The Paranoid Harry Potter

Dumbledore sprang into action the moment he saw the dementors. He instantly snapped his wand and fired out a muggle repelling ward that covered the entire street. This was quickly followed by a notice me not charm. The combination of those two charms would ensure that none of the muggles living on Privet Drive would be able to witness what happened next. A silvery ghost like phoenix sprang forth from his wand and flew straight at the Dementors. It slammed into the Dementor in the place where the heart should have been; it was thrown backwards, weightless as darkness, and as the phoenix charged, the Dementor swooped away, bat-like and defeated. Dumbledore turned to direct his patronus towards the other Dementor only to find a lynx had already thrown it up into the air and, like its fellow, it soared away and was absorbed into the darkness; the lynx cantered to the end of the street and dissolved into silver mist.

Dumbledore turned and nodded to Kingsley whose patronus the lynx had been.

"Nicely done, Kingsley. Stand and keep guard here for a moment. I must check up on the house," he said as he moved towards the front door of number four. A quick unlocking charm and he was letting himself into the house. Instead of searching the house he simply used the Homenum Revelio charm. Unfortunately, it only revealed what he already expected to find after hearing Kingsley's report. Harry Potter's home on Privet Drive was totally deserted. He spent a few minutes analysing the wards.

"Hmm, the wards have not lessened in strength; this means that they cannot have been gone long. Nor could they have been kidnapped. They must have left willingly," he thought with an enormous sense of relief. The worst had obviously not happened.

Harry had not been kidnapped by Death Eaters; he had left the house along with his relatives. He wondered why they would leave. What had happened at Privet Drive? It was all extremely puzzling. Who had attacked Mundungus? Snape would surely have heard if Voldemort had planned an attack on Harry. There was also the fact that if a Death Eater had attacked then it was hardly likely that Mundungus would have been left alive. So if not Death Eaters, then - who could have attacked Mundungus? Did it happen before or after Harry had left?

He moved upstairs, hoping to find a clue to the events that had transpired. He found the master bedroom in a state of utter disarray. It looked like someone had very hastily packed, the wardrobe was hanging open and discarded clothes littered the room. The next room he checked seemed to belong to that of a teenage boy. Was this Harry's room he wondered? No, from all the muggle paraphernalia and the oversize clothes he could see this must be the Dursley boy's room. He frowned at the door of the room next to it. Why would they need to put so many locks on a door? Especially one that was inside the house? Why would they need to have a cat-flap at the bottom of the door? He opened the door to find an utterly bare room with just an old broken down bed and desk in it. He sighed in relief. For a minute there he had assumed the worst of the Dursleys and had been utterly horrified, but this room had clearly never been in use. They probably had used it to keep a pet in at some point and installed the cat-flap so that the dog or cat would have been free to enter and leave the room. It must be some strange custom that muggles followed. There was yet another neatly furnished room further down the corridor. That must have been Harry's room he decided. Odd that it seemed that Harry had packed up all his possessions but it had probably been easier for the boy considering that he lived most of the year at Hogwarts. It would have been easy for him to simply toss his belongings back in his trunk. He snooped around the room, hoping to find something, a note, any scrap that would give him some inkling to what had happened but he could not find anything.

Giving it up for a bad job, he decided he'd just have to ask Harry what had happened, after he used his deluminator to find him. He'd modified his deluminator years ago. Not only was it extremely useful to put out the occasional light but now it had a far more important function - it worked as a homing device for Harry and with it he could find Harry anywhere within Great Britain. Unfortunately when he put his hand into his pocket he found it distressingly empty, except for his ever present packet of lemon drops, and he realised with a sinking heart that he had left his deluminator at Hogwarts. No, he remembered now, he had lent it to Moody to use when he was supposed to pick up Harry.

Bugger, he would have to contact Moody immediately. He needed that deluminator back; Harry had to be found at once. He rushed back downstairs and out into the street pausing only briefly to lock the house up after himself. He was surprised to see that Kingsley had been joined by three men, all in auror robes. Kingsley seemed to be arguing with them.

"What seems to be the problem here?" asked Dumbledore.