Hello my loyal readers. Just wanted to say a big thank you as today 8th September Luke Belmont became my 500th follower of my story. Thought i'd name you Luke in honour of the occasion.

I never expected to have 5 people want to read my story let alone 500 so I'm blown away.

Thank you all and i hope you enjoy my latest chapter.

Cheers

Craggle


Chapter 55 – Update & Authenticate

Wednesday 3rd August, Dining Hall, Tiger Land, Mahoutokoro

Harry had met Hermione in the eleventh year lounge area and they had gone down to breakfast with the Tigers as one big group and came into the room laughing and joking as they sat at their table. The group had teased Hermione and Harry for their synchronized breakfast making again and shouted down their arguments that surely they all knew what the others had for breakfast as the Tigers teased them that they did, but that they didn't make breakfast like those two did.

During breakfast Yogi appeared with a letter for Harry that had been sent by what looked to be Neville as Harry recognized his friends hand writing and Neville had taken to writing his letters in ruby red metallic looking ink. He'd put the letter in his bag rather than reading it at the table as he thought it might contain some information about the letter Susan said that Neville would be receiving from Hannah. If Hannah had sent the same thing to Neville, then Harry wouldn't want to embarrass Susan by having to explain it to Hermione, if she read the letter sitting next to him as he would stick to Susan's request and not tell anyone. Not even Neville unless he'd had the same thing from Hannah.

Luckily the table was distracted by Yogi doing a little hop around the table helping himself to scraps of peoples' plates before finishing in front of Harry and dipping his head into goblet of pumpkin juice. Harry lent forward so that his face was close to Yogi's before saying, "Now Yogi it's not polite to help yourself to other people's breakfast plates, because its different if it's mine." to which the owl looked down at its feet and gave a very low 'Boo Boo' that Harry thought sounded like a young child that had been told off by its mother.

He tickled Yogi and lent in again "But I'll make sure that I save you more breakfast from now on." Harry added getting a happier sounding hoot from Yogi who flapped his wings as Harry reached into his pocket and gave Yogi an owl treat that he was carrying around just in case and gave him another tickle and stroked his feather which all the girls 'awwww-ed' over the affectionate little display they showed each other and Yogi turned and took off from the table.

"That was really cute." Hermione gushed giving Harry a small bump with her elbow and a little smile.

The gong sounded from its mysterious place in the grounds and they made their way to Harry's first Arithmancy and Alchemy class. Harry was really nervous about it as he'd never studied either of the subjects before and all the Tigers had a red stripe or red stripe with one black stripe on it with the except of Mio, Li and Hermione who all had red stripes with three black stripes. Sensing his nerves about it, Hermione slipped her hand into his as they walked to their class and gave it a squeeze while reassuring him that he'll be fine along with the Tigers who told him that he'd only be getting a first years work to start with and he'd probably find it easy compared to the stuff that they would all be given.

When they had entered the classroom and took their seats on their individual desks Master Tao Ling entered the room. He was wearing the same brown Hoari and Hakama that he was wearing at the sorting ceremony and he went around each person's desk individually assigning them work and summoning pieces of parchment and tapping them with his wand making the person's task for the lesson appear on the parchment as the students started their work in silence with their head down working hard and not talking to each other, even after being given their work as they focused on their task.

Master Tao spent longer with Hermione than anyone and Harry unlike the rest of the class watched their exchange with a bemused expression on his face as Master Tao and Hermione settled into a funky sort of rapid fire question and answer session, which eventually had the rest of the class turning around in their seats to watch the exchange.

"Twenty points for your future Clan Miss Granger as you boast an impressive knowledge of the subject and I'm very impressed which isn't something that I normally am when meeting a student for the first time." Master Tao exclaimed giving Hermione a small smile and assigning her some work that Hermione attacked with enthusiasm.

Master Tao then approached Harry's desk and conjured a chair out of thin air before placing it and sitting next to Harry. Master Tao then cast some notice-me-not and silencing charms around himself and Harry before turning to Harry.

"Good Morning Mr. Potter, I just wanted to give us some privacy to talk and not distract the rest of the students while they are working." Master Tao explained with a wave of his hand around them. "Now Mr. Potter I can see from your uniform that you have never studied Arithmancy or Alchemy before and have only just done a couple of years of Ancient Runes from what I can see from your uniform so I'll be giving you more one-on-one attention than the rest of the class as I'm going to try and help you get as much understanding as you can on both the subjects as Alchemy especially will be really useful for you especially in your Transfiguration, Charms, Dueling and Defense classes as it will allow you to understand the basis of elemental magic and how to manipulate, magnify and harness elemental magical power."

"That sounds pretty interesting as I found out since being here that my old headmaster was very good with fire elemental magic and seeing some of the spell work he did when in a duel I'd love to be able to do that sort of thing." Harry replied.

"Excellent. Well hopefully you'll be able to keep that thought in your head as we work together this year. I might seem like a bit of hard task master but please try and understand that I just wish to help you with your development as much as we can. So you'll be getting quite a bit of homework from me this year as I try and help you catch up but if you choose Tiger Clan as your home then you'll be in very good company as if you look around the class you'll see the Tigers all have a very good grasp of the subject."

"Yes they are all as clever as Hermione as their stripes are all red at the minimum." Harry commented as he looked around the other Clans and saw that the boy called Hero in Turtle Clan and Hester from Dragon Clan both had red stripes with a black stripe each as well and that made sense to Harry as they were Head Boy and Girl so they'd be pretty good at most subjects. The rest of the class though was made up mainly of browns, blues and the odd green stripe.

"Well let's just say that if you join Tiger Clan, which was my old Clan when I attended school here, between us we'll be able to help this Tiger change its stripes." Master Tao said laughing at his own joke and gently poking Harry with his finger indicating he was the Tiger he was talking about as he summoned some parchment and tapped it with his wand and a large set of numbers appeared on the parchment and then Master Tao shuffled his chair closer to Harry.


After two grueling hours sat beside Master Tao who had only moved from Harry's side the whole lesson to go and help other students who had raised their hands for assistance and to ask a question, he was feeling like his head had been stuck in a blender after having looked at equations and formula for the last two hours. He was walking behind the Tigers with Goro, Sapporo, Li, Mio and Hermione and they were all in a big discussion about something to do with Arithmancy that Harry didn't understand. He watched Hermione talking animatedly and excitedly with people who clearly understood what she was talking about and responding with equal enthusiasm.

Harry thought that Hermione had that glow about her again like she had the first morning they had breakfast in the Tiger's dining hall and he could swear she never looked more beautiful to him than in those moments. She looked truly happy to be talking to people of similar age who accepted her and her intelligence and rather than scorn her for it or be jealous or threatened by it seemed to embrace it and cherish it and make her feel accepted for it.

That was sadly something that Harry had never been able to give her at Hogwarts as she had basically pulled himself and Ron like an anchor that was weighing her down. Here with these people she was like a bird that had been kept in a cage finally let free and soaring into the sky and reaching her potential. He knew that Hermione would be really happy with this Clan and the people in it and it made him wonder the reason that she had chosen not to go into Ravenclaw as Hermione was easily the smartest witch he knew.

He wondered how different his life would have been if he had never met the incredible witch who for the last seven years had pulled him out of so many scrapes and dangerous situations because of her intelligence. He thought about how different her life would have been being surrounded by people of similar intelligence and who understood all the things she said, rather than being with two homework shy boys who loved Quidditch more than books.

They entered the Tiger dining hall and took their seats at the table and the Tiger Clan elves scurried through the hall with large trays sliding little bowls of food on each table as they completed a circuit of the room before heading back into the kitchen through a door on the left side of the far wall before almost instantly appearing out of the door on the right side of the same wall and the procession made its way around the room again.

Their lunch which consisted of bowls of different rice, noodles, meats and vegetables and little cauldrons of what turned out to be different types of sauce. Harry and Hermione quickly saw that the lunch that say consisted of a kind of help yourself style lunch where they all have an empty bowl each and they filled it with whatever they wanted and added a sauce if they wanted it.

"It's Chinese food today." explained Jürgen at Harry's puzzled expression on Harry's face.

"I've never had Chinese food before." Harry replied.

"Really, ah man you'll love it. It's really good, it's not particularly heavy on your stomach either unless you eat too much of it that is." Jürgen explained.

"So what is all this stuff?" Harry asked.

"Right well these two here are steamed rice and, this one is a fried rice with egg and some vegetables through it. You tend to have them as your base and then you add the other stuff to it." Tai explained helping himself to some of the steamed rice into his bowl.

"These three are different noodles, there yellow ones are called egg noodles, these white ones are rice noodles and these dishes here with the meat and the vegetables in are different types of noodle dishes. This one is called Chow Mein and really popular throughout the whole world." Fu explained as she helped herself to a bowl of Chow Mein.

Hilde picked up and pointed out the vegetables, "So we've got peppers, bean sprouts, bamboo shoots, onion, mange tout, cabbage, water chestnuts, loads of different types of mushrooms but there all really interesting in taste and textures."

"Meats we've got Prawns, Pork, Chicken, Beef, there's tofu if you don't fancy meat and this one is Ostrich." Ling added as she took some tofu and pork into her bowl with her chopsticks.

"Sauces we have look like curry, sweet and sour, chili and garlic, kung pow, black bean, XO and oyster sauce." finished Mio as she ladled on some of the black bean sauce over her meal.

"Just try a bit of everything Harry and see what you like." Sapporo chipped in before using his chopsticks and taking in a large number of noodles that seemed to just keep coming and coming out of the bowl as he sucked them up and tried to chew them into his mouth.

Hermione pulled a face as she was reminded of Ron's table manners a bit, although even he didn't look like he had a noodle waterfall coming out of his mouth as he did at least bite things properly and his main problem was talking with his mouthful.

Li seeing Hermione looking at her boyfriend giggled and told Sapporo "not to be gross" as Sapporo looked up and bit off the noodles and chewed them and swallowed them before sheepishly saying "Sorry, I'm really hungry." before going back in for another go as Hermione made herself a bowl and selected the sweet and sour sauce for her pork, bean sprout, onion and pepper creation that she'd put over the egg fried rice.

"Right I've got to ask you guys how the hell do you use these things? I can barely pick up a piece of chicken with them so how the hell am I meant to pick up rice with these things?" Harry asked the table at large as he held up the chopsticks and then this broke into the Tigers explaining, demonstrating and showing Harry and Hermione how to use the chopsticks. They couldn't quite get the hang of it and reasoned that the others had been using them for a minimum of ten years if not all their lives and that was why it was so easy and in the end just transfigured their chopsticks into a fork and a spoon and attacked their meal with gusto as they really enjoyed it.


As the bowls and glasses were being cleared away by the house elves Master Lin approached the table with two wrapped bundles in the same type of paper that Harry and Hermione had received their uniforms in. She gave one to Harry and one to Hermione and explained that these were their Quidditch robes that they would be using until they had selected their clan and then the robes would change for their team.

Harry and Hermione thanked Master Lin and the Tigers made their way up to their dorms to get changed into their Quidditch robes as they had their first Quidditch lesson that afternoon. Harry had been really looking forward to this as Mahoutokoro was meant to be the best Quidditch school in the world according to Seamus, so Harry was excited to see how good everyone was and what it would be like.

Hermione looked about as nervous as Harry had felt before his Arithmancy and Alchemy lesson this morning and it was like they had a complete role reversal of their moods from the morning before lunch. Harry and Hermione took their bundles into their trunks and made their way to their wardrobes to get changed as Harry quickly stripped down to his boxers and put his uniform on top of the large waist high console in the center of his wardrobe where he kept his shoes and trainers in their own individual drawers, his watches, ties and other things that completed his outfits.

Harry opened the package that Master Lin had given him and found a pair of royal blue Quidditch trousers, a black Quidditch shirt and a royal blue Quidditch robe.

He picked up the Quidditch pants and put them on and found that they were a little too big and then resized themselves to fit him perfectly and weren't as baggy but still had enough material loose that they would whip in the wind as it struck them. Next he took the black Quidditch shirt and pulled it on before finding that it was very different to the one's he'd worn in Hogwarts as the shirt had long panels on the front that hung down to just above Harry's knees and they had two small silver buttons on the ends of them.

He saw that it was wrapped too loosely around him and a little big on the shoulders and sleeves. It took him a while until he figured out after taking it off and looking and the shirt more closely and saw another two of the small silver buttons on the inside of the shirt along with two more on the back where the hem of the shirt would rest on his lower back and realized it was meant to fasten together at the back as there was no buttons on the lapels at the front.

Putting the shirt back on he picked up one of the trailing shirt fronts and closed it over his torso like a dressing gown would, pulled the trailing that he'd wrapped around his torso to the base of his back where the two metal buttons acted like magnets and clipped together holding it in place. Harry reasoned that he'd take the other trailing piece of cloth and wrap it around the other way and connect it to the two silver buttons on the outside of his shirt, which he did and they joined together in a kind of wrap around shirt.

As he had the buttons connect on the outside of his Quidditch shirt it adjusted to fit Harry perfectly and the sleeves and shoulders readjusted to fit his frame and the sleeves moved up to just after the bend of his elbow so that his forearms were clear. He pulled on the outer robe in the same royal blue as the robes dropped to just above his ankle and the lapels of the jacket automatically moved closer together before sticking by some invisible force to the Quidditch shirt framing it on his chest so that there was only a slither of black Quidditch shirt showing. The robe resized itself and he felt comfortable his movements weren't limited and the sleeve of the robe had moved up to a half inch more than the shirt.

Harry walked to one end of his console nearest the sitting room door that looked like a plain piece of wood on the end of it and placed the Potter family ring against the wood where immediately the wood cracked revealing a large square that sank into the console before sliding down revealing a large space where Harry's Quidditch boots, pads, gloves and Firebolt were inside, which he took out and started by putting his knee pads on followed by his Quidditch boots.

He finished up by putting his forearm guards on and his seeker gloves. He stood up and grabbed his Firebolt out of the console smelling wood polish and looking at the twigs at the end to make sure they were all trimmed to perfect condition which they were. There was enough room inside the console for another broomstick along with some more space for spare pads but it was nice having somewhere to keep his Quidditch stuff. The compartment was charmed to clean equipment when he put them in there and closed the console door so that they were all ready to go the next time he needed them and wouldn't be sweaty or dirty. He pressed the Potter ring along the top of the console and the door shifted back up and into place before the crack sealed itself leaving no trace.

At the end of the console was a hidden compartment one held his safe or personal vault. He'd emptied the vault in his office at Potter Manor and moved the contents here so that he had his most treasured possessions with him. In the vault he kept his memories of his trip and had moved the memory of his kiss with Hermione in there along with the shard of Sirius' mirror, the photo album of his Mum and Dad that Hagrid had given him, the marauders map and his parents and Sirius' journals. He moved his school bag into his room and remembered Neville's letter and decided to have a quick read before collecting Hermione and going to the school Quidditch pitch.

Placing his Firebolt onto his bed he tore open the envelope and took out the later and quickly read it.

Kon'nichiwa Harry, (Did I spell that right?)

How's Japan? Well I have just got on board the ship to Mexico, it's called 'the Mermaid's Song and it's huge and I'm really excited to be going to school although it's a bit scary to be going so far away from home on my own, but they have a wicked Herbology program apparently and that's the main reason for me going.

I've already met the captain of the ship and he welcomed me aboard and upgraded my suite to the biggest one on board so that's going to be home for the next three days, I've got my own personal house elf! He also he gave me a personal tour and I'm not going to lie it's absolutely amazing.

That reminds me could you tell me how to do that memory extraction spell you were telling me about. I've bought some memory phials and I remember you said you getting some and I'd like to catalogue what I've seen as well so I can show you, Hannah and Susan what Castelobruxo is like when I get home.

Things went so well with Hannah over the last few weeks and I think that I'm really starting to fall for her. She put a letter in my trunk for me so that I didn't forget her while I'm at school.

What can I say other than holy hell! That girl is incredibly sexy and wild. I'm only going to mention what she sent me in very broad terms rather than specifics as she mentioned in her letter that Susan had sent you some 'presents' as well and a errrrr interesting photograph... I'm sure you know what I'm talking about and if you do then I guess you're feeling as lucky as me right about now if you're looking at something similar to what Hannah sent me but with the... how did Ron put it "Hotty of Hufflepuff" then you're probably smiling as much as I am.

I'm wondering what to send back. Susan was glowing this morning when she got up and seems absolutely crazy about you. I know what you were saying about Hermione and I know how you feel about her but Susan is completely smitten.

Speaking of Hannah, I have to tell you something important that I saw when Hannah and I were going to Terror Tours so that I could portkey to the ship. Anyway we had arrived in Diagon Alley and decided to go for a coffee at Rosa Lee's and we saw Pansy spying through the window of the cafe.

We asked her what she was doing and she told us that Ron and Lavender were inside acting suspicious and Hannah and I looked through the window to see what she was on about. Well what we saw was them talking and when they got up they gave each other a kiss on the lips!

But it was a bit more than what I'd class as a friendly kiss as it was the sort of kiss that I'd give Hannah or you'd give Susan and we both know that they aren't just friendly kisses or being polite. It wasn't a snog but it looked more than normal.

Harry I think he might be cheating on Hermione. I'm not saying that he definitely is and I can't confirm anything. However especially after his summer, I know that, that kiss was more than 'by mate' kind of thing.

So as we can't say either way I thought I'd write to you about my concerns as Hannah suggested that Pansy write to Hermione giving her concerns about what we ALL saw as Pansy thought that Hermione wouldn't believe her and might think she was being a bitch or just causing trouble.

I wrote to you because I'm Hermione's friend and I'm your friend. I told you over the summer Harry I'm your brother now and I'd never lie to you...Ever!

I'm telling you as a brother now I saw what I saw and what I'm saying I believe to be true, as bad as it is, and as much as I don't want to upset Hermione I had to tell you at least as he's your best friend as well and you might be able to get more out of him than the girls or I could.

Pansy and Hannah are going to keep an eye out for Lavender and Ron over the next few weeks before they go to Beauxbatons and see if they can observe any other unusual behavior.

Anyway I've got to go there is a knocking at my door and I fear that it's the Captain wanting to seat me at his table for dinner. He's a former Gryffindor, so given what has happened with me being named Godric's Heir he can't do enough for me.

Don't say anything to Hermione about what I've said about Ron just in case Pansy changed her mind and didn't write to her.

Hope to hear from you soon,

Neville


Harry's mind was reeling from Neville's revelation that what Pansy had told Hermione was true. Hermione might not trust Pansy but she would trust Neville and knew Harry trust Neville as well.

He reflected on what Neville said about not mentioning anything about it yet to Hermione until they had some concrete evidence, and after the conversation he'd already had with Hermione about it, he thought that he should wait until she had something concrete before she fired off at Pansy about it and she'd probably talk about it with him again before she did anything.

He heard a knock on the sitting room door and grabbing his Firebolt and went into the sitting room and opened the door to the corridor that led to Hermione's trunk. He opened the door to see Hermione standing there in Quidditch trousers and brand new Quidditch boots and to his surprise a she was wearing her dressing gown over the top of her Quidditch trousers.

"Oh... So you've figured out how to put the top on. Thank god as I can't figure it out." Hermione said holding up the top and giving him a pleading look.

"You just wrap it round yourself and connect it by the silver buttons and they'll click together and then the top will resize itself." Harry explained and she looked at it again with a puzzled look on her and then shook her head at him as if to say 'uh uh'.

"Here I'll show you." he said putting his Firebolt down and taking the folded Quidditch shirt off her as she turned and cast a summoning charm on her Quidditch robe which came zooming down the corridor and she caught it as Harry was opening the shirt out and Hermione dropped the Quidditch robe and her wand and started undoing her dressing gown.

Hermione did in fact know exactly how the Quidditch shirt went on, but after hearing from Pansy and her suspicions about Ron she was mad and she decided that she wanted to see what Harry would do if she let him have an ogle of her goodies again as when he saw her in one of her bikinis he'd be struck dumb and they'd ended up having an amazing kiss. Granted that was due to playing Pocky but still...

"Errrr what are you doing?" he asked her as Hermione undid her belt and putting her hands on the robe and quickly pulled it apart and shrugged it off her shoulders and let it drop to the floor.

"Having you show me how to put this on." she replied with pretend impatience and giving him the look again as she reached across herself and rubbed her upper arm which caused her breasts to press together giving them more definition in the charcoal grey sports bra she was wearing and she felt her pussy get wet as she watched Harry's eye drink in her slightly tanned flat stomach and shoulders and her breasts and she gave her lower lip a little gentle bite, which normally made Harry blush furiously.

Harry gulped as he'd only seen her once in so little clothing before and it had happened twice in four days. He was drinking in the sight of her perfect body and his cock started going stiff as he saw her body for the second time and he had to admit that he really liked what he saw. She was gorgeous her breasts were just a little over a C cup and sat high on her chest, her shoulders were toned and her collarbone was just barely visible. Clearly the years of lugging around a bag full of books had done her well as he took in her shoulders and her slightly toned arms. She had muscle but not visibly so as his eyes continued up her slender neck and when he saw bite her lip in that way he loved, a growl started to emerge from his throat that he quickly covered with a cough.

Snapping out of it Harry held the shirt open and Hermione stepped into it so her back was against Harry and as she slipped her left arm into the shirt she pushed her bum back a little as she turned rubbing it softly across Harry's crotch and felt a tingle of delight as Harry's cock brush against her bum as she turned and then she brushed passed it again as she moved her right arm into the other sleeve and having got her arms in she turned away from Harry again facing him with the Quidditch shirt hanging open in front of them.

"I got this far by myself." Hermione commented biting her lip again and seeing Harry's cheeks were already burning as his eyes were fixed on her lips and she couldn't resist licking her upper lip quickly and held a smirk from spreading on her face as she saw Harry gulp.

"Errrrr right so you just put the silver buttons together after wrapping the front around you." Harry explained feeling very hot as his eyes kept betraying him and kept wandering to her breasts.

"Show me?" Hermione asked holding her arms out slightly to the side. Harry moved forward and took the front panel of the shirt and reached across and around Hermione's waist until the two sets of buttons clicked together. As Harry had reached around her she brushed the side of her forehead along his jawline like she was nuzzling him and she let out a little purring noise and said "I see you're still smelling yummy!" as Harry swayed back and reached for the other side of the shirt and wrapped that over her and she realized that he was effectively wrapping his arms around her waist as her hands came up and rested on his shoulders.

'She just nuzzled into me. What's going on? There is no way Hermione wouldn't be able to figure out how to put this on. I don't know what kind of game she's playing but if she wants to play this game I've learned some things this summer to try and win and make her blink first.' he thought himself as a small smile threatened to creep onto his face and he forced it down so she wouldn't see. 'Let's see how far she wants to play this game.' he thought as the memory of their first night in Tiger Land and Hermione ended up straddling him came back to him.

"You smell pretty yummy yourself." Harry replied gently sliding his hands off where the buttons had connected and let them rest on her lower back. "Let me get your robe for you." he continued as he lowered down slowly onto his haunches and allowing his hands to gently graze down the top of her buttocks and started gently and slowly running his hands down across her bum and down the back of her legs and he could have sworn he felt her shivering slightly and just pictured her biting her lip sexily as he allowed his hands to run down her legs.

'God he must be able to smell my arousal with his head right next to my pussy like that.' she thought wishing that she could just push Harry down onto the floor and do all the things she'd dreamed about doing to him right here and now. Problem was her legs were starting to shake a little as she felt they could give way at any second as the tingles were shooting up and down her legs from his touch as if little ants were crawling up and down her legs and it felt delightful.

She gentle put her hands on his shoulders to steady herself as Harry started working his way up her body slowly pulling the robe up her and he seemed to be deliberately brushing his chest up the front of her body as she pressed himself against her and she leaned against him and allowed her arms to drop by her sides and they went into the sleeves of the robes as his hands brought the robe up onto her shoulders and breathed in Hermione as the robe started shifting into place fitting her frame perfectly, as he moved back ever so slightly to leave only an inch or two between them and he looked down into her beautiful brown eyes as she looked up into his emerald green eyes. He unconsciously licked his upper lip and she gave a little groan that she then masked as a cough.

They stood very close together like that just drinking in each other's eyes and breathing in each other's pheromones, feeling each other's breath as neither of them wanted to back down in the little game but both waiting to see if the other would take the next step and make the move and take this game that they were playing to next level. A little smile crept onto both of their faces.

"You're far too competitive sometimes you know." Harry whispered.

"There's the pot calling the kettle black." Hermione smirked as her hands moved up and came to rest on Harry's chest. Her fingers splayed and she felt the taut muscles of his chest and her fingers rubbed against them. She felt Harry's hands encircle her to the middle of her back and gently pulled her to him and she felt Harry's stiffness pressed against her as his thumbs gave little rubs sending little bursts of pleasure through her.

"HARRY! YO HARRY! ARE YOU NEARLY READY? THE GUYS ARE READY TO GO!" Goro's magnified voice boomed around the room.

Both them let a sigh as the spell between them was broken. "I guess I better go and get my broom." she muttered as she took a reluctant step back before adding, "God Hermione Granger playing Quidditch! Who would have ever thought that would happen?" shaking her head as she kissed him on the cheek and turned bending down picking up her wand and started down the hall to her trunk to get her broom.

"You're looking good doing it to." Harry shouted out after her as she looked over her shoulder and gave him a wink as she went through the door into her trunk and closed the door after her. Harry shaking his head clear of what Luna would claim to be Nargles turned and grabbed his Firebolt and headed out of his trunk.


They made their way out of Tiger Land and the Tigers wearing their Tiger Quidditch robes which consisted of shirts of black and had a different cut than Harry and Hermione's as the front of the lapel went across the other and connected near the shoulder. The robe was a bright orange and was completed by black Quidditch pants with an orange stripe going down the outside of each leg, and an orange belt that dangled down over their crotches and almost touched the floor.

They all mounted their brooms and shot off up into the air and started making their way towards the Quidditch pitch. Hermione on her recently purchased Nimbus 2001 was able to keep up with them all because it was a quick broom but unlike the rest of the Tigers she stayed within twenty-five feet of the ground whereas the Tigers were ducking and diving; horsing around dive bombing each other as the orange belts flapped behind them and made them look like they had tails.

Harry to his credit resisted the urge to go zooming off into the sky like he normally would as he knew Hermione wasn't overly comfortable on a broom. She knew how to fly as she'd completed her lessons in first year like everyone but she didn't particularly care for it. Harry was flying alongside her as they flew towards the Quidditch pitch and saw on the ground a burst of color at the students assembled there.

The Tigers all stopped messing around as they neared the stadium and formed a loose V formation with Hermione and Harry at the end of the V. They flew over the top of the stands towards the pitch and the Tigers landed as one with Harry and Hermione finishing just after them. Harry landed and dismounted smoothly and Hermione landed a little more sloppily.

They looked around the rest of the other Clans taking in the difference in their uniforms to Harry's and the Tigers. Dragon Clan were wearing sunshine yellow robes with blood red trousers and their yellow robes were edged in what looked like red fangs. Turtles were in olive green robes with light brown caramel colored shirts and trousers, and the design on the robes was like a turtle shell had been ghosted onto the material. The Phoenix clan members were wearing red robes and that was edged in white piping. The robe itself had patches of material laid over each other giving it an effect of looking like feathers.

Harry noticed Master Yoshi Midi stood about ten yards away from the group with a broom by his feet and his arms folded looking at them all as the students talked quietly amongst themselves and throwing glances at Harry and Hermione as their robes were a different color and were craning their necks trying to look at the what brooms Harry and Hermione had but the duo had cleverly put their bodies in the way so that they blocked them from view.

Harry looked around, with an experienced Quidditch player's eye, at the other brooms around him and saw lots of nimbus 2000s, nimbus 2001s and a lot of brooms that he didn't recognize but he was glad to see that Hermione wouldn't be outstripped by everyone purely on broom speed.

"Good Afternoon Class and welcome to your first lesson in our final year together." Master Yoshi shouted out to the group as the students all seemed to stand at attention.

"So we have two new students joining us this year. I have corresponded with your former Headmistress as to find out your levels and how much work I will need to do with you. Miss Granger I will be working closely with you this year and will work to improve your confidence and skills. I have decided that you will be part of the keeper section as I'm led to believe that you don't have much flying experience but that will change this year." Hermione nodded to Master Yoshi that she understood.

"Mr. Potter. I've been told that you have a lot of skill as a Seeker so you will be part of the seeker section." Harry nodded his understanding.

"Right class first half the lesson we will be working on flight and drills and in the second half of the lesson I will be working with the Keepers and the Chasers. Beaters and Seekers, you will be doing the advanced flight course and you will be timed against your times from the end of last year and anyone who doesn't beat their time will be getting laps of the stadium." Master Yoshi explained getting a groan from the students.

"Schmidt and Hanso you can go and get the cases out please and once you've done that we'll be off." Master Yoshi shouted as two boys from Turtle Clan detached from the group and made their way to one of the stands and opened the doors in the wall under the stands and disappeared inside to get the Quidditch cases.

"Are you alright with working with the keepers?" Harry asked Hermione.

"Yes, honestly I'm a lot happier as it means I don't have to do that much flying I just move around the goal hoops and don't have to do too many evasive maneuvers." Hermione replied her face going slightly green looking as Harry knew she'd love nothing more than to keep her feet firmly on the ground.

"Well you'll be doing lots of flying this year Hermione as the flights that he's taking about is flights close to the ground up over the forest and up the mountain to a large flag near the summit and then down the mountain and around the stadium." Jürgen explained from the other side of Harry.

"Well that's doesn't sound so bad." Hermione replied relieved.

"Wait til you've done about twenty of them and the final ten Master Yoshi sets off some evasion traps," commented Goro as he gave a shiver "I hit one last year and tumbled about three hundred yards down the hill until I hit a tree trunk."

"Are you serious?" Hermione asked fear gripping her.

"Oh yeah absolutely. You'll be alright Hermione Master Yoshi will go easy on you," Sapporo replied settling Hermione's nerves a little bit before he added, "well to start with anyway."

Hermione looked at Harry with a terrified look on her face. Harry looked at her and told her "Don't worry I won't leave you, I'll fly next to you the whole time."

"It's alright Harry. You're here to get better and I know this sort of stuff is what you love so don't go holding yourself because of me." Hermione replied not really meaning it as she wanted Harry next to her as she was really worried about what might happen to her.

"Nah I'll stick by you Hermione don't worry." Harry countered bumping her.

"We won't go leaving you either Hermione don't worry." added Mio.

"Right class everyone mount your brooms and off we go" Master Yoshi shouted out and took off on his broom as the rest of the class took off after him. Master Yoshi wasn't going easy on the class as he set off like a rocket and the students fanned out behind him as he shot out of the stadium like a bullet out of a gun and off towards the Care of Magical Creatures' forest.

"Here goes nothing... Just make sure you visit me in the hospital wing." Hermione joked to the Tigers and kicked off from the ground and turned after the class as Harry and the rest of the Tigers took off after her.


Phoenix Locker Room, Phoenix Nest, Mahoutokoro

The members of Phoenix Clan had landed back at the Phoenix Nest and were putting their broomsticks away in their locker rooms. The girls had pulled the curtain separating them from the boys' vision to stop the boys ogling them as they changed out of their Quidditch robes and the curtain was enchanted so that only the girls could open it again and it allowed sound to carry through it.

Stacey Wong had enjoyed practice as it felt good to be back in the air again after a summer of having her flying time restricted. Her parents had a lot more functions and balls to attend to amongst the world's magical aristocracy, and so she'd been stuck babysitting her little brother and sister for most of the summer as her parents had gone on a kind of tour.

She knew her mother had arranged it on purpose, as she knew this was her final summer to work on her Quidditch skills to try and impress the scouts that attended the games at Mahoutokoro as they only ever recruited people in their final years of school.

Everyone said she was good enough to play professionally, which was a nice compliment but that didn't mean she wouldn't have liked the whole summer to practice. She looked across to her friend Lei Bei, who had been an absolute angel and came over and stayed with her, as Stacey's Mum and Dad would allow her some company and Lei would help keep an eye on Stacey's siblings so that she could sneak out for an hour and practice.

Lei's parents worked for the Department of Magical Law Enforcement or (DMLE) in South Korea and they had to leave Lei, sometimes at the drop of a hat, to go off on missions that they were assigned or called in to.

She was just putting her Shockwave broom back into her locker and started to take off her robes when she heard Marco's voice through the curtain.

"Did you see the state of them? Pathetic they were and she is absolutely useless and had about as much grace on a broom as a blind water buffalo." Marco sneered to the room, "He wasn't much better. The way Master Yoshi was going on about him before we took off you'd think he was amazing but he just languished at the back all the time we were doing the mountain runs."

"Come on Marco you saw her Quidditch stripe when she got sorted and she's clearly not spent that much time on a broom." Eddie Chung's voice came from the other side of the curtain.

"Then how did she get a place here then?" Miguel Fu piped up.

"God Egg, have you not seen that she is at Sensei level in Charms and Transfiguration, not to mention the praise she was getting from Master Tao in Arithmancy this morning." Lei Bei called out so the boys could hear her.

"Same could be said about your dumb ass Egg and how you managed to get a place here, except her intelligence is clearly shown on her uniform but we're still trying to figure out where yours is." quipped one of the other girls called Gosia Potiszska causing the rest of the girls and a couple of the boys to laugh.

"Fuck you Gosia! You probably had to give the Grandmaster a blowie or something to get in here." Miguel fired back.

"Ha well he'd have more chance of getting one off me than you would Egg." Gosia replied with a smirk at the curtain.

"Plus have you not read Asia Today in the last couple of weeks Egg. Both of them are famous. Did you not read about what those two had done over in Britain? There massive articles about them defeating Voldemort for god sake!" a boy called Kuki Kim cried out.

"Well from what I've seen neither of them are nothing special, so I'm still skeptical that they even did it. Can't believe what the papers have said and there have been no official interviews or anything. It's just speculation and hear say." Marco announced.

"Come off it Marco, you saw their power levels in dueling class. They are heavy hitters. Especially Harry Potter, I mean he defeated Voldemort, survived a killing curse when he was a baby, plus he is hot!" An American witch called Trixie Popowitz called out.

"Marco's said before that power doesn't equal skill. All it takes is a lucky shot to win a duel and that power can be overcome by someone with more knowledge and skill." a Welsh girl called Bronwyn Eirwen stated hoping that Marco would be happy with her for siding with him.

"While that may be true you seem to be forgetting that his stripe is black, which means he good and that he's got the knowledge and skill." Stacey replied as she pulled her uniform back on.

"Oh here we go again! Might have known you'd fall down on the arrogant prick's side of the fence. You've already been banging on about him for the last couple of days Wong and quite frankly it's start to make me feel sick." Marco fired back.

"I have not been going on about him!" she replied hotly, "I've just been trying to make you and Miguel realize that you don't even know him and you're slagging him off at every chance you get, when we're meant to be trying to encourage him to join our Clan."

"I know plenty about those two from one of my friends that went to school with them and they've told me exactly what they are like! They told me that the pair of them were arrogant and big headed and I've not seen anything yet to dispel that." He replied his voice raising as he stood facing the curtain.

"Oh right well, you best believe this friend's opinion then rather than getting to see what they are like yourself. He was really impressive during the advanced flying course and I think the only reason I beat him was because I knew where I was going and he was just having to react to everything." Stacey shot back moving closer to the curtain so that her voice was getting heard loud and clear.

She heard Marco scoff at her and mumbled 'yeah, yeah, yeah' and that was it. She decided she wasn't going to back down this time without getting her own jabs in. "Plus, you're one to talk about arrogance Marco. You've got such a high opinion of yourself I'm amazed you can get that over inflated head of yours through a door frame."

"Think whatever you like Wong! You'll see I'm right in the end and then you'll be sorry for acting like such an idiot for being Potter's cheerleader!

Phoenix is a Clan is for purebloods from magical families. A NOMA born witch has no place in this clan and his mother was NOMA born as well, so he's just as bad as her." Marco announced smugly looking around the boys and getting nods from Cadogen Ryan and Miguel Fu. He saw Kuki Kim and Eddie Chung were avoiding his gaze and he sneered at them.

The curtain was pulled back suddenly and an angry looking Stacey Wong stood there staring daggers at him.

"Think whatever you want Marco, but I'm not going to hold any kind of grudge against them for doing nothing wrong and quite frankly I can't stomach standing here listening to you spouting this crap and more." She replied firmly trying to control her anger as she turned back to her locker grabbing her bag and stomping out of the changing room.

The sort of garbage Marco had just spouted about NOMAs was the only thing she hated about Phoenix Clan and that was because it was the sort of guff that her parents normally spouted to her at home. She heard Lei running after her calling her name but she decided she wasn't stopping until she reached the safety of the girls' dormitory's, so she wouldn't have to look at Marco's arrogant face until dinner.


Author's Note - Firstly have to give it up for my man Goldzar for doing my editing and helping me with this chapter massively.

I wanted to get a little bit of info into the quidditch lesson but the chapter was starting to get massive as there was so much I wanted to fit in their that I had to cut the quidditch bit short.

Fear not dear reader as there will be a lot more detailed quidditch stuff when Harry does his Beaters and Seekers lesson in the second week of school (oh which he and the lovely Hermione will be in a new clan area, which I'm looking forward to writing about as it was one of the first things I thought about when I pictured Mahoutokoro - Although I might have just placed a bit of unfair expectation on it. Oh well hopefully I'll do it's description justice).

During the lesson Harry will be meeting the current seekers at Mahoutokoro and will be putting his skills up against them.

Side note:- All quidditch lessons start off or take part on the official pitch that is always during lesson's set to a stand official quidditch pitch. The pitch only changes to one of the clan conditions during a school match and the Quidditch season at Mahoutokoro isn't just three games but is in fact twelve games with each plan playing six time. The reason is due to 1) it being the school with the best quidditch programme in the world so they would be quidditch mad and 2) because each clan gets to be the home team and get to pick a random counter to set the conditions in three games out of their six.

So I'm starting off all the little subplots and different storylines that will be impacting on my story which I'm realising is going to be monstrously big and I might have to split it into a series as I've found I've got into quite a lot of detail about stuff, which some people like and some people don't. You've probably realised as you've made it this far into my story that I like to give as much detail as I can sometimes about even the most trivial of things like a quidditch shirt but I like to think that it's those little things that helps make something that little more magical.

I've always dreamed that we muggles/No Maj's and NOMA's had clothes that were a standard size and then moved like transformers until they fit us properly for example as it would make clothes shopping a hell of a lot easier.

Anyway I'm rambling now (as you know I tend to do) so I'll just say that I hope you are still enjoying my story and as always really appreciate your views. I try and respond to them all as quickly as possible as sometimes I'll write something and I'll get a review as I've maybe not got my thought process and thinking about a certain thing across well enough on the page.

I'm trying to work a couple of chapters a head of myself at the moment with a pretty good speed and I'm hoping to post new chapters every four days or so until my missus starts demanding that I step away from the laptop and give her some much needed attention (not like that... Keep it clean people ;)

So I hope you enjoyed my latest offering and I'll speak to you soon.

Thanks

Craggle