Harry Potter was a small child, even for an almost five-year-old. Years of being denied food and increasingly rigorous chores would do that to a child. His Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon loathed him, and they made this fact known as often as they could - be it name calling or even smacking his hands with the burning pans while Petunia cooked. They never denied how much they resented the day he darkened their doorstep with his freakishness on that cold autumn night.

So the morning of his fifth birthday, he was shocked to say the least, when he rolled over on his small cot in the cupboard under the stairs and felt something digging into his rather boney side. He reared up, quickly shoving his glasses onto his face, fear coursing through his body at what it could have been but fell still in shock not a moment after he laid eyes on the thing.

There, before him, was a present.

A present.

For him.

He poked at it, wondering if this was some horrible joke done by the Dursley's, but he quickly threw that thought away as he hadn't felt the door open, nor the heavy thump-thump of his family coming down the stairs. He poked it a few more times, eyes showing his growing curiosity as nothing bad seemed to happen.

He glanced around, paranoid for this brief moment in time, before quickly reaching for the present. The item felt hard, almost rock-like, but it wasn't very heavy in his hand. The wrapping paper had little lightning bolts flitting around, a greenish glow emanating from behind them every few seconds. There was even a little tag attached, dangling off to the side.

He pulled the present closer to his body, leaning over it as if to protect it from being snatched away. Glancing at the little tag, he read:

To: My Darling Little Master
From: Your Servant

Harry stared, eyebrows scrunched together as he reread the tag over and over again. He wasn't quite sure what a couple of the words meant, but he did know that the person who'd left the present had called him something nice.

Or at least, he thought they did... He'd heard Aunt Petunia call her son her "darling little Duddikins" a few times so it"d probably be safe to assume.

Carefully, he turned the present over, finding a little strip of tape holding the wrapping closed. Slowly, and with the utmost care a newly five-year-old could manage, he peeled back the tape, sticking it to the dingy sheet on his bed for a moment, and then he upended the little gift on his right hand.

He looked at his gift in confusion, wondering who would get him a rock. It was a nice rock, don't get him wrong, red and pulsing in his hand, but a rock none the less.

Rolling it over a few times to get a full look, he smiled before hiding it in a corner of his little cupboard, hoping the Dursley's never found it.