The morning of the second day of classes dawned bright, the sun setting the tops of the Forbidden Forest aflame as it crept slowly up above the distant mountains.

James had awoken early, and spent more time trying to levitate his feather. Every time it still burnt out in a puff of smoke after he tried it, and now instead of shooting up to the ceiling as a dangerous projectile it flat-out refused to move. He was beginning to think that Professor Budd had given him an anti-magic chicken as some sort of joke punishment for the Detonator Debacle.

As a result of James' renewed vigour and determination to make up for yesterday's antics, he was the first to arrive at his Defence Against the Dark Arts classroom that morning. He shot a furtive glance around the room before choosing a seat near the front and taking out his book to do a bit of pre-reading. Aunt Hermione would have been beaming with pride.

James was partway through reading about the Seven Surefire Steps to Stump Sphinxes when he heard an odd step-thump, step-thump sound coming from the hallway. He spun in his chair to see a student walking into the class, carrying a stack of rolled-up parchment. She had short blonde hair that didn't quite reach her shoulders, and a round face with rosy cheeks. She seemed to be singing to herself under her breath as she strode up the aisle between the desks.

Well James had thought that it was a student, but the unmistakeable embroidery around the hem of the robe that he noticed as she approached marked the girl out as a teacher. James thought she looked younger even than some of the older students already at the school. She evidently didn't see him as she step-thumped her way towards the front of the class. That was when James noticed that she only had one leg.

She stopped as she spotted James staring at her, and gave a friendly wave and a wink.

'Check it out, pretty neat huh, engraved it all myself,' she hiked her robe up to above her knees and stuck out the leg for James to examine. The woodwork was indeed carved intricately, with delicate patterns of flowers and scrollwork entwined about its entire length.

'It happened a couple years ago,' she continued, in response to his unasked question. 'It was during an Auror training run; one of the other trainees slipped when casting a spell, and I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Your Dad was there. You are James Potter, right?'

James nodded his assent.

'He was co-ordinator at the time, he was the one who took me to St. Mungo's. He's great, your Dad. He never lets anything phase him. Real calm the whole time.'

James remembered the night his Dad had come home after the accident, he had been absolutely distraught, threatening to quit right on the spot, trying to take all the blame himself. It had taken Ginny long into the night to calm him down, and he had been shaky and on edge for the next week.

Magic was dangerous.

'That was the end of my Auror career anyway,' the Professor continued with a wistful smile. 'And here I am, back at Hogwarts, trying to teach you lot how to not end up like me.' Her expression was a little grim for James' liking. Suddenly he recalled her name, from one of his fathers' tear-filled rants the night after her injury.

'Zoe Meadows,' he breathed.

'One and the same.' She forced a smile back on her face and straightened, wincing slightly as her weight shifted back onto the wooden leg. James returned the smile, trying to make it show her that teaching at Hogwarts was just as important as being an Auror, and that she would be able to do just as much good. He wasn't sure if he achieved any of it.

'Well, that'll be the rest of them,' she said, as the class started trickling in the door. She raised her voice so the incoming students would hear. 'Now, if you are as much trouble as I hear you were yesterday Mister Potter then I will be having some very stern words with you and your father.' She gave him a cheeky wink before spinning away to the front of the class.

James made quite sure that Cat and Clip sat on either side of him for this class, just in case Fred decided that he had something in that damned bag that needed to see the light of day. He had even left Egberta back up in his room, despite several very vocal protests. Today was the day where nothing went wrong. He was sure of it. He was going to make it so.

Zoe – Professor Meadows – made each student stand up and introduce themselves to the class, plus say one spell that they wanted to learn this year and why. James chose 'Expelliarmus'. His Dad had secretly been teaching him the wand movements and the tricks to casting it, and he thought that would be one spell he could probably be top of the class at.

The last student to give their name and spell was Emry, who waxed eloquent on the pros and cons of the Full Body Bind Curse for at least ten minutes before a sheet of parchment shot up and wrapped itself around his face, effectively silencing him. James could have sworn he saw Professor Meadows hastily tucking her wand back up her sleeve after that.

A few students had begun to pull books out of bags after this, anticipating the lesson proper to begin, but Professor Meadows waved them away. 'We'll get to all that reading and learning later,' she said with a merry laugh. 'For now, who wants to hear a few cool stories about Auror training school?' Nearly every hand in the class shot up. James liked Professor Meadows already.

The class ended just as she was getting to the climax of a story about cracking down on a group of witches and wizards who were illegally exporting powdered unicorn horn throughout Europe. She paused just as one of her colleagues had been struck by a Full Body Bind, and another blasted off the dock which they were duelling on into the water. She was one against three, with only her wand, a single use of Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder and a length of Anti-Apparition rope.

The class groaned collectively as she stopped the story and clapped her hands together. 'Homework!' She yelled. James shot a panicked look at Clip, how were they supposed to do homework if they hadn't learnt anything yet? 'I want no more than a foot of parchment on how you would have captured all three of the Hastings Horn Smugglers and saved Bryce and Wetherington. Class dismissed!'

James thought that she just might be the coolest teacher ever.

On the way to Transfiguration, James found himself walking with Clip, who was equally enthralled by their new defence professor.

'She was great, really puts into perspective the type of things that we'll be learning, you know? Clip was saying, as they waited for a stubborn staircase to change back so they could get to the classroom. James wasn't totally sure what he meant by that, but nodded nonetheless. 'Instead of just rushing in learning spells left and right, gives you a good sense of the why behind it.'

James thought that Clip seemed a little too relieved about not having to do any magic, and it wasn't the first time he had mentioned it. When James pressed him on the topic Clip looked down at his shoes and scuffed at the flagstones.

'I'm just… I'm sort of having trouble with the whole making magic thing,' Clip admitted in a small voice. 'The feather in Charms, plus I've tried a few other spells in my spare time, nothing seems to work for me.' He paused and swallowed a couple of times, looking terrified of what he was about to say. 'They don't ever… They don't ever send kids back do they? Kids like me? Muggleborns that just can't do magic? You don't think they made a mistake with me?'

His voice had trailed away into barely a whisper by the end of that last sentence and James stopped in his tracks, stunned. He couldn't imagine being scared that someone was going to take away his magic from him; magic was the best thing in the world, it was his whole world. If he had come here thinking that someone could just take it away from him like that, because he wasn't good enough at it, he would have felt as scared as Clip looked.

James felt very much like this was a private conversation, and so he pulled Clip aside through an unlocked door. The two of them clambered into an uncomfortably small broom closet. James cleared his throat, not really sure how to go about this.

'Look Clip, my family has been wizards for, like, ever. My Aunt is the Head of the Department of Magical Education over at the Ministry. No one has ever said anything about sending a muggleborn student home, you were chosen to come to Hogwarts, right? They don't make mistakes about that. Whatever it is that knows if you're a wizard or not, it's never wrong, it just doesn't make mistakes.' James tried to force all the conviction he could into his voice, the truth was he had no idea what it was that somehow just knew which students all across the country were born to be wizards and witches, especially the muggleborn ones.

Something that James had said seemed to work though, as Clip offered him a wobbly half-smile in return.

'Your Aunt is Hermione Granger? The one who started the Prep Program, and sent me all the books and things about Hogwarts when I was seven?' This seemed to cheer Clip up even further, and James saw him visibly relax in the dim light. He supposed that the Pre-Reading and Prior Preparation Program might not have been such a made-up thing after all. Come to mention it, he did recall his Aunt spending a very stressful couple of months around his own seventh birthday when she had been trying to 'push a bill through'. Through what James didn't know, but it seemed like she was the reason that Clip was able to learn all about Hogwarts and Dragons and the world of magic more than just a month before his eleventh birthday. That thought made him feel happy.

'You can study with me if you want,' James offered. 'I still can't levitate a feather without nearly burning down the room, and I'm the only one in first year who managed to nearly knock someone unconscious with a bouncing bulb. I think maybe we both could use it.'

'Thanks James,' Clip smiled warmly. 'I just… I just never really felt like I fit in back home, at school and stuff. Until I came here that is, it sort of feels like this is the first place I can really call home. Does that sound dumb?'

James smiled back encouragingly; he knew someone else who had felt exactly like that in his first year, and he had gone on to save the Wizarding World. He told Clip it wasn't dumb at all.

The two pushed their way out of the broom closet, careful to avoid the clutter, at the exact time a group of older Gryffindor students who were fast becoming familiar to James happened by.

'All right Potter!' One of them yelled. 'We won't judge!'

Their laughter followed the two boys down the hall. James had no idea what they were talking about, but Clip had gone very red all of a sudden.

By the time they arrived at the Transfiguration classroom the halls were devoid of life; they knew they were late. Heartbeat quickening at the thought of landing another set of detentions James pushed on the door eagerly, hoping perhaps their Professor might be late, too.

The handle turned, but the door didn't budge and James smacked his nose hard against unforgiving, polished wood.

'Ah!' He cursed, 'Bloody hell that hurt.' He touched his finger to his nose to see if there was any blood. His eyes were watering, and the pain lanced across his entire face.

Clip, who was definitely not laughing, tried the door with a little less fervour.

'Huh,' he offered helpfully. 'We appear to have discovered what happens when one is late to class.'

He knocked firmly three, four times. No one answered.

As James' agony subsided to a more manageable level he paced the hallway, getting more impatient by the second. If another teacher caught them out here they'd surely be given detention.

'I read about a spell,' said Clip, a little more productive this time. 'But I've never tried it.'

'Alohomora, I know that one, too.' James agreed. 'I'll try it if you want.'

Clip cast a sidelong nervous glance at James' wand. If being late to class was possibly worth a detention then burning down the door would definitely do it.

James strode up to the door, exuding as much confidence as possible, and thinking of very wet things. A puddle, a stream, the shower, rain... Rain…

'Damn it,' James swore, as he lost his train of thought. He cleared his throat, hefted his wand towards the door and opened his mouth–

The door swung inwards without any warning. James looked down at his wand, confused. He jumped when a voice sounded from within the classroom.

'So nice of you to join us gentlemen, I hope I haven't impressed dreadfully upon your obviously busy schedule, by being so inconsiderate as to schedule this lesson at an apparently inconvenient time for you both?'

What was it with everyone around here and their big words? James had to stop himself from openly frowning at his teacher.

'Sir, we're really sorry,' Clip begun. But their teacher wasn't having any of it.

'I suggest,' began the professor, as though he was trying to keep himself from erupting, 'that you go over and stand in that corner, facing the wall. Quickly now, before I decide to use the pair of you as subjects for some demonstrations that I am about to perform.'

James certainly didn't like the idea of being transfigured into anything, and apparently neither did Clip. The pair of them practically tripped over themselves as they scrambled to get to the aforementioned corner. James picked a spot in front of a portrait of a very self-righteous witch, who took it upon herself to cast admonishing glares at the two of them and harrumph every minute or so.

Behind the two latecomers the lesson proceeded as normal, as if they weren't there.

'As I was saying class, my name is Professor Artimeus Plye, I will be your transfiguration professor for the duration of your stay at Hogwarts. Transfiguration is a very exhaustive branch of magic, and likewise a very powerful one. You are enforcing your will upon the subject of your transfiguration with such force as to change its physical form. Observe.'

James made to turn around, but the witch in the portrait brandished a teapot at him and shouted 'Don't you dare laddie! Don't think you be the first to be getting this punishment! He put me here for a reason, did good Mister Plye.'

Whatever was going on behind James sounded very exciting; the class was gasping, and there were a lot of oohs and aahs. He tried to catch a look out the corner of his eye but every time the witch would shake her teapot and scold him anew.

Evidently she took her job very seriously.

The two boys shot each other many a mournful look as the class laughed and applauded what James could only assume was some of the coolest magic he would have seen since he had arrived at school.

At one point their guardian looked up from the tea she had been brewing for the last fifteen minutes, and said distractedly: 'Oh, I like this part.'

The sentence hadn't even processed in James' brain when something landed on his back. Something big. Something with a lot of legs. He let out a scream that would have been very reasonable had it come from, say, Leah, or Cat, or perhaps a banshee being run over by the Hogwarts Express.

The class roared in laughter as James frantically swatted at something easily the size of a large Kneazle that was crawling on his back. Before he could do any real damage, however, Professor Plye flicked his wand and it disappeared altogether.

'Well, class,' he said with a chuckle. 'That concludes our demonstration of the Seven Forms of Transfiguration, for the animate and inanimate. If you will turn your books to page thirteen, and copy down the Forms, and associated Rules.'

The laughter died away pretty sharply at that.

'I think it may be time for our delinquent duo to return to the ranks, as well.' The professor gestured to two seats right up the front of the class. James shot Clip a look and they made their way sheepishly to sit down.

At least the rest of the class passed without incident. Although, James wondered if two feet of parchment on the Seven Forms of Transfiguration and why they should never be intermixed didn't quite come under the category of 'incident'.

Lunch saw a slightly dejected James join a group of excitedly nattering first years at the Gryffindor table. Cat sidled over so he could sit next to her.

'Check this out troublemaker!' Called Freddy, as he slid across a piece of parchment. James smoothed it out to read, and Cat leant her head on his shoulder, evidently to do the same.

FIRST YEARS:

Trouble with Tricky Trapdoors? Problems with Pesky Passages? Are your Corridors not Cooperating?

We have the solution for you!

Gather this Sunday at 10am outside the Great Hall for the inaugural First-year Acclimatization Readiness Training class.

A fun, interactive way to learn the ins and outs of the Hogwarts Castle. Late to potions and need to know the nearest shortcut? A call of nature catch you unaware and you need the closest facilities? Learn it all at this week's F.A.R.T meeting.

Students will be placed in teams and set a series of challenges that will take them throughout the castle, familiarising themselves with every nook and cranny along the way. Prizes for the winning team!

Meetings will be held throughout the year, and the team who scores the most wins unlocks the mystery Grand Prize!

Bonus! Arrive by 9:45 and get an insight into the mysterious Eighth Floor from our very own Professor Neville Longbottom, one of the Hundred who helped rebuild Hogwarts.

See you there, first-years. Happy hunting!

James looked at Fred. He shrugged in reply. Sunday was the day after Quidditch trials this weekend. James wasn't sure if he wanted to spend the day running around the castle if he was already sore from a full day on the pitch.

Cat, however, had other ideas.

'Ooh this will be excellent!' she squealed. From where her head had been resting on James' shoulder this was quite loud. 'Maybe we will get to find the Chamber of Secrets, or the Room of Requirement. Maybe they'll even let us into the eighth floor for a look.'

Cassie had chosen this point in time to wander past their spot at the table. She couldn't resist herself upon hearing Cat's outburst.

'Honestly, Kattala,' she scoffed. 'Everyone knows that the Chamber was sealed again for good after the last time it was opened. And the Room of Requirement? Everyone knows that's a myth. I mean, a room that just magically happens to appear so that the students can form their own little army to fight off Voldemort but no one else can get in? Seems a little too convenient for me.'

Cat mumbled something about what her mum had told her into the neck of James' sweater. It gave him goose bumps all down one side.

James tried to catch Cassie's eye as she stalked past, but she was very pointedly ignoring him. He called out after her, but she didn't even stop to turn around.

Cat was looking a little upset and wiping at her eyes when James turned back to the table. He felt a pang of annoyance at Cassie for upsetting her, and pulled her into an awkward sitting hug. Cat was a hugger, James knew.

'I'll come to the F.A.R.T party with you Cat, I think it sounds like loads of fun.'

Fred sniggered and slapped the table. 'Well I'll be damned if I'm going to miss out of anything called a fart party! I'm in, too.'

When they all got up to head to their next class Cat had a smile back on her face, her long silver-blonde hair bouncing happily as she skipped off with her friends.

Double Charms with the Hufflepuffs seemed to drag on forever that afternoon. The sun lanced in through the window right onto James' desk, and he found himself in a desperate battle just to stay awake. They had moved on from levitating feathers, much to James' relief, and Professor Budd was lecturing them all on the ins and outs of 'Charm Etiquette'. Or something.

'Now one must always be careful to select the Charm based on the subject one wishes to modify. It is imperative…' The professor's voice drifted in and out of focus.

James hadn't seen Holly all day. He remembered his promise to Professor Longbottom, as soon as the class was over he would go searching for her.

'… Engorgement Charm must never be used on any part of the human anatomy. There is the cautionary tale of the young wizard who, in order to impress a lady love…'

James panicked a little, where did Holly hang out? He supposed the library was as good a place as any to start looking. Maybe he would take a few feathers from Egberta and look up the Levitation Charm while he was there. That ought to impress Cassie.

'…Violent explosion, and despite a lengthy stay in St. Mungos, he was never quite the same.'

There were a few disgusted noises coming from around the room. James looked up to see what he had missed. Cat was looking even more pale that usual.

Mercifully, the class ended shortly after that, and James rushed up to the dormitory to fetch his things and begin the Holly Hunt.

It wasn't until much later, after dinner (because you can't hunt on an empty stomach, James decided) that he found her, nestled away in a quiet corner of the library behind a very large book called Transfiguration for the Talentless: Ten Top Tips for Beginners.

James approached, suddenly very nervous. He cleared his throat, and saw Holly jump, and slam the book down, sliding her bag on top of the cover. James barely stopped himself from giving a yell of fright; she had a nasty bruise on her left eye. He immediately felt even worse.

'So, erm… Trouble with Transfiguration?' He offered lamely.

Her cheeks flushed, and she shot him a scathing look.

'No. I just want to… Anyway, what does it matter to you? Come to make fun of me after hitting me in the face with a plant? Everyone else is already laughing at me anyway.'

This was going south fast. James scrambled to come up with something to say, desperate to salvage at least one of his floundering friendships.

'No, I didn't… I mean, I'm sorry… Holly it was an accident… I'm rubbish at transfiguration too,' was what came out. Interesting choice, brain. 'I showed up late and had to stand in a corner while Professor Plye threw giant spiders at me…'

He trailed off as Holly started giggling. James barely held in an enormous sigh of relief, and slid in to the seat next to her.

'He told us about that,' she managed in between fits of laughter. 'But I didn't know it was you.'

James offered a guilty smile.

'Holly, I'm really sorry about the plant thing. I just had the worst first day. Everything was going wrong, and I felt so bad after it. I wanted to come say sorry straight away, but I couldn't find you. And Professor Longbottom told me off, if that makes it any better.'

She smiled coyly up at him, and popped a strand of dark hair in her mouth.

'It's ok James. I was just really embarrassed, that's all. Everyone was laughing at me. Usually no one even talks to me. I didn't know what to do.'

'Well next time, you can just hit me with one back.' James gave her his winningest smile and held his arms out for another awkward seat-hug. If it worked on Cat he guessed it might work on Holly, too.

Her cheeks flushed and she buried himself in his jersey for a moment. When she pulled away she was smiling ear to ear. Though it was hard to tell with all that hair in her mouth.

The pair passed a couple of hours amicably, studying for their respective courses. Holly found no end of laughs in James' inability to do more than make any of Egberta's feathers smoke vigorously when he tried to levitate them.

As evening became night-time Madam Creswell, the librarian, came around to chase out the last few bleary-eyed students from where they were all ensconced. Holly asked for one of James' last feathers, to try and levitate it for herself. He slid one over to her and she placed it atop the Transfiguration library book.

James watched with interest as she pulled out her wand, a gracile length of creamy wood.

'Ash and Unicorn hair, ten and a quarter inches, supple.' She said in an uncanny imitation of Mistress Lundstrom, one of the new Wandmakers in Diagon Alley.

James laughed to himself, he well remembered the witch, intimidating in her strictness, lining him up and having him try at least a dozen wands before his had finally chosen him.

Holly cleared her throat, smiled shyly, and with a swish and a flick she said: 'Wingardium Leviosa.'

'Huh,' was all James had to offer.

The feather still wasn't moving. He saw a frown crease Holly's brow, and she tried again, in a more firm tone.

This time, with an aching familiarity, James saw instant results.

The feather flipped up on one end, spun in the air for a brief moment, and then fell back down onto the book. He could see Holly's brow furrowing in consternation, and he was about to tell her not to try again, as he knew where this was heading, when the feather burst alight in a brief, albeit intense, moment of inferno.

The fallout was immediate and it was extreme.

'WHAT IN THE NAME OF MERLIN'S BEARD DO YOU THINK YOU ARE DOING?'

James and Holly both jumped in shock, and the hawkish Madam Creswell descendent upon them, a very predatory look in her eye.

'BURNING BOOKS IN MY LIBRARY? I SWEAR I WILL HAVE THE TWO OF YOU IN DETENTION UNTIL YOU GRADUATE!'

She grabbed the pair of them be the collar of their robes and, with surprising strength for an elderly lady, threw them bodily out of the library.

'You will both report to me on Saturday at ten o'clock, where you will spend the entire day dusting the shelves. If I see either of you two in my library before then, or anywhere near any of my precious books, I'll have the headmistress expel the both of you!' Her eyes were bulging, and a vein was pulsing in her forehead as she skewered them with one final glare before turning on her heel and slamming the door to the Library shut.

Holly was on the verge of hyperventilating next to James, babbling something about being expelled, and what her parents would say. She apologized repeatedly, before running off in tears, presumably back to the Slytherin common room.

James had hardly heard any of it; the sound of Madam Cresswell's voice was still ringing in his ears. Saturday, ten o'clock. Saturday, the exact time he was supposed to have been at Quidditch trials.

The rest of the week was a mess for James; Saturday was approaching both agonizingly slowly and frustratingly quickly at the same time. His friends had all tried to console him, Fred had even offered to not go to the trials either, in protest. James had thanked him, but said that at least one of them should be on the team.

Holly would practically burst into tears every time she came near James, she had been beside herself when she found out about the Quidditch trials. She had offered at least a thousand apologies by the time their double Defence class rolled around on Friday morning, and would have come close to doubling that number throughout the period, shooting a whispered 'I'm so sorry James,' across the room every minute or so.

To make matters worse, Cassie was still very pointedly ignoring James, pretending like he didn't exist. Word had gotten around about James and Holly apparently trying to burn the library down, and as tales were won't to do, it grew in the retelling, to the point where James was congratulated on Friday lunchtime by an older Slytherin student for managing to smuggle a dragon into the school.

James had spent the entire period of double Potions trying to catch Cassie's eye, but to no avail. His efforts weren't aided by Rain, who apparently was spending the lesson trying to catch his eye. The fact that she was sitting next to Cassie, and so every time he looked over he ended up being slapped with a healthy whack of vertigo from Rain, meant that by the time the end of the lesson rolled around James was very cross. And a little dizzy.

So it was that on a Friday evening, when most of the other students were out socialising or studying, depending on their inclinations, a disgruntled James Potter was lying on the floor in the middle of the Gryffindor common room. Sometime earlier Cat had come down from the girls' dormitory and lay down with her head on James' stomach, using him for a pillow. She was now fast asleep, and the warmth of her body, coupled with the warmth from the last rays of sunlight drifting through the window were making James drowsy as well.

Fred came stumbling through the portrait hole, and dropped his bag with a crash, startling James and Cat both into a sitting position. Fred watched idly as his bag bounced gently across the room, coming to a rest against the couch next to James.

'I just had a thought,' exclaimed Fred.

Uh oh.

'That's dangerous,' James replied sceptically.

'Ah, you say that, but get this.' Fred stooped to pick up his bag, which gave an excited little wiggle. 'That feather you blew up the library with-'

James rolled his eyes at this point.

'It wasn't you who tried to levitate it, it was Holly, right?'

'Yea,' said James. 'So…'

That was when the penny dropped. He had been so caught up wallowing in his own self-pity all week that he had forgot that Holly had cast the spell on the feather.

Fred grinned at the dawning realisation written across James' face.

'Exactly, mate. I bet any money you like that that bloody chicken was transfigured from your original burnt feather, which you toasted when you got all aggressive with your Leviosaa not Levioh-sa business. I reckon Budd gave you that chicken without realising what he was doing. I mean, the guy looks like he would hardly realise if he showed up to a class wearing robes or not half the time.'

James was sitting upright, very alert all of a sudden. They needed to get down to the Professor to tell him, then he could explain to Madam Cresswell that it was a mistake and James would get to go to quidditch tomorrow!

'That's rather observant of you Fred,' Cat added from where she was sitting. 'Did you come up with all of that by yourself?'

Fred mumbled something indistinct.

'Oh alright, it was Cassie. She saw it straight away, she cornered me after Potions, told me that you were an idiot James, but you didn't deserve this one detention. I added the bit about Budd in his robes though, that was me.'

James felt a grin spread across his face.

'So she's not mad at me anymore?'

'Er… I wouldn't go that far, she still used some pretty colourful words to describe you. I had to take some notes. And she said next time she wasn't going to bail you out either.'

James sighed, a little miffed, but leaped up nonetheless and ran to grab Egberta from her cage, a feeling of hope blossoming in his chest for the first time all week.