Eva Black. Year 2.

Chapter 1

Not for the first time, an argument had broken out overbreakfast at number four, Privet Drive. Mr. Vernon Dursley had been woken in the early hours of the morning by a loud,hooting noise from his Harry's and Eva's room. 

"Third time this week!" he roared across the table. "If you can'tcontrol owls, they'll have to go!"

Eva tried, yet again, to explain. 

"They're bored," he said. "They're used to flying around outside. If Icould just let them out at night —" 

"Do I look stupid?" snarled Uncle Vernon, a bit of fried egg dangling from his bushy mustache. "I know what'll happen if thatowl's let out."

He exchanged dark looks with his wife, Petunia. Eva tried to argue back but her words were drowned by a long,loud belch from the Dursleys' son, Dudley.  

"I want more bacon."

"There's more in the frying pan, sweetums," said Aunt Petunia,turning misty eyes on her massive son. "We must build you upwhile we've got the chance. . . . I don't like the sound of that schoolfood. . . ."

"Nonsense, Petunia, I never went hungry when I was at Smeltings," said Uncle Vernon heartily. "Dudley gets enough, don't you,son?" 

Dudley, who was so large his bottom drooped over either side ofthe kitchen chair, grinned and turned to Harry.  

"Pass the frying pan."

"You've forgotten the magic word," said Harry irritably. 

The effect of this simple sentence on the rest of the family wasincredible: Dudley gasped and fell off his chair with a crash thatshook the whole kitchen; Mrs. Dursley gave a small scream andclapped her hands to her mouth; Mr. Dursley jumped to his feet,veins throbbing in his temples; Eva was laughing at the result of such a small sentence. 

"I meant 'please'!" said Harry quickly. "I didn't mean —"

"WHAT HAVE I TOLD YOU," thundered his uncle, sprayingspit over the table, "ABOUT SAYING THE 'M' WORD IN OURHOUSE?" 

"But I —" 

HOW DARE YOU THREATEN DUDLEY!" roared UncleVernon, pounding the table with his fist. 

"I just —" 

"I WARNED YOU! I WILL NOT TOLERATE MENTIONOF YOUR ABNORMALITY UNDER THIS ROOF!" 

Harry stared from his purple-faced uncle to his pale aunt, whowas trying to heave Dudley to his feet. 

"All right," said Harry, "all right . . ." 

Uncle Vernon sat back down, breathing like a winded rhinocerosand watching Harry closely out of the corners of his small, sharpeyes.Ever since Eva and Harry had come home for the summer holidays, Uncle Vernon had been treating them like a bomb that might go off atany moment, because Eva Black and Harry Potter weren't a normal kids. As a matter of fact, they were as not normal as it is possible to be. Eva Black was a witch — a witch fresh from her first year atHogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. And if the Dursleyswere unhappy to have them back for the holidays, it was nothing tohow Eva and Harry felt.

 They missed Hogwarts so much it was like having a constantstomachache. They missed the castle, with its secret passageways andghosts, his classes (for Harry though perhaps not Snape, the Potions master),the mail arriving by owl, eating banquets in the Great Hall, sleeping in his four-poster bed in the tower dormitory, visiting thegamekeeper, Hagrid, in his cabin next to the Forbidden Forest inthe grounds, and, especially, Quidditch, the most popular sport inthe wizarding world (six tall goal posts, four flying balls, and fourteen players on broomsticks).