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Harry had enough. He was sick and tired of being used as a chess piece, important while in use and then put away when it was no longer of any use. He wasn’t a pawn, a rook or whatever chess piece he was being used as! He was always shoved back into the Dursley filled box where he was abused and neglected with barely any contact, and he just couldn’t, wouldn’t take it anymore. He was a living breathing person and enough was enough.
So, Harry made a plan. He would be classed as an Adult in the eyes of the Wizarding World the moment he turned seventeen, meaning he would be able to use magic outside of school. He didn’t plan on sticking around after the clock struck midnight. Screw Magical Britain, they could deal with their own problems instead of making a teenager do it for them.
At least that had been the plan. A week before his birthday, with as usual no correspondence from his friends or well anyone from the wizarding world meaning he had no idea what the war situation was like, everything changed.
Harry had been forced to spend the day slaving away in the back garden during one of the summer storms while the Dursley’s attended a meal at a posh restaurant. He hated to imagine the abuse that they would be putting the servers and fellow customers through with their terrible personalities. So he was soaked to the bone and freezing by the time the Dursley’s returned home and unfortunately for him they were in a bad mood.
“Get in!” Vernon bellowed as he opened the back door to finally let Harry inside. They had been home for a good hour but deliberately left Harry out in the rain for longer.
“My floors!” Petunia shrieked as a water logged Harry, with muddy shoes because his bitch of an Aunt made him prune her roses in this merlin awful weather, made a mess in when he entered the house.
“Ungrateful freak,” His uncle spat and shook him roughly. Harry managed to kick his shoes off before his uncle dragged him through the house. He knew that if he had been wearing his shoes, making a bigger mess, then whatever punishment his darling relatives were going to stick him with would be far worse.
Uncle Vernon stopped in front of the Cupboard under the stairs and Harry’s heart sank. “Dudders, unlock it for me.” He barked at his son with a malicious grin. Dudley rushed to do as asked, eager to see his freakish cousin humiliated.
As soon as the Cupboard was unlocked, Vernon had Dudley pull out Harry’s trunk. “Let’s see how water proof your freakish things are.” He smirked before stuffing Harry into the small dark space that he had long outgrown. The door was shut firmly behind him and locked.
“Hey!” Harry protested, banging on the door. “Let me out!” He had no idea if his trunk was water proof and didn’t really want to find out the hard way that it wasn’t but it looked like he wouldn’t have a choice.
“You can stay in there, I think its time for Dudley to get his second bedroom back.” Ah Shit, he hoped that Dudley wouldn’t find his things hidden under the floorboard, the last thing he needed was a Dudley with an invisibility cloak. Not to mention that the prat would likely destroy everything else, including his photo album.
“Finally.” Dudley cheered.
Harry was left shivering, cold and wet in the tiny cupboard under the stairs. He hugged his knees to his chest to try and get warm, not that there was much space to stretch out. Merlin, he couldn’t wait until he was seventeen and he could be shot of this place. Maybe he should take a page out of Voldemort’s book and torture his relatives for a bit before he left...He was certainly due some revenge.
Harry must have fallen asleep at some point because the next thing he knew it was dark outside his cupboard and even with the grate open he couldn’t see anything. If he had been sleeping he wasn’t sure what had woken him but he was suddenly alert. He strained his ears and he could just make out the sound of footsteps over the beating of his heart.
No one in this house walked that lightly. Were the Dursley’s being robbed? Couldn’t happen to a nicer family, hopefully it wasn’t a Death Eater although they weren’t exactly known for being stealthy.
He heard the intruder head upstairs and then there was nothing. No matter how hard Harry strained his ears, he couldn’t hear anything. He felt rather unnerved and wondered what the hell the intruder was doing. He tried to stay as quiet as he could, not wanting to be found...
"Achoo!" A violent sneeze ripped through him. "Shit." He muttered afterwards only to start coughing. His hours in the rain had caught up to him rather quickly.
He was so distracted coughing up a lung that he didn't hear the intruder come down the stairs, in fact he didn't notice anything until the door to his cupboard was opened and a torch light was shone in his face.
He winced at the sudden bright light and covered his eyes with his free hand while the other was still covering his mouth to catch his coughs.
"Well, hello there." A smooth foreign voice pierced the night.
"Hi." Harry croaked, merlin his throat was sore.
"Were the pigs upstairs the ones that shoved you in here?" The voice was kind and Harry half wondered if his face would look just as kind. "Just nod or shake your head, no need to abuse your throat further."
Harry nodded.
"Then I have some good news for you." The voice took on a darker tone and Harry knew what he was going to say. "They will never be able to hurt you again."
"Thank you." He whispered. Was it wrong that he was thanking a murderer for killing his only living relatives? Maybe, but he had been planning to torture them himself once he had turned seventeen so...he didn't really have a moral high ground to stand on.
"You are most welcome." The voice became warm again. "Now, how would you like to get out of this cramped space?"
"You can turn on the light." Harry told him, wincing at the dry pain from his throat. "The neighbours will just think that Vernon or Dudley are getting a snack."
"Yes, they look like the type to have midnight snacks." The stranger hummed. "Although you do realise that once you see my face you will only have two options." He continued. "Either you join your family or you can join me."
"Join you?" He was offering to let Harry live? To go with him? And was implying that so long as Harry didn't see his face then he was going to let him live anyway.
"Yes, I find it despicable that a young wizard such as yourself has been left with pigs."
Harry tensed. The man knew. The man knew that he was a wizard. Did that mean he was a wizard too?
"Calm yourself," The man cooed, a large hand reached into the cramped space and Harry flinched, waiting for the hit but instead a warm hand gently smoothed his matted hair away from his face. "I take good care of my things."
Harry had always wanted to be looked after and was aware that he was likely being manipulated into choosing the option that the stranger wanted but that didn't change his answer.
"I'll join you."
"Good boy."
His name was Hannibal Lecter and he was an eccentric Eastern European man, from Lithuania to be exact. However he had spent most of his life in France and Italy before moving to America. Apparently he was only in Britain for a Psychologist convention and had run afoul with Harry’s relatives at the restaurant that they had been boasting about being invited to.
“They behaved rather rudely and ruined everyone’s evening.” Hannibal had explained as he tested Harry’s decision to leave with him by butchering his relatives on the checkerboard tiled kitchen floor. “The meat of your Aunt is quite stringy but should soften in a stew.”
Harry tried not to flinch as Hannibal broke open his Aunt’s ribs to get to her organs. “You’re going to eat her?”
“We,” Hannibal grinned darkly, “are, yes.”
“I’m not saying no, but can’t you get diseases from eating humans?”
“Magic takes care of that.” He waved away Harry’s concerns.
“Then should I get started on the stew?” Harry asked tentatively. He couldn’t believe that he was going to willingly eat human flesh but if it meant that he would live, and get out of Britain then he would do it.
“You cook?” Hannibal looked rather pleased.
“Yeah.”
“I think keeping you will be one of my better ideas.” Hannibal mused as he pulled what looked like Aunt Petunia’s liver from her corpse with a sickening squelch.
In the end because of the shortage of time, they had a quick fry up with Uncle Vernon’s heart that was apparently extra tender due to the stress it underwent daily to keep the massive man alive. It was delicious.
“Grab what you can not live without.” Hannibal ordered him. “We’ll be stopping by Gringotts to get a portkey.”
“What about your conference?”
“It was the last night of it.” He admitted. “If anyone asks I will merely inform them that I took an earlier flight home. Now hurry.”
Harry didn’t bother trying to rescue his trunk from the rain and instead shoved his most precious items into a rucksack before leaving with Hannibal. The only sound that night was the splash their footsteps made in the puddles…before Number Four Privet Drive went up to flames.
A gas leak would be the official report hiding the odd state the bodies were found in. There would be no missing report for Harry Potter, the Dursley’s nephew, as no one on the street spared a single thought about him. The wizarding world wouldn’t be aware of Harry’s disappearance until a week later when the Order of the Phoenix went to pick him up on his birthday and instead found an empty, burnt husk of a house.
“Oh Merlin,” Lupin rasped in shock. “I thought we had people watching him?! Why wasn’t this reported?” He demanded to know, turning on his friends.
“We couldn’t spare anyone.” Mad Eye Moody grunted. “We’re at war, there’s no time to babysit teenagers.”
“Is…is Harry dead?” Ron asked as he stared at the mess in front of him.
“I don’t know.” Lupin wished he had an answer. “I just don’t know.”
And they wouldn’t ever know, after all Goblins are strict about their clients' privacy…especially when said clients shared their love for the delicacy that was long pig.