Author's Note: Just a friendly reminder, for those who review my story and/or those who refuse to read my profile. I don't respond to guest reviews, no matter what they say. I do, however, read all of them, and if you're logged in then I'll try to message you a thank-you note as well as some hidden info regarding the story. Usually, it's just clarification, but I've dropped hints to other people about events that I've planned.

Incidentally, I won't be able to post any new chapters for my stories for the next week or so, not that I was actually planning on doing so in the first place. But I'm going on a trip! I haven't gone on one in years. It's a bit short as a result.

Also, hey look, nobody's crying in this chapter. Thumbs up for Zoloft.


Chapter Seven: A Change in Canon


"Well, this is new."

Henry's classroom was littered with vandalism, again, but this time the effects were more...interesting; mysterious substances were bubbling in the corners, his desk was transfigured into snakes, the desks in the classroom were walking around on spider legs, and the chalkboard had a picture of a cow.

Henry clapped his hands together, and dispensed of the vandalism. He was ever so grateful again that he wrote the runes into every single part of the classroom before classes started for the year. He noticed that the cow disappeared, with the vandalism, so Henry picked up chalk and drew it again.

He liked the cow. It was adorable.

Since he had an hour before his classes actually started, Henry decided to eat breakfast in his classroom again, like he had for the last couple of weeks, so he could eat in relative quiet while also hopefully getting work done. So he did, proceeding to nibble at a piece of strawberry toast he convinced the house-elves to make. He had absolutely no idea how they got the toast to taste like strawberries, and honestly didn't really want to find out.

Pulling out a copy of the Daily Prophet, he noticed the headlines on the front page, detailing something about a High Inquisitor. Further perusal indicated that the Ministry granted Dolores Umbridge near-unlimited power in regards to Hogwarts.

"Hm," he said, turning to the next page. People were still calling for his head; that was nothing new. What was new was the high amount of people praising his presence in Hogwarts. "Interesting." Including Umbridge herself? Henry blinked, then turned to the still-broken clock on his desk. Is it really worth that much?

Shaking his head, he continued to review the Prophet. When he finished (there wasn't much of importance or relevance to Henry, except the price of rubies having gone up), he pulled out a copy of the Quibbler, and turned to the crosswords section.

"Six-letter word for 'brainsucker that preys on emotion'..." Henry nibbled the tip of his pen in thought. "'Nargle'."

Henry didn't often read the Quibbler, but he had a subscription to it because of how much fun the crosswords turned out to be when he first bought one in the first month of classes. He preferred it to the Daily Prophet's pitiful crossword. And the outlandish stories were actually entertaining to read without being outright libel like the Prophet, so Henry continued the subscription.

"Eight-letter word for 'six-legged beast commonly found with unusual horn structure'..." Henry snorted. "This one's easier than usual. 'Snorkack.'"

"Um - Professor Greengrass?" a voice piped up and Henry yelped, scattering everything to the ground and falling off his chair.

"Oh my god hi," Henry managed to get out, climbing back to his chair. "Yes? What is it..." he squinted in disbelief. "Mr. Potter? Is something the matter?"

"Ah, well, no," Harry admitted. "I just - is it true that you're in league with Umbridge?"

"...I don't know what that would imply." Henry tilted his head. "What does that mean?"

"I don't really know, I just thought," he trailed off, absentmindedly rubbing his hand. Henry stared at the movement, causing Harry to hide it.

"Mr. Potter, give me your hand," Henry finally said. Harry shook his head.

"It's fine, really-"

"Mr. Potter," Henry said with authority. "Give me your hand."

Harry shyly, meekly, gave him his hand. Henry looked at it, unwrapping the bandage.

"'I must not tell lies'? Where did you get this?"

Harry glared at Henry, then took his hand back forcefully. "Umbridge."

Henry looked at his ceiling for a moment. Then he looked back at Harry. "Come here, Mr. Potter." He led Harry to his desk, where he opened up a drawer and pulled out a vial. The stopper on the vial came with a built-in brush. "Hold still; this might sting a bit."

'Sting' was an understatement, Henry knew, because Harry was hissing loudly as the markings literally burned away. After he cleaned off the last of the markings, he tightened the stopper and put the vial away. Then, Henry merely sat in silence, watching Harry's reactions; Harry, meanwhile, was doing the exact same thing, rubbing his newly-healed hand, although with far less success thanks to Henry's utterly blank face.

"Come back here the next time you have to write lines on your hands with a blood quill," Henry finally said. Harry nodded tightly. "Is there anything else?"

"Will this be...will you tell anyone?"

"It's entirely confidential, so no. Contrary to popular belief, or at least hers, Dolores doesn't need to know everything." Henry shrugged. "Just the things that affect her, and if I happen to help a promising student with a gift from my fiancée, then it's none of her business."

Harry blinked. "You have a fiancée?"

"Oi," Henry whapped the top of Harry's head. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Sorry, sorry!" Harry laughed. Henry noticed the almost palpable sense of relief emanating from Harry's body. "I didn't mean it like that, honest!"

"Sure you didn't," Henry said, rolling his eyes and grinning. "So, anyway," he changed the subject. "How's the studying coming along?"

"I've already finished with the third-year book," Harry said, and Henry blinked.

"In the course of six weeks?" Harry nodded. "Impressive," Henry whistled. "Hermione helped a lot, then?"

"And Daphne," Harry added. "She's surprisingly helpful."

Henry blinked. That's new. "Is she now? I don't suppose you'd know if either of them would agree to extra credit for their work, then?"

"Nobody would turn down extra credit," Harry said, and Henry chuckled.

"True, true. Alright, thanks for coming by, Mr. Potter. Enjoy your day," he said, waving Harry off.

"Thanks, Professor," Harry replied, before leaving.

Henry picked up his copy of the Quibbler before leaning back in his chair. "Seven-letter word for 'moste evil of evils'..." Henry tilted his head. "Wow, I actually have no idea."


"Alright, class, now that we've gone over the rule of threes and fives, let's go over the slightly harder one: the rule of sevens. Take out your textbooks and try the first diagram on page 131," Henry told his fifth-year class.

"Now, as with the rules of threes and fives, the rule of sevens is equally important in stable, and more importantly effective and usable, applied runes. The only difference is that, like the rule of fives was to the rule of threes, the concept behind it is also exponentially more difficult, so don't be surprised if you don't get it right the first few times." The class groaned, and Henry grinned. "Hey, it took me about a month to even fathom the rule of sevens, although I had to be more detailed than this, and didn't have the luxury of a book telling me how it works. I-yes, Professor Umbridge?"

Umbridge strode into the class like she owned the place - although, according to the Daily Prophet, she probably did. "Mr. Greengrass, I've recieved word that you've directly interfered with another student's detention?"

Henry blinked. "I did? When was this?"

"Earlier this morning," Umbridge clarified with a sniff. Henry tilted his head.

"I...don't recall doing anything of the sort."

"Really?" Umbridge inquired. "Because I've had reports that a certain Harry Potter was in this classroom," and here everybody turned to see Harry Potter steadfastly ignoring the proceedings, "and you two were laughing and enjoying yourselves, when he should have been down in the Great Hall, eating."

"Wow, he forsaked his breakfast to see me," Henry snarked to himself. "I feel honored." He said, in a louder voice, "I was only helping out a promising student, nothing more."

"And this 'promising student' is Harry Potter? The same Mr. Potter who constantly seeks attention by lying about He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?" Umbridge said, before scoffing. "Forgive me, but I don't see him doing anything of the sort. In fact, I was wholly unaware of Mr. Potter's schedule change."

"I talked to Deputy Headmistress McGonagall about it. She was more than enthusiastic to see Mr. Potter being transferred to my class over Divination." Henry snorted. "Admittedly, that's not very high praise at all. But the fact's there."

Umbridge frowned. "I see. Well, then, just be warned that Mr. Potter is an immature attention-seeking brat who wants to spread his filthy lies around about You-Know-Who." Harry muttered something like, 'here it goes,' and started to snicker, but before Umbridge could retaliate, Henry spoke up.

"Who?"

"Mr. Potter."

"No, I mean," Henry gestured to nothing. "You said I know who, but I really don't."

"You-Know-Who."

"No, I'm afraid I don't. Who is that?"

"The Dark Lord? He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?"

"That's an unfortunate name for a Dark Lord," Henry acquiesced. "But the fact remains that I don't know who."

"Never you mind!" Umbridge strode out of the classroom, flustered for some reason. Henry was confused about that, before shrugging it off and turning back to the class.

"She was talking about Mr. de Mort," Harry volunteered, and Henry's face lit up in realization.

"Oh! Well, why didn't she just say so?" Henry scoffed. "I lived in Japan, I don't know who I'm supposed to know. Hell, I didn't even know there was a Dark Lord. Wait, Vol's a Dark Lord?" he asked to Harry, who nodded with a smile. "'Vol' is still one of the weirder first names I've ever come across, but at least I can pronounce it. Not like his last name, 'de Mort'. That's far too complicated." And the class broke out in laughter, finally realizing who he was talking about. Even some of the Slytherins chuckled when they got it.

"That's enough getting sidetracked, though." Henry said, though he was still smiling. "Let's get back to talking about the rule of sevens."


Henry punched the wall in front of him. This was the seventh time in his life that a wall had outsmarted him, and Henry wasn't going to give this particular wall the pleasure of defeating him. Thankfully, the only other person in the room was family, and there was no class at the time.

"At first this was funny," his blonde sister stated in her eerie monotone. "Then it got kind of weird, and now it's just sad." Daphne turned to look at Henry. "So what do we do?"

Henry groaned. "First, we find enough C4 to blow the darn thing down." At Daphne's inquisitive look, Henry explained, "It's a Muggle explosive. Pretty hard to set off accidentally. It's kind of like a clay, except it explodes." Daphne nodded.

"Would conjuring it be acceptable?" Daphne asked. Henry shook his head.

"You don't know the chemical properties of C4, nor do you know anything about it other than what I told you," Henry noted. "So it wouldn't work." Daphne merely tilted her head down.

"I apologize for having you work at this," Daphne said quietly. "It wasn't my intention to make it so difficult."

"This time, anyway," Henry snarked with malice, before quickly sobering at Daphne's sudden depression. "I'm sorry, that was uncalled for. Just a bit stressed, you understand."

Daphne recovered a bit and nodded, but said nothing more. Henry clapped his hands again and punched the wall, to no avail. "Let's, ah, let's try..." He clapped his hands again and punched the wall again; the wall cracked a bit, to Henry's satisfaction, but the wall didn't collapse. "Why did you have to make your project on runic demolition?"

"I've always been fascinated by demolition," Daphne admitted, and Henry did a double-take.

"My sweet, innocent, dainty sister, fascinated by things blowing up?" Henry grinned. "You and I have a lot in common, after all."

Daphne let a rare smile grace her face, before it was quickly quashed. Henry noticed, and his grin grew wider. "Did I ever tell you about the time I blew down cast-iron doors? It was really tricky, since, as you know, iron doesn't conduct ley lines too well, but I noticed that the hinges were made up of something totally different; not quite iron, but sturdy all the same. It turned out to be a sort of nickel that they also used to fix small dents in the door..."


"I don't get it," Henry muttered, staring at the newspaper. "Why in the world would they be so blatant about this...?"

In one of his rare moments, Henry decided to eat his dinner in the Great Hall, instead of holing up in his office. As he pulled out his copy of the Daily Prophet, he idly noticed some of the students pointing out his presence, but gave it no further thought.

He was pretty peeved at the writing that the Daily Prophet had on display; he actually missed that writer, Rita Skeeter. She wasn't very good at writing the truth, but reading between the lines, one could pretty easily discern the truth from the glaring omissions. Then again, Henry mused, his father Cyrus wasn't exactly amused at her antics, either, and Henry had to agree - they straddled the line between harmless entertainment and outright slander frequently often.

But today's top article was very strange, even for the Daily Prophet - calling for an end to the muggleborn agenda was traditionalist rag, unusual for the newspaper. Henry made a mental note to check for anything worth notice in the Prophet's staff.

Turning the page, he noted nothing of worth happening, except maybe the price of imported ink from Japan, so he put the Prophet away. And then he pulled out a copy of the Quibbler.

Immediately, he heard some people muttering even louder. Some people stopped muttering outright and merely pointed at him. But he didn't expect a Ravenclaw to come up to the staff table because of it.

"Thank you for reading the Quibbler," the dreamy-eyed blonde Ravenclaw chimed happily. Henry blinked. "Do you have any suggestions on how to make it better? My father's the chief editor, you know."

Henry blinked again. "I use it for the crossword," he finally said after a moment's break. "Sometimes I read the articles, but they're usually not very interesting, although I liked the article about the blibbering humdingers. But, ah, I focus on the crossword."

The blonde girl hummed, "I see," and then went and sat back down. Henry was entirely nonplussed by this.

"...Maybe I was too hasty in sitting down here."