Harry Potter and the Rite of Passage

Harry Potter was not a happy little wizard.

Of course, this wasn't public knowledge. He had Hermione to thank for that. Rita Skeeter had been sure to stay clear of all things Harry Potter in her daily column after the incident last year that involved Hermione, herself, and that unbreakable jar. She still filled her readers' heads with all the latest gossip on anything else her quick quill could find, but Harry's less than jovial state had escaped public notice that summer. The only ones that knew were Ron and Hermione, as always, and for some reason, they had been surprised.

He let out the breath he didn't even know he was holding as broken thoughts of rage and discontent directly at his friends washed over and out of him. He did not know how he was going to cope going back to Hogwarts. It was difficult enough to write back to Ron, Hermione, Hagrid, and Sirius. How was he going to handle all the students and Malfoy? They all tried to write at least once a week, even when Harry only wrote back twice the entire summer. Each sent their presents for his birthday: books from Hermione, the latest Quidditch accessories catalogue from Ron, a half-eaten mouse from Hedwig, a cake from Hagrid (which he just smiled at and never tried to eat), and a picture of Sirius, Lupin, and Buckbeak the hippogriff smiling together in a sunny, warm place from his godfather. He was thankful for the fact that they thought of him, but he just did not know how to put is disjointed feelings and thoughts about what had happened that previous summer into words his close knit circle of friends and really family could understand.

He was better than he had been during the beginning of the holidays. It had been hard dealing with both the Dursleys and his own grief, but their tireless chores and the hard labor had kept him from thinking. It was not until one night in the middle of July when he woke up from his nightmare of Cedric begging to know why Harry had killed him that he actually had been forced to deal with his demons.

At first, Harry thought he was still in the nightmare. Cedric was standing at the foot of his bed, scowling at him. Harry had just looked at him and closed his eyes, preparing himself for the screaming.

"Oh, stop that," came the curt reply to Harry's actions.

Harry's eyes flew open. Cedric was still at the foot of his bed and still glaring at him.

"Cedric? Is that you?"

The other boy looked pained at Harry's words.

"Not," he paused, trying to choice his words, "not exactly."

Harry looked at him warily. "Then who are you?" Harry then took in the fact that Cedric was not whole. He was transparent with a grey tinge, though not smoky, like the ghosts in Hogwarts. "Are you his ghost?"

Cedric sighed. "Not exactly," he stated with the same pained expression.

"Then what are you?!"

"I'm..." Cedric searched for the words again, staring hard at Harry. "I'm like his shadow. I'm the part of him still bound here." Cedric rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly. "I guess that's how to describe it."

"You guess? Don't you know what you are?" Harry was angry. His dreams had the nerve to invade his reality. Reality was the one place left he could escape his life. He knew that made no sense what so ever, but he much rather be unreasonable and senseless then deal with his pain.

"Well, this hasn't been explained to me! I have just been stuck following you around since it happened! I just--" He stopped again to find the right wording and calm himself, "I just know that this," Cedric waved vaguely at his transparent form, "is not all of me. I know once some things are fixed, I can leave."

"What things? Fix what?"

Cedric glared at him. "You think if I knew that I would still be here?"

Harry sighed, raised his glasses, and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "How do you know that you're not all Cedric?"

Cedric sat down on Harry's bed and looked out the window for several moments before answering. "I just think about some things too much."

"Like what?"

"Mum, Dad..." Cedric looked at Harry from the corner of his eyes, "Cho."

Harry looked at him in silence before mumbling an "oh".

"And for some reason, I just keep ending up here with you every time I try to go see them!" Cedric was up and looming over Harry before the young boy could blink. Cedric reached forward and tried to grab the boy but his hands passed through his shoulders. Harry felt as if his entire upper body had been emerged in water and the air was so thick he could not catch his breath. Cedric gasped and quickly pulled his hands out of the boy. Harry felt the blood rush to his head as if he was upside down and the air in his lungs was sudden so very cold.

He finally came back to reality with the realization that he had fallen partially out of bed and was hanging upside down, facing his open window. His glasses were hanging from his left ear, and he saw a blurry grey image over him that must have been Cedric.

"Harry, are you all right?" the blur asked him.

Harry groaned and corrected his glasses. Cedric was indeed over him, concern evident in his eyes.

"What did you do to me?" Harry asked quietly, rubbing his head where a headache was being to bloom.

"I just...I touched you. I was upset...and...I touched you. I'm sorry."

With that said, Cedric was gone.

Harry saw the other boy sometimes out of the corner of his eye as he went about his daily chores. Sometimes, when he woke in the middle of the night, Harry was positive he saw Cedric watching him from the foot of his bed, but when he blinked, he was gone. The near glimpses made him question if he even was seeing Cedric and wonder if the whole conversation had been a dream created by his guilty conscious. Every time he picked up a quill to tell Hermione (because telling Ron those sorts of things only made his close mate ask in capital letters about his scar), he would be reminded of what Ron had said during their second year, that even in the wizarding world, hearing voices was not a good sign. He did not want to think what Ron and Hermione would say if he told them he was having conversations with the boy that died last summer.

A shrill yell of "Up! Get up!" echoed up the stairs and pulled Harry out of his reverie. Aunt Petunia was calling.

Harry wandered out his room. Aunt Petunia and Dudley were at the bottom of the stairs, both dressed in their best. Dudley was scratching his large bottom and scowling at the hideous sky blue suit his mother had placed on him. Aunt Petunia was impatiently tapping her foot.

"Hurry up! Hurry up!!" She yelled.

When Harry was in reach, she grabbed him by the ear and dragged him down the last two steps and into the kitchen. Uncle Vernon was there, squashed into a too small chair. The family diet had backfired, and now not only was Dudley four sizes bigger than the largest Smeltings uniform, Vernon had advanced further than his son. Harry was sure Hagrid would find he could fit into his uncle's suit with a comfortable looseness around the middle. Said suit was a lovely pea green that reminded Harry of the color of vomit after eating one of Hagrid's rock cakes. Vernon glared over the top of his newspaper at Harry as he was dragged into the room, but said nothing.

"We are having company for dinner," Petunia declared as she dropped her nephew in front of the stove. "Fix dinner, now!" She then went about putting together dessert, which, Harry suspected, she did so she could steal something for herself. Dudley and Vernon had taken to stealing from her plate when she was not looking.

Harry banged pots and pans about, taking pleasure in Vernon's angry glares and purple face over the evening post. His uncle had completely ignored him this summer in hopes that that alone would make him disappear. This, of course, lead Harry to bang up and down the stairs, talking loudly about his criminal godfather, and let Hedwig flutter freely about his room just to watch his uncle's face change from plum to a lovely magenta. He then decided since he was a young, tough, Quidditch playing wizard, he should not even know what the color magenta was, let alone think it lovely, so it was in his best interests just to call Vernon's face purple and be happy to make him angry.

Finally, after much banging, Dudley stole half of the steak Harry was cooking and ran outside with Aunt Petunia hot on his heels. Uncle Vernon, as part of the routine, ate most of the half cooked dinner in three fast gulps and exited the kitchen. Petunia returned, wailed the uselessness of her nephew, and banished him to his room for the rest of the evening.

Harry banged back up the stairs once again, talking loudly about how he was going to let his owl out so she could stretch her wings before he sent her off with a long letter to his convicted murderer of a godfather whom hated over-weight non-wizard folk. He smiled with grim satisfaction at his uncle's angry yell for his wife as he slammed the door shut. He had to rebel against something, other wise, what type of teenager would he be?

He fell face first on his bed wondering how he was going to get to Hogwarts this year for the hundredth time. The Weasleys had wanted to take him for the whole summer, but Dumbledore had forbidden it. The Weasleys had then tried to take him for the last few weeks of the summer, but the Dursleys were bent on preventing him from ever returning to his school, as always. After the fiasco last year with batched floos and enlarged purple tongues, Uncle Vernon had refused to allow any wizards come near the house, even though it would mean Harry would be gone for another year. Uncle Vernon much rather torture him than see him happy, no matter how much his uncle ignored him.

The twins, Fred and George, had wanted to search the Forbidden Forest for the flying car, so they could risk another daring rescue of their adopted brother, but Mrs. Weasley had stopped them before they could try Apparating without their licenses. They were currently trying to find a way to trick Percy into finding the car for them (the current plan seemed to be to convince their brother it would give him an Order of Merlin for heroism in the face of danger, but Ron did not put much faith in the idea since Percy did not think heroism was anything to be proud of). Hermione was convinced that if Harry just explained the situation to Dumbledore, everything would work out. Sirius wanted to take him by force, but a letter from Remus Lupin convinced him there was no reason to worry that his godfather would be captured trying to save him from his relatives.

"At least Dobby isn't here to save me," he whispered out loud with a frown. He would be expelled or dead by now if the house elf tried to help him.

At that thought, he heard a knocking out in the hallway. Harry thought instantly that he had doomed himself to being "helped" by house elves again, and thought of hiding in his closest. The knocking came again, but this time, it was against his door followed by a familiar, "'ello? Are you 'arry's room?" Harry wrinkled his brow in confusion. Yes, he had heard a girl with a French accent talking to his door. He got up from his bed and tip toed to the door, clutching his wand and prepared to face whatever evil that was sure to get him in trouble with the Ministry, as he did every summer before returning to school. Taking a deep breath, he twisted the knob and pulled. To his surprise, he found Fleur Delacour on her knees holding her wand with a crystal dangling by a string at the tip. She looked up at Harry with wide eyes, just as surprised. Before Harry could ask why she was kneeling at his door, she launched herself at him as best she could while on her knees, wrapped her arms tightly about his waist, and some how kicking the door shut in the process.

"'Arry! We were so worried about you! I waz sure ze giants 'ad eaten you!" Fleur wailed this into his chest.

Harry's mind would have wondered what the girl meant by giants, but he was too busy trying to process that a beautiful girl was snuggled against his chest. He was a teenage boy, after all, with very little contact with girls, beside Hermione and Ginny (neither of who snuggled against his chest). Without warning, she lurched away and grabbed him by his shoulders, staring intently at his face.

"Zey did not 'urt you, did zey?"

Harry was still in hormonal bliss, a place where blond French girls asked things like 'do you want me to do that thing with my tongue?'. Fleur panicked at the glazed look in his eyes and began to frantically poke him with her wand while watching the dangling crystal. She managed to poke him in a ...sensitive area which caused him to return to the world as wizards know it exclaiming several words that he was sure, somehow, Mrs. Weasley heard, and, because of, became very disappointed in him.

This pushed Fleur to action. She grabbed Harry's face with both hands and forced him to focus on her. "'ARRY! IF YOU CAN 'EAR ME, DO NOT WORRY! WE WILL SAVE YOU!" She said each word slowly, carefully, and was loud enough that Harry was positive Mrs. Weasley had heard this time. Without further preamble, she dropped Harry and ran out of his room, her footsteps thumping quickly down the stairs.

Distantly, he heard several voices raised in argument downstairs followed soon after by the front door slamming and a car engine blasting up the road. This strange occurrence reminded him that, yes, he had just been prodded by a gorgeous French girl, who was a witch, and she had been in his relatives' house. He was pondering why Fleur had been in the house and what she could have meant by giants when the outer wall of his room decided to explode.

He must have passed out because the next thing he knew, Fleur was looming over him again, dangling her crystal. His head felt so heavy, his ears were ringing, and right now, he did not want to move. In the corner of his eye, he saw Cedric watching him with concern.

"I told you, 'e iz 'urt!"

"I think being throw across a room by an exploding wall would hurt him!"

Harry knew that voice...it liked to wake him up at in the early morning hours during heavy rainstorms.

"No no! My crystal said 'e was 'urt before!"

"Damnit, Fleur! We were supposed to be subtle! How are we going to explain this to those Muggles? Wait, forget the Muggles, what about the MINISTRY?! AND STOP POKING HIM!"

The sharp pain in his chest disappeared.

"Muggles?! Zey were giants! Zey were going to eat 'im!"

Harry heard a deep, resigned sigh. Yes, he definitely knew that voice. He sat up with some difficulty and looked up. Where his back wall once stood, there was Oliver Wood, leaning heavily on his trusty Nimbus 2001. As he looked at the wall, which was now just a gaping hole, he wondered idly why Uncle Vernon had not broken down the door yet. Cedric was now gone, of course.

"They were not giants! I know you've never seen fat people before, but your Headmistress is a half-giant--"

"She iz big boned!"

"Excuse me," Harry spoke up for the first time, breaking a heated staring contest, "but why are you two breaking into my house, screaming about giants, and blowing up my room? I would like to know before MY UNCLE MURDERS ME!!!"

Oliver winced, but Fleur just blinked at him.

"Oh, I slipped ze giants a sleeping potion. Zey zould be out for 'ours."

Oliver just stared at Fleur wordlessly before sighing again, leaning even more heavily on his broom. "Why did you slip Harry's relatives a sleeping potion?"

"Zey might 'ave attacked or worse, eaten 'Arry! Rule number 159, when cornered in a dining zituation and fear for your life or others, use sleeping potion and question later." She tutted at Oliver in way that reminded Harry momentarily of Hermione. "Constant Vigilance! You never listen to Messer Moody."

"That's right, I don't listen to Moody, because half of his rules are illegal!" Wood rubbed at his eyes tiredly. "Is that why you charmed the loo to spit fire?"

"I 'ad to find a way to search for 'Arry." She held up her dangling crystal. "Zee! It led me right to 'is door!"

"But did you have to blow up the wall? Could we not have just, and just tossing ideas about here, just waited for Harry to open the window and climb out? Or better yet, just informed him that he need wait only a little while more and Mr. Weasley would be here to shuttle him off to Hogwarts?" Yes, now Harry was sure. Wood had a tic just under his eye and it was bouncing like mad.

"Well, zis iz an emergency!"

"Just being curious, how many laws have we--and I mean 'we' only in the loose way that means I'm going to get part of the blame even though I left my wand out in car--broken in the last hour?"

Fleur tipped her head to the side, thinking hard. "Only 17."

"Well, can't say you don't know the manual."

"Why are you here?!" Harry blurted out. He was confused as to why a Quidditch player and an ex-triwizard champion were wandering around together, sneaking into his house, giving his relatives sleeping potions, and now seemed intend on rescuing him. He thought again of Dobby, and was sure he wanted to be saved by the house elf more than these two.

"I told you! Rescue you! You're nothing but zkin and bones!" For emphasis, Harry was poked again.

"Stop that," he said with a glare.

"Hmph. Zee if I rescue you from 'ungry giants again."

"THEY'RE NOT GIANTS!! I know this is hard to understand, but not all people are pretty little sticks! How can you be this sheltered? How?!"

"Olivier...you think I'm pretty?"

Harry pretended not to hear Oliver let out a small sob. He was in complete sympathy for the man. He let Fleur murmur healing charms over some of the cuts and scraps he had gotten during his flight across the room, giving time for Oliver to collect himself.

"All right," Oliver said after a short pause, "new game plan." Harry smiled at the memories those words invoked. "Fleur, check the perimeter." The blonde leapt up giggling, and skipped out of the room. "Don't you dare take bits of 'em! They're not giants!"

Harry distantly heard a few French words float up the stairs he assumed were vulgar and directed at Oliver. Of all things, Oliver smiled at that.

"Yeah, she's nuts, but she does her job right. She just gets a little nutters when faced with someone that might be a magical creature. Likes to take pieces of 'em and experiment on 'em. Problem is, she's so sheltered she thinks everyone's a magical creature." During his explanation, Oliver limped toward Harry with a friendly smile. Harry realized that his old captain was not just leaning leisurely on his broom. He was using it as a make shift crutch, and obviously in pain every time he put pressure on his right leg.

"Wood...your leg..."

Oliver looked at him strangely. "You don't know?" He was completely surprised.

"What happened?"

"Oh." Wood looked at him blankly for a moment before sighing again. "Long story, tell you on the way. Just get your things." He hobbled over to Harry's open trunk and began tossing in whatever he could reach that might need to go off to school. Harry moved to help, quiet, thinking.

"Wood, you two are Aurors, am I right?"

"Aye."

"Well...why are you here?"

"Check up on you." Wood paused for a moment. "Everyone has been worried about you, you know. You haven't contacted anyone in almost a month. Everyone thought..." He let the sentence hang, unfinished, but the thought was clear: everyone thought the worst. "We were supposed to just confirm you were alive and well, and, if possible, pass a message on that the Weasleys were arriving in two weeks to take you back to school, no matter what Fudge said." Wood spit out the Head of the Ministry's name as if were dirty water. "Just Fleur flipped when she saw your cousin." He had a crooked smile now. "Thought he had devoured you wand and all."

"Why is she so upset about giants? I mean, Madam Maxime was a half-giant like Hagrid. I would think she would like them."

Harry was certain he heard "big boned" travel up the stairs.

"She really doesn't think her headmaster is a giant. Just don't argue it. Trust me, I've tried. She just yells and then decides you need a second head for company. All set then?" Wood snapped the trunk shut. Harry took a quick look about his room, surprised everything had been packed up so quickly. Shrugging, he went to grab an end of the trunk. "Hey there, no need for that." Wood waved his wand, which had appeared out of nowhere, and the trunk rose in the air. He pointed at the gaping hole in the back wall. "Reparo!" Brick and mortar zoomed back into place followed by a seal of plaster and coating of paint. It looked as good as before.

Wood gestured for the trunk to follow behind him. As the young man made his way toward the door, Harry asked plaintively, "But, where are we going?"

Wood turned back with that same crooked smile. "The Ministry, of course. I don't want to leave you to face those Muggles when they wake up." He shivered. "And, I'm going to have a lot of paper work to fill out on this little incident. Best get started now."