It had been about four weeks so far, and Harry couldn't see how things could possibly go on like this. After writing his third round of letters to Sirius, Ron, and Hermione, and getting meaningless chit chat back, he wasn't even sure he was going to write to them again.

The heat was getting ridiculous, hotter than Harry could ever remember it being before, and the tension in the air was palpable. Surely a storm would have to break soon.

And yet the sun continued to rise on a baking world, day after day. It was maddening.

Dudley and his gang had managed to break one of the swings at the playground. They no longer bothered Harry, the threat of Sirius had seen to that, but Harry continued, out of habit, to keep tabs on what they were doing, listening in to conversations, watching them from afar, the things he'd always done. It was something to do to distract himself from thoughts of Voldemort.

Where was he? What was he doing now? How much longer would Harry have before he died?

Harry had never really had plans for his future as a child. He'd been a bit young to really grasp the concept pre-Hogwarts, and the closest he'd ever really come was 'planning' to buy a gun and shoot Uncle Vernon when he was 'big enough'. And to burn his relative's house down, now he thought about it.

But arson and homicide didn't really constitute a 'plan' for the rest of his life.

After becoming a wizard… well, 'discovering' he was a wizard, the closest Harry had ever come was the idea of being a Auror, but that wasn't so much a plan for his future as a way to get paid for what he already did all the time anyway, and besides, taking career advice from a Death Eater felt…

Ha! As if he was going to have a 'career'. No, he was going to die, that much was clear. Harry Potter was going to die at the hands of Lord Voldemort one of these days, probably sooner rather than later, preferably, but not likely, quickly.

And that was what Harry was trying not to think about. A pair of red eyes hanging above his crib and the softly hissed words, "kill the spare."

The spare. A boy. A virtual stranger's whole life; held, judged, and dismissed.

There it was again. That feeling Harry got when he thought about becoming an Auror.

Harry felt…

There was someone reading on one of the swings.

A girl.

Harry seriously considered just turning around. It had been a few days since he'd checked the dustbins of Little Whinging for some whisper of Voldemort. But he was already in trouble for trying to listen to the news, and dumpster diving was his uncle's current least favourite thing about him, and… it was just a girl… just one girl.

"Hi?" Harry said awkwardly as the sound of his footsteps changed from the soft thud of sneakers on dead and dying grass to the brittle rustle of sneakers on woodchips.

The girl looked up, and it was at precisely this moment that Harry registered that the book she was reading was made of parchment.

"Are you a witch?" he blurted out before she had a chance to say anything. The expression of vaguely irritated patience dropped from her face, and was replaced by unimpressed suspicion. She gave him a clear once over before meeting his eyes.

"Who are you and what do you want," she said.

"Well, jeez… um. To sit down?" Harry stammered, not accustomed to this level of hostility from magical strangers.

The girl looked back at her book and gestured to the other unbroken swing, her expression morphing into something like aggravated expectation.

Harry sat.

"So, what's your name?" the girl asked.

"Um…" Harry began, but just as he was about to tell her, it occurred to him that he was alone, stranded in the muggle world with no way to call for help that could be relied upon to arrive sooner than tomorrow, and he was about to give a complete stranger his name.

However, that alone would never have been enough to stop him. The second thing that occurred to Harry was that this girl actually didn't know who he was; had apparently not noticed his scare; didn't know that he was 'famous Harry Potter'; and there was no one (Hermione) around to chastise him for what he was about to do.

"James… I'm James," Harry said. There it was again, that same feeling; like there was a wind blowing right through him.

"James who?" the girl wanted to know immediately.

"James…" (Evans? Weaselly? Granger? Black?)

"Riddle," Harry replied, and he had to fight to keep the grin off his face. He could only imagine what Voldemort would do to him if he ever found out about this. It felt rather like throwing a firework into a cauldron in potions. Terrifying, but… fun?

"Muggleborn?" the witch asked.

"Yeah, you?" Harry replied.

"Sally-Anne Perks, and yes I'm muggleborn," the witch – Sally – replied.

Oddly enough, the feeling didn't… it wasn't unpleasant right now. It wasn't frightening, and although it was cold, the cold didn't… bother him. It felt… like falling off a broom.

"Are you still at Hogwarts?" Sally asked.

"Yeah?" Harry replied, preoccupied by the strange sensation of giving his name as James Riddle, and absently wondering what the alternative was.

"Oh," she grinned, "how's that going?"

Dragons. Lake. Death.

"Fine," Harry lied.

"So, do you think he's back?" Sally asked, not bothering with any more of a segway than that.

Harry blinked.

"Yeah," he replied.

Sally gave him an odd look.

"And who's side are you on?" she asked.

Now it was Harry's turn to give her a look.

"I'm muggleborn. I don't really see as there's much choice," he replied stiffly. It felt odd; to be arguing a point based on a lie.

Because he wasn't muggleborn, and thus wasn't assigned a side in this war based on his blood status. No, he'd been assigned a side by Voldemort at fifteen months of age.

He supposed it just sounded odd the way she asked it, the idea that he should have a choice… and might actually consider the alternative.

"That's just Dumbledore's rubbish political line. There's heaps of muggleborns who just stayed out of it in the last war and were left alone. His issue's not with people's blood status, whatever Dumbledore's lot might want people to think.

Harry… had absolutely no idea what to…

She was defending him. This… girl… was defending Voldemort.

"It's 'there are'," Harry found himself saying.

"There are heaps of muggleborns."

The girl did something between a grin and a grimace and looked away from him. Harry had meant it kind of rudely, but she didn't seem to have taken it that way.

"Fair enough," she replied.

She was swinging slightly, her feet not moving on the ground, but more like she was just bending and stretching her knees. She was wearing denim shorts… like a normal – non-Death Eater – person, and this little blue blouse that left her navel on display. She looked a bit like Hermione, but her skin was a shade lighter, and her hair was gold instead of pale brown, although just as bushy, and tied up in a ponytail so that the bushiness made it sort of frame her face when she turned to him.

She looked like a muggleborn – and not at all dangerous.

"So, you're a muggleborn," Harry clarified, staring in blank incomprehension at the girl. What was happening? How could she be…

The girl rolled her eyes at him, gave a single sharp nod, and turned back to her book. There appeared to be a family tree on the page she was reading, although Harry couldn't read any of the names from this far away.

She was actually quite pretty, and just looked absolutely nothing like Harry had ever thought one of Voldemort's supporters – even a teenaged one – would.

"And you're defending him?" Harry asked, just to be sure he was understanding.

"I won't say I'm entirely onboard with his methods," the girl replied, not looking up.

"But his cause, yeah, I think his people have a very good point."

"You think we should kill all the muggleborns and muggles and have the purebloods in charge?" Harry asked, suddenly furious.

The girl turned to him, giving him the look Hermione gave Ron every time he suggested that someone had disapparated inside Hogwarts grounds.

"I just said, he's not actually trying to kill all the muggles and muggleborns. That's just political propaganda spread by Dumbledore and the Ministry – "

"Bullshit he's not!" Harry yelled, standing up.

"And how would you know that?" the girl asked sharply, also standing.

"Because… Because!" Harry yelled back.

But actually, the only ways he could think of to finish that sentence involved citing either Malfoy or Ron as evidence, and in the face of this girl's calm disdain, he suddenly felt rather stupid doing that.

"Have you actually read the statistics? The number of people that died each year during the last war? Have you actually read his book? Made any attempt to understand his goals or political agenda? Or do you just believe whatever other kids tell you?" The girl's derision made Harry… uncomfortable… because he hadn't done any of those things.

"Because he killed my parents!" he yelled instead.

Sally made a weird face. Her lips pinched like McGonagall's when she was annoyed, and she took a deep breath.

"I'm very sorry for your loss," she said. It was odd, but that was actually the first time Harry could ever remember someone saying that to him.

"But I'm not going to condemn an entire political movement based on two people's deaths."

"He's killed loads of other people," Harry countered.

"So did the Ministry, so did Dumbledore and his Order of the Phoenix. People die in wars; it sucks, but it happens on both sides," Sally replied, in the kind of tone Hermine used when she felt she was being the voice of reason.

Harry didn't like this. He didn't like this girl who was standing there and calmly telling him that everything he knew was wrong. He didn't like her calm, reasonable tone of voice, or the fact that she seemed so sure of herself, and was talking about statistics and politics as though the Death Eaters were somehow a political movement as opposed to the fan club of a psychopath.

"Whatever," Harry said, getting up.

"See you."

He did not run away from her, but he walked very quickly all the way back to Privet Drive.

People die in wars; it sucks, but it happens on both sides.

Harry didn't stop until he flopped down on his bed, glaring at the ceiling.

So did the Ministry, so did Dumbledore and his Order of the Phoenix.

What the hell was Dumbledore's 'Order of the Phoenix' anyway? Was that why he had Forks? Was there an 'Order' for people with Phoenixes, like the Order of Merlin? He'd have to ask Hermione next time he saw her.

But that idea made him cringe somehow. He didn't want to ask Hermione, he was sick of these girls making him feel stupid, damn it!

Harry sat up forcefully, glaring around his room like there might be a book somewhere entitled 'Statistics on Voldemort' that he could use to prove Sally wrong. There wasn't, of course, but there was a stack of Daily Prophet's on his desk that he hadn't been bothering to read.

But of course, if there was any news about Voldemort it would have surely made the front page? That had been his rationale the past couple of weeks, for not reading the entire thing, cover to cover.

But what if…

Suddenly, Harry's blood ran cold.

What if they were doing things more subtly? Like sending harmless looking girls out to muggle areas to try and recruit new Death Eaters? But as soon as Harry finished that thought, he knew it was ridiculous.

The Death Eaters were blood-purists. They wouldn't be recruiting people in muggle areas. Well, unless what that girl had said was true, but Harry didn't believe her for a second. So, if she was lying, she couldn't possibly be a Death Eater, and if she was telling the truth, she might be.

That was perhaps the strangest path of logic Harry had ever tried to follow, and one that sounded inherently flawed.

If she were recruiting, surely, she would have been more subtle about it, wouldn't have tried to convince him of her beliefs so much as ask him about his.

Unless she wasn't recruiting, but had been sent specifically for him… because they had found him.

Harry's first thought was that he should write to Dumbledore, but say what.

Hi Professor Dumbledore

I met a girl at the park today who thinks Voldemort's goals are justified and says you're a liar, so I think she might be a Death Eater in disguise.

Even in his head it sounded ridiculous.

His second, was that if they had found him, they would simply have killed him, not sent some girl to… try and recruit him.

So no, in all likelihood, she was exactly what she appeared to be. A muggleborn girl named Sally-Anne Perks, who, now he thought of it, Harry did vaguely remember from first year, who had dropped out of school, and had some radical political views.

It was a little odd that he would just happen to run into a witch in muggle Surry, but realistically, all the other muggle-raised kids had to be somewhere over the summer.

It wasn't entirely implausible.

However, just because Sally wasn't recruiting for Voldemort, didn't mean that someone wasn't. Now he thought about it, surely that would be the sensible thing for Voldemort to be doing. Even terrorist organisations had to get their members somewhere, they couldn't solely rely on current members' kids.

However, this thought too, bothered Harry. Voldemort had seemed anything but sensible in the brief, fairly one sided conversions they'd had in the past, and the idea of his as someone… with common sense… bothered Harry. It humanised him, in a way that gave Harry that empty-cold-wind feeling.

Well, it wasn't like he had anything better to do.

A few hours later, Harry had been thoroughly distracted from his thoughts of Voldemort recruiting, and his fury with the blond girl from the park was mostly pushed to the back of his mind. Instead, he was furious with the ministry. And Dumbledore. And Ron and Hermione. And Sirius.

He sat on the flaw with copies of the Daily Prophet spread out around him, each flipped open to a different page, and with his own name glaring up at him from the fine print.

The devil is in the details.

They were making him out to be a liar, crazy, a dangerous delinquent, everything his relatives had been telling people about him his whole life, and no one was doing anything about it.

How could Dumbledore… his friends…

Some friends.

Not a word. Not just about what was going on with Voldemort, not just about what they were doing together without him, but nothing about this either.

…

He wasn't even really angry, he just felt…

Okay, he was angry. He was furious.

After everything… everything.

Harry would have told them, would have warned them. He'd risked everything for them. Repeatedly. And yet still Ron had abandoned him just because he got into the Triwizard tournament instead of him.

But no, that wasn't fair, they'd done so much for him over the years, constantly putting their own lives on hold to help him train for the tournament all last year, supporting him when he'd thought Sirius betrayed his parents last year, standing by him when everyone found out he was a Parselmouth back in second year.

They'd been good friends to him.

It was probably just that some adults had told them not to write to him.

Yes, Harry could see that. There was very little Hermione wouldn't do if McGonnagal told her too, or Dumbledore.

Harry could almost hear her now.

Dumbledore trusts Snape.

That had always been her argument every time Ron brought up the issue of Snape's trustworthiness. Dumbledore trusted Snape, and it was evidently impossible for Dumbledore, or indeed any teacher, to be mistaken. Yes, if Dumbledore told her to tell Harry nothing, she would do it, and then probably be surprised when he was mad at her.

But Ron? Harry didn't know. Perhaps Hermione was policing Ron for them? Harry couldn't really see Ron resisting the urge to write about something exciting simply because his mum or Dumbledore told him not to, but he'd always eventually given in to Hermione, even if it took a while sometimes.

The image blossomed in Harry's mind. Ron and Hermione at the Burrow, in Ron's room, Hermione proofreading Ron's letters to Harry…

"You can't say that, Ron. Dumbledore said…"

Yes, Harry could see it very clearly.

The thought was enough to make him want to throw something, but he wasn't sure how far he could really push his uncle's fear of Sirius.

Well, Harry certainly wasn't going to write back to them. They could very well come see him if they actually cared what he was doing.

But simply refusing to write to them felt small and petty, like he was Dudley throwing a tantrum because his parents were ignoring him.

And just like that, a dangerous, stupid, suicidal, absolutely brilliant idea blossomed in Harry's mind. One that was so very much exactly what he wanted, but so ridiculously impractical as to be laughable.

He could go to Diagon Alley.

He wanted to prove that girl wrong. He needed books he didn't have. He could go to Diagon Alley.

But of course, he'd be recognised in seconds. Between his scar and the pictures from the tournament, he'd be immediately recognised, and if the Death Eaters didn't get him, Professor McGonnagal would probably show up, or someone from the Ministry. Although given that they were denying Voldemort's return, he couldn't imagine on what grounds they'd arrest him. But after everything he'd just read, he wouldn't put it past them.

So, he would need a disguise.

He could wear his invisibility cloak, but that wouldn't stop people from walking into him, and in a place like Diagon Alley, he'd be lucky to make it two steps from the Cauldron before that happened. He might have better luck in Knockturn, but he'd still have to walk through Diagon Alley to get there. He could maybe go early in the morning? Or late at night? But that still assumed there were no wards that would pick up the presence of an invisible person, and the simple act of trying to go somewhere unseen was inherently suspicious. The Aurors would be called immediately the first time someone heard footsteps or saw him bump something.

No, if Harry was going to attempt this, he couldn't go invisible. But any spell he might have used to disguise himself would require his wand, and the Ministry would expel him the moment he picked up his wand.

That thought had Harry pulling his holly want from his pocket. It sat innocently in his hand, but Harry felt himself seriously considering whether he should leave it in his trunk until the start of next term. He'd done magic before simply because he was angry? What if he accidentally made sparks or something, and they expelled him for that.

But then, when he'd opened his cupboard in third year, not to mention blown up Aunt Marge, he hadn't had his wand in his hand at all. And the warning he'd received had been for magic Dobby did.

Harry exhaled slowly and put his wand back in his pocket. There was no winning here. They were Harry Hunting, and the game was as rigged against him as it had always been. Eventually, they would find a reason to snap his wand. It was just a matter of time.

Suddenly unable to stand his room, Harry got up and was halfway to the park before he realised where he was going. Well, it was as good as anywhere, and maybe Sally would still be there. If she didn't go to Hogwarts anymore, well, he could ask her about it.

By the time he got there, he'd decided not to go to Diagon Alley. It was infinitely stupid to get himself killed just because he was mad at his friends.

But he was still mad.

He did feel a bit petty, a bit Dudleyish, but what was the alternative? The opposite to Dudley, in Harry's mind, was Harry himself; Dudley got everything he wanted, and Harry got scraps. None of Dudley's friends had ever betrayed him, at least to Harry's knowledge. They wouldn't dare. Of course, Dudley's friends were mostly friends with him because they were all bullies, but still. It made Harry angry, to realise his friends weren't as loyal to him as Dudley's were.

But this was different, people could be in danger if they passed on something, and it got into the wrong hands.

But they could still have visited and told him in person, couldn't they?

Harry stopped idly swinging himself. Having arrived to find the park deserted.

That was it.

They didn't have to write to him, because yes, it was dangerous, but they could have found ways around that if they'd tried. He'd given them both the Dursley's phone number for Merlin's sake! If they'd wanted to, they could have let him know what was going on, enough that he wasn't sitting around here, going completely mental while trying not to wonder how long he had left to live.

They had been told not to tell him anything, and they had simply accepted that.

Dudley's gang might be bullying twats, but when one of them was grounded, the others would sneak over in the middle of the night; when one of them was taken in by the police, the others would make up an alibi. No authority figure, no danger, had ever been enough to convince them to abandon one of their own.

Dudley had better friends than him.

Harry grit his teeth, momentarily screwing up his eyes before forcing his face to relax as he struggled against the sudden urge to cry.

It wasn't fair!

How was it that Dudley always, always managed to get the best of everything? How was it that Perse was a better best friend than Ron?

Harry thought vaguely about going back to Number Four, but he didn't want to. He didn't want to be trapped in the house again, didn't want to spend another minute waiting and freaking out until Voldemort killed him, or someone bothered to tell him what was going on.

Harry was swinging faster now, flexing his body back and forth as he sailed higher and higher into the cloudless blue sky.

But what else could he do? Well, he hadn't done his homework yet, but the thought of sitting in his room studying right now was repulsive, and anyway, no matter what he wrote, Hermione would insist it wasn't good enough and try to get him to redo it as soon as he saw her.

No. No, Harry wouldn't let her read it. Screw her! He'd do it on his own!

But then he'd probably fail.

Well, he'd just have to try harder. He could study if he really wanted to. He had all summer and nothing else to be doing. He wished it was something more useful, something more relevant, but he could do it. Everyone else in their year managed to pass without Hermione. Malfoy even managed to beat her in potions, and Neville did the same in herbology.

Of course, Harry rather doubted he'd be able to beat Hermione in anything, but he could at least prove he didn't need her to do it for him.

Harry spent that evening, and most of next morning doing just that. He started with charms, as it was generally his best subject after Defence, and they had no summer homework for DADA as usual, due their Professor being a Death Eater who had been kissed by a dementor before he could assign any.

He'd gone to read the relevant section of the textbook, a chapter on locomotive charm theory, but he kept having to stop and revise things from first and second year that were being referenced, about groups or related charms and how runes functioned in different contexts, so it had been slow going. However, he was finished by lunchtime, and his essay was a foot longer than it needed to be, and read pretty much like Hermione's essays, except Harry actually felt like he understood this, and had used fewer direct quotes from the textbook, preferring to phrase things in a way that made more sense to him.

Oddly enough, Harry found that studying was making him feel a lot better. It wasn't that he thought that locomotive charms themselves would be particularly useful against Voldemort, he'd really prefer to be practicing hexes, but at least he was learning something. At least he was doing something, no matter how small.

Somewhat to his surprise, the experience of actually doing his homework properly had left Harry keen to go back over what they'd learned in previous years, so, feeling very responsible indeed, Harry had hidden the Standard Book of Spells Grade One in his old school bag, and headed off to the park before it got too hot to be outside.

It was a very different experience reading material he already understood, and Harry actually enjoyed his afternoon, chuckling at memories of Seamus blowing things up, and feeling, for the first time, how far he had come as a wizard. He was usually so focused on the fact that he couldn't do the spells they were learning, he never really thought about the fact that he could do all the spells they'd covered so far. All the spells in the index of his first year charms books… he recalled each of them seeming so ridiculously impossible when they were first presented, but now… now he could do them all.

He really ought to thank Professor Flitwick.

"Hey, Freak!"

Harry looked up sharply at the old nickname. It was Malcom, one of the boys in Dudley's gang. Harry quickly shoved his book into his bag, and just had time to swing the bag over his shoulder before Malcom reached him.

"What are you reading, Freak," Malcom asked.

What was he doing here alone? Where was the rest of the group?

Harry's blood ran cold.

Why would Malcom be hassling Harry alone? The first rule of bullying was to operate in groups.

This wasn't Malcolm.

Shit! This wasn't Malcolm!

It was precisely at that moment that Malcolm stepped towards him, and Harry instinctively threw his hands up in front of him. He had just a moment to register how much easier this was about to make it for Not-Malcolm to apparate him away before he was flying backwards.

He landed on grass covered earth hard enough to knock the air out of his lungs, and lay there for a moment gasping futilely as he waited for his diaphragm to relax so he could exhale. Finally, gasping, he staggered to his feet.

His first thought was Not-Malcolm, who he was glad to see gasping for air fifteen feet away on the other side of the playground, and his second was the Ministry.

Damn! Damn, damn, damn!

Harry broke into a dead sprint, running straight past Not-Malcolm where he lay on the grass, back to Privet Drive. He had to get out of here before the ministry arrived. It had taken barely five minutes for the owl to arrive after the Dobby incident, and it would take him at least that long to get home.

Harry was breathless and his calves burned by the time he turned in at Number Four, but his expulsion letter hadn't arrived yet. He jogged up the stairs and began shoving things into his trunk willy-nilly. Sure enough, not two minutes after he got home, there was the sound of scraping at his window. Harry turned, expecting the ministry owl, and was momentarily surprised to see what appeared to be a paper airplane.

He froze, momentarily stunned by the odd new spell, before shrugging, standing, and going to the window to let the plane in. It landed in his palm and went still, allowing Harry to unfold it, and read, to his great surprise, four words in Professor Moody's handwriting.

Stay where you are.

Harry's first thought was that Crouch had escaped and this was from Voldemort.

If that was the case, he should perhaps obey.

If they could send him letters, they could send him curses, and if Voldemort's feeling towards him had mellowed enough for him to be sending orders instead… well, there was always the possibility (certainty) that this would be used to hurt/humiliate/kill him but… well, he couldn't see how obeying would be to his detriment in this case. Better to bide his time and not piss the bastard off when he was alone and couldn't use magic.

Then he wanted to kick himself.

The real Moody had survived, and was a friend of Dumbledore's. It was probably him who'd sent this.

Stay where you are.

How had they known he was running away? And what about the ministry?

Harry absently closed the window against the only slightly warmer air, still staring at the note.

Stay where you are.

Nothing else.

He flipped the page over just in case he'd missed something, but he hadn't.

Why would a friend of Dumbledore's, whom Harry had actually never met, be writing to him? How would he know Harry was about to run? What was happening?

Slowly, Harry finished packing, then closed and locked his trunk, with everything except his broom inside. Then he sat and waited. If the letter came, he could still run for it. If they came in from downstairs, he'd hear Aunt Petunia go off about it, and he'd fly out the window with his trunk. He could still fit out that window.

Every footstep from downstairs seemed impossibly loud. The sound of cars on the road outside had Harry stiffening. He got up to barricade his bedroom door after a while. Any few seconds he could buy might be critical.

But the owl didn't come, and after an hour, Harry realised it wasn't going to.

Why?

Hadn't the trace detected what he'd done? For that matter, how did the trace work?

Harry didn't know, and couldn't believe he'd never thought to find out. Seriously, all those months he'd spent in the Hogwarts library, and he'd never thought to look up the detection mechanisms that controlled his ability to do magic outside of school? Maybe he really was as stupid as Snape always said.

Angrily, Harry got up and helped himself to one of the A5 exercise books some optimistic relative had once bought Dudley, grabbed a red texter from the same shelf, and opened the book to the first page:

To do list:

Find out about trace

That made him feel a little bit better, like he was actually doing something. Maybe he could ask Sally. If she didn't go to Hogwarts, she presumably learned magic somewhere else. She must have some idea. Of course, he didn't really like the idea of asking her anything, but he liked the idea of dying because he'd never bothered even less. He'd spent the first eleven years of his life making nice with people he hated; he could do it again.

After a while, Harry figured he might as well finish his first year charms book, which was still in his bag from earlier, and settled down on his truck to do so. It didn't seem likely, at this point, that the ministry was coming, but like Moody, well Crouch, had always said: constant vigilance.

Rereading his charms textbook was actually making Harry regret not taking runes. It wasn't that he hadn't noticed the runes associated with every spell in both Charms and Transfiguration, the significant strokes from one or more runes made up the wand movement, so they were always included, it was just that he'd never been comfortable enough with what they were learning to want to understand it any deeper. He couldn't do the spell, or couldn't do it well enough. That had always been his main concern, but now, he was actually taking the time to read the sections, not about how to perform the spell, but about how the spell worked, how the wand movement and incantation came together with the casters will to create the spell, and frankly, it was fascinating. Each rune seemed to have multiple, but associated meanings, and by the time Harry had finished The Standard Book of Spells: Grade One he had two new things to add to his to-do list.

To do list:

Find out about trace

Buy runes textbooks

Ask about changing electives

He was pretty sure that he actually wouldn't be allowed to change electives, but he could at least ask when he got back to Hogwarts.

By the time he was a quarter of the way through second year Charms, evening had come, and Harry spent an even more uncomfortable dinner than usual contemplating what he would do if the ministry chose this as the opportune moment, while eating several pieces of raw carrot, a small pile of spinach, and a hard boiled egg.

Merlin, he hated Dudley's diet.

When dinner was finally over, he helped himself to some of the snacks Hermione had sent, resenting his dependence on his 'friends' more with every bite, while packing an emergency escape pack. Essentially, he put all his gold, his invisibility cloak, and a few other useful bits and pieces in his bag, so if he was caught without his trunk, he'd still have a chance.

It was while he was doing this, that he rediscovered his sneakoscope, still shoved inside a pair of Uncle Vernon's old socks. He vaguely remembered Ron getting it for him, and then hiding it, because it was always going off.

It wasn't going off now.

After a bit of thought, Harry tucked it, still in the socks, into the pocket of his jeans. It would certainly be helpful if he was approached by anyone doing anything untrustworthy. Harry wasn't sure if he should still be worried about Not-Malcolm. No one had followed him home, or tried to hex him, so Harry was no longer quite as sure as he had been that that hadn't been Malcolm, but still…

The following day dawned hot and sticky after a terrible night of fitful sleep constantly interrupted by both the heat, and vague dreams of Voldemort, and Harry woke feeling both exhausted, and marked for death.

He ate breakfast from his secret supply of Hermione snacks, his Ron snacks having run out a while ago, and not yet so desperate as to attempt eating Hagrid's rock cakes. Maybe if he soaked them in water?

Shrugging, Harry filled his cauldron with water and three rock cakes while the rest of the house was still sleeping, grabbed his bag off the floor, and headed out into the pale new day. Two steps down the garden path, he almost jumped a mile when something moved in his trousers. His first thought was a snake, but when he clapped his hand over his pocket, he felt the hard shape of the sneakoscope inside.

It was spinning.

Trying not to look suspicious, Harry patted his other pocket, trying to make it look like he'd forgotten something, and then went back inside. By the time he'd made it to the stairs, the spinning had stopped. Slowly, Harry took a couple of steps back towards the now closed front door, and felt the sneakoscope start up again. He walked left, into the living room, and the spinning got faster.

After a few minutes of experimentation, Harry had established that he was closest to whoever was out there when standing in the far left corner of the living room. There was someone out there, near Uncle Vernon's car.

The feeling of being hunted once again swelled in Harry's throat.

There was someone watching the house! Merlin, he was supposed to be safe here. That was the whole point!

Still, it seemed whoever it was couldn't get in. After a bit of consideration, Harry went up to the spare bedroom, which shared that corner with the living room, and carefully peered through the curtains, trying to spot where his invisible stalker was standing.

There was a suspicious looking gap towards the back of the hedge. Surely if there was a gap in the hedge, Harry would have heard Aunt Petunia complaining about it by now.

Huh.

He'd never been grateful for his aunt's manic approach to cleaning and home-maintenance before, but knowing her, he could be pretty certain that gap shouldn't have been there.

Well, he'd have to owl Dumbledore as soon as Hedwig came home. There was nothing else for it. He'd tell him about the girl, and Maybe-Malcolm, and the intruder outside. He wasn't going to die just to spite his not-particularly-loyal friends.

When would Hedwig be back? He'd let her go out hunting yesterday, so she should be due back soon. She didn't like it here any better than he did, but she never abandoned him here for too long.

Irritated, but resigned, Harry settled down to read in the spare room, trying not to think about the person outside. Somewhat to his surprise, nothing befell Uncle Vernon when he got in his car to go to work, nor Dudley when he headed out to meet his friends. In fact, it wasn't until around 10am that anything happened at all.

The hole in the hedge vanished. Harry glanced up from his charms book, and it just wasn't there anymore.

He froze for a moment, and then sprinted into his room, where his truck was still sitting, and barricaded himself in once again. But again, nothing happened. Harry finished second year charms and moved on to third year, and still, nothing happened.

By lunch time, to which he took his wand, sneakoscope, and invisibility cloak all tucking inside his clothes, came around, Harry was at breaking point, and after 'lunch' as Aunt Petunia was apparently calling it, he walked the perimeter of the house from the inside, fist clamped tightly around the sneakoscope.

It never moved.

Had they just left?

Harry couldn't imagine why, but after a bit of psyching up, he went outside and walked the perimeter of the house from the outside.

Still nothing.

He really shouldn't tempt fate, but he couldn't just stay in the house forever, and Hedwig still wasn't home, so he put on his invisibility cloak, and began exploring the neighbourhood. It took him only about an hour for the sneakoscope to react, but it wasn't at all in the way he'd expected.

It was just as he was stepping into the road to avoid Mrs Figg, that the spinning picked back up again.

Mrs Figg. Seriously, Mrs Figg?

Harry followed her for a while, trying to tell if it was someone else under Polyjuice, but the person was certainly behaving like Mrs Figg, right down to stopping to stroke a neighbour's cat that came up to her. Certainly, a Polyjuiced Death Eater wouldn't do that. As far as they knew, they were alone. Harry was following a good way back, and his sneakers were almost silent on the tarmac.

Mrs Figg stopped and sat down on the park bench across from Number Six, and Harry distinctly saw her place something down on the bench beside her, which promptly vanished.

He stopped dead for a moment, stunned. There was someone invisible on the bench almost directly across from his house.

Well, he'd found his stalker it seemed. Clutching the still spinning sneakoscope tightly, Harry edged closer to the bench.

"-hasn't come out yet," he heard Mr Weasley's voice say from thin air.

"Mad-Eye said something spooked him yesterday while he was out, and Dung wasn't following him, but nothing's happened since."

Harry backed away, the sneakoscope vibrating hard in his fist.

They were spying on him. Mr Weasley, Moody, and this 'Dung' person, were spying on him.

Stay where you are.

Moody had been able to see him panicking through the walls. They'd been right there outside, Mr Weasley was right there now, but instead of talking to him, letting him know they were there, telling him what was happening and reassuring him that everything was fine, they were hiding. Hiding from him.

When Harry got to his room, he was crying. He didn't even know why he was crying. He was just so angry with everyone. They always just abandoned him, even when they were right there, they abandoned him. He'd thought he could trust the Weasleys, but it was him, Mr Weasley, that the sneakoscope had been picking up on.

It wasn't fair!

Harry wouldn't tell them he knew. Fuck them! He wouldn't tell them anything. He'd… he'd…

Well, there wasn't really anything he could do to get back at them, except to sneak away from them.

So, Harry did just that. He stood up, grabbed his bag and his book, hid under his invisibility cloak, and walked to the park down the street, which, unlike the playground, had public toilets where he could take the cloak off unseen. Then he took the scenic route to the playground. Of course, this wouldn't work if Moody was on guard, as he'd be able to see right through the cloak. Hmmm, maybe Harry should take up jogging. He'd bet it would be quite a challenge to jog on that leg. The park was blisteringly hot by the time Harry arrived, but the shade cloth helped a little, so he settled down in the shade to continue reading third year charms.

He'd gotten most of the way through before he heard footsteps, and jumped about a mile in the air before recognising Sally.

"Mind if I sit down?" she asked.

Harry shrugged, struggling to pull his thoughts away from the light charm, and trying to recall what he'd wanted to say to her. It seemed a lifetime ago that he'd been annoyed at this muggleborn junior Death Eater.

But in the face of everything, Harry actually didn't feel like yelling at her.

They read together in silence for a while, but Harry quickly realised he'd been reading the same sentence since she sat down, and straightened up irritably. Alright, maybe he didn't want to yell at her, but he did still want to talk about it.

"I'm sorry, but I just don't understand how you can support Voldemort. He's evil," he said, in what he thought was a very calm tone of voice given the subject matter.

Sally looked up, her face pinched in irritation again.

"Firstly, there's no such thing as evil. That's just a word people use so they don't have to justify their condemnation. And secondly, could you do the reading before we have this conversation? I don't really want to try and explain that much," she replied.

Harry froze, and then had to fight the grin he could feel coming.

"Well, if you could get me some books from Diagon Alley, I'd be happy to do the reading," he replied, trying desperately not to sound as excited as he actually was.

"As long as you can reimburse me, I'd be happy to," the girl said, thankfully not looking up from today's book.

"Sure," Harry replied, the grin slipping through a little.

"What would you like then?" she asked.

That gave him pause. He didn't really know many books about Voldemort.

"I'd like to read his book if you can find it," Harry said.

That was right, wasn't it? He was pretty sure he remembered her mentioning that Voldemort had written a book. The image of Voldemort at a publisher's office almost had Harry bursting out laughing then and there.

"And I'd love to have a look at whatever you got your statistics from."

That should do for a start, surely.

Sally glanced up at him.

"Both of those are highly illegal, and won't be cheap," she warned.

"How much?" Harry asked, trying not to dwell on the fact that he was buying illegal books.

"Maybe ten galleons each?" she said.

Well, he could afford that.

"That will be fine," Harry replied.

Ron was going to be so pissed when he found out he'd missed this.

"Actually," Harry said, after a moment's pause, trying to look like he'd just thought of this.

"Could you pick me up a couple of others while you're there?" he said.

Sally looked up, not impressed.

"I'm not an owl," she replied.

"I'll pay you a sickle per book," Harry said quickly.

"Including for the books about Voldemort."

She gave him another look, but shrugged.

"What do you want?" She asked.

"Numerology and Grammatica, Ancient Rune Made Easy, and The Standard Book of Spells: Grade Five if that's okay," Harry replied.

Sally shrugged.

"Sure. But just so you know, I'd appreciate it if you didn't say his name around me," she replied.

Harry rolled his eyes.

"I'm not calling him You-Know-Who," he said dryly. Sally just shrugged again.

"Fine then, but read Numerology and Gramatica first. Names have power, you draw his attention to us by using his," she replied.

Harry stared at her for a moment.

"Really?" he asked.

Sally glanced up at him.

"It's the same as with incantations. When enough people, enough witches and wizards at least, use a word or phrase with a particular intention, that idea becomes tied to the word. Only wizards who were really serious about fighting him ever used his name because he considered it disrespectful. Those who fear him call him You-Know-Who, and those who wish to show him respect call him the Dark Lord. He can sense that, not well enough to be eavesdropping on us, but when you use his name, he can feel a flash of defiance, maybe the sound of your voice of a flash of your surroundings, and I'd rather not have your antagonizing him associated with a glimpse of me if it's all the same to you."

Harry sat, dumbfounded.

"He can see you when you use his name?" he asked, horrified.

"Not really. Think of it like a crowded room full of people talking. Mostly you just block it out because it's annoying, but if you hear something that interests you, your attention gets pulled that way. He doesn't see every single person in magical Britain every time they refer to him, but he looks for people using his name because it indicates who's fighting him and that's relevant. I'd rather he not think I'm fighting him, if you don't mind."

Harry nodded slowly. He could well see, if what she was saying was true, why Dumbledore wanted everyone to use his name. Dumbledore wanted everyone to fight him, and having so many people call him You-Know-Who or He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named must feel great. He could imagine how much Voldemort would enjoy feeling how much he was feared.

But Harry didn't particularly want to draw his attention, and certainly not in a way that would piss him off. That was like throwing things at Uncle Vernon's company car. You were just asking for it. No, he'd much prefer to be thought of as a small, helpless child who was very much not a priority. He hated the very thought of calling him by one of his pseudonyms, but, well… he'd done things he despised more to keep himself alive.

After that, they read in silence for a while, although Harry still found it difficult to focus on anything. Between his newly discovered stalker brigade, the incident with Malcolm yesterday -

"Hey, do you know anything about the trace?" Harry asked, suddenly remembering.

"What do you mean?" Sally asked, glancing up.

"How does it work?" he clarified.

Sally rolled her eyes again.

"It's placed on all the wands by Ollivander, so the ministry can detect whenever you use your wand, and also around the houses of witches or wizards living in muggle areas, so they can tell if you do wandless magic while at home," she told him.

"But it won't trigger if there are adult witches and wizards around, so purebloods can actually still use their wands at home, even though they're not supposed to."

"Oh," Harry said after a moment, wondering if the twins knew that.

Well, that would certainly explain why he'd gotten in trouble for Dobby, but not for the incident yesterday. They read in silence for a while after that, until Harry was disturbed by the sounds of footsteps. He glanced up, only to see Malcolm coming around the corner, eye's fixed on him.

"Same time tomorrow?" Harry asked, standing up.

There was no way he was doing this in front of her.

"Sure," she said, looking at her watch.

"Around lunchtime?"

"Sure," Harry replied, already heading off in the opposite direction to Malcolm.

He tried to make the act of slipping his hands into his pockets seem natural as he walked, the fact that the waistline of Dudley's old jeans brushed his floating ribs helped in that regard, but in reality, he had one had wrapped around the sneakoscope, and the other maintained a vice grip on his wand. He had everything he couldn't afford to leave behind in his bag. It would be a crying shame about his broom, the rest of his books, and even his potions kit might come in handy, but he couldn't carry any of that.

Still not feeling the sneakoscope spinning, Harry glanced back as he was turning into the alley between Wisteria Walk and Magnolia Crescent and nearly jumped out of his skin. Malcolm was not three feet behind him.

"Relax Harry, I just want to talk," Malcolm said.

It was such a fundamentally bizarre statement that Harry stopped. He couldn't remember this boy, or indeed anyone in Surry other than his primary school teachers, ever calling him Harry. On the other hand, a wizard would have called him 'Potter', but well… the sneakoscope was still in his hand… and it wasn't spinning.

"What about?" Harry asked, backing a step away anyway, just in case. Of course, he already knew, but he'd have to play along anyway.

"That shockwave the other day, that was you, wasn't it? You have like… superpowers or something," Malcolm said.

Harry fought the urge to grin. Superpowers. That was one way to refer to it.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Harry replied dutifully, taking another step away.

Malcolm looked at him for a moment, then slowly sat down on the curb, not making up the extra distance Harry had just put between them, and pulled a fifty pound note out of his pocket.

"Okay, let me put it like this," he said slowly.

"I get that the government would hunt you down and kill you or lock you up if they knew. For the record, I have no intention of telling anyone, but why would you believe me? So, this is how it is. I think what you did yesterday was wicked, and I think we could use a guy like you in the gang, but there's no point in pitching the idea to the others if you can't do it again, and that didn't look particularly deliberate yesterday. So, if you can do something like that again, you can have this," he held up the fifty pound note.

Harry stared.

They wanted him to join their gang? Well, Malcolm did. It sounded like he hadn't told the others yet.

"I don't want to join your gang," he replied. Malcolm smiled, and the sneakoscope gave a brief twitch in his hand.

"I'm not asking you to. I might at some point, but I'm not yet. Right now, I'm telling you that, if you can make something weird happen, here in this deserted alley with no windows looking in on us, then you can have fifty pounds. I know you're on the same diet as Dudley, and you don't have the options he has. You must be hungry."

Damn.

Harry knew Malcolm was trying to buy him, was standing there holding out the money and everything, but damn. Harry was hungry. And there were no witnesses. And he could just deny everything later. Malcolm was just asking for proof for himself. Harry didn't really know him, he was a rather recent friend of Dudley's, but, well… you could buy a lot of bread for fifty pounds; and margarine and jam too.

Of course, it was illegal, but as long as he didn't use his wand… well, Sally had said they wouldn't be able to tell. He didn't have to join Dudley's gang, and kids had seen him do a lot worse when he was little.

But the thing was, the Dursleys would believe Malcolm when he talked, even if no one else did, and he would talk, and anyway, Harry couldn't do magic without his wand. At least, not deliberately.

"I can't, I'm sorry," Harry said, feeling oddly apologetic at the hopeful look on Malcolm's face. No one, absolutely no one, in Surry, had ever wanted to see his magic.

"Just try," Malcolm replied immediately, calmly. He was… actually really weird. Calm and sure of himself in a way Harry had never seen on anyone his age. The closest thing he'd ever found was Dumbledore.

Harry looked at him. He would only be in trouble with his family, and he could just say that Malcolm was lying, because otherwise he would have been expelled. Or that he'd found a way around that problem, which would make them afraid of him, and certainly be to his benefit, as long as they didn't mention it to anyone.

"You can't tell anyone, especially not Dudley," Harry said, taking a step forward. Might as well try at least.

"Fine, I won't tell anyone unless you say it's okay," Malcolm replied at once. The sneakoscope still wasn't moving. Surely it would be if Malcolm was lying? Even holding evidence in his own hand, Harry couldn't really believe Malcolm would keep this to himself. But he was going to do it anyway.

"Alright, come further down. In case someone comes around the corner," Harry said, unconsciously lowering his voice as he beckoned Malcolm further down the alley.

Malcolm got up and followed him to the approximate middle of the narrow street, where Harry sat down and took the hand that had been holding his wand out of the pocket. If Sally was to be believed, the trace would only be set off if he used it. Of course, it was really ridiculously dangerous to be testing what she'd said this way, to be testing it at all with the Ministry as on his ass they were, but on the other hand, they weren't the only ones, and if he could summon his wand back to his hand when he was disarmed… well, that might save his life one day… soon.

"This probably won't work," he warned again.

Malcolm shrugged, sitting down a few feet away from him.

"I've got nowhere to be," he replied. Again, Harry was struck hard by the other boy's confidence. He wasn't afraid… of Harry, of magic, of getting home after curfew, of being rebuffed, of being caught by an adult, of being seen by one of his friends. Malcolm just wasn't afraid. Oddly enough, the thought made Harry want to cry, so he pushed it away.

He grabbed a leaf from the gutter, and placed it on the curb between them. If he could summon his broom from the school, surely, he could summon a leaf two feet.

He relaxed, focusing on the leaf, and held out his hand.

"Accio," he murmured, softly.

There was a faint feeling, like champagne bubbles in his fingertips, but the leaf only moved about half a centimetre.

It took him over an hour to get the leaf all the way to him, and he was exhausted and sweating by the time he'd finished. He eventually discovered it worked better if he could summon up the feeling of magic in his fingers before trying to call over the leaf, but that was much harder to do. Malcolm remained the entire time, saying nothing, but looking awestruck each time Harry managed to move the leaf. It was actually rather flattering. Harry couldn't remember anyone even being this impressed by his magic, even at school. He wasn't particularly skilled at magic. He was just… well, normal.

When the leaf finally floated the last few inches up off the concrete and into his palm, Malcolm straightened and handed him the money.

"What else can you do?" he asked.

Harry shrugged. Theoretically, he should be able to get any spell to work, at least a little, even without a wand, but he didn't want to tell Malcolm about his wand. Malcolm could take his wand from him… could break it.

And he didn't trust anyone when he didn't have to.

But Malcolm was still staring at him expectantly, so Harry searched his mind for some non-complicated answer.

"I can talk to snakes?" he said eventually. Malcolm wouldn't know about any Dark Wizards, so he shouldn't cop too much flack for this.

"Seriously?" Malcolm asked, once again looking extremely impressed.

"Wait, all animals, or just snakes?"

"Just snakes," Harry replied, chuckling, and once again enjoying the unusual admiration.

"And they understand you?" Malcolm clarified. Again, Harry nodded.

"Wow…" Malcolm trailed off, staring out into the middle distance.

Suddenly he turned back to Harry.

"I've got family visiting tomorrow, but would you want to go into town to find a pet store the day after? I'd like to see that," he asked.

Harry blinked. Then shrugged.

"Sure, as long as you don't tell anyone I'm going with you, and you can cover bus fare," he replied.

This was definitely not a Polyjuiced person, and going into town wasn't particularly more dangerous than just staying near the house. If anyone were to come looking for him, they'd do it near his house so actually, going a little further afield was probably safer.

"You should practice with that as well," Malcolm said, nodding to the leaf.

"You were getting better the longer you tried," and then he was up and walking off.

Harry blinked after him, tempted to call out that Malcolm wasn't his father, but decided against it. It would be good to practice, and it wasn't really worth it.

He stood up, stretching, and marvelling at his bizarre afternoon. A stalker, illegal books, and showing one of Dudley's friends magic all in a single day. Perhaps he'd just stay in tomorrow.

But of course, he'd already said he'd meet Sally to collect his books tomorrow. And he'd also like to go out and spend his newfound cash on some supplies. He didn't want to rely on the rock cakes turning out well.

In fact, when he arrived back at Number Four and checked the five cakes he'd left soaking in his cauldron, he found that they had indeed softened enough that he could now squish them up with his mortar and pestle. They tasted like soggy, stale bread with something gritty in it Harry didn't want to think too hard about, however, so he decided to maintain his shopping plans, even if he did move them into his truck, just in case he ever got that desperate.

Food was food, after all. He still had another couple of days of the health snacks Hermione had sent, as long as he was careful, but after that it was rock cakes or whatever he could come up with on his own.

He finished third year charms that evening, and started fourth year almost as soon as he woke up, largely as a way to distract himself from the extraordinarily graphic dream he'd had.

It wasn't clear enough to get much from, and ordinarily he'd have simply tried to forget it. But the angry little part of him that wasn't so little anymore was screaming for information, and this was the only way he could get it, so Harry had lain in bed for a while, struggling to recall exactly what horrific thing he'd been dreaming about. And then he had, and after only a few moments, had decided to get an early start on his reading.

It would seem they'd caught Karkaroff.

He didn't go out to spend his money until hunger pushed him. He had, conservatively, exactly four small meals worth of dried fruit and muesli bars left, and he should really be saving them. That sort of thing was designed to last after all.

Breakfast had been ten carrot sticks and a little pile of hummus, and Harry had refused to eat any of the health snacks simply because he didn't want to stop reading for long enough to imagine how some of those curses would feel when his turn finally came, so after a while, his hunger got him out of his room.

He cried a little while he was brushing his teeth, and somehow, that made him feel loads better. Letting the knot of feeling that had been twisting inside him ever since he'd remembered the sight of that thin, haughty face twisted, tearstained, and pleading for mercy, take its course seemed to help. At least, now he could think about it without wanting to cry.

He was still a little shell shocked, and felt just generally wretched when he left, which he hoped was why he forgot to run until the sneakoscope jumped to life in his pocket. There was a corner store a few blocks away where he could get something to eat, and he headed off in that direction at a fast jog, hands in his pockets and first year transfiguration in his bag.

He'd been vaguely planning to get to transfiguration after he'd finished Charms, but he was feeling more than a little disgusted with himself for spending the morning distracting himself with his Charms books instead of doing his transfiguration homework, so he was punishing himself by isolating himself with his transfiguration textbook in the hopes he might actually read it.

He didn't really know why he felt so… disappointed in himself over such a little thing… he often didn't do homework when he'd planned to, because Ron suggested something else or he just couldn't be bothered, but…

He supposed it was Malcolm really. The memory of the other boys… peace. How… happy Malcolm was. Of course, there was a little (massive) part of him that just hated Malcolm for being happy, because why did bullies get to be fearless and content with their lives, brave and calm and sure enough to approach a virtual stranger who could move things with their minds and act like the responsible adult? But there was another part of him that was just… Well, if Malcolm wasn't happy, if he was constantly terrified that his friends would turn on him, that someone would kill him, that the government would… Well, Harry didn't actually know what the Ministry might do but he didn't want to find out. But, anyway, Malcolm feeling as terrible as Harry maybe thought Malcolm deserved to feel wouldn't make Harry feel any better.

Of course, Harry wasn't so stupid as to believe in the kind of Hippy rubbish some of the kids at his primary school had. Happiness comes from within, and all that crap. He would happily challenge any of those kids to be orphaned, starving, hunted, terrified, and alone, and still find that happiness that was supposed to come from within.

But…

Well, Harry would have liked to be Malcolm. That was the real problem. Harry wanted to be Malcolm, and it… it had made him realise something he'd not really ever thought about before.

Harry didn't really like himself much.

No, actually that wasn't quite right.

Harry… if he'd met himself at school or something, wouldn't have respected himself at all, would never have wanted to be himself the way he'd wanted to be Malcolm as the blond sat there on the curb watching him do magic.

He'd never really thought that you should want to be yourself. That was hippy stupidity again; no one wanted to be themself, but all the same. It had never really struck Harry… how little he thought of himself.

He didn't really know what it was about himself -

But no. That was bullshit. He knew exactly what it was about himself. It was everything. It was being shy, awkward, and short, having stupid hair, not being able to see right, and right now, it was the fact that he hadn't yet done his transfiguration homework.

Well, he could address one of those as soon as he got home. But somehow, that thought didn't really make him feel any better. Because he didn't entirely believe himself. That was another thing he didn't like about himself. He didn't always stick to his resolutions. He didn't even often stick to his resolutions.

The sneakoscope had stopped spinning a while back, but running made him feel a bit better about… everything, so he'd jogged all the way to the corner store. The cheapest bread they had was £2.50, margarine was £3.00, and he found a chocolate spread for £4.50. Of course, chocolate spread wasn't the healthiest choice, as Hermione would have loudly reminded him had she been here, but he was getting plenty of vegetables with the Dursleys, what he needed here was calories. All up, that came to exactly £10.00, and left him with enough money for another 16 loaves of bread. Never had primary school multiplication given him such joy. And to think, he'd actually planned to get through this diet of Dudley's by begging his friends for food. No, Harry could take care of himself. He'd stolen food all the time as a kid, and he could do it again if need be.

Feeling a bit better, Harry paid for his groceries, stashed them in his bag, and jogged back to Number Four, where he had four delicious sandwiches in a row, while writing out the first draft of his essay on the theory behind vanishing objects. Doing so made him feel remarkably better, and even recalling his rather unpleasant night - Karkaroff, face bloodless and eyes blank as he choked on his final breath - wasn't enough to dint his good mood.

Harry wondered idly what Dudley would do if a member of his gang betrayed him, as he stood up from his half-finished essay and collected his things to go meet Sally at the park.

Probably not kill them, but something along the same lines, Harry suspected. Harry could easily imagine Dudley and his gang standing around the prone figure of someone who betrayed them, jeering as they kicked him. The thought made him automatically slow as he was jogging away from Number Four. It… he'd never really compared the two groups of people that had played such pivotal roles in making his life miserable, but now he thought about it, the two groups had basically the same structure; lots of followers hanging around someone more powerful who they thought could protect them. And maybe offer them a fun night out.

On the other hand, even if he didn't think Voldemort's cause was anything more than hippogriff dung, people like Lucius Malfoy certainly did. He may not like the man, but Harry knew he was no fool. He wouldn't risk Azkaban just for a little fun, would he? Well, he had at the world cup, at least Harry was pretty sure he had, but even Mr Weasley had assumed they must have been drunk.

Well, he supposed, he was on his way to collect reading material on precisely this subject, so he could always come back to this train of thought later. However, he should probably finish his summer homework before getting too stuck into reading about Voldemort. Or maybe he'd just have a rule where he only ever read the Voldemort books after dinner, so he'd still spend most of the day studying, at least until his homework was finished. Besides, he didn't want to risk one of his guards seeing him reading banned books, so he couldn't read them outside anyway.

He could probably finish Transfiguration today once he got home, and then the only really huge piece he'd have left would be for Potions, and as he wouldn't get a decent grade on that regardless… Well, it would still be good to know, for his OWL if nothing else, but actually writing the information down in essay form didn't need to be a priority. He'd save Potions for last.

Transfiguration was noticeably harder than Charms, and he'd definitely want to reread his transfiguration textbooks as well. Perhaps he should slot them in after Charms, but he wanted to read the runes books he'd asked Sally to get as well. But Transfiguration would just be revision, whereas Runes would be a whole new subject, so maybe he should do Transfiguration first. Luckily, there were only two Transfiguration textbooks, rather than the four-going-on-five that he had for charms. He wasn't as excited about the prospect, but it would probably be better to be able to focus his full attention on Runes once he got there.

But Harry was honestly a little bit worried that wherever all of this academic zeal was coming from, well, that it would stop coming. It wasn't really like him to be doing this much work, even when he was stuck at Privet Drive where there was nothing else to do. Perhaps it was just his fear of Voldemort making him feel like he had to be doing something. That had actually always been his way, hadn't it? He wasn't good when the stakes were low, when all he had to gain or lose was a grade on a test or essay. No, but when he was feeling threatened, was faced with imminent death at the hands of the Dark Lord Voldemort, or someone trying to steal the Philosopher's stone, or a dragon was about to kill him, suddenly he could research or practice spells all night.

Actually, that said something a bit disappointing about him, didn't it? That he couldn't seem to motivate himself to actually make an effort unless faced with immediate death or bodily harm. Ha! He'd probably be a genius at Potions if Professor Snape was actually allowed to hit them as he so obviously wanted! Or if Voldemort only tortured him when he didn't get an O. But even in his own head, that joke hit a little too close to home, so he tried to push it aside as he sat down on the one unbroken swing left, and lost himself in memories of Charms gone by.

Despite his feeling that morning, Harry found that now, reading for a subject he liked didn't come with the same level of self-loathing it had earlier. Was that bad? He supposed, he had been rather upset that morning…

Did he often punish himself when he was upset?

Momentarily stopped reading as the thought occurred to him. Was that something he did? He tried to think of examples, but it was all so confusing, and he found that he didn't really want to think about that much.

Instead, he tried to focus on reading charms, on the sense of pride and peace that came with it.

It was actually odd, when he thought about it, how much he enjoyed reading about Charms versus reading Transfiguration. He supposed it was just the way Flitwick taught. Take the banishing charm, which he'd just gotten up to, for example; Flitwick had demonstrated it to them briefly, and then had them all practice, and the swearing and banishing of pillows into other people faces had echoed so loudly in the Charms classroom that you'd had to shout just to hear yourself pronounce the incantation, which of course, had only made it worse. He remembered distinctly, chatting with Hermione about something or other in the back of the room while they were practicing, knowing no one would be able to hear them over the noise, and not feeling at all worried about getting detention if Flitwick noticed they were talking in class.

On the other hand, Transfiguration never involved group or pair exercises, and no one ever dared to chat in McGonagall's classroom. Of course, the spells tended to be more challenging in Transfiguration too, and successes fewer and further between. And the theory was harder. There were a few reasons not to be as fond of that subject.

Both Harry's musing, and his reading, were interrupted by the arrival of Sally, who's bag looked considerably heavier than it had yesterday. She walked straight up to him, and Harry was surprised to feel a sudden cool breeze as she stepped up next to him and opened her bag to show him the tops of five books.

"I stress again that it is illegal to possess either one of these," she pointed to the top two.

"And suggest if you don't own a magically lockable trunk, you buy one, because the house elves might search your things otherwise when you go back to school," she said, by way of greeting.

"They do that?" Harry asked, appalled as she sat down on the wood chips nearby.

"Well, that's the rumour," Sally told him.

"Either way, if you're muggleborn, it's probably best that you have a place to store your things that no one else can get into."

Harry nodded. Now that he thought about it, he and Ron had been able to get into the Slytherin common room. What was to stop Malfoy from doing the same thing at any time and stealing his invisibility cloak; or his broom?

"Thanks for the advice," Harry replied, relocating the books carefully to his own bag, and getting out his gold to pay her.

As a kid, he'd just always known that anything that wasn't properly hidden could be taken at any time, but having a trunk others couldn't open would be delightful. If he'd known such a thing existed, he'd have bought one of those trucks his first day in Diagon Alley.

"Can you get me a trunk as well?" Harry asked.

Sally gave him an odd look.

"Is there a reason you can't go to London yourself?" she asked.

"My relatives won't let me," Harry replied. True.

"Why not?" she asked.

"They hate magic," Harry said flatly. Also true.

Sally gave him a look.

"What?"

"Nothing," she replied.

"I'm just thinking about the Dark Lord's proposed policies on the care of muggleborn children, and mentally congratulating Dumbledore on convincing you to be so thoroughly against someone who's trying to help you."

Harry glared at her.

"Well, what's he proposing then?" he asked.

"That's most of section two," she replied, then, seeing him going to get the book out.

"Not here! Read it at home. You never know who might be watching," she hissed at him. Harry grimaced, and stood up.

"Same time tomorrow?" he asked.

"It might take a couple of days for the trunk to be ready, and I'll have to have them owl it straight to you. I'll include a note with how much you own me though," she replied.

"Fine," Harry said.

"But here," and he held out a handful of gold to her.

"Will that cover it?" he asked.

Sally counted out seventeen galleons slowly.

"Probably closer to thirty, for a good quality truck," she replied, and Harry handed over the rest of the money, wondering vaguely if she'd just disappear with it. But she'd trusted him last time, it was his turn now.

"Why do they have to owl it straight to me?" he asked. Would his guards see that?

Sally shrugged.

"It's part of the enchantment to bind it to your magical signature, you need to be the first one to touch it once it's ready," she replied.

"Oh," was all Harry could think to say. Well, if they did, he'd just have to claim it had been from someone else from school.

"Well, see you around, I guess," he said, waving as he headed back to Privet Drive.

To his great satisfaction, he did manage to finish his transfiguration essay that evening, and even added a section talking about the runes associated with vanishing, although runes weren't as closely tied to Transfiguration as to Charms. He even went so far as to find and bookmark the sections of his One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi that he would need for herbology, and wrote out some dot points detailing what he wanted to say.

Only then did he lay back on his bed to finish his fourth year Charms, and then gleefully started his OWL textbook. Why exactly he was so excited he wasn't totally sure - the image of Ron's face if he could see Harry doing pre-reading was hilarious to be sure, but really, Harry supposed it was just more that he liked the subject, combined with the fact that he liked the idea of being good at Charms this year. Not in the way that Hermione was, where she basically just made everyone feel shit about themselves, but, just good in the quiet way Neville was good at Herbology. Getting good grades and being competent, being quietly recognised for that without trumpeting it.

To Harry's relief, a lot of what they would be tested on would be revision, and he was actually a bit excited to practice some of the spells they'd be learning this year, the colour change charm, disillusionment charm, and confundus charm all looked incredibly useful. Maybe he'd try to learn them wandlessly once he had a better handle on summoning. The disillusionment charm would be useless unless it was perfect, worse than useless in the muggle world, dangerous, but the other two would be great even if they weren't very powerful. A little colour change was still a bit of a disguise, and a slightly-confunded muggle was still easier to distract than a not-at-all-confunded muggle.

After dinner, more sandwiches followed by ham and lettuce, Harry returned to his room with rather mixed feelings about cracking open one of the Voldemort books, to find that Hedwig had returned. Deciding to deal with whatever she'd brought him before he got started, Harry untied the letter and unfolded it, a little disappointed, but not really surprised to see Hermione's handwriting.

Harry

I finished the last of my Runes assignment yesterday, so I'm officially finished and can start reading ahead for next year. We're both terribly busy, of course, so we haven't had much time, but I hope you've at least looked at your summer assignments! We're about to start our OWL year, Harry, and it's going to determine what we can do for the rest of our lives. It's so incredibly important and if you still want to be an auror

Harry stopped reading.

Who did she think he was? Telling him off for not studying when she hadn't even actually asked if he'd started, she just assumed he wouldn't have. But what really infuriated him was that she was also reading ahead.

Harry stood up, suddenly determined to work on his summoning right now. He didn't quite creep downstairs, but he walked softly and didn't call to his uncle, who was watching television in the living room, that he was going out. His bag on his back, wand and sneakoscope in his pockets, Harry jogged out into the night. It only took about ten minutes for the sneakoscope to stop spinning, but Harry kept running for another couple of miles before ducking under some trees and climbing into a bush.

He could read the Voldemort books later, or tomorrow night. They didn't have the potential to save his life like this could, and he mostly just wanted to read them so he wouldn't sound like an idiot in arguments with well-read girls. They could wait.

Harry stayed still and quiet for a few minutes, waiting to see if they were going to catch up, before he picked a stick at random, and tried to summon it. He wasn't really having much more luck than he'd been yesterday, but Malcolm was right that he'd gotten better with practice, so practice he would. After about an hour, he was dead tired, and was just repeating the incantation with every exhale, pulling twigs one laborious inch after another towards him, and vaguely wondering if he should be using this time to read the runes books he'd just gotten, and which he still had in his bag, instead. He'd been doing this for an hour, surely that was enough. The rune for the summoning charm was Naudhiz, he recalled, a vertical line crossed by a descending diagonal, which was what the wand movement was supposedly based on; it stood for need, and was associated with black or dark blue, if he remembered rightly.

Something brushed Harry's palm, and his fingers closed around it on instinct. It was the stick.

What… surely it hadn't been that close to him… no, he'd just started on this one… hadn't he?

Wait, what had he been thinking about? About the rune associated with the spell. Naudhiz. The rune for need, and wand movements, which was supposedly derived from it, although Harry couldn't really understand how.

He held out his hand, and focused on a different twig. He needed it, he needed that twig, and Nauthiz meant need. Harry tried to think the rune with the meaning, the same way written words in English came to him with meaning attached, and focused all of it on the twig. The fizzing in his hand, well it didn't feel as much like fizzing anymore. Harry didn't really know what it felt like, but when he spoke the incantation, the stick floated, wobbling, but still it floated the whole foot into his hand.

…

Slowly, a broad grin spread across Harry's face. He tossed the same stick away and tried to summon it again. He could feel it, now, yes. The fizzing inside his body that he was trying to use to pick up the stick… it was like it didn't understand what he wanted. No, more like trying to pick up a pencil when your arm was asleep. You knew what you wanted, but you just couldn't get the limb you were using to move the way it should. But somehow the runes helped with that, like… like he was somehow finding the right nerve pathways through them, to get his fingers to respond.

Harry practiced for at least another hour, tossing the stick further and further away until he was summoning it a good five feet. It was around that point that the sensation of summoning it changed, and Harry could only assume the new sensation of… a sort of breathless weight, was Harry reaching the limits of his power. By the time he returned to Privet Drive, he was exhausted, the heavy feeling in his chest now constant, and he was glad to collapse onto his bed face first. His last conscious thought was that even if he could find the correct spell and learn it wandlessly, he still couldn't transfigure the lumps out of his mattress, because he couldn't do magic in the house.

Bloody Ministry.