Chapter Text
Green leaves hung above Harry as he laid motionless in the tall grass. He felt rotten for days now. The summer was supposed to be spend frolicking outside with Lily and Hedwig, but Harry felt like he was drowning. The scenes from a few weeks ago still clung to his mind. A piercing scream, flesh falling apart in his hands, the cold stone underneath him. Pictures reappeared in his mind whenever he accidentally thought of it. And the only thing that would have made him feel better, his friends, seemed to have abandoned him to their own summer.
They had promised to write him, but it was two weeks into the holidays now. Two weeks since he had departed from Platform 9 ¾ and met Vernon outside of the gates. And he hadn’t heard anything of them since. Hedwig looked sad whenever he didn’t have anything to send. The Dursleys had tried to lock him into his new room, or Dudley’s second room, but noticed that the house trembled with the nightmares that haunted him every night. Floorboards shook and creaked as if a storm passed through the house daily and the nightmares seemed to get worse with every day that Harry didn’t get to go outside.
On the fifth day, they finally let him out.
Now he only has to come back every night, as late as possible, which Harry was happy with. Being outside always helped. Sometimes he spent hours laying in the grass or floating in the small creak two towns over, thinking of nothing, while Hedwig and Lily played together near him.
His days were spent barefoot, sometimes only in trousers or with nothing on at all. No one came near his respite places, except for the occasional animal. Mud clung to him during these days, like the earth didn’t want to leave him alone. Harry grew feral once more without the regular human contact. It was like the last year had changed nothing at all. He was still alone. Only now, Harry noticed the loneliness for the first time in his life.
-Vulpes pilum mutat, non mores-. A fox may change its skin but never its character.
The events from the end of last school year had changed him. He felt himself shaking more often. And whenever he thought of Professor Quirrell, he heard his heart pounding in his ears. He felt the urge to run more often, like he was running away from everything, from the thoughts, last year, even himself.
What was the worst, was that Harry couldn’t even use his wand while he was at the Dursleys. He could get thrown out of Hogwarts if he used his wand and Vernon had locked away his school things as soon as he was back inside the house.
He could understand their fear, they didn’t want Dudley to notice that anything was different about him, they hadn’t told him about Harry’s magic or his past year at Hogwarts. Dudley still thought that he went to Stonewall High, the boarding school in Wales.
Since he didn’t spend a lot of time at the house, there was no room for conflict with them for now. He simply kept out of the house for as long as possible, sometimes even sleeping in the forest. Sometimes he longed for the times in which he looked for their approval in his childish innocence.
The forest had changed as well. It grew wilder during his time away, more blackberry bushes with sharp thorns had appeared and the woods looked darker, more intimidating. It was interesting how the magic seemed to change with his mood, like it was directly reacting to his own magic and thoughts.
Without his wand, Harry had to get creative with his usage of magic. But it was the only sense of normalcy that he had right now, so he practiced simple spells with only his hands. It was harder than he expected, he really had to concentrate for something to work. And he didn’t want to have his magic solely depending on his intense emotions. A book on magical theory had mentioned that the childish form of accidental magic was dangerous to continue into adult hands, because emotions were harder to control than one’s own concentration. And Harry meditated a lot this summer. He found that it helped him with his thoughts and feelings, like he was dipping into an ice cold pond head first. Nothing could reach him when he gained that state. Hours passed like minutes, days passed like hours. It was dangerous though. Harry could feel himself hiding his own emotions beneath a surface of steel, but they were still there and broke through much more intensely whenever they surfaced again.
He knew that he was shocked by the events that had occurred, but didn’t know how to help himself. Sure, self-help books were probably in the shelves of the local library, but they didn’t fit his situation, did they?
He was only eleven years old and had killed someone. He remembered the fury that lit up his heart as he’d held his hands onto Professor Quirrell’s face, the anger that overtook him in that moment. They were his own emotions, he couldn’t blame the reaction onto anything else. Just like he couldn’t blame it onto anyone else that he went down onto the third floor in the first place. His friends had explained to him that they’d thought of some story of suspecting Quirrell all along and wanting to protect the stone themselves, which is why they hadn’t gotten into any trouble that night.
But Harry blamed himself for putting his friends into danger. He could have gotten them all killed, and for what? A stupid stone and some exciting story to tell later? Perhaps that was why his friends hadn’t written to him yet.
He vowed to himself to never act that rash ever again. And that was why he had to practice his magic, even during the summer.
He could make a ball of light appear inside the palms of his hands already. Currently, he was working on making the light stay where he wanted, but whenever he got the ball to float away, it broke. He could also make bruises disappear and heal small scratches that he got from climbing up trees. They covered his entire body sometimes, from whenever he inevitably fell down again.
Whenever he couldn’t meditate or concentrate again, he moved around the forest or the surrounding areas. There was still a lot he hadn’t explored yet, animals he hadn’t greeted yet and trinkets still buried deep beneath the earth.
The crows where always happy about the small gifts which he unearthed. Little keys, rings, coins, sometimes even a pin or a gemstone. Shiny things spoke to him and the crows alike, but he knew that they would return the favour when they found something that they wanted him to have.
His face was filled with freckles again, just like every summer. It didn’t tan in the sun, it only got hot and red, and then, a few days later, a new freckle would appear on his face.
Right now, he was working on another trick. By sticking his hands into the earth, he could feel any bones, metals and stones within the ground. If he concentrated on pulling on something specific, it would slowly move towards him, kind of like a human magnet. Sometimes he could also feel the animals burrows beneath him, but the rabbits had abandoned their burrows this year. Foxes and badgers took up their places instead. The shiny birds from last year had also disappeared. Falcons, Ravens and Crows filled the air and the trees nowadays. Harry could also feel new snakes in the area. But they were often antisocial and were deterred by Lily’s and Hedwig’s presence.
It was interesting to see how his absence had changed to area into something rugged, feral, if not into something outright dangerous. Where the forest was filled with sunshine and play in the years before, it was quiet and darker now. Harry enjoyed the atmosphere, he felt like he needed this right now. He needed time to break apart first, and then he would quietly stitch himself together again. Lily and Hedwig were appreciated during these times. They kept away most thoughts and took care that he fed himself and that he slept enough.
He finally got the light right as he was musing his thoughts. The light had to stay locked in one place, and for that, Harry still had to feed it with energy. Without it, the ball would collapse into itself and disappear. It didn’t have a source of energy itself, that was the difference. Without a wand, it was more noticeable how much energy a spell needed. A wand acts as a conductor, the book said. But not only as a conductor, Harry thought, it was also a magnifier.
With that in mind, he could make the light hold its place for a longer time, even while he worked on something else in the meantime. It felt like success and Harry could smile for the first time in days, it felt like.
*
Weeks passed by quietly and Harry didn’t notice the time passing by until he noticed that half of the holiday was already over.
His friends still hadn’t written and Harry stopped hoping for their letters. He had more important things to do than wait, like working on transfiguring his clothing. Cheap polyester changed into soft linen, much more breathable and durable. It was an old t-shirt from Dudley that Harry worked on today. His control had gotten a lot better in the past few weeks. It still took a lot longer than it would have if he had worked with his wand, but the results stayed for longer.
Before changing the clothing, he had to imagine what the new fabric had to look, feel and smell like. The fabric had to be changed in its smallest details, the fibres themselves, then the weaving of the fibre, and lastly the size and thickness of the clothing. It was difficult to do it all at once, but once you had a firm image in mind, the transfiguration itself didn’t cost much energy.
He breathed out heavily as the task was finished and he finally held a linen button up shirt in his hands. He’d even changed out the cheap black plastic buttons for some durable mother of pearl ones.
Tonight, he actually had to be present at the Dursley household for some reason. They didn’t want him to be walking around the neighbourhood while they had their very important dinner guests over. Some investor someone or other was supposed to come tonight and talk business with Vernon while the family looked nice next to him. Harry was supposed to show the guest just what a charitable and kind person Vernon was for taking in the orphaned son of his wives drunk sister. It was laughable to imagine Vernon and Petunia as altruistic and sympathetic people but Harry supposed that it was nice that he only had to lie for one night. And after all, it wasn’t actually that bad to live with them anymore, they had an unsaid agreement to keep out of each other’s business.
And after the greeting and the dinner, Harry could go upstairs under the pretence of having some homework to do and read for the rest of the evening. It was a good compromise, Harry thought, as he made his way back out of his forest and into the streets of Little Whinging.
The dull and boring streets showed exactly what sorts of people lived inside the cookie-cutter-houses. Beige and miserable people who planted trees without fruits and flowers, without use to the bees. Their lawns were short and prickly, the exact shade of green as Harry’s eyes, even though the ground underneath it was dry as a desert. It was horrible and made his skin prickle. There was no life on these lawns and in these trees, they were as dead as the bricks of the houses, useless for nature and for Harry.
He grinned though, as he reached number four. Without even meaning to, he had made flowers and weeds spring up on the lawn, filling the once perfect lawn with insects, bees and birds. Stuff like that always seemed to happen around him and even though Vernon sprayed some toxic weed repellent on the lawn, the plants stayed. It filled him with satisfaction, knowing that at least one house on the street stood out like a sore thumb.
The sun was still bright outside, although the middle of the day had already passed. He was supposed to help Petunia inside the house. She had made it clear that he still had to work for the food and room that they gave him and Harry was fine with that. First, he would have to scrub the floors and surfaces clean until they shine. Then, he would clean the bathroom and the stairs and when he was finished with that, he was supposed to help Petunia with the preparation of the food.
A great roast baked in front of him, but it made Harry sick to his stomach. The meat reminded him of a dead rabbit a fox brought him yesterday. The innocence of the creature so cruelly taken, given as a gift to him. The fox had meant well but he’d wanted to throw up. The smell reminded him of Quirrels blood sprayed on his hands and face, so Harry gave the meat to Hedwig and Lily, who would appreciate it more than him. Tonight, he wouldn’t manage to eat the meat either, he knew.
Once they were finished, he had to change into some of his nicer clothes. He got those for himself last year, for the beginning of his first year at Hogwarts. They still fit, but had gotten a bit small over the past year. He’d gotten taller and his face had lost a bit of its roundness. He looked angular now, with deeper shadows beneath his eyes from a constant lack of sleep.
“They’re coming!”, Petunia yelled upstairs. “Get down here, Harry, Dudley”.
The red-haired boy sighed internally. They had gone through a whole show earlier today. Dudley was supposed to open the door for their guests while the rest of the family stood behind him. Harry had to take the place behind Vernon, probably to show his difference to the others. What was sad, was that it worked. The man and his wife noticed him immediately and looked at him with pity as Vernon explained that his parents had died during a car accident. It was pathetic, standing there next to them, having to act dumb and childish next to Dudley to highlight the boy’s “intelligence”.
It was hard not to laugh as he watched the well-planned show. It just looked so unnatural and practiced, the Dursley’s behaviour in front of their guests. Petunia playing the perfect house wife and mother as she plated the dinner in an apron. Dudley’s simpering act as he praised his father and told the guests of his exclusive private school. Vernon offered drinks and food as the guests looked around the beige house in faked interest. All the while, Harry stood near, but never close and never spoke out of turn.
The guests were happy to ignore him until dinner started, when the man suddenly looked at Harry and asked him: “and what subject do you find most interesting?”
He had to think quickly, he couldn’t just say, ‘Oh I like Charms best, but I’m almost as good in potions, even though the teacher seems to hate me for no reason’, so he just thought quickly of the first subject that came to mind. “I like Latin and Biology the best, Sir”.
“Ahh, a man like myself”, he lit up with joy. “Ad astra per aspera!” Harry translated quickly into the phrase ‘to the stars through difficulties’ and answered quietly in his raspy voice: “Faciam quodlibet quod necesse est (I will do whatever it takes)”.
The man raised his eyebrows and looked confused, but Harry just smiled nonsensically.
Vernon looked angry, probably for him upstaging Dudley, who’d simply answered “Uhh, I don’t know, maybe PE?”
But Harry was too tired to care about the Dursleys or the guests opinion of him. When the liquor was brought out and the topics changed from superficial into business, the children were sent upstairs. Dudley roughly shoved him as he walked past on the stairs, “You won’t embarrass me like that again, you hear me freak?”
Harry only rolled his eyes behind Dudley’s back. He’d learned a long time ago to simply ignore the insults that came out of his cousins mouth. It wasn’t his problem that he was better at school than Dudley, he didn’t have to hide his intelligence from them anymore since he was at Hogwarts.
When he entered his small room and closed the door behind him, he almost screamed out loud. A small creature jumped on his bed and turned around with wide eyes when it noticed him. It was a house elf. And this house elf was significantly less cared for than the Hogwarts house elves. It wore a dirty pillowcase as clothing and had wrinkly, dry skin, that clung to his emaciated frame like shrink wrap.
It wasn’t a Hogwarts house elf, that was for sure. But who did it belong to and why was it in Harry’s bedroom?
“Dobby is so sorry Master Potter. The Boy Who Lived is easily startled by a visiting house elf. Oh, Dobby is a bad bad elf. He is not supposed to be here, no he is not!”, at this, Dobby the house elf started hitting himself on the head. Harry honestly didn’t know what was going on anymore. The Hogwarts elves seemed much more put together than this elf, who acted like he was on the brink of insanity.
“Quiet Dobby, my relatives are downstairs and they can’t know that you are here!”, he said desperately. But the house elf only got worse.
In a loud voice, the elf said: “Master Potter cannot go to Hogwarts this year! Danger awaits him there. The school isn’t safe for the great Master anymore. Dobby cannot allow him to return there”.
“What is going on at the school Dobby?”, Harry asked confused. “And what do you mean, you can’t “allow” me to return? I have to return, the Dursleys won’t let me stay here for the whole year!”
He took another step forward. He raised his hands to show his goodwill. When the elf showed no sign of stopping his loud wailing that seemed much too loud for the normally silent room, Harry took the elf by his shoulders and tried to calm him down. But no matter what he said, the elf seemed so distressed by the image of Harry returning to Hogwarts that Harry just said: “Aright Dobby! If you tell me what is so dangerous about Hogwarts this year, I won’t go!”
“Dobby can’t tell Master Potter, he has already said too much. His Master wouldn’t be pleased at all if he knew what Dobby told Master Potter already”. Dobby reached inside his pillowcase and pulled out a stack of letters. “Dobby took these from Master Potter. He thought that if Master Potter thought that his friends didn’t write to him, he would not go back to school in shame. Master would have Dobby burn his own hands with an iron again if he knew what Dobby has done. If Dobby can’t tell Master Potter, he just has to get Master Potter expelled.”
Harry turned white. “What? No Dobby, don’t get me expelled! I have to return to Hogwarts again!”
Dobby was wide-eyed for a moment but when Harry didn’t say anything else, he said:” Dobby is so sorry Master Potter, but he has to do this for his safety.
With these words, he turned around and ran down the stairs, Harry close on his heels. When they reached the bottom of the stairs, Harry could only look on in horror as Dobby snapped his fingers to make the giant three layer cake with cherries on top float towards the dining table.
The guests were deep in conversation and didn’t notice the floating cake turning towards them. Only when the cake was directly above the guests wive did Vernon and Petunia turn white. Harry tried to stop the cake in its descent but reached it too late. The cake crashed down on the blonde woman, spraying the guests with whipped cream and cherries.
Vernon turned bright red with anger, his left eye twitching abnormally.