Chapter 107

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Monday 13/8/92

Dear Spencer,

I can't make one of those baby charms for myself, it wouldn't work, they're specifically designed to be cast with a will to protect another person and the only people I honestly think care enough about me to want to make me something like that would be you and Mrs Thomas and obviously you both can't. I'm not saying that I don't believe Seamus and Dean don't feel somewhat protective of me and maybe with their vassal oaths they might be able to make a charm like that for me if they learned it but they think of me as a friend not someone that needs to be protected. I think the only reason it worked for me to make yours is because I was the one to heal your injuries from the bullies and from your mum when I was there and I know that no matter how much you've grown and got stronger, you're still being hurt like that sometimes and that you won't fight back if it means risking hurting your mum. I'm going to offer to teach Dean the charms though so he can make some for his little sisters.

That's the other reason I hesitated to try to make one for your mum. I'm not sure if I can do it properly or if the fact that I was trying to do it mostly for your sake and not your mum who I barely know might twist the protections in unpredictable ways. I'm willing to try if you want me to, and I'd send it to the Charms master at Scoil Draiocht to check it over properly before I sent it to you.

I also found a variation that you can use on collars for pets and familiars so I've bought a leg ring for Hedwig. She's consenting to wear it but I get the feeling that she's humouring me with it rather than in need of any protection from me, but I'm glad she has it especially now that we're back at the Dursleys who hate all things magical, I think that Vernon or Dudley would like to hurt her if they got the chance. It will also protect our letters while they're in transit to and from me and Mrs Thomas. Now that you've mentioned it, I'm surprised that nobody has tried to read or interfere with our letters. Well, they haven't at least as far as I know. Hedwig is very clever and she knows not to bring me letters from you in the great hall at breakfast time, she tries to find me during the day when I'm alone but she visits me without having a letter so often that my dorm mates are no longer surprised when she comes into the dorm. I keep your letters in my inside pocket until I put them in my trunk and thanks to Mr Blott nobody but me can open it. I know Ron was bitching about me having a trunk like that but I just thought he was jealous of it at the time. Perhaps he did try to search my things out of idle curiosity, or borrow something like my invisibility cloak without asking or looking for something to eat since he's always hungry, but he could have been snooping for information for whoever is forcing him to be my friend. Hell, I don't want to think that he could be that against me, he could have just been looking for snacks for all I know, I expect that he tried to do that, Dean and Seamus have both complained about snacks they left on their beds or bedside drawers going missing, even treats they've been sent from their families and I know it happened to Neville when he left them on his side table or in his bed as well though he didn't say anything about it. I wouldn't be surprised if Neville comes back with some new security spells on his trunk, I know Seamus asked his mum for some, and Mrs Finnegan offered to put some on Dean's trunk when they meet up on the first of September too. Maybe I should write to Neville and suggest he asks his gran if they haven't already thought of it. I was tempted to try and prank some sweets to leave in my bedside drawer but I'd have to warn the others not to touch them.

I know that getting more letters might make someone more likely to notice but Hedwig is brilliant at not bringing me mail in front of other people I can't trust. She seems to have an innate knowledge. I didn't realise it last year but she never brought mail in front of Ron and Hermione, and rarely Seamus but I think that's because he's such a gossip but she brought mail in front of Neville and Dean all the time. I thought that having other people write to me might be a good thing, that way if someone does become too suspicious I can show them Patrick's letters and tell people that he's a friend from before Hogwarts whose parents have moved in the last year. I expect most of our letters will be about books and history and mostly nonmagical as well so it would give us an extra layer of protection. Unsurprisingly if there was one student from Hogwarts or Scoil Draiocht that I'd want to keep in contact with it would be Dean, or more likely I'd write to Dean and he'd probably share the letter with Seamus as well and between the two of them I might get a letter back every couple of months. The good thing is, I think that I probably could write to them safely via Mrs Thomas with their Amulets and Vassal vows to protect the secret. I'd have to buy her an owl but I'm planning to do that when I leave anyway to thank her for all her help and support since she wouldn't be able to use Hedwig to send letters to Dean anymore.

My month of school in Ireland is complete, I passed all my subjects with relatively good grades. I wasn't first in the year in any subject but top ten percent in all of them, top five for most. Ruby beat me out for top student in science by half a percent, I couldn't even be upset with her I know she worked a lot harder than I did and she was just so genuinely happy about it without being smug, she was pleased that I'd done well too. As hard as it was going to classes for thirty days straight each week, I would rather come back here for the year than go back to Hogwarts. Though I think after this the three of us are going to feel like we've so much free time at Hogwarts that we won't know what to do with it all with two whole days off after only five days at school.

Mr Finnegan took us to the beach and we spent the day having fun before Dean and I caught the ferry back to England. It was funny being on the ferry and the train with Dean but not Seamus after all the time we've spent together. Mr Thomas met us in London and put me on the train to Surrey before he and Dean caught their own train home, he looked like he wanted to accompany me all the way home which might have been a disaster. I don't want anyone from this summer near Little Whinging in case someone is monitoring the town to see if I return and find out where I've been. I tried to tell him that Hagrid didn't even do that for me last summer but he only looked annoyed about it and accused Hagrid of neglecting his duties.

Sometimes it feels like a whole year has passed since I left Hogwarts, which I suppose it really almost has with all the time compression and other times it seems like everything that's happened since the week before I turned eleven has been a mad dream now that I'm back at the Dursleys, locked in Dudley's second bedroom whenever I'm not doing chores from sun up to sundown with my wand and trunk and everything locked in my old cupboard under the stairs. Things could be a lot worse, it seems that Dean's Mum and Seamus' mum both have an idea of what it is like for me here or they've been talking to each other, because they both sent me home with baskets of food which were luckily shrunk in my pockets not in my trunk. Dean and Seamus promised to write but I haven't received any letters since I got back to the Dursleys. I haven't received any letters from Hermione either which I half expected there to be a pile of letters waiting for me since she doesn't have an owl and I hadn't received any letters from her I thought she might have tried to write to me the nonmagical way since I gave her my address and phone number before we left the train, pretty silly in hindsight since if she did ring the Dursleys would've told her I wasn't staying there, or pretended not to know me at all. Petunia insists that she hadn't thrown out any letters addressed to me and that I haven't received any telephone calls either, though she might be lying I would think that she'd be telling me off for giving a witch my address and phone number if Hermione had written or tried to call. It is odd because I would've expected her to be a very reliable correspondent, she even wrote to me when she went home during the Christmas and Easter holidays and I would have liked to get her letters while she was likely to be less under the influence of whoever was mucking around with her head at Hogwarts even though I would have disliked having to lie to her about where I was and who I was with. I did write and tell her about going to summer school, though I gave her the impression it was in Little Whinging, and I was surprised she wasn't more interested. I guess she really only wants to be my friend because of someone else magically compelling her to be. At least I won't have to feel so guilty avoiding her when I want to study stuff she thinks I shouldn't be or for telling her off if she starts nagging all the time again.

Your friend always

Harry

A/N: I am going to go back and play with the dated in previous chapters becasue I want Harry to go to Ron's before school and I'm running out of dates.

A/N: Thank you to all those who reviewed followed or favourited this story for your support.

Stay safe everyone. Please just keep being careful just a little bit longer until all the high risk people have been vaccinated.