Chapter 5: The Journal of Magical Memories

The sun was high in the sky by the time Harry awoke the next morning. He was lying under a pile of blankets on the Weasleys' couch and was surrounded by throw pillows. As he slowly sat up, rubbing his bleary eyes, the events of the previous night began rushing back to him. He knew full well that those dementors had been sent to his best friend's house to get to him. What he didn't know was how they knew he was there, or why someone would be so desperate to take him out that they would send dementors after him twice in a span of less than a month. The rate at which their desperation seemed to increase filled Harry with immense unease that was sure to turn into paranoia, always on the lookout for the next attack. And with the way the dementors seemed to suck the life force out of him, he wasn't sure how many more attacks he could survive.

"Oh, Harry dear, you're awake!" Mrs. Weasley said as she rushed over to him with a cup of tea. Harry graciously accepted the cup and took a sip, immediately feeling some of his strength return to him. "It's a magically energizing blend," Mrs. Weasley said by way of explanation.

"I'm so sorry about last night-" Harry started to say.

"Pish posh, don't you dare apologize. That was not your fault, understand me?"

Harry sighed. "Yes, Mrs. Weasley."

"Good. Now you just lay there and finish your tea. Ron is taking care of packing your things."

"Packing?" It was too early to pack for school, there was nearly a week of Summer left. Were they sending him off so he would stop attracting ambushes on their home? Harry couldn't blame them if that were the case.

As if reading his mind, Mrs. Weasley shook her head. "We're all packing to go and spend the last little bit of the Summer at the Leaky Cauldron," she explained. "Just as a precaution. It'll be fun, like a little vacation."

Harry smiled and nodded. The Leaky Cauldron was a wizard owned pub in London that hid the entrance to Diagon Alley, one of Great Britain's largest collections of magical shops and establishments. The Leaky Cauldron was also a place where one could rent a room, which was evidently what they would be doing for the last leg of their Summer vacation. Harry was going to miss the Burrow, with Mrs. Weasley's delicious cooking and the acres of land that were perfect for a pickup game of Quidditch, but he was touched that the entire family was willing to uproot themselves at a moment's notice just to keep him safe.

"Rest," Mrs. Weasley urged him. "We'll come and get you when it's time to leave." She walked off without waiting for a reply.

Harry sipped his tea in silence for a few minutes before the others started gradually trickling down the stairs, their packing complete. "How are you feeling?" Ginny asked, moving a pillow to the side as she took a seat beside Harry.

"Better," Harry replied. "Thanks to your mum's tea."

Ginny nodded. "She always makes that when any of us get sick." Harry smiled, honored to be included in the Weasley family healing tea tradition. He certainly didn't have any similar memories from his time growing up with the Dursleys. "Thank you for what you did last night. It was very brave."

Harry felt his face turn red. "Your dad was the brave one. He ran out there by himself to take on the dementors all on his own."

"Well, I'm glad you were there to help. I don't want to know what might have happened if you hadn't been there." Harry smiled at her as she got up and walked off, choosing not to mention that he was the one who'd lured the dementors there in the first place.

"Alright there, Harry?" Mr. Weasley asked as Harry, Hermione, and the Weasley kids gathered outside in the garden. When he was told that they were going to the Leaky Cauldron, Harry assumed they would be using the Floo Network. However, once everyone's packed trunks had been brought downstairs, Mrs. Weasley had ushered them all outside to where her husband was waiting.

"Much better, thank you, Mr. Weasley."

"That's very good to hear," Mr. Weasley said with a warm smile. "Well, kids, let's get a move on, shall we?" He led them all over to an old boot that was lying in the grass. "You lot go ahead and take the portkey over to the Leaky Cauldron. Your mother and I will take care of the trunks and join you all shortly."

"We're taking a portkey?" Fred asked with a frown. Portkeys were a magical form of transportation where an object is enchanted to teleport from one location to another, bringing along with it anyone who happens to be touching it at the time. They could be a lot of work to set up, and, as such, were not very commonly used.

"It'll be fun," Mr. Weasley insisted. "And it's a quick way to transport all of you at once."

"And it's untrackable," Ron whispered at Harry's side. Harry's eyes widened in recognition. The Floo Network was run by the government and heavily regulated. If someone managed to gain access to the records, they'd have all the information they needed to know about who was using the network and where they were travelling.

"I'm sure they're just being extra cautious," Hermione whispered from behind them. Harry nodded, but knew she didn't believe that. They both knew that he'd used the Floo Network to travel to the Burrow, after all, and that he'd been the intended target of the previous night's attack. Mr. and Mrs. Weasley knew it too.

"Alright then, everybody step up. All hands on the boot, it'll be leaving soon," Mr. Weasley said as he gestured toward the old boot that he'd turned into a portkey.

"Did you have to choose a boot with such a strong smell?" George asked, wrinkling his nose as he picked up the boot and proceeded to hold it as far from his nose as he could. Harry stepped up to place his hand on the worn letter, and the others followed suit.

"Very good," said Mr. Weasley. "Behave yourselves once you get there, your mother and I will be along soon."

"When is it-" Ron started, but he didn't have time to finish his sentence before Harry started to feel the pull of the portkey, dragging him in like a black hole. The Weasleys' front garden seemed to turn upside down before it swirled in on itself like a whirlpool, and seconds later he found himself standing in the middle of the old, wooden tables of the Leaky Cauldron, still holding onto the boot.

After settling into the room that he was sharing with Ron, a rather dark, bare bones room with little more than a dresser and a couple of twin beds, Harry headed back downstairs and into the pub. It seemed that Mr. and Mrs. Weasley had already arrived, and the former was deep in conversation with a man sporting a shiny badge on the front of his robes. Harry started to walk closer to see what was going on when Mrs. Weasley stepped into his path.

"Oh good, Harry, I trust you've settled in?" she said.

"Oh, yes, Mrs. Weasley. Ron and I found our room upstairs."

"Very good. I'm writing to your uncle to let him know what happened last night, and that we've relocated here for the time being."

"Oh. Um, thanks." Truth be told, the thought of telling his new guardian about his change in plans hadn't even occurred to him.

"I'll send your love," she said as she ran off to write the letter. Harry tried not to picture Uncle Severus's face when he read that his nephew 'sent his love.'

The man that Mr. Weasley was speaking to left as Harry approached, leaving Mr. Weasley with a flustered expression on his face.

"Who was that?" Harry asked.

Mr. Weasley sighed and slid his hands into his pockets. "I requested to have someone from the Department of Magical Law Enforcement come out and take my statement about the attack last night," he said. "I couldn't get the fellow to take me seriously. He said there was no way that there were dementors at my house, that I must have imagined things. 'Just a shadow' he said. Just a shadow! As if I don't know the difference."

Harry frowned, frustrated but not surprised. "I'm sorry about last night, I know they must have only been there because of me."

Mr. Weasley's expression softened. "Ah, Harry, it's not your fault, don't you start thinking that it was."

"But they've got to be targeting me, it happened twice."

"Well, I'll agree with you there. It does seem like a targeted attack, but that doesn't make any of this your fault, alright? In fact I'm glad it happened when you were with us, my biggest fear is that it will happen again when you're alone."

"I don't know what to do," Harry admitted. "Whoever keeps sending these dementors after me probably isn't going to stop any time soon."

Mr. Weasley placed a comforting hand on Harry's shoulder. "We'll figure it out, alright? You'll be safe once you're at school, that castle's loaded down with more protective spells than almost anywhere else in the world, yeah?"

"Yeah," Harry agreed, though he knew he couldn't hide at school forever. "Thanks, Mr. Weasley. For everything."

"Don't mention it, Harry. It's me who should be thanking you for your help last night, that was some impressive patronus charm."

"It took a lot out of me," Harry said modestly.

Mr. Weasley nodded. "They say that people who have experienced the most tragedies in their lives are the most vulnerable to dementors. They feed on happiness, you know, leaving you only with your absolute darkest thoughts and memories. Life hasn't been nearly kind enough to you, Harry. That unfortunately makes you very susceptible to their powers. You must be very careful."

"Do you think that that's why someone is sending dementors after me? Because they have such a strong effect on me?"

"It's possible," Mr. Weasley admitted. "I think it would be best if you made an effort not to go anywhere alone. At least for a while."

Harry nodded. He hated the idea of dragging his friends into danger just by being around him, but he also knew that, if any of his friends were in his position, he would do whatever it took to ensure their safety. He just hoped it would never come to that.

As he boarded the Hogwarts Express after spending nearly a week at the Leaky Cauldron hiding out from any more dementor attacks, Harry recalled how, only a month ago, he was worried that he would never set foot on the train again. The threat of expulsion seemed like a lifetime ago, and had only been the beginning of his problems. But at the end of every terrible Summer, Harry could always count on a return to Hogwarts to pull him back to where he belonged.

"Hey, guys," said Neville Longbottom, a fellow Gryffindor student from their year, as he walked toward Harry, Ron, and Hermione on the train.

"Hello, Neville," Hermione said. "How was your Summer?"

"A bit boring," Neville said with a shrug. "Not like yours, Harry."

Harry winced. "Does everyone know about my Summer?"

"About the hearing? Yes, news travels fast in the WIzarding World. Great news that the charges were dropped, though." Neville moved in closer and lowered his voice to a whisper as he said, "There are also people who were saying that you were attacked by dementors, but the government is trying to cover it up."

Harry sighed. "Well, they're right about the dementor attack. I can't confirm whether the government is trying to cover it up or they just refuse to believe me."

Nevilles eyes went wide. "Jeez, Harry, You could have been killed! Or… Or worse." He shuddered, and Harry shuddered with him.

The train's whistle started to blow, and seconds later the Hogwarts Express slowly started to pull out of the station.

"We should probably go find a seat," said Ron. And so the four of them started looking for an empty compartment. It seemed they'd waited too long, however, and the best they could find was a compartment with a single student.

Hermione politely knocked on the door of the compartment before standing in the doorway to address the student; a girl with long, blonde hair who seemed to be of a similar age to them. She seemed to be deep concentration in the magazine she held in her hands. "Sorry to bother you," Hermione said. "Do you mind if we join you? The other compartments are full."

The girl looked up at Hermione as she spoke and smiled. "I'd like that," she said. "People don't usually like to sit near me." She said this matter-of-factly, with no sign of sadness or contempt in her voice.

Harry and Ron exchanged glances as they followed Hermione and Neville into the compartment to take a seat.

"Why don't people want to sit with you?" Hermione asked.

"I expect it's because they think I'm strange."

"Oh," Hermione said, a bit taken aback at the girl's bluntness. "I don't think that's true," she said politely.

"I am a bit strange, actually," said the girl. "But it was kind of you to say so."

"I'm Hermione Granger," Hermione said, changing the subject. Harry and the others followed suit, introducing themselves.

"Oh, you're Harry!" the girl said. "I can't believe you were attacked by dementors like that."

Once again, Harry was surprised to hear that others knew about his terrible Summer, but also glad to find that there were others who believed him, even if the Ministry didn't. "It was pretty scary," Harry admitted. "A lot of people don't believe me, though. They won't write anything about it in the paper."

"True, but The Quibbler covered it."

"The Quibbler?" Ron repeated.

The girl held up the magazine she was holding to reveal the cover, declaring it to be the September issue of The Quibbler. Harry had never heard of it before, and it didn't seem like any of his friends had either.

"It's a magazine founded by Xenophilius Lovegood, my father. I'm Luna Lovegood," Luna explained. "They cover things that The Daily Prophet won't."

"What did they write about the dementor attack?" Harry asked.

"That they showed up in your neighborhood unannounced, and you single-handedly fought them off, and that the Ministry almost kicked you out of school for it and are refusing to admit that it happened."

"That pretty much covers it," Harry said, genuinely impressed that any periodical would dare to question the government in such a manner. "It was very brave of him to publish all of that."

Luna nodded. "He's a brave man."

Harry could feel the relief wash over him once he was back within the walls of Hogwarts castle. As Mr. Weasley had pointed out, the school was loaded down with protective spells that had been keeping its students safe for millenia. In fact, it was so well protected that magical methods of transportation did not work on school grounds, which was the reason that students traveled there by train. Whoever had been trying to attack him throughout the Summer, be it Lord Voldemort himself or some other unknown villain, would find it next to impossible to get to him for the next few months. So Harry settled into his seat at the Gryffindor table in the Great Hall for the start of term feast, talking and laughing with his friends without the threat of ambush.

"Can I have everyone's attention, please?" Professor Dumbledore said as he stepped up to his podium. "To our first years, I would like to formally welcome you all to Hogwarts. I hope that you will find your time here immensely rewarding. And to our returning students, welcome back. We've got another great year of learning ahead of us. As always, I have a few announcements to kick off the new school year. First, allow me the pleasure of introducing your new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Umbridge." He gestured toward the faculty table behind him to reveal a familiar face. Harry froze, hardly able to believe what he was seeing. But he was certain of it. Professor Umbridge was the woman from his hearing, the one who seemed upset when the Minister dropped the charges against him. How she had suddenly gotten into education, Harry had no idea. "We're all quite excited to have her join our team of talented teaching staff this year, and I trust you all to give her a warm welcome. Next-"

Dumbledore didn't get a chance to mention his next announcement before Umbridge cleared her throat loudly behind him. He turned to look at her and saw that she remained standing. "My apologies, Professor Umbridge, did you want the floor?" he asked politely.

"Yes, thank you," Umbridge said. Dumbledore graciously stepped aside as the newest Hogwarts faculty member stepped up to the podium.

"She's the woman from my hearing that I told you about," Harry whispered.

Hermione looked stunned. "That's why the supply lists took so long to go out," she whispered. "She must have been a late addition to the staff." Harry frowned, wondering why she would make such a quick career change so late in the Summer.

"Thank you for the introduction, Professor Dumbledore," Umbridge said. "I'm pleased to be leading the Ministry of Magic's initiative to be more involved in the education of today's youth." Harry's eyes widened in shock. "In addition to being your Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, I will be acting as the Ministry's eyes and ears in the castle. We will be making changes based on my findings, to ensure the most productive educational environment for all students. I'm looking forward to working with all of you throughout the year, and will be in touch soon regarding our first wave of educational ordinances. Thank you." It was clear that the student body had no idea how to react to this news and merely stared in silence as Umbridge returned to her seat. As for Harry, he wasn't entirely sure what this meant, but he knew it was nothing good.

"So this woman was at your hearing. She reacted negatively to you being cleared of all charges, almost as if she was personally affected by a child she'd never met being allowed to continue going to school. Then the Ministry inserts her into the Hogwarts faculty last minute and gives her the power to make changes? Changes she probably doesn't even need Dumbledore's consent for?" Hermione was talking through the Umbridge predicament at the breakfast table on the morning of their first day of classes. Despite the fact that their minds should be focused on their new classes, Harry, Ron, and Hermione hadn't been able to focus on much more than the surprising announcement from the night before. "These things can't be a coincidence, there's got to be a connection."

"You don't think she's here because of me, do you?" Harry asked. After everything that had happened over the Summer, he'd had enough of being a target.

"Maybe it's Dumbledore that she's got a problem with," Ron suggested.

"That's possible," Hermione agreed. "Dumbledore's also a connection. He's the Hogwarts headmaster, and he's the one who convinced Fudge to drop the charges at your hearing."

"Yeah, that's probably it," Harry said, really hoping they were right. It was a more plausible theory than the notion that this was somehow all about himself. He'd never met Umbridge before the hearing, so there was no reason for her to have a problem with him personally.

Just then, a hoard of owls flew into the Great Hall, bringing in the morning mail. The first day of classes was always a big mail day, with parents writing to their kids to wish them luck for the new school year. The Dursleys had never bothered with this, of course, but Harry could always count on some kind handwritten words from Mrs. Weasley. Right on cue, an envelope dropped into his lap, with similar ones finding Hermione and the Weasley kids. Harry smiled and was just about to tear open his letter when a package dropped down from the ceiling, landing on the table before him with a thud that made him jump. At first he thought there must be some mistake, but after inspecting the package he found that it was, in fact, addressed to him.

"What's that?" Ron asked.

"I don't know," Harry replied. "I wasn't expecting a package."

"Open it carefully," Hermione warned. "You've been attacked enough times already, and we don't know who it's from."

Harry hadn't even thought about that. He took out his wand and, with his non-dominant hand, slowly began to unwrap the packaging to reveal a leather-bound book. He poked it with the end of his wand, but nothing happened. Satisfied that it seemed relatively safe, he slowly opened the book.

"It's blank," Hermione said, and it was. It seemed to be nothing more than a leather journal that nobody had written in.

"I wonder who sent me this," Harry said as he finally picked it up. And as he did, a letter slipped out from between the pages and fluttered to the table. "What's this?" He slid the note toward himself and began to read.

Harry,

I hope this journal finds you well. It's a journal of magical memories, one where I have included memories from my own mind. You will be able to experience my memories as if you were me, seeing and hearing everything I saw and heard, even my own thoughts. The memories I have selected should show you everything you need to know about me, and about yourself. It's going to be a lot to take in, and for that I am so very sorry. I wish I could be there to tell you all of this myself. To give you time to process everything you're about to learn, I've made it so that you will only be able to view one memory per week. Know that everything you are about to see is true, and that I wish that things could have been different.

All my love,

T