit the magic fire that Petunia was, in her words, forced to use to keep us from starving. He stared at the bubbling omelette, and the hysterical voices of his family washed over him. He tried turning the omelette. It broke and stuck in several places, the egg mix running in ribbons all over the pan, and the cheese bits burning as they hit the bare metal. He scraped the omelette chunks onto some plates and brought them to the table. They were mangled, fit for the bin. But there weren't any more eggs for another try, so they'd have to make do with these.
"I – I'm so sorry for your loss," Dedalus told Petunia. "It's a dreadful thing. Were they friends, or relatives?" He tapped the paper.
Petunia and Vernon froze. Dudley continued chewing. Petunia swallowed. "She – she was a sort of cousin. On Vernon's side of the family."
Vernon's fingers twitched. His mustache bristled, too. "Dear cousin. Very close, yes. I can't believe she's gone."
The wizard stared down at the newspaper photos. "Yes, I see the resemblance." He squeezed Vernon's shoulder. Though Vernon grimaced, he didn't pull away. "You have my deepest condolences." He bowed, then gave Dudley a pat on the shoulder. Then he started sobbing again.
After their breakfast, the Dursleys told Dedalus they were going for a walk.
The strange fogs that had afflicted London and Surrey didn't come into the countryside around their safe house, and the weather had been beautiful since they'd arrived. The brilliant August morning was the perfect excuse to escape prying ears.
"You played that beautifully, Petunia!" Vernon told his wife when the safe house was hidden from sight behind a small hill. "Just brilliant!"
Petunia smiled, but her shoulders kept their tension. "I do hope it pays off. This might finally be the thing that convinces them to let us out."
"Well, they're none too bright, are they? Shouldn't be too hard to pull the wool over their eyes." Vernon puffed a bit as they climbed another hill. "No wonder your nephew's got them so hoodwinked. Not a bit of sense in the lot."
"There have to be ways they can let us out of here," Petunia continued. "The whole time he was living with us, we were protected, even when you went to work or Dudders went to school. There are disguises. Ways of changing our identities. Protective charms. They get to leave every day. We should as well."
Dudley's longer legs and youthful energy brought him a few steps ahead of his parents, and he waited for them to catch up to him. The safe house was connected to the road by a deep, narrow gorge that opened into a small valley of meadows, lakes and forested hills. There were signs of modern civilization – airplanes passed overhead, and at night, from the highest hill, they could just make out a few electric lights from a far-off village.
They were all getting worried.
At first, Dudley had been so relieved his parents had gone along with him in his decision to go with the wizards that he had brushed off his father's concerns about work and school. Dudley didn't much like school, anyway. But the trouble was, he'd never really expected to have to miss it. Here it was, nearly the start of term, and it looked like he might miss it entirely. He was supposed to be graduating this term, leaving school life forever, unless by some miracle he got into uni. Now, school seemed as distant as the moon.
Hestia and Dedalus had been agitated, that first day, anxious for news of how Harry's own escape had gone. Dudley had been worried, too. He'd only learned a few minutes prior that Harry was supposed to go somewhere else. He'd been fretting all summer over how he'd manage to patch things up with Harry enough to get along in their magical hideout, and now he had no idea where his cousin would go, or if he would survive the night.
They'd got news, eventually, that Harry and his friends had made it to safety, but that two of their number were missing. Moody was the one they were most concerned about. As Hestia said, "He was the best of us. Next best thing after Dumbledore himself."
Once Dudley learned Harry was safe, things had shifted. Harry was with friends. Hestia and Dedalus spent very little time together in front of the Dursleys, after that first day. Of course, the first week had involved so much adjustment to magical, rather than electric, tools. Dedalus had tried to make it fun, and the Dursleys had quickly come to see him as harmless. The lack of injuries, explosions, and humiliations helped. He tended to gush about how wonderful Harry was, and that was awkward, but he took the Dursleys discomfort around the topic as a sign of their deep concern for his safety.
Unfortunately, Dedalus' cheerful reports of how Harry was going to disguise himself to attend a wedding had been more enraging than comforting. It sounded like, rather than fighting a war, Harry was having a wonderful summer while the Dursleys were trapped in a television-free wilderness.
Petunia had latched onto the disguise topic quickly. "Why can't we use these disguises to get around?" she'd asked. "It would mean so much to us."
"We only have a small amount of Polyjuice available to us," Dedalus said. "And, dear lady, I'm not even sure it can work on Muggles such as yourselves."
Petunia had given him a tight smile. "Of course, potions can work on us. That's how Diddykins got his tongue swelled up – with that frightful candy. Surely, it would be worth a try."
Dedalus had wrung his hands nervously. "I'll ask – but, Moody was the one who'd brewed Polyjuice before for us. And of course, our previous Potions expert is – hm, out of the question. Young Tonks is an Auror too, so she should be able to brew advanced potions, but then it's a matter of getting all the ingredients she'd need, and the thing takes a month at least to cure, and … if the Death Eaters are looking for you, it's possible even the Polyjuice disguises will not be sufficient to protect you." He gestured at the garish house. "Here, you're fully protected."
Fully protected. That was what Dedalus and Hestia cared about. It had taken a while, but Vernon had finally convinced them he couldn't just disappear from his job at Grunnings.
The wizard and witch had eventually concocted a plan, and Dedalus was nearly dancing in delight when he told them about it. "We've convinced your employer that he's sent you on an expedition to South America! You'll continue receiving your pay, and whenever Harry Potter wins the war against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, you'll be able to go back."
"South America? What would I be doing in South America? Our manufacturing partners aren't anywhere near there. What would I write in the report?"
Dedalus waved this concern away excitedly. "Just another little visit to the management team when you're ready to return, and they'll be delighted with your progress!"
Vernon, for once, had fallen silent. His eyes were narrowed, and he remained in motionless thought until the wizard wandered off to add more equipment to Dudley's gym.
Dudley's schooling had been trickier to sort out. The wizard had suggested that, after Harry Potter had won the war, they could convince the school to take Dudley back, and that they wouldn't even notice he'd been gone.
"I'm – confused. Wouldn't the other kids say something?" Dudley'd asked.
"Hmmm." The wizard snapped his fingers. "I know! You're also on the expedition to South America! Broadening your horizons! Joining your father on his quest! What school wouldn't be proud?"
"Do I have to learn Spanish?" Dudley asked. "And, why can't I just go to a different school, under a different name?" Dudley didn't hate the idea of attending a different school. He hadn't made many friends at Smeltings.
The wizard just said, "No, quite impossible! And as to Spanish, what an excellent notion! I'll procure a dictionary for you at once!"
Dudley's parents caught up to him.
"Dudley – this is important. If they ask, we've always been very close with Di's family."
"Not the royal family, mind," Petunia said. "Even they might not believe that. Nor the Spencers. Make it the Roche's – that's her mother's side."
"And it's important to seem quite sad."
"Which we are, of course," Petunia said. "Shocked and sad."
"I'm sure their lot had something to do with this," Vernon said. "It'd be just like them."
"They ought to have been protecting her. Just like the Prime Minister," Petunia added. "Makes one question just how good their protection is. They say we have to stay here for our protection, but I think they've no clue what is going on."
"If we'd have fought the War like this," Vernon said, "we'd all be speaking German."
The whole rest of the walk, Petunia drilled Vernon and Dudley on facts about the departed. Favorite vacation spots. School anecdotes. Birthdays.
"She's a cousin, remember, so it makes sense if you don't know absolutely everything about her. But if we want to get out of here to see the funeral, it would help to know as much as possible."
Dudley's stomach gave a little twist, thinking of his real cousin, about whom he knew as little as possible.
When they got back to the house, Dedalus greeted them with a bouquet and a freshly brewed pot of tea.
"I've been reading about your cousin," he said. "Truly, a noble soul. Tell me, what was she like? And did she get to meet Harry Potter?" He stared at Vernon expectantly.
Vernon cleared his throat. "She was – she was –" Dudley had heard his father use numerous descriptions, none complimentary. He waited, hoping his father wouldn't slip up. "She was an angel. Placed on this earth for just a short while, she brightened our lives." His fingers twitched. "And she, hrmpf, fairly doted on – Harry."
Dudley wasn't sure what was more strange – his father's outlandish lie, or his use of Harry's actual name.