Stealing the Stars

Three weeks out from the destruction of Wizarding Britain found him in France, with a travel guide and a backpack containing his few possessions. His father's invisibility cloak, Sirius' broken mirror, some of the better Muggle clothes he'd bought since leaving England, and his wand.

He'd left England without a backwards glance, hating himself all the while for a coward.

"I can't stay here," he'd informed Hermione's comatose and still badly burned body at St. Mungo's. The Healers were doing all they could for her, but she - and the rest of the survivors of Hogwarts and Hogsmeade - had been poisoned by the Dark magic. Only Harry's distance from the school and timely avoidance of the shockwave had preserved him.

St. Mungo's was overwhelmed with the dying and injured; the Ministry had been destroyed similarly, much as he'd expected it to be, utterly flattened - everyone within it had been crushed to dust and ash. The Wizarding world was in chaos even the Muggles knew something was afoot, and he'd seen first hand Voldemort's power. He couldn't stay here - couldn't fight against strength like that, not without Ron and Hermione. The people were gathering, however, and wanted a reliable leader, one they knew they could count on.

They were calling for Harry Potter, Boy Hero.

Harry snuck into the remains of Gringotts - nearly the only building still standing in the aftermath of the attack on Diagon Alley - and converted fifty percent of what was in his vault to Muggle money. He bought the first, cheapest ticket he could find on the first, fastest plane out of England, which was how he found himself on the Continent - Paris, France to be exact. He stopped a passing Muggle on the street, and flipped through his guide book to find the appropriate page. He was fairly certain he mangled his attempt to ask for the bus.

"Est-ce que, vous m'excusez pourriez me dire comment trouver la gare routière la plus proche?"

"Certainement. C'est allumé trois blocs en bas de la route, et puis gauche -- parlez-vous français? English?"

"Oui, English," Harry said, looking relieved. "Je ne parle pas français." It was the first thing he'd learned to say without copying from his book.

"Of course, I can tell you. Be walking about three roads down there, and make a left at the fourth road. Begin walking for five roads." His voice was so heavily accented that Harry had a hard time keeping up with his words. "At five roads, you find train station, and at six is stop for bus. Pleasant trip, young man!" The Muggle waved cheerily, and continued on his way.

Harry counted roads under his breath until he found the bus station. Stepping inside, he smiled thinly at the woman behind the counter. "Bonjour, parlez-vous anglais? Je ne parle pas français."

She gave him an amused smile. "Oui, I speak English." Her accent was much more tolerable than the other man's had been. "What may I help you with today?"

"Thank you," Harry breathed. Getting out of the airport without the guide book had been sheer hell, and he'd turned around, walked right back through the doors, and bought the book out of the nearest gift shop. "I need the cheapest fare to - " He looked up at the cities they'd take him to. "Stuttgart, Germany." It was the farthest East they'd go, and from there he'd be able to take a plane somewhere else. At least German was closer to English.

"You are in luck, Monsieur. We have a bus departing tonight at seven o'clock bound for Stuttgart. Here is your ticket."

He paid the money and took the ticket, before wandering outside. His stomach grumbled uncomfortably, and he realised he was hungry. A quick scan of the area brought him a McDonald's, a Muggle restaurant he'd never gotten a taste for, but he was hungry.

Walking away from the building a short time later, he was feeling faintly nauseous and vowed to never touch another McDonald's again so long as he lived.

A check of the clock told him it was only five thirty, and he had another hour and a half's wait for his bus to depart. This made him anxious; he needed to be further away before they decided that he was close enough to track down and kill - or before he lost his nerve.

Suddenly remembering what was waiting for him in England, he stiffened his resolve to never return. It didn't matter where he went, or where he ended up; he'd be safe from Voldemort so long as he had a few large countries and possibly even a body of water or two between them.

Thinking on where he would go, and what he would do - never about what had happened, or who he'd lost - took him straight up to six thirty, and the bus was calling for boarding. He was the only person departing from that station, and the bus was relatively empty to start; he correctly assumed that they would be picking up other passengers along their trip.

They stopped seven times from Paris, France to Stuttgart Germany, and people got on and off, and Harry had to switch buses once, but when he made it, he breathed a sigh of relief. Nothing had swooped from the sky to kill him, or accuse him, and no masked Death Eaters were waiting as he stepped from the muggle transport. After so long as a Wizard - with brooms, flooing, and Apparation all viable means of transport - it was strange to be back in Muggle devices and yet, at the same time he realised, a welcome change. Thinking of the Floo, he thought of Hermione shouting through it at him for some last minute supplies in Diagon Alley.

This reminded him of Ron, and Hermione herself, and his eyes began welling up with tears again, and he was meant to escape this, not bring it with him.

The airport he found was small, and closed for the night when he arrived, but Harry was patient. He found himself a hotel room nearby, and bought another language guide. He almost threw away the French guide, and then decided last minute to dig it from the garbage bin and keep it as a memento of his blissfully short stay in France.


-o0o-

"Entschuldigen Sie mich, ich möchte eine flache Karte zum Bucharest, Romania kaufen," he read out of the booklet at the man behind the counter. He had blonde hair, and pale blue eyes, and for a moment Harry had to do a double take to reassure himself it wasn't Malfoy.

"Selbstverständlich. Das Flugzeug geht nicht bis den Morgen, aber ist hier Ihre Karte." The man handed him a small piece of paper, and Harry gazed at it a few moments, before thanking him.

"Danke," he said, waving as he wandered off, his nose already stuck into the book as he tried to decipher what the man had told him.

"Bitte," the man called back, a smile on his face as he watched Harry go.

The time until he set off for Romania passed by in a blur of strange faces and strong drink. Harry was hung over on the plane, and spent most of the trip trying not to be ill. By the time he landed, jet lag was catching up with him, and he got the cheapest hotel room he could find, and still felt like they'd swindled him out of more money than they had any right swindling, but he was too tired to care.

He slept while his body adjusted to the time change. When he awoke nearly two days later, he realized that his life just plain sucked and there were no two ways around it.

Here he was, in Romania, with little more than the clothes on his back. He had more than enough money to get him by, but he wanted more than getting by. He hadn't given thought to his life away from England, but now that he'd achieved it, he wanted to maintain it.

He was never sure later what made the decision that he'd stay in Romania, but just a week later he was glad of it. Remembering his early hero, Charlie Weasley, he fell in with the Magical community, and the first time he introduced himself to the shopkeeper, he'd shoved his hair back from his forehead, and introduced himself as James Evans. The Romanian witch behind the counter simply smiled at him, and inquired after his health.

The first few months in Romania passed in a blur. Most of the decisions seemed to make themselves without his brain being an active participant in the choices, but as nothing had gone wrong yet, he felt comfortable, and settled in. He'd gotten a job with the old woman he'd first met, who called him Jamie and looked after him as though he were her own son. Harry adored her, and as he mangled her name every time he tried to pronounce it, called her Rose.

"Jamie, m'boy, get out here," she called to him. Harry walked out into the front of the store to help her, pausing to plant a kiss on her cheek as he passed. She'd been teaching him to speak Romanian, and often they went days without speaking any English at all.

"Hello, may I help you?" Harry asked, and the customer turned, blinking in clear surprise. It took Harry a few moments to recognize the man; it had been months since he'd seen him last. And it was just Harry's bad luck that his former Potions professor would turn up in the Romanian Potions ingredients shop he worked at.