Alright, I want to apologize for taking so long with this chapter. The past 9 months have been crazy what with moving from college to living with my dad for the first time in over 8 years, three visits from my brother with whom I had to be social with, my dad having two nasty breakups with his girlfriend resulting in the last one being a permanent breakage, classes, homework, trips to places lacking internet (and in my mom's case, lacking proper electricity), and the notorious job hunt everyone else is having problems with (unless you already had a job before the economy sunk in which case, feel lucky).
This doesn't seem like much, but there are three major problems I faced with my writing these past 9 months and the first one is a block for writing: my muse left me. I had no idea where I was going in either story. That's all sorted out now and shouldn't happen again for a while. The other problems are a lot more serious.
Back in the beginning of May, my dad and I had to take our dog, Alex, who we have had for over 12 years, to the emergency vets. The next day we found that her heart murmur had gotten worse and had broken part of the wall of her heart and that they could extend her life for another 2-3 months, but that she wouldn't act the same. She would not be active. So we came to the hard decision to have her put down. My dad, his ex-girlfriends oldest daughter who lives with us, and I were there as they did it.
The really rough bump(read crater) in this road we call life that my dad and I hit was my grandfather who, to our knowledge, was perfectly healthy except for high cholesterol, passed away due to a massive heart attack. It was completely unexpected as we have all been expecting one of my great grandparents to pass on or my grandmother but the one who was the most active was the first to go.
So, that's what's been going on in my life. Another problem I had with this story was with the next chapter. I had a hard time with deciding what I wanted. I have a basic idea with where I want to go with this story. It shouldn't be more then 35 chapters. There will be a time jump of six years in the next 5-10 chapters. Sorry if that bothers people, but I don't want to take the next 5 years talking about Harry/Emrys' daily life and every word he said to so and so. It will annoy me and will lead to me abandoning the story. If, after I do the time jump (which, between the two chapters, will have my narrating what happens) someone wants to write a oneshot on what happens, be my guest. Hope you enjoy the chapter!
While Severus was meeting the street kids and Emrys was seeing the justice system from the inside, Minerva and Moody were collecting Kingsley to go to the Dursley's.
"Now remember to stun the husband. He's a big man and could cause a lot of damage," Moody warned.
"Not to mention his annoying voice. Fingernails on a chalkboard with that one," Minerva commented absently.
Walking up to Privet Dr, they could hear yelling at number 4. They couldn't hear the words, but could tell it was bad.
"Okay, on the count of three, Minerva will stun the walrus while we break open the door. One...two...three!" Moody barked out.
The door flew open and seeing Vernon Dursley standing right there, Minerva quickly stunned him while Kingsley put up a privacy bubble over the residence.
"Who's that...what do you want?" Petunia asked frantically, moving slowly towards the vase in the hallway.
"Peace, Mrs Dursley. I was one of Lily's teachers at school. The two men with me are Alastor Moody, Head of the Aurors, and Kingsley Shaklebolt, his right-hand man. I am Minerva McGonagall, Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts...and Harry's godmother."
Moody and Kingsley looked at Minerva in surprise while Petunia gave a sigh of relief. "Thank goodness. Where's Severus?"
"He's out looking for your nephew. Now, Severus mentioned seeing spells on your son?" Minerva answered.
"Oh...oh, yes. Go sit in the living room and I'll go get him," Petunia said, going up the stairs. "Dudley, can you come with me, please?"
"But mum, I'm almost at the end of my game," Dudley whined.
"Pause it. It's very important."
Dudley huffed before doing what his mother told him. Walking downstairs, Dudley noticed his father on the floor. "What's dad doing on the floor?"
"Taking a nap. Come, there are people I want you to meet."
Following his mother into the living room, Dudley was surprised at the appearance of the three people in the room. None of them were dressed normally, something that his father would throw a fit over and their presence seemed to cause a tingling feeling to spread through his body as well as a weird sense of loss he associated with feeling around his cousin.
"Mom, what's going on?" Dudley asked.
"Is Vernon going to wake anytime soon?" Petunia asked. When she received three headshakes, she continued, "Do you believe in magic, Dudley?"
"Yes."
The simple answer confused Petunia. "What? Why?" She had assumed she would have to explain why magic was real to her son as her husband always declared that there was no such thing as magic at least once a day.
"Because I remember weird things happening around Harry when he was here and dad demanding that there was no such things as magic whenever Harry tried to say 'It was like magic'. Why? What's going on? Why won't dad wake up?" Dudley asked quickly.
"Dudley, the reason why your Aunt Lily isn't mentioned often and why Vernon treated Harry like he did was because they were magical. They could cast spells. You know that Harry's parents were dead, but they didn't die in a car crash as Vernon insisted every time someone asked and they weren't useless drunks. Lily and James died to say Harry and caused one of the darkest wizards in history to die-"
"Disappear," Minerva and Moody interrupted.
"Disappear. Now I do not approve of how your father treated my nephew, but I didn't have a choice other then to accept it. First I had spells put on me that forced me to ignore Harry, but those eventually broke when I caught your father...whipping Harry." She was interrupted by a growl from Minerva, but continued, "Then he threatened me by telling me that if I told anyone about what was happening, he would take bother of you and rid the world of Harry. The man you met earlier is named Severus Snape and he used to be my neighbor when we were kids-"
"Neighbor?!" the three adults asked, shocked.
Petunia turned to them, irritated. "Will you stop irritating me? Yes, Severus was our neighbor." Turning to Dudley, she continued, "He was looking for Harry because he was supposed to receive a letter from Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, but he probably changed his name so nothing appeared. Sev also said there were some spells placed on you. I suppose he called in reinforcements."
"Yes. He knew I would be on his side. I am, after all, Harry's godmother," Minerva answered.
"Why did you not come check on him while he was living here?" Petunia asked.
"Whenever I tried to come, I would suddenly remember something really important that I had to do. Eventually I figured out that Albus had put wards up that wouldn't allow anyone but Harry and anybody Dumbledore approved of to get within ten miles of this block."
"He obviously placed somebody here. Who would he have placed here to keep an eye and make sure Harry was still living?" Moody asked.
"A squib. Probably a Figg, the family owes him a debt for saving them many years ago," Minerva answered.
Petunia looked shocked. "There was an Arabella Figg a few houses down. She used to watch Harry when we went out. About three years ago, right before Harry ran away, she was put into a nursing home because she had Alzheimer's and couldn't be trusted to take care of herself anymore."
The other three adults looked disapproving. "Did you really leave your nephew out of family events?" Kingsley asked.
"It was either that or put him under Vernon's watch even more. Sending him to Mrs. Figg killed two bees with one swat. Vernon was happy Harry wasn't around and Harry was away from Vernon's watchful gaze," Petunia explained. "Not that it helped matters. That old fool used to come...introduced himself as Harry's grandfather...so Vernon got more spiteful because he believed that Harry had other family but they wouldn't take him."
"What did he introduce himself as?" Minerva asked with a sinking feeling.
Dudley answered, "He wanted us to call him Grandpa Albie."
Minerva was furious, Kingsley was shocked, and Alastor was amazed at how far his friend went.
"All because Albus wanted more power...did he ever give you anything where after you felt funny? Like something was missing?" Moody asked, the other two unable to speak due to anger.
Dudley thought for a moment, then nodded. "He gave me a book that he told me to write in once a month and a special pen to go with it. It wrote in red ink."
Moody nodded. "I thought so. Can you get me both objects?"
Minerva waited until Dudley was upstairs before exploding. "Was that a blood quill he was talking about?" she asked furiously.
Petunia was watching carefully as Alastor answered. "No. It wasn't a blood quill. It was a magic catcher."
"A what?!" everyone else exclaimed.
"A magic catcher. It's an illegal, rare item tuned to a person's magic that will write in their magic. The person using the object will feel weak, irritable, and generally a monster to anyone with magic. I'm surprised he's taking us being here so calmly," Moody answered contemplatively while the others paled.
"I think my body knows you're going to fix whatever's wrong. Can you tell me, is that why I was so horrible to Harry?" Dudley asked.
"Yes, that's why. Can I have the book and pen for a moment?" Moody asked.
Dudley silently handed the objects over to Alastor.
Moody looked over the objects, then eyed Dudley. "At the level of magic this has taken, to fix this is going to be painful. There's a lot of pent up magic in here. You'll probably lose weight quickly and you'll be exceedingly kind for," he eyed the book, measuring the force inside, "At least a year. You should be the kindest person for the year and your magic will probably make you exceedingly cheerful for a long time. If you went to a muggle school, you would be diagnosed with ADHD and taken from the room."
Dudley gulped and looked at his mother who nodded. "You're not going to get anywhere the way you're acting now," she answered his unasked question.
Dudley nodded and turned to Alastor. "Go ahead. I want to see how I really am."
"Should we get Madam Pomfrey here?" Minerva asked, worried.
"No, he'll be fine. Tired for a few days and achy, but otherwise fine. Patefacio vox(1)." Alastor said, pointing his wand at the book.
A large mass of red, sparkling mist rose from the "diary" then launched itself into Dudley with a bright flash of red, temporarily blinding everyone.
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(1) Patefacio vox means "open power" according to an online English to Latin dictionary I found. If I'm wrong, sorry, but I'm not a Latin student.