23Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by J.K. Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury, Scholastic, and Raincoast Books, and Warner Brothers Inc. I do not own Harry Potter or anything related to Harry Potter. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
Good luck
It was my 27th educated attempt of breaking out in the 15 months that I was caged in here. In the beginning I just mindlessly banged at the door and even the walls. Then I went into fits of rage and tried every spell I knew. At that time I still wondered why I was left my wand. But soon I realized that no spell I knew would open the door and that was no compliment to the ward on the door but an acknowledgment of my mediocre spell knowledge . After that I had tried to destroy the walls and flung reducto curses at every centimetre of the walls. That gave me a good practice in dodging curses. The walls were obviously spell resistant to the extent that they reflected them.
Then I came up with the idea that my accidental magic would help me if the intellectual approach didn't yield any results. I drove myself to magic outbursts of hatred and anger without freeing myself. Of course I got the reparo charm fine tuned after that. I couldn't come up with enough power using love or even compassion for anyone either. But hope, hope blasted a small hole right next to the foot of the door.
It took me hours to enlarge the whole to the extent that I could crawl through. Only to end up in a larger chamber that was equally closed.
That larger chamber gave me the final clue to find out where I was and the resources to go on. I was put into a cell in my family vault for safekeeping.
I couldn't remember my arrival, just waking up in that damned cell with nothing to do than read the one book that was assigned and then starting the next. I read a huge amount of books, mostly on defence, charms, transfiguration and potions, though there was the occasional history book or one on creatures. In a sense it wasn't much different from what I had planned to do the summer after I heard that prophecy, but be put here and forced to do it was another matter entirely.
Later, when I thought about it and forced myself to be honest, I had to admit, I hadn't really wanted to study or train in the first place, I just wanted to decide for myself. And that was my undoing. I had tried to escape and had been captured three times by the order guards. It didn't help that I couldn't use my wand or even apparate to go any further either. I had just been stunned and brought back to No. 4, Privet Drive, three times at that. It was rather humiliating to say the least and it was hard to admit to myself that I had behaved like the pathetic little worm Snape made me out to be.
The first attempt had cost me my invisibility cloak. Obviously Shacklebolt could see through those too. I had just waited for Moody to leave and had then made a fool of myself by trying to sneak around Shacklebolt. The auror had obviously had a good day and had let me sneak around, but he finally burst out laughing and uncovered me. It must have been a good joke to tell at the order meeting.
The next time I waited for Fletcher to fall asleep drunk and sprinted out to call the Knight Bus at the next corner. I didn't expect Tonks to step in my way. And so I fell on Tonks, my landing softened by her body. Needless to say that was the second time I was captured. I just remember her stunning me when I lifted my face from her chest to get off her and wonder if she chose that position on purpose.
The third time was the charm. I thought to be more intelligent and offered Mrs. Figg to help her in the front yard. When she was occupied with her cats in the back, I snuck into the living room and tried to floo into the Leaky Cauldron, only to realize that I didn't have any floopowder. It took me some minutes to find the powder, yet, I got caught red handed and then stunned by Mr. Weasley.
That was the last thing I remember before waking up here. No explanation, nothing but a bloody cell with a bed, a bookshelf with one book, a small table and a chair, and my wand of course. And the worst thing was, I couldn't even bring up the energy to rave and rant properly for at least a week, I was so tired. I was probably sedated heavily.
My visions from Voldemort stopped after some time, I finally learned occlumency to an extent when I found a way to clear my mind. I suppose that the heavy emotional control I put myself under in order to occlude my mind somehow changed my behaviour. Sometimes I wondered if I was getting apathetic but the thought soon left me, for it didn't really matter. In fact, I felt much better in this detached state. I was quite sure that I did something wrong in my technique, because neither Snape nor Voldemort were that emotionless and they were supposedly master occlumens. But again it didn't bother me because it worked and it kept me sane in my golden cage. It wasn't half as difficult to do as I had expected, once I put some effort into it. The strange thing was that I was dreaming of myself the whole time. It was much more a vision than a dream in the fact that it seemed too real. I always seemed to be the observer, like in a pensieve memory.
That was why I didn't make any effort to keep track of time. It was as if someone was impersonating me and I watched on and could do nothing. Even after ridiculous amounts of occlumency exercises it didn't stop. So I watched on as the other me went to the burrow, declaring his utmost trust in Dumbledore. And then I watched as I was beat up by Malfoy on the train. I might have done stupid things, but I am sure I wouldn't have been beat up by that ponce. Then I looked on as the other me suspected some plot, learned about the Horcruxes that kept Riddle alive and finally I watched Dumbledore being killed by Snape.
After that, the other me went to the Dursleys for a little time and went on to destroy the horcruxes along with Ron, Hermione and ridiculously enough, Ginny. The most peculiar thing however happened when Ginny died, drinking from Hufflepuff's Cup and thus sacrificing herself for the cause. I couldn't bring myself to mourn her, she was stupid enough to do it. Disconcerting about it however was that it was Harry who convinced her to do it, not outright of course, but he had manipulated her into doing it nonetheless.
Hermione was blasted to pieces when she destroyed Ravenclaw's figurine. The backlash caused the glass pieces to cut right through her, leaving nothing but a bloody mess. Her shield did not stop a single shard and Ron lost his left foot while trying to erect a shield to help her. He walked with a wooden boot and gave the impression of a weary soldier after that.
Oddly enough though, Ron didn't blame Harry for it, he kept going and helped him on his way to track down the locket that Mundungus Fletcher had tried to sell. When they finally tracked him down, Fletcher was wearing the locket and slowly dying because he couldn't take it off. Ron and Harry couldn't decide what to do about it, but both agreed that they couldn't wait for it to kill Dung before destroying it. Fletcher was dead in any case, it would be faster and less painful to do it with a killing curse. So they stunned Fletcher and again, Harry brought up arguments why he couldn't do it. He convinced Ron that he had to stay pure until his final confrontation with Voldemort, and therefore couldn't cast a killing curse. And so Ron spent a week casting the killing curse on the locket before he got it right. I supposed that the stench of Dung's body helped him to come up with enough determination to succeed by then. And when the curse finally worked, the locket exploded into Ron's face, killing him instantly when a large chunk of it shot straight through his opened mouth and shattered his neck.
That was last week and since then I haven't had any visions. And again I couldn't feel sorry for any of the three dead teenagers. They were stupid enough to effectively kill themselves. In fact, I could only feel relief that the horcruxes were gone and only Nagini and Voldemort were left. But I couldn't help but wonder who was impersonating me. First I thought it might be a death eater, but then I realized that the person must have been the one to imprison me here, in my own Gringott's vault no less. And that could only be one person, Albus Dumbledore himself. For a long time I was in awe of the pure magical prowess and cunning that this move must have demanded. It was so outlandish a plan that I couldn't bring myself to be angry at him for a long time. But that time was long over, as well as the time I was angry.
I had taken Dumbledore's bold move as a gift and tried even harder to get the hell out of here. What made me slightly queasy was the foreboding that he would retrieve me as canon fodder for the final confrontation. Why else would he put me here for safekeeping, feed and educate me when he had let the others die for the cause. And that thought kept me going in my attempts to get out.
But in a sick way the imprisonment had helped me a lot. I had finally found the focus and ambition to learn all I can. The strange book assignments however where nothing but a distraction.
In my longing to get out and do something useful I had taken to practice all kinds of spells and so spent my time tidying up the main vault. I had stacked the coins along the walls to free everything else for better accessibility. There was not much left. Furniture, medieval armour and clothes, a lot of junk. Things that were obviously family heirlooms but nobody wanted them and equally didn't want to just throw them away. But a treasure was buried under the hill of knuts. It was a simple box, filled with stacks of muggle notebooks and additional books. The books were mainly arithmancy books, a few on advanced curse breaking and wards.
It took me months to understand what I had actually found. Even after thoroughly studying all the books I was amazed by the pure genius that had gone into the notes. It was the research material of my mother, obviously her project for a master's degree, though I was sure she never released her work to the public. It was the clue to my survival that Halloween night and it was no love sacrifice that she had created. She had created a ward that was embedded in a person's soul that could call up a 'Shield of Incredible Luck'. The calling of the shield took huge amounts of magic power and would exhaust a person easily. But she had cast the ward over me and that would always be with me. Voldemort had taken my blood, not my soul.
After that revelation I spent days laughing, going over the events of my school years and laughing even harder when I realized that the blood wards were nothing extraordinary, but the luck that nobody ever came after me in Surrey certainly was. Accidental magic had caused me to raise a weak shield in dangerous or stressful situations and I hadn't even noticed how lucky I had been all these years.
My mother had hoped to create a shield that would defy the rules of magic like magic defies the rules of logic, and she had seemingly succeeded. The shield could protect from the killing curse, though how it did it was another luck factor. That must be the power the Dark Lord knew not. I was sure that the produced luck was indeed that it rebounded on him, not only reflected the curse. Any other shield would have reflected the curse elsewhere. The chance that the reflection would not hit back on the Dark Lord was just to great to be unrelated to the shield itself. And I was sure that it was the most unpredictable piece of magic I had ever seen.
I couldn't understand the work of mother enough to cast the ward, I have never been a researcher and I would never be one, but I quickly learned how to consciously raise the shield. In a weak state it was just a shimmer in the air, the strongest I could muster looked as if white smoke was oozing out of my pores. And I never understood why my mother cast the ward only on me, not on my father or herself. Or maybe she did, but didn't have the chance to call up the shield. Something that I, as an infant did easily, probably though accidental magic.
But back to my escape attempt. I hadn't done anything in that direction for months. The idea came from the self transfiguration that Slughorn had done when Harry and Dumbledore visited him. It was as ludicrous as it was brilliant. And so I sat on my filled dinner table cross-legged with my wand over my head and transfigured myself into a clean plate. It wouldn't do for a house elf or goblin to try and clean me up, after all. I would just have to wait, to break out from the kitchens would hopefully be easier than from a highly protected vault.
My transfiguration skills were better than I would have ever hoped for, but they weren't perfect by a long shot. It just wasn't my field of magic. Transfiguration was about absolute control and perfect detail, it was in a way magic of the iron fist. I did much better with curses and hexes, even charms. I loved the freedom and the power, the variation it allowed and the surreal effects it could produce. I am the one on a mission to prove the impossible for a reason. It wouldn't do for the embodiment of the impossible to even know rules and restrictions, much less follow them. People have broken out of Azkaban and broken into Gringotts, but who has ever broken out of Gringott's?
And in the moment I was at the peak of my short self motivation, I was lurched violently through space. I would have wretched for sure, if I wasn't in fact a dinner plate. Dobby's eyes popped almost out of his sockets as he saw the plate painted with dark hair, wide green eyes framed by thick round glasses. I couldn't look around in my current state, neither could I speak. So I was at the mercy of the insane house elf, who just stared. I would have done something like this much sooner, had I known that it would shut him up effectively. I was surprised when I heard footsteps leaving the room and closing the door and then I saw my shield had come forth slightly. Dobby came back to life and I instantly turned back into my normal body. I was alone with Dobby in the kitchen of the burrow.
'Oh shit' was the only thing I could think and fled outside as fast as I could. In the run I disillusioned myself just in time to see Mrs. Weasley retrieve something from the other room. I didn't care if she would notice me at that moment, I was already too far away to get caught, sprinting across the lawn in the direction of the small forest. I had the pockets full of money and it made horrible clinking noises. At the edge of the forest I stopped to look back. Nobody had followed me. I cast a silencing charm over myself and crept slowly through the forest.
Now that I had actually escaped, I realized that I hadn't made any plans on how to proceed. To be honest, I was not expecting it to work that easily. The first thing that came to my mind was to apparate. The other Harry had already gotten his license, so I was sure that he would take the blame in case any monitors went off in the ministry. I didn't even know how they reinforced the licensing of apparition.
I was in a way torn about what to do, I was glad that Dumbledore had taken the responsibility to be the hero of the Light once again. Strangely enough, now that I could effectively do what I wanted to do, not what the wizarding world expected of their hero, I realized that I had nothing left. And as much as I despised the limelight and the hypocrisy of that world, it was my world as well and leaving it altogether for another country or even the muggle world didn't appeal to me. The strangest thing however was that with all my occlumency hampered emotions, my curiosity was as lively as ever. I wondered, if what I had seen really happened, if it was really Dumbledore, who had taken to live up to my responsibilities and how he planned to "vanquish" Voldemort. And as much as I feared to be thrown into the snake's den for a last strike, I couldn't bring myself to run.
So I traipsed through the forest disillusioned and silenced, at a loss of what to do, occasionally making a detour to avoid the small patches of snow. It must have been later than I had thought, judging by the rather old looking snow. It was already evening, the sun was setting to my right. 'Tempus' I whispered and the smoke that shot out of my wand showed 7:16 pm and that was strange. Wasn't the sun supposed to set much earlier in the middle of October? I can clearly remember that it was already dark out when we arrived on the first of September for dinner. And that was usually around seven. But I didn't know the spell to show the date and so I just put that question aside.
In any case, I needed to get moving, otherwise I would have to spend the night out in the open. That brought me to the question of how I could show my face in public without alerting anyone to the presence of Harry Potter. A magical disguise was out, aurors would be alerted by it and Dumbledore or Moody and Shacklebolt, I reminded myself, would see right through it. So a muggle disguise was in order. But I didn't have any muggle money, so that would be hard to accomplish. Therefore I resolved to better get going unseen for a while. I couldn't put a step into Gringotts to exchange money. I feared being put into my cage again, I didn't know what kind of agreement Dumbledore had with the goblins, after all. At least I had the foresight to take the contents of the vault with me. Money was one thing I wouldn't have to worry about.
That brought me to another sour spot. I had no one to rely on, no one to help me out, no one who would believe me in any case. I had hoped to get to know Lupin a little better but he was obviously useless and seemed in a way honour bound to Dumbledore. I doubted that anyone even suspected Harry Potter to be an impostor, my friends were all dead if my dreams were anything to go by.
I needed to go to Hogwarts if I wanted to find out, what Dumbledore was doing. The problem was that Dumbledore was in possession of the marauders map and he was well aware of how to use it. Hogwarts was possibly the most dangerous place for me to be in Britain, I was well aware of that fact. But I had to find out what was going on and that meant I was going to Hogwarts.
That curiosity, which in hindsight was a great part of my recklessness other then my hero complex, was probably the reason I landed in Gryffindor at all. I still doubted that I would have talked the head into putting me into Gryffindor if I lacked those qualities. But now that Dumbledore had taken the responsibility of the hero from me, I was free to care about myself alone.
Dumbledore had saddled himself with the role of the light's hero, I wasn't able to express my gratitude for that but the best part was that he had taken it without asking me, so I didn't feel indebted to him in the slightest. But neither did I want that role back. Nevertheless I was curious why he would do something like that. I would have understood Ron to make such a foolish decision. He didn't really understand what it meant to be the Boy Who Lived, Dumbledore however understood very well. And that was on the other side the fact that convinced me that it was indeed Dumbledore who was impersonating me. I had to admit, it was probably a good thing in the grand theme of coming closer to a victory of the light.
I didn't believe that I would have died like my friends did, but neither would I claim to have done it faster or more efficiently. The youngest Weasley children and Hermione were useless for the active war, as heartless as it sounded, there was no loss in the grand theme of things. They were pawns, I understood that, the real pieces of the game were still on the board. Thanks to Dumbledore's efforts. Who knows, Moody or Shacklebolt could have died easily in an attempt to save me from any horcrux backlash, and they were important, not some kids that didn't know their limits.
It had gone dark in the meantime and if it wasn't for the warming charms I recast regularly, the cold would already have crept into my bones. It was freezing again in the night but I kept walking though the night. I had come to a narrow road half an hour ago and kept moving north from then on. I wanted to avoid the village altogether and had therefore taken a slight detour.
The road bent around the countryside and I was still deep in thought, not exhausted in the slightest. A feeling of uneasiness overcame me, not unlike when I suspected grave danger in the past. I always trusted my instincts and wouldn't stop now, so I recast the disillusionment on myself, stepped into the tree line to avoid discovery and awaited any threat to show. No later then a second after I had completely sunken into the shadows, four figures arrived. Their masks gleamed in the dim light of the moon, they were clearly Death Eaters.
"What's that, Weasley, we were supposed to arrive at the tribes hovel!" One of them demanded roughly.
"We are at the border of the wards. They have to be crossed by foot, the amulets will shield us from the wards only if we pass them walking."
That was clearly Percy, though his voice didn't hold the usual pompousness, he sounded resigned. His shoulders were slumped and his cloak seemed to be much too large for his stature. I wondered how Percy had gotten himself into that position and listened. I felt secure in my spot, I was disillusioned, silenced and in the shadows. No harm finding out what was going on, I thought to myself. Lack of information was my weakest spot at the moment after all.
Percy led the group through the forest in a steady pace. They didn't try to stay hidden or even quiet as they walked.
"If that is one of the Parkinson's little bitches desperate attempts to get into favour with the Lord again, I'll strangle her for sure this time. How the hell does she want to know where the Potter boy went?" One of them growled.
"Now, Rudolphus, there's no need to bitch, if he's not there, we just decimate the rest of the rodents anyway. No harm done, it will be a rewarding mission in any case. Isn't that right, Weasley? "
I couldn't imagine how Percy could stand to stay quiet, but he did. I didn't see any change in his demeanour, but they were walking several meters in front of me in the dark, so there was no way to tell what he really thought.
"I would crucio you into oblivion for your disrespect right now if you were not needed for this useless mission. I am not one of your school buddies, Stanton." He snarled to the man at his right and then mumbled. "I have indeed better things to do than to entertain a bunch of idiots with cursing some insignificant blood traitors."
"Of course, Sir" Stanton replied suddenly very timid. But the one on the other side didn't seem to get the hint.
"That's right, Rudolphus, with that project you are working on with Rabastan for months now without any result. I'm surprised our Lord is so lenient with you, considering …"
"If our Lord wishes you to criticize him, he will tell you. Now stop your inane babbling. We have work to do." Rudolphus sounded seriously irritated by now and the others seemed to finally get the hint. But my interest was peeked, too bad Rudolphus didn't say another word.
And so I trudged on, following the Death Eaters at a safe distance silently. I was a bit astounded that they proceeded in the same manner when they reached the end of the forest and strolled arrogantly across the lawn.
When they were just a few meters from the patio, Dobby suddenly appeared behind them silently and did his weird blasting thing on their unsuspecting backs. Rudolphus, in the main line of fire and the one nearest the house got blasted into a window and sailed head first into the house. Blood was streaming from the many wounds on his head even before he disappeared from sight.
One of the Death Eaters, who was not that heavily affected, stumbled and caught himself in his fall. He turned around and fired a muddy brown spell at Dobby, who was hit unprepared in his right leg. Dobby slid to the floor, not uttering a word. His leg was obviously shattered. I couldn't imagine the pain he must have been in before unconsciousness took him.. The other Death Eaters seemed to be satisfied with Dobby's state and rushed into the house. I spared Dobby a last glance and headed after them, if I ever got a chance of getting at Lestrange, it would be now or never.
I entered the house and saw from a far that Mrs. Weasley was shooting stunners from behind the living room sofa, right in front of the fireplace. Rather than joining the fight I turned to the left immediately and entered the kitchen where Rudolphus had landed. He was laying on the floor groaning and clutching his bloodied face. I immediately stunned him and did the first thing that I could think of to remove him from the battlefield. I forced him into his animagus form. It was the same spell that the fake Moody had used to transform Draco Malfoy into a ferret in my fourth year. To my utter astonishment it transformed the man into a perch. I had to stop myself from staring in surprise and conjured a bowl of water, putting the small fish inside. After that I placed the bowl on the windowsill and put a notice-me-not charm on it.
Just as I pocketed Rudolphus' wand, one of the Death Eaters stormed into the room. They must have been finished with Molly, I thought as the other two followed. I was slowly creeping out behind them as they shouted at each other quite agitatedly. It did occur to me that I wouldn't have been able to do any of the things I did tonight a year ago due to my overemotional behaviour. I was glad I had become the person I now was. The Harry Potter of old had overcomplicated situations needlessly. Molly had escaped via the floo by the shouts of the death Eaters and I was glad my passive behaviour didn't lead to another death.
Outside I took the fish bowl from the windowsill without anyone inside noticing and turned to get to Dobby. I hadn't thought of him before, but now that he was there I would make the most of it. I knew that my actions would be received as cold hearted and I was in a way glad that I didn't have to excuse myself to anyone. I could just imagine the outrageous looks of Ron and Hermione by that point.
Dobby was still laying unconscious on the grounds. I disillusioned him after assuring myself that nobody was able to witness it and levitated him in front of me, towards the forest. Now that I knew were the Death Eaters had entered the wards I could easily avoid the spot. But just then I heard three cracks of apparition and supposed help had arrived or more likely the Death Eaters were gone. They must have gotten scared by the disappearance of their injured leader.
After about fifteen minutes of slowly walking through the forest I stopped to investigate the state of my companions. The fish was very still but obviously not dead. Dobby however was in a bad shape. I had no idea how to help him. I suspected he would be able to better help himself than endure my certainly torturous attempts at healing. His leg was a bloody mass of flesh and splintered bone. And I couldn't even go back into the house for supplies for fear of being discovered, at a crime scene no less. The place was certainly swarming with aurors and order members by now.
What to do? What to do? I could just ennervate him, but with his injuries, Dobby would surely make a racket and I couldn't afford that. But if I just let him stay unconscious he would die anyway and I was sure he could give me a lot of the information I was so desperate to get.
Maybe I could try legilimency on him, but though I was very sure my occlumency was abnormally strong, I had no clue about legilimency. I didn't even know if it would work on a house elf and most importantly, Dobby was a crazy fellow, who knows if I could stomach what I would find. The possibility to stumble on his Winky memories gave me the creeps and I immediately dismissed the idea.
And so the only thing that was left in my arsenal was my luck. I flared my shield slightly and pointed my wand at Dobby. 'Ennervate!', I thought, Dobby's eyes popped open and he squeaked and started to hyperventilate.
"I've got you out of there, Dobby. I want to help you but you have to tell me how. You remember me, right?"
"Dobby remembers the Great Harry Potter." He squeaked out and his breathing seemed to calm slightly.
I smiled at him reassuringly. "Now, Dobby, I want to help you. But I don't have anything with me and I can't be seen anywhere."
"Dobby knows. Dobby is bound to Master Harry Potter but Dobby is keeping the secrets of the Great Harry Potter, Sir."
He must have gotten hit in the head as well. That didn't make any sense at all. But wait!
"You know about the other Harry Potter, Dobby?"
"Harry Potter is Dobby's Master." Oh, shit, I thought. So much for finding someone who would be able to help me, now I'm screwed.
"So you can't tell me anything?" I asked, resigned to my fate. I was sure I couldn't kill an injured Dobby, that would be the only way to keep my secret, at least for a while.
"Dobby was happy to bond to Master Harry Potter, but Dobby knew after the first part of the bonding that it wasn't the Great Harry Potter. So Dobby swore to serve Master Harry Potter but then swore to keep all secrets of the Great Harry Potter."
And then it hit me, the little sneak had twisted the bonding to serve the other but keep my secrets. "You would have been great in Slytherin, Dobby." I told him. "Thank you Dobby."
"I will help you to get better and then you have to tell me everything that has happened."
"Dobby will keep the secrets of the Great Harry Potter, Dobby has to go to Master Harry Potter, Master is calling. Dobby will find the Great Harry Potter later." With that he popped away and I was left in the dark forest with my fishbowl and a bloodied patch of ground.
Then, without further ado I renewed my disillusionment, silencer and warming charm, picked up the fish bowl and started walking again.
This time, I just went north. Clearly I had walked in circles the whole time before the Death Eaters arrived. I walked the whole night without the slightest feeling of exhaustion and when the sun rose in the morning at about seven I knew that it was definitely not October. It must be spring already. The morning sun was the most beautiful thing I had seen for a long time. A few birds were twittering in the trees and I let the harmony of the morning wash over me, giving me a feeling of contentment.
It was a pity, I thought then and there that I didn't get done in my attempts to be an animagus. It would have helped me greatly to just transform, as it had helped Sirius when he was on the run. I had gone very far in the first stages, the so called mental transformation, but didn't even start with the physical transformation. The books said that the physical transformation would be easy as soon as the mental transformation was sufficiently achieved. It was the mental part that took people so long, You had to somehow achieve a kind of bond with your inner animal. Share the feelings and desires and get to know each other very intimately. The initial animagus transformation could be sped up by potions that helped in the process but in the end, it was something like puberty all over again. You have to get to know your new body, new mind and be one with it. I supposed that this was the reason why the marauders had finished their transformation in the summer after their fifth year. Someone younger, not accustomed to the awkwardness of such changes, would be hard pressed to undergo such a complete burying and resurrection of mind and body and equally someone far older wouldn't be as open to such a process.
My animal was a fox. A charcoal grey one with the tips of the ears and the end of the tail in deep black. I was very satisfied with that, it suited me perfectly. There was no marking at all on my head and the only thing that would give me away would be the eyes. But for me it was more than just a way to stay hidden or get into mischief, it was the acknowledgement that I had accepted who I am and that I was finally free to be it. I was sure that two years ago I wouldn't have even passed the first stages of the mental transformation because I pressured myself into the golden boy image that everyone seemed to expect from me. Granted, I could blame my first meeting with Hagrid for that or the Weasleys and Dumbledore, of course, but it was my own weakness in the end that lead me to believe I had to appease the whole Wizarding world. I had finally come to realize that the most important person in my life was myself and everyone who believed otherwise was a victim of moral indoctrination or should seek out a psychiatrist, because lying to one's self is the worst kind of deception that is humanly possible.
That's why the Fox suited me so well. I had gained enough perspective on my life to know that I was in no way stupid or worthless, on the contrary. Once I allowed myself to think freely, I proved myself quite nimble of mind. I would never be the bookish type but the strength of my knowledge was its accessibility, for I don't freeze in danger, I am quick in action and defensive by nature. But however skilled or talented I made myself out to be I knew that I needed lots of patience and training. I am restless, a risk taker and I am hardwired to danger, excitement and adventure through my curiosity.
Thinking about all this I could feel the fox in me as I trotted on a small path through the countryside. I had gone a long way to feel it even without any meditation but that was all I achieved. I wondered how I would perceive myself once I was ready to finally transform.
The sun brought a warm feeling to my skin and now that it was daylight I could see that the greens in the bushes and trees were indeed newly grown spring leaves, not the worn out ones of late autumn. The fish in the glass was still unmoving but alive. Good that I had taken the time to close the top so that it now resembled a glass ball filled with water. I smirked to myself. Rudolphus would get a nice surprise if he tried to transform back in the unbreakable cistern. If he even knew how.
The perch form fit him quite nicely. Feeding on the helpless, a predator in the lowest places of the food chain. I had to find out what to use him for. The best thing would probably a transfer of knowledge but I had no idea how that could be accomplished. It would be quite exerting to extract everything he knew into a pensieve and then examine it. But if that was the price for his knowledge I would set myself to the task anyway. If Voldemort set him to a research project there had to be something useful in his brain.
By noon I decided to take a nap in a clearing and enjoy the sunlight on my skin. I would proceed by sunset. If Dobby didn't appear by then I would have to find food for myself and make some concrete plans without him. Who knows, he might not even be alive by now. I had no idea if that wound was fatal for a house elf, a human would have died within the hour without medical attention and I could only imagine what a pain threshold an Ex-Malfoy house elf possessed.
So I slept peacefully for some hours under a notice-me-not charm and awoke to the tingle of the evening sun on my face. Hunger was the second sensation I encountered and Dobby hadn't shown up, so I decided to hunt for a rabbit or even a dear. It didn't take me long to have a rabbit in a stone bowl roasting in the fire. My accio charm was legendary after all. I was glad to have all the cooking experience from aunt Petunia, another seventeen year old guy would have put it on a stick and burned its skin to coal while the inside stayed raw. But my roasted rabbit would be a feast, I could already smell it.
That evening I made my way further to the north, avoiding any settlements and trying to resolve how to get into Hogwarts without being noticed. But first I had to acquire some disguise. I needed to get into Hogsmeade incognito to know what was happening in the wizarding world. And maybe I could get some potions supplies to finalize my transformation. And some books on invisibility and stealth in general wouldn't be amiss either. Knowledge of tracking and surveillance techniques was a must, even if I didn't dare to put any charms on the other Harry directly, for fear of getting tracked back in the likely event that he noticed.
It was a pity that my animagus form wasn't a house elf, went through my mind, it would be the perfect cover. But then I shuddered. The mental transformation would be a horror in itself. I could never be that obedient and giddy on the prospect of cleaning. But it would have made a happy childhood at the Dursleys. I snorted and shook my head.
Rudolphus the perch was finally awake and swimming furiously around in his little water world when morning came. I was happy that he was still alive and seemed quite recovered from his injuries, though I didn't know how the transformation affected them. Today I had planned to finally practice my apparition skills and so I set the bowl on a tree stomp and apparated back and forth, increasing the distance with every step. It was easier than I would have thought. I supposed the memories from a year ago helped me to get a feel for it, which was my way of learning new magic anyway.
By the time I felt secure in my apparition skills I was itching to get back into society. In a way I missed the presence of my dead friends, not their nagging and bickering but the possibility to sound out my plan and get distracted by Ron's inane babbling. As I was alone I had nothing to do but mull over my plans again and again.
In the evening I went into a small muggle town under a glamour and raided the local beauty salon. I put the woman at the counter to sleep and pocketed an amount of every make-up article I could find. Tanning lotion, makeup brush powders, Mister Tricky Camouflage For Men, hair straightener, all went into my enlarged pockets along with the cash from the register. I felt quite foolish in front of all these products and therefore took everything that seemed remotely useful to me.
When I awoke the next morning in another clearing I felt ready to get into action. That was I wanted to get ready. I had to make myself presentable first. That meant I had to find a way to apply all the make-up and I had no clue how. I cut my hair short, grew my facial hair out a bit and cut it into a goatee after thickly covering my whole body with the tanning lotion. It wouldn't do to have pale hands and neck with a tanned face, after all and nobody would look for a hidden Harry Potter that proudly showed his unscarred forehead. I didn't know any beauty related charms besides the hair growing one, and that was only through a prank that Fred and George had pulled once. So the muggle methods had to suffice. When I cleaned myself up a while later, my skin was as dark as that of a southern European person. A little bit overdone but still better than my normal pale complexion. My scar was barely visible now on the darkened skin but I concealed it nonetheless. The hair straightener worked better than any charm and when I watched my face in the mirror at the end, I saw a guy that looked to be about twenty and was not to be mistaken for Harry Potter. Now there was still one thing left, the glasses. I wanted to get contact lenses for a long time and now I had a real incentive to finally do it.
And so I arrived in Hogsmeade in the afternoon with my new contact lenses, certain that nobody would suspect me to be Harry Potter. I headed straight for the bookshop and was slightly surprised that it was as big as Flourish & Blots in Diagon Alley. So I took my time browsing the shelves. I selected a large variety on charms texts, a heavy runic dictionary and the workbook of Bridget Wenlock, a famous arithmancer from the thirteenth century. She was one of the few I knew from my mothers work, the number seven was the mystery of luck and harmony, though it also had a heavy part in everything concerning the mind. I was hoping to get some inside view on how an arithmancer would go about his work to understand my mothers theories better. A few auror books on detection and tracking went onto my stack, though they concentrated on the detection, not hiding from it.
The last thing I did was to go into the divination section to get some insight into the specific interpretation of prophecies. I had an inkling that Dumbledore had wanted to make himself the chosen one from the prophecy when he assumed my identity on my sixteenth birthday. But I was doubtful if he had succeeded. Though it pained me to even consider divination as a serious subject, I had no choice but to handle the cards that I was dealt.
I was slightly surprised that there were books on serious wand work in that section and so I curiously picked up one book after another on spells and potions that fell into the field of divination. But none was really of use for me until I came to a subject called ophidiomancy, which supposedly enabled the user to view distant events with the help of snakes. And that gave me finally the idea on how I could find out what was going on without risking to get caught. I picked up three different books from that shelf. On my way back to the counter I came across a rather dusty shelf that proclaimed its category to be Magical Theory. Obviously nobody really cared for magical theory, but I thought I might find some background to understand the ward my mother cast and so I scanned through the titles. I finally picked a book called 'An Arithmantic Theory of Wand Movements and Magical Channelling' and left to pay my bill.
On my way out I picked up the daily prophet and the quibbler to have a look at the latest news and gossip and sat down in a small café to read the paper and enjoy the afternoon sun. I couldn't get enough of the open air and contemplated on staying out in the open for another night when I looked though the advertisements and saw a room for rent, much cheaper than if I had rented a room at the Leaky Cauldron.
AN: If anyone is interested in beta-ing this story, please contact me. English is not my mother tongue. The story won't be long and most of it is already written or at least scripted. There won't be any romance in this fic.