Rhapsody of Harry Potter
Chapter One: On the Blind SideRated PG13 just because I'm not sure how bad it is or will get.
Disclaimer: Chapter titles are from 'Hallelujah Man' by Love And Money unless otherwise specified. I don't own Harry Potter and the other characters and settings, I'm just borrowing them ::cough:: for my own evil… I mean, not evil, definitely not evil, well for my own purposes. So back off evil lawyers! ::waves a blow-up bat threateningly::
Warnings: Um, Slash (Yaoi, Shounen-ai, whatever else it's called), probably bad jokes too. Mentions of abuse and I might put in an actual abuse scene, but only if I can convince someone to write it for me, 'cos I don't know how to write them and I know any I do write would suck.
'Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? Caught in a landslide, go escape from reality.' –Bohemian Rhapsody
Harry grasped for one of the Painless Potions that he had spent all of the last school year stocking up on. He quickly drank the contents of the vial and sat back on the bed, thankful for the relief the potion would give him from his wounds.
Harry had searched for a potion to give him a release from the pain inflicted upon him by his uncle after the summer between fifth and sixth year, when his uncle had decided that his 'freaky friends' wouldn't come if they didn't know anything was wrong. So Vernon Dursley had proceeded to beat him into submission so that he couldn't (or wouldn't) tell his friends that he was mistreating him without fear of being killed. Seeing as he had such a duty to the world to kill Voldemort, he had decided that killing him was important enough to not die by the hand of a muggle before he could.
Vernon had found out after a week of the summer holidays that Harry's magic healed him (including his eyesight, which Vernon had finally clued in to), depending on how serious the wound was. A small cut or bruise would heal overnight, a large bruise or a deep cut would take about three days to heal, and a fractured or broken bone would take up to a week to heal by itself. This in itself lead to beatings, even though it was the one good use of the 'm' word according to his uncle, as he was using magic in their house, no matter that it was unintentional and caused by Vernon Dursley in the first place.
The Dursley's classified this as a good thing, as they could harm him basically any way they wanted, and then return him to Hogwarts with no proof or evidence that it had happened except his word. Then he had found out that Dumbledore was making him stay at the Dursley's all summer, and had resigned himself to a summer filled with broken bones, cuts, and bruises.
And none of his friends had even noticed.
This was his thought as he lay on the bed in Dudley's second bedroom waiting for the potion to take effect. It had been the same this summer, the last one he would have to spend at the Dursley's household, except it had begun worse. Now that his uncle knew that he could get away with the beatings with nobody noticing, he increased his ferocity from the moment Harry had cautiously stepped in the door.
It was now the last day of the summer, and he had just received his final attack, which wasn't as bad as it had been at the start of summer, and had just been opening day old wounds that would heal overnight and breaking a few fingers, which were the only bones that healed overnight.
Harry stared at his bloody clothes (literally bloody), which he wasn't sure could actually be classified as clothes anymore, as they were barely clinging onto his body, covered in dried and fresh blood, and were merely tatters. He was suddenly insanely glad that there weren't any vampires around. This sent him into maniacal laughter (mind you, very quiet maniacal laughter) where it wasn't really funny but if he didn't laugh he'd probably go insane (well, more insane).
Still quietly laughing to himself Harry drifted off to sleep, looking forward to tomorrow and Hogwarts like no normal person has ever looked forward to school (except possibly Hermione).
Then again, when was he ever normal?
And it's a fairly safe bet that he was never Hermione.
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Harry looked down at the long overcoat that the Dursleys had made him wear to cover up the bloodied clothes he was wearing. It was one of Dudley's older coats, which they had not given him before as it was 'too good to be wasted on the boy'. The coat actually fit fairly well, considering his cousin had worn it when he was six, and he was short enough for the supposedly knee-length black coat to actually come down to his ankles.
Dragging the trunk along in his now-healed hand, Harry walked straight up to the barrier between platforms nine and ten, and walked through without fuss, not particularly caring if a muggle saw him walk through a wall. Quickly, he walked onto the train and headed for the luggage compartment, stashing his trunk and owl cage (he had sent Hedwig to Hogwarts to wait for him after his last message to the Order) in a spare place, then morphing into a fairly small seal-point Ragdoll cat (one of his animagus forms) and curling up on his trunk before going to sleep.
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Hours later, he woke up as a voice rang through the train telling the students that there were five minutes before they would be disembarking from the train. Harry stretched out and changed back into a human, before quickly switching his coat for his Hogwarts robes and standing at the door waiting for the train to come to a stop. When the train came to a halting stop, he waited for a few seconds before jumping out of the train.
Harry walked briskly to the area with the thestral-drawn carriages and petted one (which he somehow recognised as the one he had ridden more than a year ago to the MoM) before swiftly entering one of the carriages. Another person sitting in the carriage jumped slightly when he entered, and he looked quizzically at the girl sitting across from him.
She was staring at him with two-toned eyes that were blue in the centre and changed into green around the outside, and her blond-streaked, dark brown hair framed her face nicely.
"Oh god, Harry! I thought you were professor Snape for a minute, you scared me half to death!" Harry raised an eyebrow at the Slytherin. "See! You're doing it again!" she exclaimed.
"Hello to you too, Blaise," Harry replied sarcastically.
"Oh dear lord Harry, stop it! It's really freaking me out. Just when you thought a Gryffindor couldn't get any more unpredictable-"
It was an almost thankful Harry that found she had been interrupted by none other than Draco Malfoy climbing into the carriage next to her. The blond looked him over once then briefly nodded his head in acknowledgement.
"Potter."
Harry imitated to movement. "Malfoy."
Blaise jumped up and cheerfully shouted, "ZABINI!" making the carriage rock madly. Malfoy raised an eyebrow at her in the same way Harry had. "Gah! You're all going insane! First Harry, now Draco… or maybe Harry was imitating Draco not professor Snape…"
"Blaise, sit down," Malfoy commanded, and seemed to be actually surprised when she did. "Potter, you look like the living dead."
Harry rolled his eyes. "Thanks oh so much for that."
Last year, Harry had decided that the animosity shared between them had to stop, and so they had come to a sort of truce, though by no means were they friends. Blaise, on the other hand, would definitely be classified as a friend, as it was hard not to like the loud and always cheerful Slytherin girl. Actually it was quite difficult to hate her, he would know, he had tried so hard. The girl in question frowned at him.
"Actually, you look even worse than you did last year," she commented. "Have you been eating? Have you been sleeping properly? Have you been-"
"I'm fine," Harry cut her off.
"You know that fine stands for Feeling Incredibly Nasty and… um… Eggplant," Blaise told them.
"Eggplant?" Malfoy asked.
"Er, well, I couldn't think of anything for 'E'," she replied sheepishly.
Harry would have hit his head if he wanted to risk the extreme pain he knew would come with it. The Boy-Who-Lived-To-Spite-Voldiewart sighed and leaned his head back on the seat and closed his eyes as the carriage started moving forwards.
Author's Notes
Ok, this is my first official fanfic so don't be too harsh on me. Umm, Harry is going to have a few more animagus forms, but they'll all be felines (because I like cats and I want a tiger!). Please feel free to point out any other mistakes you spot as I need all the help I can get!
Please review so I know how bad I am at writing, but please don't flame me badly ::cringes from the thought of roasted Goddess::. So what I'm trying to say is; please review! I have no reason to live other than to get reviews! Well, I do, but that's entirely beside the point...
Anyway... sorry for rambling on, just one last word before you go...
PLEASEREVIEW!