"Very good Harry!"
Albus smiled slightly at the black haired boy.
Three weeks had passed since that faithful meeting in the headmaster's office. Both the Potters and Delhommes were ecstatic that he was chosen for such an educational opportunity.
Lily wrote him a long letter praising him, while James went on awhile about up holding the family name, but Harry could tell that James was also very proud. David and Alice sent him a nice long letter including cute little stories about his siblings that he enjoyed immensely, and some new materials to fiddle around with. As long as it did not require batteries all the machinery would work fine at Hogwarts.
The Delhommes usually spent the week at their house in North Carolina during the week, and then flooed to the Potters for the weekend; Lily and James where happy to welcome them with open arms, especially since the kids were beginning to view them as grandparents. Alice absolutely adored all of them, and tended to spoil them worst than even Sirius. Jalene already had both David and Alice eating out of her palm.
Most of his education was to be independent study, since the teachers usually had full schedules until dinner.
Hermione and Harry would usually begin their day with breakfast with their friends, once the others left for classes the pair would make their way to the library and study anything they desired until lunch time.
After lunch they would walk to a practice classroom where materials would be left for them to use, and they would attempt all they had studied. Harry was careful not to get too far ahead of Hermione, and would often spend the lesson helping her improve this or that.
At three they would split up and attend private lessons. Every Tuesday and Thursday he would head to the headmaster's office for private instruction, Monday was potions, Wednesday transfiguration, and Friday charms. Hermione met with the Headmaster every Monday and Wednesday, Tuesday she had transfiguration, Thursday potions, and Friday charms with Harry.
Usually after dinner they would either go to herbology, astronomy, arithmancy, or runes together, except on Tuesdays and Thursdays when Harry had quidditch practice. On those days Hermione usually went to the library to finish her essays.
Much to her annoyance and Harry's amusement she never figured out how he always seemed to be finished with his essays. Little did she know that he had every essay he ever wrote stored in his trunk upstairs and would usually tweak it a bit to perfection. Many times she would run across lines that she could swear that it sounded just like something she would say.
They were already close to the end of the second year material, and once they finished that they would be joining a third year Care of Magical Creatures class for some hands on experience that a book just could not provide.
The private lessons with Dumbledore were a mixture of defense against the dark arts, dueling, wandless magic, and some little known spells. Harry was being extremely careful to keep control of his magic at all times and not show too much potential in front of the meddling old man, something that he had been planning to use to his advantage.
Dumbledore had on many occasions looked into Jamie's mind, and while he had nothing 'important' there he still resented the fact that the headmaster dared even try to look into his mind. So therefore he came up with a plan….
Harry's holding back confused the headmaster to no end. He knew that the boy was far more talented than he showed, but why was he restraining himself?
"Very good Harry." Albus repeated smiling.
The only 'real' skill the boy had shown was in the more unknown spells. Albus was extremely surprised when Harry showed next to no skill in wandless magic. He wasn't sure if the boy truly had any skill in it or not, for he appeared to actually concentrate quite intently while trying.
"That's enough for today Harry."
Harry nodded politely and placed his wand back in its holster, but before he could turn to leave Dumbledore indicated for him to take a seat. Harry slowly took a seat while Albus rounded his desk and took a seat.
"Now would you like to talk about anything?" Albus asked steeping his fingers in front of himself and giving the boy a grandfatherly smile.
Harry gave a curious look back.
"Well nothing that I can think of at the moment, sir. Perhaps my progress?"
Albus' eyes twinkled a bit in amusement. How ironic that the boy's question would lead right to where he was going.
"Ah…yes, you have shown yourself to be most skilled. However, I feel as if you may be holding back." Dumbledore peered over his glasses inquiringly, "Harry are you holding back?"
Albus watched the oldest Potter child closely and was privileged to see surprise and then a bit of unease pass across his features. Concern? Perhaps he was hiding something?
"No sir…" The sentence was stuttered out and they both knew immediately it was a lie.
"Oh?" Albus left the question out there stating plainly that he did not believe him.
"Well not intentionally." The sentence was muttered with his eyes downcast, avoiding the piercing gaze.
Dumbledore took on a confused expression and motioned Harry to continue.
"Well you see sir…I'm not really comfortable when I'm around you. It's nothing that you've done, but rather just a feeling." Harry trailed off.
Inwardly he smirked. If Albus wanted to 'control' him he would have a much more difficulty if he was afraid of him.
"What sort of feeling?" The older man was intrigued at what he was hearing.
"A deep resentment…a need for, well…revenge."
The confusion was clear on the first year's face.
"I never felt it until I saw you at Hogwarts on the first night, but the more time I spend in your presence the more the feeling grows…it makes absolutely no sense!" Harry scowled fiercely.
"And I always have a headache after every lesson, I'm more irritable and…well just not myself." Harry ranted on, rubbing his forehead as he did so.
Albus' eyes narrowed slightly at the action.
"So I've been trying to not stand out in my lessons. Obviously I didn't succeed. I thought that if you believed I wasn't talented enough then you wouldn't waste your time teaching me, and the problem would be fixed."
"Harry why do you think you feel this way?"
"That's the point…I don't know, it's almost as if they're some other person's feelings and I am just picking up on the."
Suddenly with eyes narrowed Dumbledore made a connection. It couldn't be…could it? A connection between Harry and Voldemort…was it even possible? But why would it wait to manifest here at Hogwarts?
"Harry would you mind letting me examine your scar, for I think that it could give us a clue as to what is happening."
Naturally Harry frowned at the request and leaned back from the headmaster appearing to do some quick thinking.
Finally the black haired boy nodded, frown still firmly in place.
Albus raised his wand and saw intense anger suddenly flare in the boy's eyes and the tension was plain to see in his shoulders.
"Ostendo sum nex iunctio!"
An orange light shot out of the wand and hit Harry squarely in the forehead.
Instantaneously a black shadow enveloped the lightning scar, and red, black, and white lines spanned out from around the darkness in a spider web like patterns, covering the majority of the boy's face. Further more, a golden glow surrounded his whole body, and for a moment even his eyes seemed to glow gold.
Dumbledore did not let it show on his face, but he was down right confused. The spell he had just used was supposed to show any mental connections Harry had from death or from souls. The black he could easily conclude was from Voldemort, and the red must be from Bellatrix Lestrange for her sacrifice was by blood, but what of the white? Not only that, but he had never heard before of a glow that surrounded the whole body using that spell.
Harry looked down at his hands and stared in wonder at the golden glow.
What was going on?
He looked up and saw the confusion in the older wizard's eyes as well. Frowning he walked over to a mirror on the wall near by and looked into its reflective depths. Green/gold eyes stared back at, studying the lines that covered his face.
Harry frowned at the lines; black was for Voldemort, red for Bellatrix, and white was for him, he knew that each line represented a part of another person's soul. When Riddle failed to kill him he accidentally transferred part of his soul and power into the young Potter while Bella transferred blood protection and some of her talents as well. Harry obviously transferred his soul, but what in the world was the golden glow from?
Studying the lines Harry wondered silently what other talents Bella had left him besides being able to burn his enemies to a crisp.
Sharp blue eyes watched as small hands ran over the multi colored lines in wonder.
Another person left the boy a gift or protection, but who and when?
Both headmaster and student jumped when they heard hearty chuckling from a shelf.
"Really Harry the gold suits you…from a mutual friend I am sure."
Dumbledore stared at the sorting hat as Harry processed the new clue.
The old man surely? Chauncey wasn't it? What did the gold indicate protection wise? Could he even get in contact with this Chauncey?
Harry frowned thoughtfully, hardly noticing that the headmaster was now watching him closely, until his soft voice asked a question, "What mutual friend would that be Seanan?"
Once again the sorting hat let out a chuckle, "Honestly Albus it is really nothing that would concern you, just something for young Mr. Potter here."
Wishing to question the sorting hat further Dumbledore quickly dismissed the oldest Potter child.
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Unfortunately a few days after his lesson Harry really hadn't made any headway in finding out what his new protection was, however his over all plan had worked famously. Dumbledore had sent him a note after breakfast stating that instead of having lessons with him he would continue his lessons with Professor Snape until his 'condition' was under control. As far as Harry knew Snape would be teaching Jamie how to defend his mind against attacks, something that would come in handy in the future. He was getting sick of Dumbledore prying into his outer mind all the time. It was interesting to note that once again the headmaster decided to not tell him why he needed to learn to defend his mind; after all he was only a first year.
The Halloween feast had passed the week before without anything really interesting happening (if you discounted the Weasley twins' prank), not that he expected something to occur after how jumpy Quirrell had been lately. Quirrell had been avoiding him like the plague, careful to never be caught alone in a corridor, or a room, something that was amusing Harry to no end…he had a plan to deal with that two face git as well.
Both of the twins would regularly meet up with Harry in an abandoned classroom telling him of their great pranks and asking for ideas in return. While Harry had yet to lead a prank, many of his ideas had been used on the Slytherin population, and he had even suggested many pranking candies that they could make in the future. The twins straight away latched on to the idea of a joke shop, or inventing pranking items as brilliant. Fred had even mentioned that he would be very interested in starting a business if they could ever get the funding.
They were already in November, and the weather had cooled drastically. The group had started to wear their warm sweaters, and both Harry and Draco dreaded the hours of long flying in the evening cold. Chambers, while not nearly as bad as Oliver, worked them almost to exhaustion every practice, and encouraged them to get in extra practice on their off days. Malfoy would usually grumble under his voice when he heard that suggestion, muttering exactly where Chambers could go, giving Harry great amusement.
On the other hand Draco had taken to dragging his best friend to visit 'Uncle Sev' every Friday afternoon for tea, of course Draco had also invited Hermione, Ron, and Neville, but the first would always head to the library and the last two looked sick at the thought of tea with Snape and would run off to visit Hagrid instead.
Harry had to admit while this Snape was his usual snarky self, he had an edge to him that was more caring and plain to see as with how he dealt with his godson. Even Severus had picked up on the slight changes in his godson. Draco while he seemed to still hold prejudice it was not nearly as strong as before, and the boy was actually starting to think for himself. Honestly Harry contributed it to the fact that Hermione was so brilliant and some of the ideas he had been pushing. It is hard to say that muggleborns are inferior to purebloods, when one of them is wiping the floor with you, as the bushy haired first year was.
Harry was happily looking forward to the first quidditch match of the season which would feature his old house against the snakes. Interestingly enough Ritchie Coote a second year became the new Gryffindor seeker. Ritchie had played Harry's sixth year as a chaser, and while he was weedy looking he had excellent speed, skill, and aim, so honestly he was the lion's best selection.
The first Ravenclaw game would be the second weekend after the Slytherin/Gryffindor match, and the whole Potter clan, alone with his grandparents and uncles were planning on coming to watch the match. Draco had also mentioned that his mother would be attending since there was a slight chance that he would get to play.
Privately Harry was very interested in meeting this Narcissa, and judging how different she truly was from the death eater he knew. From the memories he could recall she did not seem like the woman from his world, but then again her change might have been totally to do with her sister's death, Bellatrix and Narcissa were extremely close.
Harry let out a loud sigh, for only time would tell whether or not he could trust the people of this world.
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Hope you enjoyed the update…lol this chapter might seem a little insignificant but it's needed to set everything up for the next part of the story.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAM (PSTurner)!!