Snape and Dumbledore were, of course, discretely wary. They probably thought he was either bipolar, had somehow managed to trick the Sorting Hat, or had some grand ill plot against his housemates. Harry took offense to the third one the most, because the Puffs were a funny bunch and he liked them, never mind the whole hullabaloo about the Heir of Slytherin thing and the TriWizard thing.
He did, however, make sure he slipped into his Tom Riddle persona whenever the headmaster and or potions professor was conveniently within sight. Only two other people seem to have noticed the slight shifts, but neither Draco nor Neville ever mention anything, even if both of them looked extremely curious.
Harry was an absolute delight to the other professors of course. Two days in and he had Professor McGonagall treating him like one of her own lions, Professor Flitwick practically singing his praises, and Professor Sprout beaming at him with pride. As far as the rest of the school was concerned Harry Potter was the next budding magical prodigy and pride of Hogwarts, eccentricity and all. Most of them couldn't even get mad about it, Harry was that good.
Then a week into Hogwarts, Harry showed up to dinner wearing a new accessory.
"Harry," Susan said slowly, "Is that a tiara on your head?"
"Oh, yeah!" Harry beamed. "I got lost earlier and found it in the Lost and Found room. Isn't it pretty?"
"Pretty real ." Hannah whispered with wide eyes. "That sapphire doesn't look fake at all."
"Of course it's not fake, it was my mother's." Half the Hufflepuff table jumped at the appearance of the Grey Lady behind Harry, and now most of the entire school was staring at the spectacle they made. She eyed the tiara curiously, but didn't make a move to touch it. "I thought it lost forever."
"Your mother?" Hannah asked the ghost, and squeaked when a glance was sent her way.
"Rowena Ravenclaw."
"Wait a minute," Ernie exclaimed, grabbing even more attention to their table. "Harry, are you wearing Ravenclaw's Diadem ?"
Someone behind Harry started choking on his drink, and heedless of all the eyes on him, Harry shrugged. "I guess so. Is it important?"
About three Ravenclaws let out a strangled gurgle.
.
"Just what," Tom dryly commented two days later during their nightly conversation, "are you planning?" He held up that morning's Daily Prophet, the headline ' Potter Finds Lost Founder's Artifact! ' written out in bold letters.
"What you apparently were too crazy to do on your first life." Harry replied lightly, flipping through his Charms homework. "You know, grabbing fame and fortune by being the one to find the lost three Founders' artifacts and not putting my soul bits in them to hide."
Tom rolled his eyes at that.
"How's it over there in dark arts wonderland?" He asked the older 'teen.'
"Less dark arts wonderland, more Lady Claire's Academy on testosterone." Tom said. Lady Claire's Academy, of course, being the all girls boarding school they met in at life eighteen. "Someone actually tried to haze me. Karkaroff looked like he was about to prepare the boy's coffin when he found out."
"Did he need it?"
"The hospital wing's bed is enough for the next week." Tom paused thoughtfully. "Or two."
.
It took all of three days for Tom to establish himself as the alpha male of the younger half of the school. He even worked at a disadvantage, having no one but Karkaroff knowing his true origins. As much as the Gaunts were part of Britain's Sacred Twenty-Eight, the name held little weight nowadays with its last disgraced and pathetic members' tarnish all over it, and very, very select people had known the connection Lord Voldemort had to the family.
"You are rather terrifying," Viktor Krum, who was a year older, told him after he sent the last of the dissenters crawling away. "That was a seventh year spell, was it not?"
Tom gave Krum a bland smile. "I read ahead."
By the end of the first week, the entire school knew that Marvolo Gaunt was not only extremely intelligent, but also extremely dangerous. Messing with him was not an option if one wanted to live long enough to see graduation. (Only one person had the balls to test that theory, later on, and his classmates haven't seen him since.)
And by the end of the first month, well .
"You know I used to wonder how you got the Death Eaters started," Harry had told him a few lifetimes ago, number forty six, when Tom was a Ravenclaw and Harry a Gryffindor (again). "Then I watch you and go, oh, that's how. You're too fucking charming. And smart. And perfect. It makes me want to punch you in the teeth."
"Careful," Tom had fakingly smiled back. "I'm going to start thinking you don't love me anymore."
"Oh, don't be like that, darling. I love you so much I'm going to propose to you publicly. At graduation." Harry had said with a shark grin, just as one of their Hufflepuff yearmates passed by and almost broke her neck with a violent double take. And that's how Gryffindor's Star Seeker and Ravenclaw's Perfect Prefect 'came out' to the school.
And for the record, yes, Harry did propose to Tom at graduation.
.
"Are you... recruiting?" Karkaroff had the gall to ask Tom, actually looking worried for his students.
Tom asked rhetorically, "What do you think?" And watched in amusement as the headmaster paled at the answer he thought of. "I've quite a few years to decide, don't you think? I am here until I graduate, after all."
At that, Karkaroff turned an alarming shade of white.
.
Perhaps the strangest thing Harry had seen so far in this lifetime was Professor Quirrell being normal and.. Competent.
"Five points to Hufflepuff," Professor Quirrell gave Harry a small smile, and Harry stared at the strange expression on the professor's face, mystified. "A perfect Lumos on the first try. You never cease to amaze, do you, Mr. Potter?"
"I do my best, Professor." Harry shrugged, acting sheepish.
"I think you're the single most point-earning student in our year," Hannah murmured to him. "Thank god you're with us and not the Gryffindors. Merlin knows all of us wouldn't stand a chance if you and Granger were in the same house."
"I don't know about that," Susan giggled from Hannah's other side. "Haven't you seen the looks she's been giving Harry? Half the time she looks ready to murder him for knowing more than she does."
Justin snorted. "I know her type. Doesn't know how to deal with the fact that she's not the smartest kid around, for all that she reads books twice her weight."
It was unfortunate, Harry thought, that child-Hermione was so led on by books rather than rationale. And so prideful and stubborn. He tried reaching out to her during the earlier weeks, but once it became clear that Harry excelled at the school work far beyond than she did, her attitude towards him soured. Ron didn't get why he even tried, Draco was derisive about it, and Neville just looked at Hermione sometimes with a heavy disappointed look.
Speaking of which, even with the House differences, it seemed evident to the entire school who Harry Potter's best friends were. People of course side-eyed Draco, and the Slytherins weren't very approving of it, but the latter eventually realized that being one of the Boy-Who-Lived's closest friends had it perks, even if it meant occasionally fraternizing with a blood-traitor and a Light wizard. And of course, Harry himself had been warned about the Malfoy family's allegiance in the last war, but all he really had to do was turn on his puppy eyes and insist how 'Draco isn't like that!' despite the contrary, and they backed off.
.
Funnily enough, Snape had warned Draco of him.
"He was rather strange about it too," Draco told him while the two of them chilled by the Black Lake one afternoon. "Cryptic. Saying you're not like what you appeared to be, and things like that." Then he gave Harry a shrewd look, and Harry inwardly smiled. He'd almost forgotten Draco, for all the pomp and bragging, was actually one of the smartest of their year.
"And what do you think of that?"
"I think he's right," Draco said firmly. "But I insist having you as a friend anyways."
That was, actually, quite heartwarming to hear.
.
Then the week before Halloween, Harry stole Scabbers from the Gryffindor dormitory.
The shitstorm that followed was beautiful, and the political fallout from falsely imprisoning an Heir of a prestigious family like the Black's even better. It would fuel many of Harry's Patronuses in the years to come.
"Britain is doomed," Tom mournfed while he read the Daily Prophet's 'Reveal-All.' "I should just stay here."
"But Tom, darling, don't you miss me?" Harry pouted.
"Fuck no."