Chapter 187

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31/8/92

To:

From:

Dear Spencer

Seamus, Dean and I returned to London tonight and are staying with the Thomas's ready to catch the train back to Hogwarts tomorrow morning. Well, that's what their parents think is the plan. Dean has convinced his Mum that she doesn't need to come to the platform to see us off. He told her that we could take the Underground to Kings Cross station just as easily as we caught it home at the end of last term. Dean also told them we forgot something we need to get at Diagon Alley so we're going to be leaving early. Which is great because it means that I don't have to go anywhere near the platform and risk being seen and caught up with people who won't let me slip away before I'm on the train and heading for Hogsmeade, where it will be much more difficult to disappear from even if I do have nearly three weeks to get myself back to the south of England. I don't know exactly where they keep the train, or if it runs at all, during the term or if it is only for transporting students, as wasteful as that seems.

Seamus and Dean know that I won't actually be going back to Hogwarts and understand why I don't want to tell them exactly where I'm going, and even I still don't know exactly how I'm going to get there. I promised to keep in touch via email since I can continue to use my British email address which will help convince any witch or wizard who finds out about it that I'm still in the UK somewhere. I'm glad I can keep in contact with them, at least over the summers though I honestly will be surprised if I hear from both of them more than once or twice over the next year or two. We probably won't have much in common going forwards, unless I come back and attend Scoil Draiocht next summer. I'm not going to stay anywhere near here, since it's possible Snape or Dumbledore will use Legilimency to find out if anyone knows where I am and we aren't completely sure that the amulets will prevent it completely. All it would take was a single second of memory of the three of us together for Dumbledore to know to visit Seamus or Dean's parents to see if I'd stayed with them over the summer. I'm going to use charms to make myself look older and try to purchase a plane ticket for my younger brother Harry to return home to our parents. With a little luck, I'll find someone willing to make the sale without asking too many questions about why 'my brother' will be traveling alone. If that doesn't work then it's the Queen Elizabeth II, and then train across America so I would hopefully arrive about the end of September.

There must be some way to set wards that prevent owl post from reaching me, and as you say the ward must be on me personally, otherwise I would've received letters when I was out at the park or school. It's another thing for me to ask the goblins when I go to Gringotts. I only realised when I got your last letter that I'd overlooked this potential side effect of staying to help the Finnegans until Mr Finnegan's back was recovered enough to look after the farm. If I'd caught the August sailing of the QE2, I'd be there by now and everybody told me that owls can't fly as far as America when I was looking for a way to be able to send letters to you before I started at Hogwarts. But now I'm going to be here for another three weeks. Even traveling to France or Spain isn't going to help since Hermione was able to send me letters from there. Hopefully the goblins will have something to prevent post owls from finding me.

I don't know how regularly I'm going to be able to email, but if the goblins succeed in the mail ward or whatever they call it, Mrs Thomas isn't going to be able to forward mail to me either so email will still be best, I'll let you know how that goes. Most public libraries have email so I will try to pop into one and send you a letter every few days so you know I'm still okay. But don't worry too much if you don't get one. It will most likely just mean that I've been caught and taken back to Hogwarts, and you'll need to wait for a letter.

Batman has a gift for mass hypnosis, so he would be able to alter people's memories and behaviour the way whoever at Hogwarts is doing it, without using magic. I bet most people reading that don't even think about how horrible that could be. Even the fact that he's a superhero and supposedly on the side of good wouldn't make me feel safe with him. Afterall, everyone believes that Dumbledore is good too.

Your friend always

Harry

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