A soft knock sounded at the door and it quietly creaked open.
"Um, hello?" said a voice attached to a bushy head of hair.
"Hello!" greeted Harry, "I was hoping you'd stop by!"
"Oh, you remember," she blushed, "I wasn't too sure that our meeting in the infirmary actually happened. That night was such a blur to me, and I must have been a frightful mess."
Harry didn't remember her. However his mind began to work at speeds it only reached when he sensed he was in danger. Millions of synapses fired in paths even more bizarre than the average brain to guide Harry to an important conclusion.
This seemingly harmless girl was actually the mummy werewolf from his first night in the castle.
He thought of how best to keep himself safe. Flattery was usually a good bet, and monsters were always proud of how scary they were. Oh, and she must be blushing because she was embarrassed about not appearing as frightening as she had during their previous meeting.
"Wow," he said, "you look terrific!"
It was an exaggeration, of course. It wasn't her current looks that were terrifying him.
She blushed again, but then steeled her expression.
"Of course, I'm here to begin your literacy lessons," she walked past him to a table and began laying out parchment.
Any doubts that Harry might have entertained about her not being a monster vanished in that instant.
Harry's fright made him a most excellent and pleasing student. For over an hour his quill scratched out approximations of letters, his ears listened to mild chastisements about their shapes, and his mouth produced the sounds of little bits of words.
This state of affairs was never going to last long. It was the arrival of Tonks that allowed Harry to cast reality in a more pleasing light.
"Oh, are you here to give lessons to Harry too?" asked Hermione.
"Um-" began Tonks.
"No," said Harry with finality. "She's here for our inaugural meeting!"
"Here we go," muttered Hat from atop Harry's head.
"Wait, why've you got the sorting hat on your head?" ask Tonks.
"Where else would I have it?" replied Harry. "Regardless, here we are, three witches in a magic castle, brought together by fate."
"I was sent by Professor McGonagall," said Hermione.
"And I'm here to…" Tonks paused, "-uh, yes, fate brought me here. And where's the third witch?"
Harry's eyes darted to Hermione meaningfully.
"It is awfully rude to exclude people," he said carefully, "particularly terrific people."
"Right, then," Tonks said. She looked a little confused, but she probably hadn't seen Hermione in her more monstrous form. Maybe she only turned into a werewolf mummy on full moons and hid in the infirmary. The night he saw her was probably a full moon then.
"Anyway," said Harry, "it's obvious we're supposed to form a cubbin."
"A cubbin?" asked Tonks.
"I believe that he means a 'coven'" said Hermione.
Harry hastily nodded despite her horrible pronunciation. He was already risking her wrath by escaping from her lessons.
"Right a coven," he shook his head minutely, "fate has brought us together to be best friends and do witchy stuff together."
"What do you mean by witchy stuff?" asked Hermione. "We're already in a school of witchcraft and wizardry."
"Yeah," said Harry, "but it's a bit light on the witchcraft for my tastes. We should be doing dark arts and crafts, telling wizards off, and not paying for trees."
Hat began shaking atop his head, with excitement, Harry presumed.
"Dark ar…" Hermione began, "wait, why is not paying for trees 'witchy.'"
"Oh, I don't know the wherefore of it all," admitted Harry, "but my mums, all fantastic witches by the way, are always saying how all witches are natural enemies of the 'pay-tree-something-or-other.' Anyways, I figure that means we don't like paying for trees."
Tonks abruptly covered her mouth and started shaking a bit like Hat was doing.
"Pay-tree, pay-tree," Hermione repeated meditatively before brightening," oh! I think 'patriarchy' is the word you're looking for! I'm afraid it has very little to do with trees."
"Oh," said Harry. He gave a well-practiced nod to feign understanding. "We'll see about how to be enemies of the 'pay-tree-arky' later. For now we should definitely get started on dark arts and crafts. Oh, and we should all be best friends, but it's ok if that takes a while."
"Er," said Tonks, "maybe we should just start with crafts."
"I mean," said Harry, "they really work best together, but sure."
Both witches seemed puzzled by this remark, but held their tongues lest they invite another 'explanation' from Harry.
"But we haven't got crafting supplies," said Hermione, "perhaps it'd be best to return to our lesso-"
At that moment, a bright white hare dashed into the room. It skidded as it tried to turn sharply to avoid Harry and he captured it with a deft toss of Hat.
"Well, that's that taken care of," said Harry.
"Wait, a moment," said Tonks, "you don't mean that you're going to use the rab-"
The door, previously ajar, was slammed the rest of the way open. The usually stern witch stared at them with unnaturally widened pupils for a long moment.
She coughed, straightened her posture and tucked some loose hair behind her ears.
"Hello Ms. Granger, Ms. Tonks, Mr. Evans-Garlick-Ogg-Potter-Weatherwax," she said, "did any of you, perhaps, see a rabbit dash past in the last few moments?"
"No, ma'am," said Harry a bit too quickly.
Hat shook with movement on the floor.
"Professor," said Hermione, "are you... wiggling?"
The professor straightened a bit too fast.
"No," she said, "of course not. Mr. Evans-Garlick-Ogg-Potter-Weatherwax, lift the Sorting Hat from the ground if you would."
Her eyes did not move from the hat even as she addressed Harry. Her pupils also seemed unusually large.
Harry reluctantly grabbed Hat, mumbling 'his name is Hare' under his breath as his only protest.
All occupants of the room save one were surprised to see no rabbit emerge from the hat.
The professor frowned.
"I suppose I'd best be going now," she said. "Carry on students."
The door clicked shut behind her and Harry immediately clutched the Hat to his chest.
"Yes!" he said. "I knew you were a great old magic looking hat that talked by magic, but now you make rabbits disappear by magic too! You're the best hat ever!"
"Well, er-" stammered Hat.
"Oh!" said Harry. "There's loads of stuff I don't really want to carry."
Harry rushed over to where Hermione had been tortur- er tutoring him and hastily shoved his quills, parchment, and inkwell into the hat. He hesitated a moment before grabbing his bag and upending it, pouring all its contents into the hat.
He then noticed that Tonks and Hermione were staring at him agape. He chose to read their expressions as expectant.
"Right, onto dark arts and crafts," he said. "Wait, just dark crafts, right?"
He reached into the hat and pulled the rabbit back out. It was white, which just wouldn't do. He began to stroke its soft fur and thought to it about how beautiful and distinguished black fur would be and how striking a figure the rabbit would cut.
"Did you just do a wandless color changing charm?" asked Hermione.
"What?" asked Harry. "Are you feeling charmed?"
"Eep!" squeaked Hermione. Her cheeks had changed to a rather bright shade of pink, so Harry took that as a yes, but he obviously hadn't had anything to do with it. Maybe she was watching him change the cat and unconsciously did it to herself.
Another bit of persuasion had the rabbit returning to a life of woven thread, this time a beautiful black lace.
"Anyway," Harry said as he split the lace into even thirds-
"Wait," said Tonks, "did you just slice up that rabbit?"
Harry looked down.
"Well, it's not really a rabbit anymore is it?" he said.
Harry set the other witches' portions of the lace on a desk since neither was doing anything but staring at the moment.
"I'm hoping the professor with the purple turban can teach me how to attach this magically," he said as he held the lace up to the hem of his robe.
"I guess I'll have to use a needle in the meantime," he said. "Either of you happen to have one?"
They continued to stare.
"I could make do with a match," he suggested.
Harry began to grow concerned, especially since he just remembered that he was afraid of being torn to shreds by a were-mummy. Perhaps he was being rude and she had never thought of wearing lace.
"Um, here," he said, grabbing her length of lace. "You just hold it up to different bits of your clothes and think about how it'd look."
Her mouth was still open, probably threatening to eat him, so he decided some flattery was in order.
"Um, wherever you put it I'm sure will look lovely," he said, "er, I mean terrific!"
She eeped again.
"You really think so?" she asked.
"Yes, definitely," Harry hastily affirmed. He still wasn't quite sure how to interpret her red cheeks and avoidance of eye contact, but it didn't seem like she was about to murder him for what he said. That being said, he also wasn't sure what a were-mummy looked like immediately prior to eating someone.
Tonks started snickering loudly, which promptly earned a glare from Hermione. Harry froze like an amateur witch in a room with an antagonized were-mummy.
"Tonks!" Harry whisper-shouted, "can I talk to you, uh, over there? And Hermione, maybe you could uh," Harry searched for the most placating thing he could think of for the monster assigned to give him lessons, "prepare the next part of the reading lessons that I'm, er, really eager to continue."
The last words came out of his mouth like boiling tea. Quickly and with acute pain.
He shuffled Tonks over to a corner.
"Stop antagonizing her!" Harry urged.
"What's wrong?" Tonks asked. "Feeling overprotective of your little girlfriend?"
She hadn't whispered that.
The blood drained from his face as he looked over at Hermione. She wasn't transforming and decapitating the both of them, but she did seem unnaturally still. Perhaps she was preparing to transform and decapitate them.
"Wait a moment, I think I might have figured out what's going on," said Tonks. "Something's got you alternating between sweet-talking and being terrified of her."
Harry nodded, glad that she understood.
"Is it her, uh," Tonks paused, "time of the month?" she finished in a whisper.
That was perhaps a roundabout way of asking if she was currently turned into a werewolf-mummy, which Tonks should be able to tell just by looking at her, but it could mean nothing else.
"Not now," Harry clarified, "but recently."
"Oh, you poor thing," said Tonks, "did she bite your head off?"
Again, Harry thought Tonks could have done a better job of using her eyes,
"Er, no, but it was a close thing," said Harry. After all, they were in adjacent beds in the infirmary, which was much closer to decapitation than Harry preferred to be.
"Well, you don't have to be so obvious about it," Tonks soothed. "Just be natural around her, it's clear she enjoys having you around."
Harry thought of Nanny's cat, Greebo, who also enjoyed having Harry around. He enjoyed hacking up hairballs into Harry's face while he slept, he enjoyed clawing Harry to shreds while pretending not to mean to, and he enjoyed tripping Harry whenever he had to carry something important. Greebo also got possessive when it was time for Harry to go live with his other moms.
"That makes it worse," said Harry, "it'll be easier for me to screw things up."
Tonks responded only by patting him on the shoulder and smiling. She was likely just relieved that she wasn't the one who had the attention of a monster.
"Harry" Hermione's mane shook as she turned, "I'm ready to continue your literacy lessons!"
Harry gulped and shuffled forwards to meet his fate. Whether death or learning, it was sure to be unpleasant.
"Focus," said the professor in the still quite stylish turban. Nanny had said fashion was cyclical. Seeing the wrap of the turban weaving in and out of itself in intricate spirals, Harry thought he understood what she had meant.
It was difficult to focus, though, given that the empty defense classroom was stuffy and full of the smell of garlic.
Nevertheless, Harry focused, or at least, he thought he did.
"Without losing focus, lash out at the wall," the professor instructed. "Focus is essential for all who would master magic. Well, most everyone at least."
Harry's hands swept out in front of him, looking something like a kitten attacking a bit of hanging thread.
"You need to focus," said the professor.
"I did focus," said Harry.
"Hm," he said, "perhaps you need to think of a better target for your hate. What is it you are focusing on?"
Harry had been focusing on the pay-tree-arky, since all his mums were very much set against it. Maybe it was a problem that he didn't have a clear idea of what it was, besides involving forcing people to pay for trees.
"Tell me," said the professor, "don't be afraid."
"Oh!" said Harry. "That's a great idea!"
Afraid was everything that wizards were, that is, everything that Harry hoped he would never be. Harry focused on his hand. How to attack like a witch? He remembered one time that a traveling priest had come into town with a pitchfork and torch and tried to convince everyone to burn some witches. Naturally Granny had taken his pitchfork and used it to convince his legs to run off. It was the same tool they used to pitch hay.
Come to think of it, that was pretty witchy too. His mums were always on about how wizards just kept fighting each other for no reason, whereas witches tried to actually make things. Harry thought of needles, hooks, and scissors needed for sewing. Harry thought of making tea, shoveling out the barn, and all the other chores he did when Granny was watching him closely.
To top it all off he thought about how none of this was like that stupid wizard with his dead fox in his stupid tower.
Harry struck out with his hand and a chalkboard was alternately pierced, scratched, and smashed.
"Very, uh, good, Harry," said the professor, "perhaps you would like to share the source of your mysterious and sudden success."
"Didn't you say that it had to be focus?" asked Harry.
"I said it was almost always essential," the professor replied, "but there are cases where a witch or wizard has a more mysterious source of power that can lead to unexpected feats of power, sometimes even in situations where focus is impossible."
The professor paused as if expecting Harry to say something.
"Like, for instance, if a toddler performed a great magical act," the professor said, "that would not involve focus."
He again waited for a response from Harry. He sighed.
"Nevertheless, at the time I was considering a less spectacular phenomenon," he said. "There are some addled people whose magic relies on often indecipherable mental connections that they force on reality through an act of will that could hardly be described as focused. In fact, I often wonder whether Professor Dumbledore is not one of these, heh."
"Okay…," said Harry whose attention had wandered, "can we do some dark crafts now?"
"Dark crafts," he asked, "do you mean rituals, and enchantment for dark purposes?"
"Sure," said Harry, "like maybe ribbon summoning, changing things to purple, and maybe something to make ribbon arranged itself into a stylish headdress."
He looked longingly at the turban.
"There is absolutely no-" he began angrily, then paused, "no-no-nothing, wr-wrong or, er, uh, d-d-d-d-dark ab-ab-about my t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-t-turban. P-p-p-perhaps we sh-sh-sh-sh-should c-c-c-call it an af-af-afternoon."
Harry nodded. It was, indeed, an afternoon.
Unrelatedly, the professor ushered him out of the classroom.
"Harry!" the beast called, savage in its intentions.
Harry remained perfectly still in his hiding place. He held his breath and waited for his executioner to pass and, well, not ever get around to being his executioner.
"Harry! I know you're here somewhere!"
They both waited.
Eventually, Harry breathed. It was a mistake.
"Harry, come out! It won't be that bad!"
An itch formed in his nose.
"I've got special plans for today!"
Harry sneezed with a resonant ting.
"The armor?" said Hermione. "How did you even get in there?"
"I am literally designed for people to get inside of me and hide from danger," said the armor, "so he got in quite easily. Thank you both for the drill. This is a quite sensible way to protect students from danger in the halls."
"Yes," said Harry, "that is definitely the only reason I wanted to hide."
"Well, hop on out so I can get back to searching for that giant rabid dog," said the armor.
"Giant rabid dog?" Hermione asked as Harry was expelled onto the stone floor.
"Don't worry," said Harry, "I've taken precautions."
"What precautions? Why are you the one taking- wait, no," said Hermione. "I'm not letting you distract me from your lessons with your nonsense again. Come on, we're going to the library today. Maybe we'll find something familiar that will help motivate you."
"Yes," said Harry, "let's talk about familiars and how I can stop wizards from stealing mine!"
Hermione steeled herself and they walked in silence for a while. Eventually, though, she succumbed to curiosity with a sigh.
"Alright, you win," she bit out, "who is trying to steal your familiar? And why didn't I know you even had a familiar?"
"Well, you didn't know I had it because it got stolen," said Harry, "and it's the one that lives in the tower, with the long white beard and stupid wizard hat."
"You can't mean Dumbledore," said Hermione, "he already has a phoenix, so I can't imagine why he would want to steal a familiar from you."
"Yes, well, I think it died, so he went crazy and convinced himself that my bird was his fox," Harry said. "It's quite sad, really."
"I… what?" said Hermione.
"Here, I'll show you," said Harry.
He held his hand up dramatically.
"Wossname!" he called.
The bird appeared on his arm in a burst of warm but not hot flame.
"Now then," said Harry, "are you my familiar?"
The bird shook its head.
"Really?!" he asked.
The bird nodded.
"Oh," said Harry, "I guess you can go then."
The bird crooned and flew droopily away.
"Harry, er..." Hermione trailed off.
She hadn't seen Harry sad before, but she had precious little practice in comforting friends. She wasn't helped by the fact that most of her brainspace had recently been devoted to forcing Harry to learn to read.
At that moment, though, a thought occurred to her. It was a thought that could solve both of her problems. It was a thought that she might not have had, were it not for all the time she had spent with Harry.
"You know, Harry, there might be a way to do something about your situation with the phoe- er, that bird," she said.
Harry gave her his full attention.
She calculated her words.
"There's a place in the castle where all sorts of magical secrets are hidden," she said.
"Like a hidden chamber in the basement?" he asked.
"No, no, not like that," she said. "They, um, by which I mean wizards, of course, have hidden these things in plain sight."
"Those bastards," Harry cursed.
"Yes, exactly," Hermione agreed. "The answers to your problems lie hidden in the books of the library!"
Harry gasped.
Hermione's plan, perhaps predictably, was met with mixed success.
Harry no longer hid from her in suits of armor. He was always willing to open up a new book.
Those were the successes, what follows are what they were mixed with.
Harry seldom consented to open a book a second time, having declared that it did not contain the knowledge that he sought. The method by which he determined such remained inscrutable to Hermione, since Harry's reading had remained poor and he had not demonstrated an understanding of anything she tried to tell him about indexes and tables of contents. He also had a worrying tendency to pilfer tomes from the restricted section, insisting that they were better books.
There was another behavior that Hermione considered a success, but ought to have considered something a that mixed with success to provide profound worry. Harry kept a journal into which he would jot notes as he played at reading. Hermione figured, wrongly, that he was writing down words that he wished to remember and other things he had learned.
Harry was, in fact, designing his own ritual. Had Hermione known this, she would have been greatly concerned. This is because, although she knew only a few things about rituals, those things were that rituals were very dangerous and could have unpredictable and likely deadly effects if they were misperformed in the slightest. Those were things she knew about known and established rituals, which were often only attempted by competent adult witches and wizards. Created one's own ritual was even more dangerous and best attempted only by even more adult and even more competent witches and wizards.
"Harry, look at this book of charms," Hermione urged. "We can learn the switching spell if you can read the instructions."
Harry looked up from the cubit-sized volume in front of him. It wasn't in English, though that made little difference to Harry, but it did have lots of pictures, shapes, and diagrams that seemed very witchy to Harry. He was currently copying down into his journal a diagram of several interlocking pentagrams, ellipses, and fibonacci spirals. He was perhaps a third of the way done, but figured he could fill in the rest from memory later.
"Sure!" said Harry, closing his book with a resounding thud. "Let's do some magic!"
