OK, when writting some of year 3's chapter, I noticed that they were shorter than I usually had them, so I made a change. Now, instead of third year being five chapter, it's now three chapters, I combined some of the chapters together. As a result, we will get through year 3 faster, but I won't update as much because I'm falling behind on my chapters, the next update will be either Monday, Tuesday, or Wendesay of next week.
Harry and the Longbottoms arrived at Kings' Cross ten minutes before eleven. They quickly boarded the Hogwarts Express and found Ginny and Luna sharing a compartment. They were shortly joined by Hermione and were off to Hogwarts yet again. The girls told them all about their vacations to different countries while Harry and Neville told them about their summer. Harry got an earful from Hermione about his Aunt Marge, though she relented a bit when she heard more about her. Ginny also told them how her family had arrived early with Daniel being escorted by their new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, another friend of the Potters Remus Lupin.
After talking about their summers, the conversation turned to the coming school year. Hermione and Ginny were shocked at Lily's letter and the gift she sent while Luna just smiled. While at Neville's, Harry had practiced many of the moves from the book Neville got him, planning on trying out for the Seeker position on the Ravenclaw Quidditch Team. Everyone offered him words of encouragement. Ginny and Luna provided information on Lily Potter, as they had her for Potions last year. They hadn't brewed many potions but had instead focused on the ingredients of potions and gotten many essay assignments on ingredients and brewing techniques.
They were also interrupted a couple of times. First was by Draco Malfoy and his goons, also offering encouragement and warning him that he was still better. Second was the trolley witch, offering sweets for the train ride. Harry bought them all something using some of the new money he got. Lisa Turpin also showed up, blushing as she said hello to Harry. He felt himself blushing as well as he said hello back. The final time was late in the train ride. It was very dark and rainy when they suddenly stopped, the lights flickering out. Everyone was slightly worried, and Harry could feel an unnatural cold flow through him. Outside the compartment, he could see a tall figure dressed in black. He could hear voices; two of them were his aunt and uncle's. Then there was a bright blue light and the figure, the cold feeling and voices disappeared.
Looking around the compartment, Harry could see that everyone was uncomfortable. Luna's eyes were completely focused, not their usual dreamy state, Hermione and Neville were shivering a bit while the latter held Ginny, whose eyes were closed with fear and was shaking like mad. The compartment door opened and a young man with greying, light brown hair, shabby wizard's clothes, and an ill look on his face was standing there. He started handing out chocolate after looking them over, his eyes staying on Harry's face for a brief moment, before leaving to check on other students. After a couple of minutes, the Hogwarts Express was moving again.
It wasn't long after that they were at Hogwarts with the rain pouring harder than ever. In the wet Entrance Hall, Professor McGonagall called Hermione over before dismissing Harry and Neville to their tables. The Sorting was over by the time not only Hermione and McGonagall returned, but Daniel came with them.
"Welcome back to Hogwarts!" Professor Dumbledore had stood and was giving them his usual Welcoming Speech. He told them a bit of information on the Dementors that had searched the Hogwarts Express. Harry did not like the Dementors one bit. He then welcomed Professor Lupin, the man who gave them the chocolate, as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher and Hagrid for Care of Magical Creatures. During the feast, Harry kept sneaking glances at Lisa, who was across from him, and blushed when she was caught him, not knowing that she was doing the same. Even since her Valentine last year, he had been unable to look at her without his face going red.
The next morning, Harry's schedule said that this year, instead of Potions with Snape, he had it with his mother first thing. Professor Potter started out her class with an introduction of herself and what was expected in her class, then a quiz on basic potions ingredients. Afterwards, she began a lecture over the quiz which lasted the rest of the lesson and then assigned two rolls of parchment for a homework assignment over the Shrinking Solution. After class, Harry stayed behind to talk to his mother.
"Professor Potter?"
She looked up smiling, though when she saw Harry, it dimmed a bit. "Hello H…Mr. Potter." The greeting sounded a bit forced. "What can I do for you?"
Harry recognized her voice as one of the voices he heard along with his aunt and uncle's. Nervous about finally talking to his mother, he couldn't speak for a couple of seconds. "I just wanted to thank you, for the broom you sent me."
Professor Potter's smile increased a little bit, her eyes watery. "Of course Harry. It may not make up for all of these years, but I hope that it's a start." She then looked at Harry weirdly. "Your eyes, I just noticed their color. I can't believe…. You better go now, got to get to your next class."
Harry had almost left the classroom when he turned to his mother once more. "In private, can I call you mum?" This time, Lily's eyes filled with tears and could only nod her head in response. Luna was waiting outside for Harry.
"She needed that Harry, greatly," Luna said.
The rest of the week went normally except for some entertainment provided by Draco Malfoy. During his first Care of Magical Creatures class, he insulted a hippogriff which tried to take his arm off, resulting in a heavy scratch that, according to him, made his arm useless for a long while. The result was Draco's father trying to get the hippogriff executed and Hagrid sacked and Draco moaning about the castle. He succeeded in the first, but do to Dumbledore's influence, didn't succeed in the second.
The first weekend was the Ravenclaw Quidditch tryouts. Harry went down with his Cleansweep, Hermione, and Luna. Roger Davis, the Ravenclaw Captain, was holding tryouts for the entire team; Harry was among four people trying out for Seeker. When it was Harry's turn, he was up against Cho Chang, last year's Reserve Seeker. Although she had a little more experience, Harry had the talent and broom to catch two of the three Snitchs, making him the new Seeker and Chang was still the reserve. Harry could hear Davis remarking that if Harry was half as good as his brother, Ravenclaw would definitely win the Quidditch Cup this year.
Harry sat next to Hermione, waiting for the start of their Defense Against the Dark Arts class. Because of the abilities of past teachers, Harry was willing to believe that Professor Lupin was even competent. Hermione was reading her course book and Harry was preparing his quill for note taking. Only Daniel and Ron weren't preparing or talking about Professor Lupin, they were sitting in their seats, smirking like the cat that caught the canary. Two minutes into class, Professor Lupin walked in looking a bit better than he had on the train.
"Good afternoon. Put your books away and take your wands out, it's a practical lesson today, follow me."
Harry and Hermione shared a look; they had never had a practical lesson ever. They and the rest of the class followed Lupin out of the classroom and through several corridors to the staffroom. Inside was Professor Snape wearing a frown at the sight of the class. He stood up and left the room with an insult towards Neville, who turned bright red. Lupin went to stand next to an old wardrobe which gave a violent wobble.
"Nothing to worry about, there's just a boggart in there."
Harry remembered reading about boggarts in his Defense book. They were shape-shifters who lived in dark, enclosed spaces. Boggarts were basically the very symbol of fear, even though no one knew what their true form looked like. There were able to change their shape to reflect the very thing their victim feared the most. The book also mentioned that being in a group was best when dealing with a boggart. Hermione said as much when Professor Lupin asked the class about boggarts.
"There is a simple charm to repel a boggart, but it requires force of mind. You have to envision something funny and force it to change with the charm. Laughter is what really finishes a boggart, so focus on something funny. We will practice the charm before we have a go at the boggart, so everyone thing of what frightens you the most and then think of a way to make it funny."
There was some muttering about the class, many had pale faces. Harry didn't know what frightened him, so he didn't know how to make something comical. So everyone was ready and Professor Lupin had Neville come to the front of the class. He looked really frightened and actually paled when Professor Snape walked out of the wardrobe. With a forced stutter, boggart-Snape was forced into clothes that Harry recognized as Augusta Longbottom's. The entire class burst out into laughter at the sight.
One-by-one the rest of the class came forward to face the boggart. Harry soon found out many of his fellow classmate's fears and was treated to a good laughing fest. Parvati, Padma Patil's twin sister, came forward to face a mummy while Padma herself faced a snake. Seamus Finnigan got a banshee while Mandy Brocklehurst was surrounded by darkness. When Hermione got to try the boggart took the form of Professor Flitwick who told her that she was kicked out of Hogwarts for failing an assignment. The result was Hermione screaming her head off and running behind Harry, much to the class's amusement.
Because Hermione was hiding behind him, the boggart's attention was now on Harry. Flitwick transformed into a tall figure dressed in a black cloak; a Dementor. Harry could feel an unnatural cold flow through him while the voices he heard on the train returned. His aunt, uncle, mother, and a man Harry assumed to be his father were talking.
"What are you doing here, freak?"
"We're here to give you our son."
"Why would we want the freak, you freaks?"
"He's a squib Petunia, he has absolutely no magic."
"What did you say?"
"Please take care of him, we're unable too. I can't have a squib in my house."
"Fine. We'll take care of the fre….the boy."
Attempting to push the voices out of his head, Harry focused on the spell he was supposed to be practicing. With a quick Riddikulus, the boggart-Dementor tripped over its own cloak and fell over. It continued to stumble over the cloak trying to stand up. The class, affected by the cold, slowly started to laugh until Harry could no longer hear the voices or feel the cold.
"Very good Harry, very good."
Even Professor Lupin looked a little pale at the sight of the Dementor, but was slowly getting his color back. Up next was Ron Weasley whose boggart managed to scare quite a few people until he was able use the charm to remove the spider's legs. The legless spider rolled around, stopping in front of Daniel. Professor Lupin moved to get between Daniel and the boggart, but before he could, it transformed. Instead of a spider, a black-haired man Harry recognized as his father was standing where the spider used to be. He looked just like Harry remembered him from two years ago on the train platform, but this time, instead of a large smile, there was a frown on his face.
"Failure! You failed and are useless as a son. You are no longer my son."
The boggart-James's words had a huge effect on Daniel; he fell on his knees and held his head down in shame with what looked like tears in his eyes. It immediately disappeared as Professor Lupin got in front of it. Boggart-James Potter transformed into a large silver-white orb that reminded Harry of the full moon they studied in Astronomy class, and then it was a balloon and was back in the wardrobe.
"Excellent! Well done everyone. Five points to everyone who successfully took on the boggart and ten points to Miss Granger for answering my questions on boggarts. For your homework, please read the chapter on boggarts and summarize it, due next week."
Things were progressing normally at Hogwarts; it was basically the same as last year except for a few differences. First were Harry's new courses; Care of Magical Creatures was boring after the Hippogriff Incident, though Ancient Runes made up for that. Second were the changes in their current courses; DADA was more fun now and Potions was more informative but he had more homework and also it was harder, much to Daniel's and Ron's dismay. Third was Harry's new position as Seeker for the Ravenclaw Quidditch Team. Most of the team had Cleansweep 7s and Harry's natural talent more than made up for his inexperience. After every practice, Davies was smiling big; no doubt imagining holding the Quidditch Cup. Harry also had weekly talks with his mother in which they learned more about each other. Harry knew she wanted him to live with the rest of the Potter family, but Harry couldn't because of the way his father treated his mother and him as well as Daniel's attitude.
The first Hogsmeade trip was coming up and everyone except Daniel was excited. With Peter Pettigrew at large, he had been denied permission to visit the village. Lily Potter had also tried to persuade Harry not to visit the village, but she knew that barging into his life like that would ruin the small relationship they had, so she stopped trying after the second time. Harry had gotten his aunt to sign the slip the day he got it, which was lucky as he doubted the Dursley's would have signed it after the Aunt Marge Incident.
Harry went down with Neville and Hermione on Halloween. As they pasted the Dementors, Harry could feel the unnatural cold all around him and the voices in his head, stronger than when he faced the boggart. It took him a little while to pass, but soon he was in Hogsmeade Village. The trio visited many of the shops including Honeydukes, Tomes and Scrolls, and Dervish and Banges, completing the visit to the pub The Three Broomsticks.
Afterwards they returned to Hogwarts for the Halloween Feast which was as delicious as ever, even with all the sweets they had eaten earlier in the day. The Great Hall was entertained by hundreds of bats flying all over, performing complicated maneuvers, and the Hogwarts ghosts putting on various performances including the popular story The Fountain of Fair Fortune, starring Sir Nicholas and Helena Ravenclaw, to the latter's immense pleasure. After the Feast, Harry was just beginning to lay down to sleep when one of the prefects told him and his dorm mates to head back down to the Great Hall as quickly as possible. Once down there, everything was revealed, Peter Pettigrew had somehow broken into the castle and attack the portrait to the Gryffindor Common Room. Now the entire school was being searched while all of the students were to sleep in the Great Hall that night.
Yes, Peter breaks into Hogwarts to get at Daniel, though this with be one of the last references to the third book. I'm not going to spend much time in third year so I have only a couple more chapters here before we go into the much anticipated fourth year. By the way, Daniel's boggart is failure, just so you know. All of his life he was told he would be the one to defeat Voldemort when he returned, making him arrogant. What most people fail to realize is that Dumbledore and James have trained Daniel up, so he's quite powerful, but still human and completely afraid of being unable to defeat Voldemort. However, I did include a major clue here, it will take a while until I reveal why it is important. I noticed that Wrong BWL fanfics start in one of three places; when Voldemort attacks on Halloween, the start of first year, or the start of fourth year. Now I'm further than most in the first category, hurray.