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The little boy ran up the cement stairs into the large white building. He moved as fast as his skinny legs could take him without tripping on said stairs. He knew from experience how painful it was when his too large shoes caught in the corners of the stairs. Aside from the scraped knees, the delay would give the bullies that chased him a chance to catch up to him. He was safe inside. Even if they did follow him inside, the librarians wouldn’t allow his tormentors to cause a ruckus.
He dashed through the door and sighed. He paused just inside the archway leading from the little entrance hall into the library proper to catch his breath.
The librarian at the desk looked up from whatever they were doing and nodded in acknowledgment of his arrival. He nodded back and made his way, quietly, deeper into the rows of shelves lined with books.
Harry spent a lot of time in the library. It was located only two streets from Privet Drive and was his favourite refuge. Whenever he could get away from the house after his chores were completed. Especially when Dudley’s gang got bored with terrorizing other younger children at the arcade and vandalizing various buildings.
Despite what his teachers thought, Harry was quite smart. He spent hours in the library, reading books on various subjects. Over the years, he read through all the age-appropriate children’s books and had long since begun to go through the grownup books. He read books about domestic subjects like cooking and sewing and gardening. These were interesting to him because they helped him do better at his chores. He also read books on his school subjects, putting him a bit ahead of his peers.
And he read other books. Books Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia wouldn’t want him to know about. Books on things like divination, and runes, and spell casting. Books about magic.
According to most of the books Harry read, there was considerably less wand work than in the fairy stories in the children’s section led people to believe. While some spells did use wands, most magic required physical objects. Ingredients for rituals to activate the magic. He was, admittedly, sceptical of magic. So, after reading through many of the relevant books in the local library, he picked out a few of the simpler spells to try.
He was limited in what he could try by his access to the necessary materials, but he managed a few. They weren’t anything serious. Just something to affect his relatives. A bit of bad luck here. A little inconvenience there. Just some minor jinxing.
Dudley’s gang got chased out of a convenience store for attempting to steal sweets. A rock cracked the windshield of Uncle Vernon’s car on the way to work. Aunt Petunia spilled red wine down her favourite dress at tea with her friends, causing stains that refused to be removed.
For once, Harry wasn’t the one blamed for the various misfortune, as he was with the strange things that sometimes happened. (He wondered idly if someone put a hex on him but had no way to conveniently check.) Otherwise, they were as horrible to him as ever.
Then, one day, he came across a particular entry that caught his attention. He remembered some other books mentioning this same thing. This method was extremely simple, with easily obtained materials.
He made his way to the attic one rainy afternoon. Uncle Vernon was at work and Aunt Petunia was playing bridge with some of the other ladies in the WI. Dudley was over at his friend’s house playing video games. He had already finished his list of chores and it was the perfect time to try what he had in mind.
He set the sewing kit and some herbs from the kitchen down next to raffia and burlap fabric leftover from Aunt Petunia’s attempts at making homemade fall décor. Picking up a pair of scissors, he carefully cut the fabric. He sewed the pieces together by hand and stuffed the resulting objects with raffia. Sewing on buttons for eyes, he ended up with three little humanoid figures. Two rounded bodies (one smaller than the other) and one narrow.
Before closing the seams, he removed three little packets of folded paper. Inside each packet were hairs, carefully collected from clothing and bedding during his chores. He added the hairs and some herbs into the little dolls and finished the seams. He quickly packed away his supplies and hid the dolls in his cupboard. His relatives would return soon, and it was time to start dinner.
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