Harry Potter and The Druid's Call

Harry Potter and The Druid's Call

     Chapter One

     Floored

Harry's groan was muffled by his pillow as he struggled out of a deep sleep. The unearthly screech of his ever so generous aunt helped him. He swung his feet over the side of the bed and stared, bleary-eyed at the door. He remained this way for several minutes, struggling against the last vestiges of sleep when the deep booming voice of an obviously annoyed Uncle Vernon yelled from the other side of the door. Harry rubbed his eyes and jammed his glasses onto his face. Uncle Vernon screamed something unintelligible from the other side of the door and stormed away. Harry listened to the groans an squeaks of protest from the steps as his uncle unmercifully put the whole of his immense weight upon them before going to the closet and pulling out a plain white T-shirt and black jogging pants that looked more like they belonged to a woman eight months pregnant than a fourteen year old just entering puberty.

Harry shook his head and reminded himself for the umpteenth time that he needed to shrink his clothes, or get Mrs. Weasley to do it for him. He growled and slammed the closet door, eliciting a yell from the kitchen below.

*Why can't I go to Ron's place. It's been weeks and not so much a peep had been heard from the Death Eaters or The Dark Lord!*

Harry knew his reasoning was unsound, but he found it difficult to be analytical of the situation when he had to suffer Dudley's whining about how little food he got, and Uncle Vernon's long and boring speeches about fine wines, which he claimed to be an expert on even though he'd only been in the business a year. Harry, still grumbling about his ill-fortune, made his way down the stairs' two at a time, his lithe body inducing much less protest from the step than from his uncle or cousin. He entered the kitchen, where Dudley was scowling at his empty plate and staring at his fathers greedily. His bulk was dangling disgustingly over the sides of his unfortunate chair, which was groaning under Dudley's great weight. The aforementioned father was paying no attention to his meager breakfast of apple slices and cold carrot sticks, as his dark, beady eyes roamed through a vintage wine magazine. He noticed his son's staring and pushed his untouched plate towards his son. Dudley reached for it hungrily, his piggy eyes glowing with greed, but recoiled sharply when Aunt Petunia's wooden ladle cracked down on his reaching hands with lightning alacrity.

*She wouldn't make a bad beater,* Harry thought, but then he just sighed sadly at the thought of Quidditch, and took his seat.

Uncle Vernon resumed his reading as if nothing had happened. Harry still wasn't positive what had sparked his uncle's sudden interest in wine other than that one of his employees had somehow managed to talk him into it. His name was Max and he was a mystery to everyone except Uncle Vernon, including Aunt Petunia, to whom it was a constant source of annoyance. Uncle Vernon could often be found speaking to him on the telephone, and every time one of these conversations took place Uncle Vernon made sure no one was near enough to overhear; though Aunt Petunia tried her best to get close enough to eavesdrop without appearing to do so.

Harry couldn't care less that his uncle had discovered a new source of income as it didn't influence his status in the Dursley household the at all. In fact the only things Uncle Vernon seemed to be doing with his money were building a wine cellar under the house, and buying a new flat screen, HD, television. Dudley had had the old television moved up to his room. Harry had only been in the cellar once and so far it was still incomplete, but was extremely spacious, and Uncle Vernon was sparing no expense in its construction. It had imported teakwood for the floors and walls and shelves. The shelves were built right into the walls. It also had a state of the art cooling system to ensure that the wine lasted even in the worst summer heat wave. The floors were still being laid, and Harry could see the flooring people arriving in an assortment of old, rusty, pick-up trucks and sport utility vehicles.

Harry ate his three apple slices (Dudley had six), and ignored the carrots, which Dudley grabbed while Aunt Petunia's back was turned. Harry got up to leave just as Uncle Vernon decided that he would put down his magazine.

"Stop right there boy," he growled, "You've got work to do. The workers in my cellar need help since some of their workers took sick, so I took the liberty of volunteering you to help," he finished.

Harry wished he could wipe the sickly sweet smile off of his uncle's face with a well-placed hex or two. Harry exited the house through the back door, but not before hearing Aunt Petunia complain loudly about lazy lay-abouts who expected everyone to do everything for them, which was possibly the most hypocritical thing Harry had ever heard anyone say.

Harry wore a heavy scowl when he entered the cellar. Several of the sweaty, shirtless workmen looked up at him but quickly went back to work when they met his icy emerald glare. The place was blisteringly hot, apparently Uncle Vernon didn't think or care to turn on the air conditioning for mere workers. Harry's scowl deepened. The cellar was well lit by the myriad of lights on the white washed ceiling. The dark wood, paneled walls gleamed dimly in the light. The floor was less than halfway finished, and five men worked monotonously across the width of the unfinished floor. One worker, who had been standing near the wall met his stare and got up, and walked over to Harry. He was a short, tubby man, who had a roundness to everything about him, from his thick, knobby, legs to his wide portly face. His brown hair was flecked with gray, and receding quickly. His friendly brown eyes were surrounded by wrinkles. He seemed like he was about to laugh or smile, as if he heard a joke that no one else could. He reminded Harry of Hagrid mixed with a little of Professor Dumbledore.

"Hello, you must be Harry," he said in an accent that Harry couldn't identify, "your uncle told me you'd be coming, but you don't exactly fit the description your uncle gave, nor do you look like an incurable criminal," His face split into a smile at that last bit, and Harry's scowl faded as the man's contagious attitude caught on.

"The name's Les Null," he said holding out a callused hand that looked like roughened wood.

Harry took the hand, it felt rougher than it looked and Harry grimaced as the grip tightened.

"You can start by laying down carpet in the office over there," he said pointing over his shoulder, "It's what all the new guys start out on, talk to Nick, he'll show you the ropes. When you're done in there you can help out laying down the tiles in the bathroom."

Les went back to his work and Harry weaved in between the hunched over workers to the door. The office was larger than the Dursley's living room. It had the same white washed ceiling, and teak paneled walls. When Harry entered he found five men sitting in badly made chairs. Two appeared to be drifting off to sleep and a third was slumped over and snoring. A man stood and walked over, he had a slight limp but hid it well. His face was badly scarred and wrinkled. The top of his head was completely bald, but stringy white hair hung down on the back. His hands were many times more blistered than Les', and he looked much more likely to scowl than frown. He could have been Mad-Eye Moody's close cousin. Harry doubted he'd ever seen such a grizzled looking man.

"Grab a seat outta that room and then I'll tell ya all ya need to know about flooring an then you're on yer own," The man had a voice like rocks being ground together. Harry grabbed a chair from what he guessed was the future bathroom. It looked as if it had been added on as an afterthought and in all likelihood it might have been considering how absent-minded Uncle Vernon had been of late.

Harry sat down and listened patiently while Nick ground out everything he knew about laying carpets, tiles, and hardwood flooring. Nick jumped around a lot; often backtracking to something he'd forgotten, and Harry found it hard to remember everything. When he finished Harry asked why they weren't working. Right on cue and before Nick could answer a large burly man came in and told them to start bringing in the rolls of carpet. The only other man awake besides Nick went around waking the other three up. The five workers and Harry filed out of the room to help bring in the large cylinders of rolled up carpet. An old blue van was parked in front of the Dursley's house. The rolls of carpet long, and appeared to be quite heavy. He tried imitating the other men by putting it on his shoulder. Unfortunately for Harry his shoulders were not nearly as wide as neither theirs nor his arms as long. Harry tried anyway. His legs wobbled under the weight. Stubbornly he locked his legs and tried to take a step. As soon as his foot left the ground he lost his balance and fell backwards. The plastic wrapped cylinder came crashing down on top of his stomach, knocking the wind out of him. Harry lie there listening to the raucous laughter of the men who so easily did what he could not. Harry stopped glaring and started focusing on taking a breath with the weight of the carpet keeping his chest from rising.

The offending object was lifted off of him and he sucked in air as if he was new to breathing. Harry pushed himself up, and turned to thank whomever it was that had helped him. The words died on his tongue as he meet the stony face of Nick. He gave Harry a look that said all too clearly that he shouldn't waste Nick's precious time with such matters. He pushed the carpet roll at one of the laughing crewmen, who stopped laughing with an oath, as he grabbed the carpet. Nick stalked away, but not before shooting daggers at the rest of the crew whom were standing around idly and chuckling. That shut them up and got them back to work. Harry realized his mouth was hanging open and he closed it quickly. He'd never thought he'd meet a person who could possibly be like a Snape-Moody hybrid but he had, and a Muggle no less. Harry scowled again, everything made him think of Hogwarts and the magical world. Shoulders slumped he followed everyone else down into the cellars. The original five men that Harry had found in the room were there again with the addition of seven rolled up carpets. Now that the thick plastic was ripped away he saw that the carpet was red with gold designs along the edges. Harry almost tripped over his own feet. Gryffindor colors. If Harry hadn't known better he'd think that Uncle Vernon was doing it deliberately to taunt him. Four of the men unrolled the carpet and began flattening it out while Nick supervised. He turned his stare on Harry and he didn't need words to know he meant he should put Nick's coveted knowledge to use and quickly if he valued his life. Harry bent down to help flatten out any air bubbles that popped up. When it came to stapling down the carpet Harry was pushed roughly to the side by Nick. He took Harry's place on the floor and Harry watched from the doorway. All the workers were fast, stapling long lines in quick succession, but Nick was by far the fastest. He had the longest side and was still done before the others were halfway through. Nick stood and glared at everyone in the room separately. They seemed to work twice as fast under his withering glare and the first part of the carpet was laid. Nick walked over to Harry, his limp making him seem even more formidable. Harry swallowed uncomfortably.

"You think you can handle it?" He growled.

Harry nodded not trusting himself to speak. Nick handed him the stapler and nodded his head towards where two of the others were busy stripping the plastic from the second roll. After getting the air bubbles out again he began stapling. He placed them a little less than half an inch apart. Going slowly at first he began picking up speed. His quick hands and eyes placed the staples perfectly, soon he was done. He got up slowly expecting everyone else to be done and waiting impatiently for him to get out of their way. He turned and was more than surprised to see that no one else was halfway done. Nick was glowering at him from the doorway. He limped over to Harry.

"Think you're pretty quick do ya?" He growled menacingly, "We'll see just how quick when ya race me."

By now all eyes were on the pair and not a hand moved. Nick rounded on them, "Get back to work, and hurry up so I can show this little smart ass who's boss."

The men finished in less than five minutes after that. They wasted no time in unrolling the next section of carpet, and taking care of the air bubbles. Harry was wondering what was going on when Nick grabbed a stapler and pointed to one side of the room.

"You take that side first one to the middle of the top wins, and know this boy, I've never lost and I don't plan to start now," he said vehemently.

Harry was slightly frightened of the man, but was determined to prove he wasn't the worthless little child everyone seemed to think he was. One of the men took a position at the finish line while another stood in between the two combatants.

"GO!"

Harry began stapling like his life depended on it, and by the look on Nick's face it just might. Every time his stapler landed it was in the correct spot and almost before the staple had left it the stapler it was off to the next position. He came to the last side and was aware of Nick arriving at the same time. Sweat beaded on Harry head and trickled down onto his face. He redoubled his efforts. Harry's stapler hit the final spot, and Nick's nearly came down on top of his hand, Harry brought his hand away quickly before Nick could get any ideas. He had not even noticed Nick coming closer. He eyed Nick warily as he too stood up. They stood staring at each other for a long time, and sweat continued to form on Harry's head. The look in Nick's eyes was unfathomable. He was dimly aware that there were many more people in the room than there had been. Obviously the word had spread.

Nick blinked, then smiled at Harry like a long lost son. The smile looked foreign to the man's face, and made his face more frightening. He stuck out his hand and Harry took it, grateful he wouldn't be dying today. The gathered workers made the room seem crowded, and twice as much so when they began whooping and hollering about Harry's victory. Harry was patted on the back so many times he was sure his back was one big bruise.

Uncle Vernon appeared suddenly, his face was purple with what could only be extreme rage. He pushed his way to the center of the gathering. He scowled at Harry, "What have you done this time boy?" His face grew a darker shade of purple by the syllable, "If you've done any of your funny business you'll never see the light of day again," he continued before Harry could get a word in edgewise. Uncle Vernon raised his voice to voice his anger to the workers, who were still yelling outrageously, "Get back to work now! I'm not paying you to have a party in my wine cellar!"

Uncle Vernon's face had reached a new shade that Harry had never seen before. His face was dark blue and looked to be turning black. His hands were balled at his sides, and he looked ready to hit something or someone, probably Harry.

"He's right, you no good sacks of flesh get back to work before I flay you all," Harry recognized Les' voice. He only sounded half-serious, and his tone had a hint of laughter in it. The majority of the men walked back into the main room, most still whispering among themselves, and looking over their shoulders at Harry, with Les and Uncle Vernon following behind. Les was talking quickly and gesturing wildly about something, and Uncle Vernon's face was beginning to purple again.

The hoard of men had made the carpet extremely dusty, and Harry was put to work vacuuming it. Harry scowled again, he seemed to be doing that a lot lately, he hated vacuuming, and why should he have to do it when the others were the ones who had made the mess.

Harry's back was aching as he lay down to sleep later in the evening. He had worked all day, but he didn't really mind that much, as exhaustion helped him to not have dreams. Harry hoped he would have a chance to work in the cellar again, and with that thought he drifted off to sleep, and didn't see the falcon flying towards his window.