The Inbetween - By Slytherin's Dragon

A/N: I know that you know that I know that I don't own Harry Potter.

Chapter XIV – An Order Awakens

"Homenum Revelio!"

Forest Malfoy leisurely tossed the spell at the seemingly barren northeast corner of the 'Practice' room. "I see you – Harry!"

"Damn it!" Harry swore when he felt the magic that was cloaking him disintegrate as Forest's Revealing spell came into contact with his invisibility barriers.

The dark haired man grinned rather inanely, "Don't be too frustrated, Harry – it took you three days to come up with a way to become invisible – most wizards take a lifetime!"

"And, I don't think there's a wizard or witch in existence that can counteract the Revealing Spell." Remus added. He was watching from the door that led out to Harry's living room, while Hadrian had his arm wrapped around his 'Uncle Moony's' leg and was watching the proceedings with interest with his bright blue eyes. "You are entering uncharted territory – Harry."

"I am going to do it again – get ready!" Forest said loudly, his wand pointing towards his student.

Harry focused on the magic from his core and reset the 'shield' that surrounded him. He had found inspiration over the past few days from reading Muggle books on Optics, Electromagnetism and Electrostatics. He had then spent time perfecting the structure of the magic based on the theoretics of light in front of a mirror. Then, he had engineered a reversed version of his original invisibility barrier but changed the substance of the magic so that sound waves that originated due to his body could not be heard by those outside. The final step was integrating both structures into one for easy assembly – that had been the most difficult part – but Harry was pleased with his efforts.

It had also been Remus' idea for Harry to find a way to negate the Revealing Spell – which was a spell that Remus said Dumbledore could cast non-verbally. That statement had earned a scoff from Forest – he was also capable of such a feat. Remus then insisted that Forest share his expertise with both their pupil and himself. The amenable Forest had obliged.

When Harry was invisible, Forest incanted again, "Homenum Revelio!"

This time, Harry was able to disperse his magical resources that weren't pooled into the barriers to track the spell leaving from Forest's wand. With much effort and difficulty, Harry used his own magic to squash it down towards the ground while maintaining his own shields.

Five seconds later, he dropped his barriers and collapsed on the ground – panting.

Both Remus and Forest had flabbergasted expressions on their face while Harry was busy trying to catch his breath.

"What did you do?" Forest finally spoke, "I felt like we were arm-wrestling or something!"

Harry, still magically exhausted, replied, "I saw your spell leave your wand. Instinctively – since I know the Revelio family of spells spread out over space... I forced it down before it could spread very far."

"That is – that is." Remus was still a little shocked, "Incredibly powerful magic. I've never heard about anyone who was able to stop a spell by forcing the path of the magic."

"It probably helps that Harry can 'see' the magic, Remus. There's not many of those around." Forest had recovered his wits as well at this point.

Hadrian, at that point, had left Remus' leg and had walked over to Harry, who had now sat up from his original exhausted position on the ground. "Harry!"

Remus nodded to both Forest and his student. "We will call it quits for today – but tomorrow – we are going to do non-verbal Revealing spells on you so be ready."

"So, what do you have there – Blaise?" Henry had barged into his friend's room five seconds ago and he was looking down at his friend, who was staring at a carefully unfolded, but old and crinkly piece of parchment at his desk.

Blaise had spent his Saturday evening after their visit to Hagrid setting up an extensive layer of wards on the entrance to his room, and only keying Henry in. Likewise, he then helped Henry set up his own ward system. Setting up wards on one's doors was actually a common practice among the upper years of Slytherin as secrecy was a highly valued asset by the Snakes. In fact, the fifth, sixth and seventh years had an annual warding competition amongst both genders – as a result, classes such as Ancient Runes were taken seriously by the Slytherins.

The reward was respect and prestige – two other attributes favoured highly by Slytherins. Henry and Blaise, upon hearing about the annual tournament, had begun reading up on Runes and wards. Blaise traded such information to Harry, who in term would provide his own advice on such matters.

Blaise, who had been immersed in the parchment in front of him, was jarred by his friend's question.

Henry smirked, "So, what's so interesting about this clipping from – let me see –"

"August 4th," Blaise answered for his friend, "The date isn't on the parchment – you blind bat!"

"Hey, kindly refrain from bat jokes! Those are reserved for the Head Bat, himself!" Henry grinned – referring to their Head of House.

Blaise laughed, "Right."

"But seriously – why so serious about this old Daily Prophet paper?" Henry persisted, "And why do you know the date this issue was issued?"

"Here," Blaise picked up the newspaper and handed it to his best friend, "Read."

Gringotts Break-in Latest

Investigations continue into the break-in at Gringotts on 31 July, widely believed to be the work of Dark wizards or witches unknown. Gringotts goblins today insisted that nothing has been taken. The vault that was searched had in fact been emptied the same day. "But we are not telling you what was in there, so keep your noses out if you know what's good for you," said a Gringotts spokesgoblin this afternoon.

"So..." Henry was not connecting the dots, "What's so special?"

Blaise sighed, "I found this scrap at Hagrid's. I thought it was rather curious that he would have this lying around. I mean, I scrapped mine when I was done with the Daily Prophet that day. I remembered it was August 4th. It's curious how certain things stick in your mind."

"Curious, curious..." Henry's conspiracy neurons were beginning to fire.

Blaise continued further, "I mean – you know what I think?"

"What do you think, Blaise?" Henry looked rather impatient.

"I think that Hagrid must have kept the clipping because he was involved in some way. He might have been the person who emptied the vault that day on behalf of Dumbledore before the attempted theft." Blaise elaborated. And what's the only other place safer to keep anything?"

Henry thought for a moment. "Bloody hell! You don't think..."

"I do think!" Blaise exclaimed, feigning being insulted.

Henry ignored him and pressed forward. "That our friend – the three-headed-dog-of-my-bloody-nightmares is – "

Blaise finished triumphantly, "Guarding whatever the contents of the vault are!"

"Bloody hell!" Henry shouted again after taking a few seconds to fully process Blaise's statement.

Blaise winced.

Albus Dumbledore sat at his desk. He was annoyed.

Excruciatingly annoyed.

On the previous fateful Saturday, he had dropped a brief visit to Harry's Aunt and Uncle – and he had been baffled when Harry's Uncle claimed that Harry had ran away despite all the care and attention was lavished upon him. He had then probed their minds with his pricks of Legilimency to discern how the boy ran away. He had neglected to obtain the memories of Harry's mistreatment during his miserable time at the Dursleys. He saw Harry, jet black hair sticking out in every direction, with the Potter glasses, emerald green eyes and the scrawny figure of the child whip fire at his only living relatives before fleeing with a fearsome black snake with a strange yellow marking on his forehead.

Dumbledore had looked at Harry with disgust at his behavior towards his relatives during the memory abstraction.

This wasn't the child I assumed he was going to be.

The logical step after his little visit to Privet Drive was to Remus' humble abode in the outer edges of London. Remus, being James' last dedicated friend, might be a possible source of information. Much to his irritation – Remus did not answer the door.

Assuming that the man was out doing the odd job for a living – Dumbledore had returned to Hogwarts to run a few errands – school related and to also to ensure that his trap and bait for his possessed DADA professor were ready. He couldn't scrap his original brilliant plan just yet. He had every intention of finding Harry, bringing him to Hogwarts and manipulating him to enter and retrieve the stone.

Plus, there was that promise to Molly.

The next day, Albus returned to Remus' house, and seeing that he still wasn't home – he took the time to dismantle Remus' extensive ward system for the meager little house. He had been greeted by silence, and the only sign was the half-drunk tea that sat on Remus' dining table. There were two teacups present, so Albus immediately deduced that there had been two people. One of the chairs was knocked askew, so Albus had a feeling that the occupants may have had left in a rush.

He had pointed his wand down at the floor to perform the Feet Tracking Spell – a spell favoured by Aurors. As the magic washed over Remus' shabby tiled kitchen floor, two sets glowing footprints led to the backdoor and to the middle of the garden. The trail had stopped there.

Albus frowned. Apparition always made things more complicated.

Using an obscure Apparition Tracing spell he attempted to follow the Apparition path.

Much to his horror, he landed in the middle The Serpentine – the eastern half of the lake at Hyde Park. He felt his elaborate robes absorb the water from the lake – it wasn't raining so he didn't bother with a Water-Proofing Charm – and he felt the weight drag him down.

He spluttered in an undignified manner.

And he realized he couldn't simply apparate out of the lake, as there were Muggles around. None of them seemed to have noticed his entry in the body of water, so he quickly cast the Water-Proofing Charm on his robes followed by a Notice-Me-Not spell and apparated back to Hogsmeade.

The old wizard swore once he had arrived back at the village. He had just remembered why his no one bothered with Apparition tracking these days. The accuracy of the spell diminished proportional to the coldness of the trail. Even when the spell was used right after an apparating person, the spell would usually be off by a few points of a degree in latitude and/or longitude.

Not to mention that his quarry would be long gone from the Muggle park by now.

He had then returned back to Remus' house and reset all of the wards that he had taken down, while adding some of his own. The old wizard had added an Alert ward just in case Remus decided to return.

During the rest of the week, Remus had not returned back to his house. Albus also packaged Portkeys into Owl Post and there were two Hogwarts barn owls, with said packages sitting on his windowsill. They had not left his office – which meant to Albus that Remus and Harry were in hiding in an owl-proofed location or they were dead.

It's time to call the Order of the Phoenix to assemble. Ah, my minions.

"Wait, so let me get this straight," Hermione halted the discussion that was brewing between Blaise, Henry, Stephen, Neville, Hannah and Daphne at the Room of Requirement, "You think... that the attempted theft at Gringotts has something to do with our three-headed Cerberus at Hogwarts?"

"Yes." Henry replied, his fingers twirling a quill, idly over his half-written Potions essay.

Daphne then spoke, "Then I guess what's in the vault is very important. But there's a point that bugs me."

"What's perplexing you, Daph?" Stephen asked.

The brunette thought for a moment, "If the contents of the vault were so precious... why a simple Colloportus on the door?"

"Maybe he's counting on his dog-from-hell to scare intruders shitless?" Neville contributed, looking up from his Transfiguration essay.

Blaise frowned, "That makes no sense. I found a book the other day..."

He paused, unsure. Something just wasn't adding up.

"Care to elaborate, Mr. Zabini?" Hannah who had been leisurely doodling in lieu of doing her Charms assignment prodded.

"Yeah, Mr. Zabini!" Henry jumped in.

"Alright!" Blaise leaned forward, his elbows propped on the table shared by all the conversationalists, "It was a book about magical creatures. And it had a section on three-headed-dogs..."

"And..." Stephen was getting a little impatient.

Blaise continued, ignoring Stephen's interruption. "You can put the scary bugger to sleep with music."

"Bloody hell!" Henry groaned. "Should have brought Daphne along with her violin last week when we paid a visit to our three-headed-friend's room."

"And..." Blaise continued, drawing all the attention from his friend back to him, "Anyone could have gotten their fingers on that book. It's not in the Restricted Section or anything."

"So what does this mean?" Hannah questioned.

"It means," It was Henry who opened his mouth this time, "That Dumbledore is most likely trying to lure the thieving bugger to whatever is on the other end."

"It makes sense!" Neville picked up the reasoning, "But that also means..."

Hermione interrupted with her flash of insight, "The thief is at Hogwarts!"

"Merlin!" Henry almost jumped out of his seat at Hermione's statement. He followed Hermione's words with musings of his own. "Must be one of the bloody professors or a Polyjuiced student seeing that this thief had enough guts to break into Gringotts and not get caught!"

"You know what, guys?" Neville broke the thoughtful silence that had fallen after Henry's last statement, "I think we better keep tabs on our sketchy professors."

"I bet you ten Galleons that it's Quirrell!" Henry grinned.

Stephen retorted with an equivalent grin on his face, "That stuttering man? He looks too timid to do such a thing. I will take your bet. Probably it's our favourite Bat of the Dungeons!"

Their conversation dissolved into topics of less importance.

On Friday, a dark falcon swooped through one of Harry's opened windows and interrupted breakfast between Forest, Remus, Hadrian and Harry. As standard, Harry inspected the rolled up scroll of parchment gripped tightly in the bird's fearsome grey talons. After deeming it harmless, Harry held out his hand and the falcon dropped its cargo.

He unfurled the parchment.

To all this may concern:

Albus Dumbledore, the Leader of the Order of the Phoenix, has mobilized the Order once more. The sole project: Find Potter. Albus has stationed Order members at various strategic places, including the Leaky Cauldron, Gringotts, 4 Privet Drive, Honeydukes (don't ask why!), the Ministry of Magic and the old Potter Place. Members of this Order include Hestia Jones, Kingsley Shacklebolt, Arthur Weasley, Bill Weasley, Severus Snape, Arabella Figgs, Mundungus Fletcher and lastly – Alastor Moody.

I will be sending by a guard to this location. Code word will be Pig Snout.

Mad Royal Soot

The falcon happily helped itself to the freshly sizzled sausages that had been laid out on the table while Harry read the message with a mixture of confusion and comprehension.

"That's Ivan's bird." Forest remarked at the black feathered bird.

Remus looked surprised, "Why a falcon?"

"This is no ordinary bird, Remus. This particular species is Falco tenebrosi, a rare breed of falcon that used to be used exclusively by the elite of the Wizarding World centuries ago, especially in Oriental countries. Its letters cannot be intercepted by any means known to wizard. These birds were referred to as the Dark Messengers centuries ago." Forest explained patiently as the two men waited for their pupil to pass on the news.

"Who's Mad Royal Soot?" Harry looked perplexed as he pushed the letter to the other two.

Remus and Forest peered at it.

The werewolf frowned, while Forest looked completely baffled.

"Looks like Dumbledore has finally reconstituted the Order." Remus said after a few seconds of reflection, "We have to be more careful from now on."

"Ivan said something about a spy," Forest added, "I suppose this Mad Royal Soot is it."

"Oh, that's easy to decipher – it's an anagram!" Remus grinned, "It's old Mad-Eye!"

Harry and Forest were both clueless.

"Alastor Moody?" Harry asked after a few moments. He pointed his finger at the signed name at the bottom and used magic to rearrange the letters.

Forest returned to his food before the falcon could get at it. "Who's he?"

"One of the most famous and successful Aurors to have ever walked in the Ministry; most of the cells in Azkaban are filled because of him." Remus explained, "He has a wooden leg, a magical prosthetic eye and a chunk of his nose missing from past battles."

Forest mused, while attacking his stack of pancakes, "Sounds like quite a character."

"Quite – doesn't quite describe it." Remus replied while stabbing his fork into a juicy sausage on his plate before the falcon made a grab for it.

The falcon seemed to pout.

Remus then looked puzzled, "But I don't understand why Alastor would defect from Dumbledore. He's very loyal."

"Sometimes, Remus, people are thrust into circumstances in where, the inexplicable occurs." Forest suddenly looked extremely grave, which made him look almost a decade older than he actually was.

Harry had a feeling that Forest was speaking from experience.

"So, what are we doing today?" Hermione asked Hannah as they walked along the third floor from their last class of the day.

They were heading for the Room of Requirement – where they gathered every day since Hermione had discovered its magical seemingly sentient properties. Members of their little group would usually stay till curfew pursuing various activities before heading back to their own dormitories.

They had been busy during the past two weeks. Research was gathered on Educational Law and the political history of Hogwarts by Daphne's task force, which had recently added two more Ravenclaws to the team – Padma Patil and Su Li. Blaise and Hermione had started teaching everyone the basics of Occlumency – including meditation techniques – so it was becoming a rather common sight to see people sitting cross-legged on mats in the Room while fortifying their mental defenses. Occasionally, one of the original four would suddenly attack their fellow students' barriers as a test. Neville, Henry and Hannah had also begun an 'extras' section. On Saturday and Sunday, they would hold an afternoon session on a useful topic, such as the useful applications of Wingardium Leviosa and things beyond the First-Year curriculum such as the Expelliarmus (Disarming) Charm.

Blaise, upon finally discovering where the Kitchens were, would often sneak food for everyone in to the Room of Requirement. Much to both Henry's and his own disappointment, they had tried to will the room to make them a feast – being the hungry gluttons they were - , but only a long dining table had appeared, with all the cutlery and beverages.

But alas, no food had appeared.

Hannah replied to Hermione's question, "Well, we've got the Potions essay due on Thursday, and I have some other assignments from Charms to do."

"I was talking to Blaise earlier about wards." Hermione whispered, "Oh, I will tell you when we –"

"Shush a moment! I hear voices!" Hannah pointed in the direction of the Forbidden Corridor. Hermione inconspicuously cast a Silencing Charm at both their feet while the two quietly dashed off to the source.

Normally, all the students evaded the staircase nearest to the banned Corridor, but ever since Blaise and Henry's encounter with the dog-from-hell, the members of their group had taken to using that particular set of steps to get to one floor to the other – just in case an interesting development occurred.

It was usually deserted – except for the ever-cruising Filch in search of prey – or misbehaving students.

Hannah and Hermione nimbly ducked behind a statue of armor, in a convenient alcove. They peered through the gap between the wall and the armor and saw two of their professors. All they could make out were snippets.

"- don't know where your loyalties lie, Quirinus – but you seem to be aw-"

"- loyalties lie. If you really are a true follower -"

"- the dog - "

"-don't know -"

"-how -"

"- the stone -"

"-later - "

At this point, the two professors had walked past them, and parted ways. Hermione had quickly cast a mild and non-verbal Notice-Me-Not Charm before the pair of adults had passed their hiding spot. Fortunately, neither of them bothered to spare a glance at the alcove in the deserted Corridor and walked on.

Minutes later, the two girls left the spot and headed up to the Room.

Harry apparated to the backyard of the Leaky Cauldron, his charcoal grey robes swirled as a gust of wind blew. None of the wizards or witches within the vicinity were interested in his arrival. Ever since Ivan's training, Harry had become less scrawny, but rather lean and toned. He was still thin, but that lent to his body a graceful elegance.

He exuded power and confidence.

Stepping into the rather grimy pub that Harry had called home during his first foray into Wizarding London, he located his dark-haired Potions tutor and his son sitting at a rather dingy corner. He walked up to them.

"Forest, Hadrian." Harry greeted curtly, but there was an undertone of warmth.

"Grey." Forest nodded. His son shyly waved a greeting to his favourite baby-sitter.

Harry pulled out the third chair from the table and sat himself down. He glanced at the menu and mentally picked what he wanted before sparing the rest of the occupants of the pub a glance. Harry, Remus and Forest had been amusing themselves by playing Spot-the-Order-Member during the past few days. So far, Remus being the most familiar with Dumbledore's henchmen – was in the lead. Forest and Harry had pored over Wizarding pictures sent by Ivan to familiarize themselves with the members of the Order.

A familiar black-haired witch wearing blue robes seemed to be busy with her copy of the Daily Prophet but Harry recognized the woman as Hestia Jones, an Auror. Harry had briefly scanned her mental defenses a few days ago – they were solidly fortified, but he knew he could break them if he wanted to. Harry saw Jones discreetly scan her surroundings. She rested her eyes curiously at the occupants of their table, but she ended up smiling at Hadrian, who was busying himself with the building cutlery towers.

He found it fascinating that Remus, and himself walked freely in Diagon Alley in midst of Dumbledore's spies without being noticed.

Appearances seemed to be everything.

Harry's dinner of grilled haddock on a bed of greens arrived and he tucked in. Forest merely looked inquisitively at the woman that Harry had been examining early before looking down at his own meal.

He winked at Harry, who smiled back.

"So, something about a stone?" Blaise mused.

Hermione nodded, "We overheard Quirrell and Snape discussing the Forbidden Corridor."

"How did you know?" Neville asked; his tone was serious.

"They mentioned the dog in the conversation." Hannah added – looking up from her parchment of doodles.

Hermione thought for a moment, "I don't think they know how to get past the beast. Quirrell did mention something along the lines of I don't know."

"That's a big problem." Henry frowned. "There are many possibilities that arise from the scenario you guys have witnessed."

"Yeah – I agree with you, Henry." Hermione sighed, "I compiled them yesterday during History of Magic." She pulled out a sheet of blank parchment and double-tapped the sheet with her wand. Inky handwriting appeared.

1) Snape and Quirrell are teaming up to get the Stone.

2) Dumbledore informed one of them that the other is the thief and is using said Professor to keep an eye on the other. (But which?)

3) What in Merlin is the 'Stone'?

"Could be some gemstone with magical properties," Henry added his thoughts, "I mean, there's stories about the Golden Emerald."

"How can an Emerald be gold?" Neville looked confused.

Henry explained, "Some mage from a long time ago infused so much magic in a gemstone that it changed colour."

"We will have to figure out this Stone business another day." Hermione yawned, "It's almost curfew and I don't want a repetition of the day you guys met our Cerberus, even though we now know Silencing Charms and Notice-Me-Not Charms."

"Ditto," The others packed their texts and other things away, before heading out their hangout towards their toasty beds.

A/N: Shorter chapter than the last one. Lots of questions regarding pairings – noticed that most of you aren't too fond of the slashy stuff so if there's any it's going to be read-between-the-lines (i.e. so implicit you probably wouldn't know it unless you are reading deliberately for it) so don't worry about it!

For example how one could interpret Grindelwald/Dumbledore slash from DH.

It's way too early to think about pairings right now – but if you got a favourite – give a shoutout via a review or something. It may or may not influence what actually happens in the story. Romance will not be the strongest factor in this story – I don't think – but it will be there!

But hey – give it a shot!

Oh and btw – this is definitely NOT a Ginny/Harry story just in case you missed the fine print.