Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.
Authors note – This chapter may be a little info dumpy but I will try keep it to a minimum.

&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6

Act One – Back to School

Part one – The big red train

?:?, ?, 1995 – ?

"Lucius, did I not make myself clear. If you fail you are aware of the, consequences"

"But it will cost a lot of money 'convincing' Fudge and the Wizengamot. Also how are you going to get the French and Germans to agree, and only merlin knows how I would go about convincing Dumbledore."

The man stood with a scowl on his face and raked the contents of his desk to the floor in anger.

"DO NOT MAKE EXCUSES LUCIUS, YOU DO WHAT I SAY WHEN I SAY IT!" He slowly sat back down and smiled as he watched Lucius bow his head and apologise, not missing the anger twitch across Lucius's face, but that just made it all the more pleasing: such a proud and powerful Wizard prostrating like a serf in front of his king.

"Why are all wizards so stupid, you couldn't even tie your own shoelaces without a spell to do so."

The man smirked as Lucius's face remained neutral at the insult: he was learning.

"Let me solve this problem for you, no sense in getting rid of such a useful pawn like yourself, especially one with such a beautiful wife. I should like for you to send her to me again, she is such a treat and so very tight, I do hope that doesn't mean you're neglecting her Lucius, or is it just a size issue?"

Lucius's wand hand twitched and he openly scowled at him. The man simply laughed before continuing.

"The French will be easy enough to convince, just grease the right pockets and make sure Fudge is sufficiently condescending when he talks with their ministers, their inferiority complex should do the rest. The Germans will be eager to prove Durmstrangs superiority over Hogwarts as well likely needing no prodding or incentives. Dumbledore will completely deny all attempts at involving Hogwarts. That's why you go to him last and simply tell him they will hold it at Beauxbatons or Durmstrang if Hogwarts wont host, I'm sure he will realise that students will likely ignore his warnings and go participate in the tournament anyway so he will agree if you allow him some control over the tournament. Now go, I do hope you don't fail Lucius. And I wasn't joking about the wife do send her round quickly"

Lucius flared his robe and stalked out of the room in a fashion that would make Snape proud. All he could hear as he walked down the hallway was the cackling of the madman.

10.58 AM, 1st September 1996 – England, London, King's Cross Station.

Harry ran through the train station counting the platforms off. Thankfully the train station was relatively empty as it was past the morning rush of workers; otherwise, he may have been unable to his destination in time. He picked his trunk up and jumped onto the train tracks, crossing to the next platform.

"Wooo, just in time" Harry muttered as he stepped straight through the wall at platform Nine and Three quarters. He really needed to look into getting his broom licence; muggle transport was much to slow and in today's case, late as hell. He had used a large sum of his trust accounts money to purchase a house in his first year. It was in a remote part of the English country side so he could practice magic in piece and never have to see the Dursley's ever again.

He pushed through a group of parents gossiping about the latest scandal involving the prosecution of Peter Pettigrew and exoneration of Sirius Black. It brought a smile to his face as he thought about his Godfather; the man had spent 15 years in hell and somehow left possessing a disposition on life more sunny than Harry's had ever been. He was curious about the amount of compensation Sirius would get from the ministry, the heir of house black being locked up without trial for 15 years, all for a crime he didn't commit; they were going to have to break the piggy bank open for this one.

The train started chugging forwards only seconds after Harry set foot on it. He quickly worked his way to the back of the train and found an empty cabin to sit in. The Cabins were enchanted with extension charms making them able to seat up to 10 or so people comfortably instead of the usual 4 or 5 not that that changed much for him.

Harry put his trunk on the empty seat in front of him and opened it up. His trunk contained a few pairs of robes and large amount of books. He sighed as he pulled his wand out of the side compartment. The ministry really tried hard to make a barely functional and cheaply replaceable wand for all Junior students: 6 inches of Birch with a delivery owl feather core. It was actually a good move as it keeps kids from accidentally injuring themselves and others because it's such a weak magic focus and allows them to learn the basics of controlling their magic and magic law before giving them any real power. Also it is unwise to do the wand bonding ritual before your magical core has stabilised as it can cause issues. And it allows the ministry to keep tabs on when kids are casting out of school by the use of some rather complex and powerful protean enchantments to make sure they aren't casting in muggle areas.

These ministry issue wands had been almost impossible for Harry to use. In his first year he had been dubbed the 'squibard' because he couldn't cast a single spell. Of course he wasn't actually a squib otherwise the Hogwarts Student Registry wouldn't have sent him the school invite. The Registry was an item as old as Hogwarts, made by the four founders to find magical children across England Whales, Scotland and Ireland; upon their 13th Birthday it would send them an invite to Hogwarts. Before they were able to attend Hogwarts wizarding children would usually attend muggle schools, small wizarding schools or be home schooled. They didn't learn magic until 13 because magic is odd and spells simply do not work until children are 13. It has been speculated that this is because 13 is one of the 3 magical primes (3, 7 and 13) but nobody knows for sure as they can't simply ask magic.

At first his lack of magical ability didn't matter to much as they weren't even learning spells in class, just the theory's and laws of the different magical specialities. The issues came when they started learning their first spell, the charm 'wingardium leviosa'. Most students were able to cast the spell by the second lesson, the last few got it by the 4th lesson: Except Harry. He had been sent to Dumbledore's office to see if the Headmaster could figure out what was wrong.

4.00 PM, 8th of October 1993 – Scotland, Hogwarts, Headmasters Office. (Infodump incoming)

Dumbledore paced around his office thinking about his next appointment, Harry Potter. He had been meaning to talk to the boy but he wanted Harry to settle and gain a little understanding of the magical world before they talked. The boy had undoubtedly uncovered things about his family and would want explanations, but he wasn't sure how much young Harry could handle.

Dumbledore sighed, he would test the boys mental fortitude before deciding. The only times he had seen the boy was during feasts in the Great Hall. He had looked focused and stoic although his hair colour was somewhat unexpected. He wasn't sure whether it was died or had naturally turned white, he hoped it was the former, hair losing colour so young is rarely a sign of anything good. On a positive note the boy hadn't appeared to have inherited his fathers poor sight.

'knock knock knock' Dumbledore stopped pacing "Come in Harry"

Dumbledore stood in the centre of the room watching as the door creaked open revealing an uncertain looking Harry Potter. His face had the same aristocratic hansom look his father had boasted and his eyes were a piercing green with ethereal ghost like glow to them. Well at least he could strike lack of magic off the list of potential problems with magic, his eyes spoke of barely restrained power. He was quite short for his age maybe a little under 5 foot but aside from that he seemed very healthy.

Dumbledore smiled down and the boy and flared his power a little to give his speckled eyes a twinkling effect. Harry smiled back and seemed more at ease. "'Welcome to Hogwarts Harry, I do hope you are enjoying yourself. Let us find a more comfortable place to talk"

Harry followed him up the stairs whilst gazing around the room at all his different gadgets, he seemed particularly interested in Fawkes, his phoenix. Fawkes gave a little squawk from his perch then went back to grooming his feathers.

Now sitting behind his desk with Harry opposite him Dumbledore decided to start the conversation. "Lemon drop?"

Harry shook his head "Ah no thank you Professor".

Harry's focus drifted towards some of the gadgets on Dumbledore's desk.

"A fascinating magic enchanting, an endless amount of possibilities if one has the patience and knowledge. Now I'm sure you have some questions for me before we try and solve your magic problem."

Harry nodded "Sir I was wondering why I was left with the Dursley's, They didn't seem to know anything about magic and they were not exactly the most… Caring of people"

Dumbledore hung his head a little and sighed. "I'm sorry about that, as you have probably heard your parents defeated Voldemort on Halloween 1981. This isn't quite the case, from what I could gather at the scene it appears your mother managed to activate a sacrificial magic she had created that protected you from the killing curse. The curse ended up backfiring and killing him instead, but it left that scar on your head, a kind of scar that can only be left by the darkest of magics."

Harry seemed to take the news pretty well and simply nodded his head "But why did you leave me with the Dursley's you could have simply left me at an orphanage or with one of the many magic families that would have adopted me."

Dumbledore sighed "I am sorry about leaving you with the Dursley's I didn't know they would be so, disagreeable. I had heard Lilly talk of how she had enjoyed visiting Petunia to see her baby, Dudley I believe, and thought you would be more loved with family than strangers. When I left you there I watched them with their son and they seemed to be kind and loving, I guess I was wrong? I know apologies will not change the past, but know that I am sorry none the less. As to why I left you with them rather than someone in the magical community, it was quite simple: the Death Eaters would be looking for revenge. I had hoped to take you back when they were all captured and in Azkaban but they had their fingers in everything. Some of Voldemort's inner circle were pardoned by claiming they were under the imperius curse and a fair few of them held office or power in the Ministry of Magic and Wizengamot so if the ministry found out where you were the Death Eaters would find out where you were, so you would have had to live your childhood under constant threat of death. So I decided to leave you with the Dursley's, I had given them quite a large sum of gold, they should have had no problem with finances"

Harry mumbled something quietly "...good for nothing leacher my ass."

"Do you have any other questions?"

"Ah, no more questions, I understand thank you for explaining" a smile seemed to grace Harry's face but it didn't extend to his eyes.

Dumbledore nodded. He hoped Harry would forgive him one day, but he did not expect that day to be any time soon. He decided to press on. "As you have likely been learning about in class, to cast magic 3 steps are required: gathering magic, moulding your magic and projecting your magic. Now, lets see what is going wrong; cast the levitating charm on this quill."

Harry pulled his wand out of his pocket and carefully cast the spell. 'Wingardium leviosa' nothing happened.

Dumbledore nodded his head and stroked his beard. "You have the wand movements and pronunciation down to a T as the muggles would say so the moulding shouldn't be an issue. I think the issue may lie with either gathering your magic into the wand or projecting your magic. Maybe it will be easier to gather your magic and project it if you understand it, I take it you haven't gone into much depth in magic theory yet?."

"No not yet sir, but what if its the wands fault? It's so cruddy compared to the wands the older students use."

"Hmmm. This will will likely require a long explanation then. As you have probably guessed there are many different types of magic and some of these do not even use wands. Certain rituals use staffs and various other magical focuses, Potion making sometimes simply requires you to use words to have a magical effect, rune magic is just writing imbued with magic, there is even dance magic. To an extent all magic is a ritual: you perform actions with objects and natural magical energy responds by moulding your magical energy into a spell. Wand magic just happens to be the most effective and varied style of magic. The wand you are using is unable to hold very much magical energy but it holds enough to be able to cast simple spells at low power.

Now onto magical energy. Magic flows throughout our bodies, it makes us stronger in many ways, it increases our strength, it makes us heal faster, it protects us from sickness and disease. The magical energy that flows throughout our bodies comes from our magical core and our magical core is a bit like a pressurised gas canister. When you gather your magical energy to cast a spell you can open the nozzle of the gas can allowing more energy to flow through your body, meaning more magic is available to fuel the spell. But once the canister is empty you will feel very weak and you are vulnerable to the many things magic protects you from. Your magical core is always replenishing itself slowly but you will usually be fully refreshed after a good nights sleep. Despite the bad quality of the core of your wand it should provide sufficient pull to gather magic into it.

Projecting your magic may be the issue. To project your magic you simply need to will it to leave the wand, as soon as the magic is moulded it starts to dissipate so you need to project it fast or the spell will simply disappear. It massively helps if you point you wand where you want your magic to go but is not required; if you have the willpower and control you could make the magic fly sideways out of your wand but that is less accurate and sometimes takes a little power out of the spell. Now, when you gather your magic to cast, imagine all of your magic flowing towards the pull of the wand and on the last movement of the spell image that magic flying towards the quill."

Harry seemed to focus on the wand intently before changing focus to the feather and repeating the spell 'wingardium leviosa'. Dumbledore frowned as nothing happened. Harry did the spell a few more times with no result.

"Perplexing, continue casting I need to try something." Dumbledore rummaged through a few of his draws before simply holding his wand up and saying 'accio lens'. A small blue object shot towards him and he caught it in the palm of his hand. He muttered some more words and tapped it before holding it in front of his eye. When he looked at Harry he was astonished, magical energy pulsed through his body his magic had even gathered around the wand as its meagre capacity was filled; he saw the issue when Harry cast the spell. Natural magical energy was activated by the casting ritual and attempted to mould his magic but it was rebuffed, as if it was water washing against a rock: usually the natural magical energy would weave and mould the wizards own magic into a spell but this was not happening. He had never seen nor heard of such a thing happening before.

Dumbledore lowered blue lense and looked apologetically at Harry. "I'm sorry I've never seen anything like this before, I will have to look into it and see if there is anything I can do but it may take a while. You can continue with your studies of course I will just have to tell teachers not to expect you to be able to successfully cast spells"

Harry didn't look as dejected as Dumbledore had expected: in fact he looked determined. "What is the problem and is there anything I can do to help?"

Dumbledore's eyes twinkled. The boys determined attitude would help immensely in keeping him from getting to hopeless about the situation but there wasn't much he could do to help. "Your magic seems to resist the natural magic energy, stopping it from moulding your spells. Unfortunately there isn't much you can do to help I will be reading a lot of books and talking to a few people who are experts in this kind of thing"

Harry looked pensive for a second. "If my magical energy resists the natural magical energy, does that mean it resists other peoples spells as well?"

Dumbledore's eyes started twinkling like mad. Harry was quite smart, turning a crippling problem into a powerful advantage. If he was able to figure out how to get him casting he would make a formidable wizard, his magical core seemed very powerful and it was still growing and its unique property of resisting magic would undoubtedly come in handy for many things. "Let's test that"

Dumbledore flicked his wand at Harry firing a very weak stinging hex at him. Harry shook his head "Nothing". Dumbledore put a little more power into the spell. "Hmm I think I felt that". Dumbledore upped it again. "Ouch, that stung" Harry rubbed his chest where the spell hit before looking at Dumbledore in challenge. "Try that again old man"

Dumbledore gave a light chuckle and flicked the spell at his chest again. This time Harry's face had a fixated look on his face and he smiled after the spell hit him. "Haha it worked. I just gathered my magic where you shot the spell and it stopped it."

Dumbledore was shocked the boy possessed a natural talent in focusing his magic, it is a relatively rare talent but it was one that was required for wandless casting. The power of the wandless cast would depend on the amount of magic Harry could gather at a point without a wand.

"Harry try gathering your magic in your hand without a wand" Dumbledore put the blue lens up to his eye and watched as Harry's had lit up like a light. He was gathering as much as he did when he held the wand.

"Wonderful, You have a massive potential for wandless magic Harry, you just need teach your magic the spells and you will be casting wandlessly in no time."

"What do you mean teach my magic the spells couldn't I just use my finger for the wand movements or something"

Dumbledore gave Harry an apologetic smile. "It would be useful if such a thing was possible but it is not. Like I said before to cast a spell is like a ritual: you say the words and do the actions and the natural magical energy responds moulding a spell. Without a wand the ritual is incomplete and the natural magic doesn't respond; resulting in no spell."

A confused look was plastered on Harry's face "Then how do you do magic without a wand?"

Dumbledore nodded. "Magic is quite a complex thing; in your 6th and 7th year you will be learning how to cast without words or wand movements and you can do this is because your magic learns. Imagine your magic is like a pet of some kind. When you cast a spell it is like teaching it a trick, only you are leading it about by the nose. After you cast a spell enough your magic begins to get a feel for that spell, the speed your magic learns spells varies depending on the type of spell: some pets like water and others hate it your magic is similar hence magic and wand preferences. And after a while you are simply able to think of the feeling of a spell and your magic will mould itself without the need for the casting ritual. You can still use the rituals to make it easier but for the most part your magic will know what to do, hence you can do the wand movements without words and cast the spell and visa versa or without either. Now once you know the feel of the spell well enough to cast it without wand movements and words if you can gather enough energy in the tip of your finger you can simply turn it into a spell and use it. You have to be careful with some magic though as if it is active inside your finger it will likely just effect you, as you are something it recognises as a target and it is already in contact.

The reason most wizards and witches can't wandlessly cast is because they are only capable of gathering their magic around a magical focus but all wizards and witches can learn to silently cast spells given the time; unless their spirit animal is a goldfish. And like a living thing your magic grows, stabilising on your 16th birthday before then it changes quite often so don't expect to be able to find your speciality with any reliability yet.

Now you should understand a little of what you are capable of just don't give up and I'm sure I'll be able to figure out how to solve your problem. You can come speak to me any time after I'm not teaching, the gargoyle will let you up. Oh and before you go you can ask any more questions you might have"

Harry stood up and quickly bowed his head "I have no more questions for now. Thank you for your help Professor"

Dumbledore saw a genuine smile on Harry's face as he turned to leave. His inability to cast must have been causing Harry more problems than he had assumed, but perhaps it had something to do with him being part of a rather elitist house they likely were not kind to him thinking he was weak.

?:?, 1st of September 1996 – Scotland, Hogwarts Express.

Harry couldn't help but feel slightly embarrassed when he thought back on his first year. Despite the headmasters help, it had still taken him until the beginning of his second year to figure out how to get around his magics resistance. The key to success lay in exhausting his magical core, he had to exhaust it to the point that it stopped responding to his every tap with a blast and filling his body with magical energy constantly; once his core was running low enough when he gathered magic at his wand he could use such a small amount that the natural magical energy would overpower it and mould the spell. This didn't make practising easy, since he couldn't keep his magical core exhausted all day so he had to focus his training on one spell at a time training it until his magic had learnt it to the point he could cast it without a wand this led to him being able to cast spells at the level of the older students since he wasn't limited to using the twig wand. The problem was he had only learnt 3 spells in 2 years, Harry didn't think this was to much of an issue when fighting but his daily life was a chore compared to most other students: he couldn't simply flick his wand to clean his clothing and room or find things, even though Dobby helped these days it was still a drain.

Half the difficulty lay with exhausting his magical core, it took him a while to figure that out as well. The most efficient way to do this was by focusing his magic into his family heirloom, the Cloak. He had asked Dumbledore why he had left the cloak with him at the Dursley's despite it being magical, to which he simply said something about how Harry wouldn't stop crying unless he had it. Unfortunately Dumbledore wasn't sure where his parents got the Cloak either but guessed it was some kind of heirloom: many very old families had strange heirlooms.

The Cloak was still in perfect condition, although now he knew that was because it was some kind of magical item. A magic item that's grand magic was – getting rid of magic, he couldn't seem to figure out what it did with that magic or if it had any proper purpose.

He picked the Cloak out from under a few of his robes and felt a very slight tug on his core, much like his 6 inches of birch and owl. He decided against practising his latest spell and stuffed the cloak back into his trunk. He wasn't keen on venturing into the snake pit with no energy, he was expecting Draco to be in an especially foul mood, and he would probably directed at Harry: the subsequent escape and Exoneration of Harry's Godfather meant that Draco's designs on the Lord Black title were pushed back decades if not forever. Harry wished Sirius hadn't been so keen to tell the press about how Harry had captured Petter Pettigrew, which had set the proving of his innocence in motion. Harry wasn't worried to much about Draco, he was more worried about Draco's influence. Draco may not be able to do anything to him with his peashooter wand, but older Slytherin's may be inclined to act on Draco's behalf to try curry favour with Lucius Malfoy.

Harry was sure he made the right decision capturing Wormtail instead of killing him but it was still extremely hard not to kill the rat. When he had actually come face to face with the snivelling coward he had almost succumbed to the seething rage inside of him, the rage was bringing up memories of his childhood dreams, which he had figured were linked to Voldemort's life, whispering to his soul; telling it to stomp the pathetic rat underfoot, as was the creature deserved for what he did. This time the voice was his own rather than that of a raspy snake. But he ignored it anyway, just on the principle of the matter: it's generally a bad idea to make permanent life altering decisions when you can't think straight. It worked out better in the end as Wormtail now sits rotting in a specially made cell in Azkaban while Sirius rides his fame balls deep into any hot ass that falls for his whiles; apparently he still hasn't lost his swagger, even after 15 years in Azkaban.

The train started screeching and banking a hard left. Harry had been unprepared and ended up in a heap on the floor underneath his trunk. He hated Banshees corner, but it was at least a reliable alarm mechanism, screeching at you that it's only 15 minutes until the train reached Hogsmeade express.

Harry changed into his school robes quickly read through his timetable for the year; it was a rather depressing sight. In the first semester he would be doing Potions and Transfiguration both the most homework intensive classes and both headed by the strictest teachers. Although Snape was usually more lenient on his Slytherin's, that courtesy didn't extend to Harry whom Snape thoroughly disliked for no apparent reason. His other 3 subjects for the first term were rather intense as well, Charms, DADA and History of magic.

History of magic was one of the most loved classes in the school. Many students said their parents told them it was the worst subject; the teacher a ghost who droned on for hours about goblin wars. But now Dumbledore taught the class and talked about all sorts of things, such as the origin of Vampires and the Merpeople or the historic importance of dragons. It also helped that he would illustrate lectures using awe inspiring magic and homework usually involved reading stories about something interesting.

The train ground to a halt and tooted. Harry waited a few minutes, letting everyone to clear out before leaving his compartment and heading for a carriage. When he got outside there was only one carriage left, so he quickly headed to it before he was left behind; walking to Hogwarts from Hogsmeade wasn't how he wanted to start his year. The carriages were pulled by Thestrals which looked quite macabre but were nice enough creatures.

He swung open the Carriage door and jumped inside, when he sat down he noticed someone sitting on the other side of the booth; Slytherin's top witch, Morgana Snape.

&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6&8&6

Authors note: I'm sorry this chapter had little in the way of plot advancement but I thought it best to get the bulk of how magic works out of the way.

Next chapter will be introducing the OC, Tri Wizard cup, Harry's school life and maybe Fluer depending on how much I can squeeze in. Hopefully it will be done in two or three days.

Also sorry if there are some errors it was taking to long to edit it and I just want to move on with the story rather than re reading everything another 3 times, hope it's still good though.

If you have any questions complaints or corrections (or reviews) just voice them in the reviews and I will try and answer.