Limitless

Year 1

Year 1

They met in Diagon Alley during the muggleborn orientation gathering under McGonagall’s expert direction. Harry was the only child there without an accompanying adult, and one mother approached him right away.

“What’s your name, child?” The woman asked with a warm smile which made Harry’s stomach flip. He didn’t think any mother had ever smiled at him like that. “I’m Angela Rivers, and this is my son Tom.”

The son in question gave Harry a brief but suspicious look and took an obvious step closer to his mother as if to signal Harry wasn’t welcome as part of his family. Which was kind of funny, because it was obvious Tom hadn’t always been part of that family either.

Angela Rivers had dark skin, long hair tied back in a bunch of dreadlocks and her accent suggested she’d been born somewhere in the Caribbean. Tom had straight, black hair and his skin was the kind of milky white that suggested his ancestors had been British and nothing but British for many, many generations.

“I’m Harry Potter.” Ignoring the glaring boy, Harry smiled up at Mrs Rivers. “I live with my aunt and uncle but they don’t like magic much.”

“Well, it was quite the shock to hear about it,” Mrs Rivers agreed while she herded Harry and Tom in front of her as they started their procession through Diagon Alley. “Just stick with us for today and you’ll be fine.”

Harry nodded his thanks and felt an enormous sense of relief there was someone looking out for him personally, at least for that day. Ever since Professor McGonagall had visited the Dursleys and told Harry he was a wizard, Harry’s mind had been in turmoil for a variety of reasons.

The first one being that his parents hadn’t died in a car crash, as his aunt and uncle always claimed, but had been murdered by a wizard who wanted vengeance against Harry’s father, who had worked as a magical police officer. Apparently the wizard had been their friend once upon a time and had become a criminal without his parents’ knowledge. After Harry’s father uncovered the truth, the wizard had attacked his father and mother in a cowardly fashion while pretending to surrender and killed them both. He’d gone on the run and Harry’s godfather, also a magical police officer, had caught up with him but had died in an explosion that also killed his parents’ murderer.

The second thing was that Harry was a wizard, which his aunt had known his whole life but never thought to mention. At least it explained all the strange things that always happened around Harry, and he’d gotten Dudley’s second bedroom after McGonagall had left, not to mention he now got to leave the Dursleys for most of the year, so it wasn’t all bad. Just a lot to take in.

“Gringotts first,” McGonagall said as she led them with sure steps through the crowded alley. Both Harry and Tom looked around with wide eyes at all the strange little shops and the strangely dressed people around them. Once inside Gringotts, McGonagall briefly spoke to Harry to tell him his parents left him money and to give him a small golden key. A wild and fun cart ride later Harry discovered he wouldn’t have to worry about money for at least his entire Hogwarts career.

Mrs Rivers had exchanged pounds into galleons, as all the parents had done and Harry joined them again as they made for the luggage shop where they all bought trunks. One of the parents talked to the clerk and discovered they could put charms on their trunks to shrink them to the size of a matchbox with just a tap of their wand and soon enough everyone wanted to have this charm applied.

“Go on, Harry,” Mrs Rivers said with an encouraging nod. “I bet it will make your life a lot easier instead of having to lug that big thing around.” And so Harry also had the charm applied, even if it cost five gold coins.