Fawkes

'Remember, remember, the fifth of November

Gunpowder, treason and plot.'

The sound of giddy schoolchildren drifted in through the window. They were chanting and singing, enjoying their morning. For those children, there were no classes on a Sunday. Harry missed being that young and carefree. Recently, all of his waking hours had been filled with N.E.W.T level classes, homework, and private lessons. The private sessions were the worst. Animagus transformation with McGonagall, which seemed to get harder every time he tried it. 'History of Voldemort' with the Headteacher, arguably the most depressing subject possible because Dumbledore was always describing new obstacles that faced any potential vanquisher. Advanced combative magic, with Tonks and Shacklebolt, which always left Harry bruised and disheartened.

Right now however, Harry would have given anything to be in one of those classes. He was currently studying 'Dark Mind Techniques' with Professor Snape. He was also currently lying flat on his back, a position which he had grown accustomed to, since he started learning Legilimency.

'No, no, no! Honestly Potter, you are the most pig-headed student it has ever been my extreme misfortune to meet. Listen to my instructions, and alter your technique.'

'I'm trying.'

'In that case, your lack of subtlety continues to astound me. Your attacks on my mind are as an elephant trying to stamp on a fly. You will continue to hurt yourself if you do not control your emotions.'

'I just can't break through your Occlumency shields.'

'I am no longer using Occlumency shields. I have discovered that protecting my mind is painfully redundant. Now stand up, clear your mind of emotion, and try again.'

Harry eased himself to his feet, and faced up to his hated Potions professor. He locked eyes with the man and tried to clear his mind. Years of pent up frustration made it almost impossible, but he had been taught some techniques that helped. Relaxing his breathing and closing his eyes, he began the process for the eighth time today. Harry imagined his own mind creeping forwards, away from his body to surround his teacher, but not trying to infiltrate yet. This part was second nature now, it was the second stage that seemed impossible. Harry's mental projection delicately reached towards Professor Snape's head. Tendrils of thought brushed the surface of his teachers mind. It seemed to be working. Harry couldn't detect any memories yet, but he was still on his feet, a welcome development. Worried that Snape would try to erect his Occlumency barriers, Harry pushed a little harder. He felt a faint trace of hostility and resentment, which was enough to make him lose his concentration. His thoughts rushed forwards haphazardly, collided with Snape's unyielding mind and raced back towards their source. Harry ended up on his back again.

'Better.'

'What?' asked Harry, feeling certain that he had not progressed at all.

'Your feelings were kept under control. That is a step forwards. The trouble came when you felt my feelings. You must learn to control your response to external thoughts. You will never penetrate the mind of another by focused emotion, whether your target knows Occlumency or not. You need to practice before I see you again.'

'Practice how?'

'Your mind, Mr. Potter, remains as blunt as ever. To practice Legilimency, you must Legilimence. Start by practicing the technique on inanimate objects. When you feel that you are able to control the mental projection, you may begin to test it on animals. The emotions they provide should prove challenging enough.'

'What about humans?'

'Potter, have you been ignoring everything I have ever taught you! Legilimency is a Dark Art. Detection would mean a prison sentence! With Azkaban as weak as it is now, we might as well hand you to the Dark Lord.'

'Oh yeah,' mumbled Harry bashfully.

'Now leave me in peace. I have lessons to prepare and work to grade. I believe I am marking my sixth year class assignment on Felix Felicis next. I assume that you included the five characteristic signs of overdose in your report.'

Harry groaned, and Snape smirked evilly.

'Disappointing. Your marks in my class this year wouldn't seem to justify your O.W.L. grade, would they?'

Harry left the room without answering, worried that any further time in his Professor's presence would result in violence.

- HPHPHP -

For the rest of the morning, Harry forgot about Professor Snape's advice, as usual. There was far too much to worry about. Harry had left a homework assignment on Conjuration a little late, it was due in on Monday morning, so he spent an hour completing that. Then he had an Animagus class with Professor McGonagall, who seemed to have been taking motivation lessons from Snape recently.

'Honestly Mr. Potter. I am beginning to think that we have overestimated you. I would have expected at least some sign of transformation by this stage.'

'What about last week?'

'Harry, only you could consider that a success.'

'I transformed without a wand, didn't I?'

'Yes, but into a tea-cosy. Impressive as far as accidental magic goes, but not especially useful. There is little evidence to suggest that You-Know-Who is afraid of knitwear.'

Harry laughed.

'Laugh all you want. In the heat of the final battle, whoever tries to reverse your mistake could be injured or even killed.'

'I won't change unless I'm sure I can manage it!'

'You might have no choice. At the end of the day, you'll need every weapon in your arsenal. You have to concentrate. I know how much work you have, but we are just trying to keep you alive.'

'You're just trying to make me kill Voldemort for you,' muttered Harry.

'Well, believe that if you want to. If you don't kill him, he'll kill you, so doesn't it amount to the same thing?'

'No,' said Harry simply, 'if why we do things isn't important, then what we do isn't important either. I'm not fighting him because he wants me dead. I'm fighting him because of everything else.'

Professor McGonagall looked stunned. She had her mouth half open, and didn't seem to know where to focus her gaze. Eventually she snapped out of the trance.

'You've been spending more time with Albus than I realised.'

She became a lot more cheerful after that, and although Harry didn't manage to make any form of transformation, her good mood was infectious. By the end of the lesson Harry had convinced himself that he was at least getting closer.

- HPHPHP -

At lunch time, all the conversation on the Gryffindor table was about the big event Dumbledore had arranged for the evening. It was a first for Hogwarts, a Bonfire Night party. Wizards didn't traditionally celebrate this particular holiday, due to its Muggle origins, so the purebloods were mostly even more curious than the rest. There were just the odd few who felt that non-magical holidays were beneath them, or as Theodore Nott had put it:

'Celebrating revolting Muggle traditions is a disgrace to the wizarding community.'

Still, once Nott had learned the nature of this festivity, he had put aside his reservations and embraced the holiday as keenly as one of his own.

Each house was to build their own 'Guy Fawkes', a reference to the Muggle anarchist, that would be judged as it was burned at the stake. Due to his extensive private tuition, Harry had been banned from taking part, although he had already seen the Gryffindor 'Guy', a huge wooden and fabric phoenix. Ron and Hermione had been overseeing the project, and they reckoned that just after the model was burnt, a large phoenix shaped firework would rise from the ashes.

Harry thought that this plan was very dangerous. It was a nice idea, and it might work - after all, Hermione was very clever and Ron definitely wasn't an idiot. On the other hand, the pair of them had been arguing non-stop since they'd begun to work together. A tiny oversight, and the 'firework' would actually be nothing more (or less) than a huge explosion. No doubt Dumbledore would not allow any student to come to harm, but explosive failure would be mortally embarrassing, especially for Ron, who seemed to be relishing his opportunity to step out from Harry's shadow.

Harry had hinted that maybe they should try something a little simpler, but their competitive instincts had kicked in. Despite their best efforts, reconnaissance missions to the other houses had brought them no information. There was no way that Ron would settle for anything less than spectacular, whilst he knew nothing about the other competition entries. Hermione on the other hand, seemed to take Harry's suggestions personally. She had stormed off, ranting about how he had never doubted her abilities before, and how all of his newfound skills were inflating his ego.

Tensions between the three were running high, and Harry dearly hoped that the Gryffindor entry won, because otherwise he could see a few rough months ahead.

- HPHPHP -

The afternoon defence class with Tonks and Shacklebolt that Harry had been expecting was cancelled. The pair of them, being Aurors, were often called into the Ministry, so this wasn't an unusual occurrence. Harry often had to fit these lessons in at strange times. He didn't envy the shifts that Aurors had to work, the job was even beginning to take its toll on the ever-enthusiastic Tonks. In fact, spending so much time in the presence of tired and stressed Aurors was making him reconsider his own career choices.

If only Voldemort wasn't around, Harry would have been much happier to go off and play Quidditch professionally, or maybe even stay to teach at Hogwarts.

'It doesn't look like that's on the cards though, does it?' he thought ruefully to himself as he wandered aimlessly towards the lake.

For a November day in Scotland, the weather was remarkably bright. Okay, so the wind was freezing as it buffeted against Harry's face, and he could barely feel his toes, but there were no clouds in the sky. Professor Trelawney had apparently made a prediction in Luna's divination class yesterday.

'A storm from the east will disrupt the celebrations.'

Harry happily noted that her skill with a crystal ball didn't seem to be improving, if her weather forecasting was less accurate than the Muggle technique.

It was as Harry reached the side of the lake, that he recalled Snape's morning lesson. He was continually being told to practice Legilimency, and he always made consenting noises, but the truth was, he barely even thought about 'Dark Mind Techniques' from one week to the next. He had never succeeded at anything in the lessons. Occlumency continued to stump him, but Snape had refused to teach him that subject any more, claiming that it would always elude Harry. After Harry had mastered the art of Legilimency, he was supposed to be moving onto the Imperius curse. Secretly he thought that this might be the cause of his difficulties, maybe he was subconsciously trying to delay learning an Unforgivable curse.

Well, maybe it was time to take his destiny into his own hands. He couldn't expect to be handed everything he needed on a silver platter. If Snape's lessons were the hardest for him, they were the lessons he ought to be practising for.

Hagrid had built a scarecrow down on the waterfront, to protect his Halloween pumpkins, and he hadn't gotten round to taking it down yet. It wasn't exactly the most realistic mannequin that Harry had ever seen, because Hagrid seemed to think that the more limbs something had, the better. Also, the animation charm had begun to wear off - so rather than shaking when birds came near, now it just twitched at random intervals. Nevertheless, it was the ideal subject for Legilimency practice.

Harry stood in front of it, and stared into the grotesque face, hacked out of a single plank of wood. Hagrid was clearly none too skilled with a chisel. He tried to clear his mind, but the lapping of water on the lakeside was distracting. There were more noises outside than in Snape's office. Harry began to work through breathing exercises, but he was distracted again when the sun disappeared behind a cloud. In the dimmer light, the scarecrow was oddly reminiscent of Mad-Eye Moody - except with a few spare arms.

He chided himself under his breath: 'Focus.' Rather than fighting against the sounds from the lake, he tried to measure his breathing to match the rhythm of the waves breaking. In, splash, and out, splash. In, splash, and out, splash. Gradually, the noise became less and less noticeable, until it seemed to be nothing more than an echo of his breathing.

A tendril of thought crept from Harry's head towards the scarecrow. It was an unusual sensation, not something easily describable, and as such, it had taken Harry more than three months of Snape's biting insults before he had even worked out what he was supposed to be doing. It was as though some of Harry's thought processes were happening at a point somewhere between the scarecrow and his own body, whilst others continued to happen within his head. He had made some progress with this part of the procedure. He could always produce the thought tendrils now, given sufficient time to clear his mind. The problem always came when the tendrils approached Professor Snape. Remaining totally emotionless was not something that Harry was capable of, once his thoughts had made contact with the Potions' Master. Even without feeling any of the man's thoughts, the mere fact of the closeness was enough to unbalance Harry's mind, and the slightest distraction caused the thought tendrils to snap back with a physical force borne of magic. But last time…

Last time he had managed to remain calm. He had felt inside his own head, a shadow of the real emotions of another person. Tentatively, Harry threw out a couple of new tendrils to the scarecrow, carefully balancing them in his mind. The lake was still breathing for him, gently acting as an anchor to the real world, a metronome.

Gently, he thought, gently now. The scarecrow twitched and span a little, and the emerging sun caught the metal washers which Hagrid had used for eyes, which glinted. Cautiously, Harry pushed all of his thoughts behind its gruesome visage. The strands of thought met in the centre of the plank, and became one again.

It was the first time that he had ever managed to focus his separate thought strands into one place before. Not that it was a massive achievement, he realised. Projecting his thoughts into an inanimate object was really no more impressive than projecting them into thin air. It proved that it was possible though, so long as Snape wasn't breathing down his neck.

At the thought of Severus Snape, the thought projection faltered slightly, but Harry managed to balance his mind. He had no intention of falling now: he wanted to complete the return to his own mind without incident. Harry didn't really have detailed instructions on how he was supposed to withdraw his projection, but he was working under the assumption that it was essentially the Legilimency procedure in reverse.

Harry was just about to begin a controlled withdrawal when the scarecrow twitched again and he felt a pang of intense and inexplicable fear, mixed with a gnawing hunger. The sudden feelings seemed to clench around his thought tendrils, holding them tight, and then they released.

Harry found himself on his back once more, but as he watched, a mouse revealed itself from behind the faceplate of Hagrid's creation, darted down the sack clothing and disappeared into the night.