The Grangers' house was covered with protections far stronger than those placed over Number 4, Privet Drive. The presence of the entire Dursley family in the dentists' beautiful cottage was necessary, secondly, because only Dudley Frederick, as Cousin Harry already jokingly called him, apart from the house-elf Dinky, could correctly switch the containers in Jones's apparatus. Why? Who could have given a sensible explanation? But since he could, that meant he would do it.
And firstly, multilayered protection was needed over the entire Granger property and over each of them individually, because they were ordinary people — that is, above all, defenseless against the abilities of any malicious wizard.
But constructing such complex charms required something else as well, and for that, the consent of Potter's relatives was necessary — his aunt and cousin, and additionally his uncle, so that the power of the Magical Trinity would take effect. So said the representative of the Great Circle of house-elves, who had to be summoned to the Grangers' house.
Petunia, upon learning of her nephew's intentions, practically boiled over:
"Harry," she said in an icy voice, "we need to be alone so we can have a word."
Dragging him into the kitchen, she launched a head-on attack:
"Do you understand what you're getting yourself into, Harry? At this age, with that bore?"
"Aunt Petunia, let us set aside the fact that Hermione is my friend and that being boring is not her main character trait — she is kind, sympathetic, inquisitive, and intelligent. All of that, as you know, would not be worth a broken farthing if I did not like her. But I think about her all the time, she is dear to me, and I believe that in time you will like her too."
"But to agree to an engagement?"
"It is the only way to win the girl over. There is this problem, Aunt Tuney — I think my father bound me to Dumbledore with a hateful oath bond, and that is the sort of complication that, without the bond master's permission, can only be destroyed by marriage to new blood."
"Hermione Granger is not the only Muggle-born in England, Harry," Mrs. Dursley tried to persuade her nephew to abandon the idea of the engagement.
"That is true, but in the overwhelming majority of cases, they are not genuine 'Muggle-borns,' but distant descendants of successful crossbreeding between half-bloods or Squibs, and we refer to them as nothing other than Mudbloods."
"So what? That Snape brat called your mother a Mudblood too, and she…"
"…was not one. She was new blood as well, just like you, by the way. Father, however, made a mistake with the ritual. He married first and then accepted the bond of vows with Dumbledore, when he should have done it the other way around — then the bond that humiliated a pure-blood wizard would have fallen away by itself."
Petunia blinked her enormous pale-green eyes, which were full of questions.
"I saw Sirius's memories in the Pensieve," her nephew replied and, to calm his aunt, took her hand in his and looked into her eyes. "Calm down, Aunt Tuney, everything will be all right. Believe me, there is no girl in the whole world sweeter to me than Hermione. Although she charges straight ahead everywhere with unstoppable determination, she is gentle and kind, tender and vulnerable, and deserves the very best in life. Without me, bitter disappointments and gray, empty days in the company of unworthy people await her. I cannot allow that."
"All right then, our noble knight," Petunia said tearfully, running her fingers through her nephew's black hair.
The holiday on the Potters' island was organized after all. Neither the Granger couple nor the boy's relatives could have imagined a more pleasant way to spend their time. The adults left the young people to themselves — under the watchful supervision of the elf on duty, of course — and surrendered themselves to relaxing idleness, countless hundreds of Mai Tais, and other iced cocktails.
The children, although they already looked more like teenagers than children, frolicked in the water, dived, swam, sunbathed…
Never in her life had Hermione Granger, the future Mrs. Potter and Lady Slytherin and Black, and, the way things were going, goodness knew who else, had such a wonderful holiday. The boys treated her like a princess, waited on her hand and foot, waved enormous jester hats before her, shuffled their feet, stumbled, fell onto the sand, and choked with laughter…
Life would have continued in a steady and peaceful manner for the entire Wizarding world if the gaze of Hogwarts Deputy Headmistress Professor Minerva McGonagall, while she was going through a pile of envelopes containing invitations for first-years for the new school year and reading the addresses on them, had not fallen upon THAT envelope. Written upon it in green ink against dirty-white parchment was the following recipient:
Mr. Dudley Frederick Evans-Dursley,
The Large Second Bedroom
4 Privet Drive
Little Whinging, Surrey
Professor McGonagall knew who Mr. Dudley Dursley was, but she knew nothing about Dudley Frederick Evans-Dursley. The first was Potter's cousin, but who was this one?
Then she looked at the address again and went cold, as though a bucket of icy water had been poured over her. He was Potter's cousin after all.
But he was the same age as Harry, so why had the Book of Young Wizards been an entire year late?
Minerva decided to find everything out on the spot immediately. Mechanically, she put a black hat with a red check pattern over her smoothly combed hair, threw Floo powder into the fireplace, and stepped into the green flames of the passage, shouting:
"The Leaky Cauldron."
Apparating directly onto the pavement in front of the house of Potter's relatives, which Minerva remembered from that memorable night when James and Lily's little son had been left on the doorstep of her sister, she immediately strode the few meters separating the entrance to the well-kept building from the street and opened the garden gate.
Beautiful roses bloomed all around, giving off a dizzying fragrance, with indescribable shades of red — from almost pink to such a dark burgundy that the buds looked black among the green leaves.
Minerva knew that Muggles had long since stopped knocking on doors and used doorbells instead, so with a hand clad in a dark-green glove, she pressed the button — someone inside began chirping in a birdlike voice. But no one met her at the door. She pressed the button again and again, and once again no one responded…
The house was empty. The Dursleys had gone somewhere without informing Dumbledore that they were taking Harry with them.
Professor McGonagall looked left and right along the street, and when she was certain that the street was empty and no one was watching her, she lightly waved her wand and whispered:
"Alohomora."
The lock did not open.
Someone cleared their throat behind her, and she hurried to leave.
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