Chapter 1

It had been three years since Petunia Dursley had awoken on that November morning to find a baby on her doorstep, swaddled in a blanket with nothing but a letter to explain who he was or why he was there. The letter was hardly necessary for her to know who the boy was; she had known the moment his green eyes blinked slowly open.

Both the postman and the milkman had come and gone and yet the boy was still there, sound asleep in his basket and not making a sound. She didn't think any baby could be or even should be that quiet; Dudley certainly wasn't. The only explanation was that one of them had left the boy on her doorstep in the middle of winter; no one else could make a baby invisible or whatever unnatural thing they had done, and no normal person would leave a baby alone on a doorstep. But why had her sister dumped her child on her without even the decency to ask? She hadn't seen her sister in years, but she didn't need to to know that Lily would never give up her child willingly.

The letter had given her a sharp stab of grief that almost surprised her in its intensity; she had hated her sister, hadn't she? It had almost skipped over the death of her sister and her brother in law – Lily and James Potter were dead, murdered by a man called Lord Voldemort, and they had left instructions for her to take care of their son, Harry James Potter. That was all. It was all about Harry now; he must be cared for and kept safe, the letter said, away from the dangers of the magical world.

She had a distinct, unnaturally vivid memory of that morning that was perfect down to the most miniscule of details even now. The strange, looping handwriting of the letter and the feel of the parchment it was written on, the way the dim light of the sunrise slowly crawled across the floor as the minutes of sitting motionlessly at the kitchen table turned to hours and the jarring stillness of the house when it was only her awake. It was something she had never noticed before that morning and yet it had been seared into her brain ever since. But at the same time, much of that morning was a blur. There was just so much to take in.

Her sister dead, her late parents' perfect little girl. Beautiful Lily, genius Lily, magical Lily. They had been close when they were little, until Lily got that letter from that stupid school and left. She had hated her for that, and Lily's efforts to make up for it by telling her all about life at Hogwarts had only made it worse. Every story of magic and wands and flying broomsticks only rubbed in the fact that Lily was special and she wasn't, but Lily hadn't seemed to understand that. They hadn't spoken in years but for the occasional letter Lily sent her. She had never replied to any of them, and now there would be no more chances for her to do so. In that moment it had all seemed so petty.

She had never even met Lily's husband, though she had seen him in the moving photographs that Lily had sent her over the years. From their wedding, of Harry flying around the house on a broomstick of all things while his father chased after him and Lily watched laughing. She had never been able to throw any of them away, even if she justified it to herself as simply stopping anyone from finding out about her sister's freakishness. What if someone saw them? No, much better to keep them locked up in the attic she told herself, far away from prying eyes.

Another child to clothe, to feed and to care for. Dudley was enough trouble as it was without having another boy to compete with for her attention. That wasn't even considering how Vernon would take it, and it was sure to be badly. He had had an extreme hatred of magic beyond even hers ever since she told him about its existence a few months into their marriage, despite never having actually met a witch or wizard. He would never accept a wizard in his own house.

As expected, Vernon had been ready to dump Harry in an orphanage the very moment he found out, but she had argued back. It was one of the first times she had really fought back against her husband and never in a million years would she have thought it would be about this; if asked before that day she probably would have said she would want to give Harry to an orphanage too. "Freaks don't belong with us normal folk" Vernon had shouted loud enough to wake Dudley in his room upstairs, and their son's cries had seemed to only anger Vernon further, as if it was somehow Harry's fault for waking him. She had managed to stop his tirade by saying that the wizards might have put spells on the boy to make sure they kept him. The statement seemed to enrage him as much as it frightened him, but it had worked. The only thing that trumped Vernon's anger was his fear.

And so, begrudgingly, Vernon had agreed to keep Harry. They had bought him a rickety old cot from the charity shop and put him in the spare room by himself – Vernon had refused to have Harry anywhere near Dudley – and used the clothes that Dudley had long since grown out of despite being virtually the same age to clothe him. It had been… okay for the first six months or so. Vernon still hated the fact that Harry was there, of course, but they settled into a routine of her taking care of the two boys while Vernon was at work. Looking after Harry for a while was actually respite from the near constant crying and wailing from Dudley, though he became much quieter when the two of them were together. Vernon didn't know that they were ever in the same room – he would go through the roof if he found out – but they seemed to get on quite well. Harry often seemed to be studying Dudley while he grinned toothily back.

But then the magic started. Not very often at first, but gradually it became so that it would be strange for him to go a day without having some sort of burst of accidental magic. The first time she saw him do it was to summon one of Dudley's toys from across the room when he was crying for it and she was shocked speechless for a few seconds. She remembered Lily doing magic when they were younger – making dead flowers bloom in her palm, little bursts of sparks jumping between her fingertips and unlocking doors when their parents were out – but she had no idea if she performed any magic this young. It was almost sweet, she thought, that he was using his magic to cheer his cousin up. Unnatural, but sweet nonetheless.

For much of the day Vernon was out working, so for the first few months of this he was none the wiser. She didn't see any point in telling him; what he didn't know couldn't hurt him, and there was no benefit to anyone in making him angry if it was avoidable.

Of course, that couldn't last forever, and it didn't. One night at dinner Harry had summoned a roast potato off of Vernon's plate – something Harry had a particular fondness for – and after several seconds of spluttering shock all hell had broken loose.

Vernon had again been insisting that they give him to orphanage where they could 'cure' the boy. The not so gentle reminder of the possibility of spells around the house had just about halted him in his rage-filled rant, but only just. He refused to have Harry going out and 'infecting good, normal people', so when they turned three Harry was left at home with her while they sent Dudley to preschool.

They had already had a few problems with that, one being that Dudley apparently "terrorised" the other children – obviously that couldn't be true, not Dudders. She wouldn't raise her child to be a bully. The other problem was that he seemed to be less developed than all the other children his age, though certainly not physically. It was almost ironic actually now that she thought about it, considering that was the reason they had given to the neighbours about Harry not going. They had told everyone his parents were drunks killed in a car crash; it was hardly a stretch to imagine that his mother had continued to drink while pregnant with him and given him some issues by doing so. The neighbours had nodded gravely even as their eyes darted around her to look at Harry through the window, muttering about irresponsible scrounges on society and about how good it was of them to take him in.

In actuality though, the truth was the exact opposite of what they had said. It was obvious from the start that Harry was a very smart boy. He was able to talk properly in a simple conversation months before Dudley had been able to and at age four was now starting to be able to read, albeit with mistakes and quite slowly. She doubted Dudley even knew what a book was.

Ever since that night at dinner though Vernon had been on a mission to show Harry just how unwanted he was; everything given to him had to be of lower quality than what Dudley got, despite the fact that even now at age four the two boys had very little idea about the concept of value unless it was glaring them in the face. And so, Vernon often made sure it was. Dudley's was new, Harry's was falling apart. Dudley's was bright, colourful, comfortable, and Harry's was dull, rough and scratchy. But really, even considering this had been going on for years, this was ridiculous.

It was a Tuesday afternoon and Dudley was sprawled tiredly on the sofa after a long day of running around at school while Harry was sat on the floor, pushing around a battered old toy car whose wheel wobbled every time he pushed it. The familiar purr of Vernon's car pulled her from her newspaper and a few seconds later she heard the front door click open.

"I'm home, Pet!" his gruff voice echoed through the hallway, and several seconds later he waddled into the living room with two rocking horses clutched under his arms.

A rocking horse. She had no idea why Dudley even wanted a rocking horse; she knew the effort of pulling himself onto it was deterrent enough for him to use it a few times and then swiftly decide he no longer liked it. It was beautifully carved and just as beautifully painted so that it looked like a white stallion that had simply been shrunken down with a silky looking mane, a long tail and a plush seat with grips jutting out of the side of the horses head. All in all, Petunia thought that the only way Vernon could have gotten him a better one was to buy him a real pony.

Harry's though, she was surprised that Vernon had even brought it into the house. It looked to be sculpted by a blind man with a chisel who only had the vaguest idea of what a horse looked like, with vicious looking splinters and patches of mould sprouting in random places. The wood itself was damp and rotting and would probably crumble to pieces under even the slightest weight.

It would have been better if he had only gotten one, at least that way Harry could conceivably believe it was to be shared. And she was sure that Vernon knew that. Quick to anger, prejudiced and harsh Vernon may be, but he was not a stupid man. This was just a way to really show Harry that he didn't want him there – her husband was trying to make a power play to a four year old boy. Was this really the man she married?

"What?" Vernon snapped in response to her filthy look as he put the rocking horses down in front of the two boys and watched as Dudley excitedly ran towards his, his tiredness forgotten while Harry looked at his unblinkingly.

"He's just a little freak, what does it matter?"

His uncaring tone wrapped an icy hand around her throat and squeezed, and as she thought the grip only grew tighter. It was so very familiar; the golden child whose parents fawned over them, and the forgotten child who watched enviously from the doorway, unseen by those whose affection they craved. She felt like she was back in her childhood home, only instead of being preferred for his magic Harry would be rejected. That was not to say her parents were in any way uncaring towards her - they still asked her about her grades, worried when she hurt herself and listened indulgently when she needed to vent – but it was never quite as much as they did for Lily. They were always that bit more keen to listen and that bit more interested in what Lily had to say, and children almost always pick up on such things.

Petunia had grown bitter as time went on, and the thought of her little nephew one day harbouring the same bitter resentment towards her that she had held towards her own parents was a surprisingly painful one.

'But it would be so much worse for him,' a voice whispered in her ear.

Her parents had still acted as a loving mother and father, albeit with a favourite child that they didn't bother to try and disguise their preference for. But Vernon would never dream of acting in such a way towards Harry, and Petunia knew that instead of resenting them he would grow to truly hate them. The thought hurt far more than she thought it would.

"Pet?"

With a shake of her head Petunia looked up and saw Vernon stood stiffly in the doorway to the kitchen even as his eyes flicked repeatedly towards the chicken that could be seen cooking through the oven door. Did she really want this to be her life? She liked being a housewife, but did she really want this? Spending every day cooking and cleaning for a man who would never even think to thank her, collecting gossip and watching daytime television all the while her nephew, the child her sister had trusted her to care for as if he were her own, was treated as an annoyance at best. And even Dudley, deep down she knew that Vernon would ruin him. He would become a gluttonous bully without kindness or drive, much like his father.

So, with a final sweeping look around her perfectly normal living room of her perfectly normal house, she came to a decision.

~Scene Change~

A lot could change in five years, Petunia thought as she watched Harry rip the wrapping paper off his new Lego set and gleefully grin at her from his place on the floor of their small house. Dudley had an almost equally gleeful expression on his face next to him as the two boys shared a look, knowing they would both soon be upstairs in one of their rooms building it.

It was five years to the day that she had made her decision to leave Vernon, and she wondered how exactly the past years would have unfolded if she hadn't. Harry would be miserable, that she was sure, but would she be miserable too? Would Dudley be well on his way to becoming like his father? She was almost positive that she wouldn't be as happy with her life as she was now though. She wasn't completely sure happy was the right word – life was more tiring now, there wasn't as much money and so she couldn't afford some of the luxuries she had become used to – but she was content, and watching the two of them grin at each other was far more than she would have hoped for five years ago.

Before meeting Vernon she had wanted to be a nurse, and so she had started on the path to becoming one as soon as she left. She hadn't had the A-levels necessary to become one, so she had gone to night school to get them, all while working a full time job to raise two young boys. Once she had done that she had enrolled in a distance learning university that allowed her to do all her work from home and only occasionally had to meet with a university tutor or take tests on the university campus. She was halfway through her second year of the three year course and she was loving every minute of it, even despite the stress and the tiredness. It made her feel like the person she had been before her jealousy of Lily poisoned her.

The two boys did everything they could to lessen that burden though, and that was something that made her all the more grateful she left Vernon. Dudley would never have thought to try and do that under Vernon's influence, and he might not have even without him if it wasn't for Harry.

Harry was a very sweet, very kind little boy, but only when he was at home or with a select group of other people he had allowed to become his friends. When he was surrounded by unfamiliar people he tended to withdraw slightly. Petunia thought it would be fair to say he didn't really like people, but there was nothing wrong with being a little introverted. She was much the same way. He didn't seem to trust people very easily, but once he let you in he was fiercely loyal and would do almost anything he could for you. It was a trait that was extremely endearing a lot of the time, like when she would come home and there would already be food in the oven and the house would be clean so that she could she spend a little time relaxing, but at other times it could cause a lot of trouble.

There had been a group of boys at school not long after she divorced Vernon that had started picking on Dudley, and no matter how much he came distraught and no matter how many times she complained to the school nothing was ever done. They continued to call him slow, fat and stupid, and Dudley continued to come home in tears. And so, Harry had retaliated. There had been no actual proof it was him, of course, but she knew it was. The boys' shoes had been filled with mud and worms while they were in PE class, their jumpers had been stuffed down toilets, their things had been stolen and later found ripped or broken, and snakes had even been found in their bags.

She still had no idea how he managed that. When she asked he had simply said that he "asked them nicely". Honestly she wouldn't put it past the wizards to be able to talk to animals; how else would they have convinced owls to deliver their post and, more importantly, get it to the right place. It was downright strange, and the fact that it was snakes was rather scary. Evil, slimy little things snakes were.

He had been appropriately scolded for it, obviously, but she knew that he would still do the exact same thing again if he needed to. As it was he didn't; no one had bothered Dudley since.

She sometimes wondered whether they would have been friends if they hadn't grown up together, but as it was she was thankful they had. Harry was a good influence on Dudley with his reading and his patience, and equally Dudley was a good influence on Harry. Without Dudley, she doubted whether Harry would ever do anything a bit more risky. Of course, as a parent she wasn't sure her son and her nephew taking risks was a good thing to wish for, but life without any risk wasn't a life lived in her opinion. If she had been unwilling to take a risk she would still be in that damned marriage.

There were still times she saw a little of Vernon in Dudley, like in his fits of temper when he didn't understand his schoolwork or in his scathing mutters about other children at school, but they were few and far between. She thought that was Harry's calmness rubbing off on him. The two acted very much like brothers, except from the times when Harry acted more like his teacher. That was another of Harry's qualities that she hoped Dudley picked up – his nurturing side she supposed would be the best word. He wasn't particularly encouraging, but if anyone of his friends needed help he would gladly give it. He was the only one that Dudley let explain things to him; not even she was allowed to do that.

He was ten now though, and that meant it wasn't long until he would be going to Hogwarts. She had explained it all to him when he was seven, but only once he had promised not to tell anyone. She had stressed the wizarding world's obsession with secrecy; she didn't know what they would do if he told his friends. She had told him about Hogwarts, told him that his parents were magical too and that when he turned eleven he would get to explore that world himself. He had a lot of questions of course, but she hadn't been able to answer almost any of them. She had told him everything she knew, except how his parents died.

She didn't truly know herself what had happened except that a man who called himself Lord Voldemort had killed them, and she wanted to tell him more than just that. He deserved more than that one sentence. To do that though, she would have to go to Diagon Alley and find out herself what happened. She had been there before with Lily and her parents and she still remembered exactly where it was – she was unlikely to forget anything about that day – but she wasn't sure if she could even get in without a magical person dragging her through like Lily had all those years ago.

She would try though. That letter had said that he was important, and if that was true she certainly wasn't going to send him in blind.

~Scene Change~

Petunia was sure that she must have looked quite strange as she stood on the pavement of Charing Cross Road and stared at the boundary between the bookshop and the record shop. To her it just looked like the two were connected, but she knew there was a slimy little pub hidden between them that doubled as the entrance to the magical world. The more she stared the more the urge to look away grew, but after several minutes of staring she gave up hope that the illusion would break. She couldn't get in.

Feeling slightly dejected, she turned to return to her car when she saw a ginger man dressed in one of the most absurd outfits she had ever seen. A vivid pink button up shirt peeking out from behind a fur coat, clearly a woman's coat at that, navy blue business trousers and crocs in an offensive shade of yellow to top it all off. She blinked away her horror-filled confusion quickly and walked up to him, though interacting with such a man felt like there was spiders crawling over her skin. Were she not aware of the magical world and their obliviousness to the normal world she would have thought him an escaped mental patient who had been given a free pass in a charity shop.

"Excuse me, sir," she said quietly, making an effort to sound desperate as she obviously looked around for eavesdroppers, "my daughter is starting Hogwarts this year and she's just ran into the Leaky Cauldron without me. I can't get in by myself, could you help me get in?"

"Of course, of course," he said with a worried look as he grabbed her hand and dragged her into the pub without even bothering to look if anyone was watching them disappear into a building that wasn't there.

Her nose crinkled involuntarily as she was hit with the stench of smoke and her eyes widened at the blatant displays of magic everywhere she looked. A broom and a mop cleaning the empty parts of the pub by themselves, and judging by the state of the place not very well, the trays of drinks floating across the room and the group of pale, snarling creatures huddled in the corner. She had seen magic before, but that was decades ago and she was so busy staring that she barely noticed the man speak.

"My name's Arthur, Arthur Weasley. I'll have to let you in to the alley itself – you need a wand to open the gateway – but do you need any help finding your daughter?" he asked as he led her across the pub to a small walled courtyard.

"Oh, no, thank you. I just have to find the bookshop; she'll be there."

"Ah, a Ravenclaw then," he said enthusiastically as he tapped bricks with his wand seemingly at random, "all mine have been Gryffindor so far, only two left to go."

When the bricks flicked and twirled away to form the archway and she caught her first glimpse of Diagon Alley in decades she felt her jaw drop and her eyes glaze over. It was like being a young girl again her with Lily, wondering why her Hogwarts letter didn't come.

"Amazing, isn't it?" Arthur said from beside her, "You'll want Flourish and Blotts, about half way down on the left. I'll be in the apothecary for a while, so come and find me if she's not there and I'll have a few aurors come and look for her."

"Thank you."

With a final nod Arthur walked off down the street, drawing more than a few looks as he did so, and left her still staring in the gateway. Slowly she walked down the cobbled street, her head still turning every which way like it had the first time she laid eyes on the precariously stacked cauldrons and the fizzing, twirling spells that erupted every now and then from the sign of a shop called Gambol and Japes. It looked like the sort of shop both Harry and Dudley would love, and the sort that she would do her very best to avoid.

It didn't take long to find Flourish and Blotts and she quickly entered the endless shelves of books, clearly much more than should have been able to fit inside a shop even four times the size as this one.

She doubted Harry or his parents were named specifically; the letter had said that this Lord Voldemort figure had tried to take over Magical Britain, chances were he killed many more families as well as the Potters. It would follow, then, that he was mentioned in a book. At least, she hoped he was. Otherwise she would have to ask.

She saw several identical dark leather books perched atop a table in the centre of first floor, all with the word "reference" written across the cover in golden lettering.

When she opened one there were pages upon pages of book titles written so small she almost couldn't read them, seemingly in no order whatsoever. It would take hours if not days to trawl through every page and she had resigned herself to ask someone when a skinny man appeared next to her and picked up another of the books.

"Ancient Egyptian runes." He said before nodding to himself and disappearing amongst the shelves.

Of course these wizards had to have some magical way of doing things. They couldn't just put it in alphabetical order like normal people could they? They just had to be extravagant and show off how much they could do that normal people couldn't. She hoped Harry didn't turn into one of them. He really was too nice a boy to be ruined like that.

"Lord Voldemort." She said, having to resist the urge the sneer that pulled at her lip at being forced to say such a ridiculous thing.

Every person in earshot stared at her and gasped as if she had said something awful, and there was one woman who was even clutching at her heart with wide eyes and pale skin. These people were even more abnormal than she had thought. Petunia looked back down at the book to stop herself glaring back and watched as the letters seemed to blend into each other as ink dripped and smudged to form words.

Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century Row 23, Shelf D
The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts Row 23, Shelf D
Notable Magical Names of Our Time Row 23, Shelf F

With that she flipped the book closed and somewhat hesitantly walked into the shelves, ignoring the stares she could still feel on her back. It didn't take her long to find row 23, but just as she was about to start scanning the spines in search of any of the three titles she had been given another one caught her eye.

Harry Potter: The Story of the Boy-Who-Lived

She snatched the book off the shelf and hurried to the nearest table which she remained at for the next two hours before she slammed the book closed with a sigh. Harry wasn't just important in this world, he was hailed as their saviour. He was a boy, for God's sake. Hell, when it all happened he was barely a year old. The chances of him even remembering what happened were slim to none, and yet, he was considered some sort of mythical figure.

The book didn't actually say what had happened the night the Potters were attacked, only offered theories that seemed to directly contradict each other. No one knew then, which would open up the possibility that they would want to study Harry like some kind of lab rat to find out how he survived an unsurvivable curse with nothing but a scar. Obviously that couldn't happen; she would have to prepare him somehow, make sure he wasn't caught off guard.

What the book did say a lot about, however, was the man that Harry had supposedly killed. They had never found the body of this Lord Voldemort figure, though, which to her at least discounted the idea that he had died. Bodies didn't just vanish, and considering that the book had specifically said that a body hadn't been found she assumed it wasn't normal for their kind either. Apparently he hadn't just tried to take over their world, he had very nearly succeeded, and likely would have done had he not disappeared when he attacked Lily's house. The book said he was one of the most feared 'Dark Lords' in centuries hell bent on ridding the magical world of everyone who wasn't 'pureblood'. She vaguely remembered Lily saying when they were children that people like her were looked down on but that was the limit of her knowledge.

He had followers as well who called themselves Death Eaters, and some of them were almost as feared as he was. The book didn't say anything about what happened to these Death Eaters after their leader 'died', but she doubted every single one of them had been caught. That was almost as worrying as the lab rat possibility.

She really did hate the magical world. Life would be so much simpler if Lily had been a normal girl and had had a normal son.

Lily. Just like the letter the book largely skipped over the deaths of her sister and her brother in law, but she wondered what they would think if they were watching. She didn't believe in things like that, but still it was something she had thought about ever since Harry first turned up on her doorstep. She liked to think Lily would be at least satisfied if not pleased by how she was raising Harry. She wasn't the most affectionate or the most loving person, that just wasn't her personality, but Harry had no doubt that he was wanted and that he was cared for even if the hugs and the overt displays of pride and affection were few and far between. His upbringing would have been very, very different if Lily and her husband had lived, but given the circumstances she thought she was doing quite well.

Now came the problem of what to do with the information. She would have to tell Harry that his parents had been murdered and hadn't simply died, but if she was honest with herself it was long past the time for that. She would tell him about Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters, but she wouldn't tell him much. He was still only a ten year old boy; he didn't need to know what those people did. Honestly she wasn't sure if telling a ten year old that they survived an unsurvivable curse was a good idea – she didn't want him to think he was invincible – but he would find out anyway the very moment he entered the magical world. There wasn't any point in keeping it from him.

~Scene Change~

Harry tapped his fingers together in impatient excitement as he stared out the window and waited for his Hogwarts letter to arrive. It was his eleventh birthday and Aunt Petunia had promised that she would take him to Diagon Alley as soon as his letter arrived so that they knew what they were looking for. Personally he didn't know why they had to wait; he was sure that he could just ask for the first year things, and then after that all he would need was a wand, which was obvious. But still, Aunt Petunia insisted that they wait for his letter. He had a feeling she found his restlessness quite amusing.

Dudley was sat next to him, and judging by the way he was vibrating almost as excited as he was. Petunia had told him that he in all probability wasn't a wizard considering he never showed any accidental magic, but although that had bothered him it hadn't made him jealous, at least not much. Still, he was just as excited as Harry was to go to Diagon Alley and see the magical world.

The postman had come and gone hours ago and there had been no letter for Harry Potter, a fact that had made him more than a little nervous about his letter not coming at all. Aunt Petunia had said they – we, he reminded himself – used owls to send letters. Maybe an owl was going to bring it? Yes, that must be it. Wizards were show offs, Aunt Petunia had said. Of course they wouldn't just put it in the post.

He heard the sound of the soft clank of the letterbox closing, a sound that he almost ignored before he realised he hadn't seen anyone come up to the door. He almost tripped trying to sprint full speed round a corner and only just managed to avoid knocking over the table next to the door in his haste to get his letter. Having his letter would do him no good if Aunt Petunia refused to take him to Diagon Alley because he broke her favourite vase.

Harry Potter
The Third Bedroom
17 St Pauls Avenue
Slough

Dudley appeared next to him just as he ripped the envelope open, hardly pausing to look at the emerald green ink or the strange yellowy parchment it was written on before his eyes starting jumping from line to line as he tried to read everything as fast as possible.

Petunia had followed him out into the hallway and was busy grabbing her keys from the hook as she watched Harry with a somewhat strained smile on her face. He was reacting almost exactly as Lily had the very moment the professor who had come to tell them about the magical world had left. It was a comparison that brought a sense of sadness that she had lost her sister over something that wasn't either of their faults, as well as shadows of the old jealousy and bitterness.

"Come on, let's get going. You can carry on reading that in the car."

It only took about forty minutes to reach Charing Cross Road, which in the opinions of Harry and Dudley was forty minutes too long. Aunt Petunia had refused to tell them what Diagon Alley was like because she "didn't want to spoil it". Neither Harry nor Dudley liked that reason very much, especially as it meant they had had to wait an entire year to see it.

Harry had to pull both Dudley and Aunt Petunia into the Leaky Cauldron and he was a bit disappointed by the gateway to the magical world. It was smoky, grimy and entirely empty but for one completely normal looking person in one of the booths and the incredibly old man behind the bar who reminded Harry of one of those hairless cats if it had had all of its teeth kicked out. He couldn't see any evidence of magic anywhere; it might as well have been a normal pub, albeit a dirty one.

"Excuse me," Petunia said to the barman, "could you let us into the alley please?"

"'Of course, of course. Muggleborn are you?"

" Just muggle actually," Aunt Petunia said, "its my nephew that's magical. His parents are at work so I had to bring him."

"Course they are, Ministry works folk to the bone. You wouldn't be the first nor the last to complain about them, I can tell you that much." He muttered as he walked them into a dead end alley and started tapping his wand – a real life magic wand! – against the bricks.

The bricks spun backwards to form a large archway that allowed Harry and Dudley to catch their first glimpse of Diagon Alley. They gaped.

Shop windows filled with wands and broomsticks and cauldrons and owls and jars full of some of the most disgusting things either of them had ever seen. It was absolutely fantastic. The only way Petunia could get them away from the joke shop was by reminding them that they didn't actually have any money to buy the fireworks or the dungbombs Dudley was gazing longingly at.

Dudley's whispered "what the fuck" when they saw their first goblin earned him a snarl from the guard as its claw-like fingers tightened around its spear and a slap on the back of the head from Aunt Petunia, which seemed to appease the goblin slightly judging by the slight lessening of its glare. The bank itself was ridiculous to all three of them with piles of gems and precious stones that were probably worth more than their house, all being peered at by well-dressed goblins behind marble desks. It almost convinced Harry that it was all an exceptionally strange dream; goblins in pinstriped suits and wire rimmed glasses were somehow far less believable than goblins existing at all.

The sneering goblin teller they walked up to barked out what sounded like orders in a horrible guttural language that grated against Harry's eardrums as soon as Aunt Petunia said his name, and the three of them were quickly escorted through a series of rough stone tunnels. Dudley was pale and absolutely convinced that they were going to be executed, and Harry didn't think it was that unlikely. It didn't take very long before they were led into a modest looking office occupied by a goblin that looked exactly the same as the goblins in the main hall, maybe a little older. It was hard to tell considering they were all wrinkled anyway.

As it turned out they weren't going to be killed, a fact that Dudley sighed loudly at. Apparently the Potter family was quite wealthy, the goblin said. They weren't by any means rich, but he had enough that money wouldn't be a problem for him or for his children assuming he wasn't an idiot with it. His great grandfather had apparently invented a now widely used potion so there was a constant and quite large revenue stream from that, but apparently a lot of it was from him. He got a cut of the profits from every Harry Potter themed product, and apparently there were a lot of them. Books, fireworks, even dolls. The thought of a doll of him existing in the world was faintly nauseating, but as he was getting a significant amount of money from it he couldn't really complain.

As well as the gold and the various books and possessions the Potters owned they also owned two houses, both of which were destroyed during the last war. One was a modest sized house in the countryside that had been destroyed by Death Eaters searching for his parents. It could be repaired according to the goblin, but it would either take a lot of time or a lot of gold. He had told them to take their time; he was eleven, he had no need for a house yet but he might as well get it rebuilt. The other was his parent's cottage, which had been seized by the Ministry and used as some sort of monument. Despite having no desire to ever visit the site of his parent's murder Harry was far from happy that it had been effectively stolen from him, but the goblin said he would have a better chance of getting blood from a ghost than getting it back. He was assured that everything from inside the house had been removed by the goblins and put in his family vault before anything could be 'misplaced'.

Family vault. As soon as he had heard those words he had asked to go and look. He was happy living with Aunt Petunia, but he would always wonder what his life would have been like if his parents hadn't died. He only had one memory of them from before they died that had flashed across his eyes the first time Aunt Petunia showed him pictures of them. He was lying in what he assumed was his cot with a mobile dangling above him, watching a dragon breathe fire while it chased a man on a broomstick around in circles. His mother and father were leaning over the side watching him with huge smiles on their faces and whispering to each other. He had no idea what they were saying, it all just sounded like noise to him, but they lookedhappy.

He was sure it was a memory too, not just a figment of his imagination like he had first thought. All orphans dreamed about their parents until they were more than just people with flaws and imperfections, he was willing to bet on that, but somehow he knew that it was real, and he knew from the way his parents looked at him that they loved him more than anything in the world. It was his most treasured memory. The prospect of reading the same books that they had read, touching the same furniture that they had touched, gave him an indescribable feeling in his chest.

Neither Dudley nor Aunt Petunia were allowed down into the vaults because they were muggles, not that Harry would have wanted them there anyway. This was something deeply personal that he didn't feel that even Aunt Petunia had any right to see. The twisting, plummeting cart ride deep into the dimly lit caverns of Gringotts was absolutely exhilarating, but it only served to momentarily distract him from the knot in his stomach that returned with a vengeance as soon as the cart screeched to a stop in front of a great wooden door.

He was excited, but he was also nervous. He didn't understand why he was nervous, he just was. There was absolutely no reason to be nervous, he told himself, but still when the door opened with a gentle caress from the goblin he spent several long seconds staring into the gloom. With a few deep breaths to still his twitching fingers he walked slowly forwards and as soon as his feet crossed the threshold torches sprung into light around the room, illuminating the contents in flickering light.

Mounds of gold and silver and bronze lined the walls, bookshelves full of books both old and new somehow stretched further than he could see, and countless bits of mismatched furniture that he assumed was from his parents' house snaked and curved at random. He wandered through the makeshift paths, running his fingertips across desks and tables and books, knowing that at some point his parents had touched it too. Tucked away towards the back was a white cot with the same mobile dangling above it just as he remembered, only now it was charred and splintered with one corner blown off. It gave off a sense of darkness that crawled across his skin, creeping between his upraised hairs and seeping into his pores.

He turned quickly away from it and walked in the opposite direction until he could no longer feel anything but the dust against his skin and stopped in front of a dark wooden cupboard with glass doors and ornate golden handles. It reminded him of the cupboard where Aunt Petunia displayed her good china at home, only instead of plates and bowls this one was filled with wands laid on deep purple fabric.

With some effort he stopped himself from yanking the door open and grabbing the first wand he could get his hands on. These were displayed and they were polished, not ice cream cones to be grabbed by a young boy from their parent's hand. Clearly they meant far more than that. There were dozens of them, far more than should have been able to fit, and he carefully picked up the one directly in front of him with a silver plaque next to it engraved with the name Eugene Potter.

Once his fingers grasped around its hilt he felt a cool, judgemental sensation until the feeling promptly turned into nothingness. The next one he picked up was fiery and uncontrolled and seemed to be raging at him for even touching it, and the one after that stung like he had dipped his palm in acid. There were wands that felt like ice, wands that crackled like lighting against his palm and wands that felt dead, as if they were no more than simple sticks. He spent what felt like hours and yet minutes holding wand after wand of countless Potters, but none felt right to him.

Tucked away in the corner he saw two wands that had been laid together that gave him a tickling feeling behind his eyes.

James and Lily Potter
1960 - 1981

For several long seconds he ran his fingers across the silver before he picked up one of the wands. His father's, and somehow he just knew that it was his father's, gave him a hot, fluid-like feeling as if it were molten metal, while his mother's felt alive in an almost indescribable way. It flickered and danced against his skin yet it was still soft. Both gave him a tangible feeling of comfort, but he knew that it was not coming from the wands. They were not right for him.

The one that laid next to it felt soft and weak when he held it, and he had resigned himself to having to just go to a shop and buy one without the connection to his family when he picked up the next one in the row.

Instantly he felt a ferocious warmth shoot up his arm followed by an echo of an icy, bottomless darkness that was so alike and yet so different to what he felt radiating from his old cot. Sparks of red and blue and green and white erupted from the tip, glinting off the gold coins and bouncing off the stone floor while Harry stared down at it unblinkingly.

Judging by the other wands he thought this one was about average in length and in width, though it thickened towards the hilt. The wood itself was light brown and completely smooth but for a few chips that he assumed were from use during its lifetime. Overall it looked like an utterly average wand, but to him it felt so unbelievably powerful, as if there had been a dam across his magic that had suddenly come crumbling down.

Charlus Potter
1915 – 1980

His grandfather's wand, judging by the dates. Harry spent several more long moments just holding it in his hand before he caught sight of his watch and immediately snapped out of his daze. He had been down here over an hour while Dudley and Aunt Petunia had to wait for him. He wasn't particularly concerned about them being worried about him – Aunt Petunia just wasn't the type to worry he didn't think – but he didn't want to keep them waiting all day. Besides, the sooner he got his books the sooner he could get home and try out his wand. As he left he scooped a generous selection of coins into the money bag he had been given – he would work out how much each coin was worth later – and picked up a what he supposed was a wand holder from a box next the cabinet. It was leathery but definitely not leather, more like snake skin, and looked like it would strap to your arm or ankle. The strap certainly wasn't big enough to go around your waist, but then with magic he had absolutely no idea what was possible.

The goblin gave him a particularly hateful sneer when he finally emerged from the vault and got into the waiting cart without a word. Harry followed quickly with his new wand, or old wand he supposed, in its holder and strapped to his forearm, not wanting to further irritate his only way out.

The cart ride up was almost as good as it was going down and before long he, Dudley and Aunt Petunia were making their way towards the bookshop, at his insistence. There were pre-made sets for each of the years so he didn't have to go hunting around for each of the books he needed, but obviously he still went wandering into the shelves. These were books of magical spells and potions, he wasn't exactly going to pass up an opportunity to learn how to make or cast more of them.

He ended up getting a few extra books about pretty much everything; history, potions, charms, transfiguration, herbology, runes and arithmancy, two subjects which didn't seem to be on the first year curriculum for some reason. The shopkeeper was kind enough to explain wizarding currency to him which actually made him even more confused. 17 sickles in a galleon and 29 knuts in a sickle? What sort of nonsensical numbers were those? His brain feel like it had been shoved into a blender as he counted out the coins. As they left the shop with his books shrunken in his pocket he decided that he agreed with Aunt Petunia's mutterings; wizards really were stupid.

They went through the rest of his list as quickly as they could – cauldrons and cloaks and telescopes just weren't as exciting as spellbooks. They did spend a little while in the apothecary staring at all the strange potions ingredients, or at least they tried to before Aunt Petunia dragged him and Dudley out with a look of distaste on her face. He and Dudley tried to sneak off to buy the dungbombs they had seen earlier but Aunt Petunia was having none of it, even after they promised they wouldn't use them at home.

He had even been allowed to have an owl so that he could write letters home, which actually surprised him a little. Aunt Petunia had been quite vocal about how stupid using owls for post was and how out of place they looked landing on their windowsill. Harry had wanted the beautiful snowy white owl but Aunt Petunia had said no. "It's not even native, all the neighbours will notice!" she had said. Harry wasn't sure if that was actually true, but he wasn't willing to push his luck too much. He had ended up choosing a brown owl with white and black speckled into his feathers and ear like tufts sprouting from his head. Aunt Petunia hadn't let him call him any of the strange names from his history of magic book either, so in the end he had decided to call him Charlie.

"All that's left now is your wand." Aunt Petunia said with a strange look on her face that Harry only just noticed before it disappeared.

"I've already got one." He said as he pulled the sleeve oh his jumper up to expose the holster strapped to his forearm and immediately realised he had no idea how to actually get the wand out.

"It's in here, I'll show you it when we get home though. We haven't got long until the shrinking charms on all my stuff wears off."

Aunt Petunia clearly knew he was lying but didn't call him on it, knowing that he wouldn't lie to avoid getting a wand and also picking up on his embarrassment. Dudley looked a little disappointed not to get to see the wand shop but followed them out of the alley nonetheless, albeit slowly, while Harry had to stop himself from walking too quickly in his excitement to get home and practice his new spells.

As it happened Harry had only just got to his room when the shrinking charms on his books and it took him nearly five minutes of trial and error to finally get his wand out of its holster. He had been waving his arm and flicking his wrist around randomly at the time so he wasn't exactly sure how he was supposed to do it, but he figured now that he knew it involved his wrist in some way it wouldn't be too hard to figure out.

He spent a few moments just enjoying the feeling of having his actual magic wand in his hand before he grabbed The Standard Book of Spell, Grade 1 and skipped through the pages to the first spell. He wasn't really bothered about the theoretical bit of casting spells yet, he just wanted to cast them.

The first spell in the book was called the wand lighting charm, and after over a dozen attempts Harry managed to get the tip of wand to flicker. A few tries later he managed to get the tip to light and stay that way, and only then did he realise that he probably should have read a little more about how to turn it off. As soon as his concentration shifted from his spell back to the book the light died, and Harry decided that concentration must be a key aspect of spell casting.

The next few days continued in much the same way until he could cast both lumos and nox pretty consistently and hold the spell even while he wasn't giving it his full attention. After all, a spell that turned your wand into a light was a bit pointless if the spell failed every time you tried to look at what it was lighting up. The next spell in the book turned matches into needles, but as Aunt Petunia wouldn't let him touch the matches he had to skip it and instead try the next one: the levitation charm.

Unfortunately, he found this one far more difficult than he had lumos. After several hours of trying without even the smallest success he decided he should probably go back and read the theory part that he had ignored at first. There was probably a reason you were supposed to read it. However, the first thing he saw once he had flicked back was a full page warning in big bold letters.

DO NOT CAST THESE SPELLS OUTSIDE OF HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY UNLESS IN GRAVE DANGER

DOING SO IS A VIOLATION OF THE REASONABLE RESTRICTION OF UNDERAGE SORCERY AND THE INTERNATIONAL STATUTE OF WIZARDING SECRECY, PUNISHABLE BY EXPULSION AND POSSIBLE IMPRISONMENT

Shit.

For the next two days he refused to even touch his wand and was constantly on edge to the point that he started pacing around his room, shooting constant glances out his window, always expecting to see owls or wizards in police uniforms. Even when he and Dudley went out to the park to play football with their friends he was distracted, something which earned him a few mocking laughs when he missed chances that he really should be scoring. He just couldn't shake the fear that the other foot was going to drop and something horrible would happen.

But nothing did. No letters came, no wizard policemen appeared on his doorstep to throw him in prison. Nothing.

As soon as the anxiety faded a wide grin appeared on his face and he started practising his magic with abandon. He could do magic outside Hogwarts and no one would know, and that meant he had three weeks to practise as much magic as he could. He was considered the Wizarding saviour after all, it just wouldn't do to arrive at Hogwarts not being able to cast any spells.