A few months before the Salem's purification, under the bright summer sun that illuminated the ever-bustling Diagon Alley, Harry Potter was shuffling along beside Sirius Black. They had gone to buy his school supplies for the new school year, but the young wizard's mind was thousands of kilometers away from that place.
Harry was angry. No, angry was too mild a word for what he was feeling; he felt a rage so hot and corrosive that it burned his insides with every step he took.
Not long ago, in the kitchen at number twelve Grimmauld Place, Sirius had finally broken down and revealed to him who Aurelian Gaunt really was. And upon hearing it all at once, something clicked in Harry's head. He understood everything. He understood why he had always hated that boy so instinctively from the very first moment he saw him. He realized why he disliked the "perfect student," the "best student at Hogwarts in years"—that self-centered, arrogant jerk who strutted through the hallways as if he owned the castle.
Aurelian Gaunt was Voldemort's son. The son of the very monster who had murdered his parents.
And the icing on the cake—the twisted, sick mockery of fate that had hit him like a bucket of ice water—was that Voldemort wasn't just alive and had regained all his power, but was now the damned Minister of Magic. The man who had taken his family away from him was now ruling the entire country amid applause and cheers. He should have known it sooner—they shared the same last name. How stupid of him.
Harry remembered how he'd exploded that day. He'd yelled every insult imaginable at his godfather at Grimmauld Place, smashing a couple of plates against the wall, feeling betrayed by the Order of the Phoenix, by Dumbledore, by the whole world. But at the end of his outburst, he realized that no matter how angry he got, that was the truth; the harsh, crushing reality settled on his shoulders—he couldn't do absolutely anything to change it.
He was just Harry Potter… a… he didn't even know what he was anymore. The son of James and Lily Potter, with no role to play in this new scenario, felt like he was nobody. He was nothing.
According to Sirius, who had tried to calm him down, it was absolutely necessary to have Voldemort on their side for the time being. The world was on the brink of collapse because of Gellert Grindelwald and other dark threats that Harry, consumed by his own thoughts, had barely paid any attention to. In the end, reluctantly and with a knot in his stomach, Harry had accepted it. For now.
Returning to the present, the noise of Diagon Alley snapped him out of his dark reverie. They had already bought all their books and robes when they reached a corner that had once been empty and now housed a new shop—it was immense and outrageously crowded.
Harry looked up, shielding his eyes from the sun. High above the colorful facade stood a giant, articulated figure of a Weasley lifting a massive hat from which—in a twist that fit perfectly with their new investors—an immense emerald-green snake slithered out, hissing toward the street.
"Traitors… filthy traitors," Harry muttered under his breath, his teeth clenched.
Fred and George Weasley were friends with Aurelian Gaunt. Harry let out a silent laugh, devoid of any trace of humor. He thought the twins were complete idiots, hopeless fools for accepting money and protection from that slithering snake. They'd sold themselves to the highest bidder just for a stupid shop.
Beside him, Sirius looked away from the storefront and observed his godson. The Animagus noticed the boy's hollow laugh and darkened gaze. Sirius sighed inwardly, thinking that every day Harry was behaving in a stranger, more isolated, and more resentful way. He gently nudged his shoulder with his fist to snap him out of his trance.
Harry blinked, shook his head, and without saying a word, pushed open the door and walked into the shop. Sirius followed close behind, slowly shaking his head, praying to Merlin that all the hostility and resentment Harry had been showing lately was just a difficult phase of adolescence.
Upon entering Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, it was impossible not to be amazed. The place was an assault on the senses. The entire space, from floor to ceiling, was brilliantly and colorfully designed. There were fireworks bouncing off the ceiling, potions changing color on shelves that floated around people, and gadgets that defied gravity. From the highest point of the wooden gallery, Fred and George Weasley were smiling from ear to ear, shouting at the top of their lungs to promote their products to the crowd of people marveling at their surroundings.
But Harry's wonder was short-lived.
After twenty minutes of walking through the crowded aisles, looking at the boxes, jars, and packages, Harry had had enough. His blood began to boil again. For every two products he picked up, in the lower corner of the colorful labels, he always found the same elegant silver inscription: in collaboration with Gauntcorp.
He'd had enough. He was sick and tired of seeing that last name everywhere he looked. Gaunt this, Gaunt that, Gaunt the other, Gaunt in everything. That idiot's empire had infiltrated every aspect of the wizarding world—even his best friend's brothers' jokes.
Feeling as if he were suffocating, Harry spun around and strode out of the shop, bumping into a couple of wizards on his way to the street.
Once outside, breathing heavily in the alleyway, he looked at the small bag of candy he'd bought just minutes earlier. Anger was the only thing on his mind. He clenched his fists so tightly that the candies crumbled to dust between his fingers, sliding down his knuckles.
Harry looked up at the giant Weasley doll and the snake emerging from the hat, its green eyes gleaming with a promise.
"I swear on my parents' lives," Harry thought, his heart pounding furiously against his ribs, "that one day I'll make everyone see the truth. One day I'll prove to them that Aurelian Gaunt isn't the perfect hero or the savior everyone makes him out to be. And on that day, everyone will regret it."
In the days leading up to boarding the Hogwarts Express, Harry had begun to feel perpetually angry. He didn't know exactly what was wrong with him, but according to Sirius, he spent all his time frowning and acting defensively. Harry didn't notice it—or rather, he didn't want to admit it; he felt that his anger was the only armor he had left in a world that had turned its back on him.
He was pushing his way through the narrow aisles of the train, dragging his trunk and looking for the compartment where his friends would be, when, rounding a corner without paying attention, he bumped head-on into someone.
When he looked up, he found himself face-to-face with Neville Longbottom.
Neville had changed drastically over the past few years. He was now much taller than Harry, had broad shoulders, carried himself with confidence, and—to be honest—was better than Harry at practically everything. But in Harry's eyes, all that success was worthless. Harry would a thousand times rather be who he was than become another one of Aurelian Gaunt's pathetic lapdogs.
Harry shot him a hateful glare.
Neville frowned, his patience rapidly wearing thin in the face of his Gryffindor classmate's hostility.
"Is something wrong, Potter?" Neville asked, clearly annoyed.
Instead of apologizing or answering, Harry shoved him roughly by the shoulder and brushed past him, forcing his way through.
Behind him, Neville watched him go for a second, shook his head, and sighed.
"Potter's an idiot," Neville whispered to himself.
Harry heard him perfectly over the noise of the train. He stopped for a moment, biting his lower lip so hard he almost drew blood. He clenched his fists and kept walking. "Someday," he kept telling himself, "Someday I'll be on top, and all of them will be at the bottom. Just you wait."
But, as luck would have it, the universe seemed determined to ruin his day. A couple of cars down the line, he came face-to-face with Draco Malfoy and his usual entourage of Slytherins.
Upon seeing him, Malfoy stopped dead in his tracks. He looked Harry up and down for a second before a smug smile spread across his face. Instead of confronting him directly, Malfoy simply ignored him and continued talking to his friends, raising his voice just enough for Harry to hear every word, deliberately and hurtfully insulting him with every comment about "the mediocre orphans who didn't accept their place in the world."
Harry's blood boiled. He reached for his wand, ready to pounce on the blond boy and start throwing punches, but a hand yanked hard on his robes.
"No, Harry, let it go. It's not worth it," said Hermione Granger's voice, pulling him into a nearby compartment.
As he walked in, he ran into Ron, who jumped to his feet and greeted him with a big, warm hug. Harry managed to relax his shoulders, gave a half-hearted smile that didn't reach his eyes, and hugged him back, grateful to finally be with the only people who seemed to understand him.
As the train moved forward and the green scenery flashed by the window, the conversation flowed.
"At least the good thing about this year," Ron began, settling into his seat, "is that the Carrow twins won't be lurking in the hallways anymore, cursing us or looking at us with disgust."
Hermione, who already had a book open on her lap, looked up and corrected him in her usual know-it-all tone.
"Actually, Ronald, they're Gaunts now, not Carrows. They've already left Hogwarts and are married to Aurelian Gaunt."
The last name hit Harry like a ton of bricks. He tried to change the subject, tried to join in on his friends' conversations, but it was a total failure. For most of the trip, Ron and Hermione spent their time arguing and fighting over trivial matters, and they clearly weren't including him.
Harry had no choice but to rest his head against the windowpane. He watched the scenery rush by, losing himself in his own thoughts and feeling, once again, completely alone even in a crowded room.
Hours later, the Welcome Banquet in the Great Hall seemed to fly by faster than in previous years. Harry barely touched his food. He ate a little in silence while the noise, laughter, and joy of the other students filled the hall. No one came over to talk to him; no one asked him how his summer had been. He felt invisible again.
As his gaze wandered from table to table, a crushing thought crossed his mind. If he analyzed it objectively, he really didn't have many friends. Aside from Ron and Hermione, the other kids were just acquaintances. They wore the same uniform, but they weren't truly his friends.
That night, in the darkness and silence of his dormitory, Harry lay in bed with the curtains drawn.
He was lying on his back, staring intently at the darkness of the ceiling. The weight of Sirius's revelation, the helplessness of being a nobody, and the bitterness in his chest were suffocating him.
Unable to hold it back any longer, a single tear escaped from the corner of his eye and rolled slowly down his cheek until it vanished into the pillow.
Harry Potter closed his eyes, feeling more invisible and painfully lonelier than he had ever felt since discovering he was a wizard.
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