The Dursleys had left for Majorca three days ago, and the house still held the fossilised silence of their absence — no television, no clattering plates, no Uncle Vernon barking about the news.

The table was covered in old newspapers. The Daily Prophet, mostly. Harry had been reading the same article for twenty minutes without taking in a word.

Harry folded the newspaper in half, then in half again, until the headline — HE-WHO-MUST-NOT-BE-NAMED RETURNED: MINISTRY VOWS REFORM — was nothing but creased paper.

His birthday was tomorrow.

The thought sat in the room like a lit candle. Small, steady, impossible to ignore.