The Boy Who Hid

Chapter Seven

THE LAST MONTH OF staying with the Dursleys wasn't really exciting. Dudley was so scared of him he couldn't stay in the same room as Thomas and Harry, Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon pretended that he never existed. That was something he was used to, Harry on the other hand not so much. So Thomas had a new schedule, he would work his ass off during the day and then pour over his texts. Reading hours into the night, from what he could tell from the books he read spells were more than waving your wand saying a couple of funny words, there were magical concepts behind the magic, which Thomas found interesting. There were spells that could unlock doors, and others to make things float. Harry named his owl, Hedwig, after a witch he read about in A History of Magic. A Guide to Becoming an Animagus was very interesting, it allowed a witch or wizard to change into an animal shape, one that represented their soul. He figured he would try it out after the first year of Hogwarts, if he felt like he learned enough. As well as learning that muggle items wouldn't work at Hogwarts, which wouldn't work so he figured out how to spell it to still work while he was at Hogwarts.

Aunt Petunia barely came into their room to vacuum mostly because Huginn and Hedwig kept bringing in dead mice and rats. Luckily  the two birds got along well, it was mostly because they were of opposite genders so they were as dominant with each other. If Huginn was a female or if Hedwig was a male there would be some disagreements between the two birds. The twins had taken on the hobby of crossing off the days left until September 1st. On the last day of August he and Harry thought they'd better speak to his aunt and uncle about getting to King's Cross station the next day, so they went down to the living room where the Dursleys were watching a quiz show on television. Harry cleared his throat to let them know they were there, and Dudley screamed and ran from the room.

"Er — Uncle Vernon?" Harry asked, Uncle Vernon grunted to show he was listening.

"Er — I need to be at King's Cross tomorrow to — to go to Hogwarts." Uncle Vernon grunted again. "Would it be all right if you gave me a lift?" Grunt. Thomas supposed that meant yes.

"Thank you." Harry replied,  They were about to go back upstairs when Uncle Vernon actually spoke.

"Funny way to get to a wizards' school, the train. Magic carpets all got punctures, have they?"

They didn't say anything.

"Where is this school, anyway?"

"I don't know," said Harry, realising this for the first time. Thomas pulled the ticket Hagrid had given him out of his pocket.

"We just take the train from platform nine and three-quarters at eleven o'clock," he read. They looked at him as if he had sprouted another head.

"Platform what?"

"Nine and three-quarters." Harry repeated for him.

"Don't talk rubbish," said Uncle Vernon. "There is no platform nine and three-quarters."

"It's on our tickets."

"Barking," said Uncle Vernon, "howling mad, the lot of them. You'll see. You just wait. All right, we'll take you two to King's Cross. We're going up to London tomorrow anyway, or I wouldn't bother."

"Why are you going to London?" Harry asked, trying to keep things friendly.

"Taking Dudley to the hospital," growled Uncle Vernon. "Got to have that ruddy tail removed before he goes to Smeltings."

Thomas watched as Harry thanked their aunt and uncle before following after his older brother to their room. He sprawled out on the camping bed and Huginn landed right on his chest, the younger boy smiled and stroked the ebony eagle owl.