Harry had a lot to think about for the rest of the holiday. On top of the question about Dobby, and how to help him – if that was possible – there was now this whole other thing about how Tom Riddle had done awful things to his soul to make it so he couldn't be killed.

On the other paw, on that matter Harry was sort of in the position Frodo was in during the several years after Bilbo had left but before the Nazgul came. Which was a fairly comfortable position to be in, all things considered.

He told Kreacher some of what they'd discussed – about how he couldn't yet destroy the locket but he was going to learn until he had exactly that skill – and Kreacher gave him an uncharacteristic hug that surprised both of them before backing away and going back to cleaning.

Over the next few days, the impact on the house was quite a sight to see, with rooms shedding their clutter and beginning to look more like you could actually live in the house itself. It was still the middle of a damp, slushy London winter, but it lifted Harry's mood and it seemed like Sirius was under a bit less stress as well.

As for the other project they had, Remus tried transfiguring some of the material lying around into a wand-holder that could be strapped to Harry's tail. It took a few tries before they had something that would stay securely attached to the tapered tail – unlike some dragons from books Harry didn't have a spade, which would have made the whole thing much easier – but by the twenty-eighth of December it seemed like they had something that would work.

"All right, Harry, let's give it a go," Remus decided, stepping back. "You don't have to cast any spells – that's something to do back at Hogwarts – but see if you can get the wand pointing where you want it."

He waved his own wand, and a dozen little coloured motes of light appeared in the air.

"Point at one, and I'll tell you which one you've got it pointed at," the Marauder instructed.

It turned out to be a lot harder than Harry was expecting. He could point his tail in roughly the right direction, but then Remus would tell him that he was actually pointing it at the green one instead of the yellow one he was aiming for – or none at all – or now he was aiming at the yellow one, but he'd been aiming for the blue one instead.

Half way through that an argument started between Sirius and Kreacher, but it sounded like this one was just about whether to put new wallpaper up, so it probably wasn't so serious.


By the beginning of January, Harry was sort of feeling like he was getting the hang of it. It'd be something to practice back at Hogwarts, certainly, and with only a couple of days to go until the start of term he packed everything up (including several new books, some of them duplicated by Remus from library books, so he had a reserve of books he hadn't read yet) and said his goodbyes before going back to Hogwarts via the Floo.

It was much more snowy this far north, and when Harry flew over the castle after putting his things away a little smile forced itself out onto his muzzle.

Hogwarts really was a beautiful place, especially blanketed in snow. The Black Lake was a smooth expanse of ice with deep black-looking water under it, marred only by patches of snow that hadn't blown off and a melted-looking hole at the corner nearest Hagrid's hut, and the lawns were criss-crossed by trodden-down patches where people had gone out to the broom sheds or just to have a snowball fight.

That line of thought led Harry to notice that one was going on right now, and that the Weasleys appeared to be gamely holding their ground against what looked like half of the lower four years of Slytherin.

Turning back towards Hogwarts, Harry alighted on the snow-covered castle roof and considered what he should do about the snowball fight.

The obvious thing to do would be to join in, and that did sound like a good idea, but… how exactly to join in?


Twenty minutes later, Harry had decided that sneaking up on the Slytherin team and hurling big lumps of snow at them with his wings, while entertaining, led to getting hit by too many snowballs himself.

Clearly the better option would have been to just join Ron and the others. But it was easy to work that sort of thing out after you'd already tried.


A few days later, when term started again, Harry reshuffled his unofficial timetable as best he could to try and fit in everything he wanted to.

It was kind of surprising how much time was still available to be moved around, with how he'd felt last term, and Harry wondered if that was just how it was – you could always find more time, and find more time, until instead you were stressed out – but he was able to arrange with Hagrid to really start teaching the big man some words of Dragonish. (Or Dragonese, or Dragonnish, or whatever the word you wanted to use was.)

On Saturday afternoon, every week, Harry began flying down to Hagrid's hut. The two of them would sit in a porch that Hagrid had built out of wood and canvas, with Harry turning his attention between Nora and Hagrid to make sure that he could keep demonstrating Dragonish to Hagrid (and to Hermione, who quickly started joining in the impromptu sessions).

Harry found the whole thing quite relaxing, really, and after the first week's session Hagrid offered to spend the time teaching Harry to knit as well. It transpired that Harry's talons could work quite well as knitting needles, though it was obvious by the end of the first hour that it would take a lot of work for Harry to produce anything other than 'misshapen lump'.

The contrast with Oliver Wood's enthusiastic Quidditch practices couldn't be greater, especially with how Oliver was sure that the Nimbus 2001 brooms about half his team was flying on would give them a massive advantage against Hufflepuff towards the end of the term.

Harry did enjoy them both, but he thought he'd enjoy the Quidditch a bit less without this to balance it with.


"Hmm..." Harry said, checking the textbook and then looking back at his homework essay. "Do you think it's fair to say that the Black Death had a bigger impact on Wizard-Muggle relations than the other plagues?"

"I dunno," Ron replied, frowning as well. "We don't know all that much about that other one from the six-sixties, do we? So maybe that one was just as bad."

"I'll say it had a significant impact," Harry decided, writing that down. "Such as… people asking their local magic users for cures…. Or thinking that the witches and wizards had caused it…"

"Don't forget that a lot of them were hiding even before the Statute of Secrecy," Hermione said. "And that the Black Death hit all over Europe, so some people could tell it wasn't an attack on them or even on England and Scotland."

"Good point," Harry agreed. "Wasn't there some plant that the local people thought was a cure, only it wasn't?"

Neville nodded. "They thought it repelled the miasma… hold on..."

As he started to look it up, Fred came over and sat down next to them.

"Oi, we're working here," Ron complained. "Shove off."

"I'm worried about Percy," Fred explained, as George came to stand next to them – Harry assumed that was because of the lack of free seats.

"He's worried about Percy," George agreed. "So, as you can tell, we're both worried about Percy."

"But, hold on..." Dean said. "Hold on. So you're worried, and you said he's worried."

"Exactly," Fred nodded. "Both of us. I'm Fred, and I say I'm worried."

"And I'm Fred," George went on. "And I say George here is worried. Since that means both Fred and George are worried..."

"Okay, what's this about?" Hermione asked.

"Percy's not his usual self," Fred explained.

"I asked him whether he thought a woollen sheep soaked in food dye would be an appropriate pranking tool, and he just grunted," George clarified.

"Why did you ask him that in the first place?" Ron said. "He's a prefect?"

"I like to include all our family members in planning," Fred said.

Harry looked between the twins, confused for a moment, then decided it was a Fred And George Thing.

"Is it possible he's being a teenager?" Neville said. "I've heard that that sort of thing happens when you're a teenager."

"Hey!" Hermione protested. "I'm one of those now."

"That's okay, girls are different," Dean nodded. "Or that's what my mum keeps saying. I've got sisters, so she'd know."

"No, I don't think it's that he's a teenager..." Fred mused. "I'm pretty sure Percy was born middle aged."


Harry was still wondering vaguely about whether Percy was ill or something during the next Defence class, which still wasn't really what he'd expected Second Year Defence to be like.

"Of course, fighting dark creatures is important," Professor Lockhart said, with a winning smile. "But just as important is making sure people know dark creatures can be beaten! And the best way to do that is for them to know that Gilderoy Lockhart – your beloved professor – is there to help."

He clapped his hands. "So! Today, I want you all to design special greetings cards including a scene from one of my many adventures, and write up why you chose what you did. I'll be taking them in at the end of the lesson, and next time – next time – you'll be provided with the materials to make those very same cards."

Dean grumbled something, and he wasn't the only one who seemed unimpressed. Harry had to admit that, while he could see the point of something inspirational, this seemed more like the sort of thing he'd done in primary school with glue and magazine cutouts.

Besides, he wanted to practice spellcasting with his tail, and doing it in Charms was better than nothing but it was still done at a desk. If there was any subject where you'd be moving around, Harry thought it would be Defence.

Still, Professor Lockhart presumably had some kind of general lesson plan for everyone.

After thinking about it a bit, Harry decided that the one that really interested him was the one about werewolves. The full moon had been only a couple of days ago, and he wondered if Remus had stayed at Grimmauld Place or gone back to his flat with the soundproofed room.

Maybe having Sirius around helped? Harry sort of remembered that that was why they'd learned in the first place.


By the end of the lesson, Harry had a sort-of-diagram drawn for what he wanted along with a few hundred words about why the card design would be good for making people more comfortable with werewolves. Dean had done better, actually sketching out a punch-up with a Yeti and making the greeting 'you're a knock-out!', but then he was the one who liked doing art.

It seemed like he'd enjoyed the lesson that way, at least. Though the Yeti was the one knocking out Lockhart in the sketch.

When everyone else set off for their free period, Harry stayed behind for a bit, and Professor Lockhart smiled.

"Ah, Harry!" he said. "Good Christmas? I notice you didn't get me that World Peace I said would be my ideal gift!"

He winked.

"I thought you said that was an ideal birthday present, Sir," Harry replied, understanding it was a joke but getting a bit distracted.

"Well spotted, nothing gets past you," Lockhart chuckled. "Looking for advice, Harry?"

"I was wondering when I'd get a chance to learn the Patronus charm," Harry explained. "I was hoping we'd start doing practical work this term."

"Well, it is practical work, isn't it?" Lockhart asked. "But I know what you mean, Harry, though… these spells… a lot of them are quite dangerous! Especially the Patronus charm, that's a very risky one. Very risky spell."

"That's why I want to learn it with someone helping," Harry replied, quite reasonably as far as he was concerned. "It's safer than learning it by myself."

"Of course, of course," Lockhart agreed, considering. "Hmm… what about if I walk you through a different spell instead, Harry? One that's a bit more appropriate for you?"

That sounded like a good idea, so Harry nodded. "If you think so, Professor. I'm just kind of worried about how many spells we're learning in Charms and Transfiguration but not Defence."

Professor Lockhart took out his wand and flourished it, spinning it around his fingers, then nearly dropped it. "Ahem! Yes, well… this is quite a tricky charm, so do pay attention. You move your wand like so."

Harry watched closely as the Professor moved his wand in a quick up-and-down motion before incanting 'Homorphus!'

Nothing happened, obviously, because there wasn't a werewolf, but Harry did like the idea a lot. He got his own wand ready, and watched as Lockhart did the wand movement again.

"So you do that wand movement and end it pressed against the throat of the werewolf?" Harry asked, to be clear on it.

"Well remembered, Harry!" Lockhart agreed, making Harry smile. "And then the incantation is Homorphus!"

"Homorphus," Harry repeated, and it certainly sounded right. Professor Lockhart had him say it a few more times, then said he'd done very well indeed and gave Gryffindor a point.

It was a pity it would take so long for Harry to have a chance to actually try the spell out, though, and Lockhart reminded him that it was best not to rely on it at all because a mistake would leave a dangerous werewolf right there.


Two days later, at dinner, Harry was muzzle-deep in Domes of Fire – and trying not to giggle at the description of the nacre-sheathed city that had to be resheathed every time there was a storm – when Ron whooped.

"Hey, Harry, look!" he said, pointing. Harry lowered his novel, and blinked in surprise at the sight of plates upon plates of pizza.

"I wonder who got the House-Elves all those Muggle cookbooks?" Fred asked, out loud.

"I wonder who had such a good idea," George agreed.

Harry took one of the nearest slices and inspected it. It had a crisp base, quite thin, and he was fairly sure there was bacon on top of it along with the cheese and tomato mixture.

On the plate next to it was one with a much deeper base, and Ron took one of those slices first. He cut a piece of the crust, then blinked and looked closer.

"The crust's got cheese in it," he said. "I wonder how they did that?"

"I think Muggles can do that," a Sixth-year Gryffindor said, taking one of the slices for himself. "I've had it before, Mum's a Muggle and she got us two of these for my birthday dinner last year."

Looking up and down the table, Harry could see all kinds of mixtures of toppings and crusts and bases – there didn't seem to be anything that wasn't pizza, but he could see one that was made with lamb chunks and apple slices, and another that seemed to have strawberries and black pepper, and it looked like that one had beef and mushrooms… it was hard to see any two that were the same, at first, but then he started to catch sight of them.

"How do you eat these?" one of the fourth-years asked.

"You just take a slice!" Colin Creevey told him, loudly enough that half the hall heard. "Then you can cut it up with a knife and fork, or roll it up, or fold it up – whatever you find easy!"

He demonstrated by taking a slice of one that had chicken, chorizo and lemon on it, folding it up lengthways, and eating the tip. His eyes went a little wide because of the sourness of the lemon, but it seemed like it meant that everyone else got the idea, and soon there was a low buzz of conversation as people began trading around bits of pizza to get a nice combination of flavours.

There was a little one that arrived for Harry with 'zinc zest', which meant they'd gone to the trouble of shaving off bits of metal and sprinkled it over the pizza. That was nice of them, and Harry checked to see whether Tanisis and June were both coping with the unusual food menu before smiling and folding his slices together.

He did notice Percy didn't eat much, though.


That day sort of set a pattern.

Harry assumed that it was the Twins who'd given the House-Elves all those ideas, and it was nice of them but it sort of seemed like they got really enthusiastic about a new kind of making food and just did loads and loads of it all at once. There was one day when everything was curry (from the very mild, through normal, to a bright green one where Neville looked like he was about to be the one breathing fire), another day when they made about a hundred different combinations of paella, and then there was the time there was nothing but muffins.

That didn't mean that lessons stopped, though, and now they were into the second term of second year they were starting to expand on the concepts from first year as well as learning new spells.

"Remember," Professor McGonagall said, putting some boxes with snails in them down on the tables – one per student. "When you are casting a set of spells in a chain, you must make sure that each of the intervening steps is properly cast. If you use a spell intended to turn a duck into a pillow, but you are casting it on something that is still partly a shoe, then you will not find yourself with any of a shoe, a duck or a pillow and you will have to reverse the transfiguration all the way back to the beginning!"

Harry made a note about that, then had an idea.

The first half of the spell chain they were going to be doing today was turning a snail into a teapot, and then they were turning that teapot into a tortoise. Both of those were first-year spells, so maybe it was a good time to try out casting a spell with his tail?

He rummaged in his bag for the thing Remus had made, and flexed his tail around to where he could reach it. It took a couple of minutes to put the wand holder on his tail and get it strapped in place, then he put his wand in place.

"What are you doing?" Su Li asked.

"I want to see if I can cast with my wand on my tail," Harry replied, tightening the strap which held his wand in the holder.

"But you don't even have it touching you like that," the Ravenclaw frowned. "Wouldn't that make it work less well?"

"Well, in Herbology we always have those gloves," Neville pointed out, from Harry's other side. "Those are magic resistant, and they still let you cast spells."

"Oh, good point," Su agreed. "Still, why do it?"

Harry moved his tail down so his wand was just about to touch the snail, then waved it three times and muttered the incantation. There was a little flash of light from his wand, and the snail changed shape most of the way into a teapot – though the spout wiggled a bit, and there was a definite sliminess about it.

"I want to be able to cast spells while I'm walking on all fours," Harry explained. "Reparifarge."

The reversal spell worked better, maybe because he'd done it more recently, and he was left with a slightly bemused snail.

Su turned to her own snail, and transfigured it into a teapot with a swirled pattern like the shell of the snail.

"Not a bad start, Miss Li," Professor McGonagall said. "Though you must try your best to ensure that no traits of the snail remain."

"Yes, Professor," Su replied, reversing the transfiguration to try again.

Harry tried again, doing his best to visualize a completely transformed teapot. It worked this time, with the whole teapot being an even black and not the least bit slimy, and he let out a sigh of relief.

It looked like he could cast spells with his wand on his tail, which meant the next thing to try and learn was aiming.

It wasn't really urgent, though, so it could probably wait until the next time there was a fire-fight. (Harry was quite looking forward to it – snow fights were all well and good, but so were fire fights, and they felt a bit more dragony.)


The weather got better as they moved through January, and Harry was quite glad of it. He might not care much about cold (or rain, really), and snow was a positive good, but when doing Quidditch practice it was harder to keep coordinated with everyone if it was difficult just to see them halfway down the pitch.

Fred and George were having a great deal of fun whatever the weather, of course, flying around on their new top-of-the-line brooms and sending the Bludger all over the place – Harry wondered if maybe future brooms would be faster than the Bludger, and whether they had to turn the speed of the Bludger up when brooms got better.

It was the first really sunny Saturday of the year when Ron first tried out his present from Harry, and sent a model rocket four hundred feet into the air. It would have gone higher, but Nora caught it in her muzzle before bringing it back – still sizzling out smoke and flame from the nozzle – and depositing it at his feet so she could go and play Fetch again.

The fact that the rocket immediately shot off straight into the Black Lake – and that Nora plunged in after it, before bringing back the soaking rocket with a kind of gunpowder sludge in it – was probably a sign that Harry needed to teach Hagrid the dragonish for 'leave it alone'.

Or teach Nora the English for it. Either would probably work.


When the first Astronomy lesson of February rolled around, Harry noticed that the timing of the full moon that month was right about midnight on Saturday – just a few minutes before it turned into Sunday.

He sent a letter to Professor Dumbledore asking if he could leave the school that night, and he was going to send a letter to Sirius as well but then he remembered something he'd got from the shop in Diagon Alley months ago. So instead he put one of his pair of mirrors in the letter, with a note explaining what it was, and sent it off with Hedwig.

The next evening the mirror heated up, something Harry only just noticed, and he looked at it to see Sirius was peering into it. Remembering the instructions, he went down to the common room – it was pretty much empty that late at night – before tapping it with his wand to answer.

"You know, I completely forgot that James and I had a set of these?" Sirius asked, sounding distinctly embarrassed. "Next time you see me, we can swap them around and you can have another set for yourself."

"That's okay," Harry assured him. "I don't mind if you keep yours. I just got this set because I saw them in a shop and it sounded like a good idea."

"Oh, they are a good idea," Sirius agreed. "James and I used them to communicate when we were in different detentions-" he coughed. "Anyway. You said you had something you wanted to talk about?"

"That's right," Harry agreed, propping up the mirror. "It's going to be the full moon, soon, and I thought maybe I could help Moony. I've learned that spell that I mentioned."

"It'd be great if you could," Sirius agreed, but he was clearly thinking. "You know, I don't think we ever tried to see if someone could cast spells in animal form..."

"Why?" Harry asked.

"Never really had anything worth doing that we couldn't just turn back to human for," Sirius shrugged. "But, well… Moony is a bit hard to handle once he's transformed. When he's around transformed Animagi he's calm enough, but if there's a human around as well he can be pretty violent."

He looked down, and his voice got a bit husky. "I… nearly made a very big mistake, back during our time at school, because of that."

Harry sort of wished he could give Sirius a hug through the mirror.

"It's worth trying," Sirius added. "It really is worth trying. And you're a dragon, so who even knows if you can be infected with being a werewolf at all."

"We do know how to treat werewolf bites," Harry pointed out. "It's in the Defence textbook from last year. Normally the problem is that you don't know that a werewolf is going to bite you, right?"

Sirius chuckled. "I suppose that's true."

"Besides," Harry added. "Couldn't you just get him some Wolfsbane?"

Sirius blinked. "Some what?"

"It's a potion that means that when you transform you just transform," Harry said, trying to remember the book he'd read it in – one of the ones about modern magical inventions. "So you keep your mind, and stuff. I think it's really complex."

"Hold on a moment," Sirius requested, and put the mirror down. Harry faintly heard him bellow 'MOONY!' and less than ten seconds later Remus came running down the stairs with his wand out.

"What's wrong?" he asked. "Are we under attack? Is Harry all right?"

"Harry's fine, what about you?" Sirius replied. "What's this I hear about there being a potion that helps werewolves?"

"I'd almost forgotten about that," Remus said, then blinked. "Why is that urgent?"

"I'm as rich as Croesus, you twit!" Sirius retaliated. "I. Can. Buy. You. Wolfsbane."

"But it's not a big problem," Remus countered. "Not really. Is it? My, um, Moony side is going to be calmed down because there'll be a transformed Animagus there. We know that works, and it's less expensive-"

"Harry, tell him what you told me," Sirius interrupted, picking up the mirror again.

"You mean the bit about how Professor Lockhart taught me the spell that can revert a werewolf back to being human?" Harry asked. "I haven't tried it on anyone yet, though."

"Well… right," Remus said, blinking. "Now I have three ways to deal with my little problem and I'm not sure which is best."

"I think Moony and I are going to be having a long talk," Sirius said. "Contact me whenever you want, Harry, I won't mind."

Harry nodded, and the mirror changed so it was just reflecting him.

It was amazing the things you could forget to mention sometimes.


After several back-and-forth messages, Remus and Sirius decided that they would try out the spell next full moon in March – making sure that Remus was dosed up on Wolfsbane potion first, to make it properly safe.

That way, Harry could see if the charm worked, and if it didn't then the worst that would happen was that Remus would be a bit disappointed.


That month, the Quibbler had a new feature.

Hermione seemed to be sort of disappointed whenever she saw that Harry was still getting the Quibbler, but – as he pointed out when she did – it was really cheap by Muggle standards, and it was usually good for a smile.

The new feature, however, even got Hermione interested. There'd always been a puzzle section, but this month it had expanded to fill out four two-page spreads, and it was full of everything from crosswords to wordsearches to complex number games – but the really tricky thing was a puzzle in the middle of the second spread which had nothing but a string of numbers next to it.

It took them both all of breakfast to fully solve just a couple of the puzzles on other pages, and then Hermione noticed that the remaining letters on the wordsearch they'd done spelled out:

The word for this puzzle is Canoe.

Hermione seemed torn between excitement and exasperation as she realized that the entire puzzle section was a giant set of ways to find the clues for the middle puzzle. The wordsearch was puzzle number four, so 'Canoe' was the word represented by the number four on the numbers-only puzzle.

It sort of made Harry's head hurt a bit, but in a different way to the way Quibbler articles normally did. So that was probably an improvement.


AN:


Sphinx roommates are great for suggesting tricky puzzles.