Replay

Chapter Two: Somehow Meet Again

    Harry watched, fascinated, as Hagrid stretched as best he could in the small room. It was the first time that he had seen Hagrid in a normal-sized dwelling -- the Hut-On-The-Rock had been tiny by anyone's standards, and Hagrid had Hagrid-sized rooms and furniture back at Hogwarts. He had to hunch over to stop himself banging his head on Mrs. Figg's ceiling, and the pretty Queen Anne-style furniture Mrs. Figg had around the living room would clearly never hold him.

    For a moment, Hagrid just looked at Harry, a gentle, reminiscing smile on his face. "Yeah, yer Harry Potter all right," he said softly. "The absolute spit of yer dad, you are. But yeh've got yer mum's eyes."

    At this, Harry remembered -- yet again -- that this was the first time Hagrid had ever met him. As far as Hagrid knew, Harry was just a kid who knew absolutely nothing.

    "Mr. Hagrid," Harry asked, "did you know my parents?" /Yes, I know you did. But I must ask, because I asked. I've got to play this straight. I can't let anyone suspect I'm not what I seem to be./

    Hagrid nodded as best he could. "Call me Hagrid, everyone does," he told Harry. "And, yeah, I knew 'em. Yeh couldn't ask for better people than yer folks."

    "What were they like?" Harry prodded. He needed something familiar to ground himself, and Hagrid telling him about James and Lily Potter was one of the things he knew had happened, both when they first met and later on.

    "Well, they were good people. Yer dad, he was a right prankster -- I forget how many times he pulled somethin' on the Slytherins! Yer mum, now, she weren't like that much. She was one o' those people yer can rely on foranythin'. They were Head Boy and Head Girl of Hogwarts in their day, and a better pair yeh could never hope to find."

    Harry sighed. "I wish I could remember them," he said wistfully.

    Hagrid nodded. "Yer not the only one, Harry. There's more'n one witch an' wizard who wept for Lily an' James."

    At that point, Mrs. Figg came into the room. "Oh, my goodness! Hagrid! How long have you been here?"

    "Not long, Mrs. Figg," Hagrid rumbled.

    "Well, come into the kitchen and have a cuppa before you and Harry head off. Harry, you should've called me!"

    "Sorry, Mrs. Figg," Harry said.

    "Eh, don't blame him, Mrs. Figg," Hagrid said easily. "We got to talkin', is all."

    "Well, come and have a cup of tea, and tell us what's going on at Hogwarts."

    The kitchen chairs proved sturdier than the living-room furniture, and Hagrid regaled them with a very funny story about how two of the owls who were carrying acceptance letters from the new first years had both almost collided over the breakfast table, and the staff members' reactions.

    "O'course, neither o' them was hurt, but sometimes yer got ter wonder about whether it's goin' ter happen one o' these days," Hagrid said expansively. "Some owls just won't retire when they ought ter, an' get right miffed if their families get another owl."

    This put Harry irresistably in mind of the Weasleys' owl, Errol, and he idly wondered if he had been one of the two owls.

    At that point, the grandmother clock on the shelf chimed eleven, and Hagrid climbed to his feet. "Well, Mrs. Figg, we'd best be off," he announced.

    Hagrid led the way back into the living room. "Now, Harry," he said seriously, what yeh do is, yeh take a handful of Floo powder, yeh step up teh the fire, an' yeh throw it into the fire and say loudly where yeh want teh go. An' then yeh step in quickly, an' it'll take yeh to where yeh said. An' then yeh step *out* right quick, too, 'cause yeh don't want teh burn yer feet. I'll go first; watch me." And Hagrid did as he had said, calling "The Leaky Cauldron!" as he stepped into the flames, and then was gone.

    "Now you, Harry," Mrs. Figg said.

    "Thanks, Mrs. Figg," Harry said quietly, and threw the powder into the fire, calling, "The Leaky Cauldron!"

*****

    He stumbled out, and it was no longer any mystery to him why Hagrid had stumbled. Harry hadn't Flooed anywhere in years and now he completely remembered why.

    "All righ', there, Harry?" Hagrid's voice asked.

    Harry coughed, to get rid of the ashes in his throat, and replied, "Yeah, Hagrid, I'm okay, just gotta breathe." He moved away from the hearth and bent over, rolling his shoulders and bracing his hands on his thighs.

    "It does take some people like that," a different voice broke in, and Harry looked up to see the face of Tom, the barman of the Leaky Cauldron, looking at him interestedly. Harry grinned back and watched as Tom's eyes widened. "Good Lord," the man said. "Is this -- can this be? Bless my soul -- Harry Potter... what an honour."

    Before Harry could do more than stand up straight again and nod in acknowledgement, the old man had come out from behind the bar and was shaking his hand. "Oh, welcome back, Mr. Potter. Welcome back."

    No sooner had Tom released his hand than another seized it and began pumping enthusiastically, and soon Harry found himself shaking hands with everyone in the pub.

    "Oh, Mr. Potter, what an honour."

    "I can't believe it -- I'm all of a flutter!"

    "I've always wanted to meet you, oh, Mr. Potter, I'm so delighted!"

    After Harry had shaken hands with everyone in the Leaky Cauldron -- although he was a tad disappointed that neither Daedalus Diggle nor Doris Crockford, both of whom had been so enthusiastic about meeting him the first time around, were in the pub -- Hagrid clapped his hand on Harry's shoulder. "Well, gotta go, lots ter do," he announced. "Come on, Harry."

    Harry followed Hagrid out to the small courtyard behind the Leaky Cauldron, and watched as he used his pink silk umbrella to tap on the brick that opened the gate to Diagon Alley.

    No matter how often he went to Diagon Alley, Harry thought he would always be awed by it. This version -- before the War, before the dark days when everyone watched their backs -- was all the sweeter for this contrast, and Harry could not keep himself from staring. The witch who was arguing with the cauldron vendor clearly had no idea of the darkness that would fall as she roundly berated the shopkeeper for not extending a special on silver cauldrons to self-stirring silver cauldrons. Harry could have stood there and listened to her, and her troubles, and the fact that too-expensive cauldrons were the worst of her troubles, for hours, but Hagrid dragged him away before he could do more than grin foolishly at her.

    "Yeah, you'll be needin' a cauldron, but we've gotta get yer money first," Hagrid told him, gently (for Hagrid) pulling him along behind him.

    They passed Quality Quidditch Supplies, and Harry heard, as if in a dream, that one boy saying, "Look -- it's the Nimbus 2000! The fastest *ever*!"

    A young wizard, no more than twenty, walked out of the apothecary as they walked by, cheerfully announcing to a group of his fellows, "They've got the rat livers in!" Harry vaguely remembered rat livers as an ingredient in headache and hangover potions, and wondered if it would please or incense Snape that he'd managed to din that much into Harry's skull.

    They were passing Eeylops Owl Emporium, and Harry felt a pang as he thought of Hedwig sitting in there, waiting for him to come in (although she couldn't know him yet) and look at her, and say to Hagrid, "I like *that* one," and for her cage to be gently taken down and set into his hands. His first friend would be napping gently now, her head tucked neatly under her wing and her beak absently nibbling at the shafts of her primaries in her sleep.

    /Sleep now, Hedwig; soon enough I will come in, and you'll have a master to worry over and hunt for./

    /Whump!/

    "Wha--?" Harry asked, and then felt quite foolish; Hagrid had stopped and he'd bumped into his back.

    "Gringotts," Hagrid said expansively, gesturing at the tall marble building. Harry, almost automatically, stared at the carven inscription on the secondary, silver doors of the building, the letters incised deeply into the metal, tarnish that polish could not reach to cleanse away on the bottom of the carving highlighting the words.

Enter, stranger, but take heed

Of what awaits the sin of greed,

For those who take, but do not earn,

Must pay most dearly in their turn.

So, if you seek beneath our floors

A treasure that was never yours --

Thief, you have been warned; beware

Of finding more than treasure there.

    "Yeah, yeh'd be mad ter try ter rob it," Hagrid pronounced.

    Harry was more interested in the goblin standing to one side of the doors. For the past few years, goblins had been keeping a very low profile. When called on the fact that they were not denying services to Voldemort and the Death Eaters, the response had been both typical and cruelly illuminating of human/goblin relations: "Why should we? One human is much the same as another. We aren't involved in your arguments."

    That the goblins couldn't see any difference between Voldemort and another human bespoke just how much discrimination the goblins had endured over the years. When the message had come, Hermione had unashamedly wept on his shoulder.

    Hermione....

    Harry blinked as he tried to get hold of himself again. The thought that Hermione was not there was almost enough to set him to crying for her. But now they were stepping up to the counter, and he needed to pull himself together.

    He was here. It was not 1998, but 1991, and Hermione was alive and well. She was. She had to be.

    "Morning," Hagrid said to the goblin behind the counter. "We've come ter take some money outta Mr. Harry Potter's safe."

    "You have his key?" the goblin asked, without expression. Harry got the strong impression that the goblin had asked this question several times already that day and anticipated asking it several million times more before the bank closed for the day. Harry watched the goblin as Hagrid emptied his pockets out onto the ledgers, seeing how the goblin pointedly did not draw back in distaste, but merely wrinkled its lip instead, and wondered just how much anti-human sentiment was building up in the non-human races.

    He watched as Hagrid also pulled out the letter regarding the Philosopher's Stone and handed it over to the goblin, and then obediently followed as Griphook gestured he and Hagrid towards the carts. This was going to be *fun*.

*****

    As Hagrid and Harry walked down the steps leading from Gringotts to the Alley, Harry said, thoughtfully, "Hagrid -- may I have my key?" He knew he hadn't actually held his own key until he'd been in Sixth Year, but he was used to looking after his money now and he really didn't like the thought that someone else -- who he didn't know -- had access to his money.

    Hagrid looked green, though that was probably just due to the Gringotts carts. "I dunno, Harry--"

    "I'm not going to spend it," Harry said reassuringly. "I've got enough here --" he lifted his moneypouch, which /chink/ed heavily at them -- "for the year, I should think. I just want to hang onto it. I'm not going to lose it."

    "Well -- all righ', then," Hagrid said heavily, and passed over the small gold key. Harry gripped it reassuringly, and then tucked it into his pocket, the one on the back of his pants that buttoned closed. He then turned around, and collided with someone else who had just come out of Gringotts. The two of them went down in a flurry of flailing arms.

    For one short instant, instinct took over, and Harry immediately flipped and pinned the other child to the ground beneath him. He blinked as he realized that it *was* another child -- one that was about his age, and weight, and size. One that was a little girl. A girl who was blinking up at him with wide brown eyes, her bushy brown hair splayed over the cobblestones. A girl whose features were achingly, heartbreakingly familiar.

    Harry stared at her in wonder. Lying there in front of him, as though his thoughts had conjured her up, the eleven year old Hermione Granger blinked at him, shocked. He couldn't stop his eyes from devouring that warm healthy skin, those bright eyes, nor his smile from breaking out all over his face. She was here! She was right here, and she was perfectly all right, and... /Whoa. I do *not* remember her being *this* cute./

    And he was on top of her.

    Harry rolled off her and sat up and back onto his heels. "Um, I'm sorry. You're all right?"

    She sat up, wringing out her wrists. "Yes, I'm all right." He felt a bittersweet pang at the sound of her wonderfully familiar voice, a voice of sharp edges, with overtones of bossiness and too much intelligence for its owner's own good. A voice that Harry had last heard yelling for him to get out of the way....

    But now she was looking at him quizzically, and Harry realized it was because he was beaming at her so sunnily, when a scant few seconds before he had been holding her in a rather hostile grip, and she had no idea who he was or what was going on. A state, he remembered, that Hermione had always hated.

    "I'm Harry Potter," Harry introduced himself. "Are you starting at Hogwarts this year too?" he asked, in an effort to distract her, and stop her thinking he was some kind of weirdo.

    "Yes! Are you? My parents and I had never heard of Hogwarts before I got my letter, so of course we had to come and see what everything was like as soon as we could. And, um, I'm Hermione Granger."

    "I'm pleased to meet you, Hermione," Harry said. /You have absolutely no idea how much. And you have nothing to worry about this time -- I'll make sure nothing happens to you this time./ "I'm kind of the same -- my parents died when I was very young, and I was raised by my Muggle relatives. I'd never heard of Hogwarts either. Do you think we'll be in the same classes?"

    She really smiled at that. "Probably, if we'll be First Years together."

    "That'll be good. I'd really like a friend there when we start."

    Hermione blinked and looked a bit taken aback. "You want to be friends?"

    /Think, Harry, think! Don't scare her off being friends before we even get on the train!/ Harry nodded. "Well, yes -- you're nice, so I'd like to be friends." He put on a woebegone expression and added, "Of course, I wouldn't blame you a bit if you didn't want to be friends with *me*...."

    She shook her head briskly. "Of course I'd like to be friends with you!"

    "Hermione, dear?" said one of the two adults behind her.

    "Oh, yes, Mum," she said hurriedly. "Harry, this is my Mum and Dad, they're both Muggle dentists. Mum, Dad, this is Harry. We're going to be classmates."

    "And friends," Harry added, looking up at the two adult Grangers. The adults smiled back at him, the woman's auburn hair as bushy as her daughter's, and the man's dark eyes as kind. Harry seared those smiles into his heart; the Grangers had been murdered by Death Eaters at the end of his Sixth Year.

    /Not this time./

    "Harry," Hagrid said behind him, making him jump.

    "Oh, yes," he said quickly. "This is Hagrid, he's looking after me today."

    "Pleased to meet you, Mr. Hagrid," Mr. Granger said, holding out his hand. Hagrid shook it gingerly.

    "Harry, I was about ter say," Hagrid continued, "would yer mind slippin' off ter The Leaky Cauldron fer a bit o' a drink? I really hate them Gringotts carts." He did look a bit green, still.

    "We were about to go get Hermione's uniform," Mrs. Granger volunteered. "I'll be happy to take Harry with us. And you can take Mike with you, he's not too steady right now either."

    "Elizabeth!" Mr. Granger moaned.

    "Oh hush, dear, it's not like you've ever liked clothes shopping anyway. I'll take care of the kids' clothes while you two recover over a pint and meet us in half an hour outside --" Mrs. Granger looked around -- "Fortescue's Ice-Cream Parlour, over there."

    "That would be great! Wouldn't it, Hagrid?" Harry said cheerfully.

    "Yeah, that'd work. If yer sure yeh don't mind, Mrs. Granger --"

    "Of course I don't," Mrs. Granger said briskly. "I suggested it, didn't I? Now go on. We'll be just fine. Won't we, Harry, Hermione?"

    As he was gently but inexorably drawn along in Elizabeth Granger's wake, Harry knew *exactly* where Hermione got her managing personality from.

    Madame Malkin was, as Harry had recalled, a short, squat witch. Today she was wearing a misty blue robe and hat that made her look as if she were a particularly large bluebell, with a pincushion strapped to her wrist, giving the impression she was in the middle of sewing something.

    "Do you stock Hogwarts uniforms here?" Mrs Granger asked her briskly.

    "Oh, yes, the complete set," Madame Malkin told her. "Robes, gloves, hat and cloak, we have it all here."

    "Good," Mrs. Granger said cheerfully. "The complete set for both of them, please."

    "Goodness! Twins?" Madame Malkin asked as she led them towards the back of the shop and an open area where several short footstools stood, surrounded by measuring tapes. She gestured Hermione towards one and Harry towards another, ringing a small bell and pointing the witches who came out from the back towards the two of them.

    "No, just friends," Mrs Granger said as Madame Malkin led her over to the glove rack.

    "These robes seem awfully heavy," Hermione said, as her head popped out of the twill her fitting-witch had flung over her head. "Won't we be sweltering?"

    "Yeh're after being a Londoner, like?" the fitting-witch replied, in a broad accent Harry couldn't place, but was reminiscent of rolling fields. "Hogwarts is bloody *cold*! Makes winter round here seem a cool spring day, leh'me tell yeh. It's an old castle up on the Scottish Highlands. Winter up there sets in sometime around early October and goes through to late April. Yeh won't be sayin' these robes are after being heavy, come November! Too thin, yeh'll swear!"

    "Oh? You've been to Hogwarts?"

    Harry's fitting-witch smiled up at him. "Sure enough," she said, in a lilting Irish brogue. "It *is* th' only school in th' British Isles for us, y'know. At least it's up in the Highlands, an' not down among all the English heathens."

    "English? Heathens?" the other witch objected.

    "Sure an' they are," the Irish girl returned cheerfully. "Not a proper Kestrels fan around here some days."

    "Kestrels? The Harpies can take the Kestrels *any* day!"

    "The fact ye're not a Puddlemere fan is one o' your savin' graces, Rosemary, but th' fact is, the Kestrels are a dead cert to win the League this year. The Harpies are a good team, but their Chasers simply aren't up to it."

    "Um... what are you talking about?" Hermione asked timidly.

    The two fitting-witches looked at them blankly.

    "We're Muggleborn," Harry explained quickly.

    "Ah," they chorused.

    "We're talking about our Quidditch teams," Harry's fitting-witch said cheerfully. "I, bein' Welsh, an' bein' sane, cheer for the Holyhead Harpies. Don't let anyone tell you those Caerphilly Catapults are a proper team, 'cause they're *not*. Now, Ivy here follows the Kenmare Kestrels, an' I do not say she doesn't have her reasons, even if those reasons are named --"

    "Excitement, a winning streak, and *they're kids*, Rosie!" Ivy interjected.

    "Do we *really* need dragonhide gloves?" Harry asked, deliberately changing the subject.

    "Oh, yes," the witches chorused.

    "It be th' Herbology classes," Ivy volunteered. "Y'need 'em for th' fanged geraniums an' th' like."

    Hermione's eyes widened. "*Fanged geraniums*?"

    "Ah, don't be after scarin' the little dears," Rosemary added. "Y'canna mention the hippogriffs -- or the man-sized Venus flytraps -- or th' Mandrakes."

    "You're joking... aren't you?" Hermione said, her voice small.

    /And I've faced worse..../ "I don't think they are, Hermione," Harry said quietly. "But I'm sure it'll be okay -- they wouldn't let us face those things alone, or straightaway."

    The two fitting-witches giggled. "Your boyfriend's right, I'm afraid," Ivy told her. "You won't be facing them straightaway. But you'll see them soon enough... and you're done!"

    Hermione pulled the now-hemmed robe over her head. "He's not my *boy*friend!"

    Rosemary grinned up at Harry as he pulled his robes off. "Give her a few more years, she'll come round," she told him.

    Hermione huffed, grabbed Harry's hand, and pulled him out to the front of the store, where her mother and their clothes were waiting.

*****

    Hagrid and Mr. Granger were sitting outside the ice-cream parlour waiting for them when they arrived. Hagrid handed Harry the cone he'd bought him (chocolate and raspberry with chopped nuts), while Mr. Granger gave Hermione a peach and vanilla cone with chocolate sprinkles, handed Mrs. Granger a classic banana split, and returned to his knickerbocker glory.

    "Ah, fanged geraniums ain't nothin' ter be worried about," Hagrid told them, as Harry interrupted his ice-cream to tell him what the witches in the store had told him. "Yer won't have nothin' ter do with *them* till Fifth Year at least."

    "That's a relief," Hermione said.

    "'Sides, all yer have ter do is stroke them gently on the underside o' their petals an' they're sweet as anythin'," he added. "I'll show yer sometime."

    Harry idly wondered if he was wearing the same 'deer in headlights' expression all three of the Grangers were.

*****

    The rest of the day passed in a cheerful, dizzying blur. Hagrid cheerfully led Harry and Hermione into Eeylop's Owl Emporium, and while Harry did indeed find and buy Hedwig (who took to Hermione almost as well as she did to Harry) Hermione remained without an owl, despite being tempted by a magnificent Australian Tawny Frogmouth.

    They got their school lists at Flourish and Blott's, and Harry cheerfully watched Hermione wander off into the depths of the store, returning with the books he knew would teach her all about his past. (At this stage he could cheerfully watch her read the telephone directory. She was here! She was here and chatting with him and just fine and he was going to make sure she *stayed that way*.) "Just a little light reading," she said, as she dropped 'Hogwarts, A History', 'Great Wizarding Events of the Twentieth Century', 'Modern Magical History' and 'The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts' on the counter with a heavy /fhump/.

    Harry looked at the pile. "It looks like you're really into history," he said, cautiously.

    She smiled at him. "Of course! We have to know where we came from if we're going to have any idea where we're going, you know!" She glanced at the copy of 'Curses and Counter-Curses (Bewitch Your Friends and Befuddle Your Enemies with the Latest Revenges: Hair Loss, Jelly-Legs, Tongue-Tying and much, much more)' in his hand. "And what's *that* for?"

    Harry blushed. "My cousin and I don't get along."

    She frowned doubtfully. "But still, isn't cursing him a bit extreme?"

    "You wouldn't say that if you'd ever met Dudley," he assured her, but put the book back, and was rewarded with a dazzling smile.

    Ollivander's was where things started to get a bit out-of-hand.

    The group trooped in and stood in front of the counter. The bell on the door tinkled at their arrival, but it looked as if there was nobody there, and as the minutes passed, it looked as if the sound had gone unheard. The Grangers and Harry exchanged glances.

    "Is there a bell to ring?" Mr. Granger asked softly.

    "I'm afraid not," a thin, dark voice said silkily, and its owner revealed himself. Mr. Ollivander was a small, slender man with moonlike eyes behind thin spectacles. "However, happily there is no need. Harry Potter. I thought I would see you soon."

    Harry knew he had to immediately redirect the conversation. If Mr. Ollivander started talking about his scar, and Voldemort's curse, he'd have to explain Voldemort to Hermione. And that was something he most definitely did not want to do. Mr. Ollivander had definitely known Death Eaters and their victims, and almost certainly had a horror story or two of his own to tell. Let her learn of his 'hero' status from a book, where white paper and black ink would divorce emotion from fact and there would be no nightmares for her in the knowledge of the Wizarding World's recent history. "Hello, sir. If it's not too much to ask, though, would you mind helping my friend Hermione first?"

    Mr. Ollivander blinked, and glanced over at the Grangers. He lifted an eyebrow at Harry quizzically before turning to them. "Please forgive my rudeness -- I was distracted by memories. Ladies first, of course. Now, let us see.... Which is your wand arm, Miss Granger?"

    Hermione proved as difficult to fit as Harry remembered being, emptying box after box and waving around wand after wand. Harry watched her grow more and more anxious as Mr. Ollivander grew happier and happier, as he ran around for wand after wand. Harry smiled at her reassuringly. "Don't worry," he said softly. "I'm sure your wand is here. It must be as unique as you are."

    Hermione managed a smile at him as Mr. Ollivander brought out a very old and dusty box. "Now," he said, "let's try this one. Phoenix feather and rowan wood, ten inches, supple, a very unusual combination."

    As soon as Hermione grasped the wand, it immediately reacted. Music immediately began playing and, as she waved it, trails of miniature golden fireworks followed. "Yes, perfect!" Mr. Ollivander said brightly. "I remember thinking, as I made it, that it might be hard for this wand to find its master. I've never made a wand so particularly attuned to defence against the Dark Arts, before or since. But then, you *are* friends with Mr. Potter."

    Hermione and her parents both looked at Harry enquiringly, but Mr. Ollivander had moved on to measuring Harry's wand arm, the length of his neck, and the space between his nostrils. "Now, you and Miss Granger are friends, so a complementary wand is likely... would it be rowan? Here, try this one -- rowan and unicorn hair -- eight inches -- quite whippy."

    Harry waved the wand but it was snatched out of his hand before he'd made the first pass. "No, try this one, beechwood and dragon heartstring, nine inches, nice and flexible -- no? Oh, it seems you're just as tricky as Miss Granger! Here, try this one, ebony and unicorn hair, springy, seven inches -- no, try this one."

    Harry watched as the piles mounted, until finally Mr. Ollivander brought out a box he recognised. "I wonder now -- yes, why not? Try this one -- unusual combination, holly and phoenix feather, eleven inches, nice and supple."

    Harry smiled, reached out, and took up his wand. He remembered the red and gold sparks that flowed out the end, and felt them again. He loved this wand -- it had been with him through everything.

    "Oh, bravo!" Mr. Ollivander clapped. "Well, well, well, how very curious," he added, more quietly, as he put Harry's wand back into its box and began wrapping it up.

    "I'm sorry," Hermione said quietly, "but what's so curious about that wand?"

    Mr. Ollivander glanced at Harry. "You know, don't you?" he said quietly. "You know about this wand."

    Harry frowned. "Yes," he admitted softly. "I know."

    Hermione drew in a deep breath. "*What* do you know?"

    Mr. Ollivander looked at Harry, and Harry nodded permission. "I remember every wand I've ever sold, Miss Granger. What is curious is that the phoenix that gave the feather that makes up the core of Mr. Potter's wand gave just one other. It is very curious indeed that Mr. Potter has that wand, when it's brother was the wand that gave him that scar. Thirteen inches. Yew. Very powerful."

    Hermione looked over at Harry. "I don't understand. How can a wand give you a scar?"

    Harry sighed. "Sometimes curses leave marks on people, even if the curse doesn't work."

    "Someone... cursed you?" Mrs. Granger asked quietly, standing directly behind her daughter.

    "Tried," Mr. Ollivander, who had been standing to one side, unnoticed, added quietly. "Harry Potter *is* The Boy Who Lived."

    "We don't understand," Mr. Granger said plaintively.

    Harry sighed. "About ei-- ten years ago, a dark wizard called Voldemort was very powerful here in British Wizarding society. He hated Muggles -- ordinary people like you, Mr. And Mrs. Granger -- and Muggleborn wizards and witches, like you, Hermione. He'd kill any he came across. And he killed anybody at *all* who opposed him in any way. Like my parents." His voice was completely blank, not a tremor betraying his feelings.

    "You said your parents... died," Hermione said.

    "Yeah. Fighting him," Harry said flatly. "He tried to kill me, too. But I didn't die."

    "He did, though," Hagrid said cheerfully behind them. "When the spell bounced off Harry here it hit 'im an', poof! Gone. An' good riddance, too."

    Hermione reached out and took Harry's hands in her own. "Harry...."

    "It's all right," Harry said quietly. "It's been ten years."

    But he didn't pull his hands away.

******

    Mrs. Figg was quite happy for Harry to store his uniform, books and Hedwig in her garage, promising to look after Hedwig properly, and Harry kept his wand with him, shoved down his waistband. Again, the Dursleys noticed nothing. The next four weeks were among the happiest he'd ever experienced, as he spent almost every free minute in Mrs. Figg's house, reading over his new schoolbooks and practicing his spells.

    Although he still *knew* the magic he'd learnt at Hogwarts, Harry made the unpleasant discovery that his eleven-year-old self still had to learn the movements to do the spells. The swish-and-flick of /wingardium leviosa/, the dash-tap of /alohamora/, and the jab of /silencio/ all had to be relearned. Harry applied himself vigorously.

    Finally, on August 28th Harry decided that it was time to talk to the Dursleys. He had a pretty good idea what their reaction would be, so he carefully hid his wand in his cupboard before his planned confrontation. He waited until after dinner -- no point, after all, in starving himself unnecessarily -- and then followed them into the living room, standing in front of the TV before they could switch it on.

    "Um, Uncle Vernon, Aunt Petunia," he began, "I need to say something to you."

    "Well, hurry up and say it and get out of the way," Uncle Vernon told him.

    Harry swallowed. "I'm not going to Stonewall High."

    "WHAT? What do you mean, 'You're not going'? We've got your uniform and we're going to get your books tomorrow!" Uncle Vernon snapped.

    "I know what my parents were, Uncle Vernon."

    That statement seemed to shock the Dursleys, so Harry went on. "I know what they did. I know how they died. And I'm just like them. So I'm going to their school. To Hogwarts."

    "No!" Aunt Petunia hissed. "You never got a letter --"

    "I just wasn't stupid enough to let you see it, Aunt Petunia. I got it. I got it four weeks ago. I've got my uniform, I've got my books and I've got my ticket. I'm going to Hogwarts, and I'm leaving the day after tomorrow."

    "Oh no you're not, boy!" Uncle Vernon announced. "When we took you in, we swore we'd stamp that out of you. I am not paying for you to learn some stupid parlour tricks, and you are NOT GOING TO THAT SCHOOL!" He jumped up, grabbed Harry's arm and dragged him into his cupboard. Harry yelled and demanded his freedom, hearing the lock go /schnick/ behind him.

    "And you're staying in there till the second!" Uncle Vernon called through the keyhole.

    Harry grinned in the darkness. /Perfect./

    He waited until 11 o'clock. Mrs. Figg, who was fond of the late-night news for some reason, would still be up, but the Dursleys would be (and were) snoring away. Harry pulled his wand out from under his blanket, and with a whispered /alohomora/ opened the cupboard. Quietly locking it behind him, he stole out of the Dursleys' house, over to Mrs. Figg's.

    Less than five minutes after leaving his cupboard Harry was sitting in Mrs. Figg's kitchen, telling her all about the confrontation.

    "So I was hoping," Harry finished, "that I could stay here the rest of tonight, go to the Leaky Cauldron tomorrow, stay there tomorrow night, and then go to Kings' Cross from there. How does that sound to you?"

    "Very sensible," Mrs Figg told him.

    "Thanks."

    "Won't the Dursleys miss you?"

    "I doubt it -- but even if they do, they won't blame you."