A/N: Thanks for all the reviews guys, I appreciate them.

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter and I am not making any profit from this story.

Warnings for this Chapter: PG-13, self-mutilation and mild language.

Chapter 6: Where is Voldemort?

Harry didn't have the courage to show up to Defense class until the next week. He sidled into the classroom and sat down near the back, certain that Adele was going to give him hell for their disagreement over the DA. Adele, however, merely smiled at Harry as class started and, without lecture, assigned the class three questions about the basics of Expelliarmus which Harry finished in five minutes. Harry looked around uncomfortably, he hadn't sat beside Hermione and Ron today and he was unsure of what to do as everyone chatted around him. Pansy Parkinson was sitting next to him and Draco Malfoy was sitting next to her. If this had been Snape's class then Malfoy would have already been goading Harry, he was not nearly so bold since neither Crabbe nor Goyle had come back to Hogwarts for the sixth year, but he still never missed an opportunity to harass Harry during Potions or even in Care of Magical Creatures. In Adele's class, however, Malfoy usually left Harry strictly alone.

Harry sighed, wishing that he had never decided to show up to class and began to leaf through his Defense book in boredom. After a moment, however, Adele came and sat down beside Harry, smiling at him ingratiatingly.

"Hello Harry," she said in a placating voice.

"Er. . . hi," said Harry warily.

Adele reached out and placed one of her hands on Harry's hand on the desk. Harry jumped in surprise and tried to withdraw his hand, but Adele held him firmly.

"Harry," she practically purred, "I so hope that you aren't upset with me for our little disagreement."

"Um, no," said Harry blushing. People were starting to look at them.

"I was just so oversensitive. Just between us, some of the staff here are simply horrid people and I was a bit on the defensive about them undermining my teaching."

"The... umm... staff," Harry muttered vaguely, wishing like anything that the floor would open up and swallow him.

"Oh, just certain teachers," Adele sniffed.

"She's talking about Professor McGonagall," a small voice inside Harry's head whispered. "You should be angry right now." But Harry was much to embarrassed and confused to be angry.

Adele leaned in close began speaking in a rather loud whisper. "I do want us to be friends Harry. I hope that you don't hold that little incident against me. Let's let bygones be bygones?

As Adele leaned in even closer, Harry began to gag on her cloying perfume. He choked and then sneezed several time.

"Are you alright?" Adele asked pulling out a green silk handkerchief and handing it to Harry. Harry held it to his face, but unfortunately, it was also liberally doused with the perfume. Harry sneezed violently and hastily handed the handkerchief back to Adele.

"Ugh... yeah," said Harry between sneezes. "I think I'm allergic to your perfume."

Harry heard several people around him snicker. Adele stiffened but waited without comment until his sneezing fit subsided. Harry noticed that she didn't take his hand again.

"So forgive me?"

"Er... sure. Of course," mumbled Harry, not sure what else to say.

"Excellent," Adele said with a small smile. Then she leaned in a actually gave Harry a kiss on the cheek. Several of the boys in the class made rather rude noises at this. Harry blushed even more furiously.

"Please God, just let her walk away."

Harry's prayers were answered as Adele got up and slowly walked to the front of the room, her high heels clicking loudly on the stone floor. Harry sighed in relief and the looked around to see several of his classmates still snickering at him. He quickly glanced over to see how much Malfoy was enjoying this little moment, only to find that Malfoy's face looked, if possible, even redder than Harry's.

"Don't know what he's blushing about. He didn't just get kissed by a Professor."

"So, I heard that you're sleeping with Professor Adele."

Caydon had a way of announcing things in a blunt little manner, but this was really a bit much. Harry nearly choked, since they had just been discussing Defensive Charms after DA meeting, this sudden change in topic was a bit offsetting. So the more outrageous rumors had trickled down to the first year?

"Um, no. She just kissed me on the cheek during class yesterday or something. It was really gross. I hate her."

Caydon grinned"I thought it sounded a little far-fetched. I don't like her much either. She's creepy."

Harry frowned. There were a lot of words that he might use to describe Adele, but "creepy" was not one of them. Well, at least not "creepy" as an eleven year old would define the word. "Where did you hear that?" he asked.

"My friend Lydia was telling me about it. And these boys in my dorm, Rick Powers and Corbin Reynold were talking about it too."

"Well you probably shouldn't listen to the rumors that your friends hear about me because by the time it gets down to first year, most of it has got to be untrue."

Harry expected Caydon to give his characteristic soft giggle at that, but instead his face darkened. "They're NOT my friends, those boys," he whispered vehemently.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said Harry, taking in Caydon's flushed face. "I just thought– "

"I know. But they're not."

"Do they. . . tease you?" Harry asked, thinking that this must be the case or else Caydon wouldn't be so obviously upset.

"You could say that."

"Why?" asked Harry softly. He couldn't easily imagine why anyone would be cruel to Caydon. The boy was so easy to get along with.

Caydon shrugged. "Lots of reasons, I guess."

"Like..." Harry prompted.

"Because I'm so small. Or because I know the answers to stuff in class a lot. Or because of who my father is. Or for no reason at all." Caydon's lower lip trembled as he finished speaking and he looked away from Harry.

"That's horrible. You should tell a teacher."

"Are you kidding? Then they would just hate me ten times more!"

"It must be pretty bad. You seem really upset."

"It's not so bad," Caydon tried to affect a light mood and failed utterly. "I just wish that they wouldn't try to make everyone else in the year hate me too."

"Does everyone in your year hate you?" Harry asked in shock. How could anyone hate Caydon?

"Well, not like they hate me, obviously, but everyone sort of stays away from me. Except for Lydia. Lydia is my best friend."

As if on cue, Lydia herself walked into the room. Caydon and Harry turned to look at her as she shuffled slowly to the front of the room, where they were standing. She shot a shy glance at Harry before pulling on Caydon's sleeve irritably. "Caydon," she whined, "you promised to work on Charms homework with me. Remember?"

"Oh. Yes, I remember. I'm coming. See you later, Harry."

"Caydon," Harry interrupted, not nearly finished with the conversation they were having before, "are those boys in the D.A.?"

"Ye – no," Caydon stammered. Harry gave him a dubious look. "Okay, yes," he said reluctantly, "but you can't do anything to them, Harry. They'll just get so mad."

"Oh you mean them," huffed Lydia, catching on, "they're–"

"Drop it Lydia," Caydon warned her. Harry opened his mouth to protest, but Caydon cut him off. "Goodbye Harry. Oh, and good luck on Saturday."

"Saturday?" Harry asked vaguely.

"You know. . . the first Quiditch match, against Ravenclaw."

"Oh... yeah." Harry had known the date of the first Quiditch match for months, but it had never seemed so soon.

Harry wanted to talk to Caydon some more, but by the time he remembered what he had wanted to say, Lydia had pulled him out of the room. He felt a little less sympathetic toward the boy when he heard the two children whispering on the way out.

"Well? Is he?" asked Lydia.

"No, he's not," Caydon answered and the two of them dissolved into giggles. Harry rolled his eyes. For a moment he had completely forgotten about the fact that the whole school was currently talking about him and his Defense teacher.

"Hermione, can I see that?" Harry asked the next day at breakfast when he saw Hermione reading over the Daily Prophet.

Hermione instinctively lowed the paper, trying to hide it from Harry. Harry had let his subscription to the Daily Prophet expire some time ago and Hermione had since seemed reluctant to let him read her copies, perhaps picking up on the fact that reading articles about Voldemort's activities upset Harry. Harry had expected that he would hear about any more attacks by Voldemort around school, but since term started, he had heard precious little. He had distinctly seen "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named" splashed across the front page of the paper in Hermione's hand. Harry grabbed across the table trying to take the paper from Hermione.

"All right! All right!" she said. "I suppose I should show it to you anyway, it's good news of a sort." She handed the paper over to Harry who opened it eagerly and began to read.

Where Is He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?

As many of our readers have observed, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and his followers have been oddly silent since early September. This strange lack of activity has many within the Ministry of Magic baffled, after a summer filled with attacks. Some Ministry officials speculate that He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is dead and his followers disbanded, but others take a darker view of things.

"We believe that he is merely biding his time," comments an unnamed Ministry Law Enforcement official. "He and his Death Eaters had been growing steadily stronger, it stands to reason that this lull in criminal activity could indicate a larger, more organized attack in the future. . ."

Harry looked up from the paper. "So there haven't been any attacks lately?" he said in an undertone to Hermione.

"No, not since about the first week of school. It's the oddest thing," she replied. "All this Death Eater activity building over the summer. . . and then nothing."

"So no sign of Voldemort at all?"

"Very little, unless... Harry have you had any dreams lately?"

Harry frowned. Now that Hermione mentioned it, Harry realized that he hadn't had any dreams relating to Voldemort lately. He had attributed this to his relative success in Occlumency, but could it have another reason? "Well no, I haven't," he said, "but I'm not supposed to be having these dreams, remember?"

"Yes, but I just thought that if you had been having dreams it would be a definite indication that Voldemort is still strong?"

"You don't actually believe all this crap about him being dead, do you?"

"No. . . I think that it's much more likely that he's planning something."

At that moment Ron came and sat down beside Harry. "Hey, mate," he said, "don't forget Quiditch practice this evening. It's the last one before the game on Saturday."

"Right, right," said Harry distractedly making a mental note to be sure and make it to this Quiditch practice – he had missed so many. But then he immediately went back to discussing Voldemort's whereabouts with Hermione.

At Potions class that afternoon Harry noticed that the Slytherin who had come into Snape's office during his Occlumency class – Darius, was sitting hunched over his notes in one corner of the room, near, but not beside of the other Slytherins.

"What's he doing in here?" Harry whispered to Hermione as class started. "Isn't he in 5th year?"

"Yeah," Hermione's voice had an edge of jealousy. "I bet you anything Snape is letting him take Advanced Potions or at least sit in on the class. He's supposed to be really talented at Potions."

"Potter," Snape hissed from behind Harry. Harry jumped, he hadn't realized that the Potions Master was there. "If you and Miss Granger are quite finished with whatever fascinating conversation you are having, I think we will start class."

Harry rolled his eyes. He really thought that was unfair, Snape hadn't even started lecturing yet. Although, admittedly he and Hermione were the only people talking – Snape's mere presence usually being enough to command total silence.

"In the next month we will be brewing a series of potions which all require burned or charred ingredients," Snape began his lecture. "For this reason, today we will be brewing a simple potion which has the effect of a light fire on whatever it touches, called the Quickburn Potion. Many may question the usefulness of this potion. Why not just use am actual fire, magically generated or no? However, this potion has the advantage of predictability. Brewed properly, it will always produce the same results, it will not die out and need to be recast, and you can control where it does and does not burn much more easily than a fire or even a hot poker."

Harry yawned. "Sounds even more boring than the potions we usually slave over."

"This is a fairly simple potion and I expect most of you to brew it with no trouble. However, I must warn you to be exceptionally careful, a few drops of this on your skin would be most unpleasant, difficult to heal naturally, and impossible to heal magically."

"Most unpleasant..."

Harry snapped abruptly out of his bored state and raised his hand. His classmates looked at him oddly. Asking questions or volunteering information in Snape's class was a bit unusual for anyone. For Harry to do it was extraordinary. Harry couldn't remember the last time he had raised his hand in Potions class or even if he had ever done so.

Snape glared at Harry as though he had just blown up a caldron. "What Potter?" he sneered.

"Sir, if we were to have an accident and spill some of this on our skin, what would be the effect? I mean would it burn clean through our skin or could it be fatal or – "

"If you exercise some caution in my class for a change then you'll never have to find out." Snape said smoothly.

"But if it did happen."

"It would depend on the amount!" Snape snapped in exasperation. "If you poured a couple of liters of it over your head then I have no doubt that it would be fatal."

"But a couple of drops on an exposed arm..."

"Would not be greatly harmful. But trust me Potter, it is not something that you want to experience so do try to be careful. Now if you are done interrupting the class with pointless hypothetical situations I think we will get down to business."

Harry followed that potion's instructions with a concentration that even the best students could find enviable. Snape was wrong, Harry did want to experience the burning potion on his skin.

Harry went directly up to his room after Potions class and found it empty. He sighed with relief, he needed very much to be alone and he thought that he had just time enough to try out the (for once) perfectly brewed potion that he had surreptitiously pocketed after Double Potions. He took out the small phial of liquid and examined it closely. It was black and thick with a barely detectable red sheen running through it.

"Perfect, at least as good as Hermione's potion," Harry thought. He was starting to understand why anyone could find brewing potions fulfilling – something he had always wondered about. There was a certain satisfaction in seeing the finished product before you in a well brewed, and useful potion. Harry knew, however, that Potions class would never really be for him.

Harry undid the button on his sleeve and slowly rolled it back. He examined his arm. He always did this before cutting, it was never enough to merely begin cutting, first he had to examine the previous damage, touching each new imperfection on his skin gently. Lately, Harry had been searching for new ways to hurt himself. He had begun to think that doing it the same way every time was rather like always eating the same food. He had tried using different tools to cut himself, even tried burning himself with a candle, but none of it seemed to quite do the trick. This new potion though. . . Harry was very optimistic about it.

Harry carefully opened the phial and took a dropper (also stolen from the Potions Lab) from his pocket. He filled the dropper and then with agonizing slowness, allowed a single drop to fall. For a moment he saw the drop suspended in midair, shining like a small onyx, then it collided with his arm. For just an instant the liquid was cool on his skin, then it began to burn, dissolving into the tender flesh. Harry gasped, though the pain was not great. The shock of the burning sensation was something completely new. Harry let a few more drops of the delicious liquid fall onto his skin, closing his eyes at the sensation it created. He was sure to let some of the potion fall across his cuts. Then he stopped stopped, wanting to conserve the potion for when he actually needed it. Exhausted, Harry fell back onto his bed where sleep almost instantly took him.

"Harry! Harry!" A voice was calling his name, an angry voice.

Harry half opened his eyes. "What?" he muttered groggily.

"What are you doing up here asleep?"

Harry awoke fully to find Ron standing above him looking exceptionally angry. Harry hastily hid his arm behind his back, the sleeve was pulled down, but the cuff wasn't buttoned, so it might be possible for Ron to see some of his arm. Luckily, Ron seemed to have other things on his mind.

"I can't believe you sometimes!" he yelled.

"What?" asked Harry, befuddled. What could Ron possibly be so upset about?

"Quiditch practice. The last one before the game against Ravenclaw tomorrow. You missed."

Harry smacked himself on the forehead. "Oh, oops. Sorry Ron, I really meant to be there."

Ron's face turned red and he turned away from Harry in disgust.

"What? Is it that big a deal? Why don't you just tell the others that I got caught up and. . ."

"You're the captain!" Ron burst out. "The team needs you to have your head in the game. Can you imagine what we would have been like last year if Angelina missed every other practice?"

"I never asked to be captain!" Harry said, his voice beginning to get louder.

"Yeah, well you are. Look, you may not care if we win, but it is really important to the rest of the team. Don't you care about anyone but yourself?"

"Oh, yeah. Quiditch is just the number one thing on my mind right now," Harry sneered. "The world will somehow come to an end if we don't beat Ravenclaw."

Ron's face hardened. "Oh I forgot," he said sarcastically, "the great Harry Potter has much more important things to worry about than stupid Quiditch games. You don't need to practice, do you? Practice is for all us losers who haven't had our names splashed all over the papers."

"Yeah, I really love having my name in the Daily Prophet," Harry drawled. "They are just so complimentary."

Ron huffed angrily, but didn't say anything to that. After a moment, Harry tried to sooth things over with him and forget some of the more vicious things that Ron had said. He really should have been at practice.

"Look it will be fine," Harry told him. "How much do I really need to practice to catch the snitch? We'll beat Ravenclaw, they're not that good, especially with Cho Chang as Seeker."

Ron looked at him doubtfully but he gave Harry a small smile nonetheless. "I hope you're right Harry."

Coming Soon: Chapter 7: A Memorable Quiditch Match