The stone walls of the old man's prison were damp and cold despite the summer season. The old man's joints ached fiercely for want of the potion that had soothed the ache for so long. He was trapped now in the prison of his body, in the prison of his own making, his very own workroom. At one end of the huge underground cellar, an enormous fireplace had been carved directly into the bedrock. A chimney might have provided a way of escape to a younger man, but the prisoner hadn't been young enough for that kind of action in so long. So long he could hardly remember what it felt like, to be young.

On one wall, racks of glass vials were filled with rare elements. And on another, hunks of metals were stacked: ingots of silver, ingots of gold, sheets of iron, sheets of steel. The tools of his trade were there as well. Tongs for handling the hottest metals. Dragonhide gloves to protect against burns and the salve that healed burns quickly when even dragonhide wasn't enough protection. There were bellows for making the fire burn hotter, though he hardly needed them. He had learned to control the temperature of the fire so precisely with his wand that he no longer needed such mundane tools. And there, he thought, was the rub in his captor's plan. For if they wanted him to make the thing they desired, they would have to give him his wand. But he would never make the thing they lusted after. He had lived long enough. So much longer than most could ever dream of. He had expected to die before now. He had readied himself and yet had been astonished at his own grief when his wife had died and he had not. They had surprised him in his grief and he had failed to defend himself, not realizing the evil they hoped to perpetrate. He berated himself. He should have made them kill him. He should have fought and now it was too late.

A sound grated on his ears. The squeal of iron rusting. His captor should know better than to leave a good bolt unoiled. But his captor should have known a lot of things better. His captor had only one object in mind. To force the old man to make his heart's desire. The old man laughed as they came, and laughed when he refused again. He ceased laughing when his captor cried out the words of the curse and his mind was filled with pain.

Far away, Harry Potter awoke, screaming. His scar was splitting apart; his mind was splitting apart. He was on fire, with pain, with rage. He sat up. Someone was shaking him furiously. Someone was yelling at him. He tried to focus and the pain ebbed away into a sharp ache. An ache like an old man's bones when he was imprisoned in the damp and the cold.

Uncle Vernon was talking at him. "Be quiet, boy! Be quiet!" and Aunt Petunia was saying, "Don't yell, Vernon. People will hear you!" and Dudley was saying, "What's wrong with him anyway? That man's coming, isn't he?"

Harry shook feverishly. He stuttered out, "Sorry...Nightmare...Sorry...Didn't mean to wake you."

Aunt Petunia was glaring at him with fury. "Scaring me twice in one night. What do you mean by it?"

He said again, "Sorry. I don't mean anything by it. Nothing." He gulped in air and said, "Let me alone. Just let me alone." He turned over and curled up in a ball, refusing to talk any further, to meet their eyes, afraid they would see the snake rearing up in his.

There was faint buzzing in his scar when Harry woke and he ached all over. A rosy red morning sun was shining in and he was possessed of a lethargy so complete that he couldn't even rise to change out of his torn, soiled clothes or to make his way downstairs to fill the empty hole in his stomach. He lay on his bed staring at the fuzzy outlines of the room, too tired even to put on his glasses.

A tapping at his window roused him. A plain brown post owl was pecking at his window with its beak, trying to get in to deliver the Daily Prophet. He put on his glasses and forced himself upright to open the window. The brown owl soared in and dropped the roll of parchment on his bed, clucking loudly and holding out one taloned foot for the silver sickle to be added to the payment pouch attached.

"Shh!" Harry said to the bird as he rummaged in his open trunk for the silver coin. Dully, he thought he really ought to straighten up his trunk. It was such a mess he was having trouble finding the small bag of coins he had left until his next trip to Gringotts before school. He finally found it stuck inside the sleeve of a robe and sent the owl on its way. From her cage, Hedwig had opened amber eyes and she sent the brown owl off with a cluck of disdain.

Harry said, "Come on out, Hedwig. At least one of us ought to be free." He added some fresh owl treats to her bowl and slogged out to the bathroom to get her fresh water. He nearly spilled it all over after his glimpse at his face in the mirror. There was a shiny black bruise on the cheek where Dudley had hit him and his lip was puffy as well. One them must have landed a punch he'd never even felt in his rage.

Harry opened the roll of parchment with shaking hands. The main headline was another story on the new Ministry Safety Guidleines. All wizards should keep their wands available at all times. All wizards were to maintain a state of alert readiness, a redundancy if Harry had ever heard one. How could you be in a state of readiness if you weren't alert? With a snort of disgust, he glanced over the letters to the editor, scanning by the now usual criticisms of Cornelius Fudge, the cries for stronger leadership and the demands that "something be done about the Situation." There were two vague stories of Death Eater sightings. A witch in Hounslow claimed to have seen masked men skulking outside her window and a wizard in Devon claimed that he had seen You Know Who himself. You Know Who was described as having long white hair and wearing Emperor purple robes. Harry thought that sounded more like Dumbledore than Voldemort and wondered whether the elderly wizard had been in Devon, and if so, for what. The Ministry had a statement saying that teams of aurors had checked out these rumors and found them untrue. On the back page, there was an op-ed that gave him the jitters. An unnmamed writer had written an article entitled:

Where is Harry Potter Now?

For a whole year, the Ministry made fun of The Boy Who Lived, suggesting he had problems, suggesting he was merely seeking additional fame and attention when he claimed last year to have seen You Know Who reborn. For a whole year, the Ministry deceived us, and left the wizarding public in the dark while You Know Who had time to gather his old followers about him and begin to entrench himself in his old power once more. Who now can fight the dark powers of He Who Must Not Be Named? Not Cornelius Fudge. Not any of the Ministry's vaunted aurors. Only one person in the wizarding world has ever defied You Know Who and lived to tell the tale: Harry Potter.

The Ministry, so quick to ignore the boy legend, so quick to heap ignominies on the head of the only one to succeed ever in breaking You Know Who's powers, will not reveal Potter's location, nor say whether they will draft him as a special operative to assist in the ongoing fight against You Know Who. Who else can fight this evil? And when will the wizarding public have a Minister that can guide us in these dark times?

Harry crumpled the paper up and threw it wildly. It sailed through the air and smacked into the reflection of his furious face that showed in the wardrobe mirror. He paced back and forth, back and forth, back and forth. Could any particle of it be true? The Ministry wouldn't seriously consider drafting him like that, would it? And if it did, he thought despairingly, what good would it do? What good had he done for Sirius? He hadn't been able to save Sirius. Sirius had had to come to try to save Harry. And it had cost his godfather his life. He hadn't fought Voldemort this last time. No, it was Dumbledore who had and Dumbledore who had defeated Voldemort, or at least, fought him off.

Feverishly, Harry pulled things out of his trunk, tossing out robes, books, socks, until he found a clean roll of parchment and a quill and ink. He shoved everything on his desk onto the floor to clear a space and paused to think about what he was writing. Common sense told him the article was just journalistic sensation. A sharp prod at the Minister who had kept the public in ignorance while danger festered. On the other hand, Harry couldn't help but remember with dread the terrifying revelation of the prophecy that he, Harry, was fated to fight Voldemort, and to kill or be killed. Did anyone else know about the prophecy? Some people did. Lucius Malfoy had known, at least the part of it that Voldemort knew, he knew. How many others also knew, and was that what was behind the article? Common sense also told Harry that he could have no chance if he faced Voldemort now. Voldemort had his blood running in his veins now. Voldemort had been able to touch him. If he faced Voldemort, fought him, he would almost certainly be killed. He could see no other outcome.

The letter, when he finished it was brief and to the point.

Dear Professor Dumbledore,

It's happened again. I can't stand being here any longer and I want to know when I can get out. Please tell me what's happening and when I can visit with my friends or stay anywhere else for the rest of the summer.

Sincerely,
Harry Potter

He read over the brief letter and thought that it was vague enough that it gave no information to anyone who might intercept it. He had no idea where Dumbledore was or how long it might take to get answer. It was the first time he had ever written Dumbledore directly, but who else had the say in waht he did or where he went? His godfather was dead, and that left him alone again, with only the Durlseys for shelter, and he thought grimly, that no shelter might be better than this.

He grabbed a second and a third parchment and wrote briefly to Ron and Hermione asking whether they knew anything and if they had any inkling whether he could get out of Privet Drive soon. As he tied the letters onto Hedwig's outstretched foot, he had the worst feeling of deja vu. He was right back where he had been last summer, stuck, except he no longer had the minute hope that he could stay someday with Sirius.

He gave Hedwig a quick caress before flinging her out the window. He followed her as she swept up into the cloudless summer sky, a flash of white on blue, until she disappeared into the bright white sunlight. Harry went back to pacing the short length of his room, back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, counting his steps each time, and the soft slap of his tread played a minor counterpoint to the buzzing in his head.

At length, hunger drove him out and he crept downstairs in his socks hoping that no one would be there. Unfortunately, Uncle Vernon was at the kitchen table taking his last swallow of coffee before leaving for work. His face purpled immediately at the sight Harry presented. Harry had no doubt he looked perfectly awful. He hadn't bothered to try to tidy his hair, or change his clothes from yesterday. His knuckles were scraped and swollen and his hands were actuallly dirty, but who cared?

His uncle started to sputter under his breath, "Dirty, rotten, lazy, no-good waste. Getting into fights, no doubt, making up stories, waking the house, waking the neighbors I've no doubt!"

His voice was building in volume, "What are you staring at, boy? Get out of this kitchen and don't come back in until you're clean and won't infect the place with your...filth!"

He had reached a final crescendo loud enough to summon Aunt Petunia, whose high shrieks clashed discordantly with his uncle's bass shouts.

"Just look at you! A foul mess! Get out of my clean kitchen! Where did you get those horrid, filthy clothes from?"

Harry knew, of course, that they'd both like to throw him out of the house and out of their lives, not just out of the kitchen. A spark of hatred spurred his response.

"I got these horrid clothes from you, of course, and the dirt on them is on account of Dudley," he said coldly.

He carried on over their shouted, "Liar!" adding, "I don't see the point of changing them as I haven't anything else to wear that remotely fits, except my school clothes, and I'm quite sure you don't want to see those in your sparkling kitchen either."

Defiantly, he opened the fridge, but Aunt Petunia slapped his hand away and said, "Get up and wash. And don't come back down here until you're clean."

He could feel his temper rise again, and had to fight bitterly to keep from pulling out his wand and cursing the both of them.

He stared at her furiously, until Petunia flinched and said, "Go on. Get up. The least you can do in return for us giving you a safe place to stay is abide by our rules and keep yourself halfway clean and decent."

Harry swallowed the nausea that rose and stomped upstairs to wash away the dirt. He scrubbed himself furiously under the stinging spray, ignoring the bite of pain from his various collection of bumps and bruises and scrapes, scrubbed himself as if he could wash away fifteen years of bitterness that he felt contaminated him more than any mere dirt ever could.

Afterwards, he rooted through his trunk looking for something "decent" to wear. The best thing he could come up with was a pair of jeans from last year. They had a hole in the right knee. They were also too short, leaving half his shins bare above his socks, and were almost too tight to button and must have belonged to Dudley at least three or four years ago. But they were, at least, clean. He found another T-shirt. This one was also so old that instead of being too large, it actually fit. It, however, had a hole on the left sleeve to balance the one in the jeans and they both went with the holes in his trainers. He thought sourly, that if he ever got out of there, he was going to go to Gringotts and exchange enough money to be able to buy himself some Muggle clothes that fit. He was dead tired of being looked at as though he might be a hoodlum or a layabout. Almost as tired as he had been of being thought an attention-seeking liar.

Uncle Vernon was gone when he returned to the kitchen, but Aunt Petunia was there, guarding the fridge as if it held gold instead of food. Harry was so hungry; he would have bypassed a mountain of gold for the food just then. Petunia looked at him with the familiar sour, pinched look. He was clean certainly, but his appearnce probably fell far short of decent. He would have liked nothing better than to walk out the door and away from there forever, but it wouldn't do and he knew it. Nevertheless, it was a bitter thing to him to have to dig out the words, to ask permission just to eat.

"May I have something to eat," he asked. There was a short silence, and he thought for a moment she would refuse. He added, before she could, "Please," and when that didn't garner a response, "I'm hungry."

Instead of moving aside so Harry could take some food, she said, "Why did you lie about Dudley this morning? You said you were running and you fell last night. Why did you lie?" She asked this as coldly as he'd ever heard her, and he wondered whether now, finally, she was going to throw him out, as she had always wanted to do. Harry considered briefly telling her the truth that had slipped out earlier, but knew the more convenient lie was necessary. He knew quite well that Dudley was the one true blind spot she had. Dudley could rob a bank in front of Aunt Petunia and she would deny he had done it.

He thought that a half-truth might serve and said, "I was hungry and still tired and I had a bad night..." He added with bitterness he couldn't conceal, "and I was angry at being yelled at for wearing the clothes you gave me."

She looked at him with an unyielding anger and said, "Perhaps you ought to do something useful then to earn them. And when exactly are you going to gone from here?"

He said, "As soon as I can get an answer from Dumbledore, I'll be gone for the next school year. And if I have my way, I'll never return." He turned away from her and walked out the door. Something was eating a hole in his stomach. Hunger, or hate. Who knew?

Harry walked up Privet Drive without looking where he was going. There was nothing for him here. Nothing. And the sooner he left for good the better. He couldn't see the use of staying here for some dubious protection against Voldemort that probably wouldn't work when the time came. He walked into Magnolia Crescent and considered going over to Mrs. Figg's. She might have a way of contacting Dumbledore or someone in the Order of the Phoenix. And maybe, just maybe, she'd invite him in for tea. He passed the park where normal children were playing, swinging on the swings that hadn't been broken by Dudley's gang, chasing each other with happy shrieks of laughter, falling down and having their tears kissed away by their mothers. He walked on under the tall shade of the trees that lined the edge of the park.

Around the corner, where Magnolia Crescent met Magnolia Road, a group of tall teens were circled around something, laughing. It was Dudley's gang and the something they were laughing at was a boy of perhaps ten or eleven. Piers Polkiss was holding the boy's arms from behind, just as he had tried to hold Harry. The others were laughing and Dudley was cracking his knuckles. Harry knew, of course, that he should walk away and not interfere. He knew that interfering was going to cause trouble, very likely mostly for himself. He knew, that every wizard would have said he was acting rashly, interfering with Muggles tormenting other Muggles. But somehow, he couldn't help seeing the frightened boy as himself. He remembered all too well what it had been like to be ten and powerless against his tormentors.

Harry walked forward and said, "What's this? Back to bullying ten year olds because you're not man enough to fight with someone your own size?"

The group turned as one and the boy gaped at Harry and paled. Harry, after all, was just one more of the ones the kid had been warned about. Harry was the one who supposedly went to a school for criminal boys. Dudley and his gang probably looked good next to Harry Potter with his ill-fitting clothes, unruly hair and dubious reputation. The gang was smirking and Dudley turned his piggy blue eyes on Harry.

"You don't look like my size, Potter. And you don't sound like you're my size when you scream at night, do you?" The gang laughed and Harry put his hand to his waistband, intending to draw his wand at that.

He snarled at Dudley, "I'll be glad to give you something to scream about at night, Duddykins. You know what I'm talking about, don't you? Perhaps a little piggy tail to go with your great piggy body?"

Dudley paled and clenched his hands in fists, and said, "You wouldn't dare, and you'll be expelled. But maybe you'd like me to black your eye for you, or both of them, to go along with all the others we gave you last night." Harry narrowed his eyes at Dudley and took a step forward.

"What makes you think I care about being expelled, Duddy-poo? What do you know about it? Maybe I don't care about going back to school now I'm about to turn sixteen. Maybe having the satisfaction of shoving it down your great fat throat would be better than going back to school." Dudley stood where he was, but Harry could see, with satisfaction, that the threat of magic was getting to him. The others were looking at Dudley with surprise. Harry was quite sure they were just waiting for the signal to have a good go at him again, and he really half-wanted them to do it. The kid was still gawping at him and it was the fear in the kid's face that was the worst of all.

He said, "I expect you lot don't care much either, whether that policeman comes back and arrests you after all. I can tell you this, it would give me great pleasure to turn you all in, if you so much as lay a finger on another kid in this neighborhood. And it'll make a whole lot of trouble for you, all of you, even if no one believes me. But you know what? It won't matter if anyone does. Because if I turn you in, just wait and see how many kids all of a sudden feel brave enough to tell what you've been up to."

The kid was looking at him with a soundless "O" of astonishment and the gang was now regarding Harry with the same fear and loathing as a phobic might regard a snake.

Dudley said, "Back off, then, for right now. I'll deal with him later. At night, when he's not so brave." And having saved face to some extent, Dudley turned his back and walked back toward the park, followed by Gordon and the others.

Piers Polkiss was the last to let go. He turned a ratty face full of malice on Harry and said, "Just wait, Potter. You won't be telling the police anything. And if I were you, I wouldn't be walking the street scavenging in dustbins alone at night anymore. You never know when the bogeyman might come to get you." He illustrated the last with a cutting motion of his throat. Harry was quite simply too furious to care about that.

He said, "I've seen the Bogeyman, Piers, and he makes you look like a friendly bunny rabbit. So just buzz off before you find out why Dudley won't stand up to me." Piers actually started for him, but backed off when he saw that the rest of the group was halfway down the road already. Perhaps he remembered last night; perhaps he didn't like the odds, now--one against one. He turned away and followed after the rest of the gang, his ratty face made uglier by hate.

Harry breathed a sigh of relief. He felt almost light-headed now and his scar was buzzing again. The kid was still standing there; apparently petrified that Harry would now attack him.

Harry said with some annoyance, "Go on. Why don't you go home before they come back?" He watched the kid turn and run and wondered why he didn't feel any happier than he had been before. Harry recollected his original destination and scuffed tiredly over to Mrs. Figg's house. One of her cats, Mr. Tufty maybe, or was it Mr. Tibbles, meowed loudly at him from the front step. He knocked at the door, but there was no answer.

Harry turned around and said aloud to the air, "I know there's someone watching. I want to talk to you. Whichever one you are. Mr. Fletcher? Tonks?"