The Fall Of The Dark Lord

The Fall of the Dark Lord

Chapter 9: Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish

Mr. Dursley was sitting in the living room reading his paper. He grunted at the stock quotes as he then went to skim the sports page. He tried to forget the fact that his good-for-nothing nephew had been home for a week. It was actually rather easy to do, since the boy remained in his room without coming out most of the time. He was very glad that in little over a month the boy would turn 18, a legal adult, and Dursley would finally be able to legally kick him out of the house.

Numerous tremors suddenly ran though the house, but Dursley barely lifted an eyebrow. His son, Dudley, was just coming down the stairs. Dudley was around five and a half feet tall, and was nearing on 450 pounds; therefore, his footsteps shaking the house was not a very new thing. Dursley turned another page in the paper.

"Dad!" Dudley whispered, his multiple chins quavering from the movement, "Dad, he’s…doing…something up there…"

"What!?!" Dursley roared, throwing his paper down and leaping up from his armchair.

Mrs. Dursley, who had been washing dishes in the kitchen, came into the room drying a glass casserole dish with an insanely puffy white towel, "What’s wrong Snookems?"

"That boy is up there—doing you know what!"

Mrs. Dursley gasped, dropping the dish, which smashed on her perfectly kept floor.

Dursley immediately stomped upstairs to stop his nephew from what he was doing—magic.

 

Harry had shut himself in his upstairs room at Number 4 Private Drive ever since he had returned, and for those seven days he had been preparing ingredients he had taken with him from Hogwarts. The room was in somewhat of a shamble. Aunt Petunia would have a heart attack if she was to see it, however, since he actively chose to avoid the Dursleys, the Dursleys had avoided him.

He was currently standing before his dresser brewing the many ingredients he had simmered, chopped, sliced, and soaked in the last seven days. He had put an enchantment on the dresser so that he could burn a controlled smokeless fire on it, without marring it.

He heard Dudley stumble out of his own room and down the hall, but he stopped in front of Harry’s door. Harry glanced away from the concoction long enough to see Dudley’s fat face peeking through a crack in the door. Harry looked back at the cauldron to stir.

Dudley didn’t know what hit him.

Harry’s hand flew out and suddenly the door slammed, smacking him right between the eyes. A small smile curled on Harry’s lips as he heard Dudley stumble backwards.

The potion part of the spell was finished. Harry looked at it, placing his right hand over the steam rising from the inside of the pot. He reached into his pocket and drew out a very long lock of black hair.

"Friend of the father—" Harry stretched the lock out across the cauldron, "I cast this protection upon you." Harry let the hair fall into the boiling liquid, a blue mist coming from the concoction. Harry reached for a pair of shears that was sitting on this dresser, and then cut off a lock of his own hair. "I will keep your secret all of my days," Harry let his hair fall into the liquid as well, "And no harm shall come to you." As he said this, the blue mist became red.

Harry heard Dudley clamor down the stairs.

He stretched his hands out over the cauldron, "Fidelitatis semper passim et reliquum tempus." The red mist escaping from the pot suddenly disappeared in a shower of sparks.

The Fidelius Charm.

Sirius was going to stay with the Weasleys, who knew that he was innocent. Harry refused to allow him to continue living in the wilderness.

He had finished the first spell he had been working on. He waved his hand over the entire workings, "Explerius." The cauldron raised itself up and poured its contents into a waiting flask. Harry moved to the other side of the room, where a second potion was brewing. This second cauldron—also taken from Hogwarts—was brewing a potion that was part of a locating spell.

He then heard Uncle Vernon thundering up the stairs screaming at him. His door burst open with Vernon purple-faced and looking as if his head was about to pop off. He strode forward, fully ready to strike Harry.

"BOY, WHAT IN THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU’RE—"

Harry’s hand flew out.

"Stop," he said calmly.

Suddenly Vernon found himself frozen in mid-stride, his arms and legs thrown out at very ridiculous angles. "Boy," he growled, "You had better undo this NOW or I am going to box your ears!"

Harry ignored him, noticing briefly Petunia’s petrified look as she shielded—very unsuccessfully—her massive son.

Harry continued the spell, leaving Vernon with his arms and legs swung out like a marching Nazi. He pulled a clear orb out of his pants pocket. He levitated it above the potion, and then slowly submerged it.

"POTTER, YOU STOP THIS RIGHT NOW!!"

Harry glared at Vernon, "Shut up."

Vernon, horror stricken, suddenly realized that his mouth was cemented shut.

Harry looked back at the cauldron containing the orb. He stretched his hands over it like he had done with the first one.

"Decere ignis in specula colligium et hilaris fieri."

The potion in the cauldron started into a rapid boil, the liquid glowing a very bright white. Suddenly the orb shot out of the cauldron and hovered in the air. As it left the pot, the light from the potion snaked into the orb so that it floated inside of it like misty clouds. After several seconds that light also diminished until the orb was as dark as ebony. Harry took the orb from the air and stood up.

He turned to the Dursleys.

He pointed his hand to a suitcase that was lying on his bed. It sprang open.

"Dimettere-contrahere-frequentere."

Everything in the room that belonged to Harry lifted off the floor or came flying from the dresser and closet. As they circled in the air each item began to shrink and then made a place for itself in the suitcase. Hedwig’s cage opened so that she could get out before it too began to shrink. Even the cauldrons that he had been using, and the potions, which were both now in flasks, shrank and made a place for themselves.

"I’m leaving," Harry said to the Dursleys as they watched horror-stricken at the flying possessions. "Aunt Petunia, if you would please move so that my trunk could get through?"

She turned her head to see a miniature of Harry’s school trunk floating beside her head. She let out a shrill scream and jumped back as it whizzed into the room and then into the suitcase.

Harry noticed that Vernon desperately wanted to say something, so he waved his hand, giving Vernon his mouth back.

"YOU ARE MOST CERTAINLY NOT LEAVING! I FORBID—"

Harry closed Vernon’s mouth again.

"I am going on a manhunt for Peter Pettigrew, the man who betrayed my parents and framed my godfather. I will be 18 in 36 days. I’ll no longer be your responsibility. As I am leaving today, you will most likely never see me again. I assure you that I am not going to die on this venture, not that you care. I have just recently become the most powerful wizard on the face of the planet. There is no other person as revered, or as feared as I am now. I can easily provide for myself.

"I will be leaving here forever, and I want all of you to know that you have been the absolute worst family a person could ever ask for. You’ve provided food, clothes, and shelter—and an absolute minimum at that—but no love whatsoever. In fact, I’m quite sure that if I hadn’t gone to Hogwarts I never would have experienced the emotion. Did you even know that I was second in the class? The Head Boy? Of course not. You didn’t come to my graduation, even though the time was open, considering that Dudley was too stupid to pass enough classes to graduate.

"I’ll leave you, and you’ll never have to trouble with me again, and likewise I never want to be troubled with you either. If you ever run into trouble with any wizards or witches, I do not want you saying that you are related to ‘The Harry Potter’ in order to get out of it. In fact, I don’t even want my name mentioned in these walls ever again. Forget that I ever existed here, and if you must speak of me, refer to me only as You-Know-Who. I want no ties with any of you. I am starting over."

Harry unfroze Vernon, also returning his mouth to normal.

Vernon, finally learning from his first two mistakes, put both feet on the ground and backed slowly away.

Harry reached his hand out and the suitcase with all of his shrunken belongings piled neatly in it slammed shut and floated over and into his hand. "Hedwig," he called, and the owl came to rest on his shoulder. He looked at the Dursleys with very cold eyes.

"Good riddance," he snarled, and disapparated on the spot, leaving the Dursleys standing in a completely empty room, save for the bed, the dresser and the rug, that left no sign that there had been a wizard living in it for seven years.

 

Harry opened his eyes wondering where he had ended up. It was somewhere in the countryside.

Harry gave a long sigh, "It feels good to be free, doesn’t it Hedwig?"

The owl gave a small hoot.

"Should we start the search here?"

She fluttered her wings slightly.

"Right," Harry closed his eyes and laid the black orb, which was still clutched in his fist, against his chest, "Peter Pettigrew." He opened his eyes, holding out the orb. The black color lightened to a dark gray. "Well, we’re closer than we were, Hedwig. When it turns white we’ll be right on top of him."

Hedwig gave another short hoot.

"What direction do you want to go in first?"

Hedwig gave a crackle of indecision before leaping off of Harry’s shoulder flying strait ahead.

"Forward," Harry said, "forward is always a good direction."