*Hogwarts express*September 1st, 1992*

"You were stalked all summer by a house elf" Blaize Zabini had grown half an inch during the summer, his hair had gotten longer, he had not cut it back to his usual buzz cut, "That sounds like a pureblood plan if I've ever seen one"

"It said that Voldemort, in one form or another, would try something this year," It was only Harry and Blaize in the compartment, they had used the excuse of going to the bathroom as to not raise an alarm, "It was the only thing I managed to get out of him"

"And you want me to keep an eye up and an ear to the ground" Harry nodded, "You realize that it could start before I found out anything, right?"

"I am counting in the fact that you will get the power hungry girl and her follower into it," Harry started to wash his hands, "you hang around them when you're not around me, and I'm sure that whoever will let Voldemort in will be a Slytherin, all the death eaters from other houses were thrown in Azkaban"

"Okay, first, Daphne is not power hungry, only ambitious, and she wants to get out of her house as soon as possible, second, Tracey is her friend, as am I, and not a follower, we are the only ones she calls that" Blaize scratched the back of his head "She's actually pretty nice to those she likes," he frowned, "Tracey, me, her sister and her mother"

"She wants to own a powerful company, that is power hungry, even if she wants to do it because she hates the misogynistic magical society," Harry made for the door, "That I understand, I'm making my own to get even more money in the Potter vault, but she could open up more"

Next he would tell Terry about the Voldemort threat, the Ravenclaw house had proven last year that they were not above pureblood supremacy, as his investigations after the prank that stopped the bullying led to uncovering that both Chang, Li and Edgecombe were purebloods.

For now though, he would relax, Slytherin, the biggest threat, was already covered.

*Compartment*

"Why is there a tiny blond in my place?" Harry asked after he entered the compartment, spotting the blond girl sitting where he had been sitting, between Lisa and Terry, "That was my spot"

"Well, she asked if she could sit with us, so we let her," Terry looked very amused with the blond girl, and was paying a lot of attention to what she was saying before Harry spoke up, "Very interesting conversation she makes, if a little odd."

"I understand that you would get attacked by nargles when speaking to me," The blond commented as Harry sat next to Morag and Hermione, "They tend to invade people around me"

"Yeah, and you are?" Harry looked around, noticing that no one paid attention to his question.

"Luna, Luna Lovegood, and you are Harry Potter" the blond girl looked at Harry, her eyes narrowing some, "You look very different from your friends," Harry could not help but think that she was talking about something other than looks.

"It tends to happen" Harry answered, reaching over with his magic tendrils, making her nod.

"Do you happen to have a crumple-horned snorkack?" the blond asked.

"What is that?" Hermione asked before Harry could even open his mouth, "And what are Nargles?"

Luna looked at Hermione as if the bushy-haired brunette was mad, "You would know that if you read the Quibler, but I'll explain; Nargles are tiny, invisible creatures that fly around people's head, and when they get inside them they scramble thoughts and ideas, and snorkacks are fyrry creatures that live in Norway, but that is all daddy and I know about them"

"Well, they aren't in any book of magical creatures" Hermione huffed.

"Neither were platypuses or kangaroos until people reached Australia," Lisa said, "yet they're very much real"

Hermione had no answer for that, so she thanked the gods when Fred and George entered the compartment, even if they only stayed a few moments to chat with Harry and Terry before moving on, Lee Jordan following them a few seconds later, and shortly after the three were dragged by the Gryffindor chasers.

In the end Luna was sure that she had found people that she could call friends.

*Great hall*

The yearly sorting, the event that would dictate the social path of the new students of Hogwarts, most would stick to their houses when it came to friends. Eventually they would become the very image of the house, but every year there was someone that tried to break that, or that simply didn't care about house barriers, people like Harry Potter, who had friends in three of the houses and was acquainted with everyone in his year.

This year was the first of the baby boom from after the Voldemort War, there were sixty-something students in all, once and one half as much as the previous year, and the next year there would probably be around a hundred students, maybe even more.

One of two things would happen; either someone would follow Harry's group example and care not for houses, or they would be sheep and stay inside their own house, but with a class like that there was sure to be at least five who would not care.

Now, Harry Potter was normally a patient guy, but cauldron cakes, the most filling food sold in the Hogwarts express by the trolley lady, could only stave off hunger for a while, and the sorting was not doing him favors, as most people were taking around a full minute, so Harry decided to let his eyes wander while waiting for the rest of the students to be sorted.

Five students stood out; one of them was carrying a camera, Colin Crevey, sorted into Gryffindor, and while he appeared to be a boy-who-lived fanboy, he was showing that he knew about the laws of the wizarding world, along with the customs and general knowledge; he would have been a great Ravenclaw if not for the enthusiasm.

Luna was another one, but Harry thought he had a good read on her, at least for the time being. The twins' sister was another notable witch, she was writing on a notebook, probably because she knew that her name would be one of the last, but Harry noticed that she was hardly paying attention to what McGonagall was saying, even less to where the students before her were going.

The third had been a Davies, yet looked nothing like the Ravenclaw quidditch captain nor Blaize's friend, as far as Harry knew those two were half-siblings, so they could be unrelated, but the way the boy looked at the great hall when he was sorted into Slytherin and the way he moved towards Tracey when he was sorted made him think otherwise. A bastard child maybe.

Fourth had not been called up yet, but she was paying less attention to the sorting and more to the decorations around the great hall, looking intently at the suits or armour that stood next to the pillars, most likely wondering how they moved, something Harry had yet to discover, even after a year of spending a weekly hour searching for whatever made them move. Perhaps a research partner when it came to that topic.

Last was also a boy, a tiny boy that looked out of place with the rest of the first years, being smaller than all of them in both build and stature, everyone was taller than him by a head, and the boy was someone Harry had saved some times from Dudley's gang, so it was to no surprise that the boy looked relieved by Harry's presence at the school.

All in all, the batch would prove interesting, from the guy that could be a pain in his arse to the guy that would no doubt stick to him like a life line, but he really wanted to meet that girl with the same curiosity as him, a person that could rival him in ideas. And perhaps more.

For now though, sorting was almost over, four more students, luckily, his stomach was already rumbling in hunger.

No one noticed when the second youngest Wesley child slipped into the Great Hall, but they did notice when Snape dragged him out by the arm, something that made his brothers shake their heads, one pair in self-pity at not having managed that in their four years and the other in shame at being related to the boy that would from now on be known as the one that broke the rules before the school even started.

But no one did notice when a house elf popped away with a remorseful look in his giant eyes.