Harry Potter
A throbbing pain went through Harry's head as he awakened. In a cupboard, obviously. If anyone would raise to Boy Who Lived in a cupboard, in was Petunia Dursley, his mother's sister who not only had way enough money to give him better than a cupboard, but also lived under the Crown neighbouring what had been Riddle's one. In other words, the war hadn't affected her. She couldn't give less of a shit about her baby sister's famous orphaned weirdo son. No, she much more preferred treating her own son like a prince. Not that he was a prince, far from that, really.
Vernon Dursley, Petunia's husband, was a renowned blacksmith. Dudley - the son - hated weapons. Well, not necessarily weapons as objects. In facts, he found them quite cool. To have. Hanged on a wall. But in his hand ? He would have rather jump off a cliff. The day Dudley Dursley did any kind of physical activity, Harry would wake up and find out he had parents.
As Vernon started screaming something about bacon, Harry decided he was sick of waiting for that miracle to happen. Really, he had decided so a long time ago. It was quite rare for a 17 years old teenager to not realise he lived in an abusive household. Truth was, he really didn't care. Because today was the day he was getting away.
At least that was what he was planning on doing until Dumbledore stepped in his house. Fuck. He had forgotten it was Sunday.
Dumbledore had been an honorary Sunday guest at the Dursley house from as far as he could remember. He couldn't stand the man. He had been the one to "save" him, aka the guy that was responsible for him living with Petunia Dursley as a mother figure. Dumbledore had let him visit his actual mother exactly once, when he was eleven. He had been severely disfigured because of a nasty fall, and somehow had the impression Dumbledore had jumped on the occasion. He had been covered in so many slashes he had been unrecognisable for weeks. No one had noticed who he was, his telltale scar drown in all the others.
He hated the man.
He hated him for he knew Dumbledore had one objective, and it was to find Riddle and kill him. And Harry knew he would be the centrepiece of whatever masterplan he had. He had known that the second he had seen Lily Potter in her hospital bed.
For the last 6 years, he had been the most careful around Dumbledore. He refused to let him know he could see through him. He was afraid of the consequences if he was to do so. But playing dumb around Dumbledore was easy enough since all it took was to, well, play dumb. Harry was good at playing dumb, a skills he had developed as a coping mechanism to Petunia's terrible parenting. A skill which also led him to the door right into Albus Dumbledore's arms :
"Uncle Albus ! Hi, I didn't realise we already were Sunday, Merlin the week went by so quickly !" declared Harry with his special-Dumbledore fake smile on his face.
"Harry, my boy," greeted the man, practically suffocating him in his gigantic beard.
As Petunia came in and let Dumbledore to the kitchen, Harry took notice of the man's hand. He had clearly flinched when they had shook hands. The flinching had been going on for months. At first, Harry had figured he probably had twisted his wrist or something, and that it would have healed in a matter of weeks, but not only had it gotten worst, but Dumbledore hadn't said anything. Even when Harry squeezed his hand too hard on purpose. Which meant he was hiding something, and Harry was decided to find out what it was.
***
That evening, Harry slipped out of the house. It wasn't hard, he had done it many numbers of times before. Besides, since he slept downstairs, even if the Dursley were to hear him, he would be out and away before they would even reach the door. As he gently closed the backdoor behind him and dashed through the quite pro-eminent backyard, Harry wondered how long it would take them to notice. Maybe if he didn't open his cupboard door by midday the next day, Vernon would break it down. Maybe they would be happy to be rid of him. With a bit of luck, Petunia would only mention him being missing to Dumbledore over tea on the next Sunday the same way she would talk about her newest piece of clothing.
It didn't matter anyway.
The only important thing was to make sure Dumbledore didn't catch him now, because if he did, he wouldn't have a second chance. Because yes, of course Dumbledore was watching him. He was always watching him. Their neighbour, Mrs Figg, an old widowed woman, had been keeping an eye on Harry since his childhood. She even used to babysit him when Vernon was asked away for a special order, often by some noble or another.
Harry blindly made his way through the small forest that separated his uncle's forge from the night market. He made it with no effort. Harry was good when it came to not tripping over his own feet. Once at the market, he exchanged the few clothes he had brought (a few of Dudley's old ones that he hated but were good quality nonetheless) for more ordinary-looking shirts and trousers. He even managed to switch the old pair of shoes he'd had for practically a decade for shining waterproof new ones. He then changed clothes and sold the ones he was previously wearing on him to buy some food and basic supplies. The clothes were so pricey, even though he had been wearing them for years as hand me downs from Dudley, that he managed to make a pretty amount of money he knew he would need if he wanted to leave the Crown.
Which he very much wanted.
His mother might be coming from here, but she had left home in her early teenage years with her childhood best friend, some guy named Snape. Harry knew this much because Petunia kept bragging about him. He didn't knew much about the guy except that he had greasy hair and that his mother was a witch. They were rare around here, witches. They used to be burned at the stake no more than two centuries earlier ; didn't fancy coming back after their much-needed runaway. Anyway, Harry had never seen a picture of Snape, but giving Petunia's hatred of anything physical about him, he could probably recognise him even though they had never met.
His father- well Harry didn't know anything about his father except the very basic things that Dumbledore had told him so he would stop asking questions. James Potter came from a family of pirates. His mother, Euphemia, was the Captain of their fleet before him - a title which she had taken from her husband when they married. Not because Fleamont Potter had died, but because he preferred to care for his potions than for his duties as leader. Therefore, he had taken the opportunity to let go of the title when he had married.
Where Fleamont and Euphemia Potter were to this day was a mystery Harry had never managed to get out of Dumbledore. He didn't even know how his parents met, when and where they married, who was their best man, with who they were friends.
Really, Harry didn't know anything except basic history that any child from the neighbouring Crown would know. That sucked, especially given the fact that he played a quite important role in said-history, and was constantly being refused any information which Dumbledore didn't deem important.
Anyway, he couldn't help feeling like his place was lying somewhere else.
Biting the last of his apple, Harry stood up from the low wall he had been sitting on for the past hour. The sun was starting to rise, which meant that ships would soon be starting to arrive. He had to make his way to the port before then, so hopefully he would be able to catch one of the early departing ships. It would probably be no more than a poor merchant boat, but at this point he would even settle for a rowboat. Merlin, if he missed the departure he was even ready to swim his way across the border.
Yes, he really was this desperate.