AUTHORS NOTE
Thank you for taking the time to read my story. This is my first work of fanfic, and I have no doubt that there is a lot I can improve on. I do have a rough plan for the story, and hopefully I'll be able to see it through. Feedback is welcome, but please be kind about it. Nothing I write here belongs to me, and I'm not making any money from it. Enjoy.
Runaways
Prologue:
Pain.
Pain was a constant in Harry Potter's life. It greeted him in the morning before he even opened his eyes, a dull ache in his ribs from the night before. It followed him through the day, settling into his stomach as hunger gnawed at him, a silent reminder of the meals he was denied. And at night, when the world was quiet and still, it was there in his thoughts—whispering to him, telling him he was nothing, just as his relatives had always said.
His uncle, his aunt, his cousin - they all had their own ways of making sure he never forgot his place.
Vernon's punishments were swift and brutal, his heavy hands leaving bruises that should have lasted weeks. Should have but didn't. That was one of the few mysteries in Harry's miserable life: he healed too quickly. A broken bone would set overnight. A split lip would be gone by morning. Even the welts from his uncle's belt or the deep scratches from being thrown into the rose bushes would vanish within a day. It wasn't normal. But then, Harry had never been normal.
Petunia's cruelty was quieter, sharper. She never touched him. Her hatred wasn't physical, it was woven into her words, her glares, the way she flinched whenever she so much as looked at him. She made sure Harry understood that he was less than human, not worthy of kindness. He was a freak. A burden. A stain on their perfect, middle-class life.
Dudley? Dudley's was the easiest to understand. He enjoyed hurting Harry. It wasn't complicated, it was power. He and his gang ruled the school, and Harry was their favourite target. The teachers never listened. The other students were too afraid. Harry learned quickly that no one would save him.
And so, every night, he wished for an escape. A way out. A miracle. Anything.
But wishes were for other people, not for boys like him. And yet… Something was changing.
The bruises healed too fast. His hair grew back overnight when Petunia cut it off. And sometimes, just sometimes, when he was alone, when he was desperate enough, strange things happened.
The latest time had been the worst. Vernon had been especially furious that day. Harry had burned the bacon, and that was enough to send his uncle into a rage. The blows had come fast, hard, unrelenting, until Harry had felt something snap inside him. Not a bone. Something deeper.
And suddenly, Vernon had flown backwards across the kitchen. The impact had shattered the cupboard door, breaking it completely off its hinges, leaving the man groaning in a heap. Petunia had screamed. Dudley had run, crying for his mother.
And Harry?
Harry had stared at his own hands, trembling. He had felt something powerful… something real… rush through his veins. It was different from the numbness that usually followed a beating.
It was the first time he had ever felt strong.
That was the moment he knew.
He couldn't stay here.
Because if he did, one day, Vernon would kill him. Or worse… one day, he might fight back.
And if that happened, he wasn't sure he would stop.
So that night, as he lay curled up on his tattered blanket in the cupboard, he made a decision. No more waiting for someone to save him. No more hoping for a miracle.
He would run.
He would leave Privet Drive behind, disappear into the world, and never come back. Whatever was out there, it couldn't be worse than this. It could only be better. And if it wasn't?
At least he would be free.
Misunderstanding.
Thoughts swirled. Facts raced. Knowledge flew in. Words spilled out.
It never stopped.
It couldn't be stopped.
Nothing could stop the stream of consciousness that erupted from Neville Longbottom's mouth.
"So, Augusta, who do you think will win the World Cup this year? I think the Scots have a decent shot," Great Uncle Algie said over tea one afternoon.
"World Cup. Quidditch. First tournament. 1473. Won by Transylvania. Scotland. Qualified. Defeated Rwanda. Venezuela. Laos. Clean sweep. Seven-match winning streak. Chasers scored a goal every 78.4 seconds on average. Keeper saved 87.3% of shots."
Neville barely took a breath as the words tumbled out, faster than he could think to stop them.
His relatives exchanged looks of exasperation. His grandmother let out a sigh. Uncle Algie simply rolled his eyes and moved on, speaking over Neville as if he hadn't said anything at all.
It was always like this.
He tried, oh Merlin, he tried, to keep his mouth shut, but the words always forced their way out. He couldn't help it.
His mind was like an overfilled goblet, brimming with knowledge, facts, details. Everything he read, everything he heard, everything he saw, smelled, felt, it all stayed. It never faded. It never dulled. And the only way to ease the pressure was to let it out, to speak.
The faster he got it out, the lighter he felt.
But it only made everything worse.
"Long-speech-with-no-bottom." That was what Terry Boot had called him, one summer evening at a party, Wednesday, August 5th, 1987, at exactly 8:42 p.m. Neville remembered every detail: the amused snickers of the other children, the way Daphne Greengrass had politely avoided looking at him, the slight downturn of his grandmother's lips as she placed a hand on his shoulder, squeezing it just a bit too tightly.
"That's enough, Neville," she had said. Always 'enough.' Never 'well done.' Never 'I'm proud of you.'
Neville hated it.
Hated the way people looked at him. Frustrated, confused, uncertain.
Hated the way his words isolated him. The way the other pureblood children shied away, afraid of triggering another outburst.
Hated that the only thing that kept his thoughts quiet was reading. But reading only filled his head with more knowledge, more facts, more fuel for his endless ramblings.
But most of all…
Most of all, he hated the one thing he could never speak aloud.
The one memory that haunted him more than any other.
His parents' screams.
Neville had been barely a year old, but he remembered everything.
The Lestranges. Barty Crouch Jr. The wands, raised. The voices taunting. The agony in his mother's cries, the way his father's breath had rattled as he begged…BEGGED for them to stop.
He could still hear them. Could still feel them.
The exact moment when his mother's mind had snapped, the moment she had stopped knowing who he was. It was burned into him like a scar.
And the worst part?
No one in his family understood.
Not his strict, no-nonsense grandmother, who only saw his parents as martyrs, not as people.
Not his great-aunts and uncles, who spoke of them with pride, as if their suffering had somehow been noble.
None of them had been there. None of them had heard them scream.
Neville had.
And he would never, ever forget.
Maybe it would be better if he left.
Maybe it would be easier for everyone if he weren't here at all.
Maybe then, at least…
At least he would be free.
Ostracism.
Hermione Granger didn't know what it was like to be alone. Not really. Even when she sat by herself at lunch, even when no one spoke to her for days at a time, even when she cried into her pillow at night, she was never alone.
Because she felt everything. Her mother called it empathy. A gift.
But Hermione didn't feel gifted. She felt overwhelmed.
Everywhere she went, emotions battered her like waves against the shore, pushing, pulling, dragging her under. She felt the quiet ache of exhaustion from her teachers, worn down by endless marking and unruly students. She felt the simmering jealousy and insecurity in her classmates when grades were handed back, a dull throb of resentment mixed with self-doubt. She felt the bubbling guilt and shame of the girl who had stolen from her mother's purse that morning, the secret heavy in her chest. She felt the sharp sting of self-loathing from the boy with a fresh bruise beneath his sleeve, who told himself he deserved it.
And worst of all, she couldn't stop it.
She had tried to help, once. When Amber Stevenson had arrived at school one morning, wrapped in a suffocating fog of grief, Hermione hadn't thought—she had just acted. She had felt it so clearly, the loss radiating from her friend like heat from a fire.
"I'm sorry about your dog."
Amber had recoiled. "What? But… how did you… I never told…"
Hermione had never seen someone so afraid of her before. By the next day, the whispers had started.
"She's a freak."
"She knows things she shouldn't."
"She's a witch."
Hermione ignored it. She had to. But the next time it happened, she couldn't. It was just before lunch when Oliver Bates tripped in the corridor, sending his books scattering across the floor. The moment it happened, Hermione felt it. The rush of embarrassment hit her like a punch to the chest, the burning shame, the desperate hope that nobody had seen… And before she could stop herself, she turned to him and said, "Don't worry, nobody saw."
Oliver's head snapped up. His ears turned red.
"I… I didn't…" His voice cracked. His eyes narrowed. "How did you?"
The moment stretched. Someone snickered. And then…
"She's reading minds now?" someone sneered.
"She's always staring at people. It's creepy."
"I bet she makes bad things happen to us."
By the end of the day, she had a new name.
Granger the Curse.
Hermione wanted to argue, to scream that it wasn't true. But what if it was? What if she did make things worse? What if she were the reason bad things kept happening? She started to wonder if even her parents thought so.
Because then, her father left.
One morning, Hermione came downstairs and found her mother sitting at the kitchen table, staring at a handwritten note. A half-empty cup of tea sat beside her. Cold. Untouched. The chair across from her, the one where her father always sat, was empty.
And she knew.
She didn't need to see the space in the garage where his car had been. She didn't need to ask where he had gone.
Because she could feel it. Her mother's emotions were a tangled mess: grief, anger, betrayal, but beneath it all, there was something else.
Resentment.
At first, it was barely a flicker. Just a shadow of a thought, too quick for words. But as the days passed, it grew stronger. Every sigh. Every sharp glance. Every strained, "Hermione, not now."
Her mother never said it aloud. But Hermione felt it. Felt the weight of blame settle onto her shoulders. Felt the way her mother's emotions turned raw whenever she entered a room. Felt the quiet, bitter 'what if' hanging between them, unspoken but undeniable.
What if Hermione hadn't been born? What if she hadn't been so strange? So different? So difficult? Would her father have stayed?
Hermione didn't know. All she knew was that the house didn't feel like home anymore. The world didn't feel safe anymore. And maybe, just maybe, if she left, things would be better. Maybe then, at least…
At least she would be free.
Expectation.
Daphne Greengrass stared at herself in the mirror, lips pressing into a thin line. The reflection staring back at her wasn't her. The perfectly curled blonde hair. The delicately applied makeup. The pale blue silk dress that itched against her skin. This wasn't Daphne Greengrass, heir to an ancient pureblood family. This was a doll. Prettied up and placed on display for another of her mother's insufferable social gatherings.
Daphne's hands curled into fists. She had been out riding just an hour ago, racing through the forests behind Greengrass Manor, hair tangled in the wind, shirt damp with sweat, alive.
And now? She was back in a gilded cage, locked in lace and expectations.
A knock at the door.
"Daphne, are you ready?" Her mother's voice was smooth, controlled. Just like the woman herself.
"Yes, Mother." The words felt like iron in her mouth.
She wasn't ready. She would never be ready for this life. The life of a perfect pureblood lady. Daphne could already picture the evening ahead. Standing in a room full of stuffy, arrogant heirs, the daughters all dressed like porcelain dolls, the sons sneering down at them as if their value began and ended with how good a marriage match they'd make.
It was disgusting.
This was what her mother had spent years preparing her for. The subtle art of polite smiles and empty words. The importance of demeanour, dress, and breeding. The unspoken truth was that, as the firstborn daughter of House Greengrass, she wasn't expected to make a name for herself, only to marry into someone else's. Her mother had been drilling it into her since she was old enough to walk.
"You must be desirable, Daphne. Refined. Civilized. Your future depends on it."
But Daphne didn't want that future. She didn't want to be some trophy wife, handed off to the highest bidder like a prize racehorse. She wanted to run. She wanted to fight. She wanted to be more. She didn't care about fashion, etiquette, or family alliances. She cared about strength—about proving she was just as capable as any man, about forging her own destiny instead of having it dictated for her.
But that was a fantasy.
Because the truth was, Daphne wasn't free. Her father, the one who should have protected her, who should have fought for her, never did. He agreed with her, in private. He had told her he admired her spirit, that she had a fire in her soul that reminded him of his own mother. But admiration wasn't action. He would never stand up to her mother. Not really. Because the real power in House Greengrass had never belonged to her father.
It belonged to her mother. The Greengrass fortune, the reputation, the alliances… all of it came from her mother's side. And so, no matter how much he loved Daphne, her father never fought back. He never told her mother she was wrong. He never once said, "Let her be who she is."
He just watched. And for that, Daphne resented him more than she could ever hate her mother.
Downstairs, the floo chimed. The first guests were arriving. Daphne exhaled sharply, glancing at her open bedroom window. Her mother's voice rang out from below, greeting their guests with the warmth of a perfect hostess. Daphne felt the silk of her dress against her skin, the tightness of her pinned curls, the weight of the chains around her.
And she wondered…
How long would it take anyone to notice if she just left?
Maybe then, at least…
At least she would be free.