Sirius couldn't help but grin when he saw Harry's owl flying towards him – Harry's letters were the best part of his week. If possible, the letters had become even more enjoyable now that Harry wasn't holding back on him (he hadn't even realised how much his godson was holding back, until Harry started telling him the truth about things. It was still weird to read about Harry's friendship with Narcissa's son though. Some days, Sirius wondered what James and Lily would think of their son's best friend being a Death Eater's son. Except, according to Narcissa, Lucius wasn't actually a Death Eater and, as much as Sirius hated to admit it, he knew that she hadn't been lying.

Sirius retrieved the letter from the owl and quickly opened the envelope. He was pretty sure that Harry had had a Quidditch game on Saturday, maybe the letter would contain details about it. Sirius couldn't wait to see him fly one day!

'Dear Sirius,

I hope that you don't mind that I'm sending you this letter. I wasn't planning to, because I know that you don't like traditionalism, but when I wrote to Cousin Narcissa she said that I should tell you about it too.'

Sirius closed his eyes and, using the techniques that his Mind Healer had taught him, forced away the sudden flare jealously. Of course Harry was still writing to Narcissa about things. Not only had Harry known her for longer, but she had tutored him over the summer. He shouldn't be jealous of Narcissa, he should be thankful that she had instructed Harry to write to him as well.

'I know you're not traditional, but I sort of am – I hope that's okay.'

Sirius gritted his teeth. He hated the way Harry's letters often sounded anxious – as though his godson was afraid that Sirius wouldn't like something he had said and would get mad. And he especially hated the way that his letters to his godson had most likely exacerbated the boy's fear. Narcissa's first visit had been a real wake-up call for him. He was 33 years old and, to use Remus' words, needed to grow past his immature teenage discriminations.

'This afternoon, after the Quidditch match (which we won – we won't win the Cup though, Slytherin are way ahead of us in points), I was hanging out with some of my friends. Draco was there, as well as Theodore Nott, Daphne Greengrass, Pansy Parkinson, Tracey Davis, and Blaise Zabini.'

Sirius reread the list, he'd heard a lot about Draco of course, but Theodore Nott? The House of Nott was notoriously dark, as were the Houses of Greengrass and Parkinson. What was Harry doing spending time with dark witches and wizards?

Sirius took a deep breath and then another. His prejudice was showing again. He needed to remember that his godson's magic was dark. There was nothing wrong with dark magic, it was just another kind of magic. He took another deep breath. He refused to stay the 'prejudice git' (Remus' words, not his) he had been at Hogwarts.

'And at one point Pansy said that her father thinks that you are a blood traitor. Which I know probably won't bother you, since you don't like traditionalism, but it was really rude of her. When I defended you she then insulted Neville Longbottom (the Heir of the Ancient and Noble House of Longbottom) and then later called me a "half-blooded blood traitor playing at being noble".

'I originally wrote to Cousin Narcissa to ask her advice on what my response should be (I have included a copy of her letter for you to read) and she thought that you might be willing to take care of it. It's alright if you're not, I know that you're not traditional and that you don't really like traditional people. I wouldn't have asked, except Cousin Narcissa told me I should.

Your godson,

Harry'

Sirius ran a hand through his hair. Bollocks. This was exactly what being a prejudice git had got him – a traditional godson who thought (not wrongly) that he didn't like traditional people. He was tempted to blame the whole thing on Narcissa. None of this would have been a problem if he hadn't had a traditional godson, and he very much doubted that his godson would have been traditional if not for the Malfoys' influence. Still, pointing the blame was not a healthy, or effective, coping strategy (according to his Mind Healer) and it certainly wouldn't help him deal with the situation.

It didn't really surprise him that Perseus Parkinson thought he was a blood traitor. Perseus had been a year ahead of him at Hogwarts and had been a traditionalist git. Not that there was anything wrong with being a traditionalist, Sirius reminded himself quickly, but there was something wrong with being a git. It did surprise him that Perseus' daughter had such poor manners. Perseus might have been a git to Remus and Peter, but he'd never been anything besides respectful to him and James.

Not that he and James would have done anything if he had been disrespectful. Despite the fact that both their sets of parents were traditional, they had both jumped on Dumbledore's non-traditional bandwagon in their first year at Hogwarts and never looked back. His parents' had been horrified and James' parents hadn't been much happier about the situation (though they had been a lot less violent in their displeasure). How ironic that James' son would be just as traditional as his grandparents had been.

Sirius looked back to the letter. Well, like it or not, he was the godfather (and hopefully soon guardian) of a traditionalist and he needed to live up to his responsibilities. Which, right now, meant writing a scathing letter to Perseus Parkinson. Good thing he still remembered all his mothers, and Cousin Dorea's, lessons on traditional protocol.

25-25-25

The week after Pansy insulted him was, in Harry's opinion, bizarre. He'd sort of expected the Slytherins to take her side and ignore him, but instead they were snubbing Pansy. It was completely unexpected and wonderful. Harry didn't think he had ever had friends who had picked his side before.

When Harry received a letter from Sirius informing him that he had written to Pansy's father, Harry considered pinching himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming. He didn't think he had ever had so many people take his side. Not only that, but Sirius had written to Mr. Parkinson even though he hated traditionalism. It was amazing!

Three days later, when he was working on his homework near the lake with Draco, Luna, Theo and Daphne, Pansy approached him and curtsied.

"Merry meet."

Harry stood up and raised an eyebrow. "Parkinson."

Pansy's face flushed at his brusque slight, though Harry couldn't tell whether it was out of embarrassment or anger.

"Heir Potter." Pansy started. "I beg your forgiveness for my audacious behaviour last week. I acted no better than a blood-traitor and…"

"You called me a 'half-blooded blood traitor playing at being noble'." Harry interrupted.

Pansy flushed darker and she stared at the floor. "I beg your forgiveness."

Harry studied her. She looked more angry and embarrassed than repentant, still there was no point in drawing the matter out any further. If she did it again though…

"I accept your apology." He told her. "Do try to be less uncouth in the future."

"Yes, Heir Potter." Pansy curtsied again. "May I join you?"

"Yes," Harry sat back beside Luna.

There was an awkward silence as Pansy sat down near Daphne and Harry turned his attention back to his Potions essay.

"And again with the Lord Malfoy impersonation." Theo commented. "Merlin, Harry, no one our age should be able to be that intense."

Harry gave him a half smile. If he really was like Lord Malfoy, he would have known how to deal with his dormmates. It had been over two months since they had decided to stop being his friends and, while he barely missed them anymore, he did wish he had been able to give them a set down like he had given Pansy. Well, it was too late now, it would look silly if he all of a sudden decided to pick a fight with them. But next time something like that happened, he would be prepared.

25-25-25

The next week was Easter Break and most of the students went home for the week. Harry stayed and, to his disappointment, so did ten other Ravenclaws. He had really enjoyed having the Common Room to himself over the Christmas Holidays.

Harry spent most of the holiday practising drawing Ancient Runes. He had less than two months until the end of year exams and he was still having trouble drawing the Runes perfectly. There was absolutely no way he was going to allow himself to get anything less than an Outstanding in the exam though, which meant a lot of practise.

The most exciting thing about Easter Break, was that he got to select his Third Year electives. All the core subjects were still compulsory, so he knew that he would be taking Potions, Herbology, Defence Against the Dark Arts, Transfiguration, History of Magic, Astronomy, and Charms. But he had choose at least two more classes. Some of the decisions were easy. He definitely didn't want to take Muggle Studies or Care of Magical Creatures and he knew that he definitely wanted to take Fourth Year Ancient Runes. But that left Magical Theory, Arithmancy, Divination and Ancient Studies to choose from.

Normally he wouldn't have even considered Divination or Arithmancy, seeing the future wasn't something he was interested in, but maybe they would help him understand his visions. Which, now that he thought about it, was a stupid reason to take a subject. He didn't even know if the classes would help and he didn't want to get stuck in a useless class if they didn't. Which left Magical Theory, Ancient Studies and, of course, Ancient Runes.

It seemed like a massive decision to make on his own. After all, picking the wrong subjects would affect his ability to get a job in the future, so Harry wrote to Sirius to ask for his advice. Sirius' reply was enthusiastic and, while he admitted thinking Harry was crazy for wanting to take three subjects when he only had to take two, let alone choosing the three that were famous for being the hardest, he approved of Harry's choice.

The rest of the students returned on Saturday, which meant that Harry, Draco and Luna were able to spend Sunday brewing the potion that they were planning to use to prank the school body. It was an easy potion to brew and only took two and a half hours, a far cry from the month that their last potion had taken. When they had finished they handed the four cauldrons worth of potion over to Stompy, Harry's house elf friend, and then went down to dinner filled with excited anticipation.

They didn't have to wait long, the potion recipe made it so that the potion activated ten minutes after the potion had been ingested (a fact that Harry found fascinating – he couldn't wait until Snape taught them about time delayed potions) and exactly ten minutes after dinner started the hall was suddenly filled with the sound of people singing.

It sounded hilarious and absolutely terrible. Nobody was singing the same tune and it reminded Harry of the School Song that they always sung at the beginning of the year. Except this time nobody was singing the same words either.

Harry turned his attention to the wall in front of him and waited for Draco activate the words that they had spelled there earlier.

'Dear Wizarding Wheezes,

We hope you like musicals.

With Love,

The Marauders Apprentices'

Later, Harry decided that the funniest part of the whole evening was Dumbledore trying to issue threats to whoever it was who was behind the prank, in an opera-esque tune.

The next morning, Dumbledore announced, again sounding more like an opera singer than anything, that classes would be cancelled for the day. Apparently the professors didn't want to have to teach classes whilst singing. There were a few more threats of detention, loss of points, and even suspension as well, but Harry mostly just ignored those. Draco wasn't nearly as blasé about the threats and it took Harry and Luna ten minutes to talk him down from his panic.

The potion wore off at dinner that night, much to most people's relief and a few peoples' disappointment, so classes started again on Tuesday. The professors, singularly unsympathetic to the students' plight, gave them all twice as much homework to make up for the day that they had missed. It was logical really, after all exams were less than two months away.

On Thursday, Harry met Neville and Takashi for their weekly wandless magic practise. Harry and Neville had been making a lot of progress. While they still hadn't managed to levitate the twig without meditating first, both of them could levitate the stick up and down once they had come out of the meditation. Takashi still hadn't managed to make his stick levitate at all and Harry wasn't sure how the other boy was still motivated to try. He was sure he would have given up if he had failed for that many months in a row.

Because Takashi's stick had yet to move even after months of trying, Harry had stopped paying much attention to the older boy's stick and so almost missed it when it slowly rose off the ground.

Harry had been watching Neville's stick and it rose up and down, over and over again, when he saw something moving out of the corner of his eyes. Turning around, in case it was another student coming to bother them, he stared in shock at the sight of Takashi's stick hovering a few inches off the ground. The older boy had a look of intense concentration on his face.

"Neville!" Harry nudged his friend with his foot. "Look!"

Neville's stick dropped immediately. "What?"

"Look!" Harry repeated. "Takashi's done it!"

Neville's eyes widened and he turned around so that he could see Takashi. "Brilliant!"

They watched silently for a few more seconds and then watched as the stick dropped.

"Takashi!" Harry said loudly. "Takashi!"

It took a while, but eventually the older boy opened his eyes. "Is it my turn to take watch?"

"No, you did it!" Harry told him with a grin. "You floated your twig."

"What?" Takashi looked down at his twig in disbelief. "Really?"

"Really." Neville nodded. "It was floating a few inches off the ground."

"Wow." Takashi shook his head in amazement. "I can't believe it. I did it!"

"Congratulations." Harry told him.

"I did it." Takashi repeated, almost to himself, his eyes focused on the twig. "My father is going to be so proud."

25-25-25

The day of the last Quidditch game of the season arrived before they knew it and Harry couldn't help but be jealous of the perfect weather conditions. Why couldn't it have been this nice for the Ravenclaw games?

After breakfast, Harry and Luna began to make their way back to Ravenclaw tower to get Harry's Omnioculars. They were halfway up the first staircase when Harry suddenly heard a voice.

"Kill this time ... let me rip ... tear. . ."

Harry spun around quickly. "Who's there?"

"Don't worry, Harry," Luna told him calmly. "It's just the giant worm."

Harry stared at her, trying to figure out what she meant. "Do you mean that it's the thing that was petrifying students?"

"Of course." Luna nodded.

"Merlin!" Harry's stomach dropped. "What should we do?"

Luna shrugged and started climbing the stairs again.

"We have to tell someone." Harry decided as he followed her. "Last time you talked about a giant worm you said that Aurors Moony and Tonks had fought it. Maybe I should tell the Aurors."

"If you like." Luna smiled. "Would you like me come with you or should I go and get your omnioculars?"

"I can do it." Harry told her. "But don't worry about my omnioclulars. They're locked in my trunk."

"Okay, Harry."

Harry raced back down the stairs and them into the Great Hall. He studied the Head Table, looking for the Aurors, and groaned when he that they weren't there. Maybe they would be in their classroom? It took Harry four minutes to reach the DADA classroom, though his hurried run had earned him some strange looks from other students.

He knocked loudly on the door and hoped desperately that they were there. When the door swung open, showing Auror Shacklebolt, Harry almost laughed in relief.

"Can I help you?" Auror Shacklebolt asked him.

"Um," Harry froze. What exactly was he going to say? In order to explain what he'd heard, he would have to admit to being a parselmouth.

"Why don't you come in?" Shacklebolt asked.

"Thank you, sir." Harry followed the auror into the classroom. He had to tell him. What if someone got petrified, or worse – killed, because he had wanted to keep a secret? "I think another person is going to be petrified today, sir."

Shacklebolt looked surprised. "What makes you say that?"

"I'm a…" Harry paused nervously. "I'm a parselmouth, sir."

If Shacklebolt had looked surprised before, he looked positively stunned now. "You're a parselmouth?"

"Yes, sir." Harry answered.

"What's your name, kid?" Shacklebolt asked.

"Harry Potter." Harry answered and immediately saw Shacklebolt's eyes dart to his forehead.

"And you're a parselmouth?" Shacklebolt asked again.

Harry sighed in frustration. "Yes, sir. I haven't really told many people because I don't want them to get upset."

Shacklebolt nodded. "Okay. So why do you think there is going to be another attack today?"

"I heard a voice." Harry admitted. "I was on stairs and I heard something talking about killing someone. I was with Luna, Luna Lovegood, I mean, and she didn't hear anything so I think it must have been in parseltongue."

"I see." Shacklebolt studied him for a few seconds. "What staircase were you on?"

"The marble one off the Entrance Hall." Harry answered.

"Thank you, Mr. Potter." Shacklebolt told him. "I'll look into it."

Harry sighed again, this time in relief. "Thank you, sir."

25-25-25

An hour later, Harry was sitting in the Quidditch stands waiting for the game to start with Luna, Draco and the other first year Slytherins, when Professor Dumbledore walked out onto the pitch.

"What's he doing?" Daphne asked in confusion.

"Maybe he's going to referee." Theo grinned.

"If I could have your attention please." Dumbledore's amplified voice echoed around the stadium. "I am pleased to announce that Aurors Kingsley and Proudfoot have apprehended the creature responsible for the petrifications earlier this year. Please be advised that the third floor will be out of bounds for the rest of the day as they deal with the situation."

Harry didn't know when he had last felt so relieved.

25-25-25