CHAPTER 14

Harry was sitting at the Slytherin table waiting for the rest of the students to arrive on the first day back. Despite his turbulent experience with the Mirror of Erised, he decided that his Christmas had been by far the best ever. He was looking forward to seeing Neville and Hermione again and thanking them for the gifts. He had decided against telling them about the mirror though. It seemed too personal to share, even with them.

He also would not be telling them about Fluffy! He had started trying to befriend the giant dog, but hadn't made much progress yet. Dumbledore's twinkling eyes seemed to linger on him whenever they were in the same room, and Harry had the distinct impression that he was being watched to make sure he stayed out of trouble. Still, he had found time to slip away to the third floor corridor a few times.

The first time had gone less than ideally. Harry remembered Hagrid's comment that music put Fluffy to sleep, so he brought the flute with him. It had worked like a charm! The giant dog's three heads all shut their eyes and fell to the floor with a soft thud and one even started snoring. When he wasn't trying to attack Harry, Fluffy was actually kind of cute! Unfortunately, Harry hadn't realized that if the music stopped, Fluffy would wake up. He had turned around to grab something out of his backpack and been startled to find himself staring into six sets of glaring eyes when he turned back around.

Since then, he had decided that it was much easier to hum instead of playing the flute, because he often hummed anyways and it was easier to keep up than blowing into the wooden instrument. He hadn't quite worked up the courage to get close to the dog yet, even though he did seem pretty harmless when he was asleep, but he was planning on that next step soon enough!

"...and I got the newest racing broom, of course!" Harry heard Malfoy brag to Parkinson as they walked over to the table. Harry rolled his eyes – Malfoy seemed to be almost as spoiled as Dudley was!

"Have a nice Christmas, Potter?" he taunted Harry as he sat at the table near him. "Oh wait, I almost forgot, even your mudblood cousin didn't want you! Imagine that – being rejected by filthy muggles! You're practically worse than a squib!"

Harry didn't know what a squib was, but he was quite sure that it wasn't a nice thing. He hated not knowing what Malfoy was talking about; how could he think of anything to say when he didn't even understand the insult! He decided to look up what it meant later so he wouldn't be at the same disadvantage the next time Malfoy tried to insult him.

He was scowling at his plate, as per usual after talking to Malfoy when something odd happened: one of the older students actually stood up for him!

"Lay off him, Malfoy," commanded a boy that Harry thought was maybe in fourth year. Malfoy was opening his mouth to retort when Zabini elbowed him. He muttered something that Harry couldn't quite hear instead and went back to talking to Pansy.

Harry's attention drifted away from the blond and his eyes slid over to the Gryffindor table. He did a double take as he locked eyes with his cousin – he had never seen the expression of pure hatred that was being leveled at him before! Sure, Dudley had made it abundantly clear that he wasn't welcome in their family and enjoyed taunting him and beating him up, but now he looked like he would kill Harry if he could!

After the meal was over, Harry was just leaving the Great Hall someone pushed him from behind so hard that he lost his balance and fell to the floor. He quickly turned to see Dudley looming over him, the same horrible expression on his face.

Dudley had told Ron about the situation over dinner. Ron was still a bit skeptical that Potter was really that bad, but he could understand the feeling of being overlooked in his house and supposed Dudley was feeling similarly. After all, aside from his initial thought that it would be wicked to be the cousin of the Boy-Who-Lived, he had realized that his older brothers weren't nearly as famous as Harry and he was already not as good as them!

Now Ron was torn as he saw Dudley looming over Potter: he knew his friend was angry, but wasn't sure they should be doing this. His internal struggle continued as he saw Dudley start kicking and hitting his cousin, while tears streamed down his face. He was blubbering nearly incomprehensibly about how Potter had ruined his life, but as he heard a loud crack Ron knew that this had gone way too far, and rushed over to restrain his friend.

When he felt hands on him, Dudley whirled around, his red eyes rolling madly around his head. He only barely registered that it was Ron pulling him back, telling him that they had to go, and only shuffled along mutely as he was led back towards the Gryffindor tower.

Harry lay moaning on the floor, hardly registering that the assault was over. His glasses were lying shattered on the floor beside his face, and he couldn't feel the fingers in his left hand. It was far worse a beating than he'd ever received before, and he honestly had no idea what had provoked it! He'd been too busy trying to shield his face to try and make sense of everything Dudley was babbling. He groaned as he tried to get up off the ground.

"Harry?" said a girl's voice from behind him. He turned to find Hermione's horrified face staring at him.

"Oh Harry! What happened?" she asked as she tentatively raised a hand as if to touch him before changing her mind and awkwardly bringing it back down to her side.

"Uh, nothing," he lied obviously. She almost made a disapproving face, but couldn't quite get it past the extremely concerned look she was already shooting him.

"You have to go to the hospital wing!" she told him.

"No!" Harry yelped. He knew he was hurt pretty badly, but if he went to the hospital wing now there would be all sorts of questions asked, and he knew from experience that people asking him questions never turned out well.

"But you're hurt!" Hermione persisted. "You have to go!" She couldn't understand his reluctance. Didn't he want to feel better?

Harry had known Hermione for long enough that he knew that stubborn look in her eyes. She wasn't going to back down on this, especially because she actually seemed to care for him. He was going to have to lie to her to get her off his back, which he really didn't want to do, but if the only other option was to tell on Dudley he was going to have to.

"Fine," he told her, in a small voice. "I'll go." She smiled at him casually fixed his broken glasses before she started to walk along with him.

"It's okay," he told her, trying to ignore the nagging guilt in his head, "I can go myself."

Hermione looked at him suspiciously.

"No, really, it's okay," he reassured her. "I'm sure you have lots of homework to go over before class starts tomorrow anyways!"

It was the right thing to say to get her off his back. She reluctantly agreed that she did indeed have a few essays that could do with some revisions and headed back down the hall away from him, after warning him that she'd be checking in on him the next day to make sure he really had gone.

Harry started walking towards the infirmary, but soon turned back towards the dungeons once he was sure that Hermione had really left him alone. In the common room he tried to sneak past the rest of the Slytherins without showing how hurt he was to any of the rest of them, but got caught by one of the older boys from the Quiddich team just before entering the boys dorms.

"Hello Potter," he nodded politely. He probably would have moved along to join his friends, when he looked at Harry properly and noticed the cuts and bruises on his face. An odd look crossed the boy's face. Harry couldn't tell what he was thinking, but he was wary of the calculating look he saw in the boy's eyes.

"Who did this? Gryffindors? Fellow Slytherins? Need me to teach someone a lesson?"

"Uh, no thanks," Harry said as he tried to inch around him to get to his dorm.

"If you're sure. If you change your mind though, come find me. I'm not sure we were ever introduced properly," he continued. "My name is Miles Bletchley." He held out his hand.

"Uh, nice to meet you," Harry shook his hand cautiously. "I'll just be on my way now..."

"One minute," Bletchley pulled out his wand. "I can heal those cuts on your face for you. No Slytherin should ever go around looking like they were just beat up."

Harry walked into his bathroom and stared into the mirror completely baffled. First the boy in the Great Hall and then Zabini had both kept Malfoy in check and now Bletchley was helping him! He was thankful, of course, but also confused. Nobody in Slytherin had ever done anything nice for him before!

He cleaned himself up the best he could. His hand was beginning to swell and was very sore. Maybe he should have gone to the infirmary after all. Luckily it wasn't his wand arm, so he could probably keep it hidden from Hermione at least! Plus, without Dudley hunting him, he had managed to brew some extra bruise salve in the last few days of class, which would come in extremely handy now.

When Harry woke up the next morning his hand had a dark purple bruise, despite the salve he'd put on it the night before, and he couldn't move his fingers. Sighing, he decided to go to the infirmary after all. It was early enough that it was unlikely anyone would see him, and his face looked fine thanks to Bletchley's help last night.

Madam Pomfrey looked skeptical when he told her how he'd accidentally dropped his cauldron on his hand the night before, but hadn't wanted to leave his dorm so late at night, but she fixed him up and sent him on his way anyways.

For the rest of the week, he carefully avoided Dudley, who needed to be held back by Ron any time he saw his cousin. Ron had even taken to picking up the homework Harry did for Dudley instead of his cousin. He was always polite enough when he came to Harry in the library, but never spoke more than was absolutely necessary.

Hermione had also noticed a change in the pudgy Gryffindor, and spoke with Neville and Harry about it.

"He's awful, I know," she confided in Harry, "but I'm worried about him. He always seems so down!" Harry didn't have anything to say. He didn't know what had caused Dudley's change in mood any more than Hermione did!

Dudley started lashing out at Harry's friends. It was a few days later when Neville came to the library sporting a black eye and looking more angry than Harry had ever seen him.

"That pig actually hit Hermione!" he hissed at Harry. His normally pleasant expression was twisted into a scowl that didn't suit the shy boy's personality.

"What?!" Harry exclaimed. He knew Dudley and his friends back home picked on younger boys, but he had thought that even Dudley drew the line at hitting a girl.

"She was trying to help him with a spell his was having trouble with, and the ungrateful git exploded and punched her!"

Neville had then stepped in, and almost wound up the courage to fight back when Dudley had punched him in the eye and some older students had broken up the brawl.

"Next time..." he told Harry in an embarrassed tone.

"I don't think it would be any better if you had hit him anyways," Harry had reassured him. "But maybe you and Hermione shouldn't be seen with me for a while..."

Neville tried to convince Harry that it wasn't his fault, but he wasn't going to be swayed. He knew that Dudley was only targeting them because they were his friends, and he didn't want them to get more hurt. He promised Neville that they would still be friends, just not hang out for a while, but the Gryffindor still looked really hurt as Harry walked out of the library.

Hermione had tried to persuade him otherwise when Neville had told her what Harry had decided, but between having almost no classes with them, and using the invisibility cloak almost all the time when they weren't in class, his friends didn't have much say in the matter. At least they had each other, Harry thought guiltily.

Meanwhile, Harry redoubled his efforts of befriending Fluffy. He was now comfortable being in the same room as the dog while he was asleep, and Fluffy was even beginning to get used to him so much that he stopped growling in his sleep. It wasn't until a while later at breakfast when Harry had his next big idea – sausages. Ripper had been terrifying until Harry smelled like sausage, and then he had almost been nice! Harry quickly looked around to make sure nobody was looking as he wrapped a few links and tucked them into his backpack.

It was Saturday, and he was itching to get away from the rest of his housemates, but they were still being so nice to him that it was oddly difficult to go off alone.

"Want to join our game of snap?" Zabini called out as he walked out of the common room.

"No thanks, I think I'll head to the library to study."

"You sure?" Nott added. "We've got a snacks!"

Harry looked over and saw an open box of Every Flavour Beans and shuddered.

"No, it's fine, really."

"Do you need any studying help?" Bletchley added as he joined the conversation.

"No, I just need to do some research..."

He finally got away and threw his cloak on as soon as he rounded the corner. He made his way to the third floor and started humming a lullaby as he gently opened the door. Fluffy's great eyes drooped closed, but his noses started to twitch as Harry carefully unwrapped the sausages. He paused as he stood before the sleeping dog. Obviously, Fluffy would have to be awake to eat the sausages, but Harry wanted to make sure that he wouldn't get an arm bitten off in the process. He decided that putting the sausages on the floor in front of each head before he stopped humming, then retreating to the far corner of the room would probably be his safest option.

His heart pounding wildly, Harry finished the lullaby. Even in their sleep, the heads were drooling more than usual as their noses picked up the scent of sausage. Slowly, six yellow eyes opened and focused on Harry. The dog stood up and started to growl softly, but didn't move towards him at all. He held his breath and tried to look as unimportant as possible.

One of the heads licked its lips, and Harry opened his mouth to start singing again, but instead of lunging at him, it went for the sausages down on the floor. The other heads seemed to realize quickly that there were more of the treats and were quick to snap them up before the other heads could steal them away.

The room was silent after the heads were finished. The heads stared at Harry, and he stared back, staying still as a statue. Deciding it was better not to push his luck, he started humming again. The dog slowly sank back down to the floor and began to snore.

Harry tentatively moved closer, emboldened by his success. He slowly reached his hand out to the head on the left. His palm was much smaller than the dog's nose, and he once again realized just how massive Fluffy was. Before he could lose his nerve, he set his hand on the dog and gave it a pat. Nothing happened. Fluffy stayed sound asleep, apparently unaware that Harry was so close.

The nose twitched as Harry was admiring how surprisingly soft the fur on the giant dog's face was. He had expected it to by much coarser, like Ripper's coat, but he had never touched the face of his aunt's dog, so maybe that was just how dog fur worked. Fluffy took in a deep breath, and Harry snatched his hand back in alarm. Was Fluffy waking up?

"A-choo!" The head sneezed and Harry was sprayed in snot and dog slobber.

"Gross!" he muttered, then quickly started humming again as the heads started to wake up. He wiped himself off the best he could, then left the room and headed back to the dungeon.

"What happened to you, Potter? Did you mistake a slime pool for the library?" Malfoy sniggered as Harry entered the common room. Zabini shot him a warning look across the chess set they were hunched over. Malfoy shot Harry a quick glare, then turned back to his game. He wished he could have worn his cloak all the way to his room, but it would have been very suspicious if he had shown up there after he had been seen going to the library. Besides, he didn't want to get dog goober over the only reminder he had of his parents!

Harry was heading to his dorm when he was intercepted by a girl a year or two above him who he hadn't met before. She was quiet, and seemed to spend most of her time studying in the common room or library.

She looked at his clothing critically, then raised her wand.

"May I?" She asked politely. Harry didn't really know what she was asking permission for, but figured she probably wouldn't hex him in the middle of the common room now that Bletchley and most of the other Slytherins seemed to like him.

"Um, okay?"

She smiled and muttered a spell that took all the drying dog slobber off his robes, leaving them cleaner than when he'd bought them.

"Thanks!" Harry still wasn't used to his house treating him well, but she had never been outright hostile to him in the past, unlike many of the others who were now treating him like he was someone important.

"No problem," she replied with a smile. "We haven't been properly introduced yet. My name is Johanna Sontau."

Harry smiled shyly as he shook her proffered hand.

"Harry Potter," he replied out of formality, knowing that everyone in the school knew his name.

"Pleasure to meet you! If you get caught by Peeves again, come find me. My mother was teaching me cleaning charms over the summer!" She walked back to her books and was quickly scratching away on a piece of parchment.

How had she been practicing magic over the summer? Harry was confused until he realized that Malfoy had been bragging about spells he had learned at Malfoy Manor from the very beginning of the year. They must have some way to avoid getting caught. As much as Harry knew that he would miss using magic over the summer, it was probably a good thing his relatives thought magic was strictly forbidden. He shuddered at the thought of Dudley practicing spells on him while his own wand was locked in the cupboard under the stairs!

With a small smile, Harry continued on his way to his room. Not only did he have Peeves to blame for anything that happened with Fluffy, but it seemed like he was finally being accepted in the Slytherin house! Now if only he could get his key back from Hagrid and keep up his good luck of avoiding Dudley, second term would be massively more successful than the first.

A/N: I am incredibly sorry for dropping off the face of the earth! Life unfortunately got the better of me, and it's not looking like it'll be much better in the near future... I don't have any chapters written ahead, so my posting will be erratic until I have more time to write in May, most likely. Thank you to everyone who's sticking with me through these long breaks in updates!