Chapter Text
A great booming sound startles Harry, and he briefly wonders why someone would want to disturb him when the world already knows he’ll be dead within days. He suspects he could fight the curse someone placed on him if he dug up the Elder Wand, but honestly, he’s old and tired and completely done with all the expectations people keep trying to lay at his feet.
There’s another massive boom, and this one startles Harry into opening his eyes. He gazes around the shack he wakes in, wondering why the hell anyone would desire to kidnap him when he’s already so close to death. But then he sees the lump on the couch. And then he realizes the booming sound is coming from the door.
And then he decides that he must have already passed on and this is a very strange version of the afterlife.
He’s subdued throughout the entire conversation with Hagrid. Hagrid mistakes his quiet for disbelief, and he gets upset with the Dursleys that Harry seems to know nothing of his heritage. They sleep for a few hours and then Hagrid takes Harry to Diagon Alley.
And then Harry starts to wonder if perhaps this is not the afterlife after all.
Events, even the most minor of them, are progressing in exactly the same way as the last time, and suddenly Harry is terrified that he’s going to have to live through everything all over again. And then all he can think about is the fact that he was ready to let himself die rather than continue on trying to convince wizarding Britain that his life did not belong to them. Harry is absolutely certain he’s breathing too fast and he can’t imagine the face he’s making, but it must be odd if the look on Draco’s face is anything to go by.
A tape measure gets too close and then a sudden burst of flame incinerates it, and Harry tries to keep himself as calm as possible while Madame Malkin tries to soothe what she thinks is a nervous first year. He apologizes and keeps quiet, and then he gathers his purchase and meets Hagrid back in the alley.
“Hagrid,” Harry says slowly. “What if I don’t want to go to Hogwarts?”
As soon as Harry looks up (and up and up and up) to see the look on Hagrid’s face, he knows he messed up. Hagrid loves Hogwarts, and he’s absolutely devoted to Dumbledore. Harry endures Hagrid’s appalled explosion, and his (very loud) exclamations, and his tremulous questioning. By the time Harry has maneuvered Hagrid into calming down and continuing their trip, Harry has identified several people who walked by and witnessed that encounter to know that news of Harry not wanting to attend Hogwarts will be all over wizarding Britain by tomorrow.
He doesn’t sigh, but it’s a close thing.
The first truly interesting thing to happen is that his old wand doesn’t give him a reaction. Harry can tell, because he’s had to use others’ wands before, that this holly and phoenix feather wand would work fine , but as Ollivander says, “the wand chooses the wizard,” and this wand doesn’t want to choose him.
Harry attempts to focus on his occlumency to keep himself calm and finds it’s just as easy to get his thoughts under control as it was before he died. He’d spent years studying occlumency and decades perfecting it and creating new practices because he’d found occlumency much easier once there was no longer a horcrux keeping a hole open in his mind.
Which means he doesn’t have the horcrux in him now.
Which means he’s not connected enough to Voldemort for the brother wand to want him.
Which means…Harry doesn’t know what this means.
Ollivander has Harry try perhaps twenty more wands before he determines there simply isn’t a wand in this shop that’s right for Harry. Harry barely draws in enough breath to ask what this means before Ollivander is summoning three small chests and arranging them on the counter in front of him.
“Here we are, then,” Ollivander says, patting the chests fondly. “Simply place your hand upon each of the chests, go one at a time, and concentrate on your magic. Feel it rise up within you and let it guide you.”
Harry’s first time through, he ends up with several cores and woods to choose from that Ollivander extracts from each chest after Harry concentrates over it.
He does the whole process again with the materials Ollivander pulled out, and he ends up with his wood and core.
“Holly and thestral hair,” Ollivander says, and Harry does not want to think about what it might mean that his new wand has the wood of his old one and the core of the Elder Wand. He doesn’t want to consider that he’s had so much trouble with a wand choosing him because they already know he belongs to another. He doesn’t want to try to imagine how much might change because the wand Dumbledore is using might no longer be loyal to him.
So he doesn’t.
He pays for his wand and a simple wrist holster, and he accepts Hagrid gifting him Hedwig, and then Hagrid takes him back to the Dursleys’ house.
Vernon tries to take Harry’s trunk to lock it away, and Harry freezes him in place. It’s almost a reflex at this point, after decades of strangers approaching him and trying to touch him or enemies trying to put a portkey or cursed object on him. Harry does this without thinking–and also without his wand. What little thought he put toward this so far made him wonder if he’d be starting from scratch magically. This body is not the one he healed and trained. But his mind still remembers, and perhaps that’s all that matters.
Harry ignores Petunia’s shrieking and Dudley’s blubbering and passes them to pull his trunk up the stairs to Dudley’s second bedroom. He doesn’t unfreeze Vernon until he’s already out of sight. He uses a simple locking charm to ensure none of the Dursleys will bother him and then almost as soon as he sets his trunk down, he’s drawing Hedwig out of her cage. He sends her to a bookstore in Celestial Alley he learned about a few years after the war for an owl-order catalog and tells her to hunt and stretch her wings and take her time.
He watches her go then sits on the simple bed he’ll be sleeping in until he leaves for Hogwarts. Unless he doesn’t go. Though he suspects he’ll likely be getting a visit from Dumbledore or someone else soon because even if Hagrid hadn’t shouted it for the world to hear, he will still report back to Dumbledore that Harry Potter asked about not going to Hogwarts.
Harry was so excited last time. When he first heard about Hogwarts, he couldn’t wait to get out of the Durseys’ house and learn magic. But back then, he didn’t know what was waiting for him. Or who.
There will be some people he won’t mind seeing, and Harry almost wishes he missed them. But he doesn’t. Not anymore.
By the time Harry had given up on life, he had spent time actually grieving his loved ones and his childhood and even his freedom. He doesn’t have anything against getting to know any of the people he used to love again, but he knows it won’t be the same. He already outlived almost everyone he ever loved. How strange would it be trying to befriend Ron and Hermione as children when he watched them grow and age and die? How can he ever look at Ginny and see anything but a child, even discounting the messy divorce? He wouldn’t even want to try again for the sake of his children because…well he’d already had them and raised them and watched them grow and mourned them when they passed away. And Harry continued on, barely aging. He had already outlived two of his great grandchildren by the time he died, and Harry has no desire to live the same life over again.
But then, if he doesn’t live the same life, what should he do? He could run around changing absolutely everything and see if things would at least be interesting that way. As it stands, Harry knows a lot of major events coming up for the next…well, for a long while. But if he makes as many changes as possible, maybe it will be like living a whole new life instead of simply doing it all over again. But maybe his whole new life will be even worse.
He can try to keep things as similar as possible. For a while, at least. He won’t be able to keep things exactly the same, of course, because that would mean re-doing every minor conversation for centuries and he doesn’t have the patience or interest. And things are already different because his introduction to the wizarding world will include the information that he doesn’t want to go to Hogwarts.
Harry heaves a great, gusty sigh and collapses back onto the bed so he can frown up at the ceiling.
Harry has thought about all of this, but he still hasn’t thought about the most important question: Why is he back? How is he back? Is this part of the curse that killed him? Is this definitely the past and not an alternate universe? Is this to do with the fact that no one else united the Deathly Hallows in Harry’s lifetime and he died the Master of Death? If he dies again, will he stay dead? Or will he just start over again? Should he try to die now and see?
This last question stays with him. And he wonders. And he wonders. And he–startles when Hedwig glides in through the window and drops the catalog he asked for next to him on the bed. He summons a few owl treats from his trunk and feeds them to her, and she seems to appreciate this. He hadn’t thought about Hedwig in decades. But this feels like having her for the first time all over again.
Maybe he’s thinking too hard about all of this.
He had developed the tendency to overanalyze and worry about every little thing before he died. In his defense, no one seemed to know why he overshot the average life expectancy for wizards by so long. He could have done more to try to find a concrete answer, but there were times he was afraid to have his theories confirmed.
Perhaps now is the time to work on confirming his theories.
Harry isn’t at all surprised when Vernon yells “Boy!” up the stairs and he comes down to see McGonagall frowning. He wants to be surprised Dumbledore didn’t come himself, but he doesn’t do his own dirty work, does he?
Harry wonders what Vernon said to McGonagall before he called Harry down because the look his old professor gives Vernon is wonderful. Harry would have given anything when he was eleven to have someone look at his uncle like that. But he’s not eleven now, and he’s had centuries to think about why no one ever tried to take him away from the Dursleys permanently and why none of his Hogwarts professors ever seemed to realize there was something wrong. Or why they never did anything about it if they did realize.
As with so many others, Harry isn’t real to these people. They look at him and they see the-boy-who-lived or the Chosen One or James Potter with Lily Potter’s eyes. None of them ever saw him as a child raised by muggles who needed help. He had a long time to come to terms with the knowledge that very few people in his life ever actually cared about him.
He nods along as McGonagall introduces herself and explains what Hogwarts is and what he’ll learn there. She pauses a few times during her explanation as though she’s waiting for Harry to ask something or acknowledge what she’s saying in some way. At the end, she asks if he has any questions, and Harry nods.
“Why didn’t Hagrid share any of this information when he took me to Diagon?”
McGonagall purses her lips at this. “Hagrid does not usually make this kind of visit.”
“Is he in training or something?” Harry asks, keeping his voice light and innocent. He doesn’t want her to think he’s being critical instead of curious. “Why didn’t you come with him to teach him what to do?”
McGonagall provides a long-winded answer that basically amounts to “I don’t know” and then she allows Harry to question her about Hogwarts and everything he’s seen so far that doesn’t seem like a very good way to run this program for a surprisingly long time. Harry can tell she’s losing her patience and trying to be polite, but Harry doesn’t let up until Vernon stomps back into the room and demands to know why she’s still here and hasn’t yet "taken the freak off to the freak school.”
McGonagall bristles, and Harry quickly thanks her for her time and walks her to the door, pressing his lips together so he doesn’t grin the whole way. When Harry turns back to walk upstairs, Vernon is already purple with rage and probably about to start on some tirade or other, so Harry freezes him and brushes past.
The last few weeks of summer pass by rather quickly, and Harry’s lack of a decision about whether or not he’ll try to keep things the same creates the answer for him: He doesn’t work to keep things the same, and between asking Hagrid about Hogwarts and then needling McGonagall, he has already caused more changes than he would have guessed. He’s seen a professional healer and received a full medical history and is using potions, creams, and a rather strict diet to help heal his many issues and promote growth in his magic and his body.
Vernon tries to put his foot down and refuses to take Harry to King’s Cross, but Harry only rolls his eyes and turns to Petunia.
“Think of it this way,” Harry says, ignoring the way they all startle because he hasn’t spoken directly to any of them since Hagrid brought him back, “you take me to the train station today and then you never have to see me again.”
Petunia looks like she’s going to argue just to be difficult but she eventually nods and they make the trip in complete silence. When Harry hops out of the car at King’s Cross, they don’t even exchange goodbyes.
Harry casts a very weak disillusionment charm over himself–something that will keep others from noticing him but that can be explained away as accidental magic from a nervous first year who doesn’t want to be noticed–and makes his way quickly onto the platform and then into an empty compartment.
It isn’t the same compartment as his first ride to Hogwarts, but Ron still shows up and claims everywhere else is full. Harry shrugs and nods to the empty seat across from him when Ron asks to sit down and then returns to his book which discusses theories of time magic but which Harry himself spelled to look like an introductory text to the wizarding world for muggleborns. If someone else tried to read it, they would only see information for muggleborns. It’s a very useful spell and one Harry imagines he’ll have to use often if he can’t get out of attending Hogwarts without raising too much of a fuss.
When Draco stops by, he focuses his comments on Harry because of Harry’s near-breakdown in Madam Malkin’s. Harry doesn’t even look up from his book. Ron tries to start something, but fortunately a prefect is drawn in by the noise before either of them can make bigger fools of themselves. Draco wanders off to harass someone else and Ron asks Harry why he didn’t say anything to defend himself.
“That kid is a bully,” Harry says, keeping his eyes on his book. “Who cares what he thinks? He doesn’t know me–he just decided to try to pick on a complete stranger based on assumptions. I’m not terribly concerned about what someone like that thinks.”
Ron is quiet for a long time after that, as though he’s trying to come up with an argument or adjust to having his worldview altered. By the time the trolley witch comes by, Harry has already eaten his prepared lunch and taken his nutrient and bone strengthening potions. Ron eyed the potions curiously, but he still hadn’t managed to introduce himself or get Harry’s name, so he holds the questions in.
When Hermione stops by to ask after Neville’s toad, Harry suggests they ask a prefect. Harry lets the train ride pass over him and barely pays attention to Draco again trying to bait him. He also ignores the sorting. Until his name is called.
He spent almost an entire century refusing to leave his house unless he was heavily disguised. He hasn't missed the stares or the whispers. He takes a deep, centering breath to rein in his annoyance so he doesn’t accidentally make himself invisible or force everyone to look away. He’s going to try his best not to stand out, and casting advanced magic before his first week of classes isn’t the way to do that.
“Well now, isn’t this interesting,” the sorting hat says.
“Is it?” Harry thinks back to the hat.
“Indeed it is, Mr. Potter. In all my time sorting students, I’ve never met a mind I couldn’t get into. How are you blocking me out?”
“Wouldn’t you like to know.”
“Hmm perhaps Slytherin.”
“Perhaps,” Harry says. “I’m cunning, but my only real ambition is to be left alone.”
“Is that truly your only ambition?”
“I suppose I also want answers.”
“About?”
“I’m afraid I can’t tell you that.”
“I see,” the hat says. “What can you tell me? Are you brave? Are you a hard worker? Are you loyal?”
“I don’t know if I’m brave so much as stubborn,” Harry says, and the hat laughs. “I can be a hard worker, but I have little patience, and my loyalty is hard-earned.”
“Well then perhaps not Hufflepuff or Gryffindor. Since you won’t let me into your head, and I suspect you already know where you’d like to go, the choice is yours: Ravenclaw or Slytherin?”
Harry can’t help but laugh. It’s not a choice at all. The-boy-who-lived in Slytherin would draw too much attention. Not to mention Harry doesn’t want to deal with Snape or Draco. And in Ravenclaw, he might have a better chance of hiding his advanced abilities under the guise of being studious. No, there’s no choice here.
“Ravenclaw,” Harry tells the sorting hat, and the hat cries out his choice to a stunned and silent Great Hall.