Sunlight streaming through the large window the next morning sent panic surging through Harry. He'd overslept by a lot, and no doubt the Dursleys would be quite angry about having to fix their own breakfast. Or worse, having to do it themselves. It took a moment of blind panic for him to realise he was sleeping directly on the floor and not the lumpy spare bed with springs that dug into his back. For a moment, he was confused.
Then everything from the day before came rushing back to him. His first wish had come true, he'd finally gotten away from the Dursleys. The joy that threatened to bubble over was tempered by the how. They might be out of his life, but James and Alex were completely unknown to him. James had appeared out of nowhere, pulled him into a whole world that was completely unknown to him, and gave the bare minimum of an explanation as to why Harry had been abandoned in the first place. One that definitely wasn't adequate, as far as Harry was concerned. For as long as Harry could remember, he'd been able to do magic. The beatings and punishments he'd endured from the Dursleys until he figured out how to control it proved that. There was absolutely no way James could have thought for even a second Harry had no magic. Not unless he was an idiot, and James didn't strike him as one. There was definitely more to it. That mystery was far beyond his ability to figure out at the moment.
With a sigh, Harry climbed out from under the plush blanket. The last thing he remembered was reading more about the end of the blood war, but, at some point, he'd migrated from the overly plush bed to the dressing room.
When he gathered the blankets up, all three snakes fell onto the floor. They hissed angrily at him, before slipping away. Harry laughed an apology out.
Arms full of the blankets, Harry moved them back to the bed, and ensured there was no sign of him having slept in the dressing room.
The book he fell asleep reading had fallen carelessly on the floor, it's pages bent beneath it. Not knowing how James would react to Harry damaging his belongings, even accidentally, Harry carefully picked it up. After smoothing out the pages the best he could, he placed it gently back on the bed. Hopefully the creases would disappear under the weight of the other books.
He changed into the second outfit he'd been left, brown shirt and trousers with a pale blue jacket thing. The blue jacket had brown detailing along the edges with little wooden buttons. His taped up shoes, which were three sizes too big, looked completely out of place with the outfit.
After attempting to smooth his hair into something other than a chaotic mess, he made his way down to the kitchen. He could smell bacon cooking before he reached the bottom of the staircase. He definitely overate the night before, the decadent dinner had been too much for him to handle.
When he stepped into the kitchen, all thoughts of eating fled his head. Two of the strangest creatures he'd ever seen were flitting about the kitchen, chattering at one another in high pitched voices. The creatures were short, maybe around three feet tall, with heads far too large for their tiny bodies. They had long, pointed ears that looked somewhat like bat wings coming off the sides of their bald heads. In the center of their faces, they had large, bulbous eyes; one had blue eyes; the other brown. Their arms and legs were long and spindly, with bony knees and elbows. Even stranger, instead of clothing, they wore what Harry thought were pillowcases. There was a coat of arms, the same one he'd seen engraved in various things around the house the night before, embroidered onto the front of the pillow case. Neither of them wore shoes.
The green eyed one spotted him, and smiled. Its overly large mouth pulled back to show its teeth.
"Oh! Little Master Harry is home," it squeaked and hurried over to him. "Mippy is so pleased to see Little Master Harry."
"Um..hello?" he said, unsure of what to say to the odd thing.
A laugh came from the table. James was sitting there in the morning sunlight with a newspaper spread out before him, but his attention was on Harry and the creature.
"Meet two of our house elves, Harry. She's Mippy, been without family since before I was born. And," James pointed to the other one, "he's Pokey."
Somehow, Mippy had ushered him to the table while James was speaking.
"Sit, sit. What can Mippy get Little Master Harry?" she asked.
"I..um."
James was still laughing. "Lilly was the same the first time she encountered a house elf," he said. "Just tell her what you want to eat, and she'll bring it. Literally, anything."
Harry was tempted to ask for a full English. He'd made every bit of it a hundred times, but had never been allowed to eat it. "Some eggs, and maybe beans and toast," he settled for.
"Right away, Little Master Harry. Mippy will get it," she said and darted away from the table.
Harry watched her as her and Pokey moved about the kitchen, chatting happily with one another, as they fixed his food.
"They're not fond of being stared at," James said.
Startled, Harry turned back to him. He was still looking at Harry with an amused smile.
"They're…different," Harry said.
James laughed loudly. "I imagine this is all overwhelming."
"A bit," Harry admitted.
James told Harry he could help himself to the pot of tea on the table, as he started in on an explanation of how new witches and wizards were introduced to the Wizarding World. Muggleborns, he called them.
Midway through, Mippy sat his breakfast in front of him. The food was delicious, and Harry ate greedily as he soaked up the knowledge James was giving him. Eventually, the explanation ended, and they lapsed into silence. James turned back to his paper.
Uncle Vernon liked to read the paper with his breakfast too, but unlike Uncle Vernon's paper, with its neat little boxes and mundane headlines, James' was the strangest thing Harry had seen yet. The Daily Prophet was stamped across the top in a curling script. Articles swirled across the page at odd angles, wrapping around others. The people in the black and white pictures even moved like a silent film stuck on a loop. The headlines were just as bizarre as the paper itself. Muggle-Baiting On the Rise was scrawled about the top of one page, and halfway down, another article read, Knockturn Raid Turns Up Jinxed Broomsticks.
Just as he was squinting trying to read more of the articles and make sense of it, James set the paper aside.
"I never asked, how did you sleep?"
"Fine," Harry told him. What else could he say? The bed was too soft, the room too large and silent. He'd thrown dinner up because he was unused to eating.
"That's good."
For twenty excruciating minutes, they went back and forth with inane small talk. With the new day, the man seemed to realise that he'd messed up in how he'd handled things. He'd stolen Harry from the only life he'd ever known, only to dump him into a world he knew nothing about with the bare minimum of an explanation. Of course, he probably shouldn't have abandoned Harry in the first place.
James peppered Harry with questions about his life and the muggle world. He avoided the Dursley's as much as possible, and kept his answers short. When he couldn't, he substituted things he'd learned from other kids at school. He'd been a house elf for as long as he could remember, so there had never been time for things like hobbies, or interests. He read because it was the only thing that alleviated the hours of boredom locked in his cupboard. He liked learning, because it was a means to getting away one day. Other than his snakes, which he definitely didn't mention, he'd never had friends.
Even though everything James learned about him was a half truth or outright lie, he learned a lot about James. He was one of the youngest people to ever become the Deputy Head Auror, which was some type of high-ranking wizard police officer. In addition to that, James mentioned that he held a hereditary seat on the Wizengamot. He'd read a little about the government in the Muggleborn book, and it seemed that the Wizengamot was something like a combination of Parliament and the High Court.
As James was finishing up, a bedraggled Alex stumbled to the table, still wearing his pyjamas. He snapped his fingers at the elves and demanded food from them. Harry internally winced at his tone. Alex sounded remarkably like Dudley.
James just let him. Instead, James just said, "Nice of you to join us."
Alex mumbled something unintelligible.
"He's not a morning person," James told Harry. Then to the both of them, he said, "The tailor will be here at ten."
Alex groaned.
"He's fitting you both for dress robes." Then, just to Harry, he said, "Harry, he'll also be fitting you for some everyday clothes. Just enough until we can make it to Diagon."
"Thank you," Harry said quietly. He didn't know what Diagon was, but getting clothes of his own for the first time was exciting. Even more so, since they would actually fit.
James waved it off, saying it was his job to provide for Harry.
Several thoughts went through Harry's head, none of them nice. He kept his mouth shut though. He'd learned the hard way to keep his thoughts to himself.
Alex's place was placed in front of him by Mippy. He turned his attention fully towards his food.
A moment later, Hames said, "Right then, I'm off."
He gathered the paper up, and stood to leave the room, then paused. "I hate to do this, Harry, but it's unavoidable. I'll be gone until Monday morning. I truly am sorry. I wanted to spend your first weekend back with you, help you adjust."
Harry wondered what was so important, but didn't ask. Instead, he said, "I'll be fine."
Turning to Alex, James said, "I expect you to behave. Make Harry feel welcome. No venturing off to your friends, no friends coming over."
"For the whole weekend?" Alex asked, shocked.
"Yes, the whole weekend."
"Ernie and I had plans," he whined.
"Cancel them."
"Ugh, fine," he snapped and stabbed at a sausage viciously.
"And no taking Harry out flying. I wont be here to help if someone gets hurt."
"Whatever," Alex said.
James sighed. "Harry, stay inside for the weekend, would you. The garden can be a bit much, I don't want you to get hurt or lost."
Harry had no problems agreeing to stay inside. He was already planning to explore the library some.
"Right. I'll see you boys at breakfast Monday," he said, then left.
Harry sipped on his tea, which was somehow staying at the perfect temperature, and wondered what to say to his brother. Alex seemed to have more in common with Dudley than him, from the little bit Harry had seen of him. He even ate as messily as Dudley.
Harry was eying James' paper, contemplating reading it, when Alex finally spoke.
"I'm going flying after before the tailor gets here," he said around a mouthful of food.
Harry grimaced. It took everything for him to not snap at the other boy to chew with his mouth closed.
"But we can listen to the match later."
"The match?" he asked.
"Quidditch match. The Magpies are playing the Tornadoes."
Harry had no idea what Quidditch was, and said as much.
"It's the best sport in the world. You'll love it!" Alex said. His eyes lit up as he launched into an animated conversation about it. He never told Harry exactly what Quidditch was, but he explained all the teams and why the Magpies were his favourite.
Conversation petered out after that, and Harry grew tired of watching the other boy eat.
"I'm going to read," he said.
There was a lot of catching up to do, and so much he didn't know. According to the letter, the term started in just over a month, and he had no idea how he would survive at Hogwarts. Every conversation so far had left him with more questions than answers about the world he'd been unceremoniously dropped into. Sure, Harry had spent years pretending to be dumb, but he'd never actually felt it until now. Part of him wondered if the muggleborn students felt the same way.
Two and a half hours later, he'd skimmed through Hogwarts, A History, and learned a little more about the houses and the school. He'd flipped through History of the Blood War learning a little more about the war, and gone back over the leaflet three times. His notes had more than doubled in length. He was contemplating going down to the library when Alex came to fetch him.
Waiting for them in the drawing room was the tailor. He was an older man, short, with sandy hair and pale skin. On his head was a wide brimmed, pointed hat, and he wore a bright yellow floor length medieval robe trimmed in green brocade.
"Mr. Cropper, meet my brother, Harry," Alex said.
"Well mat, Heir Potter. Mr. Ennis Cropper with Kildare's Wizardwear," the man said with a bow. His voice was nasally and deep.
"Well met, Mr. Cropper," Harry stuttered out, mimicking the words the tailor had used. Harry had read that he was the heir, but he wasn't sure exactly what that meant.
Alex snickered beside him. "Mr. Cropper's been the Potter's tailor since Dad was a boy."
Cropper stared at them, his eyes going back and forth between Harry and Alex in amazement.
"This way, boys, come on, come on," Cropper said, clapping his hands and ushering them farther into the room.
The entire area just through the door had been completely taken over. Two identical stations stood next to each other, each one with a squat platform placed in front of a three-way-mirror.
They were each directed onto one of the platforms. Harry stepped up onto his and looked at himself in the mirrors. He didn't look quite as small and malnourished as he had in his cousin's cast offs. Compared to Alex though, he was still too skinny and his washed out skin looked sickly against the pale blue of his jacket.
Suddenly, there was a tape measure flying all around him, and he gaped in shock at it. Floating next to him, was a piece of parchment. A quill furiously took notes.
"Lift your arms, Heir Potter," Cropper said.
Harry did as he asked, and said, "Just call me Harry." The Heir thing was too new to be comfortable. Especially since Alex made a face every time it had been said.
"As you wish, Harry," Cropper said, giving him a smile. "Now, Lord Potter ordered some additional pieces for you. Several sets of everyday robes."
"Yeah," Harry said. He was still confused about what they meant by robes.
"What styles do you like, traditional or the more modern style?" he asked.
When Harry didn't answer, Alex supplied, "Dad hates traditional robes."
The tape measure moved around him as well, but unlike Harry, who every few seconds had to be directed to lift this or move that, Alex moved with the tape measure.
"Let's do a mixture of both. Mostly modern, with a couple of traditional robes. Every young wix needs at least one or two for various occasions." Cropper paused, then asked, "How many cloaks? I know they're falling out of fashion with the younger set."
"Three should be good," Alex said for him.
Harry agreed just for the sake of it.
"Now colours, This blue looks awful on you," Cropper said. "What kind of colours do you like?"
Harry had no idea. Dudley's cast offs had always had a greyish hue to them, with most of the colours faded away. He shrugged in lieu of answering.
"I think you'd do well in jewel tones, with some darker neutrals thrown in. We should try to bring out those remarkable eyes," Cropper said.
What felt like an eternity later, Cropper finally stopped asking him questions about colours and fabrics. He was allowed to step down from the little platform, which packed itself away into a bag that sat at Cropper's feet. All the rest of it followed to Harry's amazement.
"That should be everything," Cropper said. "Your robes should arrive by midweek."
"Thank you, Mr. Cropper. Let us show you out," Alex said. He gestured towards the entrance hall, and led the three of them from the room.
After a round of goodbyes and another bow, the tailor left.
Except, instead of leaving through the front door, the man moved towards the fireplace. He grabbed a fist full of some type of glittering powder from a bowl on a little table next to the fireplace then promptly stepped into the fireplace. He shouted something and dropped the powder at his feet. Then he vanished in a whorl of emerald flames.
"What was that!" Harry exclaimed.
"What was what?"
"He just vanished!"
"It's the floo," Alex said in an exasperated tone.
"What's the floo."
It took Alex ten minutes to explain the floo and how it worked. A special powder, when tossed into the fireplace turned it into some type of portal, which allowed wizards to travel through them to other, connected locations. They could also use it similar to a telephone by sticking only their heads in the fire.
When Harry asked yet another question about how it worked, Alex snapped at him. "Just go find a book on it." Then, he quickly added, "Sorry, it's just, you don't know anything! I feel like you're asking me to explain the spells on a racing broom."
Seeing as Harry didn't actually know what a racing broom was, he figured Alex might have a point.
He itched to go down to the library to try and find more information, but Alex glanced impatiently at the clock, and swore. "Come on, we're going to miss the start of the match!"
He grabbed Harry's arm and rushed up the stairs, dragging Harry behind him the whole way. Harry wanted to snatch his arm back.
Alex's room was the only door to the right of the staircase. It was easily double the size of the one Harry had been given. A couple of couches stood at the center of the room, littered with pillows and blankets. Bookshelves were placed around the room, filled with trinkets, and very few books. Another of the odd brooms was leaning against the desk, which had papers scattered haphazardly across it. Spread around the walls were all sorts of posters of people Harry didn't recognize. They all moved around just like the photos in James' newspaper. The Weird Sisters was emblazoned in fiery letters across several of them, a few more that had Ashton Batt in bold black letters. Most of the posters, though, had seven figures in white and black uniforms holding brooms like the one leaning against the desk. The Montrose Magpies was stamped across them, with a black and white crowned bird in the top corner. Other than the posters, everything was scarlet and gold with warm brown furniture.
Alex flopped onto one of the scarlet sofas, and Harry took a seat on the one across from him. Between them was a coffee table, which was filled with sandwiches and sweets. On one corner of it though, was an old wooden radio with some type of crystal embedded in the top of it.
Alex turned a knob on the radio, and the crystal flared to life with a warm yellow glow.
"…Maltby is flying the new Nimbus 2000, its professional Quidditch debut, this afternoon. It's supposed to be a far step up from the Comet Sixty-Two Hegan's flying," a commentator's voice came through the speaker.
"The Magpie's seeker is one of the best, so it'll be something to see those two brooms to go up against one another," a second man said.
"This match will definitely be a battle of skills and brooms," the first one said.
"There goes the snitch. And the quaffle is up!" the second one shouted.
At the confused look that must have been on Harry's face, Alex launched into an explanation of Quidditch. Between his cheers and groans, Alex explained everything he knew. He told Harry about the four balls, the positions on each team, and explained the rules. He talked about the different brooms. When a particular play was made, Alex explained it. Sometimes, Alex spoke over the commentators.
It was the most fun Harry had ever had, and it was the first time he'd enjoyed himself with another person. They snacked on the sandwiches and little cakes. The sweets were strange, and Alex enjoyed telling Harry about them. Harry particularly enjoyed the sugar quills, liquorice wands, and chocolate frogs. Even though the little frogs kept trying to hop away. He should have known it wouldn't last.
"I think dad might buy us the Nimbus. It comes out on our birthday,"Alex said during a time out. The Magpies were up 120 points over the Tornadoes.
"I'm excited to learn to fly," Harry admitted. It sounded fun, and after listening to the match, he'd never wanted anything more.
"Dad's excited to teach you. It's all he talked about after Professor Dumbledore came by the other night."
The headmaster personally came to James? Harry sat the thought aside. James was wealthy, and had gone to the school. "Does James fly?" he asked.
"DAD," Alex said firmly, "loves it. Not that he has a lot of time anymore. Before his promotion, we flew together all the time."
Not wanting to fight, Harry asked, "Does he like Quidditch?"
"Like it? Dad loves it. He always said, if it hadn't been for the war, he'd have gone professional."
"He played?" Harry asked.
"He was Gryffindor's star chaster when he was at Hogwarts."
"That's cool," Harry said.
They lapsed back into silence, listening as the match went on.
"And Ferlet scores! The Tornadoes are really closing that gap quickly. It's now 180 to 200. Maltby needs to find that snitch, and soon if the Magpies want to win this match," the announcer said.
"I'm planning on trying out for the Gryffindor team when we get to school," Alex said absently.
"I thought our letters said first years aren't allowed broomsticks?" Harry asked.
"Dad thinks he might be able to smuggle one into Hogwarts for me," Alex said.
"James is going to sneak one in for you? Isn't he like a police officer or something?"
"DAD!" Alex shouted at him. "He's our dad. Why do you keep calling him James?"
"Because that's his name."
"He's still your dad too."
"I just met him yesterday. He may be your dad, but he isn't mine," Harry snapped.
Alex was turning red with anger. "Just because you didn't know him doesn't make him any less your dad."
"Yeah, it does. If he really was my dad, he wouldn't have abandoned me with the Dursleys for my whole life," Harry said bitterly.
"You ungrateful little," Alex started to shout.
"Ungrateful? He abandoned me, and only came for me because he had no choice," Harry spat.
"He didn't abandon you."
"Yes, he did."
"He was keeping you safe!"
"Safe?" Harry said incredulously.
"Safe from the Death Eaters and Dark Wizards. They're still out there."
"Bullshit. I was inconvenient, and I'm only back because I no longer am."
They devolved into shouting back and forth at that. The match was entirely forgotten at that point. Finally, Alex let out a guttural scream and lunged for Harry.
Years of running from Dudley, from avoiding hits from Uncle Vernon had left him with fast reflexes. He was out the door before Alex could reach him.
Harry fled back to the room he'd been given. Tears pricked at his eyes as he slid to the floor, his back pressed against the door. His breath came in quick pants, and he pressed his fists against his eyes. He would not cry, not over this.
"Master-Speaker, what has happened?" Morgan asked, slithering up from who knew where. She wound herself around Harry until she was draped across his shoulders. She'd always been able to sense when he was upset.
"I thought it might be different here, but it's not," he told her.
Despite his best efforts, the tears fell. It really was too much to ask, to finally be free of the pain. Alex was the first person his age to ever be nice to him, only for him to turn into Dudley the second they disagreed. He'd seen the warning signs all morning, but he'd ignored them. More the fool he was.
Harry sat there, crying, with Morgan whispering soothing words and revenge fantasies in his ear for a while. Her tongue tickled his cheek as it flicked back and forth with her words.
The sound of breaking glass was the only warning before a grey-brown cloud filled the room. It was so foul it made him gag. Morgan moaned miserable about the stench.
"What is that?" she whined.
"I don't know."
Hiss and Corra came rushing to him, complaining. Harry gathered them into his arms, which they curled around. Moving quickly, he grabbed his notebook and biros before abandoning the room.
In the basement, the Library was a quiet retreat. James had alluded to Alex not liking to read, so it seemed like a good enough place to hide for a while. Once the double doors, which were ornately carved with mythical beasts surrounding a cauldron, were closed behind them, Corra and Hiss took off into the dusty corners beneath the bookcases that lined the walls. In front of the fireplace were a couple of armchairs, and on the opposite side of the room was a study table. Beneath each of the two windows were cushioned benches built into the bookcases. They were each covered with comfortable looking pillows. Like the rest of the house, it was all scarlet fabric and warm woods.
In the center of the room was a singular large bookcase, which had shelves filled with books wrapping all the way around it. When Harry peered at some of the titles on it, he saw it appeared to be mostly children's books and wizarding novels.
Excitement coursed through him at the possibilities. He tossed his things onto the desk and browsed through the shelves. The books themselves were the most wondrous thing he'd ever seen. Some were so old the bindings felt as though they would crumble beneath his fingertips when he touched them. Others were bound in bright leather that looked brand new. The topics were fascinating, books on curses, and potions. He plucked Everyday Potions for the Clueless Beginner down from one shelf, and New Wand, New You; Jinxes for the Newly Wanded from another.
There were other interesting things beyond the titles as well. Two entire shelves on one wall wouldn't let him read the titles, and between them, he couldn't touch a single book. Every time he tried, the shelf was just slightly out of reach. He could read the titles though. Dozens of books on curses and other types of magic he didn't quite understand. He itched to pull them down.
By the time he found the section with what appeared to be history and cultural books, the stack on the study table was a dozen books high. He quickly added several more. Most of the titles he selected came willingly into his hands, but both On Lineages and History and Culture of the British Wix felt as though he had to pull them through molasses to get them down. The Untold History of the British Isles wouldn't come off the shelf at all, and he couldn't even touch The Pureblood Directory. Every time he tried, his hand grabbed one of the titles on either side of it.
When he finally sat back down at the table, he had two dozen books waiting for him. There were many more he wanted to pull down, but he was running out of space on the small table. He started with Navigating Wixen Society. It was some sort of etiquette book for girls. The book was dry and spent a lot of time talking about inane things such as place settings and hosting parties, but it answered tons of his questions.
He lost himself to the books, scribbling notes into his notebook, and hunting down answers to his questions. There were technical things about spells that went completely over his head, but he continued on.
Shadows grew around him as the sun dipped below the trees in the distance. He was practising writing with a quill. He'd found a drawer in the study table filled with quills, ink, and parchment. Apparently, wizards, or Wixen according to the books, had never heard of biros or notebooks. It was awkward and he made a mess with the ink. The longer he spent taking his notes that way, the better he would get at it. He'd ruined four pieces of parchment before he managed to get the right amount of ink and stop leaving blotches everywhere.
Mippy popped into the room with a crack, causing him to scratch a line halfway down the page. When he looked up at her, she held a tray of food in her hands.
"Little Master Harry missed dinner," she said.
She placed the tray on the table, right on top of his notes and added, "Little Master Harry must eat."
"Thank You," he told her.
Her eyes widened just before she vanished with another loud crack.
It was a simple dinner, a hearty soup with a couple of rolls, and a pot of warm tea. Despite being used to not eating regularly, he was starving. He dug into the food, careful to not get any on the books as he continued reading.
Long after he'd finished eating, when he could no longer stifle the yawns, he called for the snakes. Morgan had ventured off to join them shortly after he started browsing the books, declaring it boring. As they secured themselves around his limbs, he debated on what to do with the books. He settled on taking his notes with him, but left the books neatly stacked on the table.
Unfortunately, not only was his door knob covered in some type of slime, but some type of powder glittered on his bed in the flickering light. It still smelled awful in the room as well. Sighing to himself, he went back down to the library.
The bench, while not as nice as the bed, was more comfortable than the cot mattress he'd used for most of his life. He curled up under the long jacket-like outer layer of his clothes and drifted into a fitful sleep.
Something hot smacked him in the face, waking him with a scream the next morning. Alex's laughter echoed through the room.
"So this is where you disappeared to," he said.
"What's it to you?" Harry asked, plucking what looked like a used firecracker off the floor. How…juvenile.
Alex had turned to look at the books Harry had left out, and sneered.
"Why are you reading this tosh for?" he asked disdainfully. "No one needs to know this crap."
"Considering I know nothing about being a wizard, I think I do," Harry snapped.
"Plenty of muggleborns go to Hogwarts not knowing this stuff. You don't need it."
"I'm not a muggleborn, now am I?" Harry snapped.
"Whatever. I was just coming to see if you wanted breakfast before the elves shut the kitchen down for a while."
With apprehension, Harry followed Alex to the kitchen. Breakfast waited for them on the table, a plate with eggs and toast in front of where he sat the morning before, and another plate piled high with a bit of everything in what he assumed to be Alex's seat.
The Daily Prophet sat in front of James' empty seat at the head of the table. The two boys didn't speak as they ate their breakfast.
Harry was in the middle of an article about a donation the Lord Malfoy made to St. Mungo's, which seemed to be a hospital, when he started choking on his food. Alex had dumped something onto his plate while he'd been wrapped up in the paper.
He shoved the plate away. He glared at Alex as he stormed out of the kitchen.
The overwhelming stench had somewhat dissipated from his bedroom, thankfully. But he only noticed Alex had replaced his soap with frog spawn when it turned to slimy mush under the water.
"Ugh!" he screeched, and rinsed his hand off.
Dressed in the red outfit again, he went back down to the library.
He only had an hour of peaceful reading before several loud pops went off around him. Something sharp sailed through the air and bit him.
Alex was howling with laughter. He lobbed another firework at Harry, who only just managed to keep the books away from the small explosion. They hit the floor with a crash.
"What is wrong with you?" Harry snapped at him.
He was bit again, this time he noticed it was a bright green frisbee.
Harry fled the library. The rest of the morning was spent fleeing from room to room as Alex followed him around, throwing things at him, making him fall, or in one particularly awful moment, making the stairs drop out from under him.
Eventually, Alex grew bored and disappeared into the back garden. Bruised, singed, and bleeding slightly, Harry made his way back to the library. It would be the first place Alex would look if he came back for round two. The potions lab, while fascinating, was a bust. For one thing, the layer of dust on everything made him sneeze. Secondly, and more importantly, neither of the two doors locked. Not to mention, the one nearest the stairs didn't even close properly. He did nick a few of the beginners potions books off the shelves though.
Beyond the potions lab was a long, dim corridor James said led to storage rooms. There were four plain doors down the side across from the potions lab, and another two on the same side. One didn't have any sort of knob, and two wouldn't budge. Of the three he could open, only one didn't choke him with dust.
What he'd been expecting to find was a linen closet of some sort, or something like the loft at the Dursleys. Instead, he found a spacious room, only slightly smaller than his room, with stone floors and dingy plaster walls. It was filled almost to bursting with old furniture and trunks. A fireplace burst to life when he stepped into the room, warming the cool space considerably. His trainers left footprints in the dust.
There was more than enough space to move around, surprisingly., and after an hour of dragging heavy trunks out of the way, coughing and sneezing as plumes of dust danced in the air, he was able to create a cosy space near the fireplace. An old green velvet sofa in intricately carved legs went beneath the window. He found a cracked but functional table to go in front of it. A chair with brocaded fabric, which was ripped and showing the stuffing beneath, was moved across from the sofa, right next to the fire.
Satisfied with the arrangement, Harry rushed out of the room. He gathered the books and other things James had given him and stuffed them into his bag. Alex had shredded the duvet on the bed, and smeared something on the pillows. He left them.
In the Library, he gathered the snakes, his notebook, quill, and ink. It took three trips to transport his stacks of books to the storage room. He made a fourth trip, just to grab another towering stack of books.
The snakes loved the room.
The rest of his day was spent in blissful silence behind a locked door. He read through a couple of books, cross referenced his notes, and hunted down answers in a dozen more, trying to learn as much as he could. The only times he ventured out was to get dinner from the elves well after he guessed Alex would have gone to bed.
When he finally decided to call it quits for the night, he realised the room was too chilly to sleep without a blanket, despite the warm fire burning. With his blanket destroyed, he wasn't sure what to do. Then his eye caught on the trunks and the old wardrobes.
He went through three trunks full of books, found a set of golden animal figurines than trotted around the floor when he pulled them out. They were promptly placed on the mantle, where they quickly arranged themselves, biting and scratching at one another until they were satisfied, then promptly stopped moving. As he could only recognize the dragon, he vowed to find a book in the morning to see what kind of animals they were.
In another trunk, there was a cool dagger in a fine leather sheath. It had a trio of jewels on the hilt, an emerald with two white stones he couldn't identify on either side of it. Silver, and still sharp, it went underneath one of the sofa cushions.
He never found a blanket, but in the next trunk, he found a heavy black cloak made out of a silky material and lined with fur on the inside. It was the softest thing he'd ever felt, and warm.
It made a good blanket, and Harry slept soundly beneath it.
He woke before the sun rose the next day, and made his way up to the kitchens for an early breakfast. Mippy agreed to deliver a pot of tea to the storage room, and bring lunch, but only after he made her promise not to tell anyone, not James or Alex, or the other elves, where he was hiding.
Once he returned to the storage room, he read until his eyes went cross and he could no longer think coherently. As promised, a pot of tea was delivered only an hour after breakfast. And the kind elf snapped her fingers, making all the dust vanish from the room.
After lunch, Harry turned his attention to the trunks and broken down wardrobes. Trapped in the room until Alex went to bed, he began going through them to see what else he could find. They were filled with a myriad of things. Odd objects by the dozens, some broken, but most he didn't know what to do with, let alone what they were. Most of the clothes were moth-eaten. He did find a nice blanket buried at the bottom of one of the wardrobes, which he tossed onto the sofa. He found a nice pair of black boots made out of some type of reptile skin, which shimmered with a green hue in the sunlight that filtered through the dirty window, in the same trunk as the cloak.
They fit perfectly when he put them on. He gleefully tossed battered trainers into the fireplace.
In the same trunk, there was also a small chest filled with all sorts of jewellery; cufflinks, cloak pins, hat pins, and a handful of rings. He didn't have the right clothes for most of it, and none of the ring's fit. The chest did get placed onto one of the bookcases nearest the sofa, next to where he'd displayed the books he'd taken from the library.
The books in the trunks from the night before were fascinating. They were about branches of magic called runes, and warding, and blood magic. A few of them had what appeared to be bloodstains on them. He understood nothing in them. They were organised on the bookcase too, and he added another few subjects to find books on in the library.
By the time he finished going through the trunks and wardrobes he could reach and actually open, he'd added quite a lot of things to his growing collection. All three of the bookcases were filled with books, another one was littered in trinkets. He'd found an old clock (which yelled out times to eat and sleep) as well as a sphere that displayed the constellations around the room in a moving circle when the two halves were twisted in just the right way. It had a black marble stand, which he placed on the cracked table.
It soothed something in him, the neglected little boy who had nothing, to have things, even if they were as secret as his snakes. Everything was old, found, and dubiously stolen, but they were his now. James had let them rot in storage for years, so Harry claimed them. And he loved them already. He'd even given in and unpacked the books he'd stolen from Dudley. The Lord of the Rings, several Roald Dahl books, and Swallows and Amazons were displayed right next to a couple books on Potions.
When he finally went back to reading, it was with shoes that actually fit and comfortably wrapped in his new blanket. It smelled a little musty from sitting forgotten about for who even knew how long. Most of his original questions had been answered by the time the clock told him it was seven and time to eat something. He waited until none, hoping Alex had at least gone to his room before he made his way up to the kitchens.
Mippy and Pokey were thrilled to fix something for him. They whipped up another light meal for him. He ate it at the kitchen table that night, with a history book propped open in front of him.
Fully ensconced back in his hiding place, Harry relaxed on the sofa, with Morgan draped around his neck and Hiss and Corra soiled up on the cushions next to him.
Before he went to sleep that night, he spent twenty minutes figuring out how to set an alarm on the clock to wake him at five.
He wasn't sure how James would react to Harry moving himself to a room other than the one he'd been given for the weekend. Plus, he was feeling protective of his new things. Any time he'd ever had anything of his own, Dudley had destroyed it. Harry still had the separated head and body of the black stuffed puppy he'd come to the Dursley's with, which Dudley had ripped in half when toddler Harry wouldn't let him keep it.
With Alex having decided Alex wasn't worth his time for anything other than being a punching bag, he needed for James to at least tolerate him in order to survive the next month.
For the first time he could remember, Harry fell asleep full, warm, and if not happy, at least content.