Chapter 3: Home Sweet Hogwarts
The wild-haired Auror stared intently into the boy's eyes, neither of them daring to blink. She brought her hand up, just one finger extended, the other hand braced on his face. She could feel him tense beneath her fingertips as her other hand drew closer. The single finger reached out, pointing to his eye, growing steadily closer until finally he blinked and jumped back.
"Harry," she groaned.
"Sorry," he apologised yet again. "There's just something about intentionally being poked in the eye that doesn't sit well with me."
Tonks forced him back in front of the mirror again and went back to staring at his eyes again. "It's not poking, dummy. It's placing, gently, on the eye. No contact between finger and eyeball, I swear."
"Remind me why I got talked into contact lenses again," Harry sighed without moving.
"You're a push-over for a pretty face… and a nice arse," she grinned. Remus wasn't interested, but he sure was her idea of a handsome bloke, and he did have a mighty nice backside. Harry was so distracted by her lascivious eyebrow wiggle and her cheeky grin that he didn't see her finger move in and drop the magical lens into place. "One down, one to go. This'll go plenty quick now that I know what sort of dirty thoughts will distract you…" A few inappropriate jokes later and Harry was seeing the world clearly without glasses for the first time in his life.
"Harry Potter, you are one sexy beast," Tonks commented and kissed him on the cheek. "Now, my sexy friend, read the directions." She thrust the box into his hands and continued in a worldly and important tone, "I may not be the cleverest of witches, but I have learned many a hard lesson about the dangers of failing to follow proper safety instructions. I have a permanent scar on my left buttock because I failed to follow directions once and it's not something I would wish upon you."
Harry failed to hold his laughter in and ended up snorting loudly.
"Oi! I'm trying to help you learn from my mistakes, Mr Potter!" she insisted and smacked him on the arm.
"That is no way to treat the symbol of hope and light!" Harry protested and ran from the washroom.
"Symbol of annoyance and irritation, more like," she countered and chased after him until she crashed into a wall of Weasleys.
"Sounds like you two are having fun," Ron grinned.
"I recall a time when such irritated words were never spoken in this home, don't you, George?" Fred looked to his twin.
George sighed and nodded sadly. "I do. Lovely, quiet years, they were. No one yelled or cursed or talked with their mouth full."
"What changed?"
"Ron was born," George said.
"Oi!" Ron shoved at his older brothers, but was outnumbered even before Ginny turned against him.
"Enough!" Arthur called. "We've got to get a move on or we'll be later than usual. Harry, you're in the front car with Remus and Tonks." He gestured for Harry to move, but the boy's path was blocked. Fred and George bowed formally.
"Mr Potter," they chorused.
"As our most generous benefactor,"
"We feel duty-bound to provide you with all your skiving and pranking needs."
"Please accept these, our most popular products,"
"As a way of showing our gratitude." They thrust a bag into his hands. "We've shrunk it for ease of transport."
"Aren't we nice?" Fred said with a smart grin.
"Free refills are available upon request and only to you, Mr Potter," George bowed again.
"Uh… Thanks," Harry said a little stupidly.
"You shouldn't thank them," Hermione huffed. "I'm going to be cleaning up after their Skiving Snack Boxes all year, I just know it!" She pushed past them and climbed into the second car. Harry was surprised the Ministry had sent cars after the way they had treated him all last year, but he was their beacon and symbol and all that rot.
Sighing, he realised that he was never going to just be normal; he would always be at one extreme or the other – The Ministry's greatest hope or highest threat, the most popular boy at Hogwarts or the most reviled or feared. Was it really so bad to want people to see him as just average Harry Potter?
Tucking the bag into his trunk, he went to the first car and climbed in. Tonks followed so he was wedged in the backseat between her and Remus. In the front, the Ministry driver sat silent beside Alastor Moody, who held his magical eye aloft in a glass of water where it spun around in every direction, looking up, down, left right and everywhere in between.
"Potter," he greeted.
"Professor," Harry said. "Thank you for the trunk."
He nodded curtly. "Figured you'd need it with all that Tonks was buying for you. Make good use of it."
Harry nodded and fell silent as the car pulled away. Another year at Hogwarts, the only place that had ever felt like home to him. He wasn't sure how he would take to it after the previous year under the Ministry's tyranny. He wasn't given much time to consider it. As the car left the country lanes for the highway, Moody cleared he throat and his eye spun around to look pointedly at Remus.
"Ah, yes," the werewolf said. "The Order's arranged another precaution to keep you safe, Harry." He dug into an inner pocket of his jacket and pulled out a bracelet. It wasn't the thin, decorative and delicate sort that Ginny might wear, but a leather cuff with a large buckle that made it look as if it had once been a belt before someone cut it down to fit a wrist. Harry accepted it and put it on, but his confusion must have shown on his face.
"It's a Portkey, Potter," Moody said gruffly.
"It's for emergencies," Remus said. "It's charmed to activate only to your voice. You can trigger it with the word 'Lily-flower', your mother's nickname. It will also activate without the word if you are under attack."
"Oh," Harry said. "Where will it take me? To the Burrow?"
"No, to the entrance hall at Hogwarts," the man said. "Nearly every teacher is a member of the Order or sympathetic to our cause, someone will be able to help you there." He patted Harry's shoulder and they fell once again into silence as Harry considered the extraordinary precautions being put in place to protect him.
As much as he didn't wish this life on anyone, he wished more than anything that Voldemort had mistaken the Longbottoms for the family of the prophecy.
Keeping his dark thoughts from showing in his expression, he sat out the rest of the ride imaging what life might have been like if Neville Longbottom was the Boy Who Lived. Would his own parents have been tortured into madness? Would he have been raised by Sirius Black, who never would have gone to Azkaban? So many possibilities and lost opportunities, and all because of a prophecy made by a dippy teacher he didn't even respect.
"We're here," Tonks whispered and squeezed his hand.
Moody swept through King's Cross, frightening Muggle commuters and worrying the police on duty. Tonks and Remus rushed Harry through the barrier and set him up in a compartment after sweeping it for danger. Remus hugged him and wished him well. Tonks forced him to promise he would write.
"You wouldn't leave me worrying until Christmas, would you?" she demanded. "You will write to me once a week, understood?"
"Yes, ma'am," Harry said.
"And none of those one-line letters Ron always sends home, either," she waggled a disapproving finger. "I expect details and gossip and a dirty joke or two. Understood?"
"Yes, ma'am," he grinned.
"Good. Now give me a hug," she said and didn't wait for him to initiate it, pulling the boy into an embrace so tight he thought he heard something pop out of place. "Be good."
"I always try," he commented dryly and dropped onto the seat. She winked and waved and left him to his friends. Hermione and Ron dropped their trunks before running to the Prefect Compartment, leaving Harry alone. He pulled his trunk down and dug into it to find his Occlumency book. Leaving the trunk down as a footstool, he read until Neville and Luna joined him.
"I've been keeping up on the news," Neville said after a brief and cheerful greeting. "Very exciting the way things have changed, isn't it? Now that everyone believes..."
Harry nodded. 'Exciting' wasn't quite the word he would put on it. 'Horrifying' was more what he had in mind. The Daily Prophets that he had managed to read while at the Burrow had told of little but death and terror at the hands of the Death Eaters. Even after so many had been put in Azkaban and forced to reveal the names of their conspirators, dozens were still free to harm whomever they chose. But Neville didn't mean anything by it, and Harry knew it.
"Bloody first years," Ron swore as he opened the door and practically collapsed, exhausted, on the floor. "I know for a fact we were not that annoying. I never once tried to do magic without some training."
It was tempting to prove him wrong, to remind him that on the train ride to Hogwarts first year, he had tried a spell. But to do that would mean mentioning Scabbers, which was still a taboo subject even two full years later. That pet rat had been a man, a man who had slept in Ron's bed with him, shared his pillow. The very idea disgusted the boy to the point where he had tried to burn his sheets before Hermione stopped him. So Harry just nodded.
Hermione joined them a moment later, sighing her annoyance rather than shouting it. "Everyone is just so rowdy this year. Was it this bad last year?"
Ron shrugged.
Luna opened her mouth, no doubt ready to suggest the cause as being some invisible and never before heard of creature that would make Hermione scowl and Ron and Harry fight to hold their laughter in. She was a nice girl, but she was rather odd. Whatever the non-existent cause she might have blamed they never knew because her words were lost as the door was thrown open again.
"Potter," the normally drawling voice of Draco Malfoy cut into their pleasant chatter with a crisp and hard tone.
"What do you want, Malfoy?" Ron said his name like it was a curse word.
"A world without irritating gingers," he sneered, "and revenge for my father." He drew his wand and pointed it at Harry. "It's your fault my father's in Azkaban, Potter."
Harry stood, a bored look taking over his face. "I think you'll find it's his own damn fault for being stupid enough to follow Voldemort," he smirked to see Malfoy flinch at the name. "What's the matter, Malfoy? Scared Voldemort will come and get you?" He taunted the boy.
"No, happy he's coming for you, actually," he grit and glared at the black-haired boy. "That dog was first, and you'll be next."
Harry stepped forward, his chest inches from the wand. "Get out before we make you get out."
"Harry," Hermione whispered. "Don't…" She could feel the tension rising in the compartment even if Harry didn't. He couldn't see everyone rising to their feet, wands at the ready and spells on their tongues. She pulled at her friend, bringing him farther back into the compartment, so that the spells aimed at Malfoy wouldn't hit him.
"For my father," Malfoy sneered and started throwing hexes. The members of Dumbledore's Army closest to Harry retaliated, sending a barrage of their own hexes.
Hermione didn't know what happened, which spell caused it or who had cast it, but Harry was thrown backwards into her. They fell together atop his trunk and she felt the hook take hold behind her navel. A portkey had been activated and she was pulled from the train to some unknown location. Her head collided with Harry's and she saw stars and then nothing