Author's Note: I am so incredibly sorry that it has taken me this long to update, and that this update is shorter than my usual. (Still around 4,000 words, though.) As it says in my profile, if you've read it, I have been involved in a collaborative storytelling game called Storium, and it has been stealing all my writing time for some months now. I really need to do better at making time for my fanfiction projects, since I know I have a lot of readers here and I don't want to let you all down.
Anyway, Chapter 10 was originally going to be longer and contain more than this, but this seemed a more natural place to end.
10. Takes One To Know One
On the morning after the wand fitting Harry woke early, his blood humming with excitement and anticipation. Work was due to begin on the new building for their school, and although Harry knew that this would not be the castle that he had known in the future, he still felt that he was about to witness the birth of Hogwarts. More than witness; he was to be a part of it, along with Draco, Helga and Rowena. They had waited for him to get a new wand on purpose, so that he could help them build the new schoolhouse with magic. Not that he would have objected to doing manual labour in the Muggle fashion - his aunt and uncle had required worse of him in the past - but still, he was a wizard, and spells were more fun.
He sat awake for a few minutes, alone and in silence - experience having taught him that waking Draco early was seldom worth the trouble it caused. His newest and perhaps most surprising friend was comfortingly similar to Ron in that respect. Both liked to lay awake at night to talk about nothing, and both hated waking up early for any reason less serious than a house fire. Now that the loss of his first friend was not such a raw wound in his mind, he managed to find Draco's resemblance to Ron more amusing than painful. It was better to laugh than to cry, after all, and it was not as if Harry was unaccustomed to having things he loved taken from him.
He sighed. That was definitely not where he had wanted his thoughts to go. This was supposed to be a good day for them, a day for fulfilling dreams and beginning a legend. He was not going to ruin it by reflecting on all the many things that had managed to go wrong in his short life so far. It was almost enough to drive him to wake up Draco just for the distraction that the inevitable argument would bring. Almost.
Just as he was beginning to consider the idea of going for a walk in the cool morning air, there was a knock at the door of the house. Harry quickly pulled a black robe over his dishevelled tunic and went to open it before the noise could wake Draco. He found Rowena standing outside, and he became suddenly very conscious that despite his brief effort to tidy himself up, he still looked a terrible state. Still, what could she expect so early in the morning? At least he was awake, unlike some people he could mention.
"Oh, Salazar, I am glad to see you are up at this hour." Rowena seemed just as bright and alert as she usually was; clearly she, unlike Draco, was a morning person. Even her hair seemed perfectly in place, elegantly braided out of the way of her face - and yet she did not comment on his disordered appearance, or even seem to notice it. He knew from experience that Hermione would have scolded him soundly for his untidiness, and found it amusing that he'd ever imagined that Rowena Ravenclaw might have been like her.
"I couldn't stay asleep any later," he admitted, ruefully. "I think I was looking forward to making a start on the building, you know?"
Rowena smiled. "It is gratifying to know that I am not the only one who feels such anticipation." She looked past him into the still-darkened room, and said, "I assume that Godric still lies abed."
"Yeah, I didn't want to wake him. He's a bit of a bear in the mornings." Or a lion, Harry added to himself, smirking a little. It still struck him as hilarious that Draco Malfoy should be forced into the role of Godric Gryffindor. Before the incident with the werewolf, he would have said that his new friend had absolutely no Gryffindorish traits whatsoever.
"You may wish to wake him regardless," Rowena said, calmly, though one corner of her mouth tugged up slightly at his description. "I thought to invite you both to break your fast up at the hall."
"Really?" The word slipped out before Harry could stop it, and then he felt stupid - after all, why would she say something like that if it wasn't true? Still, this was the first time since their arrival that Harry would not have to cook their breakfast, so perhaps he could be forgiven for his surprise. He shook his head and stepped away before Rowena could say anything in reply. "I'll wake him. He usually considers food a good reason to get up."
So saying, he slipped back behind the curtain to the bed alcove and shook Draco rather violently awake. He'd considered using the ice water spell again, but decided at the last minute that it might be cruel to do so - especially given that all of the spells he had cast so far with his new wand had come out slightly over-powered. As annoying as the other boy could be, Harry had no desire to drown him. The shaking wouldn't exactly be welcomed, of course, but there was no helping that, not if Draco wanted to eat his breakfast at the hall with them.
The other boy woke abruptly, spluttering and indignant. "Ow! You - what are you doing? Where's the fire?"
Harry snorted at the bleary eyes and wild blonde hair. "Breakfast," he said, simply.
"Oh." This seemed to puzzle Draco for a moment. "I must've slept really late this morning. Damn it."
"It's not late; it's early." Harry shrugged off his crumpled robes and picked up the small pile of freshly laundered formal clothes that lay next to his bed. Ash the house elf had been busy, it seemed.
As expected, Draco's first reaction was to start complaining, a distinctly whiny note in his voice. "Then why did you-"
Harry cut him off before he could get up any steam at all in his rant. "Wake you? Because Rowena invited us to breakfast. Get up and get dressed now or you'll have to cook for yourself. And we both know you can't do that."
"I - you - okay, I'm getting up, I'm getting up, don't leave me." The covers were thrown back and Draco emerged with a speed that Harry wouldn't have believed possible if he hadn't seen it himself. "Shit, where are my clothes? Have you moved them, Po-"
"Rowena is in the other room." Harry interrupted Draco with the first words that came into his head, so desperate was he to prevent the incriminating name from leaving his mouth. That would not be easy to explain away, and Rowena was too intelligent to fall for any flimsy excuses they might concoct. Her wrath would no doubt be terrible if she ever discovered the truth. Harry shivered involuntarily.
"Oh?" Draco looked slightly paler than his usual colour, hard though that was to accomplish. There was no question but that he understood the danger just as well as Harry.
"Yeah, so don't go out there improperly dressed or anything. I doubt she wants to see you in your undershirt." Harry raised an eyebrow, and grinned when Draco flushed slightly and looked uncomfortable.
He soon rallied to the occasion, however. "Right. 'Cos you want to be the only one to see me in my undershirt, right, Sal?"
Though Harry had no such interest in Draco, or indeed in any other boy, if that was the game Draco wanted to play, he was more than prepared to go along with it. "Nah, I'd rather see you without it," he said, with a faint smirk that widened considerably when he heard Rowena's laugh from behind the dividing curtain.
Draco nearly choked and went an interesting shade of red. "Wow. Okay, you win this round, Snake Boy."
"You'd think you'd have learned not to play by now," Harry said, a trifle mockingly. "Seeing as how you hate losing so much." He noticed a pile of clothes similar to his own on the floor, scooped them up and threw them at Draco. "Look, here's your stuff. Get dressed now or I'm going to have breakfast without you, just as soon as I've buckled on my sword." The belt lay coiled around itself on the floor at Harry's feet, and he bent to pick it up.
"Yeah, sure, how would you cope if you couldn't play with your sword in public?" Draco muttered, his words muffled by the red woollen waistcoat over his head.
"You're just jealous." Harry fastened the belt around his waist and ran his hand gently over the decorated hilt. He wasn't quite sure why he did that, except that he had a feeling that the sword was somehow almost sentient. It hummed under his hand in a manner that might have disturbed him had it not felt so right.
"What, of you?" Draco scoffed, straightening his waistcoat and shrugging his way into gold-trimmed black dress robes. "Why would I be? I can't even use a sword."
"Nor could I, the first time I picked one up." Harry smiled slightly, reflecting that he was telling the absolute truth. He still had no idea whether he could use any sword other than the Sword of Slytherin, with its uncanny ability to fight almost without any input from him. "But no, anyway, I meant that you were jealous of the sword."
Draco paused in smoothing down his dress robes to scowl at him. "You think I want you to play with me in public? Ugh. Dream on, Salazar Snakeface."
"Protesting a bit much, aren't you?" Harry ducked instinctively as Draco made to thump him, and danced back out of reach through the curtain. The next moment his friend appeared in the main room as well, neatly dressed and glowering just a little. Harry ignored the dark expression on Draco's face; it was all only a joke, of course, and his show of anger wasn't the least bit convincing.
In a rather frosty voice, Draco said, "I believe you promised that there would be breakfast. Though you said nothing about insults."
"Oh, sorry; I thought the insults were implied." Harry couldn't help but laugh at the exasperated way Draco rolled his eyes in response to this.
Rowena cleared her throat as though annoyed, but when Harry looked at her there seemed to be a glow of amusement in her eyes. "Perhaps you could engage in your little flirtation at another time, when you will not be delaying our breakfast," she said, pointedly.
"You have a strange idea of what the word flirtation means," Draco muttered, darkly, but after that the subject was dropped and they left the house very quietly - by their standards, at least.
Whatever social deficiencies Draco might accuse Harry of - rightly or wrongly - he knew well enough that he needed to show his most sensible face to Lord Edgar. So breakfast in the hall under the dour man's watchful eye was somewhat more fraught than usual despite the better quality of food. Harry tried very hard not to notice or to mind the man's scrutiny, but it wasn't easy, especially since Lord Edgar seemed to spend most of his time staring directly at him. It was like being at dinner in the Great Hall when Snape had indigestion and was determined to blame Harry for it.
This did worry Harry a little, as he had no idea what he - or anyone connected with him - could have done to Rowena's rather to cause such a reaction. But, being thirteen years old and highly distractible, he soon forgot all about it after they left the hall and headed over to the construction site. Helga had not been at breakfast, having been out exercising her horse as usual, but she was there waiting for them as they approached the cleared area. When she saw them, her face brightened considerably, and she came over to greet them.
"Why, Rowena," she began, grinning. "When you said that some of the villagers might be at liberty to said us, I must confess that I did not expect to see so many. With so many willing helpers, I wonder if there will be anything at all for the four of us to do."
Rowena snorted. "I would not harbour such a hope, if I were you, Helga." Her eyes darted back and forth over the piles of lumber and the assembled volunteers. "It never does to underestimate the amount of work to be done."
"You are always far too sensible, Rowena, dear." Helga smiled sweetly at her friend, but there was a devilish spark in her eye.
"As you are determined to be as silly as possible, it falls to me to exhibit some sense." Rowena spoke equally sweetly, even as she insulted her dearest friend. Neither girl could keep it going for very long, though; Helga was too good-natured, and Rowena too straightforward, for such jokes to be entirely comfortable for either of them. "I jest, of course. You know my appreciation for your optimistic nature, Helga."
"I do indeed," said Helga, with a brilliant smile. "But it is quite unnecessary to explain your jest - you know very well that I assume any insults levelled at my person to be naught but attempts at comedy."
"Your blissful naivety is yet another quality I admire in you," Rowena returned, with a perfectly straight face. "But enough of this. Shall we begin?" She gestured towards the piles of construction material and the rather bemused looking volunteers from the village. Harry supposed that none of the assembled men and women would ever have seen their Lord's heiress act so... human before now.
Any amusement he might have felt vanished as he frowned over the beams and planks that they were to convert into a functional building. He hadn't the first idea where to start - and when he sneaked a glance at Draco he realised that, for all the other boy's claims to know about architecture, he was clueless too. "So, what exactly are we supposed to do?" he asked, hoping that his voice didn't betray his nerves.
"Well, we are to cut the wood pieces to the appropriate length as indicated by this plan." Rowena waved a piece of parchment covered in diagrams and scribbled calculations. "We can accomplish this easily enough with magic. Meanwhile our workforce will be digging foundations for the building. It is difficult to move earth with spells, and my farmers are all far stronger than we."
Harry wondered if this was really a fair division of the labour, though he wasn't really crazy about the idea of helping to dig foundations. He didn't mention it; at least Rowena had a plan for how this was going to work, which was more than he did. "Okay, then. What spells are we going to use for this?"
Rowena was as happy as she always was to teach him new magic, and once they all knew the measuring and woodcutting spells everything proceeded smoothly. That is, it did until the moment came to start levitating the roof beams into place. It started by accident; Harry and Draco both tried to place a beam in the same place, and the two large pieces of wood crashed into one another. The problem came when both boys decided this was hilarious, and continued to smash the beams together in one of the strangest mock battles anyone present had ever seen.
Rowena was a very long way from impressed. "Cease this ridiculous behaviour at once!" she snapped, pointing her wand at the beams and directing them forcefully into their proper places. Perhaps too forcefully; as it slammed into the rest of the frame, one of the beams cracked with an ominous noise, like Rowena losing her temper.
Which was exactly what happened next. "Look at it! That beam is ruined now! What use will it be to man or beast? And it is all - your - fault!" Her voice had risen throughout the rant, and while she had started off practically whispering, by the end she was more or less screaming. Then, suddenly, she spoke very quietly, sounding almost tired and yet somehow even more dangerous. "What were you doing? How could you be so... so childish!" Something about her face or her tone told Harry that it was this she minded, far more than the broken beam.
He was also smart enough to know that using his age as a defence would do no good. As he'd been told before, thirteen was almost an adult in the eyes of people from this time. And he and Draco had been acting like little kids, smashing their toys together. He met his friend's eyes and saw the same sheepish guilt there - and something else, too. Sympathy? Well, perhaps that was justified. Rowena seemed to hold him to a higher standard than Draco, unfair as that was to both of them.
Weakly, Harry tried to placate her. "I'm sorry, Rowena; we just... weren't thinking, for a moment there. It was only a bit of fun, really."
"I don't think she knows the meaning of the word," Draco muttered, careful not to speak loud enough for Rowena to actually hear him. Harry elbowed him in the ribs.
Icy in her anger now, Rowena said, "I am aware that you consider this sort of behaviour to be 'fun', Salazar. That is why I am concerned. How are you ever to teach our students anything constructive if you have no grasp of what is appropriate?"
At this point, a rather alarmed-looking Helga intervened. "Do you not think that your response is perhaps a little... disproportionate, Rowena?" This comment won only a scowl from the angry young woman, but Helga rolled her eyes and patted her friend on the shoulder. In a quiet voice, she said, "You are taking too much upon yourself, Rowena. The school does not have to be a great success immediately. I know that you have put a good deal of pressure on yourself, but lashing out at Salazar will not alleviate it."
Rowena blinked. Draco took the offensive now, his years of training in how to manipulate people coming to the fore. "We all react to tension differently. Maybe acting like children is just how Salazar and I cope with the fears we have."
Rowena seemed to be trembling slightly. Harry knew it was his turn to say something, but for the life of him he couldn't think what. He had absolutely no idea how to talk to her, a fact that caused a strange sinking sensation in his stomach. She was unhappy and he couldn't do a thing. Wait... Helga had said You take too much on yourself. Rowena considered herself solely responsible for something that was really a job to be shared. Now, why did that sound so familiar?
The solution hit him so suddenly that he almost expected to see a bright flash of light. He remembered Hermione and Ron's insistence on accompanying him to protect the Stone and face Voldemort. He would never have got that far without them. The memory gave him the words he needed. "I'm sorry we were stupid, Rowena. But... you're not alone in this, you know. We're here to help you. Even if Godric is an idiot." Draco snorted and punched him on the arm, though not very hard. Rowena gave a weak chuckle. "And I'm sure we can fix the beam, or cut a new one. It's not the end of the world."
"No, I suppose that it is not that." Rowena smiled, though she looked rather embarrassed. "It would seem that I am quite as silly in my own way as you and Godric are in yours." She looked at the ground for a moment, and when she looked up again her eyes were bright and lively. Harry's heart tried to climb into his throat, but he swallowed it back down and tried to concentrate on her words. "You are all correct; I should not take everything so seriously. Though I doubt I would ever think to play such a dangerous game myself, boys." She sounded rather stern; clearly she hadn't completely forgiven them yet.
Harry was keen to redeem himself, and to show off his knowledge besides. "I think I can fix it," he said, hesitantly. "But we need to get it back down first. Carefully." He nodded to Draco, and by combining their powers for good rather than evil they managed to float the broken beam to the ground without further mishaps. Once it was in front of him, Harry pointed his beautiful and powerful aspen wand at it. "Reparo Lignarum." The wood fibres began to knit back together, straightening out the abused beam and making it whole.
Rowena smiled and added her own spell to his. "Auxiliis Confirmo." Nothing happened except a brief flash of light, and the beam did not move, but somehow it looked a little tougher than it had before. Harry wished that he knew enough Latin to work out what the spell was supposed to do. Perhaps he should ask Draco to teach him? Rowena spoke, dispelling other thoughts from his head. "You had the right of it, Salazar; it was easily enough repaired. However, I would ask you not to make such displays in public in future, if you wish for us to be taken seriously as instructors."
"I'm sorry, Rowena." Harry hung his head a little, feeling ashamed. That hadn't crossed his mind once. Maybe the villagers - and others - would be right not to take him seriously as a teacher. An unfamiliar feeling of panic gripped his chest, with the sudden realisation of how very far out of his depth he was.
Perhaps Rowena knew what he was thinking, or perhaps it was just that she could tell that he was unhappy about something. She rested her hand on his shoulder and said, "Come, Salazar, do not worry yourself unduly. It will be well." Her wand was still in her other hand, and she pointed it now at the beam. "Here, help me levitate this back into its place in the structure." She didn't need the help, and he knew that she didn't, but he accepted it as the peace offering it was.
In unison they called out the words of one of the first spells Harry had ever learned. "Wingardium Leviosa!" The heavy wooden plank raised itself slowly and carefully into the air, directed by two young people working together.