Monday morning came far too early. Albus was still yawning when he sneaked out of his dorm behind Scorpius, both careful not to wake the other two boys. For once, even Scorpius did not look quite wide awake. The excitement of the previous night had taken its toll on him as well. As much as Albus would have liked to sleep some more, at least he was now away from Stroulger's constant surveillance. The annoying portrait had not taken his eyes off him ever since Snape had left, it seemed.
Almost in complete silence, and without much enthusiasm, they climbed the many stairs to the owlery. Albus called Rose with his talking mirror on the way there, because she had offered to have her owl carry his letters as well. Albus did not have an owl of his own, and it was way too early to struggle with James' extremely combative tawny owl which his older brother had misleadingly named Hooty.
He was about to put the mirror away when he noticed Scorpius staring at him oddly.
"That's one of those mirrors, isn't it? The ones your uncle invented?"
"Uh, yeah. Well, my dad's Godfather was the one who invented them, but it's now sold by Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes."
"Can you really talk to anyone you like? Wherever they are? Even your parents?" He looked rather excited by the idea.
"Yeah, sure. If they have a mirror of their own." Albus looked at the other boy curiously. "You don't have one, do you?"
Scorpius shook his head.
"Why not? I thought everyone used them these days. They're almost like mobiles, aren't they?"
"Mobile what?"
"You know, mobile phones."
"Is that some sort of muggle thing?"
Albus nodded. "They're really useful. Pretty fun, too."
"You actually had one of those? A real muggle tecknogy?" Scorpius seemed quite astonished.
"Of course. What else would he have used at school?" said Rose who had just walked up behind them.
The boys jumped a little at the unexpected intrusion, then turned around. Rose was carrying a thick envelope of her own, and already had her school bag with her, like them.
"Oh, and you mean technology, I suppose," she went on. "We have quite a few muggle things – muggle technology – around the house. We have to be a bit careful not to blow them up, so we don't use them so often. But we both used to have a mobile when we went to primary school. We could hardly have used talking mirrors there."
Scorpius seemed a little overwhelmed with the new information, or perhaps Rose in general, so Albus went back to the business at hand.
"Thanks for taking my letters," he said to Rose, and handed over his own envelope.
"No problem, Iris won't mind." She took the envelope as they entered the owlery, and walked over to her barn owl. "Will you, girl?" she said to the still awake owl while giving her a treat.
Iris screeched a little in reply, and went for the treat. She really was a beautiful bird. Good-natured, too, quite a change from Hooty's usual response early in the morning. James' bird liked mornings about as much as his owner. And true to form, Albus spotted him snoozing together with other tawny owls not far from them. He slowly walked over to him, careful not to step into anything … unpalatable.
In sleep, Hooty looked fluffy and cute. The impression was deceiving, Albus knew. Carefully, he extended his hand to softly pat down the ruffled feathers at his neck. Petting the cranky owl for anyone other than James was only possible when he slept, and Albus took his chance.
He should have known better. Hooty was awake in an instant, and went straight for his fingers before Albus could pull his hand back.
"Ow!" came his surprised cry. Though why he still felt any surprise, he did not know. "Get off! Get off!" he tried to shoo away the angry bird that kept fluttering in his face and trying to attack him again. He landed on his backside, and a victorious Hooty settled back majestically to continue his sleep.
The two other first-years turned towards him. Rose rushed over at once. Albus saw Scorpius release another barn owl with a letter already bound to his talons, and then he walked towards him as well.
"Al, you know not to do that," berated him Rose.
Staring at his bleeding finger, Albus could hardly disagree. "Yeah, well, I'd better go clean this up." He nodded towards his hand and got up to leave. "I'll catch up with you in the Great Hall," he told his two companions, and left.
He knew leaving Scorpius and Rose alone may not have been the best option, as he got the feeling the two were not too fond of each other, but he had other business to take care of.
He quickly washed his hand, then used a spell to clean his trousers that had straw and dirt sticking to them where he had landed on them in the owlery. Household spells could be useful once in a while.
After that, he sat down on the floor in an empty corridor and pulled out his talking mirror. All that talk before had reminded him that he had not talked to his parents since leaving them behind at the train station. He wanted to talk to them in private, and took the chance to be on his own.
He tried calling his father first. A moment later, his face appeared in the mirror.
"Dad!" greeted Albus joyfully.
"Albus? Is everything all right?" Harry Potter looked surprised.
"Sure, I just wanted to talk. Is it a bad time?"
"No, no. It's fine. It's just a little early, that's all. I was preparing to go to work, but I'm not in a hurry. We can talk." Albus could see him moving around until he settled down in his favourite armchair. "So, how's Hogwarts been so far?"
That was all the prompting he needed. Albus recounted everything he could remember, most of which he had included in his letter, but he needed to tell him in person and see his reaction first-hand. His father seemed quite amused that James had apparently guessed that the map had been intended for him all along. Seeing his younger son's dumbfounded expression, he actually laughed.
"It wasn't an altogether easy task, you know. I had to ask Teddy to return it to me first – He was the one who 'stole' it from me first. And then I had to plant it just right, as I did for Teddy some years back."
Albus continued telling him of the past couple of days and Harry tried not to interrupt and only prompted him to include more details with his questions.
"Hmm," he finally said thoughtfully, "I can't say I'm too happy that there are portraits spying on you. But in this case, it might not be too bad. Your dorm-mates have to be careful not to be caught cursing you as well."
"I wish I didn't have to worry about that. If I could get them to get along with me at least a little..."
"Hmm... Lestrange and Parkinson, did you say?" Harry grimaced. "Well, it's worth a try, but it might be a little tricky. Lestrange... Well, I don't want you to be prejudiced against him, but his family has always been one of the more dangerous ones. Let's just say it's better to be careful around him."
"And Parkinson? Scorpius said he's someone's nephew – I think, uh..."
"Pansy's nephew, is he?"
"Who is Pansy?"
"Pansy Parkinson. Tried to be Draco Malfoy's girlfriend from day one. Their families approved, and they even got engaged, I think. Then, during the war... I don't know if I should even be telling you this – Please don't go repeating any of this to your schoolmates."
"Dad, come on! It's really weird, everyone knows stuff about you, except me—"
"I know, and I tried to tell you some things. But at the same time, I don't want you to be prejudiced against those children. If I had told you everything, I doubt you'd have given Scorpius a chance, for example, and I'm afraid the same holds for your other Housemates."
"Well, I think Parkinson's a slimy toerag, who's trying to suck up to Lestrange. How could I think him any worse? And he's called Paris. Who would name a boy Paris?"
"Paris, really?" Harry shook his head. "Purebloods," he muttered somewhat hypocritically. "All right," he then relented. "I don't know much of anything about his parents, so don't go accusing him of anything. But his aunt, Pansy – she used to be in my year. She said... It was during the war, and she said something that was sort of against me, only it really had nothing to do with me. It was war, we were all scared for our lives, and she thought she had chosen the best option for survival. But then our side won, and suddenly she was in a very bad position. Malfoy – Scorpius' father – wasn't any better off, so he could not have helped her to regain her social standing.
"She knew what she needed, and acted. She married an auror – a well-respected one, though I'm not sure how well-deserved that is. It all happened very fast. A few months after the end of the war she was already married, and suddenly she had a place in society again. It was a bit of a shock, I'll tell you. I mean, I'd never been too fond of Malfoy – though please don't let that—"
"It's not Auror Bellamy, is it?" asked Albus, rather hoping his wild guess would be wrong.
Harry drew back, looking astonished. "How did you—"
"No," groaned Albus. "Her daughter's in my year, too. Bryony Bellamy. So she's Parkinson's cousin, then?"
"Huh. Yeah, I guess her daughter would be about that age. What about the other Slytherin first-years? Anyone you might try getting along with?"
Albus slowly shook his head. "I don't know, Dad. I haven't really got to know most of them yet. But lessons start today, so I'll see what they're like, I guess."
Not wanting to be late, he finished the conversation soon after that, and went down to the Great Hall for breakfast. He made it there without much delay, only losing his way once, for a little while, before being sent in the right direction by a helpful portrait.
Soon after he had sat down next to Scorpius, Professor Snape came around with their new timetables. It was bad enough, having to suffer the man's glare, but then Albus took a look at the timetable and groaned. They had potions first.
"We only have two lessons before lunch," Scorpius told him as soon as Snape was out of earshot, "and look, we have flying lessons in the afternoon."
It was clearly an attempt to cheer him up, but it did not work. "Yeah, but the first lesson will be taught by Snape. And we're not starting flying this week, didn't you see? It says here, they start in week two." He pointed at the timetable.
But while having another look at it, he noticed he would be having herbology directly after potions. With Uncle Neville. Maybe that would cheer him up if the potions lesson went badly, he told himself.
Albus sighed and glanced over at the High Table. Professors McGonagall and Snape were bickering again. Uncle Neville – Professor Longbottom – was talking to a jovial-looking middle-aged witch. They both kept smiling a lot – nothing unusual for the easy-going wizard. Albus wondered what it would be like having to listen to him in class. Then Uncle Neville turned his head, and the woman's smile dropped, her eyes growing cold. Before Albus was even sure that he had seen it, she caught his stare, and returned it with a bright smile.
The potions classroom was down in the dungeons, and if Albus had thought the Slytherin common room creepy, he was in for a nasty surprise. The pickled animals floating in glass jars all around the walls were just the decoration.
Together with the Gryffindors they were over sixty students in total, quite enough to fill up the spacious room. The Gryffindors all paired up and sat down on one side of the room. Rose, together with Fay, followed Albus to the back of the room, and sat down to his other side, directly at the dividing line between the students of the two Houses.
They had barely found a place to sit when Snape stepped into the room. He went straight to the front of the classroom and began taking the register. Albus tried to follow, to remember which faces the names belonged to, but Snape was not one for distractions and went through the list at a brisk pace.
He began with 'Leonard Archer', a slight, and by the looks of it, rather timid Slytherin boy, and had moved on to 'William Appleby', before Archer had finished saying 'Present'. Albus was only just fast enough to spot a tall Gryffindor boy with auburn hair answer 'Present', before Snape had moved to the next name on the list.
Albus gave up trying to remember all the names soon after that. He heard Flavia Belby and Bryony Bellamy being called, who sat very close to the front, with Bryony trying to pass notes while Flavia was doing her best to appear attentive. He recognised 'Emily Durant', a slight Gryffindor with too many freckles, as the girl who had jostled him to take his place during his first breakfast when he had sat with the Gryffindors. Another name that caught his attention was 'Deanna Jordan', also a Gryffindor. He recognised her after hearing her name. He knew of her, mainly from Fred, whose parents were friends of Deanna's father.
More names followed, which included three more Slytherin boys, which Albus noted were working together – the only group of three. Then came 'Cyrus Lestrange', followed by 'Scorpius Malfoy'. His friend replied a little too promptly when his name was called, and Albus thought it was because Scorpius still felt nervous for defending him to Snape. It was Albus Snape sent a dark look, though, when he looked their way.
A couple more names followed, then 'Paris Parkinson', and finally 'Albus Potter'. Snape almost spat the name, and could not refrain himself from adding, "another one of the famous Potters, eager for our notice." Rose, as expected from a Gryffindor, looked mutinous, which landed her with a barbed comment of her own. When Snape reached her name after 'Fay Walker', he hesitated ever so slightly before reading her last name, and then added, "another Weasley. What an – unexpected – occurrence." A few sniggers followed, mainly from the Slytherin side of the classroom, and Rose's expression darkened some more.
After taking the register, Snape gave them a little speech, and then started throwing random questions at the students, as if he fully expected them all to know the answers. Albus started feeling like an idiot, because he did not even understand some of the questions, until he looked around and noticed that most other students were in a similar state. Rose and Scorpius were the notable exceptions, who both raised their hands at each question. Snape, with obvious delight, let Scorpius answer most of them, while ignoring Rose completely. By the end of the lesson, Albus' hotheaded cousin had started glaring at the blond boy as well.
Albus let out a sigh of relief as the bell rang. He cleaned up quickly and picked up the vial with his first brewed potion, eager to leave. But of course Snape could not make things that easy. He picked up the vial as soon as Albus had put it on his desk and started prodding it with his wand.
"Interesting," he said before Albus could get away. "It actually doesn't seem to be completely ineffectual."
Albus thought that was a very unfair assessment of the potion. It looked exactly as the book had specified. Scorpius had looked quite impressed with the result, and he had been rather proud of it.
"Quite surprising, considering you couldn't answer a single question today," Snape went on in a conversational tone.
Albus went red as he noticed other students were still hanging around, a few of them sniggering at his expense.
"Do tell, Potter, how did you manage it?" The dark eyes seemed to be boring into him.
"Well, we had instructions," he stammered, then cleared his throat determinedly. "And I know how to follow a recipe."
"Recipe?" Snape sounded appalled. "Are you comparing the fine art of potion brewing to cooking?"
"Well, my Grandma Molly's recipes are a lot harder to follow, I can tell you that," said Albus, sounding no less indignant than Snape looked after that answer, and walked out of the classroom before Snape had regained his voice.
Rose was still giggling by the time they reached the Great Hall and parted to go to their respective classes, and Albus thought her amusement might just be worth having made matters worse with Snape.
