(A/N: Thank you thank you thank you so much for your reviews. Here is the next chapter for you!

"Speech"

'Thoughts'

Letters and spells

Parseltongue

Parselmagic

As soon as Harry went out of the potions classroom, Snape closed the door with privacy wards up and went into his office. Reaching his fireplace, he took floo powder, threw it in the fire, and said, "Headmaster's office."

Albus Dumbledore's head appeared in the fire and he asked, "What is it Severus? I believe it was Mr. Potter's first potions class. How did it go?"

Snape tersely replied, "Potter seems to be calm and collected, very unlike his father and the first years. I did not attempt a legilemency probe, but it seems he is very bright for his age and maybe has some talent in potions like his mother. I don't know for sure as it was his first class but he surely showed expertise in handling the ingredients."

Dumbledore looked thoughtful for a second, then calmly said, "Keep an eye on him, ok?"

Severus nodded in reply and ended the floo connection. He slowly went towards the couch in front of the fireplace and sat down thinking, 'Who are you Potter? You look like your father, remarkably so, but then, why isn't there any arrogance in your eyes or your posture? Why do you remind me so much of Lils when you only seem to have her eyes? Who are you really?'

After the first class ended, everyone left for their transfiguration class with Harry following behind them quietly. When they reached the classroom, they saw a cat sitting on the teacher's desk. Everyone settled down and this time Harry was sitting with two cute Slytherin girls. The girl to his right who was sitting in the middle had raven black hair like him with sky blue eyes. The girl next to her had brown eyes with dirty blond hair.

Harry looked at the cat sitting on the desk and observed it closely. He could see rectangular marks around its eyes resembling spectacles and that it was sitting very stiffly. Harry grinned with a knowing look and looked around the rest of the class.

He saw that Neville was sitting with two other Gryffindor boys while he saw the red head sitting alone. He spotted the buck-toothed girl sitting with the other girls of Gryffindor.

The cat suddenly jumped off the table when the bell rang and transformed in mid jump turning into Professor McGonagall. Harry rolled his eyes at this display muttering 'Show-off.'

McGonagall started lecturing on the basics of Transfiguration while turning the desk into a pig and back. Everyone was excited and soon she gave everyone a matchstick and told them to transfigure it to a needle. Harry looked at his needle and silently flicked his wand turning it into a needle. Then he silently put his head down to sleep.

After about five minutes McGonagall reached his table and when she saw Harry sleeping her nostrils flared. "Mr. Potter! I will not have any dilly-dallying in my class! Why are you not doing your given assignment?" she yelled.

Harry calmly looked up at her while Ron in particular snickered. Harry sent him a scathing look and then replied quietly to McGonagall, "That is because I have finished my assignment Professor".

McGonagall peered over her spectacles and stated, "I find it hard to believe Mr. Potter. Will you show it to me how you did it?"

Harry nodded and put his matchstick in the middle of the desk and silently flicked his wand turning it into a needle and flicked his wand again turning it back into matchstick.

McGonagall was shocked. Never in her years had she seen anyone so proficient in her transfiguration. Even for her, it took 25 minutes before she could transfigure her needle for the first time and that too was with the incantation and the wand movement! She was very excited and exclaimed, "Very well done Mr. Potter! 20 points to your house! 10 points for being first, 5 points for silent casting, and 5 points for casting without the need of wand movements. Please see me after the class."

"Yes Professor, thank you," Harry nodded and looked around to see who else had finished apart from him. He saw nobody and then he spotted Ron waving his arms like wings trying to transfigure his matchstick. Harry snickered quietly and twitched his tiny finger wandlessly setting fire to Ron's matchstick. Ron exclaimed in surprise disturbing everyone and McGonagall's lips thinned into a fine line in anger.

"Mr. Weasley! 5 points from Gryffindor. You don't swing your arms around like a buffoon." She then continued showing him the wand movements. After that, McGonagall resumed looking around to see who needed help. Just as she reached the buck-toothed girl's table, the said girl finished her transfiguration. McGonagall smiled at her encouragingly and said, "Very good Ms. Granger. 5 points to your house."

When McGonagall left her table, Granger turned around at Harry and shot him a scathing look. Harry just raised his eyebrows at her while mentally rolling his eyes at her competitiveness.

After the class got over, Harry stayed behind and went to McGonagall's desk. McGonagall finished sorting through her papers hen looked at Harry with calculating eyes. "Mr. Potter, would you please try to transfigure this parchment into stone?"

Harry nodded and silently flicked his wand turning the parchment into a stone. McGonagall kept giving him various things to transfigure and he kept transfiguring them into what she asked. All done silently and without the required wand movements. To say McGonagall was excited and shocked would be an understatement.

Finally, bubbling with excitement, McGonagall said, "Harry, I think you have a natural affinity for transfiguration. Would you like to take extra classes every Monday after dinner for three hours? You will have to work very hard and you will have to go around helping your classmates during the regular transfiguration class. In addition, you will be exempted from the regular written assignments. I will be giving you assignments during you extra class, which you will have to complete by the next week. Do you accept?"

Harry looked at McGonagall and asked quietly, "Will it be formal apprenticeship or just extra class?"

McGonagall started a little but then said calmly, "I didn't know you had knowledge about formal apprenticeship. If you want, then we can start a master apprentice bond but you should not take this lightly. The repercussions are quite severe if you try to go against the bond. As such, you cannot lie to your master or share his secrets with anyone; otherwise, you can even lose your magic depending on the situation. Likewise, a master cannot share his apprentice's secrets with anyone without the sole permission of the apprentice. Are you ready to take such responsibility Mr. Potter?"

Harry thought quietly, 'She doesn't seem to be involved with Dumbledore in any manner and even wanted to look out for me last night. Aunt Petunia even told me that she had brought me to them and even had doubts that she had stood outside the house holding me all night waiting for the morning. I guess I would like to trust her. She …'

McGonagall interrupted his thoughts saying, "If you want Mr. Potter, you can take some time to decide. There is no need to hurry". Harry shook his head and said, "I have one question," McGonagall nodded him to continue, so he asked, "Will it be necessary for me to call you Master McGonagall if we complete the bond?"

McGonagall smiled and said, "No Mr. Potter. That was during the medieval period. Now such thing is not necessary unless there is a formal ceremony or during the ritual starting the bond. In addition, the bond automatically disappears when you finish your mastery, but the magic binding the secret remains. So you don't have to worry about that."

Harry nodded and said, "I would like to finish the bond now."

McGonagall raised her eyebrows at him and asked, "Are you sure Mr. Potter?"

When Harry nodded, McGonagall lead him to her office where they soon finished the ceremony. As soon as the ceremony was over, Harry thanked her and left for lunch.

McGonagall looked sadly at the door through which he left and thought to herself, 'I will be there for you Harry. Whenever you need me, I will be there'.

The whole week continued as such where Harry was offered apprenticeship from Professor Flitwik, the charms professor as well and he accepted it. Soon it was weekend and Harry sat quietly in his common room reading the various books from the library and practicing advanced magic in transmutation where a circle was drawn to transmute things by sending a pulse of magic through the transmutation circle. Harry was excited with the possibilities and soon was reading the whole book quite thoroughly.