Prologue: Dreaming the Good Life
“-. .-“
It started with Quidditch.
More precisely, the night before his first match. Or, well, the entire week leading up to it. Till that point he’d been too high on not getting expelled to realise he should be bloody well falling apart from nerves. But then it finally dawned on him that he was the youngest seeker in a century with barely any training on a team that had been absolutely flattened several years in a row by all the other Houses. Life suddenly became very stressful, and the comments from all and sundry didn’t make it any better. Increasingly so the more boastful, boisterous, babbled or begrudging they got. It got so bad that the stress started following him into sleep. So Harry James Potter, like all children chasing their first life’s dream in the middle of the hot mess of life known as puberty, went to bed on the eve of the Gryffindor – Slytherin match absolutely convinced that his life was going to end. His despair was total, incontrovertible, inconceivable, absolute!
It was also perfectly contained and masked by a pretense of dutiful confidence so flawless that it would have passed muster at the Dursleys, even with Marge and her monster there to bite and bark at him, if he did say so himself.
And so it was that on the night after Halloween of 1991, it was the anguished hopelessness doggedly focused inward with absolute self-control that followed him into sleep.
The immediate result was the first lucid dream Harry Potter ever remembered having.
When he woke up the next morning, he was calm and confident and no longer afraid because he’d just spent a whole lifetime flying. The specifics were blurred, he could barely piece together ten minutes’ worth of actual memory, and most of it wasn’t even on a broom, but the feelings and the experience were etched in him deeper than the scar on his forehead. He went out, played his part and won the game handily despite whoever-it-was trying to murder him in broad daylight. Honestly, it would have been embarrassing if he’d still lost the game with that kind of experience under his belt.
He didn’t say any of that, obviously. He did, however, find it easier to live in the moment now that he’d completely satisfied one of his greatest cravings. Which meant he was loads better at spotting when Hermione’s pestering threatened to veer from good-natured to irritating enough for Ron to daydream about throwing the twins at her.
“Honestly, Harry!” Hermione harrumphed, every bit the girl that had once scolded them for almost getting them killed or, worse, expelled. “You shouldn’t egg Ron on, he’s in danger of flunking as it is.”
“We’re barely half-way through the first term, Hermione,” Ron said, probably knowing the next five moves in their chess game by now. “Lighten up, will you?”
Hermione harrumphed. “Fine. Don’t come running to me when you’re in danger of being held back a year.” Harry almost wanted to laugh. For someone so bad at lying, Hermione sure did it a lot. “And you, Harry, honestly! I know you’re smart and talented. If you only applied yourself you’d be an amazing wizard, I know it!”
“Thanks, Hermione,” Harry grinned at how red she turned upon realising how she’d just insulted him. “But I don’t think hand cramps are the answer there.”
Hermione rolled her eyes and went back to going dreadfully over the limit on her potion essay.
Harry opened his mouth, then closed it. His smile faded from his face. How did you tell your bookworm friend that you weren’t applying yourself in school because it was… school? Hermione loved school. Not that Harry disliked school, exactly, he was certainly glad to leave all the pretending to be a dumb and useless delinquent back at St. Grogory's, but…
But it was school. And not even the best kind of school either. The best professor had the sparsest syllabus. The class he’d been most interested in had a teacher that hated him for no reason. History class was somehow the dullest thing he’d ever suffered in his life even though the teacher was a ghost. The class that should have been the most exciting had a teacher so smelly and useless he gave Harry literal headaches. And the old fairy godmother may as well be a nun for all the wonder she put into her teaching.
This was supposed to be a world of magic, where you embarked on wonderful adventures of wonder to find yourself, overcame your flaws, surpassed your limits, learned important life-defining wisdom and made your dreams come true. The letter storm proved it, Diagon Alley proved it, Fortesque’s Ice Cream proved it, and Hogwarts, oh, Hogwarts definitely proved that was true once. Once.
You couldn’t make ghost haunting into the biggest and dullest disappointment of generation after generation unless something was really rotten in Avalon.
And that was the rub, wasn’t it? Hogwarts was a magical place, but the only reason they were allowed inside it… wasn’t. Not in the ways that really mattered. Even his adventure in Quidditch only happened in spite of the school rules.
Harry blinked and sat back in his armchair, absently feeding his rook to Ron’s knight. Could that be it?
He confronted Malfoy against teacher orders and won a prize, the respect of the other students, and a spot on the House Quidditch team despite never having flown before in his life. McGonagall broke school policy to enrol him a year too early for entirely personal reasons. He and Ron had only managed to save Hermione from the troll because they disobeyed the headmaster’s direct orders, and it was the best excitement of his life which earned him a life-long friendship with the brightest witch of their generation. And if there was one thing that connected all those adventures, it was freedom.
Freedom like he only ever felt in his dream.
The sounds of the Common Room seemed to fade as he wandered off in his own head. Could that be it? Could it be so easy?
The answer, it turned out, was hell yes. Time off from classes during Christmas Hols saw him receive the first presents he’d ever gotten, including his Dad’s Cloak of Invisibility. Breaking curfew to skulk around the castle let him discover an amazing ancient artefact. The ancient artefact then showed him the faces of his Mum and Dad! For the first time in his life, he knew what his Mum and Dad looked like!
He got Dumbledore to praise him too, and if that didn’t confirm his beliefs about the true point of being at Hogwarts, nothing did.
It wasn’t about the rules. It wasn’t about any of that. It wasn’t even about school. The only way to fulfil your dreams in this magical world was by going off the beaten path seeking freedom.
The Third Floor Mystery suddenly beckoned like it never had before.
Harry’s conclusion was admittedly challenged by the dragon debacle. Only briefly though, because the quest was ultimately successful and their failure in the aftermath was just that: their failure. Malfoy further confirmed it: he’d also succeeded in his rule-breaking counter-adventure and then failed in the aftermath. And wouldn’t you know it, the result fit the pattern and them some: detention with Hagrid in the Forbidden Forest, which was against school policy (like the seeker thing), mortally perilous (like the broom jinx thing), and resulted in Harry coming face to face with his parents’ murderer for the first time (like the parents in the mirror thing), but only after he went off the beaten path in search of freedom (like every other time).
Freedom was dangerous, sure, but Freedom was also the most wonderful thing ever.
That night, after being carried on the back of a Centaur who also grasped for freedom, Harry went to bed wondering about magical creatures, Mars, and the future. He had his second lucid dream.
He woke up with the vague memory of living to the ripe old age of too-senile-to-care after marrying and having three children with Ron’s little sister.
Weird!
Then life got really weird, which is to say he started living in something of a constant déjà vu up until the moment when Hermione was about to cast Petrificus Totalus.
“Hey Neville,” Harry said idly as Hermione prepared to do violence in the name of their Very Important Quest that no longer beckoned, because it wasn’t really freedom if it was dangled in front of you by someone else, was it? “You do realise you’re a wizard, right?”
“I-I know I am! …W-why?”
“You should be using your wand, not your fists.” The previously pasty boy flushed red. “Here, try mine.”
Neville stared at Harry’s wand stupidly.
“Go on. Who knows, it might even work better than yours.”
Neville’s flush turned from embarrassed to angry enough at the blatant allusion to take Harry up on his offer.
There was an awkward silence.
“I-I didn’t know new wands were so much better,” Neville said, surprised. “… Locomotor Mortis!”
Harry side-stepped before Neville even got the second word out, which was good because the flash of spellfire streaked past like a bowshot and tinkled loudly against the wall.
There was stunned silence.
“… Bloody hell, mate,” Ron gasped. “All this time! Have you just been pretending to be a useless git?”
“Ron!” Hermione hissed, snapping out of her shock. “And you two, what are you thinking Harry? We’ll be caught!”
“That’s fine,” Harry said, feeling free from the déjà vu for the first time in over a week. He briefly wondered if this was what being drunk felt like, but immediately recalled that no, it wasn’t. He’d been drunk enough times in his dream, the experience was completely different, would not recommend.
“Harry,” Ron whispered, looking worriedly between him and Neville. “We gotta go.”
“We don’t, actually.” Harry took his wand back from Neville’s slack hand and looked at it. Holly and Phoenix Feather, 11 inches, nice and supple. Not broken. Not elder either. He dismissed those vague memories and the questions they raised in favour of the one that actually stayed with him. The best memory. Him and his… wife, he supposed. Them and their children opening Christmas presents. He stared at his wand and remembered how James and Albus and Lily ripped paper and cheered and wrestled over each other’s toys until Harry provided them with the best distraction.
Dreams are true while they last.
“Expecto Patronum.”
Light. Mist. Prongs emerged from his wand, bright and solid. Sharp breaths came from around him as the stag cantered around the room before stopping in front of him.
Harry blinked slowly, then brought a hand to his neck and pressed on his Adam’s apple. “Albus Dumbledore.” His voice came out even deeper and scratchier than he’d hoped. “Tom Riddle is in front of the Mirror this very moment.”
With a flick, Prongs whisked out through the wall.
Harry Potter spun his wand between his fingers and decided there had to be some manner of holster somewhere or other. Ron, Hermione and Neville stared slack-jawed.
“Right!” He said brightly. “Back to bed.”
The next day, Dumbledore sadly announced that Professor Quirinus Quirrel had died of a bad reaction while testing the third floor defences. It was all very tragic.
Griffindor didn’t steal the house cup that year, more’s the pity.
But there was no blurb in the Prophet about the Flamels setting their affairs in order either, so overall Harry decided to consider first year a win.
“-. .-“
The déjà vu returned when he was having his last talk with Hedwig the night before taking the Hogwarts Express back to Durzkaban. On a whim, he took out a piece of parchment and jotted down a short note. Then he tossed it into the fire and wrote one that hopefully sounded properly posh, that was a thing with the famous, right?
> To the Alchemist Nicolas Flamel
>
> I am the one who warned Albus Dumbledore about the theft-in-progress. As payment for this minor debt of honour, could I perhaps bother you for some informed advice? I am currently interested in the matter of dreams. Specifically, how to control them. Reading suggestions will suffice.
>
> Live long and prosper.
He watched from the window just in case Hedwig started flying in circles, but she didn’t. Huh. No owl ward? Maybe they had a PO box or something.
Welp. Back to Fort Normal.
“-. .-“
> To Harry James Potter,
>
> My first advice is to avoid sending geminio copies when you wish to act incognito – objects created by magic like your parchment fall short of only blood for the purposes of scrying. My regular means have not been able to lock on your your current place of residence, but the train ride had you quite exposed.
>
> My second advice is to consider the color-change charm whenever you send your owl out, especially so far afield. As delightful as she is, she is also very distinctive.
>
> As to your request, that depends. If your interest arose spontaneously, the Hogwarts library should have abundant material on dream interpretation.
>
> If you’ve had lucid dreams before, however, you may have a talent for divination. The Mind Arts can be used to induce lucid dreams, but finding a trustworthy teacher that will not abuse the privilege of seeing your deepest self is the tallest order. That said, the usefulness of Occlumency or Legilimency is actually minimal once the dreaming state has been achieved. Contrary to what some believe, dreams are not a mere product of the mind.
>
> Ultimately, though, it all comes down to one’s ability to keep a clear focus. You would not be the first person to induce lucid dreams just by laying in your bed and deciding it hard enough.
>
> I do know the means by which you might draw more practical benefits, but they take years to attain, they can only be acquired personally, and they are not entirely lacking in peril, especially for a child of so few years. I will not, however, cheapen your plight, nor pretend ignorance about your prospects. Scrying your location is not the end all of my divinations. You most certainly could benefit from consistent forewarning more than most.
>
> This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.
>
> So. Convince me. For extra credit, convince me before October 8th.
>
> I will not claim to be the only gatekeeper to the knowledge I offer, but I do promise to never lead you false or use you for my own benefit. As you said, I and my wife owe you a debt.
>
> ~ Nicolas
>
> P.S. Should you encounter problems with correspondence, I noticed the far side of the local park has some excellent roosting sites.
The words jumped off the paper, burst into flames and the smoke turned into a winged gemstone that flew around his head three times before dispersing. When Harry looked back at the blank letter, it was gone and there was an owl treat in its place.
“Wicked!”
He fed it to Hedwig. She was most pleased.
Harry did end up having trouble with his mail, as in he didn’t get any from anybody, including his friends who swore up, down and sideways they’d write. He didn’t even get a reply to his thank you note containing his valiant first attempt at persuasion. Harry supposed an entire page of “please please please please please” might have overdone it a little, but his joke couldn’t have been that bad, right?
He sent Hedwig out the window and went to the park to send his letter there, feeling weirdly relieved that his door wasn’t padlocked to high heavens and he didn’t have bars on his window. Must have been something he dreamed. The Dursleys were the one part of Harry’s life that had always given him déjà vu, probably because they never changed their treatment of him much to begin with. Harry thought to dispel it (ha!) by taunting Dudley with fake incantations a few times, but that actually made the déjà vu worse, so he stopped. He had much more important things on his mind anyway. Like deciding whether he should risk… whatever the penalty was for doing magic outside school and send a messenger patronus.
In the end, he decided against it. He wasn’t quite that desperate yet, and worse came to worst, he’d meet his friends again at the train station anyway.
Hedwig came back after a couple of days, tired and letter-less. Harry went to the park to try again.
There was a long-eared owl waiting for him with a note.
> Mr. Potter,
>
> A horrible first try. It made Perenelle laugh though, so good job there.
>
> The owl’s name is Eudaimon.
>
> ~Nicolas
>
> P.S. Hedwig is not a magpie, but I’m sure she’ll find a few lost pounds for you if you ask nicely.
The letter turned into three owl treats this time. Harry stared at them. Why would Nicolas Flamel tell him to start collecting lost coins? Was this for some mysterious magical ritual of mystery?
Harry must have passed the payphone half a dozen times that week before he slapped his forehead. “I’m an idiot.”
“Hoot,” Hedwig agreed, a pound held in her beak.
“Glad you agree,” Harry said dryly.
He dialled.
“Hello?”
“Hello, is this the Granger residence?”
“Yes. I am Ian Granger. To whom am I speaking?”
“I’m Harry Potter, Hermione’s friend from school?”
“Harry Potter! Lad, my daughter’s been shedding hair like a cat fretting over you. What’s this about not answering your letters?”
“So she did write!” Harry sunk down the side of the cabin in sheer relief.
“Sounds like there’s things going on here. Let me – Hermione, calm down, I’m just – alright fine, here, take it before you go bald, I swear that girl-“
“Harry! Harry, is that you?”
“It’s me, Hermione.”
“Oh thank God, and I guess Merlin and Morgana too, what happened, Harry? Didn’t you get my letters? I’ve been going spare with worry, and so has Ron you know!”
“You are? I mean, of course you are, duh.” Oh look, no déjà vu for… quite a while now actually, huh. “Look, I don’t know what’s been happening but I haven’t received any letters from you or Ron. I just wanted to make sure you’re alright and, well, let you know I guess.”
“Oh Harry, have you called the post office-wait, what am I saying, these are wizard owls, forget I said that, do you think they have an owlpost office at the ministry?”
“I don’t know?” Harry trailed off. “Anyway, if we can’t write I just wanted to say we’ll definitely meet again at the station.”
“Or you can call again. Or I’ll call you!”
At the Dursley’s? Good luck with that. “I’ll call you if something comes up.”
“Oh… Alright Harry. Call whenever you like!”
Harry swallowed. She didn’t want to put him in trouble with his aunt and uncle but didn’t want to be insensitive and bring it up. Well, that was alright too. “Great. Thanks, Hermione. Tell Ron I said hi and good luck on your homework.”
“Oh, I finished that the first week home, you haven’t? I swear, Harry, you-“
The call cut off and Harry didn’t have any more coins.
He went home feeling weirdly happy and upset all at once.
Hedwig scrounged up a few more pounds over the next couple of weeks, but he didn’t call Hermione again in case he needed them for an actual emergency. He spent as much time in the park as he could get away with though, even if the risk of Harry Hunting increased each passing day. Dudley wouldn’t be afraid of him forever.
Harry didn’t get any closer to persuading Mr. Flamel, but he was fine with that. As far as Harry was concerned, the man had already done more than his share, even though Harry lived in juvenile prison, or near enough anyway. Harry never stopped sending letters though, and he devoured the man’s replies like… well, a starving child. Which he kind of was because the Dursleys fed him see-through soups and scraps. Harry wondered what kind of food Mr. Flamel ate. He asked him.
He got an answer.
So Harry asked about everything else he could think of too.
By the time his birthday came around, Harry was forced to conclude that Nicolas Flamel was bloody brilliant. More brilliant than every other person he’d ever met, except maybe Headmaster Dumbledore. He was old, he was young, he liked wearing purple and gold (like royalty!), he knew all sorts of magic, he knew the name and use of every plant, he knew all the alchemy, he knew everything. Harry had no idea that there wasn’t a single wolf left in the whole country, but apparently they’d all been eradicated by Irish wolfhounds by the eighteen hundreds, it was crazy!
Nicolas Flamel’s favorite star was the Sun, his favorite food was fried eggs, and his favourite pastime was minding promising young minds so they didn’t get themselves desolately despoiled by discombobulation. His words.
It was the nicest thing anyone ever said to him.
Sniffle.
Also, ‘Flamel’ meant flame, and Nicolas meant ‘victory of the people.’
I don’t know if I should feel embarrassed or glad I never cared about where names came from before. Harry had written in his last letter. Compared to you, Harry’s a joke. A diminutive of Henry, which apparently means ‘home ruler.’ Which I’m most certainly not.
Harry most decidedly wasn’t. He couldn’t believe he’d gotten a library card just to be disappointed like this. And he couldn’t even console himself with the knowledge he’d do better if he did own the house, because it wasn’t any achievement to be better than the big, sweaty tub of lard failing to realise that he’d put off the people he was ‘entertaining’ downstairs the moment Petunia opened the door.
“Harry Potter must not go back to Hogwarts!”
What the bloody hell?
“-. .-“
There were bars on his window. And a bunch of locks outside his door. And a cat flap so Vernon could feed him like a rabid animal. The déjà vu was back with a vengeance. As if not receiving any letters or gifts for his birthday hadn’t done that already.
Harry briefly wondered if he’d failed to take advantage of some opportunity that Dobby the House Elf represented. Whatever it was. For the life of him, though, Harry hadn’t the foggiest what he was supposed to have done. You didn’t bargain with crazy, that was just common sense!
Maybe he should have pretended to comply? Promise to never go back to Hogwarts but go anyway? He’d led whales one through three by the nose about his dangerous magic for months, one lunatic should have been easy!
“How does Hermione do it?” Harry muttered as the sun set outside his window. “She lies her pants off at a moment’s notice and gets away with it even when nobody believes her. And Ron somehow convinced everyone he’s so useless that they barely bother trying to force him to do anything unless it’s literally their job. Why don’t I ever get left alone? This is so stupid!”
It figured that he wouldn’t have his wand anymore when he was finally desperate enough.
He was about to doze off when a noise wrenched him out. Even though Hedwig was locked in her cage. It was a miracle she was still alive considering that Vernon’s whole reason for the locks and bars was to prevent Harry from returning to Hogwarts entirely. Were his books even in one piece? His potions supplies? His wand?
Harry blearily struggled out of his sheets and blindly reached for his torch when he saw them. Two glowing orange eyes.
He practically flew across the room and pried open the window. Eudaimon couldn’t fit through the bars – Vernon had left less space than even Hedwig could use, and Eudaimon was bigger – but with careful fingers, Harry was able to take the letter. He almost forgot to hide under the blanket before reading it.
> Dear Harry,
>
> Don’t be too easily amazed. Mighty names are a thing of the past, diluted by ego and fashion. Did you know that Alfrid used to be the rarest and most remarkable name in all Scandinavia? Alfrid, Aelfrick, they were magical names that infused the bearer with the might of all his great forebears. They were the names of kings. Now they’re as common as pimples and not to anyone’s betterment. A thousand years ago I’d certainly have given Eudaimon a different name. That aside, you certainly don’t live up to your name right now, but don’t you think you’re putting the blame in the wrong place? No one can be a home ruler without having a home first.
>
> Be constant. Be patient. Grow strong and wise. Your time will come.
>
> Happy birthday, little one.
The words rose from the letter like a Pegasus, and when the paper changed this time, it wasn’t to owl treats. It was a beautiful glass globe filled with a shining liquid that glowed emerald. Harry hated the Dursleys in that moment. Because of them, he couldn’t even have a good cry.
There was a note attached.
Show globes have a most peculiar history, feel free to look it up sometime. It involves treason and ruddy Romans. This one is spelled so muggles won’t notice it. If you ever need help and can’t write for any reason, hang this outside your window. If you don’t have a window, use the porch. If you’re walled from the outside completely, break it.
Harry didn’t break it, but he wrote him and then some. Maybe it was the anger, the injustice of it all, maybe he was addled from smothering his own crying and just snapped. Whatever it was, Harry just couldn’t hold it in anymore, he needed someone to talk to about… things. Something. Everything!
He took a biro to write in the smallest hand he could and filled two whole pages, then another two pages, then even more pages until he felt like his head had been scrubbed empty with bleach and sandpaper. He stared blankly at the stack for a while, and only snapped out of his godawful wish to tear them all up when Vernon pounded suddenly on the door. He’d spent the whole night writing. Harry went to and back from the loo and then sat there until Vernon kicked his bowl of soup through the cat flap. He ate it and then sat some more. He looked out the window. Eudaimon was asleep on the sill. Was he under a notice-me-not too? Just how much could that spell do, exactly?
Harry rolled up his… life’s story? Tied it with a shoe lace and gave it to the owl before he could talk himself out of it.
Then he crashed into bed and tried and failed to fall asleep all day because he was too busy cussing himself out in his own head for blurting out his entire life’s story to a man he’d never even seen in person. He agonised over his decision. He agonized all the way to sunset about what he’d do and not do differently if only this wasn’t the life he had to live.
When he finally caught up with the sleep that kept evading him, his mind was worried out and empty. He’d sleep on it, he decided. Dream.
He dreamed of flying again. Up until he realised he was in a dream.
Then he decided to dream of everything good he wanted from life because he sure as heck wasn’t going to have that back in reality.
Harry woke up after living to the ripe old age of too-awesome-to-care in a world where he lived a good life with his Mum, Dad, brothers and sister because Voldemort went after Neville instead. He didn’t remember most of the dream this time either, but the lifetime of contentment soothed something in him like not even a lifetime of flying did. The one memory that did stay with him was weird though. It was when Dad was dying to a wasting curse he picked up somewhere along the way to preventing Voldemort from coming back. James Potter was on his deathbed giving last words, and when it was Harry’s turn, he reached up, pulled him close and murmured something that made absolutely no sense whatsoever.
I’m half-way gone, son, but the things I can already see... You of all people know better than to live your live by another’s words. But just in case you’re silly enough to sacrifice that good sense for your dying dad, these words are not for you. They’re for the Boy-Who-Lived: The Pottery Is Located at Number Eight Rollright Weald.
Harry wondered if dream Neville was any less confused about those words than he was.
Harry wrote everything he could remember down in his ever growing dream journal and then a new letter for Eudaimon to take along when he left. Then he waited. And waited.
And waited.
Nicolas didn’t reply that day. Or the day after. Or the next.
But on the fourth, the Grangers drove up to the house to invite Harry to join them on their shopping trip in Diagon Alley.
“Though we’ll surely understand if the lad would rather wait for his proper turn,” Ian Granger told uncle Vernon while Harry eavesdropped from his upstairs prison. “The way Hermione tells it, it was quite the magical adventure. If even half of what she said was true, what with giants swinging fire-spitting umbrellas and flying swarms of letters all over the place, I’d wait for the encore myself.”
Vernon was suddenly all too happy to see Harry gone. It was amazing.
“We got an anonymous owl that you were being kept locked up,” Hermione told him in the car. “I can’t believe they’d do that to you!”
Nicolas hadn’t abandoned him. He’d gotten help.
It was only the training in pretend from the Dursleys that allowed Harry to not break out in blubbering gratitude.
Eudaimon ambushed him in the Leaky Cauldron loo.
> Dear Harry,
>
> I’m still examining your autobiography. I will follow up on it later, when I’ve finished my latest student’s surprise evaluation. I can, however, tell you that dreams don’t typically induce such lasting and fundamental changes as you’ve described. Have you had any other lucid dreams at all? Alternatively, if you ever come awake but cannot move a muscle, know that you are not actually awake. Sleep paralysis is itself a dream. Remember the difference and it will make all the difference.
>
> ~Nicolas
Harry didn’t return to 4 Privet Drive that day.
> Dear Nicolas,
>
> Sorry for unloading on you like that, I regretted it the moment I sent the letter off.
>
> As for dreams, I actually managed to wake up in one deliberately! It was odd, though, I only controlled it a little while and then it was like I lived another life again, and not the same as the first one either. I don’t remember much, except Dad talked to me on his deathbed. And I mean ME me, not dream me. Or not JUST dream me. Here’s what he said…
Harry Potter spent the rest of the summer at Hermione’s house, eating three meals a day, catching up on his other correspondence, and waging war against Hermione’s incurable bookishness to watch fantasy and science fiction marathons with her parents instead. It was great! Some of the things felt like he’d been looking forward to seeing them forever, even though he’d never even heard about them before. It was strangely fulfilling to get around to them. A few even felt familiar, maybe he’d dreamed about them too? If he did, though, he didn’t remember it.
No so great was that Harry accidentally spilled the beans on the troll incident. Somehow he fast-talked the Grangers out of immediately pulling Hermione from Hogwarts and getting themselves memory-wiped. He wasn’t entirely sure how that made them arrange a family get-together with the Weasleys all of a sudden, but the ride to Ottery St. Catchpole in an invisible flying car made it all worth it.
He met his dream wife there. Well, met again since she’d actually been there when boarding the train the year before. She was a weirdo. Tiny too, not that he had a leg to stand on there, unfortunately.
Ron was a blast to catch up with, magical homes had so much cool stuff happening all the time! And the twins were pretty cool too once you figured out the trick to them, you just had to refuse every single thing they handed you while keeping a safe distance! Harry nailed them both in the head with live gnomes and they actually praised him for it! The Weasleys were the best!
It wasn’t cool how the grownups immediately assumed they were horsing around when the entrance to the train platform closed in their face and spread them and their luggage all over the train station. Fortunately, Hermione was there to vouch for them when Mister and Missus Weasley came back looking for them, so they didn’t get in trouble. Which was annoying because one, Hermione was the only one of the three of them who ever actually lied to any adults, and two, doing as Ron said and taking the flying car to Hogwarts would have been absolutely wicked and Harry would need at least a week to forgive Hermione for talking them out of it.
He never revealed Nicolas to anyone. He didn’t want to. It was okay not to share everything right? That the man he had shared everything with didn’t write again for the rest of the summer only cemented his decision.
“-. .-“
> To my conscientious student,
>
> I am making an addendum to our agreement: either convince me by October 8th, or solve a challenge I’ve devised to hopefully assuage your need for adventure in a way that will not get you killed. I do not say this on a whim but because of the contents of your latest dream.
>
> The challenge is this: uncover the functions and uses of the Fidelius Charm by the date aforementioned. I expect a full essay, including all documented uses and misuses of it, complete with critiques for each and recommendations.
>
> I will be grading you.
>
> ~Nicolas.
Harry was torn between breath-taking relief and annoyance at Nicolas brushing past his heart-stuttering life’s confession. Maybe he was still ‘processing’? But what even was this nonsense about getting himself killed? It wasn’t like Harry ever went of his way to look for danger! Rude!
> To my secret penpal that shouldn’t be so mean to me,
>
> I accept your challenge. Even though I still haven’t the foggiest what I’m supposed to be trying to persuade you to tell me.
>
> Hint hint.
>
> -Your student who has never gone off looking to get himself killed, thank you very much!
The library fairly rung with the slam of three massive books dropped unceremoniously on the library table where an unenthusiastic boy was being enthusiastically pestered into doing his homework.
“Hermione,” Harry said while manfully pretending not to notice Ron gaping in horror. “I need your help with a bit of light research.”
Hermione stared, and then smiled brilliantly. They didn’t get anywhere that day unfortunately, but the Golden Trio left the library feeling accomplished and determined to leave no cover unturned. Well, most of them were, but two out of three wasn’t too bad. Hopefully Ron will find it in his heart to forgive him for this. If not, there were always chocolate frogs.
Oh look, Neville was getting bullied again.
Harry bickered Malfoy and his posse on their way and thoughtfully eyed the useless Expelliarmus’ed wand of the Not-Boy-Who-Lived.
Opportunity!
“Ron, I need you help with a bit of light vandalism.”
Some things were worth not getting forgiveness for.