The Taming of Harry Potter

PROLOGUE- The Thing
October, 1987
"The boy is a freak, Petunia, we can't pretend we can cure him. There is no cure for things like him."

In a tiny cupboard under the stairs, a tiny seven-year-old boy sat hugging his knees to his chest, his emerald green eyes brimming with tears and magnified by his crooked round glasses. Little Harry Potter could hear his cousin Dudley laughing at the cartoons he was watching in the living room as he crunched away on a packet of crisps and, if he strained, he could just make out the exuberant squeals of children playing outside in the street, enjoying the last hour of daylight before night set in.

Once he would have been so envious of his peers revelling in their blissful childhood where his existence was practically that of a slave's. However, today Harry was too focused on what they were saying; for he knew without a doubt his Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia were talking about him. Him, Harry- bane of their lives, nuisance, freak...thing.

With more self-restraint than a child of seven years should possess, he valiantly managed to choke back his sobs. Crying would only bring harsher punishment, a lesson he had learnt by his fourth birthday. But he was still such a very little boy and not even he could prevent the tears of self-pity and terrible fear welling over, sopping his clammy and pale cheeks. His thin frame shuddered with forceful shivers every few minutes and he rocked slightly in a vain effort to calm himself.

Today he had gone too far.

Strange events had always taken place around Harry, he didn't mean any of them and he knew how these incidents always frightened the Dursleys' when such happenings did occur. They would glower at him as if he was a stain marring their perfectly ordinary lives, as if they wished he were dead and gone like his parents. But today...today his whole school had witnessed one such event. In part it was Dudley's fault, he and his friends were chasing Harry and somehow when he tried to hide behind the big metal bins, he found himself miraculously up on the roof of the school kitchens.

He didn't even have time to explain that a gust of wind must have blown him upwards; the minute Uncle Vernon read the furious letter from his headmistress explaining he was climbing the school buildings, he was hurled into the cupboard with such force he bashed his head on the wall. It didn't help that Dudley was snickering at the by-lines, telling his father how his classmates thought Harry was some kind of alien for accomplishing such a feat.

At that news, Uncle Vernon had turned umber with a rage Harry had never seen in him before, and he had seen the man angered many times over the years. The boy knew instinctively his punishment would make a slap on the face or a week without food seem mild in comparison. This time he actually feared for his very life and he wondered if he would see tomorrow. And, young as he was, he contemplated the idea of the peaceful eternity of death over the pain of what was to come...

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"What are we going to do with him?" Petunia Dursley asked as she thought of her sister's only child, a boy who they should never have been lumbered with.

How she resented the boy with the same intensity she once felt for his mother, her younger sister. The beautiful, perfect Lily- the daughter her parents worshipped despite the monstrosity she became when she received the letter to that blighted school of hers. What had happened to society when abnormality was revered at the expense of a normal, if rather plain, child? Petunia wasn't blind; she knew Lily was a stunning girl just as her son promised to grow into a rather handsome man. Nothing incensed her more than when a stranger would coo over the cherubic Harry and ignore her precious Dudley, such occasions struck too close to her pained childhood when family and friends would crowd around Lily and she was pushed to the side.

And it was not just in the normal world where Lily's beauty reigned but, according to their proud parents, also in her witch world where apparently she possessed great power, which was no doubt to be inherited by her monstrosity of a son. What had that power brought her, however? Blown up along with her useless husband, that's what! If Lily was so wonderful, why couldn't one of her adoring fans have taken in the boy? Petunia had always held reservations over the idea of raising Harry alongside their own son, worrying over the darkness he might bring to their family for this powerful boy had equally powerful enemies who could obliterate her family on a whim.

"Drown him. Throw him away. Put him in care. I don't care but that thing is not living with us," Vernon snarled, glaring at the cupboard door concealing the child. "Who knows the effect he might have on our Dudley."

Whatever emotions Harry dredged up in her was nought compared to her husband's. Oh, how Vernon loathed the boy since the night he showed up on their doorstep seven years ago. He never knew the full story behind the Potters' deaths and what role Harry had to play that night, however, he had seen the child as a very real threat from the beginning. Vernon had all been set for dumping the baby in a river until Petunia asked him to reconsider, unable to murder a child no matter whom he was.

It was different now. Harry was obviously not only quite capable of magic even though he was only seven years old but he had also drawn much attention to them. What if one of those dark witch people, those who had killed the boy's parents, came to learn of his power? God only knew who might come looking for him. And if he was able to fly onto the roof today, the next time he might decide to strike against Dudley after one of their arguments. Was it so wrong of Petunia to put the safety of her own family before that of this boy she never even wanted? Perhaps if Lily had taken a leaf out of her sister's book and stopped meddling in the strange, she would have been alive now to mother her son for herself.

"But... but... what about the others?" Petunia said in a hushed tone, quickly glancing towards the front door. She had seen first hand what Lily could do and she knew better than to anger the beings like her. "They might be watching the house. They might harm Dudley if we hurt the boy."

Vernon crossed his beefy arms over his chest, smirking chillingly. "Leave it to me, my sweet. I know exactly how to deal with this creature."
End of PROLOGUE- The Thing

CHAPTER ONE- The Boy In The Basement August, 1991
Late one Saturday morning, four years later, the knocking on the front door echoed through the Dursley household. Unable to hear from the back rooms of the house, his mother carried on her activities in the kitchen forcing a reluctant Dudley to abandon his huge breakfast and the television in the living room to answer the door. The hefty eleven-year-old sighed as he plodded into the hallway; it was times like this he wished Harry was still around. After all, why should he be doing chores like this when his cousin could have done it?

"Can I help you?" Dudley said, opening the door to find a very strange man standing on the doorstep.

The man was tall and his skin pallid, almost a sallow hue. He was dressed head-to-toe in black, wearing what seemed like a cloak over his rather dated suit, and he reminded the boy of a cross between someone who had walked straight out of the books on the Victorian era he was made to read in school and a living embodiment of Death. Dudley Dursley was hardly the brightest of children; nevertheless, what was evident to even his rather dulled mind was this was not a man to be messed with.

The man regarded him for a moment, leaving Dudley feeling exposed, and given his sneer, he found the large boy wanting of whatever he sought for in him. "I'm here for Potter," the man demanded.

"I'm sorry, you have the wrong residence," Dudley replied.

He had been warned since the morning, four years ago, when he woke to find Harry gone and all evidence he had ever lived there had vanished with him, that he was never to mention his cousin again. Outsiders of the family had been informed Harry had been sent to stay with other relations yet, if there was one fact Dudley knew, it was that they were his cousin's only family otherwise he would have been sent away when he was a baby. The few times he had accidentally uttered the other boy's name were the only occasions he had actually feared his father, who seemed to struggle not to strike his beloved son for the sin, and he soon learnt not to ever ask what become of Harry. Now his cousin was all but forgotten to Dudley but his father's reaction stayed with him.

"This is the number four, Privet Drive, the residence of the Dursley family?" the man asked, a raised eyebrow the only sign of his confusion.

Dudley nodded his blond head. "Yes, it is. I'm Dudley Dursley."

"Then this is the home of Harry Potter," the man said in a tone that left no room for agreement.

The boy was growing increasingly uncomfortable, aware his evasiveness was not fooling this person for an instant. And he discerned playing this strange man for a fool was a very dangerous game to be playing. Perhaps, it would be advisable to tell the truth since his father was not at home to deal with the situation or to realize Dudley still remembered Harry. He just wanted to rid the stranger from his home; he sensed if he did not, his family would end up the next feature on 'Crimewatch'.

"I'm sorry, sir, he moved out ages ago," the large boy said, attempting to shut the door on the stranger.

"And where, pray tell, would an eleven-year-old child move to?" the man asked in silky sarcasm.

"To other family, he was sent to stay with other family when he was 'bout seven."

"Potter has no other family," was the irrefutable reply. The stranger forced the door open and stepped into the house, his voice lowering into a dangerous hiss as he pointed a stick at the stunned Dudley before the youngster had the chance to scream. The boy might not have known what the stick did but he could sense it was some form of weapon. "Where are your parents, boy?"

"The…the k-kitchen," Dudley stuttered, pointing behind him.

Grabbing the boy by his upper arm, the intruder hauled him non-too-gently in the direction pointed out to him. He roughly shoved Dudley into the kitchen, the momentum throwing him onto the floor. Feeling safer on the floor in preference of being a standing target, the boy remained sprawled where he was, his wide eyes darting from the man to his mother who, with her back to the door, remained oblivious of the threat.

"Who was at the door, sweetums?" Petunia asked, stirring a pot over the cooker and yet to glance back at her son.

The stranger wasted no time making his presence known. "Where is Potter?" the man snarled.

Petunia's eyes widen as she whirled around to gape at the man and the stick in his hand. "Y-you're…you're one of them!"

"Where is the boy? I know he is here."

Dudley's eyes flitted back and forth between his mother and the strange man, slowly crawling closer to his mother. "What is he talking about, Mummy?" he whispered nervously.

Petunia grabbed Dudley, heaving him to his feet and pushing him behind her, never once taking her eyes off the man and his weapon.

"I shall ask you one last time, woman. Where is the boy?"

Petunia's gaze shifted from her assailant to the padlocked door that led down to the basement. The movement did not escape the stranger's sharp eyes and he stalked over the door.

"Alohomora," the man said, pointing the wand at the padlock. The lock snapped open and fell to the floor. Grabbing the door, he swung it open so forcefully that it slammed back into the wall, the handle chipping the mortar. Staring into the darkness of the basement below, the man called down, "Potter? Are you down there, boy?"

"There...there's a switch on the left," Dudley volunteered, nervously.

Despite the precarious situation, the boy tried to peer around the man to see for himself what was in the basement he had been explicitly forbidden to go down to by his parents. Once, when he was eight or so, he been caught tugging at the door by the Dursley patriarch; that had been the only time his father had ever laid a hand against him, the confused astonishment and pain of the spanking had been enough to not encourage a repeat attempt from Dudley.

"What's down there?" the man growled.

His mother pursed her lips together, refusing to speak, but Dudley decided to speak up, both out of boyish inquisitiveness and to prevent this obviously deranged lunatic from harming him or his mother.

"I don't know," Dudley said, edging to the basement door, his amplifying curiosity beginning to override his fear of this strange, dark man. "I'm not allowed to go downstairs but—" He paused, unsure whether it was a good idea to add his own findings. "I think my dad keeps something down there. Some type of creature."

The man's eyes snapped to Petunia, the blood draining from her face and her eyes bulging with fear. He turned back to the darkness of the basement, his hand feeling the wall for the light switch. With a flick, the darkness was vanquished illuminating the concrete staircase going down to the underground room. Without hesitation, the man started to descend down the hard stairs into cold space under the house. Glancing once at his frozen mother, Dudley quickly followed after him.

At the bottoms of the stairs, the man looked around at the usual collection of boxes, which basements across the world were to be home to, but one item caught attention of both man and boy. Tucked away in the corner of the room, barricaded by large boxes, was a large plastic holder that was much akin to the enclosures used to transport large animals on airplanes. The diameters were around five-foot-high-by-four-foot-wide and Dudley could not even think what on earth his father was storing in it, he hated animals.

His brow furrowing, the man stepped closer to the holder, stilling at the stir of movement scratching from inside. Kneeling down, the man undid the latch and slowly opened the door. The disgusting stench caused Dudley to turn away, gagging, but there was no such reaction from his strange companion, only a gasp of appalled shock.

"Potter...?" he murmured, trailing off.