Getting Harry Back

Chapter 2
Morning: Strange Attack

Lully, lullay, thou little tiny child,
By by, lully, lullay.

Oh sisters too,
How may we do
For to preserve this day
This poor youngling
For whom we do sing,
By by, lully, lullay?

Coventry Carol, 15th c.
Commemorating the Slaughter of the Holy Innocents (1)

"He looks faded, gone away."

She shook her head.

"The light in his eyes, it's hidden so far inside that even I can hardly see the little Harry that's left."

She blinked and sighed.

"He woke in the dark again, screaming from his night terrors. He hardly sleeps at all. I know summers are difficult, but this summer seems worse than the last, and the heavens know that the last summer was bad enough. This summer…."

She shuddered.

"He's not just stalked from the outside, but from the inside, too. The fears in his mind, the losses in his heart, the agonies in his wound, all pressing and haunting him."

Her eyes were sad.

"The way he lies on that narrow shabby bed, so drawn into himself. Like a beaten child. Small wonder, given what's happened to him. And what's happening to him."

She sighed again. Then she bent down and took another bite from the freshly-killed mouse before silently ruffling her snowy white feathers to release the disquiet that had come over her.

"Ah, he seems to have settled something. Perhaps that will bring him some peace."

Hedwig paused and thought softly:

"I do hope so."

* * * * * * * * * *

In the small bedroom, Harry had been going between thinking and feeling, and he had finally reached a decision. He looked over at Hedwig. In the dark, all he could see was her ghostly outline and her golden eyes.

"I have to go there, Hedwig -- my home in Godric's Hollow, where I got my scar." He sighed and looked down. "Where Voldemort murdered my parents."

Harry often talked with Hedwig at night – things he couldn't say to anyone, at times when there wasn't anyone.

He got up, went across the room, and stroked his beautiful white owl.

"Saying it out loud helps a bit with the spinning in my head. And you don't seem to mind."

He smiled wanly.

"Sometimes, when I wake up at night…."

He shuddered.

"Brings back all those years in that black cupboard, when there weren't any lights, and there wasn't anyone to talk to. After a while, I feel like I'm floating, like I'm not really here…."

He shook his head.

"Guess I've been feeling that a lot this summer. Not just at night."

He went off into himself, into those feelings.

"Ever since I saw Sirius die, I've felt this hole inside me. Feels like I got stabbed or like something got ripped open."

He winced.

"Like a wound."

Hedwig nipped his finger. Harry came back and smiled a bit more genuinely.

"Don't know why it bothers me. I'm used to pain, I'm used to getting hurt. Why is this so bad?"

A thought came from inside Harry: Because the wound is different.

Harry sighed. He didn't like that thought, he didn't like it at all, but he couldn't get around it. He knew it was true.

"You know, Hedwig, the wound is strange, even a bit unnerving. Always sitting there, like a hole in my stomach. And it doesn't just hurt…"

Harry went into himself again, to the wound, feeling deeper. Then he sighed and looked up at his friend:

"Something's inside that hole, that wound. There's this darkness. And worse, something's in there, in that darkness, squirming around, like it's trying to find a way to get out and…."

He shuddered again and grimaced.

"Oh, Hedwig, I know I'm spending too much time by myself. And with the war and all, my scar almost always hurts."

Hedwig hooted gently. He gave her a small smile and went back to stroking her head. It felt more than soothing, it felt like it was grounding him, anchoring him, keeping him in the world. At least a little.

"That's probably what's getting to me."

The wound said, No.

Harry flinched, then swallowed. This wasn't the first time this had happened, that the wound had "spoken", not at all, but it was always unsettling. Reaching out for support, he offered his arm to Hedwig. She stepped onto it, climbed up to his shoulder, and nuzzled his cheek with her head.

"Maybe I'm going crazy, Hedwig, but this wound… well… it talks? It tells me 'yes' and 'no', not with words, but with feelings, right there in my gut."

Hedwig bobbed. Harry smiled broadly, even with his eyes. "You agree with me. Maybe I'm not so crazy, huh?"

Hedwig nuzzled his cheek again. Harry nuzzled back playfully, comforted by, even enjoying her closeness. But his thoughts strayed back to the wound.

"I trust the wound, those yes feelings and no feelings. I don't know why, but I trust them."

Hedwig hooted and bobbed again, as if agreeing.

Harry nodded in return, almost bobbing like his friend. Then he frowned.

"But the weirdest part…. I know if I told Ron or Hermione, they'd think I was mental…."

Harry's face sagged. Hedwig nuzzled his cheek again. This time it didn't get Harry to smiling.

"Somehow the wound sends thoughts into my head -- words or pictures. My mind's blank or I'm trying to figure out something, and this thought comes out of nowhere. Only it's not out of nowhere – it comes from the wound. I know it does, Hedwig, I know it, 'cause…."

Harry paused and frowned.

"Well, 'cause it feels like it does."

He turned his head and looked up at Hedwig with troubled green eyes:

"Have I gone mad?"

Hedwig ducked her head and nuzzled Harry's nose, then his neck and chin, tickling him. He laughed.

"Guess even if I am crazy, I'm not crazy enough to scare you away, huh?"

Hedwig flapped her wings.

"Anyway that's how I know I have to see my mum and dad's house, my real home in Godric's Hollow…."

He sighed and looked down.

"Least what's left of it."

He looked back up and smiled shyly.

"That came from the wound. Never thought about seeing Godric's Hollow before."

Harry looked intensely into Hedwig's eyes, speaking urgently:

"But it feels important, you know? Really important."

Hedwig hooted softly and bobbed. Harry scrunched his forehead.

"Maybe there's something I have to find, or something I have to do -- I don't know. All I know is I have to go there."

For several moments, Harry and Hedwig looked at each other. Then he sighed again and looked across the room.

His window at Number Four, Privet Drive showed first light moving toward dawn. Harry saw trees, houses, even the faint beginning of colors emerge from the slowly receding shadows. He heard the first birdsong, the long and complex melody of a robin. For a moment he just watched and listened. It had been another long night, another bad night.

"I just wish the wound didn't always hurt," he said. "That hurting – it really gets in my way, it makes it hard to think. And there's so much I have to figure out…."

Again Harry drifted off inside and was gone. The room was silent for many long minutes. Finally Hedwig hooted softly.

Harry looked up at Hedwig, who looked back sad and worried and wanting to help. He smiled back weakly. She fixed him with both great golden eyes.

"It's okay," he said. "I'm all right."

Hedwig ruffled her feathers, looking not-at-all convinced.

"Honest."

Hedwig held her gaze for a moment, then flew down to her perch and went back to her mouse.

Harry went back to his bed and lay down. For a few minutes his mind and heart were empty, blessedly empty. Then it started again, at first not quite thoughts, just vague feelings. Slowly they clarified….

"The war, the killings," he whispered.

Spinning thoughts returned, the scar and the wound began aching, and Harry went more and more away inside of himself.

"In the Prophet," he murmured, "almost every day…."

He shuddered.

"The Patil family…"

Parvati and Padma had been murdered along with their parents, their grandmother, and their four younger siblings. Harry remembered the article. Ron and Hermione told him the Order got reports that the whole family, even the two children not yet in school, had been put under the Cruciatus curse before killing them, whether to get information, to terrorize others, or for sport.

"Even the toddler." Harry saw that awful picture, the one he made in his head from the smiling family portrait Parvati had once shown him. Harry saw them all dead, their faces twisted in pain.

His spinning growing, the scar and wound now throbbing, Harry held his stomach and began rocking slightly.

"Parvati just turned sixteen." He'd sent her a card by Hedwig two days before the news.

Harry was thrown between feeling that it was all unreal and feeling that it was all too real.

"Now she'll never have another birthday, she'll never grow up," he whispered. "She's dead. Parvati. Her whole family. Dead."

Harry fought off waves of nausea and fury, all the while feeling trapped.

He stopped rocking, got up and went over to the window, then turned to his owl.

"I have to get over this wound, Hedwig. It's getting in the way. I have to concentrate on what I need to do. I have to figure out what to do."

Harry balled his fists, his whole body tense, and no longer seeing except inside.

"That prophesy. It all depends on me. Winning or losing. Everything. More people are going to die if I don't do something. But what am I going to do? What can I do?"

Hedwig hooted. Harry looked over and saw her staring. He hadn't known how worried and sad an owl could look.

"Oh damn," he groaned. He walked over to his bed, flopped back down and buried his head in his pillow, the scar and the wound still throbbing.

Silence. A car passed by on Privet Drive. A dog barked. More silence. The scar and wound pains slowly receded, returning Harry to emptiness. He sighed, then he even dozed some, wound and scar down to ache.

Harry heard the cat flap open. He raised his head and saw a ball of black and white puppy fur with eyes, ears and a protruding tail, all of it convulsed in squirms, wiggles or wags.

Harry smiled, rolling off the bed and onto the floor.

"C'mere, little fellow."

The furball careened joyfully into him. Harry picked him up and held him eye-to-eye. A small pink tongue emerged, determined to lick every square inch of Harry's face. Harry laughed and felt better.

"I know it's silly," he told the puppy, "but I like it that you like me."

Smeltings, Dudley's school, allowed sixth year students to have pets. Dudley demanded and of course got a puppy. There had been a "discussion" so loud that Harry heard the words through his closed door. At first Harry was surprised that Aunt Petunia would tolerate the puppy, which certainly made messes. But he figured that Aunt Petunia tolerated anything "her Dudley" wanted, or at least anything "her Dudley" threw a tantrum about.

Early mornings, the puppy – Harry, permanently locked in his room, hadn't heard its name – had taken to exploring, soon finding the cat flap into Harry's room. Harry had been delighted and looked forward to the puppy's visits, though he was always careful to send the puppy back the moment he heard sounds of the Dursleys waking up.

"You're the only one in this house glad to see me."

Hedwig hooted her owlish displeasure.

Harry smiled at her: "Except for you."

Initially disdainful of the puppy, Hedwig had grown through tolerant and was well on her way to fond. Not that they played together; that was still beneath her dignity. But Harry sensed that she liked the puppy because Harry liked the puppy, because the puppy cheered him up.

For the next hour, Harry and the puppy played tug-of-war, fetch the balled up parchment, and lick-and-wrestle. Then Harry heard the first warning noises that the Dursleys were getting up. As always, it was Aunt Petunia stumbling her way to the bathroom.

"Better get along back to Dudley, little fellow," Harry told the puppy, pushing him through the flap. "Go on, go on, back to Dudley."

Eventually the puppy left, trotting next door. Harry sat on the side of his bed.

As always, too, Harry felt sad, very sad.

"God, I hate living here. I hate being locked up. And I really hate everybody hating me."

Both his scar and wound, which took a pain-break during puppy visits, went back to aching.

Harry knew why he had to stay at the Dursleys. It was safest. "Not that anywhere's going to stay safe in the war."

Dumbledore had told him that the ancient magic of his mother's blood in Aunt Petunia protected him there from Voldemort. "Until I kill him or he kills me." More bitterness.

Dumbledore had set up a Portkey so Ron and Hermione could visit every day. That helped, that helped a lot.

"But not as much as it might've."

Over the past month Harry had watched Ron and Hermione getting closer and closer. Last week they finally told him they were in love; Harry was the first one they told. He was happy for them, or at least he tried hard to be, and part of him really was. He told himself that it was the best thing that had happened in forever, the best thing he could want for both of them, both his best friends.

Still as much and as hard as he tried and he wanted to, Harry couldn't make it feel just good. He knew it was one more way that he was left out, now even with his best friends. Ron and Hermione were a couple, and that meant that Ron, Hermione and Harry weren't quite so much a trio, they weren't just three equal friends. They were a couple plus Harry, and that "plus" felt to Harry more like a minus, another loss felt in the wound.

With the prophecy, with Sirius dead, and now with Ron and Hermione, Harry was feeling more alone than ever.

Thoughts of the war and the prophesy surged back, bringing anger and frustration.

"Why should I have to end a war?" Harry punched the mattress. "Why should I have to kill or get killed? It's not fair!"

But not fair didn't change anything.

Harry hung his head. "I still have to do it."

"And" – this felt the most discouraging of all – "I couldn't even do a Cruciatus on Bellatrix. How am I ever going to kill Voldemort if Dumbledore couldn't get him? And if I don't kill him…."

Harry saw that picture again -- Parvati, Padma, the toddler, their dead faces still radiating pain. He felt sick at heart, helpless yet responsible.

"It's my fault 'cause I haven't killed Voldemort."

The wound writhed.

Harry got up and started pacing the small room. After several turns, he began talking to himself in a tight voice.

"That wound, it's getting worse…. It's always getting worse…. I can feel that darkness…. I can feel it getting bigger all the time…."

He kept walking and turning, walking and turning.

"I can feel that thing inside the wound…. It's getting bigger and stronger…. It's always trying to get out…."

Harry started shaking his head.

"I have to figure out what to do… I have to figure out what to do…."

Harry stopped at the window.

"I've got to. I've got to!"

Harry froze, then spoke softly.

"But I can't." His eyes widened. "I can't."

He squeezed his eyes closed.

"I just can't do it!"

He whirled to face Hedwig, sweeping his Potions book off the desk and onto the floor.

"I don't know how to kill; I don't want to kill! But if I don't, if I mess up, we'll lose the war and all my friends'll die and it'll be all my fault like Sirius!"

He gasped and held his breath.

Those two words, Harry did not want to think them, he tried hard not to think them. But they echoed again and again, like an evil mantra burning into his brain and his heart with Cruciatus-like guilt.

The pain….

"No!" Harry wailed, furious with himself. "I won't think that!"

The water glass at his bedside shattered. Hedwig hooted cautiously.

Harry staggered to his bed and collapsed.

The pain….

A white-hot knife jabbed into that wound, twisting and burning, twisting and burning. Harry doubled up, his face contorting.

"I will not scream," he whispered through clenched teeth. "I will get through this; it will go away."

Well beyond distracting, Harry concentrated on breathing, having energy for nothing more. He closed his eyes and hung on grimly.

Then after several minutes' agony, it came.

This time the cloud was a luminescent ocean blue-green. It moved gently around him, embracing him, holding him. Harry sensed a wordless music just within hearing, bagpipes at a great distance playing strong and mournful. And with the music came a rich forest smell, the magic of things earthy and growing.

Staying around him, the cloud also glided into his body. Harry felt it find all his hurts – his scar, the wound, his heart, all the places in Harry that had pain, fear, sadness, unquiet.

With some hurts, it moved like a wall between the hurt and Harry; he could feel it buffering him from the scar and the wound. With other hurts, Harry felt it move inside the hurt itself to heal; he could feel it warming his heart and mind. With still other hurts, Harry felt the cloud surround the hurt and take it away to some place that Harry sensed but didn't know quite where -- a where just outside of his feeling.

Last to come, as always, were the magic flows. Like a fresh wind, these flows brought their own musics. And underneath, those drums and their dancings.

Ever since he could remember, long before he knew about magic, Harry had depended on the cloud and those magic flows, bringing him their love and shelter. That's what Harry called them: his shelter.

As he had so often for so many years, Harry curled into his shelter.

Then he waited.

His wait was long, as it always seemed to be this summer -- one hour, maybe two. Eventually, though, the wound's agony subsided to an ache. Harry opened his eyes. Full morning sun shone through his window, bringing with it the warm, plant smell of fresh- mown lawns.

Harry sat up, straightened his back, and stretched his shoulders and neck.

"This wound's getting in the way of everything," he said.

He heard Dudley downstairs, clomping from the living room where he'd probably been watching the telly, to the kitchen and its refrigerator. Harry sighed.

CRASH!

Something below shattered. Then a great roaring and squealing erupted. It didn't let up and was joined shortly by Aunt Petunia screaming and wailing.

Harry felt a jolt of pain and panic -- his heart pounded, his chest tightened, his head and stomach, his scar and wound began throbbing. For a moment he was struck breathless, motionless.

Then his panic released some, and Harry reached for his wand. His wand in his hand brought breath and thought:

"Could Voldemort've found a way to get in here?"

He heard Uncle Vernon's thudding footsteps rush downstairs. Harry steadied his breathing, though his heart still pounded. He wondered if he should magically unlock the door. But leery from last year's bout with the Ministry of Magic, he decided to wait.

Instead, he listened.

Roars and screams collapsed into sobs, which became an underlay to his uncle's shouts. Minutes passed. Finally he heard those thudding footsteps run back upstairs and stop at his door. The lock was fiddled with. Harry put his wand back on his bedside table and took a deep, calming breath.

The door banged opened, scattering the cold oatmeal that had been pushed through the cat flap.

Vernon Dursley stood in the doorway, white with fury.

"You! Downstairs! Now!"

"What happened?"

"None of your lip, boy, or I'll smash in your face! Just move!"

Harry stared at him with dead eyes and spoke with an even deader voice:

"You do, you know what happens. Remember the train station."

Uncle Vernon's neck and face colored, his hands became fists, his arms twitched. But he stood still, breathing hard and saying nothing.

Harry waited, then moved quietly through the door, having to nearly brush his uncle as he walked by.

"Strange," he wondered, "the wound pain's almost gone."

Harry went downstairs and into the kitchen, following the crying.

There Dudley, his Aunt Petunia, and indeed much of the kitchen were spattered with blood – pools, flecks and smears of blood.

"What….?"

"This!" Harry turned and Uncle Vernon shoved into his face several small jagged hunks of bloody glass. "They were in a piece of chicken!"

Harry stared, then turned back to Dudley, seeing blood still drooling out of his mouth. Dudley stared back, trembling, his face full of pain and terror.

"Well?" his uncle threatened behind him.

Harry turned again to face the hulking man, now bloated with anger and hate. His mind had gone blank; he didn't know what to say.

"Well?" Uncle Vernon's threat increased.

Harry felt his own anger begin. "I don't know anything about it."

"It has to be something you did, you or one of your abnormal kind!"

"We use poisons and curses, not glass."

"But you and any other underage… you-know!" Uncle Vernon shouted, "you can't use magic, you'd get in trouble!"

Harry knew where this was going. "I couldn't've done this. All summer you've had me locked in."

"What about those sick friends of yours?" his uncle roared.

Harry was flung into rage. "We're fighting a war! Already this summer two of my schoolmates've died! And they're not the only ones!"

Then though he knew he shouldn't, though he knew what would happen, Harry gave voice to nastiness: "You're not important enough to bother with."

His uncle seethed and expanded, then advanced on Harry, ramming him with his chest and belly.

Harry staggered back, not startled – this had happened way too many times before. He heard a voice scream in his head: "Why d'you push him? You know what he'll do!" He felt the familiar surge of panic. As the raging man pulled back his fist, Harry felt the equally familiar feeling of leaving his body.

"It's coming again," he thought dully, passively. Without thinking, two words came out of his mouth, also dull and passive:

"Train station."

Uncle Vernon stopped, then took a full minute to get down his rage.

"You hate us," he said. "It would still be worth it."

Harry considered this. Did he hate them? He should, he knew he really should. But did he? The wound and scar aches had returned.

"I don't think so," he said simply, honestly. "I don't know why, but I really don't think I do."

When he said these words, Harry noticed that the thing in his wound rose up, on the verge of coming out. Harry felt this with a detachment that surprised him. "I should be scared," he thought, "or at least worried."

"Liar!" Harry turned to see his aunt's hate. "You filthy, disgusting liar! You've always hated us! Always! I saw it the moment you arrived!" She put herself between him and Dudley.

"You're evil," she snarled. "Just like your mother and father."

Again, Harry was surprised. He would've expected to go for her throat. "Probably what she's hoping. Give them an excuse to beat me. Not that any Dursley ever needed an excuse." He found himself still not in his body, like he was watching from a corner of the ceiling.

In the normally spotless-white kitchen, flecks, smears and pools of older blood, Dudley's blood, were already thickening and drying into a dark ruddy brown, some almost black.

Harry shrugged and left. Uncle, aunt and cousin didn't move except to follow him with their eyes and their hate.

As he went upstairs, he heard Dudley sobbing again and the distant sound of an ambulance. Still detached, he entered his bedroom and went over to his bed.

As Harry sat down, he returned to his body, the blood and pain and hate slamming into him. His brain felt woozy, making the room and his stomach whirl. Harry began retching, then dry-heaving into his wastebasket, his scar and wound violent. He whimpered.

click.

Someone relocked the bedroom door.

All spent, Harry lay back on his bed, dozing for perhaps an hour, vaguely aware of the ambulance coming and going, then of the house's silence, an uneasy and nasty silence.

Outside, the birds had withdrawn into their midday quiet. Casual noontime traffic sounds came from several streets over and low telly noises drifted out of nearby houses. More distant were kid voices from the local play park, the cheery chaos of children at their weekend fun.

The sun began its afternoon tilt.