I'm sure there are typos everywhere. Sorry!

I think I introduce Sirius somewhere in the first chapter with his full name but I'll confirm again that Mr. Black is definitely Sirius. And yes, he's trying to get Harry to understand magic without being too obvious and revealing himself. Of course he isn't perfect but then who is.

Harry could barely concentrate during the classes he had after recess. Jeremy kept pestering him with 'bloody awesome' facts about King Arthur but mercifully remained perfectly oblivious to Harry's silence. Harry's mind was whirling with things from the book and the book itself was such a mystery. He still couldn't figure out if it was real or not.

But it had such familiar names in it that were so pertinent to him that it couldn't be simple make belief. Harry's next thought was that this was some joke by someone who knew about him. But Harry couldn't think of one person in the school who had a grudge against him or even knew anything about his family life. Even the amazing Mr. Black with his secret little files couldn't know the truth. He had seen Uncle Vernon fill out Stonewall High's forms himself and his Uncle had never really liked to even say the Potter name. The forms contained the names of his guardians and named his parents as deceased.

Harry's eyes widened; surely his parent's name was written in them. That was the first blank in most forms; father's name and mother's name. It didn't matter if your parents were dead or your mum had run away with the neighbour their names surely had to be written down. But then what about his siblings; they weren't public knowledge.

Harry felt relieved as his mind found another block in his theory. Harry really didn't want to start suspecting people in the school. He was already too jumpy as it was.

But the book was still a grating reminder that everything was not okay. This book had either been planted or was an accidental find. Harry had come to believe that accidents were rarely what they seemed. So either the book had been there all along or they were onto him.

Harry stood up in shock. The wizards could already be here, looking for him. But why would they want him, Harry's mind taunted. They had been ignoring him for so long then why would they want to contact him now. Surely they didn't want him to attend their school.

"Mr. Potter, do we have something to say," Mr. Black had his eyebrow raised at his peculiar behaviour.

"No, no, sir," Harry sat down, his face now warm because every single person in his class was looking at him as if he had grown another head.

Professor Black seemed to dismiss his strangeness and began to talk about angle bisectors.

Unlike Harry all the class was sitting up straight and paying attention. Mr. Black was not a man to fool around with. He had already caught Andrew staring at his own refection in his pencil case and embarrassed him enough to never want to look in the mirror again. In their opinion Harry was a lucky idiot who had gotten away too lightly.

As soon as the class ended Harry was roused by Jeremy who also hadn't been paying too much attention but was aware enough that the bell had gone off.

"Come on, Harry, daydreaming time is over."

Harry looked up a bit taken aback that time had passed this quickly and told Jeremy that he needed to talk to the professor before leaving. Jeremy smirked and left him to deal with the slightly eccentric Mr. Black.

Mr. Black was clearing up the black board when he realized the class wasn't completely empty yet.

"Have you come to ask about class? You seemed a little lost there."

"No, sir," Harry answered bashfully, embarrassed by his woolly behaviour, "I wanted to thank you for this uniform. You didn't have to buy me anything new, Sir."

"Thank me, What ever for. This isn't new. It's the same uniform that really did smell of river Thames in its good old days."

Harry had rarely seen the river so all he felt was confusion. "But this can't be the same-"

"Can't it?" Black leaned in closer and traced a finger on Harry's button.

"Look closely at the shirt. What do you see?"

And Harry did just that and to his surprise, underneath the gleam of his uniform, he could detect the lines of Dudley's old crystal maze shirt that Aunt Petunia had seen fit to dye.

"But- But-"

"Sometimes, Harry, people only see what the want to see."

Harry's eyes were still glued to his shirt while he was sitting in the library with Ali, Terence and Jeremy. Each was scribbling away on their own English assignments trying to be as creative as possible so they could have Ms. Delilah's special blueberry pastries. The winner of each creative writing assignment usually got to keep a whole basket full of them. With mushy soups and greasy fried chicken or fish the menu hardly had anything to look forward to so this was a veritable treat.

Harry's shirt was still bindingly white and bore no remnants of the lines that had been so visible in Mr. Black's class. Harry was beginning to feel he was going to lose it very, very soon. Either his mind was playing tricks on him or maybe the light was just falling on different angles.

"A kingdom for a horse!" Terence proclaimed loudly causing their librarian to 'shush' them.

"Feeling okay, or have you caught whatever Harry's been sick from.

"I'm not sick."

"Says the man who's been acing like a lunatic since recess ended."

Harry rolled his eyes and tried to put something down on paper but ironically enough, considering how outlandishly his mind was behaving, Harry had nothing remarkable to write. Jeremy was still teasing Terence but Harry soon lost tack of their conversation. He tried really hard to think about some good topic but all his mind could conjure up was wizards and witches and even thinking about them made his head hurt.

His mind sneakily suggested this would've been much easier to write about if he'd gone to their special school. Harry humphed thinking that going to another school just so he could write about them was just too much trouble.

Could they really turn teacups into rats? Aunt Petunia certainly seemed to think so. And did they really eat eyes of newts and turn into bats in the middle of the night. Harry asked Jeremy about his opinion.

"No, silly, that's vampires. Wizards and witches ride broomsticks in the middle of the night. They're also supposed to be very, very ugly; hideous to look at."

Terence nodded, looking up from his own small paragraph about giants, "Witch's keep black cats as their familiars and curse anyone who comes their way."

"Curse someone, like a killing curse," Harry asked quietly, the word ringing in his head.

"I'm sure they have that too, but I think most witches like to curse someone with boils full of pus," Terence replied, grinning manically.

Ali rolled his eyes, "Do you guys seriously believe in all this stuff."

"Sure, me mama told me that there was once a hag who lived in our village. She cursed the crops and was burnt to the stake by the villagers. It was long time back but it doesn't mean it isn't true."

"Poor woman," Ali muttered.

"And where do they learn all this cursing and stuff," Harry was now feeling terribly curious.

"They're born with it I suppose. Can you imagine a school for witches and wizards?"

Harry forced a laugh at this.

Harry decided he needed to see the shelf where Jeremy had gotten the book. Maybe there were other books in there which could help him. After poking and prodding Jeremy, who was very intently shading in the dragon doodle he was making, Harry found the shelf's location.

"It's right at the back, near the books about horticulture. The place looks like it hasn't been dusted for years."

Harry thanked him and immediately left for the direction Jeremy pointed to him.

It was a filthy corner which really did look terrible. Harry grimaced at the thick layer of cobwebs and dust. He leaned in closer to read the titles.

"The sword of whatever,

Inferno,

The odyssey,

Guilty Pleasure (Harry had to stop to stare at the graphic engraving on the spine of the book),

Chronicles of whatever,

The Ring trilogy,

The Standard Book of Spells—"

Harry's heart was beating in his ears.

"The Standard Book of Spells Grade 1 by Miranda Goshawk, Hell," Harry whispered. With shaking hands he pulled it out and blew the dust. It looked like a normal book with a witch in a pointy hat standing with a stick in her hand. And all of a sudden the figure stared moving as fluidly as a video. The witch shook the stick in her hand and it began to glow. The witch then gave a bow as if she was performing for an audience.

Harry dropped the book in fright. It made a resounding thud against the floor. Not willing to take a chance in case the librarian appeared Harry quickly picked it up and walked towards the table his friends were sitting at.

They asked questions sensing that Harry looked scared and peaky but Harry's mouth was firmly shut. From fear or excitement Harry couldn't tell.

That night when Harry was convinced everyone was asleep he pulled out his trusty old torch and began examining the book. The witch on the cover looked displeased but Harry ignored her for the contents inside. The first spell in the book was called Alohomora.

"Alo-Alo-homra" Harry pronounced, utterly mangling the pronunciation. Nothing happened and Harry wasn't expecting anything either. He was pretty sure he couldn't do any kind of magic. Besides it seemed that to do magic he needed a wand. The first page of the book had been dedicated to wand movements. A little footnote had explained why a wand was necessary.

Harry went over the theory a few times trying to understand how something locked could be opened by waving a stick around but nothing seemed to explain that.

Harry was even more puzzled by the appearance of this second book. The shelf he'd gotten it from was so filthy that here wasn't a chance someone had placed it recently.

Maybe that lot (Harry shuddered as he realized how much he sounded like his uncle) liked to leave their books in non magical places so unsuspecting little boys and girls could be entrapped by their spells.

Time passed and September turned to October. Walter had ended up winning the basket of goodies in English class. Apparently his need to have them turned him into a literary genius. Harry had eventually chosen werewolves for a subject and turned in a solid B+ performance.

Harry still looked at those books occasionally trying to figure out the hocus pocus in them. He knew most of those spells by now. They never did anything but Harry liked the feeling they left in his mouth.

One Saturday Harry was woken up by a very excited Jeremy. "Wake up, Harry, wake up."

Harry groggily wore his glasses and saw his dorm was buzzing with activity with his dorm mates rushing about like loonies.

"They're taking us to the village. I've heard it isn't much. Not a lot to do for fun but its great place to stock up on practical stuff like socks or mittens or something for mums. At least we're going to get out of this stuffy place."

Harry welcomed the little field trip. Studies were getting substantially harder and took most of his time. There was nothing to do outside because the gardens were now little more than mud fields. Playing football in them meant getting wet and cold and not to mention dirty. Hot water was scarce and the weather chilly.

They all gathered in the school's rickety buses and left for the village. It was a quiet, sleepy village with few cars and some small shops. The arrival of the school children meant total chaos. The local pastry baker both dreaded and welcomed the children's day out. He would earn what he usually made in two weeks but his shop would be so muddy by the end of the day that it would take ages to clean up.

Harry and his mates stood outside the staring at the nice, fruity pastries and tarts.

"Isn't that a gorgeous piece of art," Walter pointed at a strawberry cheese cake.

Everyone nodded. "How much is it for," Andrew piped.

"3.50. pounds. I'll be bankrupt if I bought that." Water moaned.

"Let's all put a share in and then we could divide it amongst ourselves," Ali advised sensibly.

"I don't exactly have any money at all," Harry answered with a strained voice.

"Aww, Harry, it doesn't mater, we'll save you a piece."

"No, guys, you bought it, you earned it."

Embarrassed, Harry, on the pretext of browsing some more of the shops, decided to take a stroll. It had been ages since Harry had found some free time alone. He cherished it dearly though the company of his friends was never unwanted.

As he walked into a grove of shady trees the misty path started to become mistier. It was already a grey day and Harry could bet a million pounds it was going to rain bucket loads that night. Harry put his hands in the pockets of his threadbare hoodie. With a meandering gait Harry wandered in further, lost in his thoughts, unaware that the population around him now strictly constituted of cows.

Harry came to a halt when he came up to a crossway. The fog had become so intense Harry couldn't see anything from the way he had just come.

As soon as Harry started to blindly stumble in the way he had come he heard footsteps approaching him.

"Hello," Harry asked tentatively his heart thudding against his chest.

"Hello," Harry asked again louder his voice carrying the fear he felt.

'Petrificus Totalus is a spell that freezes or petrifies the body of the victim, making it incapable of moving, except for the eyes and the breathing.'

Harry wanted to smack himself. His mind was racing along with his heart trying to think of every single way of protecting himself; out of the moves from karate kid that Ali liked to show off once in a while and his Harry hunting day's survival techniques Harry could only remember stuff from that stupid book.

As the steps grew louder a dark form appeared on his left. It continued to become darker as it grew closer and Harry was stunned on the spot. Harry was quite brave for an eleven year old but even eleven year olds have limits.

"Petrificus Totalus" Harry roared, though the effect was quite lost as his voice cracked in the middle.

A white light rushed from his hand and hit the figure just as it became clearer.

The light hit this person but the person seemed to brush it aside.

"Hallo lad. Travelled a bit too far I see."

He was an old man with a really long, long beard. He was wearing an odd suit which was slightly shimmering and a bit purple. His aunt had always warned him against talking to strangers, especially people who looked a bit odd. Anyone his aunt hated Harry was determined to like but right now Harry couldn't be bothered.

"I'm sorry, did I scare you there, my hearing isn't what it used to be. I thought I heard something but couldn't figure out what."

The man was really old so Harry could understand him having hearing disabilities.

Harry giggled nervously, "That's okay. I understand."

The man smiled back and it was a kind smile that made Harry at ease instantly. He berated himself for getting this upset so easily.

"Here from that local comprehensive are you, let me take you back to your school mates who are no doubt quite worried."

Without waiting for Harry to agree the man started to walk in the direction Harry came from.

"Enjoying your day out, hmm."

"Yes, sir," Harry had to take long steps just to keep up with the man. For an old fellow he was really sprightly. He was a confident and sure footed man. He wasn't like any other pensioner Harry had ever seen. His blue eyes were sharp and intelligent which made him feel like the man could probably read his mind.

The man made other chit chat; asking about his school, his parents (he had been so nicely apologetic about his dead parents), his interests. Harry wasn't the kind of person to reveal so much to a stranger so he kept his replies concise and polite. Harry tried to ask a few questions himself trying to mind his manners but he knew he was failing miserably. The man didn't seem to mind much.

As they got nearer the town square a figure came almost flying towards them.

"Harry Potter, where did you disappear off to?"

Mr. Black swooped in and Harry was almost certain he was going to be held at the shoulders and be shaken till his teeth rattled but his teacher seemed to have frozen in his spot.

"Sirius," the old man nodded acknowledging Harry's teacher.

"Albus, what are you doing here."

"Just having a walk, my friend."

"A walk, my-," Mr. Black looked down at Harry and controlled himself. He leaned in closer keeping his voice low. Harry pretended he wasn't trying to eavesdrop and moved away from them just to prove that.

"Do you realize how dangerous this is, Dumbledore?"

Harry gulped at this revelation.

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