Harry was standing in Dumbledore's office, the mysterious magical artefacts that were rumoured to have once belonged to the Peverell family whirring in the uncomfortable silence.

"Professor, couldn't I stay at Hogwarts this summer, or go to the Weasleys from the beginning?" Harry asked, looking at his hands as he fiddled with his fingers, clearly uncomfortable or scared.

"Absolutely not, my boy. The Dursleys is the safest place for you, even if things went a little odd last summer." Dumbledore said, his eyes twinkling, but as Harry wasn't looking at him, he didn't know how scathing Dumbledore's gaze was.

Harry took in a shaky breath, playing with the hem of the too large, tatty t-shirt he was wearing. He looked like he was terrified of what he was about to say, but he was getting himself ready.

"Professor, I'm not safe with the Dursleys, they starve me, overwork me and hit me. I'm not allowed to ask questions, not allowed anywhere near my school things, Hedwig is only allowed out so she doesn't make noise because people know about her already and they can't kill her." Harry said, his voice sounding more throaty than usual as though he was fighting back tears.

"Harry, my boy, I know you might not like it there, but the blood protection your mother left you makes Petunia's house the safest place for you. She's your mother's sister, she loves you. Besides, how can you ask to stay here over the summer knowing who the last person to ask that was, we don't want people thinking you're like him, right?" Dumbledore said, looking over his neatly crossed fingers at the boy who was far too small for his age.

"No, sorry professor." Harry said quietly, looking at his feet as he walked out, tears threatening to spill from his eyes.

Fudge would have slapped Dumbledore if the memory wasn't changing already. Why hadn't he seen it before, Harry Potter was abused, how could his magical guardian not do anything about it? And blood protection? What a joke. Everyone knew that was a myth that came from old records before they knew what magic was really caused by a sacrificial death.

When one person dies for another their magic gets passed onto them, it will form a protective barrier over them to fend off every magical attack, or contact with the original person who intended to harm them, but the worse state the carrier of the magic was in, the more of the magic would be used to repair wounds or to cause distractions.

"Not dead yet then?" Vernon said gruffly, looking down at Harry with displeasure, the teen boy knowing better than to look up and meet his eye.

"No, sir." Harry muttered, setting his stuff in the boot of the car, trying to be careful with it so it didn't get thrown around too much on the journey home, not that it would matter much, his things would end up beaten enough for 5 car journeys along winding roads when they got back to the house.

"Heard they almost caught that murderer. Be honest with me, boy, he's one of your lot isn't he" Vernon asked the boy, getting right in his face, Harry clearly trying not to flinch from both the spit in his face and the malice behind his tone.

"He's my godfather, and he will be writing to me over the summer, to make sure I'm doing well." Harry said, quietly, pushing past Vernon to get into the back passenger seat behind the driver so Vernon couldn't do anything to him.

Vernon looked slightly pale when he got into the car, glaring at Harry through the mirror.

"Is this true? Is Black Potter's godfather?" Fudge asked, Chris was more likely to know than him. If it was true it could cause problems, with Harry's confundus not seeming to have worn off, it could convince the poor boy that Black was someone he could trust, and that would likely end badly.

"Yes, he was once good friends with James, Remus, and Peter, he and James were as good as brothers, so it was only natural for James to make him his first child's godfather. I'm sure they were expecting to have more children, one for each of their little group to be a godparent." Chris confirmed, they had been at Hogwarts at the same time as the Marauders, they had caused a whole lot of problems with their pranks, but with the exception of self proclaimed Death Eaters, they never actually hurt anyone.

"If only the boy had never found out about that, it's clear he's lacking a father figure. I guess it's only natural he latched on so tightly to the confundus." Fudge said, looking at the jostling memory of Harry sadly.

"Get out, boy!" Vernon commanded as soon as they had stopped. Harry did as he was told immediately with no word.

"You can't take all of my things this time, if I don't write regularly my godfather will come to check on me, make sure nothing's happening." Harry said, his arms crossed as though to protect himself, and he wasn't making eye contact with Vernon.

"Fine, take out your damn quills and parchment, everything else is being locked up again though, and if I find out you've told anyone, you'll wish you were never born." Vernon snapped at the boy, whispering the first part as though it was filthy.

"I already do." Harry muttered to himself before the memory changed again.

Harry was in his room, it was barren, filthy and looked to contain many things that could be harmful, painful, or merely uncomfortable. If you were to see him like this you would never guess he was the saviour of the wizarding world. He was curled up on the lumpy mattress that seemed to have the springs poking through at several points.

There was a tapping at the window, a brightly coloured bird tapping at the window, and Harry's ashen face immediately brightened when he saw it, running over to his window to let it in. He took the letter from its leg, and let it drink from Hedwig's water bowl, clearly not knowing what to feed it.

Fudge was genuinely surprised to read the letter Sirius had sent Harry, while the writing was messy, and the letter itself was brief, it was filled with genuine love and concern for the young boy. It came with some genuine advice too, and you could see the regret he felt as he apologised for not being able to take Harry with him. Perhaps they were wrong about Black.

There were a lot of memories like that, Harry looking sick, or hurt, only for his face to light up when he saw a bird at the window. Contrary to what he said to the Dursleys, Harry never told Sirius anything abut the abuse written all over his thin frame.

Finally, they reached the point that explained the fire, it was more hazy than the other memories, probably due to Harry's stress the memory became unclear, even to him.

Harry ran into his bedroom, closing the door and leaning against it with a bruised face filled with nothing but pure terror. He quickly leant against the door in an attempt to keep it closed. He seemed to be starting to get his breathing back under control when a hoot came from Hedwig's cage.

The memory seemed to slow down as Harry looked over at the cage that contained his beautiful snowy owl that had been threatened so many times. The door behind him was going to give eventually anyway.

Harry squeezed his eyes shut and gritted his teeth as he ran to Hedwig's cage, fumbling with it to let the owl out, as Vernon burst into the room, his face purple with rage.

Fudge and Chris could hardly make out the next few minutes, flashed of Harry's abuse and struggle against it coming in brief snapshots. The memory only became clear again when Harry's magic caught fire, burning Vernon's right arm that was swinging forwards to hit him, while those flames went out, the ones that touched the rest of the things in that room didn't.

Harry and the Dursleys ran out of the house, only for Harry to run back in, running up to his room where the flames were the worst to grab Hedwig's cage, then back down the stairs s the flames got higher, the flames licking his legs as he fought with the lock on the cupboard under the stairs. He barely made it out the back door with his suitcase and cage before he collapsed.

And Fudge and Chris were thrown out of his memory.

"So he was the one to start the fire." Chris said, their voice far less expressive of their emotions than their eyes, which seemed to be a swirling mess.

"What on earth was Dumbledore talking about? Plenty of people have stayed at Hogwarts over the Summer holidays." Fudge said, still fuming over Dumbledore's word to Harry in his office.

"Minister, I don't think that's the most pressing matter of what we just saw, and probably the easiest to deal with." Chris said, looking down on the easily distracted Minister of Magic, honestly it was a surprise he was able to get the job.

"Hm? Oh, right, Harry. It's obvious we can't keep having him live with those Muggle relatives of his. They will have their memories of him and the magical world removed so they can't cause him any further harm. As for where he'll stay-" Fudge said, Chris sighing as the minister still missed the main point.

"Minister, I was talking about Black. I think we should try giving him a trial, we have reason to distrust Dumbledore, and he didn't do anything to harm Potter. As he's the boy's godfather, if it turns out he's innocent then Potter has a place to stay, one he'll probably feel safe in quickly, and if he's guilty then we can deal with things from there." Chris said, honestly they were started to get frustrated working in the ministry, the leadership was either corrupt or plain incompetent.

"Oh, right. How are we going to get him somewhere we can get him, though? From the look of those birds, he's not staying in the UK and we don't have the right to go looking the world for an escaped convict we aren't even sure is a criminal." Fudge said, looking at Chris as though they were an idiot.

"He clearly cares about Potter, we can get someone to imitate a letter from him asking to meet because Potter's afraid. I don't see him not coming, and we can be there waiting for him." Chris explained, honestly, how were they supposed to put up with much more of this. Maybe they'll run away to Germany, maybe there they'll have a better functioning legal system.

"That would work, I'll get someone on my idea immediately." Fudge said. Chris didn't bother correcting him, the man was always trying to take credit for other people's work and ideas, that's how he became minister after all.

-----

Harry could feel he was slipping into unconsciousness, but he had to stay awake, if they were going to give him the Dementor's kiss he wanted to be able to write goodbye letters to everyone, he's send Hedwig with Sirius' letter to Hermione so she could send it when they wouldn't be following Hedwig.

Fudge and the auror came back into the room, looking at Harry with concern as they noticed the slight glint of light reflected from his eye. Harry didn't know why they looked so concerned, weren't they going to send him to Azkaban, especially when he refuses to tell them where Sirius is.

The auror pulled one of the healers to the side, whispering to them so Harry couldn't hear.

"Why isn't he asleep yet?" Fudge demanded to the other healers. He seemed angry Harry wasn't asleep, which Harry guessed was because he didn't want to watch an awake child get the Dementor's kiss, it may be painful, perhaps this was a kind of mercy they showed people under age.

"We've tried convincing him to take the sleeping potions, but he wouldn't. He's not got enough energy to explain why, but the burns should be doing better soon. We don't have enough to fully treat him here." The healer explained, flinching away from Fudge.

"Minister, auror Chris suggested what we should do, I'll do it and they can fill you in." The healer the auror had pulled aside said, speaking comfortably, clearly this was the person in charge here.

Harry wanted to struggle, to fight the healer off as they approached him with their wand out. He didn't know what the auror had suggested, but it was already obvious to him he wouldn't like it.

The healer put their wand close to his face, between his eyes, casting a non-verbal spell that Harry couldn't really see the colour of, before his mind went completely blank.

-----

Harry was finally asleep, although his eyes were still cracked open, just unseeing. It was almost creepy as his burns were still quite bad, areas of his face that previously looked pink, but not harmed, were now coming up blistered from burns, not as bad as the ones on his legs though.

"Minister, it was Potter who set the fire, and we found his wand, although the only part remaining is the wand's core." One of the other aurors who had been at the scene of the fire.

"We know it was Potter, it was self defence." Chris told the other aurors.

"Is the memory department already there?" Fudge asked, Chris' words spurring him back into action. "We need to clear the memories the Dursleys have of magic."

"They had just started arriving when we were leaving, I could apparate tell them to do that too." The auror offered.

"That would be the best." Fudge answered coldly, Chris rolling their eyes behind him.

"Um, minister, we need to send him to St Mungo's now, he needs more serious attention." The healer who had cast the spell on him said, stepping forward.

"Right, what was that spell you used on him without permission?" Fudge asked coldly, turning to glare at him.

"It was a form of stunner, it's one that actively wakes up the recipient of the spell after a certain time, he should wake up after Black's trial either for someone to help him understand that he was, in fact, a criminal, or for him to see the man." The healer said, no matter what Fudge said, it didn't seem like he could intimidate them.

"Fine, take him there yourself." Fudge snapped, the healer merely nodding and taking Harry to St Mungo's.