Harry did know. Vernon would have thrown him out after the Dementors had attacked Dudley, but with a little prompting from Dumbledore, Aunt Petunia had put her foot down and insisted he be allowed to remain.
"I'm glad you got some help, Dudley," Harry said sincerely. "I hope Uncle Vernon isn't still being a git to you over it."
"Nah. Well, as long as I call you a freak every so often, he figures I'm doing okay. But I don't mean it anymore, Harry. I'm . . . I'm real glad you turned out a wizard, and one powerful enough to . . . stop those, you-knows. I've felt bad that I went barmy and blamed you when I should have been thanking you, that night."
Harry gave a low laugh. "Feels like I'm meeting someone new, Dudley. Hallo, I'm Harry Potter, pleased to meet you."
"I wanted to thank you at the hospital," Dudley confessed. "But with Dad there? I thought I'd better not."
"Good thinking," Harry approved. "No sense getting his back up."
"I gave you the chocolate hoping you'd understand it wasn't just chocolate."
For Dudley, Harry thought, that's a pretty complex concept. "I appreciated it."
Dudley cleared his throat. "I feel really bad about Mum. I mean, not just because I miss her, but . . . well, I was the one who told Dad that we should let you try some magic to heal her. After I knew what you'd done to those you-knows, I was sure you could do anything."
"I'm sorry I couldn't, Dudley. You do understand that, don't you? I did want to help, but there are some things magic's just no good for."
"Yeah, I get that, but it's hard to take. I mean, a wizard in the family, but what good did it do Mum? No offence, Harry."
"None taken."
"The worst part though is that I made Dad write that letter. He didn't want to, not at first. And . . . and then--" Dudley gulped in what sounded like a bucketful of air. "You offered what you could, the marrow I mean, but she rejected it, and died, and in a way it's all my fault because if I hadn't made Dad write you, you'd never have known, never have tried to help!"
"Oh, Dudley," Harry moaned, easily recognizing the sentiment, the fatal chain of logic leading to the flawed conclusion. "No, you can't do that to yourself. It's not your fault. You might as well say that your father's right and I'm to blame. It was my marrow."
"You were trying to help!" Dudley immediately objected.
"But so were you," Harry calmly insisted.
"Yeah," Dudley admitted, reluctance coating the word. "I tell myself that, sometimes. Part of me knows you're right, but there's this other part that keeps going over it, over and over, you know?"
Oh yes, thought Harry. I do know.
"I worked through a lot of things with Marsha," Dudley rambled on. "That's my therapist. Anger, mostly. And why I wouldn't stay on my diet. I . . . I'm glad you called. Dad says if you come around here, he'll show you what-for, and I figured after the . . . after what happened after the funeral, you'd know not to come home for the summer, or even try and visit, and well, anyway . . . I thought I'd never hear from you again, you know?"
"I'll keep in touch," Harry promised, surprised to realise that he meant it. "Are you still seeing Marsha? You know, to help you deal with . . . um, your mum dying?"
"Dad knows she's talked to me about . . . er, people like you, so now that Mum's not here to insist, he won't let me even mention her." Dudley sounded dead hopeless.
"Hmm. Well, tell you what, Dudley, I'll see if I can persuade him to be more reasonable."
Harry could hear Dudley swallowing. "I don't really think you should go around threatening people, Harry."
"That's a bit rich, coming from you," Harry coolly observed.
"Yeah, but--"
"No buts. Your therapy is really important, Dudley. Now, just one thing, all right? If you don't hear from me for a long time at a stretch, don't think it means anything. Things can get busy at a boarding school, and besides, we don't have phones or regular mail. Just owl post."
"How're you calling me?"
"Oh, long story," Harry told him. "I can't really get into it."
"You're hiding, huh?" Harry could almost hear Dudley nodding. "Dad's been saying that somebody's trying to kill you. Er . . . a wizard. A real bad one."
For a moment, Harry wondered how Uncle Vernon could know about Voldemort being after him again. Then he remembered that after the Dementor attack, it had all sort of come out right there in the Dursleys' living room.
"I have to tell you, Harry," Dudley admitted in a hushed, fearful whisper. "Dad'll be furious, but I just have to. Ever since the funeral, he's been going on about how he'd just love to help this whoever-it-is. Says it's time you got what you deserve, and who cares if it's some evil wizard who's after you, he'd help the devil himself if it would put you six feet under."
Harry almost dropped the phone again, but managed to say, "Uh, thanks for telling me that, Dudley. Though I really don't know what Uncle Vernon could do. I mean, this evil wizard isn't exactly in the habit of asking Muggles for assistance. In fact, you should warn your father to steer clear of him. He's really, really dangerous. He kills Muggles all the time."
"Yeah, well you be careful, too, Harry."
"I will," Harry promised. "Let me talk to your father now, okay?"
"Don't threaten him."
"No more so than he does me," Harry grimly replied.
Surprisingly enough, Dudley understood. "Yeah. Guess you have a point there. Okay. I'll talk to you later." Harry heard the phone being set down, then a bellowing voice growing fainter as Dudley walked away. "Dad! Harry wants to talk to you! Oh, come on, Dad! Come in!"
The next thing Harry heard was Vernon roaring "What now?" down the line.
"Can you guess what the Incendio curse would do to you?" Harry pleasantly inquired. "Or Petrificus Totalus? I didn't mean any of my hexes after the funeral, which is why it took my teacher to fell you, but I won't be so restrained if you go about offering to help other wizards arrange my death."
Vernon began stammering, but Harry cut him off.
"You're not to take it out on Dudley that he mentioned it to me, either! Just be glad that he has sense enough to appreciate family! And one more thing, Uncle Vernon."
The silence on the line was palpable.
"You let him see Marsha as often as he likes, and don't you dare give him a moment's grief over it!"
Vernon was cowed, but not so much so that he'd take that lying down. "Now just a minute! Who do you think you are, telling me how to raise my boy?"
"I think," Harry drawled, trying again for that glacial tone Snape could do so well, "that I'm sorely tempted to hex you right now over the phone. No reason why it shouldn't work, really. Shall I start with Alohomora? Trust me, you don't want to know what that'll do to you."
"I'll take him to his damned shrink!" Vernon screeched, rage punctuating the fear in every syllable.
"Good," Harry replied. "I'll be calling again to make sure you have. Good-bye, Uncle Vernon."
The only answer he got to that was the sound of the receiver slamming down hard enough to shatter it.
Harry sighed. Uncle Vernon was probably angry --and stupid-- enough to wish he could betray Harry to Voldemort. It wasn't a good feeling, knowing that his own uncle would gladly do that to him. But at least Uncle Vernon wasn't his blood. He was just an uncle by marriage.
Dudley, however . . . Dudley was different. In more ways than one, now.
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Harry had finally made his way through Hermione's notes for Charms and Transfiguration. He was just bundling them up, along with the letters he'd written in the past three days, when he heard Snape and Remus talking downstairs. A peculiar sort of nervousness washed over him, similar to what he'd felt last year when he'd had to go to Potions after that horrible Occlumency session, the one during which he'd seen pieces of Snape's past. Similar, but somehow even worse. Back then, he'd trampled his professor's privacy, which was bad enough. But this time, he felt as though he'd done worse: he'd betrayed a friendship.