Аннотация: At first, Harry didn't respond to emails. Now we haven't been able to get to school yet. Then the students' stupor began. In general, it's a nightmare and, most importantly, nasty slugs have almost nothing to do with it!
Book 2. Ron Weasley and the Chamber of Secrets.
Part 1.
When I got home, I wrote to Harry and Hermione several times. If Hermione sent the answers with our owl, then there were no letters from Harry. Which was very strange. Deciding to think about it later, I started doing my homework. My books were designed for five courses. All I had to do was buy a course book and a textbook on ZOTI. And I read, asking my parents about everything at the same time.
It's Harry's birthday. I sent him a gift. Hermione was getting worried too. As it turned out, Harry doesn't answer her either. I asked my father to find out if he was okay.
***
It turned out that Harry had been doing magic on vacation yesterday. It looks like something really happened. I persuaded the twins to steal our Ford and check on Harry while Dad was at work. I wrote to Hermione about it.
We waited until our father was on another night raid and flew to Little Whining.
"What kind of house?" Fred asks me.
"4 Tisovaya Street, sort of."
They searched for him in the dark for a long time. He's got bars on his window. We took a closer look. That's right, Harry's bedroom. The twins opened the door of the Ford and started knocking on the window.
***
Well, he's finally awake. I was afraid we'd wake up the whole house. We've been knocking for about twenty minutes.
***
"Ron!" said Harry, barely moving his lips. How pale and thin he is. Did his relatives starve him?
Hi almost crawled to the window and staggered open it to make it easier for us to talk.
Ron, how did you get here? What are you... And then he noticed that I was looking at him from an old turquoise-colored car that was hanging in the air near the window. Harry opened his mouth in amazement, which amused the brothers sitting in front.
"Hello, Harry!" They exclaimed in one voice. What's happening?
"I asked." Why haven't you answered my emails? "I've invited you to stay almost ten times. And yesterday your father came and said that you used magic in front of Muggles and got an official reprimand....
"It's not me. And how did he know?" the friend protested.
"He works for the Ministry of Magic," I replied. "You know it's forbidden to do magic outside the school. Harry, when was the last time you ate properly?
"Is that what you're telling me? A week ago. My aunt starved me." Harry said expressively, looking at the hovering car.
"Well, that doesn't count. We didn't take him for long. It's Dad's car. We didn't use any magic. It's another thing to do magic in front of the ordinary people you live with...."
"But I told you, it's not me..." It takes a long time to explain. "Could you tell the school that the Dursleys locked me up and said they wouldn't let me into Hogwarts anymore? Never! And I can't get out of here by magic. The Ministry will then say that I have committed two illegal sorceries in a week.
"Calm down, you'll explain everything yourself." I said. "We've come for you. You will spend the last month of the holidays with us."
"But you don't have the right to do magic either..." the friend says perplexedly.
"And we won't." I nodded towards the older brothers. "Don't you see who I brought with me? Buddy, I'm sorry, but all I have to eat is a ham and cheese sandwich. There is nothing else." I reached into the glove compartment of the car for the sandwich I had saved for myself.
"Tie this rope to the grate," Fred ordered, handing Harry one end of it.
"If the Dursleys wake up, I'm in trouble," Harry whispered as he tied a rope to one of the bars.
"Now step aside and stop celebrating the coward. And have a sandwich for now." With that, Fred gave a good gasp, passing my sandwich out the window.
Harry walked over to the cage. He devoured the food hungrily, nibbling off a piece of Hedwig's ham. Hedwig, as if sensing the master's anxiety, sat motionless after swallowing the ham. The car lurched forward, the engine roaring harder and harder, the grille finally gave way and the whole thing popped out of the window frame with a loud bang.
The car soared into the sky, and Harry looked out the window. The grate was hanging about a meter and a half off the ground. Breathing heavily, I dragged her into the car. No one seems to have been woken up.
The grille was finally safely pulled into the car, and Fred backed up as close to the window as possible.
"Jump," I commanded.
"What about my school stuff - a magic wand, a broom..."
"Where are they?"
"In the closet under the stairs." And the door of the room is locked.
"Well, it's nothing." George answered from the front seat. Get away from the window, Harry. The brothers crept cautiously into the room. Harry, finishing his cheese, watched as George took a hairpin out of his pocket and began to pick at the lock with it. "Many wizards believe that learning such magic tricks from Muggles is an empty task," Fred said.
"We don't think so. There's something worth learning from them. Although, of course, they can't work as fast as lightning."
There was a sudden click in the lock, and the door swung open.
"We'll go down to get your suitcase," George whispered, "You pack up what you need in the room and give it to Ron."
"Careful, the last step creaks." Harry warned in a whisper.
And the twins were swallowed up by the darkness of the stairs. Harry ran around the room, collecting things and handing them to me through the window. Harry handed the rest of the ham to Hedwig and ran around the room, collecting things and passing them to me through the window. Then he hurried downstairs to help carry the suitcase. His uncle coughed from the bedroom.
Out of breath, they all dragged the suitcase to the door and across the room to the window. Fred dived into the car and started pulling with me, while Harry and George pushed him out of the room.
Inch by inch, the suitcase was slowly being pulled into the car. Did he put bricks in there? There was another cough from behind the wall.
"Let's get some more," Fred commanded. "One, two, go!"
Harry and George leaned on their shoulders, strained, the suitcase jumped out of the window and fell into the back seat.
"It's all right," George whispered. "Get in quickly!"
Harry had already jumped onto the windowsill when suddenly a loud, long-drawn scream was heard behind him, which was drowned out by a thunderous male voice:
"That damn owl again!"
"I forgot Hedwig." Harry whispered in horror.
He jumped off the windowsill and at the same moment a light flashed on the stairs. Harry grabbed the owl's cage, darted to the window, shoved it into George's hands, and climbed into the car. At that moment, Mr. Dursley punched the door, thinking it was locked. The door flew open, and Mr. Dursley stood for a moment in the doorway, letting out the roar of an angry bull, leapt to the window and managed to grab onto the ankle of his friend who rushed to the car.
The brothers grabbed Harry by the arms and pulled him into the car with all their might.
"Petunia!" Vernon thundered. "He's running away! HE'S RUNNING AWAY!"
The brothers pulled again, and Harry's leg slipped out of Uncle Harry's hands. Harry flew into the car and slammed the door.
"Step on the gas, Fred!" I shouted, and the car sped up at full speed, heading for the moon. Harry rolled down the window, the night air ruffling his hair. The roofs of the houses on Privet Drive were rapidly shrinking in size. Mr. and Mrs. Dursley and Dudley stared dumbfounded from the window of Harry's room.
"See you next summer!" Harry waved them goodbye. The brothers were laughing and shouting loudly. And our friend, who was saved by us, was leaning back in his seat, smiling all over his face.
"Let Hedwig out," he told me. "Let him fly from behind. To be locked up for so many days!"
Locked up? They're crazy. It's an owl! Yes, it's a spirit, but it has all the habits of a real owl.
George handed me the hairpin, and in another minute, Hedwig flew out the window, happy and gliding like a ghost through the air next to the car.
"Well, tell me quickly," I demanded impatiently. "What happened to you?"
Harry told us about Dobby's visit, about his warning, and described the death of Mrs. Dursley's culinary masterpiece.
"So I run out with a stack of letters in my pocket and see my aunt's pudding floating in the air. And then the brute dropped him on the floor. And I received a warning letter from the ministry. And Uncle Vernon, when he found out that I wasn't allowed to do magic, put bars on the window the next day. So last week they locked me in my room and only gave me cold soup once a day. Yes, they took me to the toilet."
"It's very strange," Freddy drawled.
"That doesn't sound like it," George nodded. "And he didn't say who was plotting this atrocity?"
"I didn't think he could say that." Harry tried to explain. "He opens his mouth and immediately starts banging his head against the wall."
Fred and George exchanged glances.
"Do you think he made it up?" Harry asked.
"You see," Fred began, "Brownies can do magic, but they usually don't dare without their owners' permission. Most likely, old Dobby was sent by someone to keep you away from school. Remember, do you have an enemy at Hogwarts?"
"Yes," Harry and I answered in one voice, without hesitation.
"Draco Malfoy," said Harry. "He hates me."
"Draco Malfoy?" George asked, turning around. "Lucius Malfoy's son?"
"I think so," Harry replied. "Malfoy is a rare surname. Is it important?"
"I heard what my father said about him" George said "he was an accomplice of You-Know-Who. One of the most important ones."
"And when You-Know-Who disappeared" Fred continued, turning his head almost a hundred and eighty degrees, "Lucius Malfoy began to assure everyone that he was not involved in any evil deeds. But he was lying. His father says he was his closest assistant."
"I don't know if the Malfoys have their own brownie..." Harry shrugged his shoulders.
"Whoever Dobby's masters are, they're probably an old wizarding family, and a very rich one at that," Fred noticed.
"Of course..." George replied. "Mom regrets that we don't have a brownie, the family is big, we have to iron so much, and magic can't help here. But she likes to cook for our crowd. And the brownie will take away all her hobbies. She won't even let us boys near the cauldron. Ginny, the future hostess of the house, says that she should eat and learn to cook, and our wife should feed us. We only have a decrepit ghoul who lives in the attic. And the gnomes have filled the whole garden. Brownies live only in old mansions and castles. They are inherited. There's no elf in our house."
Harry flew in silence. Yes, Draco could very well have sent a devoted servant to Harry to prevent his appearance at school at any cost. Draco Malfoy is capable of that. But he really considers his friend a cousin. A stupid little cousin. That's why he clings. You've already told me straight out that you're his friend, so at least raise him as a pure-blooded wizard and not just feed him.
"Anyway, I'm glad we came for you," I said. "You know how worried I was! "I'm writing to you, and I'm writing, and there's no response. At first I thought it was the Shooter's fault..."
"And who is Strelka?"
"Our postal owl, an old, old one. Flies, flies with a letter and suddenly falls on the way. She's just too old to hold her wings anymore, she's still Grandpa Galus. I asked Hermes..."
"Who, who?"
"Percy's owl. Mom and dad gave it to him when Percy was appointed prefect," Fred explained from the front seat.
"But Percy didn't give it to me. He said he needed Hermes himself."
"Percy's been acting weird this summer." George frowned. "He writes letters to someone endlessly, sits for hours locked in his room. Well, how many times can you jerk off in the room and polish the prefect's badge? You've gone too far west, Fred," he caught himself, pointing to the compass embedded in the control panel.
Fred hurriedly turned the steering wheel to the left.
"Does your father know that you took his car?" Harry asked.
"N-no," I mumbled. "He's working at night tonight. I hope we can get the car in the garage before Mom wakes up. God forbid she notices that we took a Ford.
"What does your father do at the Ministry of Magic?"
"He works in the most boring department, "Illegal use of Muggle inventions."
"What is the use?" "I'll explain now. For example, you have a thing that wasn't made by wizards. You bewitched her, and then she got back to them - in a house or a store. An old witch died last year, and she had a tea set. It was sold at auction to a woman in the non-magical world. She invited her friends over for a cup of tea. So what was going on there! My father spent several weeks solving the case from morning to night.
"Can you tell me more details?"
"I can, of course. The kettle went berserk. He spat boiling water all around him, and the sugar tongs pinched one guest's nose, and he was sent to the hospital. My father was furious. There were only two of them in the department: him and an old wizard named Perkins Warbeck. They suffered a lot back then! They even used the Oblivion spell."
"What about your father's car?"
"It's totally awesome!" Fred laughed.
"It wasn't the wizards who made up so many little tricks, they drove my father nuts. We have a barn full of them! He'll bring it back, take it apart, cast a spell, and put it back together. If he had searched himself, he would have had to arrest himself. Well, if he uses these things in a non-magical world. Mom swears that the whole barn is full of junk, but he doesn't give a damn."
"That's our highway." George said, peering through the windshield into the thinning darkness. "Ten more minutes and we'll be home. It's getting light, I think we'll be on time."
The horizon in the east was faintly flushed. I've been feeling a sinking feeling in my stomach for a long time. Harry ate my late pancake dinner. Well, I'm not sorry. He's so skinny. Damn, his stomach is rumbling too. Even louder than mine.
Fred began to descend. I could make out the boundaries of fields and clumps of trees below.
"Hey gobblers, we are almost over the village of Ottery St. Catchpole," George informed me.
The ground was rapidly approaching. The crimson edge of the sun was already shining through the treetops.
"Let's sit down! Breakfast is coming soon, so we won't be with Mom, but we'll sit quietly in our rooms. Then we'll eat." Fred announced.
And the car bounced slightly and touched the ground with its wheels. We landed in a tiny backyard next to a sagging garage. Initially, it was a small brick house, but then from time to time new rooms were added to it from above and from the sides, the house grew by several floors, but it looked so unstable, as if it was held together by magic alone. Five chimneys jutted haphazardly from the red-tiled roof. At the entrance, the inscription "Rabbit Hole." hung on a pole, slightly askew. On the side of the porch, next to a huge rusty saucepan, was a pile of rubber boots of various colors and sizes. Plump little birds walked around the yard and pecked at something. They've bred up again, and we'll be able to slaughter meat soon. There will be chicken soup and fried legs. Mmm. And not just the tired eggs.
Our whole company poured out of the car.
"It's not much" I said modestly. It definitely does not reach the full-fledged menorahs of the old magical families. Besides, we don't have a magic source. There's a ley line nearby, of course, but it's pretty weak.
"Great!" Harry exclaimed enthusiastically.
"Now go upstairs. Everyone go to their beds. Just very, very quiet! Otherwise, Mom will wake up and make a scene." Fred commanded. "Mom will call for breakfast at 9. Ron, you'll run downstairs and cheerfully shout, "Look, Mom, who showed up last night!" She'll be happy, and no one will notice that we took the car.
"Okay," I agreed. "Come on, Harry," I called to my friend, who was staring at the house in fascination. "I'm on the move sl..."
Choking, I fell silent and my face turned green: the lights were on in the windows of the "Burrow", and my mother was approaching us from the porch, scattering the chickens. A small, plump woman with the kindest face, now resembling a saber-toothed tiger.
Fred gasped.
"Oh, my God," George blurted out.
Mom came up to us and stopped, putting her hands on her hips and looking from one guilty face to another. She was wearing a flowered apron with a magic wand sticking out of the pocket.
"Well?" she demanded menacingly.
"Good morning, Mommy" George said it in what seemed to him a cheerful, contented voice.
"Don't you understand how worried I was?" Mom whispered furiously.
"I'm sorry, Mom, but we had to..."
The three of us were almost a head taller than our mother, but we were mortally afraid of her anger.
"Empty beds! No note! The car has disappeared! They could have been in a traffic accident! I'm almost crazy with worry! You don't think about anyone but yourself! I can't remember how long I've been alive! Just wait, the father will come. The older brothers had never done anything like this, not Bill, not Charlie, not Percy...
"...our good boy," Fred ended his mother's angry tirade. "I WISH I COULD LEARN SOMETHING FROM PERCY." Mom exclaimed, pointing her finger at Fred's chest. "You could have died, you could have been seen, your father could lose his job because of you... Well, it's unlikely about work. Although he's considered a nutcase for collecting all sorts of junk, he's the only one in the Ministry of Magic who knows anything about Muggle technology. After all, he is well versed in Muggle technology and helps the ministry with the enchantment of official vehicles.
Mom's anger seemed to have no end. And, only hoarsely, she turned to Harry, who backed away from her in fear. I thought he was used to shouting. With such relatives, but he was also afraid of our mother.
"Welcome, dear Harry. Come in, we'll have breakfast now." Mom smiled warmly and with these words hurried back into the house. Phew, it seems to have worked out. Harry gave me a questioning look, I nodded encouragingly, and he followed my mom.
Our kitchen is small and quite cramped. In the middle is a scrubbed wooden table surrounded by chairs. Sometimes we sit down to eat in the garden, but for now we can fit in here. Harry sat on the edge of the nearest chair and looked around. He had never been to a wizard's house before.
On the opposite wall was a single-hand clock, enchanted by Dad after the wedding. At that time, he wanted to become an apprentice to artefactors, but he became interested in Muggles. And the magic war was going on then, and the masters were not up to recruiting new students. Instead of numbers, there were inscriptions on the watch face: "Tea time", "Time to feed the chickens", "Lateness" and the like. On the mantelpiece are stacks of my mother's books: "Conjure yourself a cheese!", "Charms used in baking", "How to cook a feast in one second. Miraculous magic!" There was an old radio on the wall behind the sink, which started talking again. The announcer announced:
"The Hour of the Magicians. We begin the performance of the famous singer, the fortune teller Celestina Warlock."
"Mom loves her. And they broadcast important news of the magical world on the radio. But Muggle televisions haven't caught on. Illusions are much more spectacular, but we don't like that."
Mom was fussing over the stove, preparing breakfast: she threw sausages into the pan and, in between, shot menacing glances at us, saying:
"I don't know what you were thinking... I would never have believed it... I don't blame you, my boy." She assured Harry, flicking eight small sausages onto his plate. "Arthur and I were very worried about you. We decided just last night to come get you if there's no reply to Ron's last letter by Friday. But think about it: flying halfway across the country in an illegal car! Surely someone noticed! You've flown through a non-magical world. Yes, since Harry lives in the Muggle part of Britain, he had to travel through Muggle space. Well, at least the car has an invisibility and eye-avoidance system. And the night was dark.
Mom added a three-egg glaze to the sausages. Then she touched the dirty dishes in the sink with her magic wand, and it began to wash itself, tinkling slightly. It is necessary to learn this spell by the way. Mom refuses to teach us how to cook, she says it's a wife's responsibility and there's nothing to take away her hobby.
"It was low cloud..." Fred mumbled.
"They don't talk while eating." Mom called my brother to order.
"They were starving him!" George tried to distract Mom.
"That applies to you too." the mother did not calm down. But she didn't look so threatening as she buttered Harry's bread. Yeah. My friend looks like a starving man. And given Mom's belief that a man should eat properly, a friend will be fattened. Maybe even give him some muscle-building potions. Suddenly, a distracting circumstance invaded the kitchen in the form of our sister, dressed in a long nightgown. Damn, I should have warned her. Jeanie gave a little cry and ran out of the kitchen.
"This is Ginny, my sister." I whispered to Harry. "She's been talking about you all summer. She's going to ask for your autograph. He smiled and joked. But when he met his mother's gaze, he looked down at his plate again. No one else said a word. We were silent until the plates were empty, which happened pretty quickly.
"Oh, how tired I am" George yawned sweetly, putting his knife and fork on his plate. "I'm going to get some sleep..."
"No, you're not going," Granny cut him off. "You didn't sleep all night because of your own stupidity. Go to the garden, it's time to expel the dwarves. They're all over the place again."
"But Mom..."
"And both of you will go" She looked at Fred (he has a green badge pinned on his tank top, and George has a red one.) and me and added, turning to Harry: "And you, my boy, go upstairs and rest. You didn't ask them to follow you in that wretched car."
"Can I go with Ron? I want to see how the dwarves are expelled. I've never seen it before." Harry hurried to say.
"You're a very kind boy, Harry, but kicking out dwarves is a boring job. Let's see what Lockhart says about this." Mom took a heavy volume from the mantelpiece. It's starting again...
"But we know how to expel them." George protested.
On the cover of the book was written in beautiful gold letters: "Gilderoy Lockhart. Household pests. The Reference book". There was also a large photograph of the author: a pretty face framed by blond curls, bright blue eyes. His face was lively, and his eyes twinkled merrily, if not cheekily. The reference is good, but here is the author... I just want to punch him in his face, but Mom likes him.
"Oh, he's beautiful!" The mother exclaimed. "And how does he know his subject - household pests. It's a wonderful book..."
"Mom loves him." Fred whispered loudly.
"Don't be silly." Mom said, turning pink. "Well, if you know better than Lockhart how to make a garden safer, go ahead and work. And if even one dwarf remains, take the blame on yourself.
Yawning and grumbling, my brothers and I trudged into the garden. Harry followed us. The garden was large and neglected. There were too many weeds, the lawn was not mowed, but the stone fence was overshadowed by the gnarled, gnarled branches of old trees, flowers that mom grows for potions, and a small pond overgrown with green duckweed is full of frogs. They walked across the lawn to the flower bed.
"Muggles have dwarves too." Harry told me.
"Very similar to ours! I've seen them" I ducked headfirst into a bush and said. "Small, fat, Santa Claus-like, fishing rod in hand. Ours wear trousers and shirts. They're also running around the garden with shovels and picks."
The bush twitched, there was the sound of a desperate struggle, and I straightened up, holding the dwarf aloft in one hand.
"He's a real dwarf," I said solemnly.
"Twist me! Spin it!" A small creature that slightly resembled a human was screaming. The dwarf was small, wearing blue trousers and a checkered shirt. With kylo in one hand. I held him at arm's length, and he squirmed, trying to kick me with a foot as hard as flint. I deftly grabbed his ankles and turned him upside down.
"Try to do the same." I said to Harry and, holding the gnome high, began to spin it with a flourish ("Twist me!"- shouted the dwarf), like a lasso. When I saw the horror in Harry's face, I added: "It won't hurt him. Only his head will spin, and he will not be able to find his way back to his burrow."
With these words, I let go of my ankles, the dwarf flew about five meters, and crashed somewhere behind a hedge.
"Too close!" Fred appreciated. "I bet I can get mine to that stump over there. Harry decided to throw his first dwarf over the hedge without promotion. But the latter, sensing the weakness of the newly-minted dwarf persecutor, managed to sink his razor-sharp teeth into Harry's finger. It wasn't so easy to peel it off.
"He was a nice dwarf," One of the brothers noticed, "He could have flown ten meters away. Soon, the air was filled with a cloud of flying dwarves."
"Our dwarves are a bit silly." George noticed, grabbing five of them at once. "When they hear that the expulsion has begun, they come to the surface. No, to get deeper into the burrows." Soon, two dozen exiles crowded into the field, and they walked away in a long line, hunching their shoulders.
"They'll be back," I said, watching the dwarves disappear one by one into the hedgerows at the other end of the field. They like it here. My father is so kind to them, he says they're funny."
The whole garden was devoured by contagion. And my father is against a radical solution to the problem. The front door slammed in the house.
"It's the father!" George exclaimed. "Returned from work."
The dwarves were forgotten, and we ran through the garden to the house. My father was sitting wearily in the kitchen chair, taking off his glasses and squeezing his eyes shut. He was thin, with a short haircut, but his hair was also bright red. He was wearing a green robe, worn and dusty from constant travel. Dad spent the whole week running around on night raids. I had a snack at home and ran to work.
"What a night it was," he said softly, reaching for the kettle. We sat around him. Even Harry was curious about what he had to say. "Nine challenges. Nine! Old Mundungus Fletcher tried to curse me when my back was turned..." My father took a long sip of tea and sighed.
"Were there any interesting cases, Dad?" Fred asked curiously.
"Just a few melting keys, plus a biting cauldron." My father replied with a yawn. There was one very unpleasant substance. "But it's not in our department. And there were also exceptionally strange ground squirrels, and Prudsmert was called in for questioning. Thank God, the gophers are under the jurisdiction of the Committee on Experimental Magic..."
"I don't understand, who wants to waste time on melting keys?" George asked his father.
"There are still fans of annoying Muggles," Mr. Weasley sighed. "They will sell such a key to a muggle, and the key will disappear. The Muggle is looking for him, looking for him, but the key has disappeared through the ground. And there are no guilty parties. Muggles don't report things missing, they don't want to admit that there are melting keys. They say they lost it. They'll put up with anything to ignore magic, even if it's happening right under their noses. You can't even imagine what our people conjure."
"FOR EXAMPLE, CARS?!"
The mother entered the kitchen, holding a long poker in her hand like a sword. The father opened his eyes wide and stared guiltily at his wife. Yeah, I forgot that she didn't know about the additional functions of the car.
"W-what kind of cars, dear Molly?"
"Yes, Arthur, cars." Her mother's eyes were sparkling. "Imagine a magician who bought an old wreck and told his wife that he would take it apart just to understand the device. But in fact, he uses a spell of volatility on her. And please, you can fly to the ends of the earth in this car."
Dad blinked and launched into an explanation. You see, darling, you're about to realize that this wizard didn't break the law one bit. Although, of course... uh... it would have been better if he had told his wife the truth... There is a clause in the law... if the wizard had no intention of flying in the non-magical world, the fact that the car acquired volatility does not mean..."
"Arthur Weasley, you wrote this law yourself, and of course you inserted this clause carefully!" Mrs. Weasley was thundering. "So that you can safely mess around in your shed with all these Muggle nonsense! mom never shared her husband's love for the technology of ordinary people. Yes, that's understandable. She's been working intermittently. To make it work, you need to enchant it specifically. And it's not a fact that something won't fail at the most inopportune moment. "So, for your information, Harry flew to us this morning in the very car that was not intended for flights! Across an entire non-magical land!"
"Harry?" Mr. Weasley said, not understanding anything. "Which Harry?"
He looked around the kitchen, saw my friend, and jumped in surprise.
"Oh my God!" he exclaimed. "Why, it's Harry Potter. "Happy to see you! Ron has told us so much about you..."
"Your sons flew this car to Little Whinging last night and brought their friend. What do you say to that?" Her mother's voice grew stronger.
"Did you really fly there? And quite successfully?" My father asked with genuine delight. "I... I..." he broke off: fiery sparks were already flying from his mother's eyes. Of course, boys, this is very, very wrong..."
Mom started to swell up like a big American frog. It's time to go. I tugged at my friend's shirt sleeve.
"We have nothing else to do here." I whispered to Harry. "Come on, I'll show you my room."
We quickly left the kitchen and walked down a narrow hallway to a lopsided staircase that ran up through the house. On the third landing, the door to the room was open. As we passed by, the door slammed shut.
"This is Ginny," I explained. "She's so shy, and it really torments her. Actually, her door is always wide open."
They walked down two more flights and stopped at a peeling door with a sign on it: "Roland's Room."
I was named after a knight, and Harry was actually Harold, I asked. However, he says his aunt indicated it in the documents.
I opened the door, and Harry and I found ourselves in a small room with a low, sloping ceiling that almost touched the top of his head. I used to hook the ceiling with my head in low places where the roof went downhill. Everything in the room was ablaze with shades of bright orange: the bedspread, the walls, even the ceiling. Every inch of the old wallpaper was covered with posters depicting the same seven witches and wizards in bright orange cloaks, holding a broom in one hand, waving greetings with the other. How much time did Bill and Charlie take for that... I wish they had bought me a new wand. Even though I asked for a new one at the beginning of the summer, I was told that I would have to suffer for a year or two because of Gini.
"What is your favorite team?" Harry asked.
"Peddle guns," I replied, waving my hand at the orange bedspread, which was decorated with two huge black letters "P" and a flying cannonball. "Ninth place in the League."
School textbooks lay in uneven piles in the corner of the room, next to comics, almost the entire series "Patrick Piggs, the Crazy Muggle." On the windowsill is a sun-drenched aquarium full of frog eggs, with a magic wand on it. Charlie asked to breed some magical frogs. They say they are very tasty. Nearby, a fat gray rat is dozing in the sun.
Harry stepped over a self-shuffling deck of cards and looked out the small window. He turned to me, and I froze nervously, waiting for the verdict.
"It's a little small, of course," I said. "Not like your room at the Dursleys. And definitely under the nook of a ghoul. He's up there in the attic, howling and banging on the pipes."
"I think it's the most beautiful house in the world." Harry said happily, smiling all over his face.
I felt my ears turn pink.
"Make yourself comfortable, I'll go get a cot now."
"Where to?"
"Into the basement. We have a warehouse there and Mamina's potion factory."
"All kinds of healing and strengthening potions. Mind you, she'll feed them to you. You're so skinny."
Part 2.
Our house was a mess. Something was constantly making itself felt in him: it was making noise, knocking, falling. Mirrors gave advice. There was a ghoul in the attic who sometimes felt that life in the house was too quiet and measured. And he began to howl, accompanying himself with blows on the water pipes. And there was always something exploding in the twins' room. I'm used to this, but Harry was scared at first. But then I got used to it. He even started sticking his tongue out at the mirror when it talked about a comb.
Mom gave us a pair of fresh socks every morning, and at each meal she stuffed several supplements into Harry. After all, my friend is so skinny. At dinner, his father would sit Harry down next to him and bombard him with questions about Muggle life. He was particularly concerned about electrical appliances and the work of the postal service.
"Well, well!" he rubbed his hands in anticipation, having heard from Harry about the phone. How many things they made up! And what else can they do without magic? Well, I'll sort it out and enchant it. And then I'll install it at home.
A week after we arrived at the Burrow, we received letters from Hogwarts. It was a clear, sunny morning. Dad, Mom, and Jeanie were already having breakfast in the kitchen, and Harry and I soon came down. In the blink of an eye, she ducked under the table for a bowl and came back out red as a crab. Harry sat down in his seat and took a plate full of toast from his mother's hands. And he looked at his friend with displeasure. He'll be chewing naked bread again.
"Harry, honey, take some orange jam."
"Thank you, Aunt Molly."
"Here, take some more tea, don't eat it in dry water. Ron, do you want another chop?"
"Yes, thanks Mom."
We began to eat. When we were just finishing breakfast, Dad appeared in the kitchen.
"Boys, there are letters for you from school." With that, my father handed Harry and me an envelope each. The envelopes were identical, made of yellow parchment with the address written in green ink. "McGonagall already knows that we have you, nothing will escape her."
The door opened and Fred and George came into the kitchen, both still in their pajamas.
"We've finally arrived. This is for you." Dad handed the twins the same envelopes.
The kitchen was quiet for about five minutes. We plunged into reading. Outside, my parents and I go in search of Harry. We walked down the street. So it's like Hagrid is coming. He even took off his favorite jacket and was wearing pants and a plaid shirt. And who's next to him? Well, he's dirty.... Where did that get him?
"Harry!" Taking a deep breath and waving his hand in greeting, my father shouted. "We were hoping you didn't get past one of the bars." He wiped his shiny bald spot. "Molly was almost crazy with worry.
Dad summoned the silver fox and sent it to his mother, saying:
"Molly, dear, Harry has been found. We're at the bank."
"Which fireplace did you come out of, Harry?" I asked.
"I don't know."
"He disembarked at Lyutny Lane," Hagrid knitted his thick eyebrows. Holy shit... It's dangerous even for adult wizards to enter there.
"Holy shit!" The twins exclaimed.
"We are strictly forbidden to go there..." I said gloomily.
"That's a good thing! It won't take long to disappear there", Hagrid croaked.
"Harry! My dear! Found it!" Mom was racing toward us at full speed, waving her purse with one hand and dragging Ginny with the other. "Harry! Darling! You could have died!" But she's right. If it wasn't for Hagrid, I wouldn't have seen my best friend again. Only adult magicians risk entering this hotbed of crime, and then only armed almost to the teeth. Running over, Mom instantly took an enchanted clothes brush out of her bag and began to sweep away the soot from Harry's robes. And Dad took Harry's glasses off his nose and touched them with a magic wand, one, two, and the glasses are as good as new! By the way, why hasn't he bought new ones yet? Did he even check his eyesight, or is he still wearing old glasses? Judging by their appearance, he had them since childhood. He should ask Hermione to find him new glasses. She has to understand them. Magicians mostly use potions. Glasses are worn either for solidity or artefactors when working.
"However, I have to go, see you at school," Hagrid said goodbye, pulling his hand out of his mother's, who still couldn't calm down:
"Lyutny lane! And if you hadn't found it!" His mother was wailing over Harry.
The forester moved in the opposite direction to Lyutny Lane, towering over passersby by almost a head. And our whole company went to the bank.
"Guess who I saw at the Gorbin and Burks store?" Harry asked Hermione and me. And then he answered himself: "Malfoy and his father!" What, did that pompous dark one drag a child there?!
"Did Lucius Malfoy buy anything there?" Dad asked eagerly. He's had a thing for Malfoy since the wizarding war.
"No, he sold it himself."
"Ah, he got nervous." My father was clearly pleased. "I wish I could catch him on something!"
"Be careful, Arthur," Mom said sternly, following the goblin, who was bowing low, into the bank. "This family is dangerous. Don't dig into a piece that you can't swallow!"
"Do you think I'm no match for Malfoy?" the father was indignant. But then he saw Hermione's parents and immediately forgot about him. The Grangers were standing at the counter that ran along the walls of the marble lobby. They were waiting for Hermione to introduce them, and they were visibly worried.
"Hello, friends!" Their father greeted them enthusiastically. "Muggles! You are real Muggles! Our acquaintance should be celebrated! You came to change the money, right? Look, Molly, real pounds." He pointed to the ten-pound note in Mr. Granger's hand.
It's a shame. They might be Muggles, but my father was completely taken aback by the sight of them. He's probably already figuring out how much information he can get from them about their technology. Harry is a kid and he just doesn't know a lot.
"I'll meet you here, Hermione," I said, and our whole family, along with Harry, went to the vaults of the bank, where our safes were located.
There were rails leading to the safes, along which wagons ran. The wagons were operated by goblins and carried wizards back and forth. The road connected all the underground banking facilities. The door of our safe opened. Inside the steel box was a pitiful handful of silver sickles and only one gold galleon. Mom took a good look around the corners, took out all the coins in one fell swoop and poured them into her purse. Then we went to Harry's safe. A friend, blushing, went into the safe and blocking the entrance with his back, began to blindly rake in the money. And why is he embarrassed. He must have a lot of money in his safe. His grandfather did a good job selling a hair potion called just shine. After that, we all got into the trailer together and went upstairs. What a mug he's got. Red as a tomato.
Our group split up on the marble staircase. Percy mumbled something about a new pen, and Fred and George met Lee Jordan, a school friend. The father invited the Grangers to the Leaky Cauldron to celebrate their acquaintance. Well, right now he's going to ask around. And Mom and Ginny were rushing to the second-hand clothing store.
"We'll meet at the Flourish and Blotts bookstore in an hour and buy textbooks for everyone. And forget about Lyutny Lane!" She called after the twins and, holding Ginny tightly by the hand, trotted off towards the clothing store.
Harry, Hermione, and I were walking along a winding, cobblestone street.
Harry bought three large cones of strawberry ice cream with chocolate and peanut butter. And we ate it with pleasure. Hmm, well, he seems to have calmed down.
We walked for a long time, looking at the shop windows. My eyes lit up: there was a full set of equipment for my favorite team, the Cannons of Peddle, in the window of the Quidditch shop. Hermione pulled me away from the display case and led us to a nearby writing supplies store for ink and parchment. There we met the twins with Lee Jordan. They were stuck at the counter with Dr. Feuerwerkus's cold and wet miracle firecrackers. And in a tiny shop selling broken magic wands, ruined copper scales, old stained robes and other junk, they stumbled upon Percy. He was standing at the counter, immersed in the most boring little book "Elders who achieved power."
"The prefects of Hogwarts and their further life path", I read the text from the back cover out loud.
"Don't bother me!" Percy blurted out without looking up from his reading.
"He is very ambitious and purposeful. Wants to be Minister of Magic," Moving away from my brother, I explained to my friends in a low voice.
"Harry, let's go to Madame Malkin's."
"What for? My old robes still fit."
"Buddy, I'm sorry, but at least you could change your clothes. Okay, we don't have money for new things, but you are. She's hanging on you like a sack."
"Harry really is. By the way, I've heard that you can buy an enchanted costume."
"Yeah. Only they cost more."
"Okay, we're convinced."
And we dragged each other to a clothing store. And then to the pharmacy. Hermione had seen eye drops to improve her eyesight. At the same time, they asked the healer on duty at the pharmacy to cast a special spell on Harry's glasses. So that they adjust to his vision.
An hour later, we hurried to the Flourish and Blotts store. And, I must say, we weren't the only ones in a hurry. As we approached the store, to our amazement, we saw a huge crowd at the entrance, rushing inside. The reason for this was obviously the huge sign on the upper window:
Gilderoy Lockhart signs autobiography
"I AM A WIZARD" today from 12.30 to 16.30.
Damn. Here we are. Or did Mom drag us to the presentation on purpose?
"We're about to see Lockhart himself," Hermione stammered in delight. "He wrote almost all the textbooks on our list!"
The crowd consisted mainly of women in their fifties. At the entrance, the stuffy wizard kept repeating:
"Take it easy, lady, take it easy! Don't push! Please be careful with the books!"