"Dumbledore is not going to be very pleased with you."

"Why?" Sirius demanded of the portrait that had spoken, interrupting his discussion with Remus and Tonks.

"Oh," said his great-great-grandfather distantly, "perhaps because your godson just followed your sterling example of spurning the advice of his elders and indulging in adolescent rebellion."

"What are you talking about?" Sirius snapped.  Phineas' smile was not quite a smirk.

"He just packed his bag and sneaked out the front door."

Three pairs of eyes stared at the picture of the man calmly examining his gloved fingers. 

"He what?!"

It wasn't until he was knocking on the door of No. 4 Privet Drive that he seriously considered what the Dursley's reaction might be to his turning up so unexpectedly.  By that stage, exhausted from lack of sleep and the journey back to Little Whinging, he simply pushed his way past his gaping Aunt Petunia as soon as she opened the door.  Once inside, he headed straight for the kitchen and grabbed a few slices of bread and a glass of water before heading upstairs.  His foot had barely touched the first step when he was nabbed by the elbow, and twisted around to face his outraged aunt.

"Just what do you think you're doing back here?" she demanded furiously.  "You're supposed to be at that  - that school of yours for months yet!"

"Yeah?  Well, I'm not, and I won't be going back there," Harry snapped back at her, trying to dislodge her grip without spilling any more water from his glass.  Both efforts proved futile, succeeding only in causing his satchel to slip from his shoulder and weigh his arm down further.

"What do you mean you're not going back there?" she persisted.  "You're certainly not staying here!"

"Why not?" he replied unthinkingly.

"I don't want those freaks here looking for you!"

"I don't want them here either!" he told her, but was suddenly very aware that they would eventually come looking for him here, both the Order and -

"I shouldn't have come here," he realised, staring at Aunt Petunia's angry, yet almost frightened expression.

"No you shouldn't have," she agreed scornfully.  "You made your choice years ago when you went with that man.  You'll never be anything but a freak now, so go back to where you belong!"  She pointed angrily at the front door - which rattled with the sound of someone fitting a key to the lock.

Harry dropped his bread and started groping for his wand before his mind registered that the person was using a key.  That meant -

"Vernon," Petunia whispered in alarm, and glared accusingly at her nephew, making shooing motions with her hands.  He reacted on instinct, and ducked into the cupboard under the stairs.  His aunt tossed his bread in behind him before shutting the cupboard door just as the front door opened.

Harry sat on the floor and listened while his aunt greeted his uncle, ushering him quickly past the cupboard under the stairs and into the kitchen for his tea.  The sounds of plates and cutlery in use reminded him of his own empty stomach.  Groping around the shadows of the cupboard floor netted him his bread.  He brushed it off and started nibbling at it slowly, trying not to smell the dinner his aunt had prepared for Uncle Vernon.  The bread and water ran out long before they finished their meal.

Eventually Uncle Vernon settled down to watch television in the living room.  Harry risked a quick peep around his door only to be glared at furiously by Aunt Petunia as she left the kitchen.  Repressing a sigh, he leaned back against the walls of his cupboard, curling his knees up against his chest, and berated himself for being an idiot a thousand times over.

The Order would be looking for him.  Sooner or later they would investigate Privet Drive, perhaps even leave a watcher.  This house was no secret from them.  What was worse, though, was that he was not sure how well the house was protected from Voldemort and his toadies.  Were the wards active, or did they only work in summer?  Surely Dumbledore wouldn't leave the Dursleys completely unprotected? 

He rubbed at his eyelids.  That was another problem: he couldn't risk staying here any more than he could have stayed at Grimmauld Place.  Harry wasn't particularly fond of his remaining family, but he didn't wish them dead, either.

But where else could he go?

Nowhere in the wizarding world was safe.  Not for him, not for his friends.  He couldn't risk anyone he trusted, which was why he'd just run away from most of them.  Besides, between Voldemort and Dumbledore he was sure to be found at some point, the only real question being who would find him first.  He doubted there was a single witch or wizard who didn't know his face since the Triwizard Tournament and Rita Skeeter had splashed it across the front page of the Daily Prophet, and they were always too eager to tell their friends that they had seen the Boy Who Lived.  No, the magical world was definitely out.

Unfortunately, the muggle world wasn't looking that much better.  Far fewer people would recognise him, of course, but there was also the drawbacks of no money and no contacts. 

He had nowhere to go, no one to help him, and no idea what he could do.

In his cramped cupboard in the house at 4 Privet Drive, Harry Potter had never felt so lost and alone.

He stood before the door at the end of the corridor, desperate to open it.  He rapped on it with one hand, wrenching at the handle with the other, but it would not open...

"Up, boy!  Get up!"

The sharp taps on his cupboard door dragged him from his restless sleep.  Groggily, he opened it to see Aunt Petunia standing waiting for him with her arms folded across her chest. 

"Go clean yourself up, then come to the kitchen," she ordered, her frown following him all the way upstairs. 

He felt much better after a shower, and was only mildly annoyed to discover that he'd failed to pack any underwear in his bag.  He returned to the kitchen to find Aunt Petunia waiting at the table for him, sipping at a cup of tea.  A plate with a single slice of bread and a glass of water was laid out for him.  He slid into the chair and ate his breakfast swiftly under his Aunt's unwavering scrutiny.

"You can't stay here," she declared as soon as he had finished.

"I know."

She frowned at him suspiciously. 

He stared at his plate.  The silence lengthened.

"Then why did you come here?" Aunt Petunia burst out at last.  "Are you putting us in danger?"

He forced himself to raise his eyes to meet hers.  "I'm sorry," he replied, meaning it in more ways than one.  "I just didn't know where else to go."

She blanched, and opened her mouth to speak.  Harry cut her off, standing up and picking his bag up off the floor.

"It's okay.  I'm going now."  He made it out of the kitchen before she regained her voice.

"Where?  Where are you going?" she demanded shrilly.

"I don't know," he shrugged."

"Back to them?"

He paused.  "No.  I can't go back."

"Why not?"  She grabbed hold of one shoulder and dragged him to face her.  "What did you do?"

He stared at her for a prolonged moment.  He wasn't about to explain that he was being periodically possessed by his parents' murderer.  She'd only want to know why he'd put her family in such danger by returning where he wasn't wanted.  He didn't want to hear that right now.  He already knew he shouldn't have come.

"Don't worry," he said instead, not answering her question.  "I won't be back."

When he'd left Privet Drive he'd really had no idea where he was going.  He simply walked, not caring which direction he was headed.  Eventually he found himself walking alongside the motorway.  When a passing car pulled over to offer him a lift, he accepted before he really thought about the consequences.  Luck was on his side, however, and the driver was not anything other than he appeared to be: a young man with a friendly smile who loved to talk.  He was headed back to London, so London was where Harry would go.

He dropped Harry off at a tube station, after receiving repeated assurances that he could find his own way from there.  It wasn't a lie - if he'd had a place to go he was sure it would have been all right.  As it was, he wandered around aimlessly for several hours before finding himself in front of the shop window for Purge & Dowse Ltd.

He stared at the dummies in the window, his mouth open to speak, yet filled with dread at the consequences of doing so.

"Here to see Mr Weasley," he said at last.  The dummy beckoned him through.

He kept his head down as he threaded his way through the crowd in the waiting room.  Trying to look as inconspicuous as possible, he made his way down the hall and up the stairs to the Dai Llewellyn Ward.  He peered cautiously around the door - and froze at the sight of Bill Weasley sitting next to his father's bed, the two of them conversing softly.

"...and they haven't managed to find any sign of him yet."

"Poor Harry - what he must be going through!  Oh, I don't mean he was right to run off like this, but when you think about what's been happening to him..."

Slowly, ever so slowly, Harry backed away from the door.  He turned to go down the stairs but managed to bump into someone coming up them, causing them to drop a tray of cups.  They clattered down the stairs, spilling their contents everywhere.

"I say!" the woman began crossly, only to stop and stare at Harry's forehead.  "You - you're - "

Harry didn't wait for the rest of her sentence.  He took off down the stairs at a run.  Several people looked up when he ran past them, but nobody stopped him.  Out on the street, the crowds thinned with the closing of the shops and the coming of a light drizzle.  He was soon cold and wet as well as hungry.  He was feeling rather miserable, all told.

Poor Harry indeed.

He sat down on a sheltered doorstep, letting his head lean against the wall.   His scar itched; he rubbed at it angrily.  If not for his stupid scar he could have been with Sirius and the others at Grimmauld Place.  He wouldn't be possessed by an insane wizard with a fondness for snakes.  He wouldn't have seen Mr Weasley being bitten.

If Harry hadn't seen it happen, they wouldn't have been able to save him.

He worried at his lip as he contemplated that thought.  Would Mr Weasley have been in danger without him being inside the snake?  Most likely.  Could he have stopped the snake from biting him?  It hadn't seemed that way at the time.  The snake's own urge to strike had been too overwhelming, he'd just been a passenger along for the ride...

He had been inside the snake.  Did that mean he had possessed the snake?  Only Moody had said that Voldemort was possessing him...  The whole business simply made his head ache worse than ever.  He so many questions he couldn't answer.  The only way he could get answers was to go back.  But wouldn't that put his friends in danger?

That was one question he knew the answer to, he realised, even as he asked it: they were all already in danger, and nothing he could do would change that.  The only thing he could change was his own actions.  What could he do to minimise that danger?  What should he do?

Harry had no real answers of his own, but he knew who would.  Would Dumbledore provide him with the answers he needed to hear, though?  There was only one way to find out.

His plans to sneak into 12 Grimmauld Place quietly in the early hours of the morning without being noticed were shattered when he tripped over the umbrella stand and set Mrs Black to screaming insults at him.

"Harry!"

"You're back!"

He was smothered in the collective embrace of several Weasleys and Sirius. 

"I'm sorry," he apologised again and again as they remonstrated with him for running off like that. 

Eventually Mrs Weasley managed to rally herself enough to order everyone else back to bed while she and Sirius let the Order know that he'd turned up again alive and well.  They all dutifully trooped upstairs - and into the room Ron and Harry shared.

"Harry, where did you go?" was one of the first questions he was bombarded with by Ron and the twins.  It was easier to deal with than Hermione's "What were you thinking?" or Ginny's "You're an idiot.  You know that, right?"

"I went to the Dursley's, all right?!" he muttered, not looking at any of them.  He could feel the weight of their eyes on him as they all stared at him in disbelief.

"You went where?!"

"You ran away from us to them?!"

"Well, yeah."  His cheeks were burning.  "I didn't stay, though."

"At least you haven't gone completely barmy, then," said Ron.  The twins sniggered, setting everyone else to laughing, too.  Their laughter was infectious, and Harry had to admit, the situation was slightly ridiculous.

"I guess I really wasn't thinking straight," he conceded, a smile tugging at his lips.

They might all be in danger from a homicidal dark wizard, but here amongst his friends he could pretend for the moment that none of that mattered.  Right now they could laugh and be happy, together.

In the morning, he would seek his answers, alone.