Free From the Lies

by Great Ace

Harry, along with his best friend discover the lies that they have been sheltering behind. Not content with the way Dumbledore has been behaving, they seek to add a third side to the war against Voldemort, discovering unlikely allies and creating very different and somewhat unusual study routines along the way. ABANDONED!

1. Chapter 1

Potter Manor Chapter One

"Hermione! You made it!" said the boy.

"Of course I did- what were you expecting?"

"Well, it's really early, the first day of the summer! You're eager."

"You only just realised that?"

"Well- no, I might have realised that you're over-eager the first day on the train, but this is crazy! I'm eager, too, though," confessed the boy.

"So how did you get them, anyway?"

"What, the time turners?"

"Yes!"

"It's really ridiculous; an Unspeakable must have been borrowing then because they were just lying there!"

"Unless you were meant to take them…"

"What?"

"Harry, think about it! Unspeakables aren't just going to drop time turners on the ground when you're right behind them! Though why they would want you to have a pair of them, I don't know…"

"At least this means we don't have to get them by asking Dumbledore to let you join every class again... because then I would have to do that as well, and that's really suspicious!"

"Mmmm… anyway, Harry, are you ready to go?"

"What? Oh, yeah, the twins put a charm on my trunk so I could shrink it whenever I wanted, It's completely packed and in my pocket now."

"Good, we'll have to go to my place first to get you disguised the muggle way and then we can go. For now you'll just have to wear your invisibility cloak."

"Dumbledore has tracking charms on it- well, he did, and the charms are now on the vase in the Dursley's lounge- so okay, let's go!" Harry pulled the cloak out and swung it over him, hiding him from view. He followed Hermione to the car that was parked just around the block and climbed in after her.

"I'm in," he said once he was fully seated and pulled the door shut, "thank you for doing this, Mr. and Mrs. Granger."

"It's no trouble," said the woman- Mrs. Granger, who was seated in the front passenger seat, "what that Dumbledore man is doing to you is despicable!" Mr. Granger just grunted, and she continued.

"Just call us Jean and David, though, Harry."

"Thanks," he said gratefully, and the relatively short car trip passed in comfortable silence. Soon, they were pulling into the Granger's drive and Hermione was pulling the now visible Harry out the door.

"Come on, Harry, I want to get to Diagon Alley as fast as possible," she said, tugging on his arm.

"Hermione, you're regressing to your 11 year old self," he complained, "and Dumbledore might have gotten people to follow us, so I really think it would be smart for me to wear the cloak for now as well!" He said, swinging the cloak back on. Hermione looked faintly embarrassed.

"Sorry for snapping," he said, "I've been feeling strange since Voldemort came back," he shivered at the memory of the tall, skeletal man climbing out of the cauldron a few days back.

"No, I'm sorry, I should have thought of that. Probably could have gotten away with not mentioning your name so loudly, either," she said, her cheeks tinged pink.

"Okay, let's go," said Harry and Hermione looked a little happier.

"It's just lucky that dad kept his clothes from when he was younger," she said happily. Harry followed her up the path and into the large, spacious home that was a far cry from Privet Drive.

"This is really nice," he said off-handedly and Hermione smiled. They walked up the stairs into the bathroom.

"We bought some wash-out hair dye for you," she said, "unfortunately your hair is black so we have to bleach it before we can change the colour. We also need to hide your scar. I've got some hair gel, but I don't know how well it will work with your hair being so untameable," she finished cheekily. Harry suddenly felt nervous and began wishing really hard that he could hide his scar and that his hair was tameable. Soon, he felt a tingling feeling on his scalp and Hermione's small, muffled yelp. He spun around quickly to look in the mirror- his hair was growing… and it was straight. Soon, his hair was down to his shoulders and his fringe was completely covering his scar.

"Harry- you're a metamorphmagus! Why didn't you tell me?"

"What's a metamorphmagus?"

"You can change your appearance at will! They're really rare, hardly anyone becomes one. You should be able to change your looks with it. Try!"

"I don't know what I did, though."

"What were you thinking about when it began changing, then, and what did it feel like?"

"Well- I was thinking about how much I wanted to hide my scar and how my hair was completely untameable and I wanted to fix that- then it felt really tingly on my scalp when it started to work."

"So why don't you try and imagine the tingling feeling on your scalp while you concentrate on, say- red hair."

"Red hair? Okay…" and he began to concentrate on the image Hermione had planted in his head- long, straight red hair like that of Bill Weasley's when it wasn't tied up. After almost 30 seconds of concentration, his hair began to grow even longer and turn a shocking shade of red.

"It worked!" said Hermione excitedly, "this is brilliant! See if you can change anything else. Don't work with you face shape, that might be dangerous as we don't know how it works, but you could try and move your scar or make it disappear completely, maybe change your skin tone to something a little darker and change your eyes to brown or something," said Hermione, reeling off ideas. Harry almost laughed at her enthusiasm- she would get excited about anything she'd read about beforehand. He focused on his scar disappearing, but after over a minute he decided that it really wasn't going to work, so he tried to move it- he concentrated on 'feeling' it slide downwards and onto his chest, and to his relief, it worked.

"Hermione, I moved the scar," he said, before turning back to what he was doing. His eyes were too noticeable, so he decided to go with Hermione's suggestion of brown. It worked, and his speed was slowly increasing- it was starting to take him less time to focus on the magic. Last, he decided to go with Hermione's suggestion again and he began to change his skin tone- darker until it looked as though he had spent a year living on the equator with a dark tan. He smiled.

"Now it's your turn, Hermione! People recognise you as well, and seeing as we don't need to disguise me with these products, we can do you!" he said happily.

"What? That's not fair! Oh, fine, have it your way," she grumbled, but Harry could tell that she was secretly amused.

"You'll have to bleach it first as the red is a little too shocking to work with the brown hair." Harry watched as Hermione worked silently, bleaching her hair a really light brown.

"Done," she said finally, before turning to the hair dye. "If this doesn't work as well as it should, you are in big trouble," she threatened.

"Hey, Hermione, do you have a hair tie?"

"Yeah, in the top drawer," she said absently, focused on the red hair product.

"Thanks, I'm going for the Bill Weasley look and tying it up," he said before opening the draw and attempting to find a tie that was just plain black! It was far too difficult for his liking.

Very soon, Hermione was getting a hair dryer out of the cupboard behind him.

"Need to dry the hair for the dye to work, that's why it would have been better to use it on you," she grumbled, "your hair would have dried faster."

"Hermione, just dry it until it's damp, and then I have an idea," said Harry.

"Okay," she said sceptically, "as long as it's not bad," she said, watching Harry pluck spare elastics threateningly.

"Oh, it's not," he said, "where did you say that hair gel was, anyway?" Hermione shivered.

"Right, it's still damp, so let's do this. Got the idea from Seamus, he spends too much time around his older sister," he said absently, pulling her hair into a tight pony tail.

"Seamus has a sister?"

"Hn, she's older- a squib."

"I didn't know that," said Hermione, "why doesn't he talk about her?"

"She's a little upset that she didn't make it to Hogwarts and so she told Seamus that he wasn't allowed to mention her at school- she didn't want anyone to feel sorry for her- or worse, considering people look down on squibs. Anyway, I saw a photo of her in Seamus' trunk last year, so when Ron was ignoring me we spent hours exchanging stories about Jane and Dudley," said Harry, "Can you pass me the hair gel now, please?" he added once the ponytail was tight and neat enough.

"Thanks," he said when it landed in his hand. Harry opened it and poured the gel into his hands before he began to smother the tips of her hair in it.

"Seamus reckons that adding it to the tips weighs it down enough to pull the curls out without making it look like Snape's hair. He also said not to use a hair dryer as it will puff out and look strange."

"What do you talk about in there? Seamus tells you how to get rid of the curls in a girl's hair, that's just ridiculous!"

"Well, actually, he just repeats what Jane says in her sleep and there are plenty of hair-tips in there, she's apparently really girly," said Harry absently, "there, I'm done!" Hermione looked it over. It didn't look as good as her hair from the Yule Ball, and it was still a little wavy, but it was unrecognisable as hers and that was the whole point.

"It's great," she said, "let's go!" Before she bounded out the doorway. Harry followed, bemused. She had way too much energy today.

"Mum, Dad, we've done the hair!" she called. the mentioned people came out into the hallway and stopped in shock at what they saw.

"How one earth did you manage to get Harry's hair like that? And his eyes?"

"Oh, yeah, we realised that Harry has a really cool talent where he can change his appearance at will. He didn't know about it before, but it certainly made things easier," she said, her eyes sparkling as she watched her parent's look of shock.

"Er… right, so… I'll just go get Harry some clothes now," said David, who was the first to come around of the pair.

"Thanks, David," said Harry, trying to hold onto his laugh as the man spun around and headed to his room quite a lot faster than was necessary. Very soon, he was back carrying a small pile of clothing.

"Here, you can have these. I've got some shoes in your size as well," he said, holding them out for Harry to take.

"Thanks," he said.

"Harry, you can get changed in the bathroom. I need to get changed as well and then we can go," she said. Harry nodded and took the pile into the bathroom. He quickly changed and un-shrunk his trunk. He put his old clothes in there and pulled out his moneybag before shrinking it again.

"Ready to go," he said to himself before walking out the door. Harry stood silently in the hallway, waiting for Hermione. When she came out, he offered her the invisibility cloak and got underneath it with her. They followed her parents out the door and to the car. David went around to the Driver's side while Jean opened the back door of the car so that the two of them could get in under the guise of Jean attempting to put a large box in the back. When it 'didn't fit,' she shut the door and dumped it in the boot of the car and they got going on the slightly longer trip to London. Speech, however, was entirely unnecessary as the two Dentists seemed to enjoy turning the music up really loud and just listening to it. The cringe on Hermione's face told Harry everything he needed to know about her ideas on the topic.

"Gringotts first," said Harry as the two of them walked down the alley, completely unrecognisable. Unfortunately, it was not as simple as that. It took a lot of discussion, persuasion, arguments, a blood test and Harry to briefly change to his normal self to let them into the Potter family vault. There, they picked up a 'library' trunk which was similar to a normal trunk except it held a lot more than one and had a second compartment for storing books. They also picked up a portkey ring to Potter Manor before they left the bank- and a moneybag with a lot of galleons was picked up as well.

"Flourish and Blotts, Harry!" said Hermione excitedly. Harry rolled his eyes but was inwardly pleased. He enjoyed reading as well- not as much as Hermione, but the bookstore was still a good place to go in his opinions, and he was sick of hiding his love of reading for Ron's sake.

"Fine, let's go there," he said, "Hermione; you're in charge of history books and books on any other forms of obscure magic- things that aren't taught at Hogwarts. I'll get the things that are, and Defensive books." Hermione nodded, and ran off to the nearest shelf. Harry rolled his eyes and began looking. He decided to get the Defence books last as he wouldn't be able to get away from them otherwise. He picked up almost every book in each of the sections he tasked himself with, much to Hermione's amusement. There was even a book for Metamorphmagi in the transfiguration section. In Defence, however, he abandoned all pretence and just picked everything up. He joined Hermione and together they took the books up to the counter. When the owner saw how many they were buying, he nearly fainted.

"Look," he said, "If I try to add that all up, you'll be here for a week. How many books do you reckon you have? I'd put it at around 500, myself." The two of them looked at each other and silently agreed.

"So say each book is around 2 galleons, approximately. I know that some are much more than that, but you can call it a bulk-buy discount," he said and Harry grinned before pulling out the thousand galleons. The owner gaped.

"I didn't expect you to actually have the money," he stammered, "have a nice day!" Harry snickered and handed over the money before Hermione helped him to get them all into the trunk and they walked out of there.

"Potion supplies," said Hermione who was reading a short list of everything they had planned to get. Harry nodded and they went systematically through the apothecary buying enough of every ingredient before stocking up on cauldrons, knives, stirrers, burners, scales and everything else Hermione pointed out that they might need- including two belts designed to carry potions and be invisible to all but the wearer, things couldn't be summoned out of it and all phials in it were unbreakable. Harry was impressed.

"We still need robes, muggle clothes, wand holsters and you wanted Quidditch supplies," Hermione said the last in disapproval once they were finished getting potion supplies.

"Hermione, it's not just Quidditch supplies! From what I can gather of the First War- and yes, it's the First War as we are going to be entering the Second War soon- The Death Eaters were skilled in aerial combat! They shut down all other modes of transport do that people were forced to fly everywhere then ambushed them in the sky. The DE knew what they were doing up there and the Light side didn't, so they lost those battles! We need to know how to beat them in the air and you need to get comfortable on a broom, and no- I'm not talking about the sticks they call brooms at Hogwarts. They frighten even me. We are going to practice flying these holidays."

"I- This is really annoying, I know you're right but I want to convince you out of it," she moaned.

"You'll be fine, the flying we learn at school does not make anyone comfortable in the sky- it's as if they don't want anyone to know how to, but that's ridiculous as all of the DE families teach their children to fly… unless Dumbles wants that to happen…" Harry trailed off, leaving Hermione confused but gaining confidence. She wanted to learn to be comfortable in the air.

"Okay, let's get whatever you wanted from the Quidditch store," she said nervously.

"Brilliant," Harry beamed at her, "this is really going to help," he said before dragging her to his favourite store. They browsed around a little, buying everything Harry thought he would need to play Quidditch at home to make them look a little less suspicious before they bought 3 more brooms. A training one for Hermione and two for long-distance flight and put them in the trunk before walking out.

"The training broom will be really useful, Hermione, it won't let you do anything too risky and has auto-pilot if you're getting dangerous. Also won't go too high to get you comfortable in the air," he said. Hermione nodded nervously before pointing out quickly that they still had more to buy. Harry allowed the subject change as he subtly made his eyes and hair change back to their original colour, but theft the hair's length and straightness. Once they entered Madam Malkin's, he slowly changed his skin tone back to what it normally was. Under false names, they managed to each get a full wardrobe of wizarding wear and wand holsters as well- invisible to all but the wearer, only they could remove them and the wand inside was impossible to be summoned. To draw them out, they had to snap their wrist and the wand would fly into their hand. Hermione mentioned entering the muggle world to get clothes from there and Madam Malkin got their attention.

"Do you really want a muggle wardrobe, and know how to dress properly in it?" she asked.

"Yes, I'm muggle-born and Harry was muggle-raised," she said. Madam Malkin's eyebrows rose.

"You can afford a lot considering, as the exchange rate is poor for a reason."

"You mean, the pure bloods don't want Muggleborns to be able to afford anything decent," said Hermione.

"Exactly," she said, "now, I'm Muggleborn as well, though not many know that. I sell muggle clothes, but they have to be hidden to keep the purebloods from dropping out. If you don't tell anyone, I can get you a full wardrobe in muggle clothes as well," she said nervously.

"You could do that?" asked Hermione excitably.

"Certainly," she said.

"Yes please! We need everything, especially Harry as we are planning on burning every article of clothing his relatives have given him," she said. Madam Malkin nodded and set to work. Very soon they were leaving the shop weighed down by two whole wardrobes each.

"I think that was overkill, just a little," said Harry bemusedly.

"Just a little? Could have done with just a quarter of this! We didn't even manage to get Hogwarts robes, either!"

"Yeah, but that's because I think we might be doing a little growing… weren't we going to St. Mungos to get a check before we leave?"

"Oh, yeah, there's a book that mentions an entrance near the shop over there," said Hermione, pointing.

"Cool, let's go," said Harry sarcastically. He knew the check was necessary, but he still wasn't happy about it. Hermione dragged him into the entrance and they walked out into the open reception.

"We'd both like a full magical and physical check," said Hermione to the WelcomeWitch.

"5th floor, beside the Tea Room," she said in a bored voice, and Harry didn't blame her. He didn't have much time to think about that, though, as Hermione was quickly dragging him away towards the stairs. It didn't take all that long to get there, either and Harry was in a daze as Hermione told the healers what they wanted. He followed the instructions, not really noticing anything until they were done and the healers were announcing what was wrong.

"You, boy, are in bad shape. Severe malnourishment is there, to the point that both your magical and physical growth has been stunted, though that can be remedied. You're lacking the necessary vitamins, too, so you will have to stick to this diet," the healer said, handing him a slip of parchment, "you both have heavy blocks on your magic, and Harry has one on the mind as well, preventing you from learning occlumency."

"Occlumency?"

"What do they teach you at school these days? Occlumency is the art of protecting your mind from external penetration. Some people can perform Legilimency which is invading someone's mind and interpreting what they find. There are rumours that Professor Dumbledore can do that, and Professor Snape most certainly can. Occlumency essentially makes it impossible for them to 'read your mind' as some muggleborns put it, though it is not exactly the same as your mind is not a book."

"Are there any books that can teach us how to do this?"

"Not in any common bookstore. There is a rumour going around telling people that it is extremely difficult, though some of us believe that the rumour was started by a Legilimens who didn't want people to learn to protect their minds from them. It's actually incredibly easy, though no one bothers to finds out so only healers have the necessary information… and possibly Unspeakables. I can get you a book if you like, once we are done here," she said.

"Thank you," said Hermione, who had gone pale at the thought of Dumbledore using Legilimency on them and discovering what they knew.

"Right. Hermione," the healers knew their names thanks to patient confidentiality, "you just need the block on your magic removed. Harry, you need potions to reverse the malnutrition, and we need to remove the blocks on your magic and the one preventing you from learning Occlumency. That was probably placed because you are natural at it. We will give you some potions to develop your muscles as well, as they are weak from malnutrition. Well, that or we can reverse it here, but it might be painful to shoot up like that and you will be extremely hungry," she said.

"Uh, can you do it now, please?" asked Harr who preferred to be ready to train right away.

"Certainly, Johns, can I get you to retrieve a large meal from the nutrition room? Thanks." she turned back to them. "I'll start with the magic blocks, Hermione you first."

"Urgh, I can't believe how hungry that made me," complained Harry as they left the hospital an hour later- at least a head taller, and quite clumsy thanks to his new height, though thankfully the healers were able to expand the clothing in his wardrobe to suit it.

"Are you really? You did need the food."

"Hey, Hermione, can you feel your magic pulsing stronger than before? As though it's itching to be used?"

"No- you can feel magic?"

"Well, yeah, can't you?" asked Harry nervously.

"No, I can't. You really are the exception. How's life without glasses?"

"Brilliant! Everything's so clear and the colours are amazing. This is going to make Quidditch so much easier," he said happily.

"You mean you couldn't see properly even with them on?"

"Nope. I was blind as a bat without them, but things were still fuzzy with them on and reading gave me a headache because of it," said Harry softly, "the snitch was incredibly difficult to spot, too, as it was just a little blur of gold that could have been anything."

"You're really incredible, Harry, did you know that?" Hermione shook her head at him, "anyway, are we going to Potter Manor now? I'm really curious and I can't wait to see it. What did the parchment say about it?"

"It's really large, first off. There's a library, potions lab, couple of studies, gymnasium, indoor running track and pool, multiple bedrooms, etcetera- it's a Manor, anyway. Outdoor pool, Quidditch pitch, there's a forest as well. Some house elves are still there and the wards are incredible! It's unplottable, so it can't go onto maps, muggle-repelling, the ministry can't detect magic done there, so no chance of being pulled up for underage magic, tracking charms fizzle out when the pass them, though the tracker thinks it fizzled somewhere else, harmful mail is re-directed, anti-apparition wards and only the ring can be used as a portkey, it's impossible to see through the wards even if you are magical, the Dark Mark is burnt if it attempts to cross, only bound elves can apparate in or out and the list kept going one- needless to say, it is one of the most protected areas in Britain," said Harry and Hermione gaped at him.

"There's more, though, if you are inside the anti-apparition wards, you can still apparate as long as you don't cross them, so we can learn!"

"Remind me why I agreed to learn all the illegal things you're planning," she grumbled.

"Because they might just save our life," snapped Harry.

"I know, I don't like it but I know we need it," she said.

"Sorry."

"That's alright, are we going to portkey now, though?" Her answer was a hook behind her naval, a swirl of colour and the feeling of flying through space before her feet landed on solid ground and they stumbled.

"Master Potter!" cried an elf. Harry looked around, shocked.

"Master is back!" cried the same elf. The consequent explanations took a while. By dinner time, they had had the full tour of the Manor and they were impressed.

"We need to work out our schedule, so we need to know what we want to learn," said Harry.

"Magic," said Hermione, as though it was obvious.

"Yes, but what magic? How? We can't just say magic! I personally know that I want to learn to fight physically as well," he said.

"I don't," Hermione shuddered, "I don't like physical exercise and even the war is not getting me into it," she said.

"I think your attitude will change soon enough, but for now that's fine. I also want to practice duelling, using charms and transfiguration as well as Defensive magic. We also need to learn Offensive and they won't teach us that. Apparition is a must, animagus training as well. Occlumency, maybe learn to make portkeys; I'd like to review everything we've learnt so far as well. Runes and Arithmancy as well."

"I think we need to learn some new languages so that we can communicate with others as well as ourselves without people understanding," said Hermione, "and we need to study past wars and the strategies that each side employed, what worked and didn't work, etcetera. We need to learn Healing magic as well, as we can't go to Madam Pomfrey every time we injure ourselves."

"Agreed," Harry shuddered, "warding as well."

"We should learn things that are in the syllabus for this year no matter if it will be useful or not in the war as it will give us more time at school next year."

"Huh. So, how about we use the turners to keep going back a day. In every 'day,' we spend a day in the study reviewing previous years and when we're done we can move on from there. Another day can be spent in the practice room, learning apparition and portkeys, plus animagus and other magics that we aren't supposed to be learning," said Harry.

"Another day in the library studying tactics and strategies, past wars and the like, you're sure to have more books in there than just the ones bought today. We can learn Occlumency in there as well, and Legilimency too. Languages in the library to add more interest. A day in the duelling room and potions lab, brewing and practicing defence."

"A day outside flying and learning aerial tactics and fighting. Once we've got our animagus forms, that will be useful as well, and I will do an extra day in the gym learning to fight physically. Duelling and flying will get you a little fitter as well, Hermione, but I need to get even more."

"So that's 5 days for me and 6 for you in each day… for you that's a whole year fitted into one summer!"

"That's pretty good. Only problem is sleeping. Maybe a tent outside, a couple of beds in the study and library and just use different bedrooms for the other days," said Harry.

"I think we could use cushioning charms and sleeping bags in the duelling room and the practice room as well, Harry, leaving you a bedroom on your gymnasium day," said Hermione.

"That works as well, though it won't be comfortable. You know that if we get the portkeys to work from here, you could spend a day at your parent's house, don't you?"

"Brilliant, I like it! That way if Dumbledore notices you're missing, I'm not missing with you! Need to learn Occlumency before that, though," she said, "and there is no way you are going to the Dursleys just to keep them from being suspicious, Harry."

"I wasn't planning on it," he said, "I also think that we will need a different elf working on each 'day' to keep them from overworking themselves."

"Good point."

"Yeah, so 6 elves… How about Trixy, Gilly, Trish, Scrat, Blinky and Lolly?" There were 6 pops as the mentioned elves popped into the room at their names. Together, they explained the plan to the elves that were confused but agreed anyway.

"I think we need to work it so that when we move around the manor we don't walk into ourselves, so we start in the Library."

"Alright… do we sleep in there tonight, or in the study which is before it?"

"In the Library, it makes more sense like that. How about we get into a pattern of waking at 5am as well? It's not that much earlier than I usually do, anyway. We move to the next room at 9pm."

"Sounds good, Harry, but we start tomorrow, so we'll just spend the rest of the evening setting up, shall we?"

"Or the elves could do that," said Harry, who had noticed that they were already doing the set up.

The next morning, the two of them woke at 5 thanks to the alarm Hermione had set. It was still dark, but it wouldn't stay that way for long.

"We forgot to think about bathrooms," complained Hermione.

"No we didn't, there's one attached to the Library, it's there, Hermione," said Harry. She blushed and walked over to it while Harry summoned a scrap of parchment and a quill.

5-9 Occlumency/Legilimency

9.30-12.30- Tactics/Strategies

1-4- Languages

4-7- Tactics/Strategies

7-9 Occlumency/Legilimency

When Hermione got back, he showed it to her and she agreed, only pointing out that he forgot about dinner. He blushed and said that they could eat while they worked. She agreed and they began pouring over the Occlumency books.

"It says to 'clear your mind,' said Hermione who was reading one of the Potter books, "but that doesn't make any sense!" she cried, frustrated.

"Hermione, this book is newer and has a different idea," said Harry cautiously, "there is a spell, if you use it on me it would sent me into my mind, where I would organise it and set up barriers. I think it's barely known as it mentions that you wouldn't see it in any other book and it's a technique for healers only, but it would be really secure depending on how well we do it."

"That sounds good," said Hermione who was getting frustrated at the lack of information. "All these books say is that Occlumency helps guard your mind and you can recall things better if you use it, but it doesn't tell you how to! What's the spell?" Harry chuckled.

"What are you going to do while I'm in my mind, seeing as we can't do it at the same time?"

"Probably read about Legilimency, how long does it take?"

"It says 'no longer than two hours,' but that's not very specific. I think it depends on what's in your mind. Well, there's time for me to do it now and you this afternoon," he said.

"Alright, if you're ready now," she said nervously, "we can do it."

"Let's go!" Hermione said the spell and Harry suddenly found himself in a large space with thoughts and memories floating everywhere with no idea where to start. He began to collect the memories when he remembered that it was his mind- meaning he could do anything he wanted! He quickly visualised Potter Library and began to sort all of his memories into books by date and emotion. (Emotion first, date later) meaning the 'Happy' memories were separate from the 'Sad' and 'Frustrated' memories. He placed knowledge separate from the emotions as he was appalled how much his emotions weighed on what he did and didn't learn. That would be a weakness. Once everything was sorted, he imagined 'wards' stopping theft and others from touching the memories. Portkeys and apparition weren't allowed, nor was magic by anyone apart from him. He knew that the 'anti-theft' wards would prevent Obliviate from working. If anyone attempted to breach any of the wards in the Library, they were sent to a secure room which just happened to be the study adjacent to the library, from which they couldn't escape unless he let them out. Harry then walked to the door and put an alarm on it before walking out. Outside, he imagined the grounds at Potter Manor and added some interesting creatures who know that it was their duty to attack trespassers. They would inflict visible injuries on the Legilimens. He then added seven people on brooms equipped with wands ready to attack the same as the creatures. He was interested in aerial fights and he would try it in his mind first. Once again, he added wards so that only he (and the 'people' on brooms) could perform magic and made the Library invisible and added wizard-repelling charms to it, though he keyed himself into them so that he wasn't repelled. Finally, he was confident that no one would get to his memories, so he withdrew.

"Harry, you're back! It's only 7am; we've got 2 more hours of Occlumency. Do you think I can try it out now?"

"Sure," said Harry, who proceeded to place the spell on Hermione. He watched as her eyes glazed over and her face went black before he turned to the book on Legilimency that Hermione had been reading. It was interesting, and Harry was particularly interested in the passive-Legilimency that was mentioned. If he could perfect it, it could be really useful, though he wasn't all that thrilled about the part that mentioned needing direct eye-contact, though he supposed that it was a good thing considering what Dumbledore already did with his skills. Once he finished that book, Harry turned back to the book on Occlumency and was interested in the fact that an organised mind made it easier to remember things and helped with speed-reading. That was when Harry remembered the ward that he had forgotten to put up. Thankfully, it only took Hermione an hour to organise her mind and she put the spell back on him allowing him to re-enter his mind and put up the spells that allowed his mind to automatically sort the memories onto the right shelves so that he didn't have to keep re-entering his mind every night and hope that he hadn't been Obliviated during the day. He then had an idea and added a ward to the 'idea' section of his mind so that no charm, spell or potion could tamper with it. He was now immune to compulsions including the imperius, love potions; even Veritaserum would have no effect other than giving him a glazed look. His ideas would be solely his own. That was when he noticed the spells designed to affect his emotions set by Dumbledore- they had been negated by his ward, but they annoyed him. They had been designed to make his anger and impulsiveness come to the surface, as well as not want to make Ron jealous by learning too much. He shuddered, and left his mind. He just hoped that Dumbledore and Snape hadn't thought to create that ward, and he promptly told Hermione about it.

"That's brilliant!" she said, "I hope I can do it, you have more skill in your mind than I do, but that could be extremely useful especially if it means we can be less than truthful under the influence of Veritaserum. Oh, I hope Dumbledore never had that idea, though he might not have been able to learn this way. Just hope that's true- we got these books thanks to our name, he could have done the same," she said.

"Did you say its breakfast time?"

"Oh, yes, I did."

"Brilliant! Trixy!"

"Yes, Master?"

"Could you please bring us up some breakfast?"

"Of course, Master, what would yous like?"

"Did we give you the diet from St. Mungos?"

"Yes, Master."

"Then please pick something off that," he said. Within minutes they were eating steaming bowls of porridge and fruit.

"Tactics and Strategies," said Hermione thoughtfully, "we'll each take a book and write notes, then compare them half an hour before the end of this session."

"Good idea," said Harry who quickly found a book on an ancient war. He was working on physical wars, like the Grindelwald war, while Hermione was focusing on the more political ones, such as Voldemort's first war. Harry was surprised at how interesting the strategies employed were. At the end of the session they talked.

"Based on what we've read and talked about so far, I think we are looking at a war on both fronts. The DE are going to be violent, as usual, but with Malfoy they're going to be looking at a political and economic war as well," said Hermione thoughtfully.

"So both- all- sides are going to want the co-operation of the goblins. Each side has a name, too. Much as I hate to admit it, 'Harry Potter' is a powerful name, as is 'Dumbledore,' though they're not looking so good at the moment. 'Malfoy' commands a lot of respect as well, and Voldemort is famous too. Right. Currently we can't do too much on the political side of things without a proxy- and that's dangerous, so I say we disassociate your name from the other two sides for a while and let them weaken themselves- same economically, though you maybe should start working on investments in stores that will get a boom when people realise the war is beginning. Now, not many people are worried about protection, for example, but very soon they will be, so we need to buy up shares there which will get us some money. Otherwise the Potter's hold a lot; we can let the other two side's waste resources for a while. We need to learn more about how your family gets its money, anyway. Physically, both Dumbledore and Voldemort have similar strategies. They lie in wait, gathering information and letting people get lulled into a false sense of security. Both sides feel that they need plenty of time to plan each attack perfectly and struggle to react to attacks that they had no prior information about and seem to slip into a little 'panic mode' every time that happens. We've got plenty of time with the turners, I think we need to keep hitting both sides and not give them time to clean up and reposition- though I suggest we wait until we go back to school to get more experience and somehow get rid of the tracking charms on our wands."

"I think I agree with you, Dumbledore and Voldemort have been playing cat and mouse- we'll just bring out the dragon. Dumbledore's the mouse currently, by the way. Not only do we need to get rid of the tracking charms, though, we need to get spare wands. Wouldn't put it past them to check our wands after attacks to make sure it wasn't us, we need to keep our spell-casting safe. Onto economics and politics, when the war starts in earnest people are going to be attempting to get as much news as they can; I'm thinking shares in the Daily Prophet and Wizarding Wireless, etcetera. It also means that we can limit how much they slander my name, and increase the Dumbledore-slander," said Harry.

"That works, we'll need to get into contact with the goblins, though, and buy under several names otherwise I doubt they will be willing to sell it to you," said Hermione, "how about 6 different names- 3 mine, 3 yours. We might have to borrow your money, though."

"How about half the money is mine, the other half Black. When Sirius was imprisoned, the name went to me, so I have full control over Black finances and property. Also, Bellatrix Lestrange and Narcissa Malfoy were both originally Blacks so we can cut a little of their finances there, though we need to make sure they don't realise it was me. Might get you to write the letter to Gringotts in my name as I think you would be better at it than me."

"So, shares in the Prophet and Wizarding Wireless, as well as companies that will be getting a boom soon, such as warding companies, and you want controlling shares in both media companies. You also want to take control of the Black fortune and cut off Bellatrix and Narcissa?"

"That sums it up nicely, yes," said Harry to Hermione who had already begun writing. By the end of the session, Hermione was rolling up the letter and attaching it to Hedwig's leg when an elf popped in.

"Master, Tibby can be taking Lady's letter to goblins," said Tibby, bowing.

"Can you do that for us, Tibby? That would be brilliant, much safer than sending Hedwig," said Harry, relieved, and the elf popped away with the letter just as Trixy popped in with their lunch.

"Hermione, there has to be a faster way to learn languages," complained Harry when they sat down for their first language study session. "Can't the elves speak the language of their master no matter what it is?"

"I think they can, Harry, but I'm not sure how they do it- we need to ask Trixy," said Hermione thoughtfully. Trixy popped in at that statement as Harry had asked her to treat Hermione as a mistress.

"Trixy how is it that elves can speak the language of their masters, no matter what it is?" Trixy looked at them for a second before she started to speak.

"There is an elvin spell, Master and Mistress that we can use to learn a language very quickly. The problem is that it teaches us proper speaking and we's having to learn to speak it badly. Masters forbid elves form speaking properly," she said. Harry was appalled.

"Trixy, you and all of the other elves here are most definitely allowed to speak properly!" Trixy beamed.

"Thank you, Master," she said happily.

"Would you be able to teach us the spell, Trixy?"

"I'm sorry, Master, but only elves can perform it. However, I can place it on you if you like."

"Trixy- that would be brilliant! Thank you!"

"You can only do one language a day, which one would you like first?" she asked. They looked at each other for a second before they agreed.

"Latin, please, Trixy." Trixy nodded and sent a silent spell at each of them before popping away leaving the pair of them to get used to speaking in Latin as it felt awkward and strange when they began, but were speaking fluently about anything and everything when they were finished the language session.

The afternoon session of Tactics and Strategies consisted of them discussing the different attacks they could do when they had more information- they were surprised at how limited their information was when they were stuck in Potter Manor, but they were able to create a person who would be attacking each side so they felt as though they had more enemies than they really did. Halfway through, Tibby popped back into the room with a reply.

"Hello, Tibby, we have just told Trixy that all the elves are allowed to speak properly. Did you manage to get a reply, or do they need more time?"

"Thank you, Master; I got a reply from the Goblins. They looked most pleased with your request." Tibby handed the letter to Hermione before popping away as Harry knew that she was better equipped to deal with the mail- she could understand it!

"This is brilliant," said Hermione when she was done, "We have 51% of the shares in both the Daily Prophet and the Wizarding Wireless under the name of Harold Jones for the Prophet and Mione Manga for the Wireless. The Prophet was more expensive and came out of the Black fortune which you successfully obtained, though silently so unless the Blacks enter Gringotts they won't find that out- Sirius can't go there personally, so he won't realise. Narcissa and Bellatrix have both had their dowries seized and returned to the Black vaults, and each of them are unable to gain access to the vaults now, as well. Apparently most of the Malfoy fortune came from Narcissa as they are a relatively new family, so they might have some financial difficulties… this is brilliant! They were the main suppliers of Voldemort's wealth in the first war; he's going to have some economic difficulties, though no doubt he'll just find another Death Eater or five to take over Malfoy's job. Both the Prophet and the Wireless have been warned to cut the slander of your name or the person responsible will lose their job… goodness, the goblins work fast! They would make brilliant allies if they were willing," she said the last a little wistfully. "You also have shares in multiple warding companies throughout Britain, though nothing major. They've maintained a massive safety net for you as well. This is going to build our funds up quickly once the war starts, and you've made it difficult for the other sides to get money from shares in those industries… brilliant. The economic war has begun."

"Great, now we just have to start getting Dumbledore to begin wasting money on trivial things."

"We could always employ the Weasley twins to start destroying things at Hogwarts properly… such as vanishing expensive equipment."

"Hermione, I'm shocked! Who would have thought Hermione Granger would suggest something like that!"

"Well that's the point, they're less likely to suspect me… though now I think about it, we can't employ the Weasley twins, they don't know Occlumency and we don't know how close they or their family are to Dumbledore, we will have to do that ourselves… the twins will be thought of as suspects, anyway."

"Not if he uses Legilimency on the entire school and they're found innocent."

"If we project feelings of innocence as well, he will have to suspect outside involvement. That way Liberum Aiacet draws the most suspicion and we can get away with more."

"I like the name, by the way. Liberum Aiacet. Free from the lies, but changed. He is a lie, it fits."

"Thank you."

"Huh, we'll call him Aiacet in public, the lies. Liberum should just be known, unless we call him Liberumaiacet."

"We could, it is ridiculously long like the other two sides."

"It doesn't sound right, though… Aiacetliberum?"

"That sounds better, though it is getting a little more ridiculous. We are messing it up a little too much. Vol De Mort means 'Flight from Death," but 'Free from the lies' is 'Liberum a iacet.'"

"Don't get too technical, most people won't work it out other than the fact that it is a ridiculous name- the name of a person that is taking on both Voldemort and Dumbledore."

"True enough- but Aiacetliberum needs a look. Both Voldemort and Dumbledore are easily recognisable both by what they wear and their basic looks," said Hermione, "and I think it should be you. You have more magical power, so you're more likely to do well in a fight and you're a metamorph… plus the fact that more people are likely to follow you because you're a male fighting men. People are so sexist."

"I see your point about it being easier for me to disguise my looks to create a believable character, but surely if we are going to take the two of them down, we might as well take down some of the ridiculous prejudices and the sexism should go first!"

"Harry, it's not about the sexism- think Amelia Bones, Bellatrix. It's that you will fight better than I will. I'm your tactical operator- I think, make the plans, and gather information because that's where my strengths lie. Your strengths are out on the battlefield, fighting and giving people the strength and confidence they need to follow you. Harry, you are a leader, I am a follower- it's just who we are. You have a way about you that inspires people to do what's right- and you don't even realise you're doing it. It's not your name that does it. It's your personality, how you hold yourself, the way you speak. We need someone like that out on the front line, being visible because face it, Harry- more people will follow you than they will me. It has nothing to do with me being female, it just is. Besides, we will have time for the prejudices later, for now we need to get them to work with us. Dumbledore is a pureblood, Voldemort… pretends to be. For now, we need a pureblood person to take up the third side. Do you see where I'm going yet? When people believe in us, when we have enough supporters, we can start tearing down prejudice. Doing that now would weaken our side, not enough people believe and those that do are too scared to announce it outright for those that disagree are too powerful. This is part of the political side of the war, Harry, we need to be clever. Gryffindor behaviour does not work in the political wars!"

"Okay, I get it- leave the Political war to Hermione, I'll fight the physical one and we work on the economic war together. As for the look, I'm sure we can find a good battle robe. I see your point about looking strong, too, and we can't have a 14- almost 15 year old leading a side, so we will have some work to do there but I would rather learn more about my metamorphmagus abilities before I go trying something so major, so we can let it go for now," said Harry, "and I think we should be eating dinner. Back to the economic war seeing as we were on a roll. We've got Dumbledore spending needlessly, though we need to discover where his income comes from before we can do any more damage- he can't get it all from Hogwarts, the tuition fees are too low. What about the other side?"

"We've already destroyed the Malfoy and Lestrange fortunes, but that's not all he has. We can't just go and attack all of the pureblood families, though! Who were the named people in the graveyard, they must all have quite a bit of influence in his inner circle, and we need to destroy the richer ones."

"There was Malfoy, already done, Lestrange, done as well. Crabbe and Goyle. They're both extremely stupid, so money is probably how they got in… Macnair, also stupid, he's the guy that came to execute Buckbeak… Crouch is incredibly loyal so we have to watch out for him, Wormtail, he can't do much seeing as he is apparently dead, there's Snape but he didn't turn up until later… that's all I can think of at the moment, though," said Harry, embarrassed.

"We need to work out how they get their money; although I am suspecting that it might just be inheritance, most families have a business that grants them large incomes. Snape we can get spending unnecessary money, and work on Dumbledore at the same time. That's all I can think of for now, though," said Hermione.

The Occlumency and Legilimency was spent taking turns attempting to break into the other's mind and giving tips depending on who succeeded.

"Harry, I couldn't see where you store your memories, which is good, but it's too obvious. There is a huge patch in the middle of your mind where there is nothing. It's obvious that something is there, invisible, so I just walked up to it. Throwing a few things that I picked up off the ground provided a good distraction, too. The Library is still solid, so I felt it, and then I just walked around until I found the door. The wards are brilliant, I couldn't beat them, but it is a little worrying how close a student with four years of magical education could get even if you weren't trying to push me out. Try creating an illusion or something else to hide the Library, and for heaven's sake, add more creatures! There's not enough of them! Their other problem is I told them that I meant no harm and they were less vicious. You need them to not listen to what I say," said Hermione after her first attempt at the spell. After Harry made the suggested changes, he returned the favour.

"Hermione, it's organised really well… a little too well. You really don't need the signs that actually tell the truth. You could have them lie, that would be much better. Also, the fact that I could do magic is your mind is a little disturbing as people with warding abilities could take them down with ease- thankfully, I have none. You could try riddles or something that you have to get right to be allowed access as riddles take time to solve and its right up your alley- you're brilliant at solving them. It's just too simple, and you have the intelligence. Don't add more wards, though, I don't think you can handle the power that would take. Maybe an invisibility cloak? You could shrink it to the size of an ant, or transfigure it into a flower before using an invisibility cloak or disillusionment charm. Definitely, though, make sure that only you can use magic in there as that gives you a distinct advantage." At 9pm, they slowly walked down the hall into the practice room and fell asleep, exhausted from a full day of learning. They woke at 5am the next day and flipped the time turners back exactly 24 hours. That done, they decided on the schedule;

5-9 Apparition

9.30-1.30 Portkeys

2-6 Animagus

6-9 Other Magics

And sat down to read about the theory of apparition. By 8am, they had finished reading the theory.

"I think this is like Occlumency- they make out that it's harder than it is just to make less people want to try it… and why does it have to be painful, or uncomfortable? I think that is just the expectation. People have heard that it is uncomfortable, so their magic lets it be. I think if we made it feel comfortable by focusing our magic on that it would work," said Hermione thoughtfully.

"I think that once again, you have a point," said Harry, "apparition is a dangerous skill to have and Dumbledore is in control of the education… you have a book from after Dumbledore, don't you? The one I have is from the Potter Library, it was written before Dumbledore gained control of the education system. It mentions nothing about discomfort, or it being difficult. It warns about splinching, but says that it is only rare and happens when a novice attempts to apparate without being fully focused on making it to the destination whole. This method is silent and fast. You focus on a destination and imagine yourself appearing there, fully intact. It also advises new apparators to know how to put a person back together if they splinch, but it is an easy spell."

"This book is nothing like that! It mentions splinching as common, discomfort as high and tells the reader that the must focus on the destination and their determination to get there, but says absolutely nothing about focusing on getting there whole," said Hermione, "seeing as this book's way is apparently loud and uncomfortable, as well as dangerous, let's try your way first. What's the spell?"

"It's here- I'll go first, shall I? Just to the other side of the room." At Hermione's nod, Harry focused on the other side of the room. Once he was sure he had it, thanking Occlumency all the while, he pictured himself appearing there, whole and complete. When he was ready, he turned- and suddenly he was there. There was no uncomfortable sensations, he just was there and then he wasn't. Harry grinned and apparated back to Hermione.

"We will just have to work on building up speed, it took me a while to get focused enough, but it's brilliant! Easy enough, as well," he said, and smiling, Hermione stood up for her attempt. By 9am, they could both apparate to any place in the house in less than 30 seconds of concentration. Gilly brought them their breakfast, and then they began to study portkeys which they discovered was much more difficult than apparition. Unfortunately, they could also see that it was just as important.

"Here, read this; 'The animagus transformation has 3 steps. Trance, Partial and Full. The first step is Trance, where you must meet your inner animal and merge with it. You let the animal approach you and join you, where you become one being. This gives you not only the power to complete the transformation, but also some of the traits and abilities of the animal in your human form. There are no personality changes as the inner animal was already a part of you, but the link had not been formed. Unfortunately, not all people have an inner animal. This is usually because of one of two reason; one, they do not have enough magical power, and two; they already have an animal form- for example, they have lycanthropy….' this is what we need, Harry! We just need to enter the trance… there's a spell for it here!" said Hermione excitedly, "Can I go first this time?"

"Why not, you found it," said Harry, "I'll do the spell to send you into the trance… why is this so easy?"

"The book is outdated again, Harry," said Hermione wearily, "and the spell is 'Animalis Ecstasi' just point the wand, wand movements are not actually necessary for any spells, they just tell us that in first year to get us to focus." Harry nodded, a little frustrated with finding out everything unnecessary that they had been taught but supposed that there was a reason for it, like Hermione's focus theory.

"Animalis Ecstasi," he said and watched as Hermione slumped to the ground. Harry sat back and began reading, not knowing how long she would take. Finally, after what felt like ages but was really only 15 minutes, she sat up.

"That was brilliant," she breathed, "you really have to try that Harry, I'll tell you my form once you're done." Harry nodded and watched as the spell hit him. Darkness engulfed him and he hit the ground.

Harry opened his eyes, confused. He was in a dark room, and had no idea where it was. Slowly, he sat up and remembered what he was doing. The Animagus trance! As soon as he realised that, he spotted an animal in the distance. He squinted, trying to make it out. As it came closer, he began to see it a little better. It was a bird, as it was flying. Large, but not massive. It seemed to be pure gold… Harry was getting confused. As it got closer, Harry began to see the similarities between it and Fawkes… a phoenix! Apart from having no red, they were identical. Harry gasped as it came to land beside him. He stretched out a hand to pat it, and suddenly he felt the phoenix merge with him. He had his form. Harry thought about waking, but something was telling him to stay. That was when he noticed. He had been so focused on the phoenix; he had failed to notice the others. There were two more. Harry was shocked. A pure black horse with green eyes approached him slowly and Harry, in shock, lifted a hand to join as he had with the phoenix. It worked. Then the second animal approached and Harry admired it for a while before finally putting his hand out to join with the large Peregrine Falcon. Once he had joined with all three, he felt himself jerked awake and he sat up slowly, seeing Hermione looking at him nervously.

"I agree, Hermione, that was brilliant… and I will never be normal," he said softly.

"Why do you say that?" she asked curiously.

"I have three forms," said Harry.

"That's brilliant!" said Hermione, "what are they?"

"Uh, the first one is a gold phoenix, a black Arabian Horse and a Peregrine Falcon," said Harry.

"That's not abnormal, Harry," said Hermione, "you are magically powerful enough to have a magical form, and everyone with a magical form has a non-magical form- I'd say that the Arabian is your non-magical form as the personalities are almost identical. Also, because you are a metamorph, you are naturally inclined towards physical transfiguration, so the Falcon is your metamorph shape. That is a really good thing, and I'm glad you have a land animal, as I do as well- though smaller and more intelligent," she teased.

"What are you?"

"I'm a squirrel- highly intelligent and good at strategy with brilliant memories," she said, "small enough to hide, as well."

"You have way too many facts… and I think a squirrel does suit your personality… always squirrelling away every fact you find," he said, "So, squirrel, what's next?" Hermione rolled her eyes.

"Well, another fact that I squirrelled away earlier is that after the trance, we begin partial transformation. We have to focus on changing our arms, legs, hands and feet separately in a similar way to you when you were metamorphing. I suggest you try the Arabian first, Harry," she said. Harry nodded and began to concentrate on the hoofs of the Arabian. One the image was firmly in his mind, he pictured them attached to his arms and focused on the tingling feeling he had felt earlier. He watched in amazement as his hands did as he imagined.

"Hey, Hermione, I've done my hands, look!" he said excitedly.

"Harry, that's amazing! Try your arms and legs at the same time, though otherwise you might overbalance," she warned. Harry nodded and returned his focus to attempting to become an animagus. He was still trying to shift his arms and legs at the same time when an excited squeal broke his concentration and he looked up.

"I did it, Harry," she cried happily and held up her hands. Harry grinned, it looked really strange.

"That's great, Hermione!" By the end of the session, Harry was able to change all but his head which he was nervous about into the Arabian, and Hermione was improving as well.

"Now we study other magics," said Hermione.

"We need to know what other magics we're going to study first, though," said Harry.

"Obviously nothing that can be done at Hogwarts, or through that curriculum- like Runes for you, Harry," said Hermione, "healing magic is a must, and so is metamorphmagic, we need to know your limits. Anything else, I can't think of at the moment," she said.

"We'll think of it as we go along," said Harry, "so what's first?"

"Well, I was thinking that learning about a metamorphmagi's limits is really only a one-session thing, but healing magic is several- maybe we should get it over and done with so we can focus more on healing later?"

"Good idea, I'd like to know my limits before we try anything. There's two books, I'll read this one, the other one looks like something I won't be able to handle," said Harry before he picked up the more basic of the two books. The books took them a while to read, but by 8.30pm they were into the discussion.

"So basically what you're saying is that I can't manipulate bone, or anything directly attached to it, such as muscle. Fat can't be manipulated either, but cartilage can. The only thing I can really do is change my outward appearance without interfering with by basic body structure. I can't make myself fatter or thinner, stronger or weaker, taller or shorter, heavier or lighter. I can change certain features more than others, though. Can you explain that again, please?"

"You can manipulate cartilage, Harry. Your hands are made from muscle and bone, so the basic structure has to stay the same. The only things you can do to your hand is change the skin tone, grow your fingernails and change the amount of wrinkles on them. Your nose, for example, is made of cartilage. Because of that, you could- say, give yourself a pig's nose if you really wanted to. You can change its shape dramatically as there is no bone to inhibit you. The same can be said about your ears and lips, there's no bones to stop you," she explained patiently.

"So essentially anything you can't disguise by using a glamour charm can't be done by a metamorph except for the cartilaginous regions of their body… and it's undetectable, unlike a glamour."

"Exactly! So… if you want an intimidating body, you'd best get into that gym session you're planning," she said cheerfully.

"Huh, well there goes my private chat-fest with the portraits in there," he said playfully, "anyway, so Harry-the-weed won't be going anytime soon without work."

"No, he won't. I've always wondered why wizards feel the need to use magic for everything. I don't think I've ever seen a fit wizard, apart from curse-breakers like Bill, and they're no athletes. Even their sports are lazy. Quidditch is no workout!"

"Now that I think about it, Hermione, you're right. There are thin wizards around, but I don't think they get it from exercise. We really do need to learn more about wizarding culture, it's so different from what we've grown up in. I wonder if the portraits will help us."

"They might help you, Harry, but I think, and this is just from observing over the last four years, every magical family is so different that you need more than just the viewpoint from those in the Potter family as everyone has such different views of the world, and magicals seem to stick with their family, cutting themselves off from the others except for very, very small groups of family and friends. I've never seen the Weasleys interact with another family, for example, even though their children have so many friends," she said, and Harry realised that she was probably right.

"Don't forget though, Hermione that people marry into the families… but that conversation is for another time, we were studying metamorphmagi…"

"Oh, yes, of course, I forgot," she said looking faintly embarrassed. Harry barely suppressed a smile. If Hermione got passionate about a subject, nothing got in the way of her and a discussion regardless of what they were supposed to be doing.

"Anyway, it's 9pm- probably time to head down to the duelling and potions room," and all of a sudden they were there.

"Apparition sure has it's uses," said Harry mildly, "and I'm glad that it's not as uncomfortable as they say."

"I wonder if we will be able to do this at Hogwarts. Surely the wards must be similar, and the rumour that you can't would stop people from trying- especially if it's more comfortable to walk. It would explain how Dumbledore gets everywhere so quickly and the other teachers too…"

"We can test that pretty easily, you know," said Harry, "we set up a disturbance timed to go off after curfew and watch the map to see in the teachers apparate there or if they walk. Just have to be careful to not be spotted as I think the portraits report…"

"That would definitely explain Dumbledore knowing 'everything,' but there's not portraits in the girls bathroom- Myrtle's bathroom, the entrance to the chamber and where we brewed Polyjuice… we found his blind spot!"

"Brilliant… and there's none in the dorms, either. Now, though, we need to sleep."

5-9 Potions Theory

9-1 Potion Brewing

1-5 Duelling Theory

5-9 Duelling Practical

"Great, so… what is potion theory?" The effect of the statement was shocking. Hermione literally stopped in the middle of her thoughts and froze.

"He really… never taught us anything, did he? You really don't know any Potion theory… well no wonder your potions never turned out right! He should have spent months on teaching us this," she said, "Do you think it was on Dumbledore's orders that we learnt nothing, or does he really want to be the only Potions Master alive?"

"If it was on Dumbledore's orders, we have to wonder if he truly means what he says about his view of muggleborns and half-bloods," said Harry, disgusted "and speaking of half-bloods, what am I? Pure-blood or half?"

"Your father's status as a member of an Ancient and Most Noble house wipes out your mother's blood status. She was magical, so you're a pureblood. If he had been part of a younger house, you'd be a half-blood," said Hermione and Harry nodded. He knew of his family's place in the ten Ancient and Most Noble families. He had been amused to find that the Malfoy's didn't make it onto the list.

"So, this potions theory…" and they spent the session reading up on it. When Scat provided them with breakfast at the end of the session, Harry was furious.

"I can't believe that we were allowed to brew without knowing that! That was so dangerous! Every mistake I've made in the past, I've never understood it, but now it makes so much sense! That- that man!"

"Harry, I know that you're angry, but we're going to get worse than this when we go back to school. It's only the second day of the holidays! Sort your emotions out behind your shields and try to be silent until you've got a handle on them. You can't let your emotions rule you anymore. Then we can start practicing our brewing, I was thinking we might want some healing potions considering what we're doing this afternoon," she said.

"You're right, thanks, Hermione. She nodded. The brewing session later went better than Harry expected. He knew that he would never have the patience to become a Potions Master, but it was more enjoyable than he expected and the potions they were able to brew would be useful for them. They managed to brew batches of Pepper Up, bruise and burn salve before the end of the session. He knew that even if they had managed a potion to reduce scarring, he wouldn't want it. More scars would hopefully help his look and make it harder to distinguish the lightning bolt if he hadn't thought to move it. Natural scars couldn't be moved, though.

Duelling Theory ended up starting as a revision of every spell they knew that could be used in battle. When they realised how much they were lacking the knowledge, they split the session in half. The first would be spent learning new spells that they could use and the second developing their own tactics based on how much knowledge they had. The way they decided they would do that is take a battle from history and discuss how they would have fought if they had the same resources as the losing side. Hopefully they would begin to pick up a pattern on the things that caused a side to lose tactically and how they could overcome that. They learnt several new spells in the first half and they began working on tactics.

"Right, this side has 50 aurors, equipped with brooms and their wands and they're going up against a group of 20, but they lost."

"Where were they? What were the resources?" Harry sighed.

"It was a purely physical battle, and one-time, too. It was supposed to just be in and out- grab the criminals and go. Their disadvantages began when the fight was started in the criminal's home- base- but they still had a huge number advantage. From what I can see, they were over-confident and they tried the proverbial Gryffindor approach."

"So they were defeated- how?"

"I think there was a spy in the ranks, the criminals got the jump on the aurors and set several traps. Having no idea where they were going, the all gravitated towards the noise and were beaten pretty soundly- 5 escaped," said Harry.

"They're almost amateur mistakes," sniffed Hermione, "I'm losing faith in our Auror force very quickly. Forces should swear an Oath to not betray their team, very specific so that there's no loopholes. That should be the first thing they do when joining a side of the war! The Gryffindor approach is no good when attacking the other's home base, too- they know the area too well and you not at all. They needed to infiltrate first, invisible. If someone has mage-sight, it's possible to incapacitate them silently, though that would indicate that your cover was almost blown and you need to get out of there. Scout around; we need to learn how to create the Marauder's Map. It might be safer to pretend to join outright, though we can't do that with the death eaters. Once you're closer to equal in that regard, you could move in, but knocking down the front door is a bad idea, as is moving towards the sound- or moving in a pack at all in that situation! They could have easily surrounded the aurors moving like that. A buddy who watches your back and they yours instead of everyone watching everyone means your back is safer as the other can pay you more attention especially as you have more experience with your buddy's fighting style and they are trained to work together. That's all I can really think of at the moment. They were definitely too overconfident, an attitude of 'we will have to work to our best to win this,' would be a good idea, but you can't dictate another's attitude besides a good briefing."

"Yeah, you're probably right. The only problem is that hindsight is always 20/20. The aurors would come up with the same plan with this knowledge- so why did they choose to fight like that without the knowledge? How do we know that we won't fall into the same trap as them with the same information? They probably were told that the shock would incapacitate them for a while."

"It was still foolish; shock doesn't stop people for all that long. You learn from your mistakes. They won't make the same mistake twice and we are learning from them as well. Hopefully we won't do that. Besides, we can't have any betrayers yet."

"You're probably right, and that Oath will definitely be used when our side really gets into the physical side of the war."

The last session of the day was Harry's favourite. They began by duelling each other a few times, and when they tired of that, they pulled out the duelling dummies and teamed up- Harry and Hermione versus the two duelling dummies set to the level of Hogwarts graduates.

"It's almost 9, so you will be apparating home and me to the Gym next," said Harry, "and that was a really fun session, though we are really going to be sore tomorrow. The three extra years really do make a difference in skill levels…" Harry winced from a bruise on his arm inflicted by the duelling dummies "we really need to get some better potions to fix injuries, and spells to- if one of those bone-breakers had hit we would've had a problem."

"True, we'll work on that tomorrow," she said. "Time to go now, Harry," and they each apparated away. Harry's day in the Gymnasium was brutal and he was shocked at how out of shape he was and felt determined to fix that. The portraits in the gym were a great help- they were of all of the Potters that had frequented the gym regularly and each were apparently masters at a different form of physical fighting- which was apparently natural to metamorphs as they were more connected to their physical bodies making it easier for them to learn the different skills. He loved it. At 9pm, a weary Harry Potter apparated outside to meet Hermione.

"Harry! You'll never believe what I learnt today!" she cried, "Dumbledore's really getting set up for the physical war!"

"What happened?"

At 9am this morning, I was sitting in my room reading like I always do when there was a knock on my door. I opened it to find Dumbledore with my parents standing behind him. He told me that it wasn't safe at my parent's house and that I had to go with him. He told me to pack all of my things as quickly as I could and go with him. He had used Legilimency on my parents, Harry, and discovered that we went to Diagon Alley together yesterday but he thinks that you went back to the Dursleys and isn't going to check on you because he doesn't want to disturb your holidays. He took me to Sirius' house but I can't tell you the address because it's under a charm called the Fidelius. Same as the one your parents used… and Wormtail betrayed."

"Who's the secret keeper?"

"Dumbledore," she said bitterly, "anyway, the Weasleys were there and we were instructed to not send you letters unless you sent one first- and then we were to not say anything as owl post isn't secure. We were expected to spend the holidays getting the house 'fit for human inhabitation' as it's a mess! The adults have all joined Dumbledore in a secret organisation called the Order of the Phoenix. I got barely any information on it, though. Basically I found out that Dumbledore formed it back in the first war against Voldemort and he's restarting it because of the rebirth. The Order is for overage witches and wizards that have left school and their symbol is the Gryffindor lion- though their name implies a Phoenix, I don't think Dumbledore is light enough to use the symbol. I wonder about Fawkes a lot. Fred and George are inventing products to help them listen in on the meetings, though with Dumbledore I doubt they will get much information through using them. Ron's loyalties are to Dumbledore, by the way."

"I thought they would be," said Harry sadly, "did you work out any names of members?"

"Well, there's Sirius, obviously, and Dumbledore, Professor Lupin, Hagrid, Mr. and Mrs. Weasley, Bill and Charlie as well, there's metamorph named Tonks…"

"Damn," Harry swore, "that complicates things a lot!"

"Well, yes, it does, Professors McGonagall and Snape are both involved, Hestia Jones, Dedalus Diggle, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Elphias Doge, Mundungus Fletcher, Arabella Figg…"

"Really? She was… my neighbour, oh, Dumbledore you are really not doing yourself many favours."

"Sturgis Podmore, Emmeline Vance and Mad-Eye Moody…"

"That's not good."

"There's more, too, but I'm not sure about their names yet. They all seem to know a 'message-spell,' too, though I've never heard of it."

"Well there's a good project. Are they all completely loyal? Oaths or anything? Or is Dumbledore so sure of his act he feels he doesn't need it?"

"I did a subtle Legilimency probe on Charlie; I thought he was my best bet. There was no Oaths I could discover, and though he seemed loyal, I thought I got a glimpse of doubt before I left. That means the members could be swayed and we could get a spy in there, but it would definitely take a while."

"You say McGonagall was in there?"

"Yes, she is."

"Well, she does have trouble believing some of our stories, but if we can get her on our side she would be a fierce fighter. We're her 'lions' and she hates people hurting us. If we showed her some memories we could persuade her… and just have an obliviate ready if she doesn't believe us," said Harry thoughtfully.

"You're right it would take some work to get her to believe us… remember the Philosopher's Stone?" she giggled "but I think it just shows how strong she stands for what she believes in and she would fight identically to her house symbol for us once we got her on our side." Harry shook his head.

"She needs to learn to be a Slytherin if we get her on our side. We need ears in the Order and McGonagall can't go confronting Dumbledore, it would defeat the purpose in more ways than one!"

"You're right again, Harry. Other matters, If and When we get her onto our side, we can't teach her Occlumency."

"What?"

"Not our version, anyway! Think, Harry! what would Dumbledore think if all of a sudden his Deputy had perfect mind shields? He's going to suspect something. If he realises that they are the same as what you and I both have, the suspicion is put on us. With mind shields, his trust of us had already decreased a lot. Giving McGonagall the same shields is as obvious as writing a list of our allies and leaving it on his desk. No, you put basic wards up keeping him away from the information about us, but subtly so that he doesn't notice it. We then leave her a book on Occlumency- a new one; and she can learn it that way. Much more believable and those shields are remarkably different. Best to ward her suspicions of him, as well."

"You're right, but it still seems like the wrong thing to do," he complained, "goodnight, Hermione."

"Goodnight, Harry."

The Outdoor session was different. Harry was adamant that Hermione had to do at least a small amount of physical exercise every 'day,' so they woke and swam for an hour in the lake. Blinky brought them a picnic breakfast and then Harry set to getting Hermione confident on a broom- by spending the next 6 hours in the air with her. By the end of that time, Hermione had progressed from the training broom to the other broom that Harry had bought, and though not all that comfortable, was no longer worried about falling. By that time it was already 12pm and Blinky was out with the lunch. They discussed aerial tactics for an hour, and that was Harry's time to show his tactical brilliance as he was more experienced in the air. They decided to leave animagus training as Hermione was not close enough, so they spent the rest of the day in the air and Harry even spotted a smile on the girls face, but it was gone as soon as he pointed it out.

"The brooms aren't as bad as I thought they were," said Hermione, "though they really could use a cushioning charm on them. That might have had something to do with the length of time we were up there."

"I swear you were enjoying it for a while up there, Hermione," Harry grinned and Hermione sniffed.

"It is a nice way to… sightsee," she said, "and they really are quite safe if you think about the charms that are on there. I've been frightened ever since I saw what Quirrel did, but the books inside say that racing brooms have less resilience to Dark magic and the broom you bought me is not in danger of being affected like that. As you said, it is an effective way to move around undetected and gives us a greater chance in aerial combat if we can practice it." Harry smirked as he apparated into the study. That was a confession of great enjoyment from Hermione.

5-9 Charms

9-1 Transfiguration

1-5 Ancient Runes

5-9 Arithmancy

"I figure that we're doing HOM in the Library and Duelling is practically Defence. We're already studying Potions in the lab and Care of Magical Creatures will end up being covered in other sessions both outside and in the duelling room. Astronomy is useless, as is Divination, Muggle Studies and Herbology, though we will end up doing a little of that Outdoors and in potions. That's all we study," said Harry nervously. Hermione thought over his words and gnawed on her lip before nodding slowly.

"I hope your right, though I can't fault your logic. It feels wrong to skip subjects, but I can see why- we don't have the time to cover everything. We can get a lot done, but a lot isn't everything and your plan is the best I can come up with as well. I just hope that it doesn't backfire on us," she said cautiously.

"Great, let's get started!" And the 'day' that shocked Harry more than any other so far began.

"I didn't realise I had missed so much," he said at the end of the transfiguration session, "in both of those subjects. That theory work is really going to make this a lot easier!"

"Why do you think I did so well all of these years, Harry? I've never had the raw magical power you have, and even with the blocks removed from both of us I don't hold a candle to you. I do well because I really know the theory. I pretend that I'm just reciting the textbook to take some of the perceived threat away, but you really need to understand the theory to get anywhere."

"I think I can see that," said Harry, "especially in transfiguration. I can't believe it took me so long to realise what I am!"

"Harry, it was probably mostly hidden under the block."

"That would make sense. It just feels so right; as if I've found a friend that I've always known about, just not been able to remember. Maybe not friend, closer to a limb that's just been reconnected."

"A very disturbing way to put it. Is that really how you think of me? Another limb?" she asked, sounding offended.

"What? NO! Of course not, I didn't mean it like that, believe me Hermione! You're not just another limb to me," he said horrified, until he spotted Hermione trying to stiffly giggles. "You're evil," he huffed, "and now it's time for lunch… thank you, Trish." The last two sessions of the day were eye-opening for both of them. Harry struggled with Arithmancy but took to Ancient Runes like a fish to water. Hermione was shocked by his progress in it, and said so when they were finished for the day.

"That was incredible! You've finished the 3rd year runes curriculum in 4 hours! Of course, each year is harder that the last but the problem is that you were seeing correlations and asking questions that I haven't been taught! In a few days, I won't be able to teach you and you will have to just use the books in the Library… though from what I could gather the other day, your family has had gifted runics in it and you have Mastery-level books to study from… you really do have to get into the Ancient Runes course, you can learn a lot from reading the books, but I don't think that's enough; you need a Professor, and Professor Babbling does have a Mastery in the subject- she would help you out a lot! I think she wold enjoy having you in the class, as well, it's clear that you are a runic."

"What on earth is a Runic?"

"Someone who is naturally gifted at runes. You'll spot them more easily as well, if someone tries to place runes on something and disguise them, you are more likely to see the runes for what they are than, say… me."

"Oh."

"Hmmm… we really do need to work a lot harder on your Arithmancy, though."

"It's hard, though. It just doesn't seem to make any sense! I don't get it at all, it's worse than Maths."

"It's brilliant, but never mind. You can't be the best at everything, it just doesn't work like that- although someone needs to explain that to Dumbledore, he would teach every class if he had the time… and could get away with it…"

"Yes, well, that doesn't make for pleasant thoughts, so let's just head to the library, shall we?" They apparated into room in time to see their past selves walk out the door.

"I don't think I will ever get used to that sight," grumbled Harry.

The next day was just as hectic and packed in just as much new knowledge and skills. Trixy was able to give them French and they spent a lot of time practicing both it and Latin. As their Occlumency was good and Legilimency was a waste of time while they were in Potter Manor, they spent the time researching some of the problems they had come up with the day before. For them, it was the message-spells the Order were taught to perform. They managed them and decided that they would be exceptionally useful in battle as Patronus Messages could be used as decoy-messages being rather large and obvious. They guessed that the Order did the same thing, though they weren't sure.

They decided that they didn't need the hours set aside to practice apparition as they already had it down, so they replaced it with learning healing magic as it would be extremely useful. They found that while both of them were very good at it, Hermione was definitely the natural. They managed to create successful portkeys and Harry managed to transform into his falcon, leaving the phoenix the only form he hadn't attempted and Hermione successfully transformed all but her head- a successful partial transformation. They brewed a larger stock of healing potions in the lab and their duelling skills were increased dramatically. Harry spent his day in the gym while Hermione went to take notes on the members of the Order of the Phoenix. They now had a parchment tacked up in the Library.

Known Members of the Order of the Phoenix

Sirius Black- Grim Animagus form. Unemployed, on the run from Ministry. Prankster! Very protective of perceived family.

Dedalus Diggle- Disguise unknown. Short, excitable and awed by fame. Possible member of Harry's guard when he was younger.

Elphias Doge- No longer on the front line. Attended Hogwarts alongside Albus, frail and weak but can provide intelligence, information gatherer. Skilled with a wand. Exceedingly loyal to Albus, his first ever friend.

Aberforth Dumbledore- Disguise Unknown. No longer on the front line. Collects intelligence, 'background fighter'. Hogs Head Bartender, younger brother of Albus by 3 years. Unsure if rift with brother is real or engineered. Affinity for goats, possible animagus.

Albus Dumbledore- leader of Order. 115 years of age. Able to get away with illegal activity behind 'leader of light' and 'twinkling grandfather' acts. Slogan of 'For the Greater Good,' shared with Grindelwald. Piercing blue eyes, silver hair and beard. Major plans involve Harry's death. Definite Animagus; form unknown, Quote; "Don't need a cloak to become invisible."

Arabella Figg- Squib; blends in perfectly with Muggle world. Income from trade of Cat/Kneasle cross-breeds. Liaison between muggle and magical world for Dumbledore, known member of Harry's guard before Hogwarts.

Mundungus Fletcher- short, squat, unshaven man, bandy legs, long, straggly ginger hair, bloodshot eyes. Criminal dealings earn a living, ears for Dumbledore in Black Market and shadier, Darker areas of magical communities. Extremely loyal to Dumbledore.

Rubeus Hagrid- Half-giant, basic magical skill. Rough, loves dangerous animals, post of gamekeeper at Hogwarts and Professor of CoMC.

Remus Lupin- Disguise unknown. thin, prematurely ageing werewolf, can't get a job due to prejudice, sent by Dumbledore to persuade the werewolves to join the 'Light' side of the war.

Minerva McGonagall- Cat animagus, tall, severe-looking, black hair, Transfiguration professor, fiercely loyal to students especially Gryffindors.

Mad-Eye Moody- personal invisibility cloak. Badly scarred, missing leg, eye and chunk from nose, Notorious for only drinking from personal supply, 'leader' personality. Retired auror, many enemies, famous for skill on battlefield.

Sturgis Podmore- Borrows invisibility cloak regularly, other disguise unknown. Employee of Ministry of Magic, Department unknown.

Severus Snape- Possible animagus. Doe patronus; sallow skin, greasy black hair, empty black eyes, Potions Master and Professor, Head of Slytherin House.

Emmeline Vance- Disguise unknown, formidable witch with a wand, Unemployed.

Fleur Delacour- Part-veela, silver-blonde hair, pale eyes, good looking, ability to charm men. French, desk job at Gringotts. Loyalty to Bill W and light side, however strength of loyalty to Dumbledore unknown.

Hestia Jones- Disguise unknown. Frequently on missions with Diggle, tall, thin witch, unemployed.

Kingsley Shacklebolt- skilled in Muggle world, disguise well there. Lynx patronus, Calm, unshakeable personality. Senior Auror.

Nymphadora Tonks- Metamorphmagus, wolf patronus form. Auror. Clumsy, unsure if act or not, young and bright. Skilled with wand.

Arthur Weasley- Disguise unknown, tall, thin, receding hairline, obsessed with muggles and their culture. Head of the Misuse of Muggle Artefacts Office in Ministry.

Bill Weasley- Disguise unknown. good looking, tall, flaming red hair in ponytail, fang earring, intelligent. Cursebreaker for ministry, currently based in Egypt.

Charlie Weasley- Disguise unknown. short, stocky, weather-beaten, muscly and extremely freckly, red hair. Dragon Keeper in Romania, in charge of recruitment abroad.

Molly Weasley- plump. Not on the Front lines, formerly Prewett. Fierce, formidable fighter, unemployed; housewife. 'Leader' personality.

Harry was incredibly proud of the list. The outdoor sessions still consisted of mainly flying to get Hermione comfortable on a broom, though they still talked about aerial tactics for over an hour and worked on their fitness. They once again left animagus training as Hermione hadn't managed a full transformation. The study session saw them working through 4th year material in Charms and Transfiguration and having almost completed 4th year work in Runes, though they were still in the middle of 3rd year work for Arithmancy as Harry was holding them back a lot.