'Maybe if I- no, that wouldn't work, what about- no that wouldn't work either. Hmm, maybe if I… ha! That'll work. Now to convince the elves I fixed the problem.' Harry closed his notebook and stretched. Then blinked and looked around him. 'Er- where am I? Oh well, looks like more exploring for me. Again. I have got to stop doing this.' He muttered.

'Talking to yourself Mr. Potter? How touching.' Harry jumped and whirled around, his wand appearing in his hand.

'Oh, Professor Snape, it's you. Please don't do that.' Harry sheathed his wand and bent to pick up his notebook, which he had dropped earlier.

'Why are you in front of my private quarters Mr. Potter; when you should be in class?'

'I'm in the dungeons? That explains why I have no idea where I am. And I don't have classes today.'

'Really? Because I know for a fact, that the seventh year Gryffindors have DADA this block.'

Harry stared at him blankly for a moment. 'I don't want to know why you know that. But that's beside the point. I'm getting privately tutored in DADA this year. My tutor owled me this morning and said she couldn't make it.'

'Special treatment Mr. Potter? Why am I not surprised?'

'Actually sir, it was for the safety of the class. I kept overpowering my spells at the beginning of the year. It was putting everyone else at risk, and by the time I had that under control, I was way ahead of everyone else. I have to use a large amount of my magic every day, or I'll have the same problem again.'

'And if you don't have your DADA class, what do you normally do?'

'I either bake something, or I duel Professor Flitwick, but he's got classes all day, and the elves won't let me back into the kitchen until I figure out why the recipe I was making last time exploded.'

'So you have no way to expel your magic today.'

'Actually, I just fixed the recipe. It shouldn't explode this time.'

'I'm surprised anyone would let you near a stove with how you're always exploding the cauldrons in my class.'

'I've been cooking since I was three professor, I just don't understand potions, or why you need to stir them certain ways or why you need to add the ingredients the way you do.'

Snape looked thoughtful for a moment. 'Since you were three?'

'Yes, what has that got to do with anything?'

'It has everything to do with your problems during potions. Come, I need to see how you cook. I might be able to fix your problem.' He turned and walked to the stretch of wall Harry had previously been sitting against. He leant close to the wall and whispered something to it, then turned to Harry. 'Well Potter, are you coming in or not?' He then turned and vanished, leaving Harry to scramble in behind him.

'Er, exactly how long were you watching me professor?' Harry asked tentatively.

'Long enough to know you keep a diary.'

'I don't keep a diary sir.'

'Than what would you call that, Mr. Potter?' Snape asked, pointing to the notebook clutched in Harry's arms. 'Take your shoes off. I won't have you tracking dirt through my quarters.'

'It's a recipe journal.' Harry answered as he kicked off his trainers. 'It's where I keep my recipe ideas. It's not unlike a potions journal, these just taste good.'

'Potions can taste good as well Potter. I just don't see the point in making them do so. People like you would end up in the infirmary more often.'

'You do know that more than half the time I spend in there is 'cause your Slytherins curse me from behind, right? Where's your kitchen?'

'Through here. And don't blame your stupidity on my Slytherins.'

'Ask Madam Pomfrey then. Ron and Hermione are never around when it happens, and the curses always come from behind me. Though, if you don't mind my saying, they can be pretty stupid, they actually talk while cursing me, and in doing so name the people who cursed me.' Harry rummaged around in Snape's' cupboards. 'Do you have anything edible in here?' The cupboards were filled with potions ingredients.

'I believe there's a bezoar in there somewhere.' Snape answered amused.

'Not funny. How am I supposed to cook something for you, if there isn't anything to cook?'

Snape gave him a blank look then placed a silencing ward between them and called a house-elf. He spoke to briefly, then it popped out. Snape removed the silencing ward. 'I want to see if you can identify what you'll be making by the ingredients.'

'Depends on what you're making me make, but if you're having me bake something; then there'll be no problem.' The elf popped in, laid the ingredients out in front of Harry and popped back out. Harry stared at the ingredients, then at Snape. 'You want me to make beef stew?' he asked incredulously.

'Yes. It has a lot of the different motions you need to make for potions making in it. Now start making it.'

Harry rolled his eyes and called another elf to him. He whispered in its ear, and listened to the reply, he looked thoughtful for a moment, then answered it. The elf popped away and Harry set to work.

'Do I want to know what you just asked that elf?'

'I don't know, do you?'

'Let me rephrase that, should I know what you asked that elf?'

'Not really, you'll find out soon enough anyway.'

'Stop.' Snape barked suddenly, standing up from the table where he had been watching Harry chop his potatoes. Harry looked up startled.

'Why?'

'You're chopping is sloppy. Make them even pieces.'

'Alright, but why?'

'Different sizes in chopped potions ingredients means they'll react slower or quicker than other ingredients, which would explain how you managed to mess up the potions that even Longbottom managed to make successfully.'

'So because the chopped bits weren't the same size, the properties were released at different times, and therefore reacted at the wrong time?'

'Essentially, yes. Stirring is the same; stir clockwise, certain properties are released or encouraged to react; stir counterclockwise and other properties are encouraged to release or react. It has to do with the magic you release while stirring the potion one way or another.'

'Er- we're supposed to release our magic while making potions?' Harry asked, slightly sheepish.

Snape gave him an assessing look. 'Yes. You've been holding back your magic haven't you?' Harry nodded.

'So did Neville, although, I'm not entirely certain he did it on purpose.'

'With the amount of magic you have that might actually have been a good thing. Too much magic will cause larger explosions when you screw up, or when the potion is at an extremely volatile state. With you, just release a small trickle of magic, if you can control it that much.'

'I can. It was one of the first exercises my tutor made me go through when we started. Was ever so glad we were in the room of requirements when I cast the first spell.'

'Why is that?'

'The first attempt increased the amount of magic I was channeling, instead of decreasing it; turned the target to dust. The next attempt nearly blew up the wall.' Harry admitted sheepishly, rubbing the back of his head. 'It's a good thing the room takes any spells that aren't meant to hit the wall and puts the power into the wards.'

'That would explain why the wards have been a lot stronger this year.'

Harry frowned at that. 'From the small amounts of magic I've had hit the walls there shouldn't have been a noticeable increase in the power of the wards, not unless they were on the verge of falling, and Dumbledore should have noticed that when he powered the ward stone at the beginning of the year.'

'Albus doesn't know where the ward stone is, none of the past five headmasters knew where the stone was.'

'Really? I know where it is, I've visited it several times. There's always a small boost in the power of the wards at the beginning of the year. I always thought it was because Dumbledore powered the stone at the beginning of the year as it is his main start of term job. I guess it was the students returning that power the stone. It would explain why all the students are tired at the end of the first day feast, when we aren't at the end of the train ride home. The castle's been sucking power from the students to keep the wards going, only there have been less students attending each year, so she can't suck enough power to keep them up anymore.'

'You're going to have to show Albus where the stone is.' Snape said worriedly.

'I can't. I can't even mention it to him, I've tried; several times. All I end up saying is some strange psycho-babble that I had to take classes to understand.'

'Then you'll have to go and power the wards. And why can you tell me about the stone, but not the headmaster?'

'Maybe the castle likes you? I know she's not overly fond of the headmaster.'

'What do you mean?'

'All that psycho-babble I was talking about earlier? Yeah, that was the castle venting her opinion of the headmaster to him. And I know he understood her, because he always looked mildly miffed when she gave me my voice back. There, this good? I can leave Dobby to look after it while we go to the ward stone.'

'Why am I coming with you? There's next to no chance of you being able to show me where it is, even if you could tell me.'

'I have a feeling she'll let me take you at least once, and if we're doing this; I'm most likely going to need help back up, I have a feeling she'll be taking as much of my magic as she can when I do this, and that will most likely leave me too weak to walk; if not unconscious.'

'All right, call your elf and we'll go, it's a good thing you don't have any classes tomorrow isn't it, even you will probably need a few days to recover from being drained nearly dry.'

'We'll see won't we professor?' After pulling his shoes on and giving Dobby instructions to turn off the stove and remove the pot to the cooling rack when it was done, he headed out the door and to the left, the promptly closed his eyes and kept walking.

'Potter, what are you doing?'

'Letting Hogwarts guide me.'

'What do you mean 'letting her guide you'?'

'Hogwarts has a thread of her magic attached to my core, it's how she communicates with people. All the heirs have one, and their soul mates, though the soul mates won't be able to communicate with her until they have bonded with their soul mate.'

'If she's got a thread attached to you, can't she pull the magic from your core without us going to the stone?'

'Nope, it's for communication purposes only, and even then, it's only fully activated once we reach our majority. Actually, she says she could;' Harry cocked his head to the side as if listening. 'But in doing so it would kill us, therefore she would rather not.'

'So she could kill the Dark Lord?' Snape asked as Harry pricked each finger with a knife Snape had not realized Harry had on him.

'Only if he were inside her, but she says she won't involve herself in our wars. Oh, look; we're here!' Harry said cheerfully. As he reached his bloody hand towards the stone he cheekily added. 'Besides, of all the ways he could die, I think Grandfather would appreciate death by castle the least.'

Before Snape could react Harry's hand made contact with the stone and he stiffened. There was an overly bright flash of purple light, and he crumpled to the floor, Snape barely managed to catch his head before it hit the floor. Just as Snape settled on the floor next to Harry to wait for him to wake up, a white light shot out of the stone and struck the both of them in the chest, the last thing Snape saw was a pillow appearing right before his head hit it instead of the ground; then he blacked out.

When Snape came to a few minutes - or was it hours? - later, Harry was still out of it.

He glared at the stone, then shoved the pillow the castle had conjured for him under Harry's head. He pulled out his wand to summon a blanket, then glanced at the ward stone and put it away; he covered Harry with his cloak instead.

It was an hour later that Harry began to stir, and half an hour after that until he woke up.

'Well it's about time you woke up Potter, Albus is sure to be looking for us by now, seeing as the ward stone knocked me out and I didn't cancel my last class. I should have made you wait until after my last class to do this.' Snape grumbled as he held out his hand to pull Harry to his feet.

Harry grinned up at him as he took Snape's hand. 'Well then, my quota of chaos has been completed then. Grandfather will be pleased.'

Snape frowned. 'About that Potter, what, exactly, did you mean when you referred to the Dark Lord as 'Grandfather'?'

'Well, I went to Gringotts before my birthday, and they found so many blocks and other stuff on me, that they took them off and did a test to see if I had any living relatives. Turns out Mum was adopted, and Tom Riddle was her biological father. When I confronted him about it, he'd had no idea that he'd had a child. But he was happy that he had a reason to stop trying to kill me. It's impossible for two heirs of Slytherin to kill one another. Of course, he didn't recognize females as heirs, so it's quite possible for an heir to kill their sister or daughter.' Harry explained. 'Or even their mother, if she was the descendant.' He added frowning.

'What if one descendant had done another a great wrong?'

'I think there are ritual words we can say that would enable us to kill the one who had done us the wrong, but magic has to judge it and there are consequences of attempting it when the wrong was not great enough. And they have to be said within a certain amount of time or magic forgives the wrong.'

'And if the one wronged wishes to forgive the one who wronged them?'

'Another ritual, one I did with Grandfather, as I was not of age to use either ritual when he committed the wrong; magic waited until I had my majority to start the countdown. The odd thing is we don't know either ritual until it is needed, and we forget the words after speaking them, but anyone who witnesses them remembers the words. Hence the punishment for speaking the one when not needed.'

'Ah. Now, seeing as you speak with the castle, perhaps you can ask her why she attacked me?'

Harry cocked his head for a moment. 'She hasn't attacked you, she bound you to me because she took a bit more magic than she had planned and needed your magic reserves to stop me from falling into a coma. And... Er... apparently you're my soul mate.'

Snape fainted.