harry-potter-gen-z
Chapter Four
THE KEEPER OF THE KEYS
BOOM. They knocked again. Dudley jerked awake.
“Where’s the cannon?” he said stupidly, in a smooth-brained fashion.
There was a crash behind them and Uncle Vernon came sliding into the room. He was holding a rifle in his hands - now they knew what had been in the long, thin package (that’s what she said) he had brought with them.
“Who’s there?” he shouted. “I warn you – I’m armed and I’m majorly triggered!”
There was a pause. Then –
SMASH!
The door was yeeted clean off its hinges and with a deafening crash landed flat on the floor.
A heckin chonky man-mountain was filling in the doorway. His face was almost completely hidden by a hot mess of hair and a total unit of a beard, but you could make out his eyes, glinting like black beetles under all the hair.
The giant squeezed his way into the hut, getting low so that his head just brushed the ceiling. He bent down, picked up the door, and fitted it easily back into its frame. The noise of the proper nasty storm outside dropped a little. He turned to look at them all.
“Couldn’t make us a cup o’ tea, could yeh? That journey? Full Caps gross…”
He strode over to the sofa where Dudley sat frozen with fear. “Budge over, chonks,” said the stranger.
Dudley squeaked and ran to hide behind his mother, who was crouching, terrified, behind Uncle Vernon in total human centipede style.
“An’ here’s Harry!” said the giant.
Harry looked up into the fierce, wild, shadowy face and saw that the beetle eyes were crinkled in a smile.
“Las’ time I saw you, you was only an iddy bit,” said the giant. “Yeh look a lot like yer dad, but yeh’ve got yer mom’s eyes.” “Oops, not giving them back tho”, snarked Harry (in his head, ofc. Ya boi ain’t no smooth brain!)
Uncle Vernon made a sussy rasping noise.
“I demand that you leave at once, sir!” he said, completely torying up. “You are breaking and entering!”
“Ah, shut up, Dursley, yeh total unit,” said the hella tall dude; he reached over the back of the sofa, jerked the gun out of Uncle Vernon’s hands, bent it into a knot as easily as if it had been made of rubber, and threw it into a corner of the room.
Uncle Vernon made another sussy baka noise, like a mouse being unalived. No more Karen-ing for him.
“Any road, – Harry,” said the giant, turning his back on the Dursleys in peak hot girl fashion, “a very happy birthday to yeh. Got summat fer yeh here – I mighta sat on it at some point, but it’ll taste all right.”
From an inside pocket of his black overcoat he pulled a slightly squashed box. Harry opened it with scared fingers. Inside was a large, sticky chocolate cake with ‘Happy Birthday Harry’ written on it in nuclear-green icing.
Harry looked up at the Mt Giant Mc Beary-face. He meant to say tyvm, but a smooth brain moment had him saying, “Dude,Who are you?”
The giant lol’d.
“True, I haven’t i.deed meself. Rubeus Hagrid, Keeper of Keys and Grounds at Hogwarts.” He held out an humungous hand and shook Harry’s whole arm.
“Hurry up with that tea, will ya?” he said, gesturing at the Fam. Dursley. “I’d not say no ter summat a tad more prime, if yeh’ve got it, mind.”
His eyes fell on the empty grate with the shriveled crisp packets in it and he snorted. He bent down over the fireplace; they couldn’t see what he was doing but when he drew back a second later, there was a thiccc fire there. It filled the whole damp hut with flickering light and Harry felt the warmth wash over him as though he’d sunk into a hot bath.
The giant sat back down on the sofa, which sagged under his weight, and began taking all sorts of things out of the pockets of his coat: a copper kettle, a squashy package of sausages, a poker, a teapot, several chipped mugs, and a bottle of some amber liquid that he took a swig from before starting to make tea. Soon the hut was full of the sound and smell of sizzling sausage. Nobody said a thing while the giant was working, but as he slid the first six fat, juicy, slightly burnt sausages from the poker, Dudley fidgeted a little. Uncle Vernon said sharply, “Don’t touch anything he gives you, Dudley.”
The giant chuckled darkly.
“Yer great chonky ball of a son don’ need fattenin’ anymore, Dursley, chill.”
He passed the sausages to Harry, who was so hungry he had never tasted anything so wonderful, but he still couldn’t take his eyes off the big chungus. Finally, as nobody seemed about to drop deets, he said, “I’m sorry, but I still haven’t got a scooby who you are.” The sofa-smasher knocked back his tea and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.
“Call me Hagrid,” he said, “everyone does. An’ like I told yeh, I’m Keeper of Keys and General Dogsbody at Hogwarts – yeh’ll grok Hogwarts, o’ course.”
“Er – no,” said Harry.
Hagrid looked shooketh.
“My b” Harry said quickly.
“Your b?” barked Hagrid, turning to stare at the Dursleys, who shrank back, not well, into the shadows. “It’s them as should be sorry! I knew yeh weren’t gettin’ yer letters but I never thought yeh wouldn’t even know abou’ Hogwarts, fer f’s sake! Did yeh never wonder where yer parents learned their shit?”
“What shit?” asked Harry.
“WHAT SHIT?” Hagrid thundered. “Now let him cook!”
He had leapt to his feet. Boi was amgery, no cap. The Dursleys were triggered against the wall.
“Do you mean ter tell me,” he growled at the Dursleys, “that this boi – this boi! – knows nothin’ abou’ – about ANYTHING?”
Harry thought this was going a bit far. He had been to school, after all, and his marks weren’t bad.
“I know some things,” he said. “I can, you know, do maths, geography and all that.”
But Hagrid simply waved his hand and said, “About our ‘verse, I mean. Your ‘verse. My ‘verse. Yer parents’ ‘verse.”
“What ‘verse?”
Hagrid looked as if he was about to totally go off on one.
“DURSLEY!” he boomed.
Uncle Vernon, who had gone peak white, whispered something that sounded like “Mimblewimble.” Hagrid stared wildly at Harry.
“But yeh must know about yer mom and dad,” he said. “I mean, they’re proper famous. You’re PEAK famous. Like, full cap.”
“What? My – my mom and dad weren’t influencers, were they?”
“Yeh don’ know… yeh don’ know… “ Hagrid ran his fingers through his hair, fixing Harry with a bewildered stare.
“Yeh don’ know what yeh are?” he said finally.
Uncle Vernon suddenly found his voice.
“Stop!” he commanded. “Stop right there, sir! I forbid you to tell the boy anything!”
A braver man than Vernon Dursley would have absolutely wet himself under the furious look Hagrid now gave him; when Hagrid spoke, his every syllable trembled with rage.
“You never told him? Never told him what was in the letter Dumbledore left fer him? I was there! I saw Dumbledore leave it, Dursley! An’ you’ve kept it from him all these years?”
“Kept what from me?” said Harry eagerly.
“STOP! I FORBID YOU!” yelled Uncle Vernon in panic.
Aunt Petunia gave a gasp of horror.
“You can just do one, mate. Bloody tories, both of yeh,” said Hagrid. “Harry – yer a wizard.”
There was silence inside the hut. Only the sea and the whistling wind could be heard. “Say what now?” gasped Harry.
“A wizard, o’ course,” said Hagrid, sitting back down on the shonky sofa, which groaned and sank even lower, “an’ a damn’ good ‘un, I’d say, once yeh’ve been trained up a bit. With a mum an’ dad like yours, what else would yeh be? An’ I reckon it’s abou’ time yeh read yer letter.”
Harry stretched out his hand at last to take the yellowish envelope, addressed in emerald green to Mr. H. Potter, The Floor, Hut-on-the-Rock, The Sea. He pulled out the letter and read:
HOGWARTS SCHOOL
of WITCHCRAFT and WIZARDRY
Headmaster: ALBUS DUMBLEDORE
(Order of Merlin, First Class, Grand Sorc., Chf. Warlock, Supreme Mugwump, International Confed. of Wizards)
Dear Mr. Potter,
We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment. Term begins on September 1. We await your owl by no later than July 31.
Yours sincerely,
Minerva McGonagall,
Deputy Headmistress
Questions exploded inside Harry’s head like fireworks and he totally spaced on which to ask first. After a few minutes he stammered, “My owl? WTF?”
“Gallopin’ Gorgons, that reminds me,” said Hagrid, clapping a hand to his forehead with enough force to knock over a cart horse, and from yet another pocket inside his overcoat he pulled an owl – a real, live, rather ruffled-looking owl – a long quill, and a roll of parchment. With his tongue between his teeth he scribbled a note that Harry could read upside down:
Dear Professor Dumbledore,
Given Harry his letter.
Taking him to buy his things tomorrow.
Weather’s horrible. Hope you’re well.
Hagrid
Hagrid rolled up the note, gave it to the owl, which clamped it in its beak, went to the door, and threw the owl out into the storm. Then he came back and sat down as though this was as normal as talking on the telephone.
Harry realized his mouth was open and closed it quickly.
“Where was I?” said Hagrid, but at that moment, Uncle Vernon, still ashen-faced but looking very angry, moved into the firelight.
“He’s not going,” he said.
Hagrid grunted.
“Yeah, right, yer great Muggle like you gonna stop him,” he said.
“A what?” said Harry, interested.
“A Muggle,” said Hagrid, “Bit, rude, if I’m honest, but, if the shoe fit, yanno? Means No-Mag.. An’ it’s your bad luck you grew up in a family o’ the biggest Muggles I ever laid eyes on.”
“We swore when we took him in we weren’t having it,” fumed Uncle Vernon, proper mad like, “swore we’d stamp it out of him! Wizard indeed!”
“You knew ?” said Harry. “You knew I’m a – a wizard?”
“Knew!” Aunt Petunia full on Karen’d suddenly. “Knew! Of course we knew! How could you not be, my bloody sister being what she was? Oh, she got a letter just like that and disappeared off to that – that school – and came home every school break with her pockets full of frog spawn, turning teacups into rats. I was lit the only one who saw her for what she was – a freak! But for my mother and father, oh no, they were All Lily All The Time, they were complete fanboi about having a witch in the family!”
She stopped to draw a deep breath and then went ranting on. It seemed she had been wanting to say all this for years.
“Then she met that Potter at school and they left and got married and had you, and of course I knew you’d be just the same, just as weird, just as – as – abnormal – and then, if you please, she went and got herself blown up and we got landed with you!”
Harry had gone pale as poss. As soon as he found his voice he said, “Blown up? You told me they died in a car crash!”
“CAR CRASH!” roared Hagrid, jumping up so angrily that the Dursleys scuttled back to their corner. “Like a car crash could kill Lily an’ James Potter? It’s an outrage! A scandal! Harry Potter not knowin’ his own story when every kid in our world knows his name!”
“Ok, spill?” Harry asked urgently.
The anger faded from Hagrid’s face. He looked suddenly anxious.
“I never expected this,” he said, in a low, worried voice. “I had no idea, when Dumbledore told me there might be trouble gettin’ hold of yeh, how much yeh didn’t know. Ah, Harry, I don’ know if I’m the right person ter tell yeh – but someone’s gotta – yeh can’t go off ter Hogwarts not knowin’.”
He threw shade at the Dursleys.
“Well, it’s best yeh know as much as I can tell yeh – mind, I can’t tell yeh everythin’, it’s a great myst’ry, parts of it….”
He sat down, stared into the fire for a few seconds, and then said, “It begins, I suppose, with – with a person called – but it’s incredible yeh don’t know his name, everyone in our world knows–”
“Who?”
“Well – I don’ like sayin’ the name if I can help it. No one does.”
“Why not?”
“Gulpin’ gargoyles, Harry, people are still scared. Blimey, this is difficult. See, there was this wizard who went… bad. As bad as you could go. Worse. Worse than worse. His name was…”
Hagrid gulped, but no words came out.
“Could you write it down?” Harry suggested.
“Nah – can’t spell it. All right – Voldemort.” Hagrid shuddered. “Don’ make me say it again. Anyway, this – this wizard, about twenty years ago now, started gaining likes, follows. Some were afraid and thought they’d be safer wiv’ Dictator-face , some just wanted a bit o’ his power, ‘cause he was gettin’ himself power, all right. Dark days, Harry. Didn’t know who ter trust, didn’t dare get friendly with strange wizards or witches… terrible things happened. Proper brown trousers time, no lie. He was takin’ over. ‘Course, some stood up to him – an’ he unalived ‘em. Horribly. One o’ the only safe places left was Hogwarts. Reckon Dumbledore’s the only one You-Know-Who was afraid of. Didn’t dare try takin’ the school, not jus’ then, anyway.
“Now, yer mum an’ dad were as good a witch an’ wizard as I ever knew. Head boy an’ girl at Hogwarts in their day! Suppose the myst’ry is why You-Know-Who never tried to get ‘em on his side,… probably had intel they were too close ter Dumbledore ter want anythin’ ter do with the Dark Side.
“Maybe he thought he could persuade ‘em… maybe he just wanted ‘em outta the way. All anyone knows is, he turned up in the village where you was all living, on Halloween ten years ago. You was just a year old. He came ter yer house an’ – an’ –”
Hagrid suddenly pulled out a very dirty, spotted handkerchief and blew his nose with a sound like a foghorn.
“Sorry,” he said. “But it’s that sad – knew yer mum an’ dad, an’ nicer people yeh couldn’t find – anyway… “You-Know-Who unalived ‘em up close. An’ then – an’ this is the real myst’ry of the thing – he tried to unalive you, too. Wanted the full deck, I suppose, or maybe he just liked killin’ by then. But he couldn’t do it. Never wondered how you got that scar on yer forehead? That was no ordinary cut. That’s what yeh get when a powerful, evil curse touches yeh – took care of yer mum an’ dad an’ yer house, even – but it didn’t work on you, an’ that’s why yer famous, Harry. No one ever lived after he decided ter make ‘em not be, no one except you, an’ he’d been slapping the life out of some o’ the best witches an’ wizards of the age – the McKinnons, the Bones, the Prewetts – an’ you was only a baby, an’ you lived.”
Something very painful was going on in Harry’s mind. As Hagrid’s story came to a close, he saw again the blinding flash of green light, more clearly than he had ever remembered it before – and he remembered something else, for the first time in his life: a high, cold, cruel laugh.
Hagrid was watching him sadly.
“Took yeh from the ruined house myself, on Dumbledore’s orders. Brought yeh ter this lot…”
“Bull,” said Uncle Vernon. Harry jumped; he had almost forgotten that the Dursleys were there. Uncle Vernon certainly seemed to have got his shit together. He was pouring shade straight at Hagrid, and his fists were clenched.
“Now, you listen here, boi,” he snarled, “I accept there’s something strange about you, probably nothing some more good thrashings wouldn’t have cured – and as for all this about your parents, well, they were weirdoes, no denying it, and the world’s better off without them in my opinion – asked for all they got, getting mixed up with these wizarding types – just what I expected, always knew they’d come to a sticky end–”
But at that moment, Hagrid leapt from the sofa and drew a battered pink umbrella from inside his coat. Pointing this at Uncle Vernon like a sword, he said, “Zip it, Dursley – I’m warning you – one more word…”
In danger of being speared on the end of an umbrella by a bearded giant, Uncle Vernon’s courage failed again; he flattened himself against the wall and fell silent.
“And don’t you forget it, muggle,” said Hagrid, breathing heavily and sitting back down on the busted up sofa, which this time was skewering into the floor with all the up n downs Hagrid was punishing it with.
Harry, meanwhile, still had questions to ask, hundreds of them.
“But what happened to Vol-, sorry – I mean, You-Know-Who?”
“Good question, Harry. Disappeared. Vanished. Same night he tried ter ring up the curtain on your ass. Makes yeh even more famous. That’s the biggest myst’ry, see… he was gettin’ more an’ more powerful – why’d he go?
“Some say he died. Complete balls, in my opinion. Dunno if he had enough human left in him to die. Some say he’s still out there, bidin’ his time, like, but I don’ believe it. People who was on his side came back ter ours. Some of ‘em came outta some kinda “trances”. Don’ reckon they would’ve done if they thoughthe was comin’ back.
“Most of us reckon he’s still out there somewhere but can’t online his power. Too weak to carry on. ‘Cause somethin’ about you finished him, Harry. There was somethin’ goin’ on that night he hadn’t counted on – I dunno what it was, no one does – but somethin’ about you dropped him, straight up.”
Hagrid looked at Harry with warmth and respect blazing in his eyes, but Harry, instead of feeling pleased and proud, felt quite sure there had been a total cock-up somewhere. A wizard? Him? How could he possibly be? He’d spent his life taking savage beats from Dudley, and equally savage verbals from Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon; if he was really a wizard, why hadn’t they been turned into warty toads every time they’d tried to lock him in his cupboard? If he’d once defeated the greatest sorcerer in the world, how come Dudley had always been able to kick him around like a football?
“Hagrid,” he said quietly, “I think you must have made a mistake. I don’t think I can be a wizard.”
To his surprise, Hagrid lol’d.
“Not a wizard, eh? Never made things happen when you was scared, angry,or simply done?”
Harry looked into the fire. Now he came to think about it… every odd thing that had ever made his aunt and uncle furious with him had happened when he, Harry, had been upset or angry… chased by Dudley’s gang, he had somehow found himself out of their reach… dreading going to school with that ridiculous haircut, he’d managed to make it grow back… and the very last time Dudley had hit him, hadn’t he got his revenge, without even realizing he was doing it? Hadn’t he set a boa constrictor on him?
Harry looked back at Hagrid, smiling, and saw that Hagrid was positively beaming at him.
“See?” said Hagrid. “Harry Potter, not a wizard – you wait, you’ll be right famous at Hogwarts.”
But Uncle Vernon just did not know when to quit, omg.
“Haven’t I told you he’s not going?” he hissed. “He’s going to Stonewall High and he’ll be grateful for it. I’ve read those letters and he needs all sorts of rubbish – spell books and wands and –”
“If he wants ter go, a great Muggle like you won’t stop him,” growled Hagrid. “Stop Lily an’ James Potter’s son goin’ ter Hogwarts! Yer mad. His name’s been down ever since he was born. He’s off ter the finest school of witchcraft and wizardry in the world. Seven years there and he won’t know himself. He’ll be with youngsters of his own sort, fer a change, an’ he’ll be under the greatest headmaster Hogwarts ever had Albus Dumbled–”
“I AM NOT PAYING FOR SOME CRACKPOT OLD WEIRDO TO TEACH HIM MAGIC TRICKS!” yelled Uncle Vernon.
But he had finally gone too far. Hagrid seized his umbrella and whirled it over his head, “NEVER – “ he thundered, “ – INSULT – ALBUS – DUMBLEDORE – IN – FRONT – OF – ME!”
He brought the umbrella swishing down through the air to point at Dursley – there was a flash of violet light, a sound like a firecracker, a sharp squeal, and the next second, Dudley was dancing on the spot with his hands clasped over his fat bottom, howling in pain. When he turned his back on them, Harry saw a curly pig’s tail poking through a hole in his trousers.
Uncle Vernon roared. Pulling Aunt Petunia and Dudley into the other room, he cast one last terrified look at Hagrid and slammed the door behind them.
Hagrid looked down at his umbrella and stroked his beard.
“Oops. Shouldn’ta lost it on a muggle. Bit unfair, like, cause they cant front up and win against wixen,” he said ruefully, “but it didn’t work anyway. Was aiming at yer Uncle. Meant ter turn him into a pig because that ‘stache under a snout? Epic. I suppose their kid was so much like a pig anyway there wasn’t much left ter do.”
He cast a sideways look at Harry under his bushy eyebrows.
“Be grateful if yeh didn’t mention that ter anyone at Hogwarts,” he said. “I’m – er – not supposed ter do magic, strictly speakin’. I was allowed ter do a bit ter follow yeh an’ get yer letters to yeh an’ stuff – one o’ the reasons I was so keen ter take on the job.”
“Why aren’t you supposed to do magic?” asked Harry.
“Oh, well – I was at Hogwarts meself but I – er – got expelled, ter tell yeh the truth. In me third year. They snapped me wand in half an’ everything. But Dumbledore let me stay on as gamekeeper. Great man, Dumbledore.”
“Why were you expelled?”
“It’s gettin’ late and we’ve got lots ter do tomorrow,” said Hagrid loudly. “Gotta get up ter town, get all yer books an’ that.”
He took off his thick black coat and threw it to Harry.
“You can kip under that,” he said. “Don’ mind if it wriggles a bit, I think I still got a couple o’ dormice in one o’ the pockets.”