Drarryfanficsao3

by Suicide44

Dhhdgd

226. oo

Preface

Harry Potter and the Den of SnakesPosted originally on the Archive of Our Own at /works/12608820.

Rating:

Not Rated

Archive Warning:

Choose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Category:

F/M, Gen

Fandom:

Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling

Character:

Harry Potter, Theodore Nott, Theo Nott, Blaise Zabini, Original Male Character(s), Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, Neville Longbottom, Fred and George - Character, Weasleys - Character, Ginny Weasley, Luna Lovegood, Daphne Greengrass, Crabbe, Goyle, Millicent Bulstrode, Pansy Parkinson, Lavender Brown, Parvati Patil, Minerva McGonagall, Severus Snape, Albus Dumbledore, James Potter

Additional Tags:

Potter Twins, WBWL, Slytherin Harry, Slytherin Harry Potter, Gray Harry, a rewrite of book one if Harry was in Slytherin and his twin brother Jules was a git, potential dumbledore bashing, mild james potter bashing, potential snape bashing, Draco Malfoy's still annoying, Slytherin Politics, slytherin maneuvers, i don't know what else is supposed to go here, I'll probably add more tags later, idk pairings yet, no pairings before 4th year

Series:

Part 1 of

Sarcasm and Slytherin

Collections:

Political HP Fics,

Best in Fandom

Stats:

Published: 2017-11-02 Completed: 2017-11-13 Chapters: 9/9 Words: 78245

Harry Potter and the Den of Snakes

by orphan_account

Summary

After ten years of misery with the Dursleys, Harry Potter learns that he has magic. Except, in this story, it's not a surprise-the only surprise is that there are others like him. Including his twin brother, Julian Potter, the savior of the Wizarding world.

This isn't the Harry you think you know.

The Freak

Chapter Notes

Edit 1/20/18: Guest user Luna has generously offered to translate Den of Snakes into German. The German version is available here:

https/www.fanfiktion.de/s/5a6364200008d3951fe156e0/1/Sarkasmus-und-Slytherin-Harry-Potter-und-der-Bau-der-Schlangen

Endless thanks to Luna for their work!!!

See the end of the chapter for more notes

Harry had been running so long he thought his lungs were about to collapse.

Dudley and Piers and the rest had just found his last, best hiding spot in the park, which of course meant that he had to take off running to stay ahead of the gang. He hadn't gotten breakfast because he burned the toast, and his stomach was hollow and angry, and Dudley was hyped up on smoothies and Harry's scrambled eggs and excitement.

They were getting closer.

He saw a street sign he didn't know and went that way, desperate enough to hope unfamiliar ground would confuse his cousin.

Then he saw another sign, this one outside a big ugly gray building: Public Library.

The school library—Harry remembered the school library was very strict about being quiet. It was also a place Dudley's crew never went.

He didn't have to think twice about flying up the steps and through the automatic glass doors.

From just inside, he saw Dudley and Sammy and Piers and Brian go running by, hollering and mad, Dudley and Piers both waving sticks. They didn't even look at the library.

Deciding he might as well hang out for a bit, here where they couldn't kick up a fuss even if they found him, Harry turned around.

It was bigger than the school library. A lot bigger.

He never liked the school library much; the librarian was a friend of Aunt Petunia's from the PA, and she always watched him like she thought he was going to steal the books, or shred them, or possibly make a fire inside of a pentagram. (Harry wasn't supposed to know what pentagrams were, but he'd eavesdropped on some of the older kids talking in gleeful whispers like children do when they come across forbidden knowledge that they don't fully understand, and he knew it had to do with summoning the Devil. Aunt Petunia seemed to hate the Devil, though, so Harry figured vaguely that if he knew how to call on the Devil and the Devil would take his side against his aunt and uncle, he'd pick the devil over them every time. He didn't actually know how to summon the Devil, though, and even if he did he wouldn't do it in the school library.)

This library was different. The front desk didn't have anyone sitting at it, and there were a number of people scattered about at plain beige tables, reading or typing or writing in silence. Harry narrowed his eyes at the kindly woman pushing a cart full of books by; she looked a bit like an old teacher of his, Mrs. Moore, who was plump and had a head full of wild dark curls and a really pretty accent and who slipped him extra corned beef sandwiches sometimes during lunch, except this lady's skin was a little bit closer to copper than medium brown.

"E-excuse me," Harry stammered.

She turned to him and blinked. He knew what she saw; knew his clothes were big and ugly and worn out and that he looked closer to five than seven years old. Harry put on his best innocent face, the one he wore with his teachers, making his eyes wide and vulnerable and his mouth hopeful. He also did his best to dim the unnatural green of his eyes. He knew it made some people uncomfortable and wasn't sure exactly how it worked but he knew he could make them duller for short time periods if he concentrated, although it always gave him a headache afterward.

It seemed to work. The woman's face softened almost immediately into a smile. Harry hid his satisfaction. "How can I help you, dearie?" she said, bending down a little bit.

He gave her his best shy smile in return. "I was wondering if—if you have books here… for kids?"

"Of course," she said, her smile wider. "Want me to show you?"

"Thank you," Harry said, looking bashfully at the ground, a move he'd learned from Piers Polkiss, who for all his rat-faced stupidity was weirdly good at manipulating teachers. Harry was pretty sure Piers only used the look-down-and-away maneuver because it was harder to trust him when you could see all his face.

"Are you a librarian?"

"I sure am," the woman said. Harry squinted and made out the words on her name tag—Smithy. "Been working here for thirty-three years."

"Gosh," he said, trying to sound admiring. "That's a long time to work anywhere."

"I'm sure you get lots of advice from grown-ups, and I'm sure you find most of it's useless," Mrs. Smithy said with a wink. "But this bit's never failed me yet. Do something you love and you'll never work a day in your life."

Harry frowned a little, thinking about that. It made sense, if work was something unpleasant you only did for money. He didn't think Uncle Vernon's job was very fun, based on how much Uncle Vernon complained about his boss and his coworkers and the people who worked for him and the companies he worked with and the layout of the parking garage and the quality of the coffee. Maybe if Uncle Vernon did something he liked, he wouldn't be so irritable all the time.

"So get a job you like…" he said slowly, "and you won't ever get bored with it? Or wish you didn't have to do it?"

Mrs. Smithy smiled even brighter. "Exactly! You're a clever one. How old are you? Five?"

"Seven," Harry said, looking down again. This time it wasn't a fake. He knew he was tiny for his age, and hated it.

"Oh, dearie me, I'm sorry. Well, I'm sure you'll grow," Mrs. Smithy assured him. "My son's grown and gone now, of course, in his thirties now, but let me tell you, he was the shortest boy in his year until he turned sixteen, and then he shot up like a weed. Tallest of all his classmates inside eighteen months. And, here we are!"

"Wow," Harry breathed, looking around with wide eyes. They had loads more books than the school library, and there was no beady-eyed Ms. Gurgle there to glare at him anytime he coughed. "Thanks!"

"Have a nice day, dearie," Ms. Smithy said with one last smile, and then she bustled away.

Harry spent about a minute just wandering around, before he pulled out a blue paperback with a dragon on the cover and started reading.

The library became his escape.

Harry's favorite thing about the fiction section was that—was that all the weird things about him—all his freakishness—well, in the books, it wasn't freakish. It meant he was a magician, or a Dragon Rider, or a genie-in-training, or starstruck. It meant he was special, powerful, not just a kid from boring Little Whinging. Slowly, he started to think that maybe Aunt Petunia was wrong. She wasn't a very nice person, after all—he'd believed her when she said he was a freak, but he hated Aunt Petunia, so maybe being something Aunt Petunia didn't like was good.

He worked extra hard for a month, was on his best behavior, and worked up the courage to ask Aunt Petunia if he could read some of the old books Dudley got for Christmas and birthdays and cast aside to gather dust in his second bedroom. Her face got pinched and cruel, and for a second Harry was sure she'd take a broom to him, but then she nodded jerkily and told him harshly to "not even think about damaging them." Harry thanked her and disappeared before she could change her mind.

He put in an extra effort at dinner that night. Not because he thought it was a kindness—he'd read enough to know his family sucked at being family, and that acting like a decent person for once didn't count as something he should be grateful for—but because he figured it'd be easier to get concessions in the future if he gave something in return. Even if it was maddening.

Dudley never noticed the books' absence, and Uncle Vernon never noticed them lined up at the low end of the cupboard when he threw Harry inside, and Harry and Aunt Petunia never brought it up again. But one by one, Dudley's books walked away from his second bedroom and moved to Harry's cupboard.

He was careful with them. But he didn't ignore them.

Harry sat in the library one day, about a year after he'd first come here. He was frowning. He'd been trying to read for a while but he was distracted. He hadn't come in a week, since Uncle Vernon saw him accidentally repair a broken dish in the kitchen and threw him in the cupboard for six days straight. Harry knew he had to learn to control his freakishness. Just like the characters in his books—they had to learn it, too.

"How you doing, Neal?" Mrs. Smithy asked, sticking her head into the corner Harry liked to read in.

He gave her his best sweet smile. "Hi, Mrs. Smithy! Pretty good."

She looked at the closed book. "Is something wrong? Usually when I come back here, you've got your nose buried in the pages."

Harry hesitated. "I…"

He might as well ask her. She was a grown-up, and while he didn't trust her (no one had ever helped him, even when he asked; asking for help just got him could shouldered by adults at school and beaten at home by the Dursleys for being ungrateful and spreading rumours), he did like her. And he trusted her… a little more than any other adult.

"If you want to learn a new skill, how do you do it?" he said slowly. "One that you have to teach yourself."

She paused. "Like a language?"

"I… guess." That would work.

"Study and practice," she said with a shrug. "Lots of practice. Even when you don't see anything improving."

He nodded slowly. "Oh… kay. Thanks."

"If you need anything, let me know," she said with a warm smile.

Food. A warm jacket. Bandaids. Books. Someone to whack my cousin in the face. Something to help me sleep at night. "I will, thanks."

She disappeared, and Harry frowned at the book.

He'd made things move. He'd regrown his hair overnight. He'd accidentally resized his clothes at least twice that he knew of so he looked like was dressed in bits of tailored rags instead of just rags. He'd turned that one teacher's hair a funny color when she laughed at him in class for being dumb, even though he was only being dumb so he wouldn't do better than Dudley.

Harry tugged off his old, ratty beanie and thought about warmth. Warm showers on the rare days the Dursleys left him alone in the house. Warm summer sun and the baking asphalt in the park, soothing against his back even when Dudley's gang was standing around laughing, even though his skin stung from sliding over the ground. Warm air hitting you in the face when you came in out of the cold.

He smelled smoke at the same time as his hands registered heat and looked down—and yelped.

His beanie was on fire.

Harry dropped it, and then came to his senses and stomped on it until the baby flames were gone, and then nervously peeked out of his corner.

No one had noticed.

He let out a breath and picked up the beanie; if you turned it inside out, you wouldn't even be able to tell it was damaged.

He hadn't burned the library down, and he had gotten a reaction.

At least it proved he had some degree of control.

It took a month for Harry to master the warming. He could put warmth into an item of clothing or pretty much anything else, although paper was hard, that would last a few minutes to all day, depending on how much strength he put into it. At first even a little bit made him dizzy and exhausted, but with practice, it got easier and easier. He found himself sleeping loads better with warmth sunk deep into his thin, ratty blanket.

Fire was easier; he didn't have to worry about the line between heat and burning. When he needed to burn something, he just thought about all the times Dudley pushed him down the stairs or broke things and blamed it on Harry or flaunted his piles of presents in Harry's face or stole Harry's food, the times Aunt Petunia whacked him with a broom or a frying pan, the times Uncle Vernon got out his belt or his big meaty hands for a beating, and things ignited easily. Harry normally kept his anger packed away. It was interesting to learn that it could, sometimes, be useful.

But if he really thought about it, his anger wasn't really hot. It helped with fire, but mostly Harry's anger felt cold in his stomach. Cold and dense like the glaciers he'd read about. So that was what he did next—freezing things. Ice came even easier than fire did. And he got a spark of happiness that lasted for a week when he glared at the pavement and spread ice over it just in time for Dudley and Piers and Sammy to slip and fall into a rubbish bin.

When they turned around, he was gone.

Harry didn't even get blamed.

He learned a lesson from that, too:

Don't get caught.

Around the time he turned nine, his aunt started locking him in the cupboard at night. So Harry took it upon himself to learn how to unlock things.

He spent an hour every night for three months glaring at his cupboard and concentrating until his head hurt and he had to give up and go to sleep because Aunt Petunia made him get up at six every morning to make breakfast.

The first time he heard a grudging click, Harry's breath caught in his throat.

He reached out slowly for the door. If he'd imagined it—

But he hadn't, and the door opened slowly at the touch of his fingertips.

Harry smiled, slow and sharp.

He ate better after that, and while he didn't really grow, the ability to creep out and snag a piece of leftover chicken, a slice or two of bread, a few swallows of milk straight from the carton, cold carrots or celery from the counter—it made all the difference. Harry found he had more energy, needed less sleep, and got sick less often. If his aunt and uncle noticed, they didn't say anything, and he gladly took the free time that resulted from not finishing his chores more quickly than they expected and then hiding in the garden shed where no one else really went. Between warming charms and Dudley's old books, many a pleasant hour was snatched in the garden shed.

Using his freakishness didn't tire him out as quickly, either, and learning new things took just as long but he didn't get migraines and dizziness like before. Harry worked at locking and unlocking his cupboard, then the front door, then the back door, then the padlock on the garden shed, then Uncle Vernon's car doors, until he could do it consistently and with his eyes closed, and then when Aunt Petunia scolded him for going through lightbulbs too quickly in his cupboard despite the fact that there was only one bare bulb that he only used for reading at night, he decided to learn something else. This one was easier than the locks. Summoning a ball of light to one palm wasn't very different from the warming he could put on things. Making it float up by the ceiling of his cupboard was harder, but Harry managed eventually, and the light wasn't particularly strong but it worked. Eventually he got to the point where he could make it as small as a pinhead or as big as a basketball and anywhere in between, and the colors of the light could change, though bigger lights, or color changing, still tired him out easily.

After that he set himself to learning how to move things. Doing more than moving one of the kitchen chairs a foot or two, or pushing his cupboard door open or closed, was hard, but the night Harry managed to lift his mattress a few inches off the cot with himself sitting on it was one of the best nights of his life.

He'd make it through school. He would survive. After he turned eleven, he'd be going to a different school from Dudley; maybe then he could make actual friends and get decent grades and use all the knowledge he'd been gaining and then hiding in class and in the library for all these years.

He'd use his freakishness when he could, and keep it secret, and stay sneaky, and not get caught, and one day he'd make it out of here and he would never come back.

Sometimes Harry fantasized about payback. Sometimes he imagined holding Dudley's head in the toilet without moving a finger, or spreading ice beneath Uncle Vernon's feet at the top of the stairs, or making the flames of the stovetop grow and reach for Aunt Petunia's apron. But those were the thoughts that became painful because he couldn't do anything about them (yet) so he just shoved them into the back corner of his mind and ignored them when they cropped up again.

He'd never let Aunt Petunia know, but Harry actually rather liked gardening. He could drink from the hose to keep himself from getting thirsty or even too hungry, and it was satisfying in a weird way. So he kept his face blank when she sent him outside but trimming the roses and mowing the lawn and weeding the flowerbeds were some of his favorite chores.

It did get lonely, though. Harry hated it but he did feel intensely lonely sometimes. He'd never had a friend; Dudley chased everyone away at school, and anyway he thought most of his classmates were a little too dumb and annoying to be real friends even if Harry's cousin hadn't been the bullying terror of the school. He started talking to himself sometimes, or the flowers, just to hear his own voice. "Oh no you don't" when a rosebush tried to tear his shirt; "take that" when he yanked a particularly stubborn root; "well that's just nasty" when he came across slugs hiding under low-growing leaves in the spring.

He happened across a gardener snake one summer day. Harry was distracted thinking about his cousin's birthday the next day, and how he'd have to get up extra early and be especially careful not to burn the bacon, and wondering if he could use his freakishness to lift some bacon to his mouth while his hands were busy, and he almost stepped on the snake.

"Oh no—" He stumbled, tripped, and fell.

"Stupid clumsy humans," the snake hissed.

Harry froze.

The snake glared at him. "Are you going to start screaming too, you big dumb lump?"

"Sorry—what?" Harry choked, realizing that his words had come out with a little bit of a hissy sound.

The snake reared back, seeming as shocked as Harry. "You are a speaker!"

"I… guess?"

"How interesting." The snake seemed curious now. "I apologize for calling you dumb. I still think you're a lump. Humans are clumsy."

"I was trying not to step on you," Harry said indignantly, forgetting to be shocked.

"Thanks for that, I suppose," the snake said. "I haven't met a speaker before."

"So it's not common? Being able to talk to snakes?"

"Oh, by my egg, no."

Harry paused.

"If there's nothing else, I need to go hunt," the snake said irritably.

"Right—sorry. Um. I can—I'd like to—talk more. If you can come back," Harry blurted, not wanting to lose this sudden and unexpected connection.

The snake seemed to think it over. "I have heard that humans can stroke snakes in a way that feels nice. If you will try, I will come back… sometime."

"Deal," Harry said quickly.

The snake slipped away so easily that Harry blinked and it was gone.

Okay. So he could talk to snakes. That was… not actually any weirder than lighting things on fire with his mind or hovering himself off the ground like his mattress was trying to copy Aladdin's magic carpet.

Word spread, and gardening got a lot less lonely after that, as a number of local snakes showed up to talk to chat while Harry worked. The first snake he'd met went by a name that Harry heard as Jase and seemed particularly fond of gentle rubbing of his back, though he wasn't the only one. Snakes didn't provide the most interesting of conversation. Mostly they talked about their nests, their prey, how the day's hunting had gone, looking for a mate, preparing for hibernation, or nice places to laze in the sun. Harry got good fast at talking about snake things. Snakes also, he learned, liked attention; if he stroked them when they asked him to and asked questions and let them talk about themselves and their days, they quickly came to see him as an interesting and somewhat useful diversion.

He was sorry when interference from school cut back on his time in the garden, and sorrier when the cooling weather sent many of his scaly friends into hibernation. The winter looked even longer after a few months of companionship that, despite his companions not being actual people, had felt like a gift to the conversation-starved boy.

"Get the mail, Dudley."

"Make Harry do it."

"Get the mail, Harry."

"Make Dudley do it."

"Poke him with your Smelting stick, Dudley."

Harry dodged the Smelting stick and happily fled the chaos of the kitchen, the stink of his new school uniform, the pile of presents, and the terror that was Dudley armed with a school-issued weapon.

Honestly, he thought, what kind of school gives all the kids actual clubs to hit each other with?

He took his time collecting the mail and sifting through the envelopes, prolonging his freedom from the kitchen as long as possible.

His hands froze.

Harry brought the letter almost up to his nose, squinting at the letters.

Mr. H. Potter

The Cupboard Under the Stairs

Number 4 Privet Drive

Little Whinging, Surrey

A… letter. To him.

From someone who knew he slept in a cupboard.

Harry's eyes narrowed, even as his heart pounded with excitement. He wanted to be excited… but it could also be a nasty prank. Though the handwriting was too neat to belong to any of Dudley's friends, who knew about the cupboard, and anyway all of them were too dumb to write something like "Mr. H. Potter." He couldn't think who else would be willing to prank him and also know about the cupboard. Aunt Marge, maybe?

But this wasn't her style. If she wanted to hurt him she'd just show up and sic Ripper on him. In fact, she had, just a few weeks ago.

"Boy!" Uncle Vernon bellowed, and Harry jumped and stuff the letter into the waistband of Dudley's old shorts before trotting back into the kitchen.

"Sorry, Uncle Vernon," he said, handing over the stack of letters and returning to the counter.

He was cooking the bacon, amidst Aunt Petunia's shrill orders for him to not burn it, when the knock sounded.

"I bet it's Piers!" Dudley shouted, moving faster than Harry would've expected a boy Dudley's size to be able to move.

Harry did his best to calm his heart rate and hoped that Piers' arrival would mean Aunt Petunia would kick him out of the kitchen so he could read the letter.

Then a shriek from the front hall jolted him out of his thoughts, and Harry almost dropped the pan.

Vernon's head snapped up, and his eyes sharpened. "Petunia?"

"— not have you in my house!" Aunt Petunia's rose over the low murmurs of conversation—Dudley's voice, and then another man Harry didn't recognize. Hers were the only words he could pick out over the sizzle of cooking bacon.

"Petunia, now is not the time," someone said, quite clearly, and then someone stepped into the kitchen and Harry looked up and froze.

He was looking at a mirror of himself, if he were twenty years older, and if his older self got regular exercise and meals and had a life that would put a healthy glow in his skin. Same wild black hair, same round wire-frame glasses, same lean build, same mischievous set of his mouth. The only difference was that while Harry's eyes were bright green, this man's were a warm hazel, and while Harry had a small scar on his forehead from the car crash that killed his parents, this man's skin was unblemished. Harry could tell because his own hair flopped forward and hid the scar but this man's hair was swept back and up off his forehead in a carelessly stylish way.

Harry realized he was gaping and shut his mouth rapidly and returned to the bacon. If he burned it, he'd be in trouble.

"Boy, leave the bacon," Uncle Vernon ordered.

Harry did as he was told as quickly as possible. He knew the tension in the room; knew it usually meant violence if he wasn't really, really careful.

Then he dared peek up and pay attention to the adults. The strange man was looking around the room, slow and stunned like he couldn't process everything. Aunt Petunia had pushed her way into the kitchen and was standing by Uncle Vernon. Dudley, meanwhile, was in the hall still, unable to fit his girth behind the stranger and shouting about how he wanted his presents and he wanted his breakfast and who is this in the house, Mum, he's in my way, Mum what's going on?

Harry saw how his aunt and uncle were staring at the stranger and a few pieces clicked together. They knew him. They knew him, from somewhere, and they were not happy to see him, and the reason why had something to do with Harry.

"Harry?" the strange man said uncertainly.

"Yes, sir," he said politely.

"Harry, I'm… it's me," the stranger said. "James… Potter?"

Harry's eyes darted to Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon before he could help it. He knew that name. That was his father's name. His father, who was dead.

This was all a joke.

Strangely, that was enough to make Harry relax. A joke he could deal with. It made him angry, of course, but where Dudley's anger was hot Harry's ran cold, and he could set it aside to deal with what was in front of him.

"Petunia," the stranger said slowly, clearly fighting back anger of his own. "Petunia, what—"

"You said you weren't coming back," Aunt Petunia said in the tone of voice that said she was dangerously angry. Harry was more scared of her when she got that tone than he ever was of Uncle Vernon no matter how much his uncle stomped or yelled or used his belt. "You said you couldn't take care of him. That we had to raise him because you couldn't."

"I didn't—I asked you to tell him about us," the stranger said, something weird in his voice.

Harry was starting to doubt the prank conclusion. This was too clever and too well acted for the Dursleys, not to mention too complicated, not to mention they'd never do it on Dudley's birthday.

"You forfeited any say in his upbringing when you dumped your one-year-old son in my arms in the middle of the night, gave me a thirty-minute rushed explanation, and disappeared for ten years," Aunt Petunia hissed.

Harry choked. "You're—you're my— what?" he gasped out before he could stop himself.

The stranger looked pained when he finally met Harry's eyes. "Yes, Harry. I'm… your father."

Chapter End Notes

I know this chapter's short; I'm just testing it out. Heads up: my writing style is my own and I'm not trying to emulate JKR's. I've seen several fic writers who did so admirably, but I tried and it sounded stilted and awkward, so I'm sticking with what's worked for me before. I have about 50,000 words of this already written. First year should be finished by the end of this week because I'm kind of obsessive. *sigh*

Diagon Alley

Harry locked his knees to keep from falling over.

The man—his father?—looked almost disappointed. Like he'd been expecting Harry to jump for joy and run into his arms. But Harry was busy turning over what Aunt Petunia had said— you dumped him in my arms in the middle of the night, gave a thirty-minute rushed explanation, and disappeared—and he didn't think he liked his father much.

All this time he'd thought his parents were dead. That if they were alive they'd have come to get him and he'd have a life like a kid in a book, with parents who loved him even if they were poor or on the run from evil people or facing some danger.

He had so many questions he didn't even know where to start.

James' explanation took an hour.

Harry sat silent and still through it all, keeping his face as blank as possible. It clearly unsettled James that Harry was so unresponsive, but he couldn't bring himself to care.

Harry sat on one of the chairs in the living room that he'd never been allowed to touch before. Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon took the sofa, while James took an armchair to Harry's left and across the table from his aunt and uncle.

And Harry learned several things about his family:

James had married Lily, Aunt Petunia's sister, right out of school. Wizarding school, apparently, because his mum and dad were a witch and a wizard, and there was a school for people with magic. That was about the only good part of the whole speech, actually—when Harry pulled out his letter from his pants, he relished the look of revulsion on Aunt Petunia's face, and savored the excitement that came with knowing he might be a freak but he wasn't the only one and there was a place he could go to learn more.

His mum and father were fighting in a war against an evil wizard named You-Know-Who.

When his mum got pregnant, they went into hiding.

She gave birth to twin boys.

(When Harry learned he had a twin brother born seven minutes after Harry, named Julian, he momentarily forgot how to breathe.)

They trusted the wrong person, and one night was out at a meeting for their side of the war while his mum watched over their sleeping sons. A fight started at the meeting and James got sidetracked. It was really just a distraction; while they were fighting, the evil wizard broke into their house and killed their mum and then tried to kill Julian with the worst, deadliest spell ever. Somehow Julian survived and managed to destroy You-Know-Who in the process, which Harry found ridiculous because Julian had been only a year old then, so it's not like he fought some great battle, but he still wasn't able to summon words so he just nodded numbly.

Overnight, Julian became a hero to Wizarding Britain, as James called it, but You-Know-Who's followers still very much wanted the remaining Potters dead, and in the chaos it was decided that young Harry ought to be sent away until his magic appeared and he'd be able to defend himself. "It was for your own safety," James said, almost begging Harry to believe him. (Harry didn't.) "I was a target, and your brother was a target, but that didn't mean—didn't mean you had to be, too."

Harry had been left in the care of his mother's sister with the understanding that she would call a certain number when Harry displayed "accidental magic" which was apparently the sign that a wizarding child had magic. Which, obviously, she never did. So James had assumed that Harry was something called a "squib," or a baby from wizard parents without magic, and that Harry would be better off away from wizards since he'd never be able to defend himself against them. Harry thought that was ridiculous, too; he could've at least gotten to know his family in secret, but by this point he thought he was too angry to say anything to James Potter that wouldn't come out badly.

So when the headmaster of the magic school asked James about his older son and the fact that the school, which was somehow magicked to know all the babies in Britain with magic talent who should go there, James immediately knew Petunia had lied and had come to get him.

"I'm sorry," James said, when he'd run out of explanations and Harry still hadn't said a word. "I… can't explain how sorry I am. And I know I've probably wrecked any chance we had at a normal father-son relationship, but I hope we can… at least try to fix some of the damage." He took a deep breath. "The envelope… it has your list of school supplies. There's a place in London where wizards go to buy things like this. If you would like, I can take you there to buy your school things, and then we can go—home."

"Home," Harry said. "Your home?"

"Yes."

"And my… Julian will be there." You seriously named your twin sons Hadrian and Julian?

"Yes." Something Harry couldn't define crossed James' face.

He thought about it.

Part of him wanted to stay here, where he had his snake friends in the garden and where he knew how to navigate the dangers. But one look at his aunt's face told him she and Uncle Vernon would hate him even more now than they had before, and that he couldn't count on things staying the same for the two months before he left for school.

"Okay," he said quietly, doing his best to portray a shocked, frightened, cautiously hopeful child. (Only the first part of that was true.)

James' smile was overwhelming with the force of its relief.

Harry didn't tell him that he thought he preferred Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon. At least his aunt and uncle were honest about not wanting him.

"Welcome to Diagon Alley," James said with a huge grin.

Harry walked along slowly, eyes and mouth slightly open.

He didn't know where to look first. So many shops, so many weird sights, people in weird clothes. The conversations he overheard were even stranger.

"Quite a sight, isn't it?" James said, looking around with all the comfort of a man returning to well-known, well-loved stomping grounds.

That snapped Harry out of it. "Amazing," he agreed, since he'd decided to stay on good terms with his father for now.

"Where do you want to go first?" James said. Harry thought he looked and sounded a little like a kid himself. "We can get your wand, or the bookstore—" so you're not a reader, Harry thought, detecting a bit of disgust— "or the apothecary, or to get you better clothes—seriously, I could string Petunia up by her toes for dressing you in these."

Harry agreed with the stringing-Petunia-up-by-the-toes sentiment, but he was pretty sure James was joking, so he kept that to himself. "I… was wondering," he said shyly. "I've never had… money, I guess…"

James looked like he'd swallowed a lemon. Harry didn't tell him how much the expression looked like Petunia right then. "Oh, for—of course we… have the money. Look, I should explain—come on, I'll catch you up while we go to the bank, okay? I need to make a withdrawal anyway."

"Sure," Harry agreed.

"So there's a bunch of old families in wizarding Britain," James explained, keeping a firm grip on Harry's shoulder as they wove through the crowd. He nodded and smiled at loads of people but kept a quick pace; Harry was pretty sure he was dodging casual acquaintances. "Lots of them are arseho—sorry, er—not very nice. They pride themselves on being 'purebloods' and only marrying wizards, which is a load of hogwash since there aren't actually enough pureblood wizards to keep them from inbreeding like medieval royals, but try telling them that. We're one of the old families—the Potter line—but we're not technically pure and we aren't blood purist jerks either."

That was a lot of information to process at once; Harry did his best to remember it for later.

"Anyway. The Potters have a number of vaults in Gringotts—that's the bank. You and your brother each have a trust vault that you can draw up to five hundred Galleons from a year until you're seventeen, at which point you get access to it. When I die, Harry, you'll inherit the Potter lordship."

Harry caught some distinct tension there and knew there was a lot James wasn't telling him. He resolved to look for books in the bookstore that might explain it.

"So will I buy my school stuff from my trust vault?" he said.

"Merlin, no, that's stuff I'll pay for," James said, looking surprised. "Parental duties and all." He seemed to realize the irony of talking about 'parental duties' and winced and rushed on before Harry could laugh in his face. "Anyway, we'll still swing by your trust vault to finalize your access to it and set you up with a Gringotts bag. Then we'll go by mine, I need to—to pick something up for the headmaster."

Harry thought James was trying to get him to ask more questions, so he stubbornly pretended to get sidetracked by a shop window displaying a number of elaborate hats.

When they got to Gringotts, Harry made a point of nodding respectfully to the goblins at the front door while James breezed on by, ignoring them. He did the same to the goblin who he and James talked to at the counter and then the one named Griphook who came to take them down to their vaults.

They stopped at Harry's first.

"Lay your hand on the door," Griphook instructed, sounding bored. "It'll finalize your blood right to the vault and ensure no one can access it except you."

Harry did so gladly.

The door shone briefly silver and settled back to a dull iron-gray shade, then swung open.

His mouth dropped.

Piles and piles of gold and silver and bronze. Harry only vaguely listened to Griphook explaining the money denominations; he was too busy trying to process that all the years he'd been starving and shivering in Little Whinging, this had been waiting for him.

Griphook snapped his fingers, and a small bag of nicely tooled black leather appeared in his palm. It was just large enough to fit a small paperback book if you crammed it in far enough. "That'll allow you to withdraw up five hundred galleons a year from your trust vault, as much as you want from the family vault with parental permission," he explained. "Just stick your hand in and think about how much you want to withdraw. It's also got an Undetectable Expansion Charm; you can fit up to about the volume of a large goat of other things inside."

"Thanks."

Griphook leered—although Harry didn't take it personally, since leering seemed to be the goblin equivalent of a smile—and beckoned him out.

They climbed back in the crazy cart and rattled on down into the belly of the earth.

"Potter family vault," Griphook announced.

"Come see," James said with a wink.

Harry followed him into the vault and stopped dead. Again.

If his trust vault had been impressive, then this was… unfathomable. You could fit all of the Dursleys' house in here and still have room left over to walk around the edges. The bulk of it was money, but Harry definitely saw some bookshelves around a big pile of bronze knuts and his eyes narrowed.

"Can I… look around a bit?" he said, not bothering to hide his awe.

"Of course," James said absently, already walking away the other direction. "I'll just be a few… minutes…"

Harry left him to his search and made a beeline for the books, thinking about that undetectable expansion charm on the bag, and about how far behind he'd probably be from the rest of the students if they all grew up around families with magic.

He grinned when he saw the books. They all looked old, and dense, and fascinating. But he didn't have much time…

His hands reached for the books that seemed most interesting.

A Study of Restricted Potions.

Walking the Line: Spells and Curses considered "Gray Magic".

Emeric's Complete Compendium of Curses, Jinxes, Hexes, Counterspells and Other Offensive Magics.

The Subtleties: On the Arte of Mind Magicke.

He stuffed those four quickly into the bag and scanned back over the shelves again, heart pounding.

His eyes caught on a small book on the floor and around the corner of the bookshelf. Harry grabbed it, registered that the title had something to do with animals, and crammed it in his bag without thinking because he'd been distracted by—

He'd seen James using a wand by now, of course, and everyone else. In fact, Harry hadn't seen anyone doing magic without a wand. When he asked, James said only the strongest wizards could do wandless magic, and then not without years of practice, or young wizards, whose magic wasn't controlled. Harry nodded and didn't say anything about his own wandless magic. He also thought he was looking forward to seeing how a wand would help him cast spells, and he'd paid attention to how casually everyone else seemed to use theirs.

So he recognized the rack of wands for what they were when he saw them, but what caught him off guard was the power coming from them.

Harry sidled closer. The wands near the top left looked oldest; there were little plaques next to them, worn with age and barely legible. Lord Edmund Potter. Lady Caroline Potter. Each was followed by details that Harry didn't fully understand that probably had to do with the materials the wand was made of.

The bottom right held a wand labeled Lord Fleamont Potter and then, below it, Lily Evans-Potter with several empty racks below hers. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that these were old family wands.

Harry blinked tears out of his eyes and scanned back over the wands, feeling… pulled.

The black wand almost pulsed when he saw it.

Harry narrowed his eyes and stepped closer.

Vincent Gaunt-Potter, read the label, faded and tarnished with age. Ash, thestral tail feather. The wand itself was about average length, it looked like, and plain, carved of a dark brown wood. It was on the far left column of wands and only a few down from the top. One of the oldest here, then.

Harry reached out for it almost without thinking.

When his hand closed around the grip, a surge of energy rippled between it and him. Then it settled and firmed, and Harry thought the wand felt… satisfied.

The feeling faded, until there was no indication of the connection except for a subtle warmth where Harry held the wand.

He lifted and examined the smooth, polished wood, studying it carefully. He wondered whether it was common for old wands to find new owners; he didn't think so, since none of the other slots were empty, meaning James and Julian probably had their own wands.

I shouldn't take this.

But the thought of leaving the wand behind made him narrow his eyes and grip it harder. There was an unmistakable sense of power to this wand, and Harry couldn't deny how much that called to him. Plus, it liked him. It'd be stupid to leave it here.

Mind made up, he stuffed it into his bag and hurried back to the front of the vault just as James got there.

"Harry, good," James said, grinning. "See anything cool?"

Harry thought back over what he'd seen, looking for something appropriate to ask about. "Do those brooms fly?"

James' smile widened. "Born Quidditch player already, I can tell! Yes, technically, but they're antiques. I'll teach you how to fly before you go to school; you'll love it. Jules's been flying since he was four, I'm sure he'll be happy to give you some pointers…"

He kept on about brooms and some sport called Quidditch played on them. Harry thought it sounded cool and like he definitely wanted to try, but in his experience admitting to wanting something was a great way to get it taken away forever, so he didn't tell James that. He made a mental note that a great way to get James talking and/or distracted was to bring up brooms.

He also noted James tucking a small package wrapped in brown paper into his pocket and narrowed his eyes. So that was what James had come here to get for this mysterious headmaster, whose name, according to the letter, was Albus Dumbledore, as ridiculous a name as any Harry had ever heard. James had said it was an old family name, and if he hadn't Harry would've suspected the man chose that name just to sound bumbling and kindly and grandfatherly, which of course immediately made Harry quite certain that the man was none of those things. Of course, it being a family name, that was a moot point, but still.

Harry relaxed enough to truly enjoy the cart ride this time, letting a grin spread across his face since James was sitting behind him and couldn't see it. Griphook, in front, seemed bored. Harry didn't think even doing this several times a day could ever get boring, but maybe the goblins were just less easily excited than people.

The light of the white marble lobby made Harry wince and blink when they came out of the tunnels. James laughed at him. It wasn't a mean laugh, or even a taunting one, but Harry had spent enough time being bullied that he tensed and grew cold, his good mood evaporating.

"How about Ollivander's, eh?" James said. "Get you a wand—you'll be a proper wizard now!"

That, at least, Harry could support. He made himself grin back at his father—a trace of caution and reserve, too, because it'd be suspicious if he was too affectionate too quickly—but a grin.

James looked awkwardly happy.

Harry decided his birth father wasn't much more observant than most of his teachers.

Ollivander's was cramped, dusty, and smelled of wood and varnish. The sense of power and magic coming from the Potter wands in the vault had been strong; in here, it was almost oppressive in its strength. The short ends of long, narrow boxes in jumbled stacks showed on shelves on both walls, stretching back much farther than you'd expect from the front of the store. Harry couldn't even see the end of the hall. The front windows, while free of obstructions, were dusty and grimy and let only a sort of golden half-light into the shop. Harry was pretty sure the owners had done it on purpose for the effect.

"Ahhhh," someone breathed. "Mr. Potter, the elder. I was wondering if I'd be seeing you in here…"

The little old man with the eerily wide eyes glanced at James as he said it and—was that a trace of reprimand in his voice?

Harry decided he liked the man, even if he was creepy.

"Harry, this is Mr. Ollivander," James said. "The most famous wandcrafter in England. And the best."

Harry wondered if his Ollivander wand would match the one he'd taken from the vault.

The little man started taking all sorts of measurements. Harry tuned out his chatter, obviously meant to unnerve and intimidate and fascinate customers with the oh-so-impressive knowledge of the wandmaker. Although he had to admit it was cool that Ollivander could remember everything about James' wand, and also Harry's mum's.

His attention was drawn to the wands themselves.

He didn't know if he'd have noticed before holding Vincent Potter's wand, but there were distinct… attitudes coming from different boxes as Ollivander plucked one unmarked box after another from the shelves and piled them on the counter. Some seemed stubborn, others fiery, others sluggish, others simple, others flighty, others capricious, others cruel, others stern, others kind.

"Here, here. Twelve inches, yew, unicorn hair. Try…"

Harry took the wand and waved it about, feeling foolish, but it was snatched from his hand almost instantly.

" Obviously not. Fourteen and three quarters inches, cherry, dragon heartstring—"

Harry waved the wand, and a bowl on the counter shattered.

He flinched back, apologies already springing reflexively to his lips, one hand raised to block a fist—

But Ollivander simply tsked and waved his own wand at the bowl, repairing it, and didn't seem to notice Harry's reaction.

James did, though. Harry sneaked a peek at his father and saw the guilt and horror and realization written large across the man's face. He really was about as subtle as a brick. Harry was eleven and he could hide his emotions better than that.

One wand after another was tried and discarded. Some of them didn't react at all; some resulted in something breaking or falling over; most just gave Harry the subtle but distinct feeling of disapproval, of rejection. He could usually tell almost as quickly as Ollivander that a wand was unsuitable.

He fought back the embarrassment and guilt—the feeling that of course he was weird and a freak, even here, where magic was real, and accepted—and probably wouldn't have managed if James hadn't sat there, unconcerned, while Ollivander just got increasingly excited. Neither of them treated it like something weird, or something shameful, to have trouble finding a wand, so Harry bit his lip and dealt with it.

He wouldn't let Aunt Petunia shame him now that he was gone. He wouldn't.

"One minute, Harry," James said, and Harry glanced over to see his father's attention caught by someone outside the shop. "I'll be right back—got to deal with this, work stuff, you know."

Harry did know. Uncle Vernon had always been the same, willing to drop any family engagement if "work stuff" came up. He watched James leave and turned back to the wandmaker just as the short man, whose delicate appearance, Harry was fairly sure, was deceptive, disappeared into the gloom of the back of the shop. Only his voice drifted out.

"Tricky customer, eh? Not to worry, not to worry… Ah… yes, I wonder… why not… might be interesting, if nothing else…"

Ollivander reemerged, holding a box consideringly in his hands. He slid across the counter to Harry, a new gleam coming to light in his eye. "Eleven inches, holly, phoenix tail feather core."

Harry stared at the wand. It seemed—younger than the one in his bag had felt, young and curious and wanting. Ready to be used, ready to go and do great things. It felt powerful in its own way.

He picked it up, already knowing deep down that this was the one.

Warmth ignited the second he picked it up. The power of this wand was definitely less restrained than the other. Untested, inexperienced.

He waved it in the air and a burst of gold sparks rained from the end.

Harry realized he was smiling, the sharp-edged expression he wore on his inside face that no one ever saw. But Ollivander didn't seem perturbed. "Curious," he murmured, "curious…"

He hated asking questions; none of the adults in his life except Mrs. Smithy had liked them, but— "Sorry, sir—what's curious?" Harry asked.

He slumped in relief when Ollivander didn't seem to take it badly. "You see, Mr. Potter, the phoenix whose tail feather lies in that wand gave just… two others. One belongs now to your brother, and the third… well, the third wand with this core gave your brother his scar."

Harry's hand almost flew instinctively to his forehead but he disguised the motion as rubbing his nose. "It was—that dark wizard's whose name no one will say."

"Thirteen and a half inches. Yew. I always wondered what might have happened with Voldemort had I not sold him his wand," Ollivander agreed. "Though I recommend you not repeat the name; most do not respond well." The batty old man was gone, and there was definitely a dangerously clever edge to his expression now. "That the sibling wands to the Dark Lord's should choose both the Boy-Who-Lived, and his twin… is very… curious."

He slid the wrapped wand box across the counter to Harry but didn't let go. "I think we can expect great things from you, Mr. Potter. After all, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named did great things… Terrible, yes, but great."

Harry looked down at the wand box and thought that he liked the sound of doing stuff others would call "great deeds".

He managed a nod just as James Potter blew back into the shop, shattering the stillness. "Got one? Excellent, what is it?"

"Eleven inches, holly, phoenix feather," Harry rattled off reflexively.

"Good, good," James said absently, fishing about in his money bag, a slightly larger twin to Harry's own. "The usual seven galleons?"

"Indeed, Lord Potter," Ollivander said.

Harry noticed as they left the shop that Ollivander's eyes did not leave his face.

"Where to now?" he asked.

James winced. "I, ah, may have to go deal with… something. I'm—my job's as an Auror, like a policeman in the wizarding world—there's been a sighting of a dangerous wizard, nowhere near here but I might need to go deal with it—are you all right on your own for a bit?"

"I think so," Harry said, trying not to sound too uncertain. He didn't want to wander around this chaotic unfamiliar street without a guide, but he also wasn't sure he wanted James Potter around either.

"Stay on the main street, in sight of Gringotts," James said sternly, kneeling in front of him. 'Stern' didn't sit well on his face. Harry thought he looked like he should be laughing and careless. "You've got your letter, right? Swing by Dyson's Luggage and Travel Supply and buy a trunk with a shrinking charm; then you can go around and get your books and cauldron and potions supplies." Again, that little bit of dislike when he talked about books and potions. Harry made a note to pay particular attention to potions. "If I'm not back, you can head to Madame Malkin's or Twilfit and Tatting's for robes… actually, best buy a whole new wardrobe while you're at it. We can get you Muggle clothes later. Don't forget a good cloak; winters at Hogwarts are cold. I'll find you when I come back. If things run really long, head to the ice cream parlor and wait for me there."

Harry's head spun, trying to keep track of all that. "Okay…"

James took his money pouch, laid a hand on it, and said clearly, "I, Lord James Potter, head of the Ancient and Noble House of Potter, give permission for my son Hadrian Remus Potter to withdraw up to two thousand galleons from the Potter family vault today to purchase school supplies."

He handed it back over with a wink. "Now, don't go buying a solid gold cauldron; stick with the pewter one from the list, and don't you dare buy anything so ridiculous as a broom; we've got good ones at home. Clothes… go ahead and spend as much as you want, okay?"

Harry clutched the money purse and nodded. He was feeling distinctly overwhelmed, and also like James was trying to buy him, which was annoying but useful.

"See you in about two hours," James said, and ruffled Harry's hair, and turned on his heel and disappeared.

Harry flinched backwards from the sudden vanishing and swallowed, hard, suddenly very aware that he was alone in a world he had no idea how to navigate.

Well. That wasn't entirely true. He knew exactly how the money worked, and Diagon Alley was just a mostly straight cobbled road with Gringotts at one end and the Leaky Cauldron at the other, where they'd stepped out of a fireplace (a fireplace!). It would be hard to get lost. And he'd been fending for himself around Little Whinging for years.

Determinedly, he started walking, holding tightly to his wand box with one hand and his money pouch with the other. He was acutely aware of his clothes, which were ugly and in bad condition and low quality even among Muggles, meaning they stuck out here like Dudley had among the other choirboys when they were eight and Aunt Petunia had spent two months convinced they all needed to go to church. (Harry had been immensely relieved when she gave that up.) He decided he was going to the tailor's as soon as he had his trunk, not the bookstore, no matter what James said.

There. Dyson's Luggage and Travel Supply. Harry glanced over the bags in the front window and marched in.

There were seven or eight other customers; the man behind the counter seemed to be very involved with a family of icy blondes. Harry thought the parents looked all right, if stern, but the son had a pouty self-absorbed look on his face that reminded Harry uncomfortably of Dudley, and he resolved to stay away from them.

While the owner dealt with his other customers, Harry poked around the trunks. There was a display of school trunks along one side. He passed over the first two, which he could immediately tell were lowest price and lowest quality. The third and fourth trunks had more promise—they were clearly made with nicer materials, and slightly larger.

The third one's description told Harry that it had a self-sorting library compartment with a five hundred book capacity, a clothing compartment that could hold two standard wardrobes, one for potions supplies with "top-of-the-line preservation charms" and an expandable cauldron stand, a standard-use compartment, and one smaller secret compartment that could only be accessed with a password. The fourth trunk was similar except it had a one-thousand-book capacity, half again the wardrobe space, and a lot more capacity for potions ingredients. It was also two hundred galleons, which even Harry's limited exposure to wizarding shops told him was a high price.

He considered his finances. He wasn't sure he wanted James to know he'd bought a high-end trunk; it'd seem like Harry was either taking advantage of James' generosity or trying to be secretive or greedy or all three. He also didn't want to dip into his own money that much.

He left me with the Dursleys for ten years, Harry thought with sudden anger. He can buy the bloody trunk.

He waited until the man at the counter was unoccupied. "Excuse me," Harry said politely. "I'd like to buy a trunk for school."

The man looked up. His face reminded Harry of Piers Polkiss, except without the cruelty. "Of course. Hogwarts?" the man said, coming around the corner.

"Yes, sir."

"Figures. Get a lot of you through this time o' year," the man said, walking over to the school trunks. "Now, which one've you got yer eye on?"

"This one, sir," Harry said, pointing to the best of the four.

The man eyed him cleverly. "That's two hundred galleons, lad."

"I know, sir. I can pay."

The man shrugged. "All right, it's yer money. Want a demonstration?"

"Please," Harry said.

"Got a wand?"

"Yes, sir," Harry said, and pulled the ash wand out of his money pouch, since the holly one was still wrapped up. He was relieved that seeing it again confirmed what he'd thought; though it was varnished to a dark brown, it wasn't that far off in shade and color from the holly wand.

"Good. I need a half deposit before I key you into the trunk, mind," the man said.

Harry pulled out his Gringotts pouch, stuck his hand inside, and thought loudly: Potter family vault, one hundred galleons.

A smaller leather bag hit his fingers, surprisingly heavy. He pulled it out, careful not to jostle the books, and handed it to the shopkeeper, who glanced inside and nodded. "That'll do. Now tap your wand to the trunk and say your password."

"Can I change it later?"

The shopkeeper grinned. "Clever lad. Yes, just touch your wand or your hand to it and say 'password change,' then the old password, then the new one."

Harry nodded and tapped the lid with the ash wand. "Magic."

The man snorted. "Good. Now, this dial here, see?" He showed Harry a dial set in the center of the front side of the lid, in the middle of the two latches. "Spin it to which compartment you want. You've got to close and open the trunk to switch compartments. There's only four shown here, but if you hold a finger to the middle and say your password again, and it'll let you into the secret compartment."

Harry experimented and found the potions section. The shopkeeper showed him how it contained different cubbies and containment options for a wide variety of ingredients, all of which had Volume-Dependent Expansion Charms so they'd grow or shrink to fit the amount of stuff you put in them. The top set of containers would transform into a standard portable potions kit at the tap of a wand— "Ye'll put that in yer bag so you don't have to tote the whole trunk to and from the Potions classroom," the shopkeeper said with a grin—and there was space for up to a size 3 cauldron, with a collapsible cauldron stand tucked down into the bottom corner. "For brewing on the go, understand."

The library compartment fascinated Harry; it would show three rows of books turned facedown based on his most recent reads and related topics, but if he wrote on a bit of parchment search terms like a specific title, author, or subject, and dropped it into the shadowed edges of the library, the shelves would rearrange to show him what he wanted. He couldn't wait to fill and play with that feature and barely spent any time examining the other compartments, one of which looked more than adequate for holding his clothes and one of which was basically just an empty space that looked disconcertingly like the very plain inside of a normal Muggle trunk. He tested the secret compartment and found that it had a simple, basic organization to it, and would be entirely serviceable.

He agreed to pay an extra five galleons for the shopkeeper to put anti-theft, featherlight, and shrinking charms on the trunk, and got his initials (HRP) engraved in silver on the top. On a whim, he purchased a charcoal gray pack with an Undetectable Expansion Charm for his everyday use, and a leather wand holster charmed to be unnoticeable that strapped to the inside of hiswand arm. The shopkeeper waved goodbye with a wink and Harry walked out with the shrunken trunk in his money pouch, chest swelling with the kind of good mood he'd only felt a few times in his life.

He went to Twilfit and Tatting's next; he almost went into the one called Madame Malkin's but saw the pale pointy boy in there and decided to pick a different store. He was three hundred forty-four galleons and nineteen knuts lighter when he left, but Harry was also wearing a light gray summer wizard's robe over a purple tunic, black trousers, and dragonhide boots, with an entire wizarding wardrobe from casual to formal to school robes in the trunk, so he considered it money well spent. Especially when he caught a glimpse of himself in a storefront and almost didn't recognize how he looked with properly fitted clothes.

Harry tried a smile at his reflection. It looked a little uncertain, but also unreservedly happy.

He hadn't had time to examine his feelings towards his father yet but he was pretty sure they were solidly in the very negative territory. He had to deal with a suddenly-heroic-mother, a twin brother, an absent negligent father, and an entire new world he knew next to nothing about.

Despite all that, he thought he loved being a wizard.

Harry did as his—as James had suggested, and went to the apothecary next. He bought two of the standard first year Potions supply kits and one of a standard sixth year supply so he could experiment a bit, a basic cauldron, and a potions toolkit of medium quality. He didn't want to stand out as having fancy stuff but neither did he want to deprive himself of any options. They had a good book section, too, and since Harry figured they'd have better potions options here than at the bookstore, he grabbed four that looked interesting but within a reasonable level for someone with no experience.

He lugged it all outside, found a shadowed spot around the corner from the apothecary, and packed all the potions gear away carefully. Harry had glanced through a few of the books and though potions sounded a lot like cooking, except that it might blow up in your face. He was excited to try it out. He liked cooking, when he wasn't doing it with Aunt Petunia breathing down his neck, and he was good at it even with Aunt Petunia breathing down his neck.

He thought back over what James had told him to do, trying to remember if he'd forgotten anything, and then went back over the supply list he had folded in his pocket.

Telescope. Right. There'd been a shop selling all kinds of finicky-looking metal instruments a little bit farther up; he expected he'd find a telescope there.

The shop was called Phenomena, and it smelled like metal. Harry was reminded strongly of the steampunk-themed Halloween party he'd gotten dragged to with Dudley once, except the things in here weren't fake. It would've been a confusing, chaotic mess, except there was a stand off to the side labeled HOGWARTS in glowing letters. He headed right for it and grabbed a standard first year telescope.

"Hogwarts, too?"

Harry spun around. "Er—hi, yeah."

He shuffled aside so the other kid, a boy a little taller than Harry with sandy brown hair and clever hazel eyes, could reach the telescopes.

"Theo Nott," the other boy said, shifting his telescope to his left hand and sticking out his right.

"Harry Potter," Harry said, shaking Nott's hand.

The other boy's eyes narrowed. "Any relation to Julian Potter?"

"He's my twin."

"I didn't know the Boy Who Lived had a twin," Nott said, with just a hint of a sneering emphasis on 'Boy Who Lived' that made Harry instantly like him.

"Until this morning, neither did I," Harry said. "I was raised by muggles."

Nott's eyebrows rose. "Really."

Harry shrugged. "I suppose I'll have loads of catching up to do…"

"Nah," Nott said, still giving Harry that appraising look. "There's plenty of students who're Muggle-born and haven't even heard of magic before they show up. They do all right. In terms of wand work, anyway, most of the time they've got no clue how to navigate wizarding politics or culture." He rolled his eyes. "You should do fine. Old family like the Potters—I bet you've plenty of magic."

"I'll read up on culture, then," Harry said, making a note to buy books on that at his next stop.

"Not a bad plan. What was it like, with Muggles?" Nott said, a sudden gleam coming to his eye. "I've never spent much time in Muggle London."

"All right, I guess," Harry said slowly. He didn't think he wanted everyone and their mum knowing about the Dursleys and how they'd treated him. "I mean… My mum was Muggle-born. I grew up with her sister—my aunt." He shrugged. "She and her husband and my cousin were—are—not great. But school was fun." Harry paused. "You've never seen a movie, have you?"

"A what?" Nott said.

Harry stared. "That's—okay, kind of weird, but whatever. I don't know. They have a lot of technological advancements that it seems like wizards don't use." He looked up at the ceiling, which was lit by magical lights spread out like constellations. "Electricity, for example."

Nott cocked his head. "What's that?"

"Er—it's like—basically lightning," Harry said, trying to think back on his science classes. "We—they—get energy from moving water, or burning stuff, and then they turn it into the same kind of energy that's in lightning and they use it to power their homes and stuff."

"How interesting," Nott mused. "I suppose they've got to compensate somehow for not having magic somehow. I'd go mad."

"I've spent less than a day knowing about all this and I can't imagine giving it up," Harry agreed fervently. He wasn't sure what about the other boy made him this talkative, as he was normally quiet, but he thought he might tentatively like Nott.

Nott made a face. "The brother of the Boy Who Lived, growing up muggle… the press would go mad."

Harry stiffened.

Nott laughed and headed for the counter, Harry following on his heels. "Oh, come off it, I wasn't suggesting—I'm not going to go blab." His face took on a dreamy cast. "Just, oh. The drama."

"It would be dramatic," Harry admitted, paying for his telescope. Nott did likewise, and stuffed it into a pack while Harry bent to pack his away in the standard compartment of his trunk.

They stepped, blinking, back into the street. Harry glanced sideways at Nott, reluctant to give up the other boy's companionship so easily but unsure how to go about this whole… friendship thing. He'd never had much experience with friends.

"I'm headed to the bookstore," Nott said easily. "You?"

Apparently, that was how it was done. "Same, actually."

Nott tossed Harry a smile that reminded Harry of his the one he saw in the mirror sometimes. "Excellent."

They wandered down Diagon Alley. Nott asked plenty of questions about muggles and Harry did his best to answer them before turning the conversation around and asking about Hogwarts.

"It's one of the oldest wizarding schools in the world," Nott said with obvious pride. "And one of the best. I say 'one of' because the standards have slipped somewhat in the last twenty years, thanks to our current headmaster, who's less interested in the school and more interested in politics." Again, that hint of sneer.

"That's the one named Dumbledore," Harry said.

"Right."

"Ridiculous name," Harry muttered.

Nott snorted. "Can't argue that one. Anyway, the basic classes are Transfiguration—turning one thing into something else—Charms— 'normal' spells—potions, which should be self-explanatory—herbology, same there—Defense Against the Dark Arts, which is something of a joke since no teacher ever lasts more than a year, lots of people think it's cursed—History of magic, another joke, it's taught by a ghost and my cousin Roxanne says he could put a brick to sleep—and Astronomy, what we got the telescope for."

Harry blinked hard, trying to process all that. It sounded like a lot of work, but fun work. "No math or writing?" he said uncertainly.

"We write loads of essays," Nott said. "Math—mathematics? Like arithmetic?"

"Yeah, but arithmetic is like… basic math," Harry said. He'd been sitting in on math tutoring sessions in the library for years out of boredom. He didn't love it but the clear cut yes or no, right or wrong aspect of math appealed to him.

"Huh. Must be a Muggle thing. It's not in the core classes, but it sounds like Arithmancy—you can take that starting third year—is kind of similar?" Nott frowned, maybe because Muggles had something wizards didn't.

"How about dormitories?" Harry said.

Nott made a face. "Well, according to Roxanne, you have to share a room with some of the other kids in your year, depending on how many there are."

"But we get beds?" Harry checked.

Nott gave him a weird look. "Why would we not get beds?"

Harry realized his slip and blushed, looking away. "I, uh. I lived in a cupboard under the staircase in… my aunt and uncle's house," he admitted. "I just got a mattress on a cot. I don't mind sharing a room."

Nott looked furious, but Harry just made his face blank and kept walking until the other boy shrugged and launched into a description of his cousin's dormitory that she'd sent him in a letter while Harry grappled with the sudden warmth that came from knowing someone who'd get so mad on Harry's behalf over the cupboard.

Harry had known it was a bad way to treat a child. For years. But knowing it and knowing it were different things.

"And—oh, you don't know about the houses, do you?"

"Houses?" Harry said, feeling a bit stupid.

"Don't feel stupid," Nott said. Harry blushed again; the other boy was annoyingly perceptive. "You couldn't be expected to know these things. There's four of them; you get sorted in based off your values, basically. Hufflepuff, they value loyalty, fair play, hard work, honesty. Don't cross a Puff, you'll have the entire house ready to eat you alive. Ravenclaws value creativity, intelligence, wit. They're stereotyped as the 'smart house' but Roxanne says they drive all the professors up the wall with random questions and homework they didn't do because they got sidetracked and stayed up all night researching some obscure charm. They're brilliant, though. Mostly they don't hold grudges or get involved with squabbles but they bicker with Hufflepuff and when the Claws do a prank or something, apparently it's always vicious, clever, and complicated. Then there's Gryffindor, the house of the brave, noble, and chivalrous." Nott rolled his eyes. "Based on the Gryffs I know, and what Roxanne's said, they're a bunch of impulsive, reckless fools. Easy to dupe. But I guess they have their uses. And finally, Slytherin. The best house." He shot Harry a sly grin. "Slytherin's the house of cunning, ambition, and resourcefulness. It's where I'm hoping to go. Slytherin has a rep for turning out loads of Dark wizards, which I suppose is kind of true, but the other Houses all have their fair share. Slytherin and Gryffindor have a long-standing rivalry. Apparently Quidditch games between those two get insane."

"Right," Harry said, privately thinking Slytherin and Ravenclaw sounded interesting, and that he'd bet his entire trust vault James was a Gryffindor. "Quidditch. Can you explain more about that?"

"I—you know what, can I just recommend you a book on it?" Nott said. "Frankly, it's not my biggest interest."

"Sure," Harry said. "Good timing, look—we're here."

Nott held the door for Harry. "My Lord Brother Of The Boy Who Lived," he said with a mocking smile, but it wasn't bad mocking, more like inviting Harry to share in the joke. Harry smirked back at him and swept through the doors with as much drama as he could muster given his height and generally scrawny frame.

Nott followed him in, snickering.

They swept through the display of books for Hogwarts first years, collecting their first-year texts and, for Harry, a year's supply of quills, ink, and leather-bound notebooks and parchment. Nott bemoaned how basic all the books were, and then Harry discovered, to his delight, that his new acquaintance-maybe-friend shared his love of books.

"Oh you have no idea how much of a relief this is," Nott announced when Harry admitted he'd been looking forward to spending a large bag of galleons at the bookstore all day. "All the other children in my social circle are unbearably reluctant to read. Drives me mad."

"I spent a lot of time in the public library growing up," Harry said. "I love reading."

Nott looked intrigued, and then Harry had to spend ten minutes fielding questions about public libraries and how they worked while the boys browsed the shelves. Eventually, though, Nott got distracted by the books and they lapsed into companionable silence. Harry found a massive compendium of charms listed in alphabetical order, a Transfiguration theory book that Nott said was dry but extremely useful for understanding the underlying concepts of the discipline, a couple of interesting potions books, and then stopped with a smile when he saw the large section labeled "Self-Defense."

"Interested in hexes, are you?" Nott said with a grin.

Harry nodded, trailing his fingers over Defending Yourself, Your Family, and Your Posessions.

"Oh, you'll fit right in in Slytherin. Come on, I'll recommend you some. Not that," Nott gave the book Harry was considering a withering glance, "it's just wimpy Ministry-approved hogwash about passive responses."

He loaded Harry down with nine books on personal self-defense, offensive magic, warding spells, guard spells, and alarm spells. Harry could not wait to dive into these. If he'd had access to this stuff years ago, he could've protected himself against Dudley and all the rest; he could've kept Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon from giving him the scars that littered his back and shoulders and arms. In the wizarding world, just doing magic wasn't an advantage on its own, since everyone had magic. So he'd just have to be one of the best to make sure no one ever hurt him again.

Harry wasn't naïve enough to think bullying and prejudice were unique to the Muggle world.

Nott somewhat gave off his own book cruising and seemed to enjoy guiding Harry through the bookstore and the various topics. He pointed out some good tomes on wizarding culture, history, etiquette, law, and politics; Harry bought everything Nott recommended and more besides. He planned to spend most of the summer reading and he had a lot of catching up to do.

They hit the shelf of miscellaneous subjects last. Harry grabbed two books on wand lore and wand making to try to figure out whether he should use the ash or holly wand more, and slid them into his basket.

A book on unusual magicks caught his eye. Harry grabbed it and flipped it over. "What's an animagus?" he asked.

Nott leaned on a bookshelf and briskly sorted through a few books set on an end table. "Person who can turn into an animal at will," he said absently. "It's… different from… self-transfiguration. Not as dangerous—once you've achieved the transformation, anyway—and it's loads… easier to control. Ridiculously hard to do, though."

Harry dug into his money pouch and pulled out the small book he'd found in the Potter family vault, half-hidden beneath the shelves. The Animagus Transformation.

"Where'd you get that?" Nott asked sharply.

Startled, Harry looked up. He'd thought the other boy too lost in his own reading to notice, but apparently not. "Er—why?"

Nott's gaze snapped back up to Harry's considering. "It's… not entirely legal."

"Something's either legal or it isn't," Harry said, stuffing the book back in the pouch and scowling at Nott.

Nott shrugged. "It's not technically illegal to own, but it's illegal to sell, print, duplicate, or purchase. It's also illegal to be an Animagus without registering yourself with the Ministry of Magic. You'd get some… bad attention if you were caught with that."

"Thanks for the warning," Harry said stiffly, not liking that the other boy had leverage on him. He'd have to make sure that even a surprise search of their belongings wouldn't turn up the book. He didn't know what the privacy rights were for students.

"Your secret's safe with me," Nott said, then paused, his smirk fading into thoughtfulness. "As long as you promise to involve me if you ever use that thing and teach yourself animagery."

Harry wondered at the other boy's assumption that Harry would be willing to do something illegal—an entirely correct assumption, but still not one most people would make—and at Nott's willingness to join in.

He slid the book of uncommon magic skills into his basket. "Deal."

The other boy nodded sharply and looked around the store. "I think I'm done here."

Harry looked over. Somehow, even though Nott had seemed to spend most of his time helping Harry go through the bookstore, Nott's basket was nearly as full as Harry's. Thankfully, the baskets had expansion and featherlight charms on them, so neither boy was struggling to carry or balance their enormous book purchases.

Between the two of them, it took ten minutes before they'd paid for their entire purchases. Nott paged through a book that seemed to have to do with water magic while Harry found a corner of the bookstore by the Pre-Roman Wizarding Law section, which was small and horrendously dusty, to open his trunk and pack his books away. Hidden from Nott behind the open trunk lid, Harry unwrapped the holly wand and tucked it up his holster, and stashed the ash wand and the books he'd taken from the Potter vault into the secret compartment.

Thirty seconds later, the compressed trunk was tucked away inside his charcoal backpack along with Harry's nasty Muggle clothes, which were only staying with him until he could find a quiet moment to himself to burn them.

"Have you got an owl?" Nott said abruptly as they were leaving the bookstore. "If you're willing, of course, I'd like to write you. We still have a good month and a bit before school starts."

Harry stared at him. "Owl?"

"Right, sorry. Owl post." Nott craned his head back, then pointed; Harry shaded his eyes and squinted and saw a large brown bird spiraling down towards a shop by Gringotts with something attached to its legs. "We use them for mail. First years are allowed an owl, a toad, or a cat." He smirked. "Loads of people break that rule; as long as it's small and doesn't hurt anyone and you're subtle about it, the professors look the other way. Which is to say, lots of Slytherins and Ravenclaws break that rule, because Hufflepuffs don't break rules as much and Gryffindors are about as subtle as bricks."

Harry smiled. He didn't like laughing, as a general rule; it was more expressive than he preferred to be. But he thought Theo Nott wasn't the sort of person to be offended or irritated by quiet, or by Harry being reserved. Which was a relief.

"I'd like that," he said. "To write, I mean."

"Oh good," Nott said. "I'm going to need a study partner and you seem like a good bloke."

Harry looked at him sideways. He felt comfortable enough around Nott at this point to needle him a bit. "Even if I'm in Gryffindor?"

Nott heaved a sigh. "I suppose I could make an exception in the Slytherin-Gryffindor feud. As long as you don't turn into a reckless prat."

"I think I can manage that," Harry said. "I doubt I'll be in Gryffindor anyway, based on what you said."

Nott smirked. "My thoughts exactly."

Harry hesitated. "I—do you know what my father's House was?"

"Oh, Gryffindor, of course," Nott said. "Both your parents. I imagine it'd be quite the scandal if the Gryffindor golden couple's budding Gryffindor golden boy's twin ended up in Slytherin. Where is your dad, anyway?"

"He had… work stuff," Harry said. "He's an Auror?"

"Yeah, magical law enforcement. Head Auror." Nott looked like he was struggling to hold back either a sneer or an eye roll. "One of the youngest to ever get the position."

Harry noticed the word choice. "Get? Not hold?"

"He's new," Nott said. "Promoted a year and a half ago. There's a betting pool on how long he'll last. Don't tell him that; I'm pretty sure he doesn't know. It's not exactly… the people he spends time with."

Harry narrowed his eyes at Nott. He'd been picking up on little things for a while, and he was pretty sure there was something about the politics of this new world that Nott wasn't telling him. "Why do I get the feeling your family and mine don't get along?"

"Because you're annoyingly observant," Nott said, frowning.

Harry thought. "Ice cream?" In his very limited experience, it was hard to be irritable while eating ice cream.

"Yeah. I'll explain that one over ice cream."

Harry got a simple bowl. Nott ordered some massive thing that looked like a sugar coma waiting to happen and got halfway through before he slowed down enough to talk.

"Right, here's the situation." He had a determined look on his face. "In the war that—that your parents fought in—"

"That killed my mum," Harry cut in. "The one where Vol- sorry, You-Know-Who tried to kill my brother and it killed him and everyone freaked out over."

Nott snorted. "Right, that. Sorry. It's not funny. Just your summary was. Anyway… the big problem in the war was that the old pureblood families don't like the Ministry coming in and telling us what to do and how to do it. There were also a lot of blood purist belief—basically that Muggles are inferior animals, wizards should rule them by right of strength and superiority, and Muggle-born witches and wizards are inferior at best, usurpers to be tortured and killed at worst, depending on who you asked."

Harry felt vaguely green. He suddenly lost interest in his ice cream. "And… is there… anything to that? Are Muggleborns usually not as strong in magic?"

"Not as far as anyone can measure," Nott said, stabbing viciously at his ice cream. He didn't seem very satisfied, probably because ice cream is soft and not very satisfying to stab. "It was built as an excuse for the cultural argument. Basically that wizarding culture is being eroded by the influx of muggleborns who don't know our customs and traditions, and more importantly, don't try to integrate at all. My parents are in that second camp. You-Know-Who came along and built off that fear and either brainwashed, terrified, or convinced loads of people to follow him. He was on this take-over-the-Ministry-kill-the-muggleborns-and-rule-the-dirty-Muggles crusade. On their own, his followers wouldn't have been as dangerous as they were. With him… it was a close victory. And even then, the so-called Light side only won because a baby defeated the killing curse and no one can figure out how."

"That'd be my brother, then," Harry said, unsure how to feel about his twin being a celebrity.

"Yep. In fact, I'm surprised no one's come over to shake your hand or ask for an autograph," Nott said. "Might be the eyes. Your brother's are brown. Or the bearing; he's loud and bloody impossible to overlook. Which reminds me, you've been squinting all day; do you need to get your eyes checked?"

"Maybe. So, the 'Light' side won," prompted Harry, who didn't feel like taking a jaunt down the Potter Sitcom right now.

"Yeah, and then… a bunch of You-Know-Who's followers used what's been termed the Imperius Defense. There's this mind control curse called the Imperius and loads of them said they were under it. Near impossible to prove one way or the other, since veritaserum—truth potion—hadn't been invented yet."

Harry could see where this was going.

Nott opened his mouth just as a loud voice sliced through the ice cream shop's outdoor seating area. "Harry!"

Harry flinched hard enough to almost knock over his ice cream, memories of Vernon's loud, angry voice, of raised fists—

But Uncle Vernon never used his name.

He blinked the images away and focused on his father, who was crossing the patio with an angry stride.

"Bloody hell," Nott whispered. "Potter, I should go—"

He was halfway out of his seat when James reached their table. "Harry," James said through gritted teeth. "It's time to go."

Harry frowned at him. He didn't want to go anywhere with anyone who looked like this. Angry adults resulted in beatings. And James hadn't seemed the type before, but this sudden anger was worrying, and his mum Lily was Petunia's sister, which meant—which meant maybe Petunia wasn't the odd one out in her family, maybe his mum wasn't nice either, and one person who isn't nice tends to attract others who aren't either, Harry knew that much—

Which was to say, he had no guarantee that James Potter was any better a person than Vernon Dursley. Only better at hiding his nastiness.

"I'm not done," he said as politely as he could manage. "I'd like to finish my ice cream."

James sat down stiffly, glaring at Nott.

"I can leave," Nott said, sounding admirably bored and uncaring. "I'm about finished. Nice to meet you, Potter."

"You as well," Harry said, and watched his first tentative ally walk away to give the used ice cream bowl back to the shop.

James turned on him instantly.

Harry flinched back, hunching his shoulders up. Then forced himself to relax—they were in an open area; James couldn't hit him here.

When he looked up from his ice cream, he saw something else on James' face: horror. Shock. Guilt.

"Harry," he said, his voice suddenly much gentler. "I know… this is a sensitive subject and you have no reason to trust me. But… did the Dursleys ever hit you?"

Harry clenched his fists under the table and let a little of his anger come to his face. (Little did he know, when he looked up, his eyes were practically glowing, and the exact shade of green as the Killing Curse.) "Fists," he said. "Mostly. Uncle Vernon liked his belt a lot. Sometimes with an embellished buckle. Aunt Petunia broke a broom over my back when I was nine. And hit me on the head with a frying pan when I was seven." With every word, he watched the knife twist, watched James Potter's eyes get just a little hollower. It suggested that James wasn't going to physically abuse a child. Or maybe that he just didn't want anyone else abusing his child.

Either way, hurting his father like this—it felt good.

But he didn't have to tell everything. So Harry kept the other things to himself—the food withheld as punishment, the sometimes two weeks of being locked in the cupboard with only limited bathroom breaks, the forced labor, the barely-treated broken bones. That could be ammunition for another day, and he didn't need to dump all his messed-up childhood out in the open at once.

He deliberately relaxed his hands, dulled his eyes, and went back to his ice cream.

James took a breath. "Harry, I'm—I'm sorry. I had no idea. I swear, if I'd known—"

"But you didn't," Harry said as lightly as he could manage. "It doesn't matter now." He took another bite, and when James didn't say anything, decided he'd rather have it out here, in public, because most people were more self-contained in public. "Why were you so mad?"

"Did that— boy tell you his name?" James said.

"Yeah. Theo Nott."

"His father's a Death Eater."

Harry paused, and a few things clicked. "One of You-Know-Who's people?"

James frowned. "How'd you know that?"

Harry shrugged.

"Yes, one of You-Know-Who's followers," James said. "He told the courts he was being mind controlled, got off of punishment." So that's what Nott didn't want to tell me. Can't blame him. "All lies, of course. He wasn't the only one. I don't want you associating with his son, Harry."

Harry focused on his ice cream to buy time. He wasn't ready to give up the only contact he had among his year-mates, but he also didn't want to push things. There was no point picking a fight with his father so soon.

He settled on "He was nice to me. We did our book shopping together. He told me about Hogwarts."

"What did he tell you?" James said, clearly assuming that Nott would've passed on only the prejudiced bad stuff.

Harry had to hide a smirk. "That it's the oldest and best wizarding school in the world, although it's sliding down the best ranking in terms of test scores in the last twenty years. There's four Houses. Slytherin has more than its fair share of Dark wizards come out of it. Hufflepuff is loyalty and fairness, Slytherin is ambition and cleverness, Ravenclaw is creativity and intelligence, Gryffindor is nobility and bravery. They play Quidditch against each other and room separately and go to classes with their housemates."

James blinked. "That's… mostly true."

"Mostly?" Harry said.

James frowned. "Okay, all true. But listen, Harry—Tiberius Nott is bad news. It's entirely possible that he told his son to make nice to you or Julian in order to get close to you and hurt you."

"I doubt that," Harry said. "Given that no one knew I existed until this morning, and most of the wizarding world is still probably clueless."

"Fair point," James said, still frowning.

"He seems like a decent bloke," Harry said, watching his father carefully. He couldn't just shout I'm going to be polite to him and you can't tell me what to do! without starting a fight he didn't need. "He said we should study together no matter what houses we get sorted into. And asked if he could write me before school starts."

James heaved a sigh. "I suppose just writing can't hurt. Speaking of which, you need an owl."

"Right," Harry said. "Owl. Nott mentioned that. You use birds for mailing letters? It sounds really slow."

James waved his wand, and Harry's empty bowl floated over to the used dishes tray. "It's much more efficient than it sounds. Owls have magic in their blood from centuries ago. Muggles don't notice, but when they spend time around wizards and magic, they get smarter and faster, better at surviving. Falcons and hawks work, too. They're not as common, though. I imagine you want one?"

Harry shrugged. "It seems useful."

"Sure are," James said, smiling. It wasn't as warm or wide as earlier but he seemed to have gotten over the thing with Theo Nott, which was a relief. Harry was still going to watch him closely. "Julian has a snowy owl already. Named her Ghost."

Harry resolved not to get a snowy owl.

Eylops' Emporium was dark and vaguely musty-smelling, if not in a bad way. Rustling and hooting and faint cries echoed around the space. Harry saw several other kids about his own age and avoided all of them; more aware now of his fame, and the impact his brother and therefore Harry had on people, he wasn't about to start a scene in a pet store.

He walked out thirty minutes later holding a cage with a young female Taita falcon. The bird looked sharp and fast, with a black head, back, and wings, beige breast and belly, and some orange spots around its head and neck. Her eyes were clear and bright and her beack looked viciously sharp. Harry thought back on his Greek mythology phase from the previous year and thought he wanted to name her Alekto after one of the three Furies of just punishment. Except he'd probably change it to Alekta so it was less obvious where the name came from.

Then Harry mentioned to James that his eyesight hadn't been checked in a while, and James dragged him to a wizarding optometrist. Harry fought back panic for the few minutes he was without his glasses while the optometrist tested his eyes. He hated being vulnerable like this; the entire world was fuzzy and his depth perception went down the toilet. Anything could happen.

He put the glasses back on with relief when they were done.

"You can either pick out some new frames, or we can keep and repair that set," the witch said, looking at the break in the middle where the glasses were held together with tape. Harry fingered it—Dudley had broken them a few days ago and Harry had never gotten the hang of repairing broken things. He bet there was a spell for that and resolved to learn it soon.

He glanced at James, who also wore round glasses, and wondered whether he should get the same shape to manipulate his father… or a different shape to satisfy himself.

Rectangles it is.

Harry chose a set with durable metal rectangular frames and handed them over with his best grateful smile.

The witch smiled back. "I'll be back in a minute," she said, and bustled into the back, Harry guessed to transfigure or magically replace the lenses.

"When was the last time you got your eyes checked?" James asked quietly.

Harry had to think about it. "Five years ago."

James' mouth tightened but he said nothing else.

Harry started asking him questions about school just to pass the time. James seemed to like to talk, so it worked out well. He quickly gathered that Theo's descriptions of the houses were a lot less biased; James described Slytherin as "the house of untrustworthy, sneaky snakes," Ravenclaws as "hopeless bookworms," Hufflepuffs as "nice, but kind of boring," and Gryffindors as "the best of the best, where the brave and righteous go."

Harry didn't point out that "righteous" didn't necessarily mean "actually correct".

He was relieved when the witch came back with his new glasses. Even more so when he put them on and it was like opening his eyes for the first time.

"I can see," he blurted, forgetting for a second to be reserved and self-contained.

James laughed. "You sure can. Cool feeling, huh?"

Harry nodded and sent him his least reserved smile yet. He needed his father to like him. At least for the next month.

"Trunk's in that pack, I take it?" James said. "I like the new clothes, by the way. You look like a very proper young wizard. Much neater than Jules, that's for sure!"

"Thanks," Harry said. "And—yeah, it's got a shrinking charm."

"Great." James looked suddenly apprehensive. He tried to hide it, but Harry had spent years watching the Dursleys for any hint of emotion that could result in him needing to be somewhere else, and James wasn't nearly subtle enough. "Let's get you home, yeah? I bet you're excited to meet your brother."

My twin brother, who I didn't know about until this morning. My twin brother, who is apparently some kind of hero type for something he doesn't remember doing and that no one can explain. My brother, who Theo Nott, the son of a Death Eater, described as the Gryffindor golden couple's budding Gryffindor golden boy.

"Can't wait," Harry said, and his sarcasm went right over James' head.

Summer with the Potters

Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

This time, instead of using the fireplace at the Leaky Cauldron, James took Harry's hand and did the same disappearing trick.

He said it was called Apparition and that Harry would get to learn it when he was older. Harry wasn't sure how excited he was about that. Apparition was uncomfortable and felt too much like being molecularly taken apart, crammed through a straw, and put back together. Alekta shook herself and shreeed angrily.

Harry was too busy gaping at the house.

So this is where my brother got to grow up.

He kicked that scrap of resentment aside. Jules might be a prat, but he also might not, and Harry didn't think highly of his father but that didn't mean Jules was automatically nasty. On the other hand, Harry didn't have a great track record with boys his age.

The house, though. The house was absolutely gorgeous.

It was made of old red brick, with loads of windows outlined with white shutters. The front porch was warmly lit and the front doors were massive and white-painted with iron handles. Harry counted four—no, five stories. You could fit four of Number 4, Privet Drive inside this house.

"Potter Manor," James said, grinning at Harry and bounding up the steps. "The ancestral seat of our House. Your new home."

This place isn't home yet, Harry thought, but he followed James inside more or less willingly, looking around with interest at the paintings on the wall.

Paintings that moved.

Harry stumbled back with an embarrassing squeak when the nearest portrait shouted, "It's the Heir! Harry Potter returns!"

James chuckled. "Sorry, forgot to warn you—pictures and paintings in the wizarding world move," he explained as the other portraits started an excited high-volume conversation. "They're basically moving reflections of the person they were made from. Most of them can move between portraits, too." He nodded at a heavyset woman stumbling into a painting of three men playing cards. "I can make ours be quiet, as Lord Potter, but mostly I don't. They deserve a little fun."

Harry thought he'd make them quiet all the time when he was Lord, just for the sake of his sanity.

"Jules!" James bellowed up the massive staircase in the back left of the entrance hall. "Come on down! We have a guest!"

Harry shifted his pack.

The faint sound of footsteps reached his ears seconds before another boy skidded to a halt at the top of the staircase. "Oi! Harry!" he shouted, and hurtled down the stairs.

Harry forgot how to breathe.

Seeing James had been a weird trick of a funhouse mirror. Seeing Jules—his brother—was even worse. He was Harry's exact copy, except his scar was bigger, more silvery, and more resembled a single line than a weird jagged shape. He had the round glasses, too, and Harry was suddenly glad he'd gotten the square pair.

"Julian," he got out. "Er. Hi."

Well that was bloody brilliant. Way to make a good first impression.

Julian's eyes were just as wide. "Hi," he managed. "This is weird. You look… exactly like me."

Harry managed to get over the physical resemblance and look at the rest of his brother.

Julian's shirt was a plain cotton T-shirt, and he was wearing khaki cargo-style shorts. Good to know wizards emulated some Muggle clothing choices. There was some kind of stain or smear on the red shirt and his hair was even wilder than Harry's.

The silence stretched.

Harry opened his mouth even though he didn't know what exactly he was going to say.

"Okay," James said, clapping his hands together. "Jules, why don't you show Harry his room? I'll whip up some dinner for us."

"Order out," Jules said instantly. "Please."

James made a face. "My cooking's not that bad."

"Yeah, but it's not great," Jules said. "And it's Harry's first night here."

"Good point. Pizza sound good?"

"Um, yes. With pepperoni. And… sausage."

"Some vegetables, too. Remember, you have to eat healthy to have a healthy body."

"Fine, those pepper things."

"Done. Harry, does that work?"

Harry blinked, still trying to process the rapid-fire conversation. Dudley would never talk like that to Uncle Vernon. Like… so friendly.

"Uh. Anything's fine. I haven't really had pizza before."

Jules looked shocked. "What! How could you not have! Pizza is amazing. Dad, can we get three?"

James grinned. It didn't even look that strained. "Three pizzas, coming right up."

"Your room is this way," Jules said, and then he was dragging Harry up the stairs, chattering on about the portraits and how he spent the morning cleaning out the room because it was right down the hall from his normal room and he kept stuff there sometimes and how he couldn't wait to take Harry out and teach him flying and how he couldn't believe he had a brother—

Harry did his best to remember how to breathe and walk without tripping at the same time.

"Here you go," Jules said, throwing the door open. "It's a little smaller than mine, but a lot of the rooms are closed up because there's only been two of us in the house for ages and this was the one we could get ready fastest—"

"It's great," Harry interrupted him. "Really."

"Okay good," Jules said.

Harry tried to ignore how relieved he was that he got an actual bedroom, and a big one at that—bigger than either of Dudley's rooms, to his satisfaction. The big bed was upholstered in red and gold on varnished warm brown wood; he had bookshelves and a big closet and a desk and a beanbag chair and an armchair in the corner and a big window looking out over a grass back lawn that backed up to a forest.

Jules threw himself out on Harry's bed. "Do you like the quilt? I helped Dad pick it out. We have a bunch up in the attic with preservation charms on them. They were all kind of the same colors but this one was warmest. Red and gold are Gryffindor colors. Dad told you about the Houses, right? We're both going to be in Gryffindor, I bet—it's the best house!"

Harry took a deep breath and shot Jules his best smile. "Yeah, that's all great—I, er, I kind of need to… change and stuff," he said, waving a hand around vaguely. "And—sorry, it's just—been a really long day, and I'd appreciate—a few minutes before dinner—"

"Oh! Yeah, okay." Jules rolled off the bed with easy grace. "I'll knock when the pizza's here, yeah?"

"Sure. Thanks."

Harry shut the door in his face and rested his head against it for a long moment.

Breathe. Breathe. You're okay. Breathe.

He concentrated on the cool wood against his fingertips and forehead until things didn't feel quite so much like an endless wave crashing down on his head, and then he turned around.

The room was almost too large. Harry couldn't imagine owning enough things to take it all up. Couldn't imagine considering this enough of a home that he could put clothes in the closet and books on the shelves and let his life be rooted here.

For now, he'd bee leaving everything in the trunk.

Harry put the summer cloak away and swapped his tunic for a plain black T shirt, one of few options that resembled normal Muggle clothes from the tailor's. He chewed his lip for a minute before putting on jeans and keeping his dragonhide boots. The holly wand went in his back pocket. He put the clothes he'd been wearing away in his trunk, re-shrunk it, and put it back in his pack. Then he changed his mind and took the trunk out and blew it up to full size and left it at the foot of the bed. He could make that much of a concession. But he wasn't going to unpack anything, in case he needed to leave in a hurry.

That done, he stood in the middle of his new room and had nothing left to do.

Harry heaved a sigh. With James standing there, Petunia hadn't refused when Harry asked if he could take some of Dudley's old Muggle fiction books with him. He'd chosen his eight favorites and James had put them in a bag that had an Undetectable Expansion Charm on it. Harry could've read one of those now, but he didn't want to go track James down just yet to ask for them back.

He ran through his wandless spells just to make sure he hadn't lost them now that he had a wand. Everything worked perfectly, from the warming charm to the light summoning to the levitation to the regrowth of his hair. He even unlocked and locked the door a couple times, but when he tried that on the trunk, his magic slipped and slid away from the locks. Which at least showed the wards and the password protection were working.

Okay. So he still had his wandless magic ability. He'd have to keep working on that, see if he could learn other tricks…

Harry huffed a sigh and pulled out the book of Charms. They were arranged alphabetically, but if he tapped it with his wand and said "Easy," all the charms considered beginner level glowed a soft minty color. He flipped through and tried a simple levitation charm— "Wingardium leviosa! "—on his pack a few times before it wobbled and slid upright in the air. He frowned, concentrated, and the pack stabilized.

A bit of experimentation had Harry able to levitate things wordlessly. He had a lot more control with his wand, he noticed, over the movement of the thing he was levitating, and it tired him out a lot less. He moved on to levitating different things at the same time and got up to four pillows in the air before he started fumbling it. When levitating multiple things, Harry found he still needed the incantation.

Something to work on.

He picked up his wand again and twirled it around his fingers for a bit, lying back on the bed. It was kind of nice to just relax. This day had been absolutely exhausting, and now he'd just spent thirty minutes practicing magic…

Someone was banging on the door. "Oi! Harry! Pizza's here!"

Harry blinked his eyes open and took in the high ceiling, the room. Right. Wizard. Father. Brother. Pizza.

His stomach growled, reminding him how good an idea food was.

Harry stuffed the holly wand in his pocket and opened the door.

Jules jerked his head in the direction of the stairs. "Kitchen's this way."

"Do you normally walk all this way for food?" Harry said. They were going down a different staircase, a smaller one built into the wall instead of the grand sweeping one down into the entrance hall.

Jules shrugged. "I guess. It doesn't seem to matter much."

"Does Dad usually cook?"

"Yeah, him or the house-elves."

"House-elves?"

Jules made a face. He was so expressive. Harry didn't know how his twin was comfortable just wearing his emotions out there like that for the world to see. "They look a little like goblins except not as hard-edged, and smaller. They're bound to serve the family living in their house."

"So like slavery."

Jules looked horrified. "No! They like serving. It's the biggest shame for a house-elf to be let go."

"Hm." Harry'd have to see that for himself, but he supposed he'd tentatively believe Jules for now. "Like brownies, I guess."

"I'm going to assume you don't mean the pastry and move on," Jules said.

So you can be witty. Maybe there's hope for this yet. "And they cook?"

"Yeah. It usually only takes a few minutes between when I walk into the kitchen and when the food's ready. They don't do pizza well, for some reason. Might just be ours—Bidda and Corker are both kind of old, and Marnee is… strange. You'll see."

"Do they take requests?" Harry asked, thinking of the naan bread and spicy curry he'd eaten as leftovers when Aunt Petunia relented and got takeout one time. None of the Dursleys had liked the spices and she gave him all the leftovers. It had been a fantastic meal.

"Yeah, we'll get there," Jules said. "What was it like with the Muggles? Do their pictures really not move?"

"Er, no. Unless you go to a movie, which is like… a sequence of events, recorded, and played back. Except most movies are fiction. They don't interact with you at all."

"So not like portraits, then," Jules said. "Wait, we have that one of Sir Lucas on the fourth floor and he just reenacts the same jousting tournament over and over and doesn't talk to anyone—is that kind of what it is?"

"Sounds like it's on the right track at least," Harry said.

"Can we go see a movie sometime? How do you do that? Where are they kept?"

Harry did his best to explain the cinema and was relieved when they got to the kitchen and the presence of food distracted Jules.

He was pretty sure Jules's earlier hyper nonstop talking had just been excitement, and that now that his brother had calmed down some, there'd be… curiosity. Harry hoped they could be friends, at least, though it might be a long time before he called Jules brother in anything other than blood. And he didn't think he'd ever call James Dad.

Jules and James tore into the pizza. Harry guarded his two slices and listened to their awkward, stilted conversation; it was made weird by his presence. The two-person dynamic of the house had fundamentally shifted.

Harry hated being the one who was mucking things up.

The pizza was good, at least, and things warmed up a little bit. Harry had to tread carefully around all of Jules's questions about growing up a Muggle, but most of them centered around how the Muggle world worked and not specifically Harry's role in it, which made it somewhat easier. James seemed wound impossibly tight but Harry ignored him and focused on Jules. Baby steps.

Jules seemed a little unsure of himself around Harry, too, but it could've been worse. They could've hated each other on sight.

Although it was still weird to look at another person and see a mirror image of himself looking back.

Harry watched how much Jules ate, and stayed about a slice behind his brother, keeping an eye on James to make sure he didn't eat more than he was allowed. But James didn't seem to care how much Harry ate.

Even though he wasn't really hungry, he took one more piece than Jules did.

James didn't say anything.

Harry ate it slowly, waiting for a reaction, but James didn't seem to notice, much less care, which of them had eaten more. Harry decided that was a point in his favor. At least Jules had gotten a decent upbringing.

"Dad, it's still light out," Jules said, turning puppy dog eyes on James. "Can I take Harry flying?"

Flying. Now that sounded fun. Harry desperately wanted to try. But he was also exhausted and he'd spent enough time cooking and cleaning on little sleep to know that he got clumsier the more tired he was.

"Today's maybe not the best time," he said. "It's been a long day, I'm super tired. Maybe tomorrow instead?"

"Sure," Jules said, shrugging and returning to picking at his last piece of pizza.

"And I was thinking we could give you a tour of the house," James said.

Harry cocked his head. "I'd like that." He planned to explore on his own, of course, but having a guide would tell him for sure what parts of the house he was allowed into and give him a chance to ask questions, to figure out what the boundaries were.

He'd have to write Nott sometime in the next few days. Hopefully Alekta already had some sense of how to deliver mail. He'd let her out of her cage, and the falcon had immediately shot away to hunt.

"James?" he said hesitantly. "Today, you… flipped out about Theo Nott. How much of a threat are the Death Eaters still?"

James put his napkin down slowly.

Jules met Harry's eyes, suddenly serious. "They're still out there," he said. "Some of them. And a lot of the pureblood beliefs are still around. The Nott family's one of them. Did you meet their son?"

"Yes," Harry said, wondering how to put this. "I, er, ran into him buying telescopes today. We talked for a bit."

"The Notts are an old family," James cut in. "I think there were a few cousins who stayed out of the war, but the main branch… they were very much supporting You-Know-Who."

Harry frowned at Jules. "Do you know Theo Nott?"

"I wish I didn't," Jules muttered. "Yeah, he comes to a lot of the same parties and galas and stuff."

Harry sent James a confused look.

"Jules's the Boy Who Lived," James said, with a proud look for his younger son. "It comes with a lot of media attention. We host a charity gala every Christmas; I run a Quidditch training camp in his name for kids from families who can't afford sleep-away camps in the summer. Things like that."

"They wrote books," Jules said, sounding vaguely horrified. "Children's books, can you imagine? 'Jules Potter and the Surly Snowman.' It's ridiculous. I'm destined to fight Dark wizards, not run around making friends out of enchanted snowmen."

"Jules," James reprimanded gently. And ineffectively.

Harry tried not to roll his eyes at them.

But—

"So you go to social things," he said. "With… other pureblood kids."

"We kind of have to," James said. "The adults use them for political negotiations and networking. As Head Auror and the holder of a Wizengamot seat, I unofficially have to be at these things. The kids play in the host family's house while we talk and any older siblings supervise. It happens, oh, a few times a year."

Harry decided to ask about the other kids in his age group later, when he wasn't too tired to think straight. He added that to his ever-growing mental list of questions.

"Your original question, though—it's not so much Death Eaters as dark wizards in general," James explained. "There's always some witch or wizard out there with a wand and a willingness to do bad things. It'd immortalize anyone's name if they took down the Boy Who Lived. Jules's a target."

Harry's brother was a celebrity with huge social power and cultural importance, and also a walking target for any up-and-coming wannabe magic crime lord. Fantastic.

"May I go to my room?" he said quietly. "I'm… really tired."

"Yeah, of course," James said, looking startled. "Do you remember the way, or—"

"I've got it, thanks," Harry said.

James nodded. "If you need anything, call out the name "Corker" to summon a house-elf. He'll handle it for you. The room's okay?"

"It's great," Harry said, only having to fake a little of his enthusiasm.

"Good," James said with visible relief. "All right, off you go."

Harry walked out of the room and made a point of letting his footsteps noisily retreat from the room before he crept back to eavesdrop.

"—kind of quiet," Jules was saying. "It's weird. He's weird."

Harry narrowed his eyes.

"Well," James said after a pause that told Harry he didn't disagree, "he's had a very different childhood from yours." I didn't have a childhood, thanks to you , James Potter. "You guys might look alike but you weren't going to just connect like the Weasley twins."

"I know, but—" Jules broke off with a frustrated noise. "Are we gonna… tell people? The papers will go crazy over this, won't they?"

James sighed. "Yeah, they will. For sure. I'll talk to Ethan tomorrow or the day after to sort out how and when we reveal Harry. For now, I guess… the best thing we can do is try and help him adjust. Make sure he's not too far behind everyone else when school starts."

"Okay," Jules said. Pause. "I have to invite him out with all my friends, don't I."

"It'd be rude if you didn't," James said.

Harry promptly decided to accept at least the first such invitation, even if he didn't feel like talking to people, just so he could irritate Jules Potter. Who was apparently not much less of a prat than James.

"I guess..."

Harry decided he'd heard enough and crept back upstairs to his room.

Only once he had the door shut did he let his hands tremble and his eyes burn. He glared around the shadows of the room, barely noticing Alektra when she flapped over to perch on his shoulder, hardly aware that he'd lifted a shaking hand to stroke her.

So James and Jules thought he was weird. Too quiet, too different.

Freak.

Harry glared at the charms book sitting on his desk. Fine. If they thought he was weird, he'd be weird. If Jules's friends didn't like him, he'd just make his own friends, or maybe not, depending on what kinds of people he met. If he didn't find anyone—well, he'd done just fine all these years without friends his own age. He could manage a few more.

And in the meantime, he'd be better than Jules. He'd be better than all of Jules's friends. He'd prove that they should've kept him, that James Potter was wrong to not want him.

If that made him a freak to them, he'd live with it. Freak just meant different. People were afraid of things that were different. If his stupid family thought he was a freak, then he could make them afraid of him, because he didn't mind being different from people he didn't like.

Harry closed his eyes and let his resolution sink into his mind like a stone, and then he gently shifted Alektra onto her perch and changed into his new pajamas and crawled into his new bed.

Harry rolled over.

It was so warm… the Dursleys must have turned on the heating vent in the cupboard for once… And his pajamas felt weirdly soft…

Someone banged on the door.

"Coming, Aunt Petunia," Harry said as strongly as he could manage, and opened his eyes.

Oh. Right. Potter Manor. His real family. Magic.

Harry bounced out of bed and yanked the door open.

"Aunt Petunia," Jules said. "Mum's sister?"

"Yeah," Harry said shortly. He didn't want to talk about the Dursleys. Or James. Both of those things would ruin his current good mood.

"I want to meet her someday," Jules said.

"No, you don't, she's not very nice." Harry stepped aside and Jules did exactly as he expected, barging straight into the room and somehow making the entire space feel a lot smaller. He jumped on Harry's beanbag.

"Where are your clothes?" Jules said, looking at the half-open closet with a frown.

Harry pointed at his trunk.

"You haven't unpacked yet?"

"There doesn't seem to be much point," Harry said truthfully. "We're leaving for school in a month."

"I guess." Jules looked at the trunk. "You got your school books, right? Don't they look boring? I just want to learn hexes." He pulled out his wand and waved it about. "Do you know any spells yet?"

"Er—kind of," Harry said.

"Which?"

"The levitation charm. Reparo."

"I've been doing those for ages," Jules said rudely.

Harry blinked. And here he thought he'd been doing well. For just a second, embarrassment flooded his gut, and then he shook it off and resolved to work harder.

"Can I see?" Jules said, grinning.

Harry pointed his wand at the beanbag. " Wingardium leviosa!"

Jules yelped as the beanbag slowly but steadily rose about a foot off the ground.

Harry gritted his teeth and concentrated, fighting to hold it steady. He could only keep such a large object, supporting that much weight, off the ground for so long.

The landing was a little rough, but at least he didn't just drop Jules on the floor.

"Wicked," Jules said. "I haven't lifted anything that big yet. Can I try?"

He made to get up from the beanbag, but Harry was in no way ready to trust Jules enough to let him levitate Harry around the room. "Show me something else?" he said hurriedly. "A—a spell I don't know."

Jules thought for a second. "Okay… Oh, here, Dad uses this one when we play Quidditch." He pointed his wand in the air and said, " Aquafy!"

A stream of water leaped out of the wand, arched through the air, and disappeared before it hit the ground. Jules showed Harry how to drink from the stream of water, and then said "Finite," ending the spell.

"Cool," said Harry, who did not actually find it all that cool.

Jules grinned. "That one's fun. I also know the Trip Jinx but I'm not very good at it yet."

"What's the… words?" Harry said.

"Incantation," Jules corrected him proudly. Harry resisted the urge to spray the Aquafy water in Jules's face, mainly because he wasn't sure the charm would work right on the first try and it would be embarrassing if he failed. " Fallo ambulare."

Harry committed that to memory and reached for his trunk, whispering the new password— Firedrake, after a character in one of his favorite books—and opened it to the clothes compartment.

"Anyway. Dad's not up yet, either that or he had to run in to work early, so I was thinking we can go get breakfast from the house-elves and get you on a broom," Jules said.

Can you think about anything other than flying? "Sounds fun."

Harry pulled out a gray shirt, jeans, and his boots, because Jules was wearing a T-shirt and another pair of cargo shorts, and he didn't want to be overdressed for anything. Then he hesitated—at school, in gym, most kids just changed in front of each other, but Harry never had. No matter how much he got teased for it, hiding in a bathroom stall was better than showing everyone his scars. And Jules didn't need to see them yet.

"I—sorry, it must be a Muggle thing, but I don't—like changing in front of people," he said, stumbling a bit over the words. "Can you—"

"Oh! Right, sure." Jules slid off the beanbag and jammed his wand into his pocket. "See you downstairs. Oh, and I have some friends coming over later today. We had it planned before I learned about you, and now you're here you can meet all our year-mates. We can fly for a bit and then come in for lunch before they get here."

Harry stared at the door after his brother left.

People. On top of the chaos of the last twenty-four hours, he was now expected to deal with people.

Harry tried to calm his breathing before he tipped into hyperventilation. He'd done all right with Nott yesterday. Okay, so that was one other boy instead of multiple, and Nott seemed very decent, which he didn't think Jules's friends probably would be.

I'll be fine. I'll be fine. Harry clung to his wand and changed as fast as he could, deciding he'd probably need food to make it through today.

The house-elves were as good as Jules said. Harry walked into the kitchen and found his brother sitting at the big old table in front of a massive plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, toast, oatmeal, and sliced apples. There was an identical place across the table from him.

"This is all for me?" Harry checked, staring at the food. It was more than he'd ever eaten at one time in his life.

"Yuff," Jules said, and swallowed hard. "If it's not enough, the elves will bring more."

Harry switched his staring from the plate to his brother. "No way could I eat… all of this!"

Jules shrugged. "You should see Ron. He could eat double that. Not to mention the twins."

Harry remembered James talking about a set of twins, but not a Ron. "Who're they?" he asked, starting in on the food, which was delicious. He could really appreciate the benefits of house-elves.

"Weasleys," Jules said. "They're a big old family, allies of the Potters. They've got loads of kids. The twins Fred and George are two years older than us, Ron's our age, and Ginny's a year younger. Ron's my best mate. He and the twins and Ginny are coming over today."

Harry just nodded. Having food in his mouth was a great way to avoid having to talk. He'd grown up being quiet and he already thought James and Jules were way too talkative for him.

Jules, thankfully, seemed willing to relax and eat without talking.

Harry eyed him and then looked at the battered old watch on his wrist, wondering how long Jules could go in silence.

An impressive three minutes later, Jules finished his food and propped his elbows on the table. "Ready?"

Do I look ready? Harry wanted to snap. He looked down at the food left on his plate and decided he probably shouldn't eat more anyway. His stomach was used to small meals, and he'd stuffed himself on the few occasions Aunt Petunia let him eat as much as he wanted, and every time it ended up with him vomiting in the bathroom later. He'd have to adjust to full meals. "Yeah, I'm done."

Jules dragged him up and out the back of the house, onto the lawn Harry could see from his window. There was a small shed tucked up in the garden against the back of the house. Jules put a hand on the lock and said "Open," and it clicked and let them in.

Harry blinked, letting his eyes adjust to the dimness in the shed. Jules grabbed something and threw it to Harry, who flinched back and barely caught it.

A broom. Much sleeker than the ones he'd seen in the vault. This one even had leg braces. It was taller than Harry himself and practically hummed with potential.

His grip tightened.

"These are Cleansweep Tens," Jules said. "Dad promised be a Nimbus Two Thousand if I make the Gryffindor Quidditch team, but for now we're stuck with these old ones." He had a broom identical to Harry's in his hand.

"Are Cleansweep Tens not nice?" Harry asked.

Jules shrugged, leading the way back out of the shed. "They came out last year, so I guess they're decent. Not the best, though."

He was reminding Harry uncomfortably of Dudley. Thirty-six! Last year I got thirty-eight presents! Harry tried to hold onto his good mood.

"Okay, put it on the ground," Jules instructed. Harry copied him, standing just to the left of his broom.

"Hold out your hand and say Up!" When Jules did it, the broom shot up off the ground and into his hand with a smack.

"Up!" Harry said, feeling foolish, but the broom jumped into his palm almost as quickly as Jules's had.

"Nice," Jules said.

He showed Harry how to straddle the broom, how to grip the handle, and where his feet would go.

"Then you just do this," Jules said, and pushed off the ground gently so he was hovering a bit above the ground. He leaned and his broom spun in a slow circle, and Harry narrowed his eyes, looking at Jules's form, his feet, the way he leaned forward. "You try."

Harry took a deep breath and pushed off the ground.

The Cushioning Charm on the broom kicked in and Harry felt the ground drop away from his feet and couldn't stop a huge grin from spreading across his face.

"Right?" Jules said, grinning back. "It's amazing."

"Yeah," Harry breathed. "Okay, how do I—"

He heard a whoosh and a whoop and looked up and Jules was gone, speeding away over the house.

"Prat," Harry shouted after him, but Jules disappeared.

He sighed. Looked down at the ground. Leaned forward a bit and pushed down—his broom dipped slowly down towards the earth.

He paused, standing there, looking towards the house. He should probably put the broom away and go inside and wait until James or Jules was around to keep trying.

That would be the smart thing.

But—he had a point to prove. That he was as good as Jules. That he wasn't just a failure. And Harry knew he wouldn't instantly be as good at flying as Jules, but he also wouldn't be the weak one who couldn't fly.

"Okay," he muttered, kicking off again. Just lightly, so he was only about two feet off the ground. "Okay, nice and slow…"

He experimented with slow, subtle movements, leaning one way, then another, careful to never overcompensate and never do anything too drastic. He could go up and down, turn both ways in place, and make big looping circles over the lawn by the time he heard a loud slam from the house.

Harry looked up sharply before he realized it was just a door slamming. The motion upset his balance and he had to flounder for a second to stay on the broom and when he looked back at the house, it seemed like nothing had changed.

He saw a small pond tucked back by the edge of the trees, near the east side of the house, and aimed the broom that way. If he wanted to try anything more complicated, he'd rather fall into water than onto dry land.

The pond was big, about the size of the parking lot at the library. Harry did a few circles around it and then dared to go higher and try a few dives, always pulling up well above the water but getting a little closer every time. His speed turned the warm July air into a cool breeze on his face and he felt like he could outrun anything. Harry couldn't stop smiling. He never wanted to give this feeling up.

He dove down towards the pond and dared stray close to the water, spinning a tight lap around the pond, then on a whim he took one foot off the footrests and skimmed his toes across the water.

"Yaaaaaah!"

A blur of red and blue shot past Harry's shoulder. Followed promptly by another.

He twisted away violently. Towards the foot that wasn't on his broom.

And the next thing Harry knew, he was crashing into the water.

He flailed and floundered. Up and down lost all meaning. There was water around his ears, water in his nose and eyes, and all he could think about was the time Dudley and Piers spent an hour ducking him in and out of the water, holding him down until he started to thrash, that time at the lake three years ago, and how he couldn't swim—

And then a hand latched onto his shirt and dragged him up out of the water.

Harry choked and coughed and thrashed. He needed to get away get away from whoever was holding him—

"Harry!" someone shouted, and the shock of hearing his own name brought him back. Harry wiped water out of his eyes and shook it out of his ears and promptly registered a group of children standing about on the shore laughing at him.

The one who'd pulled him out of the pond was a slightly older boy with violently red hair and a soaking wet blue shirt. "You okay, mate?"

Someone on a broom slid smoothly to a halt next to him. Harry looked between them in confusion. Twins.

The Weasley twins.

"Sorry about that," Broom Twin said. "We didn't mean—"

"—for you to go in," Pond Twin said. "Just wanted—

"—to surprise you, really."

"Consider me surprised," Harry said stiffly. The twins were both smirking, but there was a canny intelligence in their eyes and the glance they shared indicated they at least realized they'd pushed a more sensitive button than they realized.

"You can't swim, then?" Pond Twin said.

"What tipped you off?" Harry snarled, wading out of the pond and glaring at the pack of laughing kids his own age a little ways off, around the shore and closer to the house.

Broom Twin landed and handed Harry his Cleansweep. "Oh, maybe just that you had a bloody panic attack."

"Pretty big clue right there," Pond Twin agreed.

Harry looked back and forth between them. He'd never have been able to keep them straight if not for the fact that one of them was completely soaked. Although Broom Twin seemed just a little wilder, somehow, than the other one.

"Such a pity," Broom Twin said.

"Got a whole summer left."

"Be a shame to waste it."

"I'm Fred, by the way."

"No, I'm Fred. You're George. Honestly, did Mum clock you on the head again?"

They both sniggered, but Harry stiffened. The Weasley mother—

The twins looked at Harry's face and their laughter died. "Was a joke, mate," Broom Twin said. "She wouldn't actually…"

He trailed off, and the twins shared another loaded glance, and Harry knew they were putting some of the pieces together.

"I'm Harry," he said. "I'd thank you for dragging me out of the pond except you're the reason I was there in the first place."

George/Fred/Pond Twin shrugged unrepentantly. "That's fair. We can—"

"—teach you," the other one added. "Gesture of goodwill and all."

Harry looked at them. He wasn't sure about these two yet but at least they weren't mocking him like the rest. "Deal."

Broom Twin clapped Harry on the back. "Come on, let's go find the rest of the babies."

"I'm not a baby," Harry said indignantly, heading back for the other kids even though he really did not want to.

The twins grinned as they tagged along on either side of him, identical expressions of pure mischief. "Ohh, ickle baby Harry doesn't like being the baby, hm?"

"Are you cranky?" the other one teased. "Do you need your diaper changed?"

"Only if I get to rub the used one in your face," Harry returned.

"Ahey, it bites!" Broom Twin said, reeling backwards with a hand clamped dramatically to his chest.

"I like this one," Pond Twin said to his brother over Harry's head.

Broom Twin smirked. "This will be an interesting year, for sure."

Harry decided he wasn't going to hold a grudge for getting dumped in the pond. They wouldn't have predicted that his reflexes were jacked up and would dump him off his broom. They'd fished him out of the water and not even ribbed him too badly for his inability to swim.

The others, though—

Harry could clearly see a red-headed boy who looked like a skinny younger brother to the twins reenacting Harry's panicked floundering. A girl, also ginger, was giggling, but it seemed like that was mostly because she was obviously infatuated with Jules, who was laughing so hard Harry was vaguely surprised he could even stay on his feet. Two other girls who looked like their family came from southern Asia shifted uncomfortably, and a sandy blond pudgy boy laughed a little along with Jules and the redhead.

"Think it's funny?" Harry said coolly.

"Bloody hilarious, that was," the redhead said, grinning. "I'm Ron, by the way. Ron Weasley."

"Way to make a first impression, Har," Jules said with a snicker.

Harry didn't smile.

Jules and Weasley's laughter slowly died.

"That's our brother," Broom Twin said, pointing at Weasley. "He's a prat, you can ignore him."

"Hey!" Weasley protested.

"And that's our little sister Ginevra," Pond Twin added, nodding at the girl, who scowled.

"Ginny," she snapped. "If anyone calls me Ginevra I'll hex them as soon as I get a wand."

"Which is a year from now," Weasley said dismissively. "Like you'd remember."

Ginny turned the full force of her scowl on him. Harry raised an eyebrow. The girl had fire, that was for sure. He wouldn't bet on her forgetting who she wanted to hex. He would bet that Ron was on that list.

"I'm Parvati," one of the other girls said.

"And I'm Padma," the other added.

"There's way too many twins around here," Harry muttered.

Both of them half-smiled, half-grimaced. "Yes, well, we're easier to tell apart, at least," said Parvati. "I'm an inch shorter."

Harry turned to the last boy in the group.

"Neville," the boy said, and cleared his throat. "Neville Longbottom."

Unfortunate last name. "A pleasure," Harry said, looking around the group and imitating how he'd seen one of Vernon's coworkers treat Petunia when he came over for dinner. Harry had gotten the distinct impression then that the man didn't find it pleasurable at all to be meeting the walrus man's wife, and he did his best to get the same message across here.

Longbottom blinked, and Padma and Parvati seemed to pick up on his subtle jibe, but it went right over Weasley and Jules and Ginny's heads.

The Weasley twins shared another loaded glance.

"Let's head back up to the house so I can get changed," Pond Twin suggested. "I bet Harry'd like dry clothes, too. Then we can all get brooms and play a bit."

"Someone better teach Harry how to stay on the broom first," Weasley added.

Harry decided Weasley was now on his "to be hexed" list.

"I can do a drying charm," Padma said, pulling out a wand and waving it in a specific pattern at Harry and Pond Twin. "Adsiche."

Their clothes and hair dried instantly. Harry wriggled his feet and thought his toes were still damp, but he wasn't complaining. He made a note to look that charm up later.

"But the Trace!" Longbottom protested.

Parvati rolled her eyes. "They ignore the Trace for students before first year," she said in the manner of someone who likes knowing things others don't, and likes to show it. "And besides, we're at a wizarding family home. Any Trace that goes off here, they'd have no idea if it was us or Lord Potter."

"He's told you to call him James loads of times," Jules said, and he and Padma and Parvati started bickering as they made their way back up towards the Manor.

Harry hung back. The twins had moved on to teasing Ginny, flying circles around her head and tossing leaves pulled from who knew where down at her. Weasley joined in the bickering with Jules and the girls, leaving—

"Sorry about all that," Longbottom said, dropping back with Harry. They were a little ways behind the rest of the group. "I'm pants at flying, too, it's not that big a deal."

I'm not pants at flying. "Thanks."

Longbottom looked at him, then at the other boys. "You—oh, you're just pissed at Jules and Ron."

Harry didn't answer, which he supposed was an answer on its own.

"They're kinda…" Longbottom trailed off, obviously not sure how to finish that sentence, and Harry didn't bother trying to continue the conversation. He'd been right about Jules' friends.

"Is anyone else coming?" he said after a second.

Longbottom shrugged. "I think this girl Luna Lovegood was supposed to come but she doesn't do so great with being on time. Seamus Finnegan, Cedric Diggory, a few others."

Harry winced. He did not want more people around to watch Jules and Ron take turns having a go at him, but it seemed he wasn't going to get a choice.

Jules yanked open the broom shed and started passing out brooms. The Weasley twins apparently played for the Gryffindor team and had brought their own brooms along today; Weasley, Longbottom, Padma, Parvati, and Ginny didn't have decent brooms of their own, so Jules lent them his.

"I don't know why Jules put him on a Cleansweep Ten to start with," Harry heard someone whisper.

He realized that, leaning against the outside of the broom shed, he could hear someone inside it, just on the other side of the wall. Someone who sounded a lot like Pond Twin.

"It's a racing broom," Broom Twin said. "Or a Quidditch broom—for a beginner?"

"Jules has never been the fastest broom in the shed," Pond Twin said, which made both of them snigger and might have made Harry laugh if he hadn't been so bloody furious.

A pause, during which Harry assumed they were communicating wordlessly somehow, and then, "No, you're right, it's too clever by half for Jules."

"Mind, putting a beginner on that broom is something we might do."

"We did do it. Remember Ginny?"

"Except she flew it like she was born in the air."

"Ickle Potter was doing pretty well before we scared him."

Pause again.

Harry was about ready to punch Jules. The twins seemed to think plotting to make Harry look ridiculous by throwing him on a high-quality hard-to-fly broom was too clever for Jules, and Harry was inclined to agree, but even then it proved Jules was self-centered, inconsiderate, and foolish.

Harry's grip on the broom tightened to the point that his hand hurt.

He added Quidditch to the list of things at which he fully intended to beat Jules Potter.

But he wasn't good enough yet to show up his brother now. So when the others came back out of the shed and took to the sky, passing around a big red ball called a Quaffle while the Weasley twins looped them and tried to knock it out of people's hands, Harry was cautious. He kept his turns big and his speed down and one hand on the broom at all times. He didn't give them any reason to laugh at him, but he didn't call attention to himself either. He made sure to fly just barely not quite as well as the Weasley girl, who was a year younger but had at least been on brooms before.

Luna Lovegood was the next to arrive, a dreamy blond girl who most of the others seemed to view with vague contempt, except Ginny and Neville. Ginny seemed to consider Luna an odd friend, and Neville hovered around her with obvious fascination, probably because Luna was so obviously off. Harry watched her dreamy gaze and watched her tell Jules that he needed to dodge something called a Wrackspurt, watched the way Jules and Ron and Parvati seemed to make fun of her, and decided Luna was another kid who'd probably been called a freak before.

He didn't like Seamus Finnegan much. The boy was brash, somewhat rude, and talked far too much about how his dad was a famous author. Dean Thomas was all right, as were Susan Bones and Ernie MacMillan, but Harry didn't like how they all hung on his brother's every word. Longbottom might be okay if he got over his shyness and obvious insecurity.

Harry eventually excused himself from the Quidditch game and sat down on the grass with Ginny, Luna, and Neville to watch the others play. Luna was telling a fascinated and confused Neville about a Crumple-horned Snorkack, and Ginny was frowning at the players.

"Not a Quidditch fan?" Harry asked her.

She huffed. "I love Quidditch, but Mum doesn't like me playing and Ron will tell."

Harry noted that she specified Ron, not the twins. That held with what he'd picked up; they were pranksters and probably lived to cause trouble.

"You were flying well, you know," she said. "Before the twins scared you."

He cut her a sideways glance. "Thanks."

She nodded. Harry noticed that she was mostly watching Jules do loops and dives around Weasley and Finnegan, who clearly had slower brooms and couldn't quite match Jules' pace. He'd seen girls act like this at school. Ginny had a crush.

Harry hid a smirk and lay back on the grass, paying less attention to the players and more to the sky.

Jules' friends left around one, after a rowdy lunch that left Harry exhausted just from trying to keep up with everything going on. He got largely ignored in the chaos, except for Longbottom and Lovegood, because the former was curious about the Muggles and the latter just seemed curious in general. Even the Weasley twins got sidetracked poking fun at Jules, their brother, Finnegan, and Thomas, for which Harry didn't fault them because he greatly enjoyed watching Weasley and Finnegan in particular receive the teasing.

Jules apparently had some kind of special tutoring session on weekday afternoons for "physical training," whatever that was, after which he sometimes had dinner with friends, and as James still hadn't come home from work, Harry had the whole house to himself for the afternoon.

He spent it curled up with one of his new books on wizarding etiquette, politics, and history.

Harry dedicated the rest of his summer to making sure he wouldn't be hopelessly behind the other students when he went to school.

James and Jules gave him a tour of the house; Harry tried not to let slip how strongly he disliked both of them and asked questions about the house. To his surprise, none of it was technically off limits, though James warned him that going into any of the locked rooms would probably give him a sneezing fit from all the dust. He also matched James and Jules' level of interest in the library, which was very low, and promptly began using it as an escape.

It was easily his favorite place in the entire house.

Harry spent hours curled up in some strange nook in the library. Growing up in the cupboard had taught him to make himself comfortable in weird places and awkward positions; he could clamber up shelves like a monkey, tuck himself into corners, and crawl into small spaces, and be just fine there for an hour or three. He didn't understand most of what he read, but what he did get was fascinating. A certain section of the library wouldn't even let him in. He spent a week attacking it with various unlocking spells from the books he'd bought at Flourish and Blotts, and then in his next letter to Nott, he asked for help. Nott sent back a book on ward spells, both setting and breaking, with the warning that it was not legal to own and most of the spells in it were at the very least restricted. Harry was pretty sure it was a test of some kind, and he made sure to thank Nott sincerely in his response, as well as tell him that after two hours of work he finally managed to get into the restricted section of the Potter family library.

The books there were definitely borderline Dark. Or at least what James Potter called "dark magic" in one of his long rants about the Dark Side and the Light Side and Death Eaters that he was prone to falling into in the evenings. Harry would prod him into a rant and then just listen and gather information that James let slip in his anger. James would probably go through the roof if he knew what kinds of books Harry was finding back here. Even though Harry couldn't understand most of them and didn't bother trying most of the spells… something about the promises held in these pages, promises of tricky curses and slow pain and the ability to protect himself and get payback on the people who'd hurt him—was appealing.

He stewed for a few days before deciding that James and Jules never spent time in the library and no one would notice if some of these books went missing. Harry was the Heir to House Potter, anyway; technically he had just as much of a right to the contents of the library as James. Most of the "Dark" books he left on the shelves, but his book collection grew a lot with tomes snagged from the Potter library.

Things only got more tense after Jules and Harry's birthday; the mysterious Ethan had apparently decided to reveal Harry's presence during a press conference, and when James proposed the idea, Harry responded with a flat no. There was no way he was joining the Potter Family Drama before he knew hardly anything about the wizarding world. He'd probably put his foot so far in his mouth he'd kick his own tonsils. That, of course, led to a three hour argument that Harry concluded by locking himself in his room and burning three of his pillows to ash. The house-elves replaced them without comment and Harry hid in his room during the Boy Who Lived's birthday gala, which was apparently one of the summer's biggest social events. The twins tracked him down and hung out with him for a bit, the three of them aiming trip jinxes at random people from Harry's second floor window, which conveniently overlooked the backyard and the bulk of the party. Only when a red haired woman saw Ron Weasley face-plant into a rhododendron and looked up at the open window did the twins retreat and leave Harry alone with his books again.

He told himself he wasn't lonely, or jealous.

Ethan turned out to be Ethan Thorne, the Potter family lawyer and one of James' good friends. He'd been made Jules' second godfather when Jules was three, since his original godfather, Peter Pettigrew, was dead. Harry asked about his own godfather and learned that he'd once been named Hadrian Sirius Potter, until Sirius betrayed them to You-Know-Who and almost cost Harry and Jules their lives, at which point James made his other friend Remus into Harry's godfather and had Harry's middle name legally changed. Remus, however, hadn't been back to England in almost seven years; he was traveling somewhere in Europe or possibly Asia. Harry thought it was a bit odd that a supposed best friend was so out of touch with James but decided it wasn't worth his time. Ethan, on the other hand, was… concerning. Harry didn't like how perceptive the tall, gangly man was. He had watery blue eyes a little on the large side that never seemed to miss a thing. And he definitely didn't like Harry. Harry made polite conversation all the way through dinner and plead a headache to go to leave early.

Flying, at least, was incredible, and it quickly became the bulk of the time Harry spent with his father and brother. The three of them went flying a few times a week. Harry gritted his teeth through their tasteless jokes and filed away all their tips; he studied moving diagrams in Quidditch Through the Ages and Exercises for the Beginning Flyer and Basics of Broomsticks and Quidditch Training: The Fundamentals for drills he could run on the afternoons and evenings that James and Jules were busy doing Boy Who Lived things. A lot of it seemed to involve going to various Ministry functions, occasional press conferences, social calls at various people's houses, and Jules' mysterious "training" that seemed to be mostly indoctrination of the whole "Everyone who doesn't like House Potter and Gryffindors and the Ministry is evil" schema, as well as "how to dodge when bad guys are shooting spells at you" since he was technically to young to be casting spells. He was a naturally gifted flyer, though, and he had a lot more practice than Harry, so Harry ignored Jules going on about the Patil twins and Ronald bloody Weasley and copied him in the air. James seemed to think they were destined to be the golden Gryffindor Quidditch players, the heirs to the legend of James Potter, then Charlie Weasley, then the Weasley twins, and now back to the Potters.

Harry was careful to be not as good as Jules when flying. Or doing anything else. James relented and taught them a few basic spells, like a Color-Change Charm that you could put on someone's hair as a prank, and a really simple blocking spell for oncoming jinxes, and the Jelly-Legs Jinx. Harry made sure that Jules succeeded at casting them first, even though he probably could've beaten his brother. It helped, a little, to see that he was doing at least as well with his magic as Jules, who'd grown up a wizard.

And at night, he swapped the holly wand out for the ash wand and practiced with it until he was too tired to fire off a single spell.

He knew from his book of wand lore that ash wood was good for intelligence, planning, knowledge, and cleverness, while holly was associated with protection and fire. He got to know the personalities of the wands more than anything else. The holly wand felt like Harry himself—young, untested, eager, curious. It seemed to like casting new spells and his magic felt volatile when he used it.

The ash wand, on the other hand, was distinctly patient. Harry got the sense that it liked him but was only humoring him until he got to the point where he could cast harder spells. It seemed particularly willing to cast jinxes and hexes that he practiced in the dead of night from books Nott recommended or that he'd bought without James knowing or that he'd swiped from the library.

His correspondence with Nott was consistent and—lukewarm. Neither of them was fully willing to open up via letter; Harry suspected Nott was as reluctant as Harry himself to commit anything to ink and paper that could be used against either of them later. Harry got quite good at reading between the lines, and at writing convoluted letters in return that implied in their subtext Harry's irritation with his father and ongoing interest in questionable magic. Nott seemed particularly interested in Herbology, and when Harry found a book near (but not in) the restricted section covering various Dark plants and their uses and growth conditions, he spent two weeks learning the Geminio Charm so he could take a duplicate with him to school. He planned to give it to Nott in exchange for the book on ward spells, which had already been useful not just for getting into the library, but also augmenting the wards on Harry's trunk and allowing him to break into Jules' room and poke around one afternoon. Not that he found anything particularly interesting, but it was still a decent diversion.

He hung out with Jules' friends. The Weasley twins were funny, and Harry thought someday he might come to count them friends. Same for Ginny, and Longbottom if he could ever stop stuttering and hovering awkwardly. Diggory was all right, if a bit too straightforward and easy to read to really old Harry's interest. But most of the others—at best, Harry found them boring. At worst, they were downright prats.

Mainly that category included Ron Weasley and Seamus Finnegan. And of course Jules Potter himself.

Harry counted down the days until September first.

Chapter End Notes

Update 12/20/19: Changed the name Thomas Jones to Ethan Thorne. Thomas Riddle and Thomas Jones in the same fic didn't work for me. James' lawyer friend is now named Thomas Jones.

Welcome to Hogwarts

Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

"Ethan!" James shouted, throwing his arms open and hugging his shorter friend.

Harry watched from the side, face carefully blank. He had his trunk and his school robes in his pack, Alektra in her cage in his left hand, and his holly wand in the flick-out holster on his right arm. He'd stocked up on books from the Potter library that should get him through the school year and practiced the ward spells he fully planned to put up around his bed to keep the other boys in his dorm away. He'd finished a preliminary reading of all the first-year textbooks just a few days ago and planned to go back through the first chapter of each before any of his classes started, and he and Nott were planning on finding each other on the train. He felt about as prepared as he could've hoped to be.

James had decided to show Harry and Jules the Muggle way to the Hogwarts Express, since apparently running at a solid barrier with your eyes closed was what James considered fun. Harry personally would've preferred to Apparate or Floo.

And, of course, as soon as they were on the far side of the barrier, Thorne appeared out of absolutely nowhere, hugged James, and jumped right in with a briefing on the various media outlets present to document the Boy Who Lived's departure for Hogwarts.

Harry slipped away in the chaos of reporters and posed photographs and people asking for Jules' autograph, nodded to Longbottom, Thomas, and a boy he didn't know, and boarded the train.

It was just as chaotic on the train as it had been off of it with the Potters. Harry spent fifteen minutes searching for either Nott or an empty compartment. He ended up in an empty one, cast a locking spell on the door, pulled one of his Muggle fiction novels courtesy of Dudley out of his bag, and started reading.

Someone knocked a few minutes later. He stood up, opened the door, and let Nott into the compartment.

"I couldn't even break that locking spell," Nott said by way of greeting.

Harry smirked. "You're the one who sent me the book about ward spells, did you think I wasn't going to apply those lessons?"

Nott raised an eyebrow, and Harry knew his message had gotten across—he wasn't above using questionably legal spells, and he didn't fault the other boy in the slightest for having owned, and passed on, a book of them.

"In fact," he continued, sitting down across from Nott, "I found a book in the Potter library I thought you might like." He pulled out the book of Dark plants from his pack, where he'd put it instead of in his trunk for easy access, and handed it over.

Nott examined the cover, then paged through. "Mmm. Interesting. I don't believe I've seen this one before."

"Oh good," Harry said with a grin. "That would've been rather tacky."

Nott met his eyes and Harry knew they were both aware of the subtext of this exchange, too—Harry repaid his debts, and he wasn't any more opposed to supposedly "Dark" magic than Nott.

The other boy nodded slowly, and smirked suddenly. "You're all right, Potter."

"Likewise," Harry said with a grin, and picked his own book up again.

Nott looked at it, and his eyebrows rose. "Is that a Muggle novel?"

"Muggle raised, remember?" Harry said. He shrugged. "They've got their depictions of magic wildly wrong, but that doesn't mean it's not entertaining."

Nott looked interested. "Can I see?"

Harry passed it over, and somehow that resulted in an involved conversation comparing Harry's knowledge of Muggle fiction with Nott's knowledge of wizarding fiction. Nott read a chapter of Dragon Rider and concluded that it seemed interesting, even if the dragons were completely unrealistic. Harry reminded him that it was a book for kids and anyway, Muggles didn't know anything about real dragons, so how could they be held to any standards of accuracy in their books? Nott laughed and conceded the point, and they only cut themselves off when someone rattled the compartment door furiously.

Nott glanced over. "Oh dear, Potter," he said in an abruptly bored tone of voice. The switch from his animated bearing of just a second ago tipped Harry off that something was up. "It's your brother. I don't think he's happy to see me."

Harry looked up. An irate Jules Potter was glaring at them through the glass of the compartment door.

"I really should've closed the shade," he said.

"Too late now. Better let him in before his head explodes with anger," Nott said.

Harry snickered at that image and muttered a quick Finite Incantatem at the door, canceling the lock spell.

Jules barged in, followed closely by Ron. "Harry!" he exclaimed.

Harry raised an eyebrow. "Yes, that's me."

Nott made a choking noise that sounded a lot like trying not to laugh.

Jules turned and glared at him. "Nott," he said through gritted teeth.

"Potter," Nott said coolly.

"Oh good, I don't have to introduce you," Harry muttered, hoping this wouldn't turn into hex-throwing less than half an hour into the train ride."

"Harry, come on," Jules said, finally tearing his furious gaze away from Nott. Weasley, behind him, looked about ready to hurl himself in fists first if something broke out. "We've got a compartment in the middle of the train."

Harry glanced at Nott and saw the resignation in the other boy's eyes. Nott fully expected him to go with his brother.

Harry looked back at Jules. "I'm good, thanks."

"Harry," Weasley said tightly. "That's—Theo Nott."

"Yes," Harry said. "I know. We'd hardly have gone this whole train ride in the same compartment without introducing ourselves."

Weasley glared. "He's a Death Eater's son."

"My father was acquitted," Nott said. "So unless you're suggesting that you, an eleven-year-old, know better than the entire Wizengamot, I recommend you back off such accusations."

"Technically you could sue him for slander," Harry said casually.

Nott shook his head. "It's hardly worth it."

Harry shrugged, as if it didn't matter to him either way.

"Fine!" Weasly snarled. "Be a—be a prat, then!"

"Harry, come on," Jules said. "You've got to associate with the right sort."

"I'd salute you for that statement, Potter, if you weren't associating yourself with a Weasley," a new voice sneered.

"Oh Merlin, give me patience," Nott muttered.

Harry shot him a questioning glance as Weasley and Jules turned to face the newcomer. Nott shook his head and mouthed, Watch.

The speaker pushed his way into the compartment and sneered at Weasley. Harry couldn't blame him, honestly; the redhead had a smudge on his nose and both he and Jules were wearing thoroughly messy clothes. Then Harry recognized this new addition as the pale Dudley-like boy he'd avoided in Diagon Alley. Interesting that Nott seemed to recognize his voice, and wasn't too pleased that blondie was here.

"What's wrong with being a Weasley?" Weasley snapped.

Blondie gave him a dismissive once-over. "Far too many freckles, obnoxiously red hair, hand-me-down robes, to start with—and I've heard your parents can't even afford to get you younger lot your own wands, is that true?"

"And who are you?" Jules returned before Weasley could throw himself at the blond. Harry wished he'd brought popcorn.

Blondie puffed himself up a bit. "Draco, Heir of Malfoy House."

"Oh that explains a lot," Jules said, crossing his arms. "My father never lets us go to events your family's at. Death Eaters, the lot of you. And anyone who's not is still an inbred Pureblood git."

"Didn't we already cover why that insult is a bad idea?" Nott muttered. Only Harry seemed to hear him.

Malfoy glared. "My father was Imperiused, Potter. Watch your tongue. And you're Heir to a house of 'inbred Purebloods' yourself."

"Actually, he's not," Harry pointed out casually, without even bothering to stand up. Malfoy's eyes snapped to him and seemed to register the presence of two other people in the compartment, one of whom was identical to the Boy Who Lived save for being a little shorter and scrawnier, which clearly caught Heir Malfoy completely off guard. "Hadrian, Heir of Potter House." He added, a bit condescendingly, "I'm the older twin."

"Since when does Julian Potter have a twin?" Malfoy demanded.

"A magical accident a month ago," Nott cut in. "Jules Potter's personality split, leaving all the intelligence in one body and all the reckless idiocy in the other. You can probably tell which is which."

It was Harry's turn to choke on a laugh.

Weasley frowned, but Malfoy and Jules both caught the insult; Malfoy looked taken aback and Jules looked furious.

"Are you quite certain you don't want my help finding the right sort, Potter?" Malfoy sneered, obviously choosing the Boy Who Lived as the better target for his social climbing aspirations than Harry.

"I think I'll manage," Jules said shortly.

Malfoy's sneer deepened. "Suit yourself. Nott," he said shortly, and turned on his heel. Harry saw two heavyset boys who looked weirdly like bodyguards following Malfoy down the hallway.

"What a slimy little git," Jules snarled. "Bet you anything he's in Slytherin."

Harry looked questioningly at Nott, who rolled his eyes and said, "Unfortunately, he's not wrong. On either count."

Huh. Well, no House would contain only people Harry liked, and frankly he thought he'd prefer dealing with Malfoy than with Jules and Weasley.

"As if you really think that's unfortunate," Weasley said, turning on Nott. "You and he probably have matching snake tattoos."

"Last I checked, the Death Eaters don't recruit chilren," Nott said acidly. "Except possibly as human shields. Now can you please go? It's pretty clear Harry's not interested, and I'd like to go back to my book."

"Have fun with that, Harry," Jules said darkly, and he and Weasley finally left.

Harry and Nott looked at each other, and burst out laughing.

"Okay, how do you and Jules know each other?" Harry asked finally.

Nott made a face. "He and I see each other at a lot of the events that're mostly for old Pureblood families. We've never gotten along."

"Understatement," Harry said. "And Malfoy?"

"Son of an acquitted Death Eater," Nott said succinctly. "Same as me."

He dropped that one casually, but Harry knew Nott was waiting for surprise that didn't come. Which would tell Nott both that he'd been a topic of discussion in the Potter household over the summer and that Harry had known and chosen not to care.

"I see him a lot more often than I do Jules," Nott continued. "We're not friends, but our fathers are, so we have to get along. He's a bit too preoccupied with himself and he's jealous that I'm smarter than he is."

Harry snorted. "He reminds me of my cousin."

"The baby walrus?" Nott said doubtfully. Harry had described Dudley, Petunia, and Vernon a bit in his letters.

"Not in looks," Harry said. "Although I wish, it'd be so easy to poke fun at him. No, just—he's so self-centered. Dudley's the same way. World revolves around him."

Nott smirked. "Yeah, that's Malfoy, all right. Oh—"

Harry looked up just as the door slid open and Neville Longbottom paused on the threshold, biting his lip. "Hey, Ha-Potter," he said. "Jules said you were down this way and, well, they're being very loud—he was complaining about how you two just wanted to read, and I was wondering—can I join you?"

"Come in," Nott said. Harry glanced at him and saw the appraising look his potential friend was giving Longbottom. "We're not really reading, but I promise we're quieter than a compartment full of probable Gryffindors."

Longbottom grinned. "That's all I ask."

He sat down next to Harry and saw the book on the seat next to Nott. "Hey, is that a Muggle novel?"

"It's mine," Harry said. "I was reading it, and he wanted a look."

"Huh." Neville pulled out his own book, which seemed to be Herbology, and then he registered the title of Nott's book and froze.

Harry tensed. He'd forgotten—Nott's book was quite obviously not standard issue first-year content, and if Longbottom pitched a fit—

"You like Herbology, then?" Longbottom said, looking a bit nervous but determined.

Nott leaned forward, a gleam in his eye. "I do. This is a new book, though, I haven't gotten very far, but there's this one plant that produces sap that can turn a wizard into a Squib temporarily."

Longbottom looked somewhere between sickened and fascinated.

Harry returned to his potions book, keeping half an ear on their conversation to make sure Nott didn't eat Longbottom alive, but it turned out that Longbottom was quite the herbology prodigy thanks to his family apparently owning loads of greenhouses and a major chunk of the magical plant industry, and once he got over his nervousness he and Nott had quite a good conversation going. Most of it flew right over Harry's head, and once he figured out that Longbottom wasn't as prone to dumb stereotypes as Jules and Weasley, he tuned them out.

"Theo, darling," someone crooned.

Harry looked up and saw a smirking eleven-year-old girl with icy blond hair.

"Daphne," Nott said, looking resigned. "Should've known you'd find me eventually."

"Couldn't miss you," Daphne said, sitting down with Nott like she owned the compartment. Another boy followed her in, short with curly brown hair and blue glasses and a round face.

Introductions were made. Daphne turned out to be Daphne Greengrass, from yet another old Pureblood family who tended to end up in either Slytherin or Hufflepuff, while the other boy was Anthony Goldstein, a cousin of hers by marriage. They'd grown up together by default. Harry could tell they bickered like siblings. Both of them expressed the now-expected shock that the famous Jules Potter had an older twin brother, which Harry brushed off with the canned excuse that he'd grown up away from his family for security reasons. They were soon joined by Daphne's friend Tracy Davis, a halfblood witch, and then another witch named Sue Li who saw Daphne demonstrate a hairstyling charm and stepped in to ask about it and somehow never left. Harry was shocked that their conversations flowed so easily. At any given time, at least two topics were being discussed, and while it spilled over into fairly heated arguing several times, no one got really angry. Nott seemed reluctantly interested with everyone, and like Harry, a little surprised that so many people conversed so easily.

Harry raised an eyebrow at him. Nott shook his head.

Harry focused back on the argument between Goldstein, Li, and Davis about whether it would be possible to enchant a Muggle radio to work in Hogwarts. Greengrass was listening with an expression of reluctant interest. Harry figured she'd probably grown up with some of the anti-Muggle beliefs James was always going on about, but at least she wasn't picking a fight about it.

A bit of paper hit his forehead. Harry just managed to catch it before it hit the floor. Nott was determinedly not looking at him, which told Harry exactly where the paper had come from.

He surreptitiously unfolded it. The message was short and to the point. To answer what I think you were trying to ask me, people tend to avoid me because of my surname.

He nodded slowly, aware that Nott would see the motion in his peripheral vision, dropped the note on the floor behind his foot, and set it on fire with a thought.

No one so much as twitched, so he'd gone unnoticed. Good. He didn't want to let slip just yet that he could do wandless, wordless magic, no matter how simple his tricks were. Even James and Jules didn't know.

"Excuse me," someone said, "has anyone seen a cat? Some girl's got out, I said I'd help her look—oh, is that the second year Potions textbook?"

Everyone looked up, blinking, to find a bushy-haired young witch standing stubbornly in the doorway, looking with interest at Nott, who'd pulled out the second-year Potions book from his trunk to prove a point to Longbottom about the use of a particular plant.

"Yes…" Nott said.

"Is it good? My mum and dad wouldn't let me buy the second or third year books, they said the first-year set would be enough. I've already memorized all the course books, of course, I just hope it'll be enough, I'm the first person from my family to have magic, it was ever such a surprise when the letter came—I'm Hermione Granger, by the way, do you mind if I join you?"

Harry couldn't quite process this entire stream of rapid-fire words.

A sneer was already forming on Greengrass' face, and Nott looked somewhere between cold and bemused, but Goldstein elbowed Greengrass sharply in the ribs and said, "Yeah, sure, I think we can make space for one more—"

Harry, Longbottom, and Li shifted to allow space for the newcomer on their side of the compartment. It was getting a bit cramped, but they made it work.

Greengrass, and Nott were noticeably cool towards Granger at first. It didn't that she was rather a know-it-all, but Harry didn't think she was trying to come off that way. Mostly she just seemed like an overachiever who was a bit desperate for friends. He'd seen kids like her in Muggle school and knew she probably hadn't had many before. The smart ones always got picked on by people like Dudley's gang. So while he found her chatter irritating, he was willing to put up with her, especially since she was actually intelligent. Plus it was informative to watch Greengrass and Nott deal with the presence of a Muggle-born. Greengrass never quite lost the vague disdain, but Nott was at least trying. And neither of them made any sneering comments.

In fact, Harry got so engrossed in their various conversations that he didn't even notice the changing landscape until a brisk knock sounded and a tall redheaded boy—probably an older Weasley—stuck his head into the compartment. "We'll be at Hogwarts soon," he said. "Best be changing into your robes." He paused, looking at wands lying across laps and textbooks open to where people had been arguing about their contents. "Budding Ravenclaws, I see," he said with a grin.

Harry snorted—he couldn't help it.

The prefect looked at him and recognition flashed, but thankfully, he didn't comment. "See you all in school," he said with a proud, if pinched, expression, and left.

The compartment slowly emptied as the others left to find their trunks and change into their robes, until only Harry and Nott were left. Longbottom asked if he could come back and join them instead of Jules' crew for the trip into the school. Harry tried not to laugh as he assured the boy that he'd be welcome.

He and Nott packed up their books and wands and changed into their school robes, talking casually and occasionally about nothing particularly important.

"What'd you think of Granger?" Nott asked after a bit.

Harry shrugged. "Bit annoying, but maybe we can train the know-it-all out of her. If nothing else she'll be useful to possibly study with."

"I'd be willing to make this crew a study group," Nott said thoughtfully. "I have to say, I've never met a Muggle-born before."

Harry was surprised for all of half a second before he remembered who Nott's family was and that of course he probably didn't go to things that Muggle-borns got invited to as well. "She's no less smart than us," he said. "Just… different social graces."

"Someone's got to instruct her in the etiquette," Nott huffed, "or Daphne's gonna lose it within two months and hex that girl eight ways from Sunday."

Harry snorted, picturing the icy Daphne going up against heart-on-her-sleeve Hermione Granger. "I have a feeling she might handle that a bit better than you expect."

"I've been on the receiving end of a hex from Daphne," Nott said with finality. "It's not a pleasant place, let me tell you."

Harry made him tell that story, which involved a Christmas feast and a bit of Babbling Brew slipped into Daphne's drink. Nott was halfway through when Longbottom came back, which of course meant Nott had to start the story over, and then Goldstein popped up again with Sue Li in tow, and by the time Nott finished the story, it was time to get off the train.

Leaving his trunk behind left a nervous feeling in Harry's stomach, since it contained almost everything he owned in the world, but the others went along with it without hesitation so he made himself expand it to full size and leave it on the rack next to Nott's before he followed the others off the train.

"Firs' years! Firs' years this way!" a deep voice bellowed.

Harry and Nott both jumped a bit when a looming figure, far too large to be a natural man, lumbered through the steam from the train. He was carrying a lantern and his face looked kindly enough, but Harry couldn't help seeing Uncle Vernon when the big man walked by, and he shrank back a bit.

Nott eyed him, but didn't comment. "I guess we're supposed to follow him," he said.

Harry chewed his lip and nodded.

The giant led them down to the edge of a lake, turned black by the lateness of the hour, where a small fleet of wooden boats waited. Harry, Nott, Longbottom, and Goldstein climbed into one; Greengrass, Davis, Sue Li, and, surprisingly, Hermione Granger were in the boat next to them. Granger chattered on with Li, oblivious to Greengrass' cold glares. Nott elbowed Harry, who turned and exchanged a smirk with him over the Muggle-born witch's somewhat lacking social skills.

"If she makes it across the lake without any kind of 'accident,' I'll be shocked," Nott muttered.

Harry kept an eye on the other boat, but Daphne was too well bred to try anything so crass as dumping Granger in the lake, and simply resorted to largely ignoring the other girl. Davis managed to bounce back and forth between Greengrass and the other two, looking torn between her friend's snobbery and her obvious interest in whatever Granger and Li were talking about.

Nott and Longbottom got caught back up in herbology—apparently Longbottom's father had enjoyed the subject as well, and used to tell the Longbottom matriarch about some strange plants that grew in the lake—while Goldstein chatted amiably about what members of his family had been in what houses and Harry listened with vague interest. Everyone stopped, though, when they curved around a slight peninsula and the castle came into view.

It was beautiful.

Harry's eyes couldn't drink it in fast enough. He realized he was leaning forward and made himself sit up straight, but he couldn't contain his excitement, couldn't contain his hunger. The school was big, and clearly old, with towers and battlements and windows glowing with golden light. Somehow intimidating and friendly at the same time. You are welcome here, it said, but it will not automatically be easy.

And it practically hummed with magic.

Harry's fists clenched. This was everything he'd been dreaming of, and more.

"Merlin," Longbottom breathed.

Nott and Harry exchanged a glance. Nott was trying to hide it, and he'd never verbalize it, but he was just as awed as Longbottom and Harry.

Harry grinned at the other boy. Nott hesitated, and then grinned back.

They saw Malfoy walking along with his bodyguards and three other girls and a boy, all clearly quite focused on Malfoy. Harry rolled his eyes and caught Nott doing the same.

"It's going to be so fun if we have Defense with him," Nott muttered. "It's basically a school sanctioned opportunity to hex people."

"Sounds bloody fantastic," Harry said. "I can already think of a few people I'd love to aim at."

Nott sent him a sly glance. "Let's see… Jules Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Malfoy?"

"Aren't you the clever one," Harry deadpanned.

"Yes, actually, thanks for noticing."

Longbottom squinted at them. "If I didn't know better, I'd think you two disliked each other."

"Oh, we do," Nott said.

"Bordering on hate," Harry agreed, trying not to laugh at how confused Longbottom looked. He lasted right up until he made eye contact with Nott, and then they both lost the battle and cracked up.

Longbottom shook his head. "You're both nutters."

"Takes one to know one," Greengrass retorted, leaning an elbow on the slightly shorter Goldstein's shoulder as she rejoined them, trailed by the other girls from her boat.

"We nutters have to stick together," Goldstein agreed, grinning.

Nott opened his mouth but was interrupted by the sudden arrival of multiple ghosts soaring through the front of the room the first years had been herded into. Harry jumped and promptly got annoyed at himself. At least he hadn't shrieked, like a good third of the students had.

The ghosts made a big show of pretending to notice the first years, hinting at the Sorting Ceremony, and soared away.

"Well that was subtle," Harry muttered. Only Nott and Goldstein heard him. Or maybe they were the only ones who appreciated his sarcasm. Either way, Goldstein snorted and Nott smirked.

A tall, severe woman entered the room and gave them a quick speech. Her hair was scraped back into a bun and probably didn't dare so much as attempt an escape. Harry was a bit wary of her; something about the sternness of her face reminded him of Aunt Petunia a bit, but there was a kindness and steadiness to her that Petunia didn't have. So maybe she wouldn't be too bad.

She introduced herself as Professor McGonagall and began organizing them into loose lines. Harry nodded goodbye to his companions and worked his way through the crowd just as McGonagall reached Jules.

"Professor?" he said tentatively.

She turned, looked down at him, and promptly raised her eyebrows so far they almost disappeared into her hairline. "Mr. Potter, and—Mr. Potter?"

"Yes, ma'am," Harry agreed, trying to be polite and ignore the glares he was getting from Jules. Luckily the room was a chaotic mess of first years trying to sort themselves by alphabetical surname and no one really paid him any attention. "I was wondering—alphabetically, I'd go before Jules, my name's Harry, but I'd rather let him go first—I know he's excited about the Sorting, and people are going to point at me—"

"I suppose I can make an exception," McGonagall said, still clearly not over the shock of the Potter twins.

"Thank you, Professor," Harry said as politely as he could manage, and elbowed his way into line after Jules.

"What was that for?" Jules hissed.

Harry shrugged. "If everyone's talking about me, it'll take away from your dramatic moment, little brother."

Jules looked caught between furious and confused. Clearly he couldn't tell whether he'd just been insulted, which of course he had, but no one with any sense of subtlety was there to interpret it for him.

They might've bickered more, but McGonagall called for their attention and opened the door she'd come from, leading the double line of first years out into the Great Hall.

Harry was so stunned by trying to take everything in at once that he almost stumbled when the line stopped moving. Jules elbowed him with a frown. "Be careful," he hissed.

With a massive effort, Harry managed to keep himself from elbowing Jules right back. It would only escalate, and they were up on stage, being stared at by over three hundred people. Not the time for sibling squabbles.

There was an old, battered, pointed wizard's hat sitting on a stool on the dais, front and center. Harry was just starting to wonder what was going on—he'd read about the Hat in Hogwarts, A History, but it wasn't moving—when it opened its brim and began to sing.

It had a surprisingly good voice, for a hat.

Harry only half listened to it. The descriptions of the Houses were accurate enough, he supposed, from what he'd read, but short and simple. He was more interested in watching the students. The table of red-and-gold was the on his far left, obviously Gryffindor, and then Hufflepuff in black and yellow, Ravenclaw in blue and bronze, and finally Slytherin in green and silver on the far right. He was pretty sure they'd put Slytherin and Gryffindor on opposite sides of the Great Hall for a reason.

The Hat finished singing, everyone applauded, and McGonagall stepped to the front with a scroll in her hands.

"Abbott, Hannah!"

Harry watched the blond girl walk up to the stool in the middle of the dais and jam the hat over her pigtails.

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

The Hufflepuff table erupted in cheers. Harry saw the glint of money changing hands and decided people must bet on which house would get the first Sort every year.

Susan Bones, who Harry knew from Jules' little get-togethers, went to Hufflepuff, and a girl Harry thought he remembered Sue Li mentioning named Jessica Banderas was the first to go Ravenclaw. Davis went to Slytherin, which surprised Harry a little; she'd seemed like more a Ravenclaw but he supposed he didn't really know her all that well. Seamus Finnegan ended up in Gryffindor, which surprised Harry not at all. Granger took almost two full minutes to sort, but eventually the hat opened its brim and screamed "GRYFFINDOR!" Granger was clearly pleased. That one did surprise Harry a little.

Anthony Goldstein went to Ravenclaw, Malfoy's goons to Slytherin, Sue Li to Ravenclaw, and Longbottom to Gryffindor. That Sorting took even longer than Granger's and made Harry's eyebrows flick up. Harry's eyebrows rose. Either the lions would eat Longbottom alive or he'd learn to display a bit of the spine he'd shown when arguing with Nott about plants.

Malfoy went to Slytherin, and with every name, Harry got more and more nervous.

Not about the Sorting so much as—

Everyone was going to stare at him.

This is what you wanted, he reminded himself harshly. You deliberately kept your existence a secret for the last month. Now deal with it.

Nott went to Slytherin. He didn't seem surprised in the slightest, and sauntered over to sit with Daphne, ever-so-slightly separated from Malfoy, the goons, and the stocky girl Harry had seen with Malfoy earlier. Evidently Greengrass wasn't much more fond of Malfoy than Nott. Harry wasn't surprise. She valued class and subtlety, and Malfoy had neither, only money and arrogance.

Padma Patil ended up in Ravenclaw. Parvati went to Gryffindor. Harry could barely pay attention; he was too busy trying to wipe his sweaty palms on his robes without being too obvious about it.

Finally—

"Potter, Julian!"

Whispers broke out over the hall. "Potter, did she say?" " The Jules Potter?"

Jules walked up to the stool like he hadn't a care in the world, sat down, and put the hat on his head.

It took barely five seconds to settle on "GRYFFINDOR!"

Harry would've felt vindicated except he was too busy trying not to panic.

The red-and-gold table exploded in screams. The Weasley twins were chanting "We got Potter! We got Potter!" Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw applauded enthusiastically; the Slytherins looked to be clapping mostly out of decorum.

"Potter, Hadrian!"

Harry lifted his chin, made sure his blank mask was firmly in place, and walked up to the stool as confidently as he could manage, ignoring the sudden, louder set of whispers and confusion.

He picked up the hat and put it on his head. Its wide brim slid down, caught on his glasses, and then slipped over them.

"Hmm," said a little voice in his ear. "Interesting… A fine mind, plenty of courage. Talent, oh my goodness, yes—wandless magic? At your age?"

Are you going to tell anyone? Harry thought as loudly as he could.

The hat snickered. "It's hardly my place to reveal your secrets. Oh, look at that, such a thirst to prove yourself—and you don't forgive easily, do you… Yes, I think I know where you'll be great…"

Harry thought back on what Ollivander had said. On being called freak, of James and Jules just assuming he was weak and helpless and to be sent away. Yes, he thought. Greatness. I want that.

"Well, in that case… better be SLYTHERIN!" The hat screamed the last word for the whole hall to hear, and Harry bit back a grin as he stood up and took the hat off.

The hall was dead silent.

He stubbornly ignored the shock. Didn't look at Jules or anything except the black-and-green blur of the Slytherin robes. He was halfway to his new House table before they got over their shock and started applauding. The rest of the school followed suit.

Mercifully, McGonagall moved on briskly to "Roper, Sophie!" just as Harry slid into a set next to Tracy and across from Nott.

"Well, this is certainly a surprise," a snide voice said.

Harry glanced to his right while applauding for Sophie Roper's sorting to Hufflepuff and saw the same pretty dark-haired girl who'd been with Malfoy earlier.

"Parkinson, right?" he said, hoping not to deliberately antagonize anyone just yet. He knew exactly what a shock his sorting was.

"Pansy Parkinson, at your service," the girl said, giving him a cunning smile. On Parkinson's other side, Malfoy studiously ignored them in a way that told Harry he was hanging on to every word. "I can't say anyone was expecting you to be in Slytherin."

"Or, you know, to even exist," Greengrass said. She and Parkinson made eye contact. Harry thought the temperature fell a few degrees.

Parkinson smirked. "That, too."

"I lived with relatives until a month and a half ago," Harry said coolly. "For… security reasons."

"What relatives?" Parkinson said, clearly interested. Harry could already tell her sort; he'd known girls like her before, who collected gossip and rumors like they were prized gems and used what they knew to rule the social ladder. It'd be bad to get on her bad side, but he also didn't particularly like her, or the way she hung on Malfoy's every word.

"My mother's Muggle sister and her husband," he said flatly.

It was, as he'd predicted, rather like dropping a bomb on the table. "Muggles?" Malfoy said, losing his studied disinterest. The others had learned on the train already, but Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle, the stocky girl, and Parkinson were visibly shocked. "I hope you washed the taint off."

Harry rolled his eyes. "It's not as if it's contagious."

The stocky girl curled her lip. "So I suppose it's as if you grew up Muggle-born."

Harry was sorely tempted to wandlessly lift the pitcher of water from the middle of the table and pour it on her head, which should make his point quite nicely, but he didn't want to play that card just yet. "I suppose," he said indifferently.

Malfoy sneered. Harry was starting to think he made that face rather a lot. "A Slytherin with a Muggle childhood. Wait till my father hears about this. You'll probably disgrace all of us with your primitive ways."

Harry glanced around his end of the table. Nott, Greengrass, and Davis were all clearly waiting for him to handle this on their own. He could already tell Slytherin was the house of power plays and internal politics, meaning that he had to deal with this challenge or they'd all think of him as the weak one and probably shun him.

Fine. He'd dealt with worse bullies than Malfoy.

"I did plenty of reading over the summer," he said pleasantly. "Enough to know that it's a poor idea to antagonize the heir to an Ancient and Noble House on the first day of term. A lesson some of us could apparently stand to learn."

Malfoy blushed bright red. "You think you're so clever, Potter," he snarled.

"No," Harry said flatly. "Just right."

He turned back to Nott, hoping no one could see how nervous he was, hoping that had been enough to at least keep him from turning into Malfoy's verbal punching bag.

Greengrass was watching him the way a cat does something that it had thought was a mouse but suddenly shows it has claws. Davis was grinning and Nott looked approving.

Ron Weasley, unsurprisingly, followed Jules, Finnegan, and Dean Thomas into Gryffindor, and with "Zabini, Blaise" being placed in Slytherin, the Sorting finished.

Zabini took a seat in between Crabbe and Nott, on the opposite side of the table from Harry. He was tall and dark-skinned with a cutting white smile and an expression that made it seem like he was perpetually laughing on the inside at a joke the rest of them were too ignorant to get.

"Zabini," Malfoy mused. "Not the Black Widow's son?"

Zabini's smile went from cutting to lethal. "On the chance that I am, Malfoy, are you really willing to piss me off?"

Malfoy grumbled.

Harry raised his eyebrows at Nott, who mouthed later just as a tall man with a flowing silver robe and tastelessly purple robes stood up and gestured for silence. "Welcome!" he cried, beaming as if nothing could've made him happier than seeing all their faces. "Welcome to a new year at Hogwarts! Before we begin our banquet, I would like to say a few words. And here they are: Nitwit! Blubber! Oddment! Tweak!

"Thank you!"

He sat back down.

Harry stared at the high table, then turned back to his year mates. "Is he—a bit mad?"

"Bloody disaster of a headmaster, if you ask me," Davis sighed.

"And yes," Nott added. "He's… off upstairs. Of course, he's also one of the most powerful wizards alive today, arguably the most powerful, and rumor has it he's the only person the Dark Lord ever feared."

"And he's a school headmaster?" Harry said in disbelief. "If I was that good a wizard, you can bet I'd be doing anything except—except hanging around this place teaching."

The others chuckled, and then the conversation was interrupted by the appearance of so much food Harry's jaw dropped.

"Tuck in, Potter," Nott said with a smirk.

"I love magic," he said fervently, serving himself a healthy amount of roast beef and Yorkshire pudding.

Conversation mostly died as they steadily ate their way through everything on the table, and them all the desserts when the main course disappeared. Malfoy seemed content to retreat to his own conversation with Parkinson, and Harry stuck with Nott, Davis, Greengrass, and to some degree Zabini, who seemed content to stay quiet and aloof.

Harry was starting to feel warm and sleepy from all the food he'd eaten and sipped ice water to keep himself alert. His new housemates didn't seem the sort he could drop his guard around. Not yet, anyway, especially not the girls and Malfoy and his goons. He finally dared turn his attention up to the high table. He'd been determined, this whole time, to act as though his sorting wasn't a Dramatic Event, which of course meant not sneakily looking around at people's reactions.

McGonagall was seated in between a very short man and a tall man with slightly greasy dark hair. Since the first years sat at the table closest to them, Harry had an excellent view of the professor on the end, who wore a turban and seemed exceedingly nervous, especially whenever the black-haired man turned to talk to him.

"Who's got the turban?" he said.

Nott glanced at the table. "New Defense teacher."

"They say the job's cursed," Parkinson said with relish. "No one's been able to hold the position for more than a year in over a decade."

"His name's Quirrell," Nott said offhandedly. "Apparently he had a bit of a scare with a vampire and walks around with garlic in his turban now."

They all stared at him.

"What?" he asked. "My cousin's a Ravenclaw fourth year."

Harry glanced up at the high table again just in time to meet Quirrell's eyes. A sudden hot pain seared in his scar.

He winced once before he mastered himself and tucked the pain away.

"You all right, Potter?" Nott said.

Harry met his eyes squarely. "Fine. Who's the professor who looks like he wants to poison me?" He had a pretty good idea based on James' furious ranting about someone named Snape, nicknamed Snivellus, who had apparently gone to school with James and his friends and was a "greasy, slimy, Slytherin git." Jules apparently had instructions to "not accept any bias" from the mysterious professor. Harry had stayed out of those discussions while privately deciding anyone James Potter went to the trouble of giving such a nasty nickname couldn't be that bad.

Greengrass glanced at the black-haired man, who seemed to be alternating between glaring at the Gryffindor table and at Harry. "Professor Snape," she said, confirming Harry's suspicions. "Our Head of House, and the Potions master here."

"He really does not seem to like you, Potter," Malfoy sneered.

Harry glanced at the table again. "Well, he seems to like my brother even less, so I'll take my chances."

Nott and Greengrass took turns explaining what their older relatives had told them about the various teachers, with Zabini, Harry, and Davis in particular paying close attention.

Dumbledore dismissed hem from the hall with a few warnings, namely that the Forbidden Forest was forbidden—" Never would've guessed," Nott muttered with heavy sarcasm, drawing smirks from Harry and Zabini—and that a particular corridor on the third floor was strictly out-of-bounds on penalty of death, leaving Harry wondering exactly what kind of school this was.

"Slytherin first years," someone said firmly. "Come with me, please."

They looked up and found an older girl and boy waiting for them, both wearing little silver badges embellished with a stylized P. Prefects, Harry assumed.

The first years obediently shuffled off their seats and fell in behind the prefects. Harry lingered so no one would be able to get behind him; Nott casually let Malfoy pass him by to walk with Harry at the back, a gesture that did not go unnoticed by anyone except possibly the monosyllabic slabs of beef who appeared to consider themselves Malfoy's shadows.

The prefects introduced themselves as they walked as Gemma Fawcett and Tony McDougal, sixth year Slytherin prefects. Evidently the major wizarding school exams were at the end of fifth and seventh years in Hogwarts, so the sixth year prefects were responsible for handling the firsties. Harry paid attention to all their commentary about landmarks to help them find their way through the twistin corridors of the dungeons. He did not want to get lost down here. They also mentioned something about secret passages, which Harry resolved to search for at the first opportunity.

"That there is our Founder, Salazar Slytherin," Fawcett said proudly, pointing at a large portrait depicting a sharp-faced, dark-haired man holding a large snake. He raised a scornful eyebrow at them all and turned away. "Most of the other Houses would assume the entrance to our dorms is behind the painting. If any of you corrects that misconception, you can expect one of the upper hears to hex your mouth shut while you sleep."

Harry blinked. All right then.

"The entrance is actually down here," Tony added, winking at them and pointing to a blank stretch of wall, then showing them that the wall sconce across from the concealed door had a tiny snake engraved on the side, where no one would think to look unless they knew it was there. After telling the password to the wall—"Firedrake"—the stone rumbled out of sight and let them into their common room.

Harry had thought he wouldn't be impressed, not after Potter Manor, but he was. Distinctly. The common room was littered with chairs, tables, and couches; it might've been oppressive expect for the fire crackling merrily in the massive hearth and the white-gold glowing wizard lights shining from chandeliers and wall sconces all around the room. One wall was lined with books; another was made entirely of glass that seemed to look into the bottom of the lake. Harry imagined it'd be stunning during the day, but at night it was just blackness outside the windows. A large bulletin board, mostly empty, waited on the wall next to the entrance.

"Welcome home," Fawcett said with a grin.

A few upper years were already camped out at the chairs and tables. They ignored the firsties. Some others came in the entrance, skirted the group of young students, and went into a passage over to Harry's left that he guessed went to the dorms.

"First years, this way," McDougal said.

They settled down into a series of sofas and chairs scattered around the fire, all facing Fawcett and McDougal. Four others joined them and introduced themselves as the new fifth year prefects, Ava Pucey and Lucas Roberts, and the seventh year prefects, Emily Taylor and Spencer Wright. The fifth and seventh years then sat down and let Fawcett and McDougal lead the orientation.

"I know you're all tired, so we'll keep this short," Fawcett said. "Welcome to Slytherin. The people in these dorms will be your second family for the next seven years. After your biological family comes loyalty to the school, and within it, loyalty to Slytherin House."

"Professor Snape, our Head of House, has certain standards," McDougal continued. "Grades, for those who don't know, are O—outstanding—E—exceeds expectations—A—acceptable—P—poor—and D—dreadful. On the OWLs in fifth year, you can actually get a T for troll, but that pretty much only happens if you sleep through the test or someone hits you with an Illiteracy Jinx."

Harry made a note to look up and learn that hex.

"If you're floundering in a class, come to one of us," Fawcett advised. "Me or Tony first, then if you can't find us, one of the fifth or seventh year prefects. We'll arrange tutoring from one of the other upper years. We work together to keep everyone up to scratch."

"We'll pass out your schedules and maps of the castle in the morning," Fawcett said. "We'll lead you to your dorms tonight and to the Great Hall in the morning, but after that you should be able to find your way around. If you get really lost, poke the maps with your wands and say "Slytherin" and they'll guide you back to the common room."

"One last thing," McDougal said. "The Slytherin rules."

"Rule one: House unity above all. Whatever squabbles and power plays you have, keep them to yourselves. Never bicker with another Slytherin where another house can see."

"You should be warned that most of the other houses don't like us much," Wright cut in. "We get on well enough with Ravenclaw in the classroom and most of the Hufflepuffs at least get what it's like to be stereotyped, but a lot of the school—especially Gryffindor—will expect you to be a set of stupid prats. Don't go picking fights and proving them right." He paused. "At least, don't be stupid. If they're prats, go ahead and be a prat back."

"Just do it with class," Ava Pucey added, drawing laughter from the other prefects.

"Anyway," McDougal said, "rule two. Don't get caught. We're Slytherins, meaning we do what it takes to be successful, even if that involves breaking the rules. But we're also the house of cunning, which means if you're breaking a rule, you better have a damn good reason, and you better have a plan to pull it off."

"Rule three: if you do get caught, blame someone else, and make sure that person isn't a Slytherin."

"Rule four: Academic standards of excellence, like we covered."

"Rule five: No dueling in the common room or the dorms. We don't want to have to deal with repairing broken furniture, and no one likes it when the whole common rooms stinks of burned hair."

"Rule six: no non-Slytherins in the common room. Ever. The password changes every week; it'll be posted on the bulletin board on Mondays. Don't tell it to anyone who's not of this House."

"Rule seven: what happens in the dungeons, stays in the dungeons."

They paused, looking around at the first years. Harry had never seen a group of eleven-year-olds this solemn.

"All right," Fawcett said at last, looking satisfied. "You're all probably exhausted. Girls with me, boys with Tony."

Harry fell in with Nott, Malfoy, the beefcakes, and Zabini. Tony showed them the branching passages of the boys' dorms, explaining how the castle opened and closed rooms for every student. "There's six of you, which is the most we ever put in a room," he said. "You're here. The doors are all labeled with what year you're in, so you have zero excuse to barge in on another dorm. We all respect each other's privacy; no peeking in upper year dorms and we won't break into yours. Same goes for each other's trunks and wardrobes. If you need warding spells, come talk to me or Wright. Bathrooms are at the end of the hall. Keep them clean and don't leave your toiletries lying about. Clear?"

They all nodded, and he pushed the door open.

The room was long and rectangular, larger than Harry would've expected, with three beds on the left and three on the right. He took a second to decide—bed by the door, so he had an easy exit, or bed by the back, so he had a corner to back into and his roommates as buffers if a threat came in?

The decision was made for him when Zabini and Crabbe took the beds closest to the door. Harry made a beeline for the back corner and snagged the bed on the same side as Zabini; he had Nott next to him and Goyle across the aisle. Malfoy settled down in between Crabbe and Goyle, prattling on about how he shouldn't have to share a room with anyone, and how he'd be complaining to his father about this, and how his father said the Head Boy and Girl got their own rooms, and he'd be going for that in a few years, thank you very much, and how his father told him there were secret passages in the Slytherin dorms if you were clever enough to find them. Harry and Nott made eye contact and Harry had to look away to keep himself from sniggering.

As soon as he sat on the bed, there was a pop and his trunk appeared at its foot. Harry was immensely relieved. He hadn't realized how nervous he'd been about being separated from it until he got it back.

He watched Malfoy unpack into the wardrobe by his bed and decided there was no point in doing the same. The wardrobe section of his trunk was just as functional, and it allowed him a quick exit if he needed one. He changed into his pajamas and started muttering ward spells and silencing spells around his bed. He had nightmares sometimes, nightmares that made him talk and shout even if he never remembered them, and there was no way he'd let his dorm mates overhear. Or sneak up while he was sleeping. The book on wards that Nott gave him was complicated, and most of the spells in it were way beyond Harry's current magical ability, but he'd mastered a simple one that would turn the curtains around his bed into a barrier and another that set off a wail if anyone but him tried to touch the bed. There were others that you could weave something called the Body-Bind Jinx or the Stunning Jinx or another, nastier curse into, but he couldn't cast either Petrificus totalus or Stupefy yet, much less the more complicated ward. The book said that stunners needed a stronger and more mature magical core than almost anyone under age thirteen or fourteen possessed. The Body-bind, on the other hand, could probably be cast by a skilled first year. He resolved to practice it soon. Possibly on Weasley.

Nott and Zabini both seemed to be casting wards of their own. Malfoy frowned at them and crawled into bed, looking annoyed; clearly he hadn't thought to learn any ward spells. Neither of the beefcakes did, either, but that was no surprise.

Harry nodded goodnight to Nott and Zabini and climbed into his bed. His silencing spell cut off all sound as soon as he was fully on the mattress. He'd have to find a way to let sound in but not out instead of the spell being two-way.

The bed was even larger than his bed at Potter Manor, with a heavy duvet, silk sheets, and a canopy and curtains of a rich dark green. He saw Nott simply point his wand at the curtains to close them and copied the other boy; they slid obligingly closed.

I'm at Hogwarts, he thought with delight, I'm going to learn magic, and no words had ever sounded so wonderful.

Even a month at Potter Manor hadn't been enough to undo the ingrained habit of getting up early. When Harry pulled his curtains apart, the window into the lake that formed the back wall of their dorm, which he hadn't noticed the night before, still showed only blackness. His crappy digital watch showed it was 5:43 in the morning.

He strapped his wand holster back on, pulled the holly wand from under his pillow and slid it into place, gathered his toiletries, and headed to the bathroom. It only took him five minutes to shower, brush his teeth, and fail to get his hair in any kind of order.

When Nott and Zabini came up to breakfast, they found Harry already seated at the Slytherin table, eating a piece of toast and reading The Rise and Fall of the Dark Arts.

"Morning, Potter," Nott said, sliding onto the bench next to him.

"Harry," Harry corrected absently. It was a school thing in general and a Pureblood thing in particular to go by surnames until official permission was granted to use the familiar first name. He figured, after half a summer swapping letters and being sorted into the same House, he could extend that permission to Nott.

Nott paused. "Only if you'll call me Theo."

"Done." Harry pushed the pitcher of water towards Theo without looking up.

"I'm insulted," Zabini said, not sounding very insulted. "No first names for me?"

Harry finally set his book aside and raised an eyebrow. "We met yesterday."

Zabini smiled beatifically. "Yes, but we shared a dorm last night, Potter. Surely that counts for something." He paused. "I can go first. Please, oh famous brother of the Boy Who Lived, would you do me the honor of calling me Blaise?"

"Er—okay," Harry said, a little confused, as he'd never met anyone quite like Zabini—Blaise—before."

Theo heaved a sigh. "Fine, I guess we're all on a first name basis now. Wonderful to have that sorted. Someone get me food already."

"Somebody's not a morning person," Blaise said, shoving a basket of still-steaming toast towards Theo.

Theo scowled. "What tipped you off?"

"Mainly the Stinging Hex you sent at Malfoy."

Harry choked on his toast. "You what?"

Theo grinned meanly. "He was nattering on about his father and how he's so irritated he can't have his own broom and his father some more. I was sick of it."

"Nailed him right in the arse," Blaise said with satisfaction. "I've never heard a human make a noise that sounded so much like a large rodent before."

Harry scowled at them. "Next time, Nott, do it when I'm around to watch."

Theo snickered. "Don't get up at such an unholy hour, then. How did you even wake up before the sun?"

"Old habits," Harry said shortly.

Theo paused. He'd definitely picked up on enough from Harry's letters, and from their conversation in Diagon Alley, to guess that life with the Dursleys had been less than ideal. Blaise looked between them, clearly picking up on the subtext.

"And where, precisely, did you develop that habit?" Blaise asked, when neither Harry nor Theo said anything else about it.

Harry shrugged. "My Muggle relatives expected me to cook breakfast."

Blaise's face darkened. "A wizard, slaving away for Muggles—that's bloody appalling," he muttered.

Harry found himself wondering what exactly Blaise's views on Muggles and Muggle-borns were. Greengrass clearly thought them inferior; Davis didn't seem to mind, but being a half-blood, that wasn't surprising. Harry could already tell, though, that there was an unspoken seventh Slytherin rule: people who tolerated or accepted Muggles and Muggle-borns didn't put up a fight on principle, and blood purity supremacists didn't make a point of fitting "Mudblood" or "filthy Muggles" or "blood traitor" into every other sentence. With the exception of Malfoy, who for all he was a Slytherin seemed to have no more than a teaspoon of tact. Which all meant that though Harry liked Blaise, or thought he did, they definitely weren't close enough for that conversation. He hadn't even really talked about it with Theo.

They ate breakfast and speculated about their classes while the Great Hall slowly filled. Harry was pleased to see that Longbottom and Granger came in together, and that both of them nodded at him and Theo before sheering off to the Gryffindor table.

"Fraternizing with the enemy, Potter?" Blaise said lazily.

Theo glared halfheartedly at him. "We met them on the train. They're both all right. If they can manage to avoid the contagious Gryffindor stupidity."

"If anyone can avoid catching stupid, it's Granger," Harry said drily. "Hopefully she can teach Longbottom some spine and he can teach her some etiquette."

Blaise looked between them and the Gryffindor table. "That girl's a Muggle-born?"

Harry nodded like it didn't matter in the slightest.

Blaise clearly wasn't fooled by his casual act, but let it slide. "Longbottom… They're an old family, right?"

"Pureblood back at least fourteen generations, I think," Theo confirmed.

"Could do worse in a Gryffindor ally, I suppose." Blaise eyed them both. "You do realize it'll be hard to maintain any kind of social standing in Slytherin if you're friends with a Gryffindor Muggle-born."

"I'm not an idiot," Harry said scornfully.

Blaise shrugged and went back to his food.

Malfoy sauntered in at three minutes to eight, which was when breakfast officially started, with his entourage of Parkinson, Bulstrode, Crabbe, and Goyle. Greengrass and Davis were close behind them and occupied the middle ground between Malfoy's crew and Harry, Blaise, and Theo.

Not thirty seconds after they sat down, Snape came down from the dais holding a stack of parchments. His face was icy cold and his voice pitched just low enough that they all had to be perfectly still and silent to hear him over the growing breakfast glamor as he instructed them to get to class on time, comport themselves with decorum, and stay out of trouble. This last was accompanied by a particularly nasty sneer sent Harry's direction. He kept his face blandly polite and respectful, hands resting neatly on the table, body language as nonthreatening as he could make it without literally bowing.

Snape handed out their schedules with one final sneer and stalked away.

Harry glanced his over.

"Herbology with Ravenclaw, Defense with Gryffindor, and Transfiguration," Nott said. "Today's going to be fantastic."

Chapter End Notes

I'm aware that their dialogue isn't totally consistent with how eleven-year-olds speak. I don't spend time around people younger than *maybe* high school age, so i don't have a good ballpark. I've decided to just let this one go but i apologize for the inconsistency.

Carving a Place

5

Harry ended up being a bit bored by the first two days of class. Herbology, Transfiguration, Charms, and Defense spent their first session going over safety, classroom rules, and theory. Defense with Gryffindor was the only remotely interesting part, and even then, with Quirrell present, even Malfoy didn't throw more than an occasional sneering jibe. Harry ignored the frequent glares he received from Finnegan, Weasley, and nodded to Longbottom and Granger when he saw them. Herbology was a bit easier; he and Theo usually ended up working with Li and her new friend Lisa Turpin while Blaise, Greengrass, Davis, and Goldstein worked at the table next to theirs. Harry didn't particularly enjoy Herbology but after years of doing the Dursleys' yard work he was at least comfortable around dirt. Although the singing flowers were definitely new.

He finally sat down and wrote James on the third day of class.

James,

You're probably not happy about me being in Slytherin. I hope it won't cause too many problems between us. I still want to try to be a family. I promise I'm not getting indoctrinated with blood purity ideas. Theo Nott doesn't hold with that and if anyone else does, they keep it to themselves. Except Malfoy, but I think Jules and I agree about him being a git.

Classes are good so far. I really like Transfiguration. McGonagall is tough but she's good at what she does. Defense is a joke. The whole room smells like garlic.

Slytherin and Gryffindor have it together. Could you tell Jules to keep Weasley from trying to hex me under the table? It's getting annoying to have to cast a shield spell every three minutes every class period.

-Harry

He scanned the letter, decided it was a decent length and not too warm, and headed up to the Owlery on his own during lunch, leaving Theo and Blaise to argue about something that came up in Herbology that morning with Sue and Lisa, who'd joined them at the Slytherin table.

Alektra was perched near the ceiling when Harry walked into the Owlery, which smelled a lot like Eylops' Emporium. He called her name, and she shrieked softly as she dropped down from her perch to his shoulder.

"Good girl," he said softly, stroking her head and back. The falcon made a quiet kree sound and nipped at his hair while he moved to tie the letter to her leg. "Take this to James, please? I'm not sure if he's going to respond, but maybe wait a few minutes to see if it looks like he's going to write back?"

He wasn't sure how much of this Alektra could understand, but she made another kree, kree noise and took off in a flurry of efficient wingbeats, then vanished out the open window.

Harry leaned out and watched her shoot away to the south, took in the beauty of the Hogwarts grounds spread out in the September sunlight, realized he was possibly going to be late for the study session he'd agreed to go to during their free period, and dashed off down the stairs.

Halfway to the library, he heard Peeves' distinct voice cackling something about bottles of ink. Harry quickly decided that was not a good sign. Especially since it was getting progressively louder. He turned around and jogged back down the hall to the nearest classroom and tried to open the door. It didn't budge.

"Alohomora," he hissed, and when that didn't work, he tried " Dissolvere incantatem, aperiportus!"

The door clicked slightly, and he shoved it open, slipped inside, and closed it again just before Peeves shot by in the corridor.

Harry sighed with relief.

"Well lookie here," someone said.

He flipped around, wand out and heart in his throat.

The Weasley twins. Grinning at him.

Harry noticed Broom Twin—he'd figured out how to distinguish one from the other, if not which one was George and which was Fred—tucking a bit of parchment in his bag. The twins were definitely sneakier than most Gryffindors, but between the Dursleys and the Slytherins, Harry was good at both being sneaky and recognizing it in others.

"If it isn't ickle snakey Potter," Broom said. "What mischief are you up to—"

"—running around with fourth-year unlocking spells?" Pond finished.

Harry shrugged. "I was hiding from Peeves, and a friend taught me those."

"What'd you use, Aperiportus?" Broom asked.

"With Dissolvere Incantatem."

"Impressive."

"For a first year."

Harry shrugged again. "So are you hiding from Peeves too, or are you up to something… else?" he asked, eyeing the clean box on the otherwise-dusty table behind the twins.

They smirked in unison.

"Why, Potter."

"We're offended you would even suggest—"

"—that we're capable of mischief."

"We're just minding our own business."

"Completely innocent."

Harry snorted. "I'm fairly sure you've never been innocent."

Their smirks grew but they said nothing.

"Right," he said. "Well, if you have pranker's block, I have it on good authority—" thanks to eavesdropping, gossiping Hufflepuffs named Susan Bones, who just happened to be friends with Lisa Turpin of Ravenclaw, who worked at the same Herbology table as Harry— "that a certain Cedric Diggory plans to sneak out tonight and meet up with a Ravenclaw of unknown identity. And I heard somewhere that you and Diggory aren't exactly fond of each other after something that happened during a Quidditch match last year." That story had been retold multiple times over the summer, at least three times in Harry's hearing.

The twins' smirks had turned to full-blown grins by the time he was done talking.

"See you around," Harry said, checking to make sure Peeves was gone before he left the room and hurried to the library. He was meeting Theo, Blaise, Greengrass, Davis, and whichever of the Ravenclaws Goldstein could round up to study the wicked complicated theory behind Transfiguration.

Harry didn't hear back from James the next day.

It left a cold feeling in his stomach no matter how hard he tried to convince himself he didn't care what his father thought of him. No matter how hard he tried to believe he wasn't looking for Alektra's dark wings and the orange spots on her head among the flurry of owls bringing post over breakfast on Thursday morning.

Theo and Blaise, who knew about the letter, both sent him unreadable looks. Harry ignored them. His family drama was his own problem.

"Study group after classes?" Harry asked.

Greengrass sniffed. "I suppose you lot could be useful."

"Come off it, Daphne," Theo sniped. "You'd never have gotten the matchstick Transfiguration down if not for Harry and Blaise."

"You wouldn't have, either," she returned.

"At least I'm not pretending I didn't find it useful."

Harry tuned them out and looked at Davis with a raised eyebrow.

She shrugged. "Might as well. I'm having trouble in Charms."

Harry was having trouble with Charms, too. Transfiguration theory was devilishly complicated, and as hard for him to grasp as anyone else, but he could do the practical work just fine. He'd been second of the Slytherins to transform his matchstick into a needle, after Blaise. It was mostly about exerting force of will on whatever you were Transfiguring. Willpower was something Harry definitely did not lack.

They'd managed to rope Goldstein, Sue, and Lisa into coming, and Harry thought he could convince Justin Finch-Fletchley and Hannah Abbott of Hufflepuff to come along. He'd spent an amiable fifteen minutes chatting with them in the school-wide study rooms on the second floor on Wednesday after class. They both seemed decent. He'd rather liked Susan Bones, but according to Lisa, Jules Potter and Ron Weasley were saying Harry was a Dark Lord in the making, and Susan had taken it to heart.

Either way, he was making alliances in Ravenclaw and had a couple potential inroads to Hufflepuff. Which just left—

"How about Longbottom?" he said casually.

Blaise eyed him over his tea. "I've heard he's absolutely pants at anything involving a wand."

Harry shrugged. "He's still from an influential family." Greengrass and Theo broke off their argument to listen. "And he's a prodigy with Herbology, which frankly, Blaise, you and I both need help with."

"I can help," Theo said, looking affronted.

"You're terrible at teaching," Blaise said flatly. "Some advice: if you're trying to explain something, try to deliver a lot fewer sarcastic insults and a lot more actual help."

"Well, it's hard when the lot of you are so stupid—"

"Do you have to bicker with everyone, Theo?" Davis said. "Some of us are trying to be productive."

"And it's not as if you need the practice," Harry added, which got him a laugh from Davis and a smirk from Greengrass, which was as close as she came to expressing actual amusement.

"I suppose Longbottom does come from a powerful family," Greengrass said thoughtfully. "If he does a turnaround and surprises everyone, it'd be useful to be on good terms with him."

"We're lucky," Blaise said dourly. "He's the one decent Gryffindor, and you four met him on the train."

"Speaking of Gryffindors…" Harry muttered, watching Weasley, Finnegan, and Jules come into the hall. They instantly snapped their gazes over to the Slytherin table for their morning glare-at-Harry ritual. Harry just nodded cordially and went right back to his breakfast.

Blaise shook his head. "You're too nice to that lot."

"I'm not going to make a show of my sibling rivalry," Harry said. "If Jules wants to start a fight in here, that's his choice. I'm not going to make it for him."

"Which gives you the social high ground," Greengrass said consideringly. "I had my doubts about you, Potter, but you think like a Slytherin."

Harry grinned at her. He was starting to figure these children out. He couldn't drop his guard, but he was comfortable enough to not be as reserved as he had been to begin with. "Why, Miss Greengrass, that's the nicest thing you've ever said to me."

She smirked at him and looked away.

Harry caught Longbottom after breakfast. The Gryffindor was heading for Herbology and running late; Harry was risking being late to Transfiguration for this, but it might be his only chance to catch Longbottom alone. He didn't want to deal with extending this invitation during Defense with all of Gryffindor watching.

"Longbottom!" he called.

Longbottom looked distinctly nervous. "Yeah?"

"Don't look at me like that, I'm not going to eat you," Harry said. "There's a study group happening with some of us from the train. Library after our joint Defense class today; all the first years have a free period. Want to come?"

"Er—sure," Longbottom said.

"And maybe bring Granger," Harry said, because he couldn't exactly ask about that at the breakfast table without bringing up things better left at rest among the Slytherins, but he still wanted Granger around. First because she was some kind of prodigy if she could memorize the contents of the textbooks, and second because he wanted to poke holes in Greengrass and maybe Blaise's comfort zones. "But if anyone asks, I didn't specifically mention her, okay?"

Longbottom frowned. "Why?"

Harry sighed. "Not all the Slytherins are as dismissive of blood politics as Nott and myself. No one at the study session is going to make a fuss about it, but I can't just ask them to include Granger. You're accepted. She's not, officially, but if she shows up with you…" He trailed off suggestively.

"I'm so glad I'm not in Slytherin," Longbottom muttered, then promptly looked terrified. "I didn't mean—"

"No offense taken. Just suggest to Granger that the two of you come join some of the kids from the train in the library to study," Harry said. "See you in Defense."

He took off, barely making it to Transfiguration in time.

Defense was interesting. The Slytherins and Gryffindors sniped at each other across the aisle before Quirrel started class, and after he'd started, they stayed quiet but hostile. Weasley kept shooting Stinging Hexes at Harry until Harry took advantage of Quirrell's turned back to retaliate with a whispered Jelly-Legs Jinx. Weasley and Finnegan spent a frantic few minutes searching for the counter in their textbooks, which at least kept them occupied for the second half of class.

As soon as it was over, Harry took off for the library. He deliberately arranged the tables for their study group so that they'd have exactly two extra chairs on the end of the table farthest from the seats Greengrass and Davis had claimed last time, figuring that he didn't have to throw Granger in Greengrass' lap right at the start.

It worked like a charm. Harry glared Theo away from the seats he had in mind for the Gryffindors, and Theo took the hint; he and Blaise settled to Harry's right. Justin plopped down cheerfully to Harry's immediate left and the other Hufflepuffs and the Ravenclaws mixed up on the other side of the table, with Greengrass and Davis on the other side of Blaise. Longbottom and Granger were the last to arrive, and while Greengrass shot them both an icy glare, Finch-Fletchley and Sue and Anthony responded warmly enough to make up for it.

"Nicely done," Theo muttered in Harry's ear as they all pulled out their Charms textbooks.

Harry smirked at him. "I've no idea what you're talking about."

"Sure you don't," Theo agreed, and let it go.

Surprisingly, Finch-Fletchley was the other one to pick up on Harry's scheming. He pulled Harry aside after they left the library. "That was decent of you," he said.

"What, exactly, was so decent?" Harry said.

"I know you arranged for Granger to come," Finch-Fletchley said bluntly. "And I know you've probably got Slytherin motivations I'm not seeing, but you just got half the Slytherin first-year class to sit down with two Muggle-borns without a single blood purist comment, which from everything I've heard is really unusual. And by the way, Jules Potter thinks you're some kind of evil sociopathic maniac, and he's been telling the entirety of Gryffindor and Hufflepuff that on a daily basis, but I think he's being stupid and I plan to tell him so."

Harry did not appreciate having his entire plan dragged out into the open like that, especially in front of Blaise, who he'd hoped to keep out of the loop on this one for a bit, but that was Hufflepuffs for you. So open, except when they weren't.

"I didn't know you were Muggle-born," he said, opting for the neutral response. "And I'd appreciate if you didn't go around telling everyone about… today." He hoped the Hufflepuff would be clever enough to realize that would complicate Harry's position in Slytherin. So far, most of the upper years seemed content to ignore the firsties, but some of them were definitely blood supremacists who could make his life difficult if they chose.

Finch-Fletchley nodded. "I understand."

"What," Theo said, "did you think Finch-Fletchley was an old Pureblood name?"

Blaise was silent. Harry shrugged, conceding the point. He hadn't really thought about it, to be honest.

"Speaking of which," Finch-Fletchley said. "You Slytherins are so bloody formal, and my last name is a pain to say. Can we all just go by first names already?"

Harry shrugged. "I will. Can't speak for anyone but myself, though. See you around."

He turned and walked away, deliberately leaving it up to Theo and Blaise whether to extend the hand of tentative friendship to the Hufflepuff.

"Call me Theo," he heard, and then a cheerful goodbye from the Hufflepuff. So Blaise opted out.

Harry suppressed a sigh as the other boys caught up to him, walking with Theo in the middle. It was progress.

"So that was deliberate," Blaise said, his voice carefully neutral.

Harry glanced over at him. Theo's eyes were sharp, tracking the exchange carefully. "I didn't actually know Fi—Justin is Muggle-born." He left the rest unspoken, which was as good as admitting he'd arranged for Granger to be there.

Blaise considered for a few minutes.

"She's a good witch," he finally conceded. "If someone teaches her some manners, I can tolerate it."

Which was about as much as Harry had hoped for.

"Plus, the look on Greengrass' face was priceless," Blaise added. "And I can get behind needling her icy royal highness."

Harry and Theo laughed, and the tension was broken.

Harry waylaid Granger the next morning.

He'd noticed that she either came into the Great Hall alone or with Longbottom most mornings. The two of them both seemed to be loners in Gryffindor. Frankly, Harry didn't care about either of their social lives, but he knew the promise of friends would be a powerful motivator to bring both of them to the study group, and that was all he needed.

He lurked at the base of the Grand Staircase until the main Gryffindor herd went by, ducking back before Jules or Ron could see him, and popped out just in time to catch Granger and Longbottom where they followed a bit behind the rest.

"Granger," he called.

She and Longbottom turned, both looking surprised.

"Potter," Longbottom said.

Harry nodded to him. "Longbottom. Mind if I borrow Miss Granger for a minute?"

Longbottom looked a little startled. "Ah, yeah—I mean no, I don't mind. I'll save you a seat, Hermione," he added, and went into the Great Hall with several backwards looks.

Granger eyed Harry cautiously. "What do you want?" she said, not unkindly.

"Not here," he said, and slipped down a small side hall that wound back beneath the stairs. They were still within shouting distance of the front hall, but out of line of sight for all but the most dedicated searcher, or possibly someone with night vision.

He took a deep breath and looked her in the eye. "Okay, don't take this the wrong way, but your social skills need some work," he said firmly.

She looked annoyed. "Oh, really?"

"I'm guessing you went to a school that valued classroom participation," Harry said, since his experience with Muggle schools was that the good teachers liked active classes and Granger had clearly had a good education.

Her expression went from annoyed to curious. "I did—how'd you know?"

"I was raised by Muggles," Harry said. "I think we were past this on the train by the time you joined us, but I only found out about the wizarding world in July. I spent most of the summer reading and there's a lot of weird little social things that Muggle-borns miss out on. I'm effectively a Muggle-born except I got a crash course in wizard etiquette over the summer and you clearly didn't, and I think it'll be easier for you if you at least acknowledge that."

Granger looked furious for all of a second before she took a deep breath and visibly made herself admit that he was right. "What would you suggest?" she said.

"For starters, stop raising your hand in class so much," he said bluntly. "Again, I know it's a big thing in Muggle public school, but here people take it to mean you think your classmates are too stupid to know the answer. Wait to be called on. And in study groups, try to sound a little less like you're pointing out everyone else's flaws and more like you're helping them improve."

Granger frowned. "I had no idea… about the hand-raising thing." She blushed suddenly. "I've been doing that all week, haven't I?"

"I definitely noticed it in Defense," he said, softening enough to smile at her. "That's the biggest thing. And—look, it's obvious you know the material, and that you're pretty brilliant. I know what it's like in Muggle public schools, but here, you don't need to try so hard to prove it to everyone all the time."

"Fine," she said. "I'll… consider it."

"Ask Longbottom for help," Harry said. "His family's an old one, but he's too shy to say anything to you even if he notices the same things I have." Which he almost definitely had. "It's like traveling to a foreign country. Prepping yourself for cultural differences, even a little bit, goes a long way. I'm not saying change your principles or whatever, but—just try for some culture study."

"Do you have any book recommendations for helping a Muggle-born fit in at Hogwarts?" she asked, a sudden gleam in her eye. Harry recognized it. Theo got the same expression when they started talking about books, and Harry was pretty sure he did, too.

"Several," he said. "I specifically hunted down that section at the bookstore before the start of term. I think there's another study session planned for tomorrow—I can bring a few for you to borrow."

"I'd like that," she said, and smiled cautiously at him. "Thanks."

"You're most welcome, Miss Granger," he said with his most charming smile, the one he used on teachers when he wanted something.

She looked a bit stunned. Harry supposed it was quite a change from the reserve he usually displayed in front of anyone who wasn't a Slytherin.

Granger took a few steps and turned back, frowning. "Aren't you coming?"

Harry shook his head. "Slytherin politics," he said bluntly. "I'm not walking into the Great Hall with a Gryffindor Muggle-born; too many of the upper years might decide to hex me in the halls."

She looked sad.

"Don't pity me," Harry said sharply. "I'd rather Slytherin politics than dealing with the Three Stooges."

"I assume you mean Seamus, Ron, and Jules," she said.

"How clever of you."

She gave him a shockingly condescending look for an eleven-year-old and flounced into the Hall. Harry waited several minutes before he followed and slid almost unnoticed into his seat between Theo and Blaise.

"How'd that go?" Blaise murmured.

"I had to tell her directly that she comes across as a know-it-all and needs to work on her social skills," Harry said. He wasn't surprised that Blaise and Theo had noticed his maneuvering.

"Blunt," Blaise commented drily.

"You'd have to be, with a Gryffindor," Theo said, just as quietly. "If you tried subtlety you'd still be trying to get your point across by lunch."

Blaise and Harry laughed.

That afternoon was their first Potions class. Harry was nervous. Not only did Snape seem to contemplate cursing him into oblivion every time he saw him, but Slytherins were expected to be the best in Potions, and it was with the Gryffindors. Harry wasn't sure he wanted to deal with constant Stinging Hexes from Weasley while standing over a volatile brew. He'd spent the previous night going over the first four chapters of his first-year Potions text in detail.

The two groups lined up in the corridor outside the Potions classroom. Harry deliberately ignored Jules and his lackeys, who seemed to now include Parvati Patil, a girl with mousy brown hair, and Dean Thomas, while greeting Granger and Longbottom politely before turning back to talk to Theo and Blaise.

The door creaked open at one-thirty exactly. The Slytherins took the hint and filed in first, carrying their cauldrons and Potions kits and taking over the work stations on the left side of the classroom. They worked four to a table. Harry, Theo, and Blaise ended up at one, while Davis, Greengrass, Parkinson, and Bulstrode shared another and Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle took the last. The Gryffindors came in and made a lot more noise while setting up their cauldrons and workspaces. Parvati and the brown-haired girl ended up at the same table as Granger and Longbottom, which made apparently none of them happy.

Snape entered from the rear in a dramatic flurry of black robes, spun on his heel at the front of the class, and glared at them all.

Harry had never been in a quieter group of eleven-year-olds.

"Lavender Brown," he said, reading from a scroll.

"Here," the brown-haired Gryffindor said meekly.

Snape moved swiftly through the attendance sheet. He paused before reading Harry's name and paused again when he got to Jules'. "Julian Potter," he said at last. "Our new… celebrity."

Malfoy and the beefcakes sniggered. Harry, Blaise, and Theo kept their amusement to subtle smirks.

"Here," Jules said, obviously furious.

When he finished, Snape snapped the scroll shut and looked them over. He was expressionless but somehow managed to make it seem like he was utterly disappointed with the lot of them. "You are here to learn the subtle science and exact art of potion-making," he began, and proceeded to deliver a dramatic but obviously preplanned speech about the potential glories of brewing that cut off abruptly by calling them all dunderheads.

"Potter!" he snapped, and corrected himself. "The younger!"

Jules looked absolutely furious at the reminder that he was, technically, the younger twin. Harry decided maybe this class wouldn't be so bad after all.

"What would I get if I added powdered root of asphodel to an infusion of wormwood?"

Jules glared. "I don't know, sir."

"Fame clearly isn't everything," Snape sneered. "Let's try again. Where would I find a bezoar?"

Granger's hand twitched. Harry caught the aborted motion and grinned; Blaise did, too, and gave him an appreciative nod.

Meanwhile, Jules was still at a loss. "I don't know. Maybe if you combed your greasy hair out of your face, you'd be able to see for yourself," he said with a sudden grin. "Sir."

Harry's mouth dropped open.

He controlled himself in the next second, of course, because Slytherins were always composed, but he at least wasn't the only one. Finnegan and Weasley were delighted, but the rest of the Gryffindors looked sick, and most of the Slytherins had outright shock showing on their faces.

Snape's eyes glittered with cold triumph. "Fifteen points from Gryffindor for such blatant disrespect," he said. "What is the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

"The difference between shampoo and olive oil?" Jules suggested.

"Another fifteen points from Gryffindor," Snape said.

"I see why my dad calls you Snivellus," Jules said with a sneer worthy of a Slytherin.

Harry thought he could've heard a pin drop.

"Twenty points from Gryffindor," Snape said.

Jules opened his mouth.

"Excuse you, some of us are actually hoping to learn Potions today," Granger snapped, looking outraged. "So if you'd kindly be quiet and let us move on, that'd be fantastic."

"She's got a spine," Theo whispered, eyebrows raised.

"She's in Gryffindor," Blaise retorted in an undertone.

Snape looked Hermione over. "Five points to Gryffindor," he said slowly. "Mr. Potter, are you quite finished?"

Jules didn't look finished, not nearly, but he scowled and wisely shut his mouth.

Snape zeroed in on Longbottom, who looked absolutely terrified. "Let's see if anyone else bothered to crack a book before coming to class," he said with cold disdain. "Mr. Longbottom, can you tell me the difference between monkshood and wolfsbane?"

"Er—they're the—the same plant," Longbottom got out. "A-also known as aconite."

"Five points to Gryffindor." Snape swept his malevolent gaze over the Slytherin side of the room, and Harry somehow knew exactly who Snape was going to pick next. He swept any and all of his nervousness beneath a cool mask.

"Potter the elder," Snape said, black eyes gleaming. "Can you answer either of the questions posed to your twin?"

"I can, sir," Harry said evenly. "Bezoars are found in goats' stomachs and can be used for curing most poisons. Powdered asphodel and an infusion of wormwood are the key ingredients to a powerful sleeping potion."

"Five points to Slytherin," Snape said. "What a fascinating study on the result of nature versus nurture… Can anyone tell me where in the textbook the answers to these questions could be found? Mr. Malfoy?"

"The Draught of Living Death is detailed early in the first chapter," Malfoy drawled, "as an example, I believe, of basic safety techniques. Bezoars were covered in the list of useful items to have around a potions laboratory in case of emergency. Aconite is one of the first entries in One Thousand Magical Herbs and Fungi."

"Look at that, he actually studied," Blaise whispered with fake shock.

"Another five points to Slytherin," Snape said, and waved his wand at the board. Instructions appeared, written in chalk. "Today, we will be brewing the boil-cure potion to assess your basic potions capabilities. Begin."

Harry and Theo swapped slightly nervous looks and began laying out their supplies.

Harry's summer potions experiments, limited and untested as they were, paid off. The reading he'd done helped. He and Theo worked easily together. Theo understood the ingredients better but Harry was better with the process and the combinations; something about the delicate balance of one thing with another reminded him strongly of cooking.

He was actually enjoying himself, right up until Longbottom melted Granger's cauldron.

Within seconds, acid green smoke filled the classroom and the Gryffindors were clambering onto tables to avoid the malevolently hissing potion that spread across the floor. Longbottom moaned in pain as angry boils spread across his face, neck, arms, and legs. Granger whimpered a bit; she'd gotten splashed but not as badly.

"Idiot boy!" Snape said. He waved his wand and cleared away the remnants of the potion. "I suppose you added the porcupine quills before taking it off the fire. Finnegan, get them to the hospital wing."

Finnegan looked all too relieved to escape the dungeon, leaving Thomas to brew on his own.

Harry kept his head down for the rest of class and turned in a potion that he was almost certain matched the perfect outcome. It was just as good as Malfoy's and closer to the ideal orange shade than anyone else's, at least.

Snape examined the vial with an unreadable face when Harry handed it in, then put it with the others without comment.

Theo taught Harry a useful cleaning spell as they cleaned up their workstation. He and Harry stowed their cauldrons and Potions kits in the slots assigned to them in the storage room and joined the rest of the Slytherins for the climb up out of the dungeons for dinner.

The next week, of course, they had to have flying lessons with the Gryffindors.

"I can't believe this," Harry muttered. "Are they trying to start fights all the time? Why do they force the houses that hate each other into group activities?"

"Inter-house unity?" Theo suggested with a perfectly straight face.

"We've already demonstrated that," Blaise said acerbically. He'd overslept and was still in a terrible mood even now that it was afternoon. "In fact, I'm pretty sure we've already found and adopted the only remotely decent Gryffindors in our year. Speaking of which, nice job taming Granger, Harry, she's been much easier to deal with this week."

Harry nodded, barely listening anymore. He was too excited that he'd get to fly again.

The first years lined up next to the brooms on the ground, shuffling around for the best brooms. Malfoy was talking, as usual, complaining to Parkinson and the beefcakes that the school brooms were terrible and his father, who was a school governor, would be hearing about this—

The usual nonsense.

Harry eyed the broom next to his feet. He had to admit, reluctantly, that Malfoy had a point. The broom did look rather sad and battered compared to the Potter Cleansweeps.

"What's the matter, slimy Potty?" Weasley said. "Scared you'll fall into the lake this time? I hope you've learned to swim."

Blaise frowned. Theo, who'd heard about the lake incident, glared at Weasley. "Really," he sneered, "'slimy Potty'? Did you spend all morning coming up with that onel?"

Harry just faced Weasley, held out his hand, and said "Up" as mildly as he could manage with how angry he was. The broom leaped eagerly off the ground and slammed into his palm.

"You were saying, Weasley?" he said.

Weasley looked startled. Then outraged.

"Look at the way his ears turn red when he's mad," Blaise said with the air of someone examining an unusual type of insect.

Jules grabbed Weasley's shoulder before his friend could throw himself across the space between the Gryffindors and the Slytherins. He also looked irate and Finnegan was glowering threateningly at Blaise, but luckily Madame Hooch appeared before things could escalate.

She moved up and down the lines of first years, correcting Malfoy's grip and Weasley's food position and nodding approvingly at Harry, Jules and, interestingly, Davis, who Harry hadn't known had broom experience. They were just about to try pushing off lightly when Longbottom suddenly shot up into the air with a screech.

"Merlin," Harry sighed, watching his Gryffindor ally slip off the broom and hit the ground with a crack.

Madame Hooch fussed over him. Harry heard her mutter something about a broken wrist before she helped Longbottom to his feet, barked at the rest of them to not move while she took him to the hospital wing, and hurried away.

"Did you see his face, the great lump!" Malfoy jeered, and Crabbe and Goyle laughed along with him. Parkinson and Greengrass smirked. Harry would've considered it bad form under any circumstances, but he considered Longbottom something of a friend. So the decision to reach out and yank sharply on Malfoy's ankles with wandless magic was an easy one. Malfoy tumbled face-first to the ground.

"Draco!" Parkinson shrieked, kneeling to help him up.

Malfoy rolled over, spitting grass and livid. "Who did that!"

The Gryffindors were busy laughing. Harry made a point of keeping his open, wand-free hands where Malfoy could see them.

"Look!" he said suddenly, grabbing something out of the grass. "That fat little crybaby dropped his Remembrall!"

Harry remembered Longbottom carrying the thing around; he thought it seemed pretty useless but it was a gift from Longbottom's grandmother. Of course Longbottom had to go and lose it and make Harry's life unnecessarily complicated. He kept his sigh internal, concentrated, and plucked the Remembrall out of Malfoy's hand.

Malfoy turned red and picked it up again, only for it to scoot out of his reach.

"I don't think it likes you much," Greengrass said snidely. Harry could've hugged her and he didn't even like touching other people without a very good reason. He and Greengrass had their differences but she could usually be counted on to knock Malfoy down a peg or three.

"Shut up," Malfoy retorted intelligently, and reached for the Remembrall. It zipped away again.

"I'll take it," Jules said, and elbowed Malfoy out of the way in his hurry to get at the little red sphere. And if Harry knocked it against Jules Potter's forehead hard enough to hurt before slinging it out of sight, well, he could excuse that as just part of the chaos that was Malfoy and Jules fighting over the thing.

"Where'd it go!" Weasley said, looking around wildly.

Jules and Malfoy appeared to be having some hissing argument.

Harry and Theo stepped in to defuse things between Parkinson and Parvati Patil before words turned to curses, and when Granger shouted something about getting in trouble, he spun around and saw, of all the things, Jules Potter and Malfoy rising into the air on their brooms.

"I had no idea flying lessons would be this interesting," Blaise muttered. "I might've actually been looking forward to this."

Harry squinted, and saw Malfoy chuck something into the air. Jules' wand. How on earth had he gotten hold of that?

Jules, of course, sped after the wand, while Malfoy shot back to the group and stepped off his broom. Harry was reluctantly impressed by how deftly Jules caught the wand and pulled up seconds before turning into a pancake on the grass. His brother really was a gifted flyer.

"JULIAN POTTER!"

Jules instantly looked ill.

McGonagall stormed into sight. Harry felt like Christmas had come early. Hooch had threatened expulsion for anyone who didn't follow her orders to stay on the ground. Not that Harry expected them to throw the Boy Who Lived out in the second week of term, but it should still be interesting to see exactly how far the rules got bent for Jules Potter's sake.

" Never—in all my time at Hogwarts—how dare you—might have broken your neck—" McGonagall was nearly rendered speechless with shock and rage. She marched up to Jules like an elderly avenging angel.

"It wasn't his fault, Professor!" Patil protested.

"Enough, Miss Patil," McGonagall said furiously. "Julian Potter, come with me this instant."

Jules fell in step behind her. His face had been pale with fear; now it looked distinctly greenish.

"But Malfoy—"

"I said enough, Mr. Weasley," McGonagall said, which was just the icing on the cake as far as Harry was concerned, and dragged a terrified Jules Potter back into the castle.

Harry tracked Longbottom and Granger down in the library later. "How's the wrist, Longbottom?" he said, slipping into a chair next to the other boy.

Longbottom jumped. "How do you do that," he squeaked.

"Slytherin secrets," Harry said dramatically.

Granger huffed. "Honestly, Neville, you're just concentrating on your textbook, it's not some dark spell."

"My wrist's better, thanks," Longbottom said, rubbing it. "Madame Pomfrey fixed it up."

"Good to hear. Oh, before I forget—" Harry pulled the Remembrall from his pocket and passed it over to Longbottom. "You dropped this when you fell."

"How'd you get it?" Longbottom said in amazement. "We heard all about how it scooted away from Jules and Malfoy."

Harry shrugged and opened his Potions textbook. "I went back and looked." He'd actually whisked it out of sight and then around and into his hand behind his back when everyone was distracted by McGonagall, but Longbottom didn't need to know that.

"Thanks," Longbottom said.

Harry started reading and pretended to ignore them.

The silence lasted for all of three minutes before Granger blurted, "Have you heard what McGonagall did?"

Harry looked up with fake surprise. "Hm? Oh, you mean with Jules? No, not yet—it's only been a few hours, the gossip mill doesn't reach from Gryffindor to Slytherin quite that fast."

Longbottom looked a bit nervous. "Hermione—"

"He's going to find out eventually," Granger said decisively. "Harry—she made Jules the Gryffindor Seeker."

Harry lost the battle to pretend he didn't much care and stared at Granger in outrage. "She bloody what?"

"Yeah," Longbottom said miserably. "It's supposed to be a secret, so don't go blabbing that one around."

Harry was already considering how exactly he'd let slip to Parkinson that his brother was the Gryffindor Seeker in such a way that Longbottom and Granger weren't implicated. "Of course not. But seriously—he must be the youngest Seeker in a few decades."

"A century, actually," Longbottom said.

"How?"

"Apparently rules don't apply to Julian bloody Potter," Granger spat.

Harry frowned at her. "Such language, Miss Granger."

She looked at Longbottom, who responded with an attempt at a glare. Granger pursed her lips. Longbottom tilted his head. She looked away.

Harry decided to rescue them from their pathetic attempts at nonverbal communication. It might've passed for subtlety in Gryffindor Tower, but after only a week and a half with the snakes, he found himself pitying them their transparency. "Clearly, you've got a secret that Longbottom wants to tell me and you, Granger, are trying to keep to yourself. Which implies it's something to do with potential conflicts of house loyalty. Do you want to spit it out or keep playing this clumsy game of eyebrow wiggling?"

Granger glared at him.

Longbottom heaved a sigh. "Apparently, Malfoy's challenged Jules and Ron to a wizard's duel."

"Of course he has," Harry said tiredly. "It's almost definitely a trap. Any chance of you convincing the Moron Exhibits A and B from going?"

Longbottom and Granger shared a concerned glance. "You really think it's a trap?" Granger said uncertainly.

"It's a very Slytherin thing to do," Harry said. "I could ask Malfoy, but if the duel's tonight that wouldn't help. And no, I'm not going to sneak out and play interference. I prefer my evenings without a side of detention, thanks. Speaking of which, it's near curfew and I have a long walk back to my dorm."

As soon as he walked back into the Slytherin common rooms, Harry marked Pansy Parkinson and worked his way over to her as subtly as he could manage. He paused by the end of the couch she was sitting on and pretended to page through an extremely dry book about the history of cauldron making that was lying on an end table. "Parkinson," he muttered.

To her credit, she didn't look up from her books, and her posture stayed relaxed. She'd been trained well. "Potter," she said, just as quietly.

"You didn't hear this from me." he said. "According to Ron Weasley's bragging, Jules Potter's been made the new Gryffindor Seeker after today's display."

That made Parkinson react, but Harry thought it'd fly mostly under the radar. She at least kept her head down. "What?" she hissed.

"It'd be a shame if the Slytherin team didn't hear about this," Harry mused. "Such an unfair advantage Gryffindor would have… and I bet Jules Potter'd be annoyed to learn his best made's carelessness let the secret out."

"I don't need you to tell me what to do with this," Parkinson snapped softly, but she shot him an appraising glance. Harry just smirked at her, closed the book on cauldrons, and walked away as casually as he could manage.

He had to congratulate Malfoy on a clever plot. Even if he didn't like the other boy, he had to give credit where credit was due.

The next morning, it was all over the school—Jules Potter was the new Gryffindor Seeker.

The entire Slytherin Quidditch team was up in arms, along with half of Ravenclaw's. Even Cedric Diggory put aside his bitter rivalry with the Slytherin Seeker, seventh year Terence Higgs, to protest the bending of the first-year brooms rule for Jules Potter's sake. They got absolutely nowhere, because Harry could see even from his exile at the Slytherin table that Albus Dumbledore considered Jules Potter a saint in the making. Fred and George followed Jules around all day to keep him from getting hexed, glowering at everything. Harry caught them in the entrance hall and learned they'd been assigned "babysitting duty" by the Gryffindor team's captain. Neither of them seemed happy about it. Marcus Flint, the Slytherin captain, paused to thank Harry on the way out of the Great Hall after lunch. "Not that anyone'll hear it from me," he said quietly, "but I know you tipped the Parkinson girl off. Appreciate it."

He swaggered away, flanked almost instantly by Pucey and Bletchley and Bole, but Harry couldn't help grinning. Having Marcus view him with vague approval instead of outright disdain was definitely a step in the right direction.

"Harry!" someone hissed.

Harry paused, looking around. He knew this corridor; he'd sneaked out three times already to explore the castle on his own. He'd found the secret passage halfway along that connected the first-floor common study spaces to the Charms corridor on the third floor two nights ago. That made it easy to spot Jules Potter and Finnegan lurking in the shadows.

"Look at you being all sneaky," Harry said, sauntering over to them as if it were normal to be meeting his estranged brother in dark corners thirty minutes before curfew. As if he didn't have his right arm tensed, ready to flick his wand from his holster. "Are you sure you were sorted right, brother mine?"

Jules flushed and Finnegan glared. "Shut it," Jules growled, "I know it was you who told everyone."

"I'm fairly sure that was Weasley. I only heard about it this morning at breakfast from the third years."

"Yeah, well, Ron swore up and down he didn't say a word outside the common room, and since he's not in the house of liars, I'm gonna believe him!" Jules said, voice rising with every word.

"Keep it down, will you?" Harry said irritably. "Not all of us can use celebrity status to dodge the rules. I had nothing to do with your little secret getting out." Lie. "You can blame Gryffindor lack of discretion for that one." Truth, technically. "Now if you don't mind, I have places to be."

"You'll get yours at the match, you Slytherin filth," Jules growled.

"Oh, and if you could stop trying to convince people I'm a Dark wizard, that'd be fantastic," Harry said sarcastically. "Especially since I'm eleven."

"Well you hang out with Death Eaters."

"Again," Harry said with the tone of someone explaining something rather simple to a small child, "we are eleven. It's not like we'd even be of use, so we're hardly targets for dear old Death Eaters, and on top of that, do you honestly think I'd be happy to grow up running around killing people?" He paused. "And since you clearly can't see what's in front of your face, I'm hardly on good terms with Malfoy and on shaky footing with Greengrass, Parkinson, and Bulstrode at best. Just because we don't hex each other every five seconds doesn't mean we get along. Goodnight."

Seething, he took off down the hallway.

Granger and Longbottom only got around to telling him about the trapdoor and the three-headed dog two days later, when Harry thought to ask about the 'wizard's duel.'

"We're pretty sure it had something to do with this," Granger said breathlessly, waving a newspaper at Harry. He plucked it out of her wildly waving hand and skimmed the article on the Gringotts break-in. Apparently the thief had been going after some of the most secure old family vaults in Gringotts. Yet nothing was stolen, and the author seemed to be implying that the target wasn't gold.

Harry frowned, thinking of the package James had collected for Dumbledore. The Potters were obviously close with the headmaster; he was constantly stopping Jules in the hall to ask about classes and such, and Harry had seen James' distinctive Great Horned Owl bring the headmaster letters at least three times. It wasn't surprising that Dumbledore would trust James Potter to guard something valuable in his vault. Something that, if Granger was to be believed, might now be under the watch of a monster in the third-floor corridor.

He told her and Longbottom to stay out of it, that whatever was going on had to do with Dumbledore's plots and nothing to do with first-year students, but he was fairly sure they wouldn't. If nothing else, Jules and Weasley had both been there, and they'd never let it alone.

He did go to Hannah Abbott, who loved magical creatures of all kinds, and picked her brain for anything she knew about Cerberi.

Things died down a bit by the time Halloween appeared on the horizon. Harry approached it with a sense of dread and an increase in his nightmares now that he knew it was the night his mum was killed. About the only positive side of his insomnia was that he got a lot of practice creeping around after dark and came to know the halls of Hogwarts better every week. There were loads of secret passages that most people didn't know about, including one that inexplicably led from just outside the Slytherin common room up to the kitchens but only on Thursdays between one and three in the morning, and it gave him plenty of time to practice with the ash wand. He was still using the holly one in front of everyone, but the ash wand called to him in a way he couldn't explain. He developed a good repertoire of low-level hexes and jinxes and started teaching himself Protego. The shield spell, like a stunner, needed more magic than he really had at the age of eleven, but he sweated and fought headaches and kept trying until he could cast an uncertain wavering shield for a few seconds at a time. Once every hour. He also made a point of working ahead in Charms, where he had the most trouble. If not for his nighttime practice and Sue and Anthony and Granger's help during study sessions, he'd be struggling to keep up.

On top of all his homework, Harry kept reading through his books from the Potter library and Flourish and Blots. He quickly developed a habit of plugging his ears with wax to block the soporific effect of Binns' voice and just reading history books during History of Magic. Theo and Davis copied him before long, and even though Granger looked scandalized at the thought of not paying attention in class, Harry noticed that she started checking history books out of the library, too.

Potions remained one of his favorite subjects. He could ignore Snape's lurking and looming and leering—honestly, the man wasn't even as threatening as Uncle Vernon, at least Harry was mostly sure Snape would never hit him—and focus completely on brewing. Theo didn't have the "touch," as Snape called it, and was mostly content to let Harry lead the way in exchange for Theo and Neville dragging Harry through herbology homework. They worked well together, and on top of that Snape often humiliated Jules, Finnegan, and Weasley, which meant Harry genuinely looked forward to the class.

He should've known it wouldn't stay that way.

The day of the Halloween feast, the Slytherin and Gryffindor first years trooped down to the dungeons after lunch and filed into the classroom. Harry set up his things with Theo and Blaise like usual, ready to attempt the Energy Potion.

Snape swept in on an even thicker cloud of malevolence than usual. "Potter," he snapped. "Potter Major. You'll be working with Longbottom today. I'm curious how Longbottom will do without Granger hissing instructions in his ear."

Longbottom winced. Harry did his best to keep his face blank but his dismay was probably visible to the Slytherins, at least.

"Have fun with that," Malfoy snickered quietly. Blaise and Theo said nothing, just sent him sympathetic looks.

"Weasley," Snape said, "move up here to the front. Mr. Malfoy, you'll be joining him. Miss Parkinson, take Weasley's place with Mr. Thomas."

Poor Dean Thomas looked like he'd rather drink the sludge Longbottom created last week than work with Parkinson, whose grin promised bad things to come. Harry set his Potions kit down on the table next to Longbottom's cauldron harder than necessary and tried not to think about all the ways this was going to go wrong. Parkinson working with a Gryffindor, Weasley and Malfoy at the same table without one of the more level-headed Slytherins or Gryffindors to run interference, and on top of all that, Harry was going to ruin his O average in the class with whatever nastiness Longbottom managed to create.

He took advantage of the noisy shuffle as students went for the stores and put water bases in their cauldrons. "Longbottom," he hissed, grabbing the other boy's shoulder tightly, "I have an O in this class right now. I'm not going to lose that because of whatever curse you have about brewing. You do what I tell you when I tell you to do it and other than that you do not touch the cauldron, the ingredients, the table, or your wand. Got it?"

Longbottom gulped. "Y-yeah."

"Fantastic." Harry released him and turned on his most charming smile. "Chop the valerian root, please. Even chunks."

Longbottom nodded hard and started cutting.

Harry watched him mangle a few slices and stifled a sigh. "Okay, let me," he said, and elbowed Longbottom out of the way. Part of him wanted to slow down, show Longbottom that his grip on the knife was wrong and it made him clumsy and resulted in the roots being cut into ragged irregular lengths, but he was doing the work of two people this class, apparently, which meant he had no time to be patient and nice.

His hands were a frenzy of motion. Harry thanked Merlin he'd gone over the potions textbook so many times. He had a decent feel for the pattern of ingredients and processes by this point, and several times he was able to make educated guesses about pending disasters. When Longbottom somehow managed to dump too much powdered snake fang into the cauldron, it started turning an alarming shade of pink, but Harry grabbed a pinch of crushed beetles and threw them in before it got too bad. The color stabilized and he added beetles in tiny amounts until it returned to normal, and until the quiet magic of it felt right under his hands.

They were the last group to finish, but Harry corked a vial of Energy Potion that he thought was nearly as good as anything he'd have managed with Theo and handed it to Longbottom to pass to Snape. He looked at his Gryffindor friend's trembling hands and made sure to cork a few extra vials before vanishing the contents of the cauldron. This turned out to be an excellent idea, since Longbottom somehow managed to trip and drop his vial, shattering it on the floor. Harry saw Malfoy snickering and tucking his wand away, resolved to do something about that later, and wordlessly hauled Longbottom to his feet before passing one of the extra vials to Snape.

He'd been so focused on keeping his and Longbottom's potion from exploding that he only heard after about the detentions served to Jules Potter and Ron Weasley for 'cheek,' and the fact that Dean Thomas had walked out looking shell-shocked and apparently didn't talk for an hour. Harry was only kind of curious what exactly Parkinson did to him.

As they left the classroom, Harry fell in with Blaise and Theo but didn't even bother trying to follow their conversation. His brain was numb with exhaustion.

"He's bloody useless," he heard someone grumble. "A disgrace to our House. And Granger's no better, insufferable know-it-all, no wonder she hasn't got any friends—"

Harry whipped around without thinking, wand out. "Volculeus," he whispered without thinking, pointing his wand towards the voice as he spun around.

Ron Weasley stumbled back, hand clapped to his chest where the stinging hex hit him. This happened just as Longbottom stumbled over his own feet and Granger pushed past them all, tears running down her face, to vanish up the staircase.

"I think she heard you," Harry said coldly.

"You git," Ron spat, and went for his own wand—

Only to find Blaise's hovering steadily in his face.

Jules and Finnegan were starting to move, too, but Theo drew his wand and covered them, and to Harry's shock, so did Parkinson. The rest of their classmates had drawn ahead and didn't seem to notice the stalemate.

"I really wouldn't," Harry said calmly. "Weasley here said something rude, he got his, can we all move on?"

Jules scowled, but somewhere in his thick skull, a neuron fired, and he had the sense to retreat. His friends followed with many a backwards glare.

Parkinson lowered her wand and turned her attention on Harry, who tried not to feel nervous. He was mostly successful.

"You're a lot more interesting than I expected, Potter," she said with a smirk.

"Thanks," he said, and gave her the smile that had edges to it.

Parkinson went into the Great Hall without looking back, and Blaise and Theo started to follow them, but Harry—

He suddenly and sharply realized, again, that today was the anniversary of his mum's death, and in that room was several hundred people, was Jules' stupidity and Slytherin word games and he suddenly didn't have the energy for an of it.

"You guys go ahead," he said finally. "I need… some air."

"What?" Blaise looked confused. "Harry, it's the Halloween feast—"

"Idiot," Theo said. "Think, Zabini."

Blaise was silent for a second. Then— " Oh."

"Yeah, oh," Theo muttered. "I'll come with you, Harry, I'm not that hungry."

Blaise looked torn.

"Go on," Harry insisted, waving at him. "I know how you are about that food."

"I'll bring some desserts down to the dorms for you," Blaise promised.

Theo watched Harry impassively for a few seconds. "Want to walk for a bit?"

Harry shrugged. It sounded better than going down to the common room and sitting, so they started wandering, Theo a steady, quiet presence. The sharp-edged boy managed to settle himself for once and just pad along in silence at his side. Harry was annoyed at himself for how much of a comfort it was.

He wondered when he'd come to consider Theo a friend and not just an ally. He wondered if he even knew enough about friendship to tell what a friendship was.

They must've been walking for forty minutes when running footsteps snapped Harry out of the trance he'd fallen into.

He and Theo didn't even glance at each other before drawing their wands in unison—

Neville Longbottom hurtled around the corner and ran straight into them, sending all three boys to the floor.

"Potter? Nott? What—never mind. Troll—dungeons—gotta find Hermione!" Longbottom babbled.

Harry picked himself up off the ground. "Longbottom!" he snapped. "Pull yourself together."

The shaking, terrified Gryffindor shut his mouth with a click and stood up.

"What happened?" Harry did his best to channel Snape.

"Quirrell—burst into the hall. There's a troll. In the dungeons. Parvati said Hermione was crying in a bathroom up here on this floor, she doesn't know about the troll, I have to warn her—"

"So you sneaked away from the Great Hall to handle it yourself instead of, I don't know, telling a prefect maybe?" Theo snarled. " Gryffindors."

"We're here already," Harry said. "It'd be faster to just grab her and head back down to the Great Hall. Wait—what about the Slytherins?"

"Staying in the Hall."

"Perfect. Bathroom's this way. Let's go." Harry took off at a quick jog. Theo fell in behind him, still grumbling about Gryffindors. Longbottom stumbled along behind.

They turned a corner and Harry froze.

A huge, beastly humanoid lumbered down the hall. It paused, half in and half out of a doorway, and for a second Harry was frozen in panic, thinking it'd heard them—

It continued into the room, and Theo lunged forward to slam the door shut, and Harry whipped out his wand and cast a "Colloportus!"—

A scream echoed from inside the room.

"That's the girls' room," Longbottom choked out.

Harry canceled his locking spell so hard the door blew in off its hinges, which meant it slammed into the troll's back and distracted it from Granger, who was cowering on the floor in the back corner of the bathroom. That was the plus. The minus was that its attention focused on the boys.

"Longbottom, get Granger," Harry snapped out, again drawing on Snape's influence, and something in his tone of voice jolted the Gryffindor into action. He fell to his knees and crawled along under the sinks while the troll bellowed and advanced on Harry and Theo.

"You have a plan, right?" Theo hissed.

Harry bit his lip. "Kind of."

He lifted his wand, thinking of their Charms lesson from that morning. "Wingardium leviosa!"

A large chunk of broken ceiling tile floated up off the ground. The troll stared at it dumbly. Harry flicked his wand, concentrating as hard as he could, and smashed it against the troll's head. Bits of stone flew. The troll didn't even seem inconvenienced but at least its anger was redirected towards the wall. It hauled off and hit the wall with its club.

"Top this," Theo said with a vicious smirk, and cast his own levitation charm. On the troll's club.

It floated up in the air, hovered for a second, and slammed down on the troll's head when Theo slashed down with his wand.

The troll bellowed again and staggered back.

Longbottom and Granger came scrambling out from under the sinks, running for the door.

The troll noticed the movement and threw a chunk of broken wall at them. It hit the ground a little to Granger's left. Stone pellets bit into her legs and she yelled in pain and went down hard on the tile. Harry stumbled; Longbottom slammed into him, and they both went down. Harry's wand clattered to the floor a ways away.

" Bloody hell," Theo said, and then he was levitating Granger up and forward, and Longbottom was diving for the door, and if they could only get out of this room alive—

But Harry could see the troll aiming with another bit of rubble. And this time, it looked too alert to miss.

And his wand was still ten feet away.

Harry turned on the troll and thought, fire.

Its tattered clothing burst into flames.

The thing roared again, and stumbled back when it tried to rise. Apparently even its thick skin wasn't totally resistant to fire.

Harry gritted his teeth, thinking only about how this thing had tried to hurt him, had tried to hurt his friends—

He smelled burning hair. Hear roars of pain.

Registered dimly that his wand might get lost in the chaos, picked it up and moved it back to his hand, cast a verbal Incendio and watched the flames lick higher.

"Potter!" someone shouted, and dragged him backwards out of the room.

Harry blinked, hard.

And choked, and vomited, because the smell of burning flesh was everywhere.

"Oh that is nasty," he heard Theo say, as if from a very great distance.

"Have some compassion, he just saved our lives!" Granger said, voice shrill with fear and adrenaline.

Harry stared vaguely the puddle of his sick on the floor. He couldn't remember ever being this tired. Why was he…

Oh. Right. That was a lot of wandless magic.

Hopefully he could pass off his condition as shock.

"Mr. Potter," a stern voice said.

Harry knew that voice; he knew to listen to it. He snapped his head up and straightened his back. "Yes, sir."

Snape blinked, the only visible sign of surprise before his usual sneer slipped back into place. "Would you care to explain yourself?"

"I didn't want to go to the banquet," Harry said numbly. "I—Halloween."

"His mum," Theo said evenly, stepping in when it was clear Harry's brain had lost its grip on language. Harry was suddenly and fiercely grateful for his friend. "We were walking about. Longbottom found us—told us there was a troll in the dungeons and that Granger was crying in the bathroom and wouldn't know about it and that the Slytherins were waiting in the Great Hall. We were on this floor anyway; we figured it'd be faster to grab Granger and head down to the Great Hall again than go straightaway and send a prefect back for her."

If Harry hadn't been so tired, he'd have been impressed with how well Theo spun the story to paint their decision in the best possible light.

McGonagall, Flitwick, Quirrell, and the headmaster skidded around the corner seconds later. Theo had to repeat his story. The teachers clucked and fussed over four first years taking down a mountain troll—and burning it alive, no less. Quirrell stutteringly declared it very dead. Harry couldn't find it in him to feel regret. Or much of anything.

He was so tired…

The headmaster twinkled his eyes at Harry and declared that of course any eleven-year-old would be tired and in shock; Incendio was a third year spell and it was impressive that Harry had been able to cast it enough times to actually harm the troll, and how he shouldn't feel bad because he'd been in shock and didn't know what he was doing…

Harry wasn't so far gone that he told the headmaster the whole truth. He'd burned the troll alive mostly with wandless magic. He'd only cast one Incendio. And he'd known exactly what he'd been doing.

Professor Snape passed Harry a small vial. Harry drank it down and felt marginally better.

"Energy potion, sir?" he croaked.

Snape almost stopped frowning. "Yours, in fact. It was very neatly brewed. Particularly in light of your… handicap… from today."

Longbottom, behind Snape, scowled at being called a handicap. McGonagall was fussing over him and Granger and bustling them away towards the tower.

"Points," Harry said. He remembered something about points from a minute ago.

"Yeah," Theo said with a smug grin. "We got twenty points for Slytherin. Gryffindor got ten, just because of Longbottom's courage or whatever."

"He deserves it," Harry said.

"It was stupidly brave to come alone," Snape said with a firm tone of superiority, helping Harry and Theo to their feet.

"Yeah," Harry said. "But he came. For… a friend."

Snape rubbed his temples. "Mr. Potter, you are in shock, and not thinking clearly. Mr. Nott, help him back to the dungeons and get him in bed; he'll likely sleep the full night."

"Yes, sir," Theo said.

"Thanks… professor," Harry said, struggling to remember Snape's title.

The Potions Master looked like he was fighting to keep from rolling his eyes. "Preferably before the rest of Slytherin House beats you down there and turns Mr. Potter's condition into a cog of the rumor mill, Mr. Nott."

"Right. Yes, sir," Theo said, and started hauling Harry down the corridor.

Harry let himself be hauled.

Christmas Interactions

Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

6

Predictably, the entire school spent four days speculating wildly about the first floor bathroom that smelled like cooking rotten meat, the troll that hadn't actually been in the dungeons, and the supposed involvement of Harry Potter, Theodore Nott, Neville Longbottom, and Hermione Granger.

Harry and Theo fended off questions from their house mates by saying they got caught up in the crossfire when a Gryffindor did something stupidly brave for a friend. The other Slytherins sniggered and believed this excuse quite readily. Granted, it was true.

The Ravenclaws asked sharp questions, and Justin watched Harry wearily retell the story with clever eyes, and Harry was pretty sure at least Justin and Sue could tell he was downplaying the story—he was in fact, very much so, since he didn't want to get a reputation quite yet as the sort of person who burned trolls alive in bathrooms—but they didn't push, for which he was grateful.

Theo was actually the hardest to deal with.

"I thought I saw you drop your wand," he said one day, randomly, while they were working on an essay for Charms.

Harry hoped the slight flinch of his hand went unnoticed. "Yeah, but I picked it up again. Obviously."

Theo looked at him with glinting eyes and stopped asking questions.

In all this, Harry had almost forgotten about his ongoing feud with Jules.

He was forcibly reminded in Defense a week after Halloween when Jules loudly and pointedly struck up a conversation with Weasley in which Weasley repeatedly drew attention to Jules' Seeker status. And how young he was. And how everyone said he was so spectacularly talented. And how he was going to carry the Gryffindor team to the Quidditch Cup for the first time since Charlie Weasley left.

Harry spent three hours in the library looking up the various anti-jinx protections on Quidditch brooms and how one might conceivably get around them.

The next Saturday was the first Quidditch game of the season.

The entire first-year Slytherin cohort packed into the stands together. Even Malfoy and Harry's rivalry (Harry had not forgotten Malfoy tripping Neville in potions) was set aside for the sake of cheering Slytherin House.

They were all decked out in green and silver, and one of the fifth years came around and taught them a charm that sprayed green and silver confetti from their wands. This almost instantly resulted in a game that involved spraying confetti in each other's hair. Malfoy was particularly dismayed when Greengrass dumped a load of it directly onto his perfectly slicked back blond head.

The Weasley twins' friend, Lee Jordan, was commentating. He announced the Slytherin team— "Flint, Pucey, Wright, Higgs, Bletchley, Derrick, and Bole!"—to loud cheers from the Slytherin section with mingled support from Ravenclaw, and the Gryffindor team— "Wood, Spinnet, Bell, Johnson, Weasley, Weasley, and Potter!"—to even louder cheers from all the other students. Harry rolled his eyes at the favoritism and lost himself watching the game.

The teams were neck and neck for ages. Flint fouled Jules in a collision that Harry was pleased to think would probably leave his brother bruised. Spinnet nailed the penalty shot, unfortunately. The Gryffindor Chasers were a machine, and their Keeper was a maniac, and the Weasley twins weren't called the "terrible twins" or "Weasley terrors" around the Slytherin common room for nothing. And then there was Jules, who was clearly a natural on a broom even if he did look shockingly small compared to Terence Higgs.

And because apparently every aspect of Jules Potter's life just had to be as dramatic as possible, someone started hexing his broom. "Someone" being Professor Quirrell. Harry aimed his binoculars at the teacher section as soon as Jules' broom went bonkers, assuming correctly that only an adult killed in the Dark Arts would be able to jinx a well-warded high-end broom. Sure enough, there was Quirrell, maintaining eye contact and muttering under his breath—but Snape, too.

Harry had his wand out ready to do something drastic when he noticed Hermione worming her way into the space beneath the stands.

"Merlin," he muttered, "she's too clever for her own good."

Hermione rushed along—knocked Quirrell headfirst into the teachers in front of him—Harry checked on Jules, whose broom had abruptly stopped its bucking—back in the teachers' section, Hermione set fire to Snape's robes and disappeared into the back of the raised viewing section.

Jules spat out the Snitch and waved it about in the air and the match dissolved into chaos.

Theo stared at Harry, who was ignoring the post-match chaos and focusing his binoculars on the teacher section. "What just happened?" he said.

Harry lowered the binoculars and looked at Theo and Blaise. "Quirrell just tried to kill Jules Potter. Hermione set Snape on fire and saved Jules' life."

Both boys blinked.

"Come on," Harry said suddenly, noticing that Hermione and Neville were following Jules, Weasley, and Finnegan off the pitch. "I'm pretty sure they're all convinced Snape is a would-be murderer, we need to set them straight."

The Slytherins easily tracked their Gryffindor allies and enemies to the gamekeeper's hut. Harry had been down here once for an extremely awkward tea that he'd rather not repeat and hadn't been invited back. This time, he didn't even knock, just paused long enough to identify the voice inside as Hermione's and pushed the door open.

Jules was on his feet in an instant. "You slimy snake—"

Then he registered Theo, who was looking around with glorious contempt, and Blaise, who wore his trademark I'm–laughing-at-a-joke-you're-too-stupid-to-get smirk. Harry could see Jules' anger ratcheting up a few notches into "speechless with rage" territory.

"I'm going to guess you're mad because you think my Head of House just tried to kill you," he said, trying to emulate Theo's composure.

"How'd you know that?" Finnegan demanded. "Were you in on it?"

"Really?" Harry sighed. "Fratricide? Come on, Finnegan, it's not as if Slytherin has nightly meetings where we plot Gryffindors' untimely deaths."

"Believe it or not, we actually have more important things to do than obsess over you," Theo said. "Like study, which most of your lot could stand to try."

Hagrid looked alarmed at the rising tensions. "Hey, let's—let's keep it civil, all righ'?"

"Of course," Harry said pleasantly. That, he was good at—acting pleasant when he didn't feel it at all.

"Harry, Theo, we—we don't just think Snape tried to kill Jules," Hermione said. "I saw him—he was holding eye contact and casting nonstop, all the marks of jinxing a broom—"

"I know," Harry said. "I looked into it." He paused to smirk at Jules. "But, of course, what you didn't notice is that Professor Quirrell was also holding eye contact and muttering spells."

"That only tells us one of them was jinxing the broom and the other was casting a counterjinx," Hermione argued.

Harry nodded. "Exactly. Which is why, as soon as you knocked Quirrell face-first into Professor Sprout in your mad dash for Snape, I checked on Jules. His broom was fine, after Quirrell's concentration was broken and before you sidetracked Snape by setting him on fire."

"Nice touch, by the way," Blaise added. He'd warmed slightly to Hermione once she learned to be careful about accidentally shoving her genius in everyone's face all the time and calmed down in class.

"Hold up," Finnegan said. "Hermione, how come you're going by first names with Nott?"

"How come you get to control who her friends are?" Theo retorted.

Neville blinked; apparently either the freedom to choose your friends was a foreign concept or he was surprised at Theo coming to Hermione's defense. Or both. Harry suspected both.

Finnegan flushed a dull crimson that reminded Harry unpleasantly of his uncle. "Because you lot are—are nasty, that's why—"

"We fought a troll together," Hermione snapped, rounding on the Stooges. "If that doesn't put us on a first name basis then I don't know what would!"

"Also, Finnegan, that was ages ago," Harry said. "Do try to keep up." He looked around. Weasley looked stunned, Hagrid confused into silence, and Jules actually thoughtful. "Questions? No? I'll be going, then."

"Wait," Jules said suddenly. "You—Harry, Snape was out skulking around on Halloween. We think he was going after whatever—whatever's hidden in the third floor corridor."

"You mean beneath the Cerberus?" Theo said.

Jules shot to his feet. "You know about this?"

"Well, it was an educated guess," Theo said. "Thanks for the confirmation."

Harry was watching Hermione and Neville. "You know something else, too," he said. "That you're hiding."

"Hagrid… may have let slip that it has something to do with Nicholas Flamel," Hermione admitted.

Hagrid leaned forward, suddenly angry. Harry flinched back a step and reflexively dropped a blank mask over his face. The room felt half as small as it had a moment before and he had to fight the urge to bolt. He stared resolutely forward and ignored the concerned looks he was getting from Blaise and Theo. "You were supposed'ta forget abou' tha'!" Hagrid said.

"Sorry," Hermione said, not looking very sorry.

"I've heard enough," Harry said, then looked at Jules. "I hope it's clear that as a first year, you have no business going near whatever's going on in the third floor corridor. Or interfering with the plans laid by people loads older and smarter than you. Or just smarter. Meaning don't mess with my plans, either. Later, Hermione, Neville."

Getting out of the hut was an enormous relief.

He and Blaise and Theo were halfway up to the castle when Blaise coughed and said, "I'm guessing you'd prefer I not tell them Nicholas Flamel is the creator of the Sorcerer's Stone," he said.

Harry choked.

Theo laughed. "There's that Slytherin discretion."

"I think I can guess what the dog's guarding," Harry said darkly. "Should we take this to Snape?"

"He hates you," Theo said bluntly. "He might hate your brother more, but he hates you. It'd be better coming from Blaise or me."

"But you should come," Blaise said. "To answer questions. Just, you know, stand there and look sorry for existing."

"Oh good," Harry said. "I don't even have to fake anything."

"Has anyone ever told you your sense of humor is rather dark?" Theo drawled.

Harry thought. "No, actually."

"Well, your sense of humor is rather dark," Theo said.

"Noted."

Snape scowled as soon as they walked into his office. "Yes?"

"Sir," Theo said respectfully, "we thought you should know that Jules Potter, Ron Weasley, and Seamus Finnegan know about whatever it is the Cerberus on the third floor is guarding, and they know it's connected to Nicholas Flamel. They're also partially convinced that you tried to kill Jules Potter today during the match."

Snape very precisely laid his quill on his desk and focused the full strength of his glare on the three of them. Harry was suddenly glad he'd agreed to let Theo take point on this one. It felt rather like Snape could look into his mind.

"How did you come by this information?"

Theo explained that their Gryffindor acquaintances Granger and Longbottom had told them what the Three Stooges learned about the Cerberus, and then Harry's observations from the students section, Hermione's arson attempt—though he left her an unnamed Gryffindor—and finally Hagrid's latest slip. He finished with, "Blaise knows a bit about alchemy, Professor, so we're pretty sure the thing the Cerberus is guarding is the Sorcerer's Stone. Hermione Granger's clever, and I wouldn't be surprised if they figure it out eventually, but we didn't say anything."

"Thank Merlin for small mercies, then," Snape sighed. He looked at Harry with an unreadable gaze. Harry suddenly thought with prickling certainty that he shouldn't make eye contact with Snape for very long, and looked down. "Five points to Slytherin for your discretion and for thinking to bring this to a professor. Potter, a word. Nott and Zabini, you may go."

"We'll wait outside," Blaise muttered on the way out.

Harry braced himself as the door closed on his friends' heels.

For a few long seconds, Snape remained silent and Harry's eyes stayed aimed at the edge of his desk. Then—

"I've noticed that you don't seem to receive owl post, Mr. Potter."

Well that was random. Harry probably didn't do a good job keeping his surprise, suspicion, and irritation off his face. "No, sir," he agreed.

"Is there a reason you're refusing to meet my eyes, Potter?" Snape's voice absolutely dripped condescension.

"I—I try to follow my instincts, sir." And Harry's were screaming that he ought not make eye contact. Interestingly, they weren't reacting with fear to Snape's anger. At least, not like Hagrid's. He was afraid of Snape, of course, but no more than any self-respecting Slytherin.

Another heavy pause. "Your instincts are clearly not inherited from your father, then," he said drily.

Now that was a test. Probing for a reaction. Harry figured out what was going on here—Snape was trying to figure out the relationship between Lord Potter and his Heir. He kept his face carefully blank. "I've only known him a few months, sir, I really couldn't say."

"Mmm. You may go."

Harry nodded and left as quickly as he could without looking like he was running.

Weasley and Malfoy's sniping only got worse as November crawled towards the winter holidays. Gryffindor marched around in obnoxiously high spirits after the Quidditch victory, and Weasley seemed to consider it a personal pride thing even though he'd had nothing to do with them winning. He was even more puffed up about it than Jules, which was saying a lot.

Jules at least seemed to have decided on a truce between him and Harry. They ignored each other in class and kept their respective house mates from hexing each other blind. If Harry pretended not to notice some of Malfoy's hissed spells shot down the corridor at the Stooges, he could always just say that he didn't exactly hang out with Malfoy.

So Jules had slid down from the To Do List to the Watch List. This left Malfoy at the top of Harry's To Do list. He'd been an insufferable prat to Neville for ages and strutted around the common room like a peacock, annoying even the fifth years and pretending he was at the top of the pecking order among the firsties. He was not, but so far he hadn't tried ordering anyone but his crew around, and until he made the first push Harry was willing to stay out of the Slytherin power plays and let him have his delusions.

When it came to Neville, though, Harry wasn't going to just let it lie.

"I know for a fact you finished the essay on powdered spine of lionfish two days ago and we haven't got any other Potions homework," Theo said flatly. "So I'm a little confused why you've spent four hours with four Potions books, all of which are third year level or higher."

Harry didn't look up. He'd taken over almost an entire table in the library with scribbled calculations, predictions, and notes he'd taken during an experimental brewing session the previous evening that dragged on for three hours. "Aren't you observant," he muttered absently.

"You're not going to explain what this is, are you?"

"Nope."

Theo heaved a sigh.

Blaise wandered over just in time to catch it. "What was that for?"

"Harry's been spending too much time with Snape," Theo said mournfully. "He's gone all cryptic."

Blaise surveyed the table. "That looks horribly boring and I'd much rather go back to my Charms practice. Theo, you coming?"

"Wouldn't miss it," Theo said, but his attention lingered.

Harry ignored them both. He had work to do before double Potions with the Gryffindors tomorrow.

He deliberately dropped his cauldron when pulling it out of the storage space, setting up a clatter and bringing a derisive scowl and a sneering order to work with Longbottom from Snape. Harry pretended to be annoyed and got Neville started carefully smashing snap-pod seeds with a mortar and pestle. Harry kept half an eye on him, a very small fraction of his attention on his own work, and the rest of his attention on Weasley and Malfoy. Who almost invariably ended up brewing together when Snape got annoyed with Harry and put him with Neville.

They were brewing the Numbing Potion today, which came out a thick green-gray paste and could be spread on skin for powerful temporary loss of sensation. Harry had spent loads of time going over the ingredients in detail, brewing the potion, and experimenting with adding or removing certain ingredients, until he struck on the right inputs. It was a relatively minor change but it would have a dramatically different result.

"No, no—stir slower," he muttered to Neville. "Add a quick reverse stir—here, like this." He grabbed Neville's hand and guided the boy into a single anticlockwise stir before pushing him back to clockwise. The potion, which had been veering distinctly away from the olive green it should be at this point and towards sickly mustard yellow, turned back to olive.

"Thanks," Neville muttered, and kept stirring, slower this time. Harry was relieved to see that two months of drumming potions knowledge into Neville's head every time their study group met, which was several times a week now, were starting to pay off. If slowly.

He glanced over at Malfoy and Weasley's cauldron again, tuned out their hissed argument and quiet insults, and studied the shade.

Olive green with just a hint of gray. Perfect timing.

Harry cocked his head, concentrated, and just as Weasley turned to get a knife and Malfoy looked down at his book, he wandlessly lifted three toad livers and a cup of Brazilian spotted slug slime from Weasley's open Potions kit into their cauldron.

The livers and slime slipped into the cauldron without a splash.

Harry bit his lip. That was the easy part; the toad livers would negate a finicky combination of three other ingredients that created the numbing effect. It left the base effect—targeting nerve cells—intact. The slug slime did the opposite of the previous affecting ingredients; it'd react with the leftovers of that reaction plus the toad livers to send targeted nerves a message of brutal pain. Harry had tested it on himself and knew it was not a pleasant experience.

So now he had to make sure Weasley and Malfoy got to share the fun. Which was the hard part.

On a whim, he glanced over at Jules and Finnegan's cauldron, which was bubbling away merrily and nowhere near the drab olive-gray the potion should be right now. Harry checked on Neville and was pleasantly surprised to see that while it wasn't really the right color and probably wouldn't do much actual numbing, Neville had managed to more or less follow the instructions without supervision and not blow up the cauldron. An inert potion was better than an explosive one.

It figured that Harry was studying how to cause potions disasters at the same time as Neville was finally figuring out how to avoid them.

He swept a little extra calcite into Jules' cauldron, causing it to hiss and spit a few yellow sparks, and while everyone was distracted, Harry turned his focus back to Malfoy and Weasley.

A large chunk of mashed wormwood lifted itself out of Malfoy's potions kit and into their cauldron.

The next second—chaos. Malfoy and Weasley's cauldron exploded and sprayed both of them with the modified Numbing Paste. Neville jumped violently. Harry's targets promptly started yelling in pain and trying to wipe it off, which of course only smeared it around more. Malfoy had taken the brunt of it and appeared to have gotten some in his eyes, but Weasley was pretty solidly spattered, too. Lavender Brown, Parvati Patil, and the beefcakes all caught a bit of the fallout and started complaining about the pain, adding to the noise.

Harry looked down and discovered that Neville had managed to knock over their cauldron; he scrambled back away from the spreading Numbing Paste, which had been passable before but was now reacting with leftover ingredients on the worktable and turning a nasty hissing shade of purple. Bullstrode and Parkinson's cauldron spilled as well.

A loud BANG from Snape's wand silenced everyone except Weasley and Malfoy. Snape waved his wand and vanished the potion covering both of them; with it gone, their nerve cells stopped sending shrieking messages of pain to their brain and they resided to hiccupping sobs. Malfoy had actual snot on his face and had never looked so disheveled.

Snape force-fed each of them a Calming Draught, vanished the two spilled potions, checked over the others who'd gotten a bit of spray, and declared the day a failure on which no one would be graded. He'd assigned everyone an essay on the properties of calcite; now they had another one to make up for the lost lesson on the history, brewing process, and applications of the Numbing Potion. He examined the remainder of Weasley and Malfoy's potion in their cauldron while the rest of the class scrubbed down their work stations and put everything away.

Only then did he sit them all back down and glare balefully. "Mr. Weasley. Mr. Malfoy. Did either of you add toad liver to this potion?"

"W-what?" Weasley stuttered. "Toad liver? N—"

"Why would we have added toad liver?" Malfoy said. "It's not one of the ingredients, sir."

Snape ignored him. "Brazilian spotted slug slime? Mashed wormwood?"

Harry's respect for the man's Potions skills grew.

"No," Malfoy and Weasley said, looking confused and shaky instead of just shaky.

Snape turned on the rest of the class with the darkest scowl Harry had ever seen. "It seems," he said with quiet malevolence, "that we have had a deliberate and carefully planned act of sabotage today."

Harry kept his face blank. He didn't look at Theo or Blaise and knew they'd have the good sense not to turn around and stare at him.

"You will all submit your wands for examination with Prior Incantatem of the last hour," Snape said, eyes lingering on Harry, "and if I find any evidence of magical interference with Weasley and Malfoy's potion…"

He trailed off menacingly. They all got the message.

Harry solemnly presented his wand to Snape when it was his turn in line. He was careful to avoid eye contact with his Head of House while Snape touched his own wand to Harry's and said softly, "Priori Incantatem."

Ghostly shapes left his wand, showing the practice Harry did with Switching Spells that morning before leaving his dorm, the counterspell for the Jelly-fingers Jinx, and a quick Reparo Harry had used to fix a torn page of his notebook. Nothing that would indicate he'd been magically levitating Potions ingredients around the classroom.

Snape let him go at last. "This is… acceptable," he said, sounding like each word had to be dragged out of his mouth. "Who did you use the Jelly-fingers counter for?"

"Longbottom, sir." Harry still needed to figure out the caster. Neville thought it was an upper year Ravenclaw but hadn't been sure.

Snape pressed his lips together. "Mm. You may go."

"Thank you, sir." Harry slipped out of the classroom.

He was immediately accosted by Blaise and Theo, who glared him into silence and went straight for a nearby unused room.

"You did that," Theo said flatly.

Harry crossed his arms. "What makes you so sure?"

"Beyond the fact that you've been obsessively researching potions for three days and Snape was clearly impressed with how clever and pointed that sabotage was?" Blaise said drily.

"Circumstantial evidence," Harry said, a term he'd picked up from listening to Aunt Petunia's crime TV shows.

Theo shrugged. "And I saw you glaring at Malfoy's cauldron right before a couple toad livers and some slug slime ended up in that cauldron. Wandlessly."

Harry looked at both of them, debating with himself. He'd hoped to keep his wandless magic to himself longer and was a little annoyed at himself for not being more careful. "So what if I did?" he said slowly.

"It was brilliant," Theo said. "I'm not torqued off about the sabotage; it was well done and Malfoy's a prat. Very Slytherin of you. Just— wandless magic?"

"I had a lot of time on my hands when my stupid relatives locked me in a boot cupboard for days on end," Harry said flatly. Blaise, who hadn't gotten most of the details about Harry's life with the Dursleys, blinked with shock. "Once I figured out the weird things that happened around me were linked to me, I started trying to control it."

"Do something," Blaise said.

Harry's fists clenched as he concentrated; last period had been tiring, and he hadn't slept much the last few days, but—

Blaise slowly levitated a few inches up off the floor. He yelped in surprise. "Put me down!"

"That wasn't a very Slytherin reaction," Harry said, letting him down.

Theo's mouth was open slightly. "Harry, do you—do you understand how rare this is?"

"I looked it up," Harry said, wishing they'd stop making such a fuss. It wasn't like he'd defeated an undefeatable curse. That was his brother. This was just… stubbornness, mostly. "It's pretty rare, but I can't do more than a few really basic things, and I get wicked headaches and super tired if I try too much—I'm getting a headache now, actually…"

"Still," Blaise said. "That you can control it at all…"

Harry really didn't like how they were both looking at him in a way that threatened to cross the line from impressed to awed. He didn't want to make people feel awe. At least, not these people. He wanted Theo and Blaise as—friends. If that's what they were.

"The troll," Theo said suddenly.

Blaise frowned. "What?"

"I knew you didn't have your wand!" Theo said, snapping his fingers. "No wonder you were so tired—I can cast Incendio just as well as you, and it doesn't leave me completely loopy—you set the troll on fire wandlessly, didn't you?"

"…maybe," Harry said slowly.

Blaise whistled.

"Don't go getting a big head," Theo said. "Just because you're some kind of wandless prodigy doesn't make you better than us. You're still pants at Charms and History of Magic."

"Everyone is pants at History of Magic," Harry protested, but the tension was broken, and he was immensely relieved that they managed to move on with their day without treating him differently.

Harry cornered Malfoy in the bathrooms the next day.

"Potter," the other boy said when he noticed Harry leaning silently against the wall by the door. "What do you want?"

It was accompanied by his usual sneer.

Harry smirked at him. "Good to see you've come back from the hospital wing, Malfoy."

Malfoy glared. He'd been irate when Snape marched him and Weasley up there to make sure their Potions dousing hadn't caused any side effects. "What do you care?"

"I don't," Harry said flippantly. "Just giving you a warning. In the spirit of Slytherin house unity and all. I'd focus on Weasley and the other Potter, stay away from Neville Longbottom, and quit calling Granger a Mudblood to her face if I were you. Otherwise things might get… painful."

Malfoy looked confused, then shocked, then angry, then—angry still, but also a little afraid.

He grinned at Malfoy, a sharp-edged thing he'd learned from Blaise. Malfoy's face got a little paler.

"See you at dinner," Harry said cheerfully, and turned around, shoulders prickling as he turned his back on Malfoy, but no hexes came for him.

His gamble paid off.

"How'd that go?" Theo said when Harry rejoined him and Blaise in the common room.

"I think he'll redirect his squabbles towards the Gryffindors who are actual prats from now on," Harry said, already pulling out his books. He had a Charms essay to write and Astronomy work to do before class. "Potions should go a lot easier without Malfoy needling Longbottom every ten minutes."

"And we get to watch the Malfoy versus Weasley Show," Blaise agreed. "Works out beautifully."

He wrote James again in mid-November. It had been ages since he had even attempted to communicate with his father, and with Jules still giving Harry the cold shoulder and Christmas approaching, he figured it was time to do something.

James,

I haven't heard from you all term. I'm going to assume you're mad at me for being in Slytherin. (If not, please tell me why you never wrote back, and you can ignore the rest of this paragraph.) I didn't choose this House; the Hat put me here and when I argued it wouldn't listen.

Technically that was a lie but Harry was willing to tell some minor lies if that's what it took to stay on decent terms with his father for now.

Some of the Slytherins are decent. Theo Nott's a good guy. He's not prejudiced like some of the others. Blaise Zabini isn't a huge fan of Muggle-borns, but he's coming around. I still think Malfoy's a git. He's always being followed by these two beefcakes named Crabbe and Goyle. If you know their fathers—is being huge and stupid genetic for those families?

I'm in a study group that meets a couple times a week. We've gotten thrown out of the library four times already for getting too loud, mostly when Theo and the Ravenclaws get into it about something. Theo likes arguing and the Ravenclaws like debating. The other kids in the group are Daphne Greengrass, Tracy Davis, Neville Longbottom, Hermione Granger, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Sue Li, Anthony Goldstein, Hannah Abbott, and sometimes Lisa Turpin.

It was almost painful to be so obvious about the fact that his study group contained students of all four Houses, two names James would recognize as Muggle-borns, and several others who were probably halfbloods, but Harry wasn't certain his point would get across if he wasn't horribly blunt. James was a Gryffindor with no tact.

Neville and Hermione and Theo and I took down a troll on Halloween. Theo and I were walking around, and Neville came out of nowhere babbling about a troll in the dungeons and how Hermione was in the bathroom and wouldn't know about it. We decided to grab her on our way back to the Great Hall, except the troll wasn't in the dungeons; it was on the first floor and it almost killed us. We made it out and even got House points out of it.

I bet you already heard about it from Jules, but the Quidditch match was super dramatic, and he flew really well. He'd definitely talented. I'm going to try out next year, but I doubt I'll be as good.

Another painful sentence.

Harry chewed his lip, thinking about how he wanted to phrase this.

There's a list going around of everyone who wants to stay over the holidays. I'm going to assume you don't want me at home since I haven't heard from you all term. If I'm welcome at Potter Manor for Christmas break, owl me back and I'll take my name off the list, but for now I'm marked as planning to stay here.

-Harry

Theo snatched it out of his hands and read the letter. "That's nicer than he deserves," he muttered, passing it off to Neville, who scanned it and nodded agreement. The three of them were sitting in the library, waiting for the rest of their study group to show up so they could prep for the Transfiguration mid-year exam.

Harry grabbed it back. "I'd rather have somewhere to go over the summer, thanks."

"If he won't have you at home, you'd be welcome at a bunch of places," Theo said. He hesitated. "Including my house, but—our fathers aren't exactly on good terms. It could get… complicated."

Neville looked confused. "Wouldn't he be happy to take in Harry, then? To make James mad?"

"Not necessarily," Harry said. "I'm in Slytherin but I'm still a Potter, and the Notts and the Potters don't get along." He couldn't believe he was yet again explaining subtleties like this to Neville. "It'd drive my father even farther away from me if I went to one of his sworn enemies' houses for the summer. And it would cause tension between Theo and his father if Theo insisted on giving me a place to stay, which would be a rude thing to ask on my part. Best for everyone involved if I just… I don't know, I could just stay at the Leaky Cauldron for a few months. Maybe I could ask Goldstein; he's always going on about how empty his house is over the summer…"

"You—you could stay with—me," Neville stammered. "If—if you need to. I'm sure Gran would love to have you."

Harry met Theo's eyes when Neville blushed and looked at the table. It was almost too easy.

"You sure, Nev?" he said uncertainly. "I wouldn't want to inconvenience you…"

"It's not," Neville said, looking immensely relieved. Possibly he'd been expecting Harry to laugh him into silence. "Really. The house is huge and empty, and—and there's not that many kids around. Plus—your dad wouldn't be able to complain, I've been hanging around Jules for ages—"

"Thanks, Neville," Harry said. His sincerity wasn't faked exactly, but—well, he was definitely expressing it way more than he usually would. "I can't tell you… I mean, this means a lot. I've been really worried about next summer. And about—about Dad not wanting me at home, I mean…" He bit his lip.

Neville patted him awkwardly on the shoulder. "I mean—that's what friends do, right? Help each other out?"

"Yeah," Harry agreed gratefully.

Theo winked at him.

Neville turned back to his Transfiguration book, the tips of his ears a bit red, and Harry returned Theo's faint smirk.

James Potter never replied. Harry tried to tell himself that he didn't care and signed his name on the "staying at Hogwarts" sheet with a flourish.

Theo and Blaise swapped glances.

"Oh go on, I know you lot want to go home," Harry said, more snappishly than he'd meant to.

"You could come with either of us," Blaise said.

"Right. Go stay in Italy with you and your mother, who my father hates, or go stay with Theo, whose father mine hates even more?" Harry shook his head. "We've already gone over all the reasons those won't work."

They had, in detail, around and around in circles, before settling on the Longbottoms as a safe option and running their little con on Neville. And by "con," Harry meant planning out how to ask a friend for a favor in the politest way possible with the best odds of success.

His friends paused.

"For Merlin's sake," Harry said. "Seriously. I'll be fine."

"There's a whole gaggle of Weasleys staying and apparently Potter's hanging around to keep Ronald company," Parkinson said, sitting down rather abruptly at their table in the common room. "You might actually want backup. Which is why I'm staying here."

Harry eyed her warily. He didn't know what to make of Parkinson. She was too smart to be over there hanging onto every word out of Malfoy's mouth, which told him either she was hitching her social chariot to his, was running a long game on him, or had some kind of familial obligation like the one he'd gathered bound Crabbe and Goyle to the Malfoys. "I don't know if I trust you to watch my back, Parkinson," he said slowly.

"I'm hurt," she said, smirking. "We Slytherins stick together, after all."

Harry narrowed his eyes at her.

"It won't be so bad," she said. "I hear you're on good terms with the Weasley twins."

There it was. "I am," Harry said, fighting back a smirk of his own. "Let me guess, you want something from them in exchange for being my backup over the holidays."

Parkinson sighed. "And after I went to all the trouble to lead into it."

"I'm not in the mood for word games," Harry said dismissively. "What's the bargain?"

"They've an uncanny ability to creep around," Parkinson said. "If you can find out who Lucas Roberts' secret girlfriend is from them, I'll put my name down and back you against the Weasleys."

Harry cocked his head, considering.

"It's not a bad exchange, actually," Blaise said.

Parkinson pouted. "You say that like you're surprised I can drive a good deal, Zabini."

"Merely surprised you made it with Harry," Blaise said cuttingly.

"He's got something I want," she said, grinning. "Pull with the Terrors."

"Deal," Harry said.

They shook on it.

Three hours later, after trading the incantation for a jinx that would yank someone's trousers down Harry had learned from a Slytherin fourth year, Harry walked back into the Slytherin common room and walked past Parkinson without so much as looking at her on his way to Theo and Blaise. However, a particularly canny observer, such as Theo Nott, would notice that a bit of paper fell out of Harry's hand and neatly onto Parkinson's half-finished Charms essay. Parkinson swept it into her hand under the guise of rolling said essay into a neat scroll and read it while she tucked the scroll into her bag.

Elizabeth Osborne, Gryffindor fifth year.

That same clever observer would also notice that no matter how good Parkinson was at hiding her feelings, especially for an eleventh year, she looked positively gleeful as she collected her things and left the common room.

Theo glanced at Harry, who'd had his back deliberately turned, and shot him a subtle wink.

Harry endured Malfoy's pointed comments about him not having family to go back to for two days before he got a hint of a cold shoulder from Greengrass and Davis and decided he ought to put a stop to it before his standing in Slytherin, always slightly precarious, took a turn for the worse. The next time Malfoy made a crack, Harry turned around and coolly said, "At least none of my relatives are in Azkaban, Malfoy. I'll take my family over yours any day."

Malfoy fired the first hex. Harry dodged and retaliated with one he'd learned from the twins. Malfoy promptly lost the ability to speak any language but Swahili and consequently to cast spells. One of the prefects warned them about dueling in the common room, but without any real force to it since the "duel" was over almost as soon as it began. Harry had learned ages ago that most spats could be settled with magic as long as nothing except the participants sustained any damage. Malfoy stormed away in a towering rage and Harry received approving nods from Greengrass, Blaise, and, surprisingly, third year Chaser Adrian Pucey, who'd been sitting nearby.

Blaise and Theo boarded the train with almost the entirety of the school and headed south to meet their families, promising to write at least once over the holidays.

On the first morning, Harry and Parkinson found themselves in the common room after breakfast with only two other students and no homework. Parkinson decided to start teaching Harry wizard chess and trounced him thoroughly. Apparently it was tradition for one of the seventh year prefects to stay over the holidays if any other Slytherins were also—this year it was Spencer Wright, who was occupied with studying for NEWTs but nevertheless managed to take an hour or two to coach the first years in chess. "We'll keep doing this during the holidays, just so I don't have to listen to you argue with your pieces all the time, Potter," he said coolly, but Harry appreciated it anyway and resolved to send the prefect a box of chocolates for Christmas.

His Christmas shopping gave him trouble. Theo was easy; Harry simply filled a box halfway with Theo's favorite sweets and topped it off with a set of Muggle novels about Greek gods and a boy whose father was Poseidon. All of their covers were Transfigured to look like volumes one through five of a complete compendium of Brazilian flora in case Theo's father had opinions on whether his son should be reading things written by Muggles. Blaise got another box of candy and a wand holster like Harry's except nicely engraved with snakes and a stylized BZ, since he was always going on about how convenient Harry's looked. Beyond that, though, Harry was at a loss.

He sat down in front of Parkinson at breakfast on the second day with a determined expression. "I need advice on Christmas gifts," he said bluntly. "You've the best grasp of what people would like, and frankly, I've never been in a position to give or receive gifts before."

Parkinson eyed him cannily. "And what do I get in exchange?"

Harry played the trump card he'd bargained for the night before. "Immunity from the Weasley twins for the rest of the year," he said instantly.

She coughed midway through a bite of toast and glared at him, probably for making her do anything so unladylike. "How did you manage that?" she demanded.

Harry smirked. It hadn't been all that hard; he'd heard from his Hufflepuff friends that Fred and George had charmed Cedric Diggory's broom to coat its grip in oil whenever Diggory got near a Snitch. It was an open secret but the twins got off scot free. He'd simply threatened to go tell Percy Weasley about the prank if the twins didn't grant immunity to a person of Harry's choice. "Let's just say having connections in other Houses has its benefits," he said. "You in?"

"Done," Parkinson said instantly, as Harry had known she would. A week ago, any Slytherin who walked through a certain door on the fourth floor ended up with brilliantly red hair for a full day, and there wasn't much Parkinson considered as valuable as her hair. She whipped out a quill and parchment, shoved her breakfast things aside, and eyed Harry with an expression that made him suddenly wonder if he'd regret giving Parkinson an opportunity to dish out advice, which was a favorite pastime of hers. "For starters, let's figure out who you're getting gifts for."

He flatly refused to tell her what he'd gotten Blaise and Theo, since the Muggle novels were a complication no one needed and he couldn't very well reveal Blaise's gift and not Theo's. They worked their way through Harry's list of acquaintances. He ended up sending sweets and simple but personalized letters to Hannah Abbott, Justin, Anthony, Sue Li, and Lisa Turpin; he skipped sweets for Hermione since her parents were dentists and instead found a homework organizer that was charmed to remind her of due dates and proofread any of her essays that she put into it with a convenient Copying Charm he wrote on a bit of paper and tucked into the front cover. For Neville, Harry and Parkinson settled on sweets plus an actual collection of books detailing the weirdest plants discovered on each of the seven continents over the last five years, which made Harry laugh. He refused to explain the joke.

The girls were harder. Harry dug his heels in about jewelry until Parkinson flatly told him that he should remember what he'd read about pureblood culture and buy them each a bracelet. He let her pick the bracelets, since he hadn't the faintest idea what was tasteful and what wasn't, made sure that neither one of them was too ridiculously expensive, and sent them off along with more sweets and slightly more formal Christmas letters.

The twins were easier. Harry placed a large owl order with Zonko's joke shop, wrapped the box without even opening it, and smirked at the thought of all the havoc the twins could cause with its contents. Everyone knew the Weasleys were short on gold. He highly doubted either of the twins would be able to afford so much from Zonko's on their own. Parkinson looked disapproving, but since she was already on the safe list, she couldn't exactly complain.

Harry stewed for a while before he brought up his father and brother with Parkinson. He didn't want to air his family's dirty laundry for her, but it wasn't exactly a secret that he was on poor terms with his biological family—he was here over Christmas for Merlin's sake—so he finally just took a deep breath and went for it. They argued for an hour before settling on a gold cloak pin for James shaped like a lion and a red scarf with a warming charm for Jules.

Their truce continued with amiable meals, chess lessons with Wright, and then more games played just against each other. Harry got progressively, if slowly, better. He also started sneaking out to fly in the mornings before breakfast. He'd gotten quite good at creeping around the castle undetected, thanks to his insomnia, and he reckoned he knew the secret passages of the school better than any of the other Slytherin first years. Parkinson—Pansy, now, apparently—figured that out almost right away and negotiated another agreement by which she'd bring any particularly interesting tidbits she learned to Harry, spread rumors how and when he wanted, and keep any of his secrets she learned to herself for the rest of first year if he spent an hour a day for all of break showing off his secret passages. He agreed, and only kept the most secretive, obscure, and useful to himself. He fully expected her to be selective with what information she passed him, no matter what their agreement was. It was the Slytherin way.

He figured out pretty quickly that she might be only middling skilled with a wand but she was brilliant and slightly terrifying about the gossip mill. She was a first year, for Merlin's sake, and it seemed like she had dirt on half of Slytherin House.

Harry did his level best to avoid Ron and Jules. Fred and George—he was almost certain Fred was the slightly wilder twin, though he couldn't be sure—were a constant presence, somehow managing to walk on the knife's edge between hilarious and irritating. Harry picked up a few entertaining jinxes from them and in turn taught them one of the simpler ward spells from the book Theo had sent him last summer. It was maybe the fourth closest to legal in the book. The twins shot him knowing smirks when he warned them not to let a teacher hear them cast it.

They roped him into a snowball fight. Parkinson sat it out but Harry teamed up with the twins against Ron, Jules, and Seamus, who lost spectacularly. Harry knew that was mostly due to the almost psychic bond between the Weasley twins, but he definitely got some satisfaction out of wandlessly mashing a snowball into Jules' face. He only left when the twins decided to charm snowballs to bounce off the back of Quirrell's turban. Harry didn't fancy detention over the holidays.

On Christmas Eve, Wright pulled Pansy and Harry and the fourth year Eva Price aside and told them all their gifts would be in the common room since there were only four of them and it was Slytherin policy to never let anyone celebrate Christmas alone. Price just nodded and left. Wright sternly made Harry and Pansy sit back down and spent an hour and a half drilling them on basic spells to detect harmful enchantments, cursed objects, and booby-trapped or malicious gifts. "We're Slytherins," he said. "We make enemies. It's not unheard of for Gryffindors to send nasty bits our way, which completely violates the spirit of the hols. If anyone does that, come to me, we'll figure out who it is and how to get them back once term starts up again."

"Unofficial rule nine," Pansy said, smirking. "Always get even."

Wright grinned. Harry was forcefully reminded that he'd made Prefect in Slytherin House for a reason. "Exactly."

Harry thought it was all a bit foolish, since he probably wouldn't be getting gifts anyway, but set himself to learning the spells with vigor. Any new wandwork was an advantage.

He rolled out of bed the next morning at his usual hour and headed out to the common room with a book, fully expecting to be the first one there. Instead, he was confronted with a new version of Pansy. Her entire face was bright with excitement and she was literally bouncing on the sofa.

"Who are you and what've you done with Pansy?" he said. "Pansy would never be so unladylike as to bounce."

"Oh, stuff it, Potter," she said. "It's Christmas. Honestly, if I didn't think I'd get hexed, I'd have already gone to wake Wright and Price so we can open presents already."

That was when Harry realized there were four piles of gifts by the hearth, and one of them had a package facing him with Harry Potter written on it in bold black script. His eyes flew wide. "I got presents!"

"Well what were you expecting?" Pansy sniped. "You bought gifts for loads of people."

"I—er—I guess I didn't think about it," Harry said sheepishly. "I've never gotten presents before. Well. Once a coat hanger and an old sock."

Pansy stared at him. "The Muggles didn't treat you well, did they."

Harry shrugged, suddenly awkward. He didn't want to break unofficial rule eight: when it came to blood politics, live and let live. As far as he could tell, being Muggle-born didn't make you any worse a wizard or witch, just gave you a culture shock handicap to overcome. He'd been subtly helping Justin and not so subtly helping Hermione figure this out for months, after all. And he didn't think that all Muggles could be as bad as the Dursleys were. Just based on statistics. But stepping up to defend Muggles was a great way to end up with jinxes hitting your back on the way in and out of the common room, so the most Harry ever did was retaliate cleverly and quietly whenever one of the first years used 'mudblood'.

"They… weren't great," he said finally. "My aunt and my mum didn't get along, I think, and my aunt took it out on me. Most of the kids in school seemed all right. My cousin's a beast. He looks like a pig trying to pretend to be a boy."

Pansy shook her head. "I can't believe they let a pureblood grow up Muggle," she said. "It's a tragedy."

"I'm not technically pureblood," he reminded her. "My mum was Muggle-born."

"She at least had magic," Pansy said. "Step above Muggle, right there. And by all accounts, she was a brilliant witch for all that. She had more NEWTs than anyone in her year. And your family on your father's side is as pure as they come."

Harry had first learned this over the summer in his cultural research, and now as then it made him uncomfortable to realize he'd be as inbred as Malfoy if James Potter hadn't had the good sense to marry a Muggle-born. He promptly changed the subject. "Have you started checking for booby traps?"

"I tried," Pansy said. "Didn't find anything. I'm not sure if that's because there's actually nothing or if I'm just doing the spells right. Charms are about the only wandwork I'm any good at."

"I'm pants at it," Harry said. "Come by our study group sometime; if you help us out with Charms we'll swap for everything else."

She shrugged like she didn't care either way, but Harry definitely saw some interest there. He ran through the checking spells on his own pile of gifts, trying to stomp down the queasy-excited feeling in his stomach at the thought that anyone had bothered to send him gifts, and turned his wand on Pansy's pile without being asked. He was using the ash wand today, since it seemed to do better than the holly with jinxes, curses, ward spells, and anything remotely Gray or Dark. The holly was better for Transfiguration, Charms, and shields.

Eva Price stumbled into the common room not long after, hair messy and eyes half closed. She mumbled a good morning and made herself a large mug of tea from the set in the corner. By the time Wright joined them, Price was on her third cup and looked a lot more awake.

Wright sat down and eyed the first years, who were both clearly excited and trying their best to be polite, well-mannered Slytherin children.

"It's Christmas," he said, and shredded the wrapping paper of his first gift, smirking at them. "To hell with manners."

Harry and Pansy needed no more prompting. They both tore into their piles.

Harry's was the smallest, but he couldn't bring himself to care. He was still shocked he'd gotten things at all. Neville had sent him a book about rare Potions written by a great-grandfather who was the last Potions Master in the Longbottom family. Another book came from the twins, except this one was spelled so that if you pressed a bit of parchment in it, said parchment would become disguised as another page of the textbook until you wanted it back. Greengrass, whose family, Pansy mentioned in an undertone, owned a clothing design retailer, sent Harry a massive box of clothing which he took to mean that his fashion sense was somewhat lacking. He glanced inside and could tell the things were all high quality, charmed to grow at least two sizes with him, and tasteful colors and styles. He couldn't wait to go through it more later.

Davis sent him sweets and a hat pin in the shape of a curling silver snake. Theo had somehow gotten hold of a pair of shoes spelled to resize to fit the wearer and make no noise while they were worn. I've got my own set, his accompanying note said, and now Blaise has, too. Should be useful for creeping up behind Longbottom. Blaise, in turn, gave Harry sweets and a handsome raven-feather quill. He got yet more sweets from most of the members of the study group, plus a pack of ballpoint pens from Hermione cleverly spelled to pretend to be quills if you told them "I'm a wizard". He showed the gift to the other Slytherins, none of whom had seen a pen before and were reluctantly fascinated. Wright even traded a package of Dungbombs for one of the enchanted pens. "Bloody useful for taking notes in class," he said, "NEWT year and all, I can't believe no one's shown me these things before…"

Price sniffed. "I suppose the Muggles had to get some things right."

Harry was rather surprised to find a book on Quidditch Chaser solo drills lying unlabeled and unwrapped in his gift pile. He cast an extra few spells on it to make sure it wasn't something else disguised as a book that most first years would drool over before he picked it up.

"You think no one's noticed you sneaking out to fly in the mornings, Potter?" Wright said. "The team's going to need more decent Chasers next year, and Malfoy's more suited to Seeker than you are. I've been watching; you fly like you were born to it. I'm going to drill you ragged for the rest of the holidays. No way am I going to graduate without someone who can at least try to replace me."

Harry tried to hide how happy he was at that prospect. The favor of the seventh-year Prefect and star Chaser would help cut down on the looks he got from the upper years that ranged from wary to outright hostile, and if he could get on the Quidditch team next year he'd be even more secure. Plus, it was a chance to fly.

He probably didn't fool anyone.

Harry reverently set the book aside and grabbed the last package, an oddly lumpy thing wrapped in brown paper. He opened it and paused. "What in Merlin's name…"

The sweater inside the package was knitted of soft wool, and it looked both homemade and wonderfully warm. It was green with a silver H on the front.

"Sweet Merlin, what'd you do to get a Weasley sweater?" Price snickered.

Harry held it warily by the shoulders. "Is that what this is?"

"The Weasley matriarch makes them every year for all her kids," Price said sneeringly. "I didn't know you were on such good terms with the blood traitors, Potter."

"Just the twins," Harry said. "Mostly I think they think it's funny watching Ron Weasley turn red whenever he picks a fight with me and then can't find any comebacks."

Price shrugged and lost interest.

"Don't wear that," Pansy said in a low voice.

"I'm not an idiot," Harry muttered, setting it aside. "Only in my dorm. It looks really warm."

Pansy eyed it critically. "I suppose."

He definitely surprised Pansy with the filigree necklace he'd bought from the same catalogue she used to find gifts for Greengrass and Davis. "Harry!" she said, immediately starting to extract it from the box. "How'd you know I liked this one?"

"I saw you keep flipping back to the page," Harry said smugly. "You left the catalogue in the common room. I was worried you'd already asked your parents for it…"

"They say one piece of jewelry from them a year 'til I'm thirteen," Pansy said, rolling her eyes. Harry was still not used to the much more vibrant version of Pansy he'd been seeing since the holidays started and the rest of their year shipped off home. He wondered for the first time if she had reasons of her own for wanting to not go back to her parents for Christmas, and had just been using the deal with him as an excuse to stay. "And I already picked out a different one for that."

For his part, Harry was pleased with the soft leather fur-lined waterproof gloves Pansy gave him, and set them with the rest of his gifts. Looking at the pile made him feel warm inside, almost enough to bury the prickling awareness that he hadn't gotten anything from either his father or his brother.

Pansy and the others clearly didn't miss it, either, but at least none of them had the bad grace to bring it up. It was one of those moments where Harry was fiercely glad to be in Slytherin, where everyone understood that families got messed up and when they should back off and leave you alone. Even Neville probably would've tried to talk about it and then Harry would've had to restrain himself from hexing the other boy into silence. He might've only had up to a mediocre second year's knowledge of hexes, but it was definitely more than anything Neville could cast. Not to mention Neville's extremely fragile confidence. Harry losing his temper with Neville would not end well.

All the meals at Hogwarts were good, but the house-elves had really outdone themselves for the Christmas Eve feast. Harry ate until he was positively stuffed and pulled a wizard cracker with Pansy. "Oh, look, a chess set!" she said excitedly. "Excellent, I'll take the Wart-Growing Kit, I can use that on Bulstroke and you can stop borrowing my spare pieces, they're starting to complain that I don't like them—oh sweet Merlin—"

Harry followed her horrified expression and choked on his treacle tart. While they were distracted with the banging and smoke-emitting wizard crackers and their own desserts, the professors had been drinking. Dumbledore was wearing a flowered bonnet in place of a hat and had two white mice on his shoulders. Harry was just in time to see a red-faced Hagrid kiss McGonagall on the cheek. He fully expected her to hex him, but she giggled.

Harry turned to Pansy, feeling slightly green. "Tell me I imagined that."

"If you had, I'd worry about your mental state," she returned, looking equally disturbed.

The rest of the holidays passed in a bit of a blur. Harry sat down with Pansy to work through their homework; he breezed through his Potions and Defense work, nailed the Transfiguration practical and attacked the essay with enough grim determination to bust it out in two hours, spent an evening recording Astronomy observations, and floundered his Charms work for another two hours before Pansy took pity on him and helped. He returned the favor by proofreading her Potions essay and then letting her read over his.

"You explain things so much better than the book," Pansy complained.

Wright took to drilling Harry in the mornings from five to six and at night from eight to nine, with Pansy tasked to keep an eye on the Gryffindors and run interference if any of them decided to come out to the Quidditch pitch. He worked Harry ragged but Harry had never had such fun on a broom in his life. Wright seemed more grimly pleased after every training session. In the afternoons Wright cast Notice-Me-Not charms on himself and Harry and they lurked in the stands, spying on the Weasley twins, Ron, Jules, and Finnegan as they ran drills. Wright kept up a low running commentary on their performance.

"We're going to keep doing this, Potter," he said determinedly three nights before their classmates came back. "Every morning, up at five and behind the castle by five-thirty. I can drill you for exactly forty-five minutes out of my day, and you can work on your own for thirty more. Not on the pitch; the Gryffindor captain's a maniac and he's out there all the bloody time charming Quaffles to fly at his face. We'll stay over the lake."

Harry readily agreed. Just the chance to fly on a decent team broom instead of the school ones was worth the grueling practices, and he'd need all the help he could get to catch up to Jules before next year. Not to mention Malfoy, who'd undoubtedly be trying out for the team as well. It wasn't even really an inconvenience; he tended to wake up around five or six most mornings anyway. He reviewed what he spent the most time on outside class and decided that he could sacrifice some of the time spent playing Exploding Snap and Gobstones in the common room to homework hours and use what had been his late-night homework time for practice with the ash wand, which had previously happened in the mornings before anyone else woke up. It'd be rough, but manageable. Definitely no worse than some of the bad months at the Dursleys, and here, he actually liked all the things he was doing.

That very night, Harry decided to test out Theo's gift.

He was delighted to find that the shoes were sturdy, had grippy soles and good support, and made absolutely no sound no matter how fast he ran. It was almost eerie to feel his feet slamming against the ground without any accompanying noise other than his breathing, and he got so lost in the feeling that he almost ran straight into Peeves. He was only saved by the fact that Peeves' back was turned. It gave Harry a precious two seconds to dive into the nearest classroom and freeze.

The poltergeist's cackling laugh faded into the distance.

Harry exhaled, long and slow, and turned to glance around the room he'd found.

It looked like an unused classroom, much like the one he'd found the Weasley twins in the first week of school. Dusty desks and forgotten, empty bookshelves were shoved haphazardly into the corners. The weird part was that a huge, ornate mirror, almost twice Harry's height and set in a beautifully worked golden frame, sat right in the middle of the room.

"Bizarre," he muttered, walking closer and careful not to look closely at its surface in case it was dangerous. Peering at it from the side, he saw words engraved on the top. Backwards letters. Harry stared at them for a long second, muttering to himself, and against his will found himself very tempted when he figured out what they said.

I show not your face but your heart's desire.

That could be useful information.

He was just about to look in the mirror when a scuffle of feet in the corridor and a muffled curse tipped him off. Harry instantly ducked down behind a desk in the corner and held his breath.

"Ow— gerroff, Ron—"

Oh Merlin. It was Jules and Weasley.

Harry clapped his hands over his mouth to keep from laughing.

He peered around the edge of the desk and saw Jules stuffing a bit of cloth into his bag. Weasley was busy scrambling up in front of the mirror, where he promptly froze and dropped his jaw.

"Jules," he said in a strangled voice, "Jules, I—"

"What do you see?" Jules said eagerly.

"I'm—I'm alone, not like yours—I look different, though—I'm older—and I'm Head Boy!"

Yeah, that's about as likely to happen as me getting re-Sorted into Gryffindor.

"What?" Jules said incredulously. He seemed to think the same.

"Yeah—and Quidditch captain! I'm holding the House Cup and the Quidditch Cup—"

He rounded on Jules suddenly and eagerly. "D'you think it shows the future?"

"How can it?" Jules snapped. "Harry's in Slytherin, not Gryffindor, and I saw him wearing red robes…"

Harry actually had to pause and think that one over. Jules' heart's desire involved him in Gryffindor?

It was almost nice.

Something deep in his stomach longed for that—for family. For him and Jules to be brothers like they should have instead of this toxic state of constant rivalry.

Harry kicked that hunger until it retreated into the dark cave it came from. He had a new family—Slytherin. A dysfunctional one, where you had to ward your bed and play word games with every breath, but a family just the same. He had friends who'd watch his back, and the potential to be great. That was what he wanted.

"Wonder why it shows your family and not mine," Weasley grumbled. "Look again, see if it's the same—"

They shuffled about, switching places.

"Yeah," Jules breathed, almost like he was in a trance. "Yeah, we're—we're standing outside the Manor, my dad's there—he looks so proud—and Harry's with me, except he actually looks decent and not like a git, and he's wearing Gryffindor robes, and I'm holding a broom and wearing my Quidditch gear, and he looks happy for me—"

"So nice to know you only want me around as a member of your fan club," Harry drawled, sauntering out of his hiding place.

Weasley and Jules both drew their wands.

" Gardus!" Harry said, deflecting what looked like a Body-bind and a Jelly-legs.

"What are you doing here, you snake?" Jules sneered.

"Wow, you do that face almost as well as a Slytherin," Harry said with mock surprise. "I'm here because, apparently, sneaking out at night is a genetic trait."

"Did you hear?" Weasley demanded suddenly. "What we said?"

Harry grinned and loosened the damper he kept on his eye color just a little, knowing his eyes would be eerily bright green in the low light. "Quite a shallow heart's desire of yours, Weasley."

The other boys blinked.

"Honestly, didn't you sort out the clue?" Harry said, pointing to the top of the mirror. "Read it in reverse, ignore the spaces. I show not your face but your heart's desire."

James looked caught between longing and fury. "What—so what we saw—"

Harry shrugged.

"You shouldn't have eavesdropped," Weasley snapped, ears burning. "Now we you know ours but we don't know yours—"

"Go on, Harry," Jules said. "Or are you not wizard enough to handle it?"

Harry blinked once. He couldn't have known exactly how nervous his eerie composure was making the other boys. In Slytherin, it was normal, even expected, that you be controlled all the time. And with his upbringing, Harry was better at it than most firsties. To the Gryffindors, though, he was practically a foreign species.

His mind was racing. He knew he was being manipulated; it was unbearably clumsy and obvious, but even so Harry was furious at the implication that he couldn't handle whatever he'd see in the mirror and also deathly curious what it was. And Jules and Weasley didn't seem to have suffered any side effects, except possibly being extra snappy, but they were both gits even on a good day—

Face a study in boredom, internally seething with nervousness and curiosity, Harry walked around the edge of the mirror and looked at his reflection.

For half a second, he thought he was looking at James. Then Harry realized this wasn't James, but an older version of himself. Early twenties, probably, wearing purple Wizengamot robes and the ring of Lord Potter on his finger. Theo, Blaise, and Neville were with him, all of them endlessly happy and confident. This Neville had swapped pudginess for muscle, timidity for good-natured ease; Blaise was as cutting as ever and Theo's smirk was the same. Harry's older reflection—whose hair was just mussed enough to be stylish, but tamer than Harry had ever seen his own or James' or Jules'—looked at the real Harry and shot him a wicked grin.

For just a second, a physically painful combination of joy and aching hunger took root in his stomach.

Harry tore his eyes away. He didn't need to sit here and stare at a dream; that would get him absolutely nowhere.

"Powerful mirror," he murmured, glancing at it with respect and quickly stepping to one side.

"Well?" Jules prompted.

Harry lifted his chin and met his brother's eyes. "Seems your ideal future involves having me as a lackey, little brother, but mine doesn't involve you at all. Just me and my friends, healthy and happy and somewhere in our twenties."

"And you said mine was boring," Weasley scoffed.

"I said shallow, not boring. You're apparently hungering for the Quidditch Cup as your ultimate goal? Really?"

"I suspect it's far more complicated, my boy."

All three of them jumped. Harry's reaction was the most violent; he spun towards the source of the voice, wand in hand and falling into a crouch, shoulders hunched in case a blow was coming—

It was just Dumbledore, shimmering into view from where he'd been standing invisibly in one corner. "Mr. Weasley, I believe you to be wanting all the things your brothers achieved individually," he said gently. "To set yourself apart by accomplishing it all instead of just a part. Mr. Potter and Mr. Potter… well, it seems your childhoods have affected what you see in the mirror as well."

Harry had his wand stowed and his face blank again by the time Dumbledore finished his speech, eyes twinkling kindly. They were bright blue and gleaming, the opposite of Snape's but somehow Harry got the same distinct feeling that eye contact was a bad idea. He focused on the floor, faking respect.

"Headmaster," Jules stuttered, sounding terrified, "I'm—I'm sorry, we—"

"No apology necessary," Dumbledore said with a smile. "I will take no points tonight, provided you all return immediately to your dormitories. The Mirror of Erised is a powerful magical artifact; I can blame none of you for falling into its allure… Although, Harry, I must commend you for your willpower. Few can so easily step away from their first glance into the mirror."

"Thank you, sir," Harry said stiffly.

"Rest assured, it will be moved after tonight," Dumbledore said, a trace of sternness entering his voice. "Many have wasted away staring into the mirror at their heart's desire. It does not do to dwell on dreams and forget to live."

With that, he shooed the three boys out the door and closed it firmly.

Harry turned around and found Jules glaring at him. "Just listen to him go on about our childhoods," Jules muttered. "So what if the Muggles were a bit mean to you, it doesn't give you the right to—"

"A bit… mean… to me?" Harry echoed, spine straightening and eyes lighting up with the full force of their natural poison-green shade.

Jules glared right back, Weasley hovering like an angry red shadow behind his shoulder. "Yeah, a bit mean," he repeated. "I had to go through years of intensive training, my childhood wasn't exactly peachy either—"

"I'm sure dodging the paparazzi was ever such a challenge," Harry sneered.

Jules snapped his wand out. "Furunculus!"

Harry dodged easily. "Expelliarmus!" he cast, and snatched Jules' wand out of the air just in time to step out of the way of a Body-bind from Weasley—he retaliated with a Jelly-legs Jinx that Weasley barely blocked—called on his wandless magic to coat the floor in a bit of ice, making Weasley slip—

It was all the opening Harry needed.

He disarmed Weasley, caught his wand, too, and stepped forward until he was nose to nose with Jules. "My childhood didn't involve paparazzi," he said softly. "My childhood involved frying pans to the head and spending my summers running from my cousin and his gang of baby thugs. My childhood ended around the time I turned four. The next time you try to pretend you've dealt with anywhere close to as much crap as I have, I will show you exactly what I've learned in Slytherin."

Jules was dead silent. And that was definitely a trace of fear in his eyes.

Harry relished it.

"If that's all," he said pleasantly, switching off the icy fury and giving the two a disarming smile, "I'll be going now."

He dropped their wands on the floor and walked away.

Behind him, Jules gripped his wand in a hand that was not shaking and wondered, after half a year of telling people scornfully that Slytherin would turn his brother into a Dark wizard, whether he'd actually been right.

Inside a classroom, next to an enchanted mirror, Albus Dumbledore ended the spell that had allowed him to eavesdrop on the boys and sighed heavily. At least the elder Potter had managed to handle things without resorting to violence; Albus would've been forced to step in if that had happened, and even he had winced when Julian willfully dismissed the trials poor Hadrian had had to endure. Albus would carry the guilt of that on his shoulders for the remainder of his life. He knew he'd had a role in convincing James that sending Hadrian to the Dursleys would be for the best.

But he would carry it, and he would not allow himself to fall prey to doubts and regrets and second thoughts. What was done was done, and it had been for the best. For the greater good. Julian Potter had to grow up strong, protected, and ready to step into his role as the Boy Who Lived. A brother would only have been a distraction.

Albus put thoughts of schoolboy squabbles out of his mind. The Potter twins would work out their differences or they would not. In the meantime, he had more important work to do.

Chapter End Notes

A/N: It has been brought to my attention by a commenter that there are a number of parallels between this work and a fic I read on about a year ago, and then more or less forgot about because I don't have a account and never got notified when the author started posting year 2 of PoS. I've apparently been mirroring PoS in a couple elements--PoS also has Harry sorted into Slytherin while his twin goes to Gryffindor; Harry befriending Theo and Blaise and Hermione and Neville while making enemies of his brother and Ron; Harry trying to rehabilitate Malfoy. There are some pretty key differences but the resemblance is there. Credit, then, goes to The Sinister Man on for any subconscious influences I've drawn from his work, and I'm sorry to anyone else who noticed this. Endless gratitude to user Odysseus and other nonentites for pointing this out.

The Prince of Slytherin book 2 rewrite is in progress. I'm really excited for it but I won't be reading it until after my own adaptation of Chamber of Secrets is finished (it's in production now).

Grand Schemes Just Out Of Sight

The start of second term was rather anticlimactic. Aside from the secret early morning training sessions with Wright, Harry's schedule was more or less the same. He went to his study group, hung out with his friends in the Great Hall and by the lake on afternoons when it wasn't too bitterly cold or dumping snow, exchanged hexes with Malfoy in the common room, and kept Neville from crashing and burning in Potions. Hermione's manners had vastly improved and even Greengrass was willing to talk to her on occasion, which Harry considered a big step in the right direction, even if Hermione complained about it all the time. Harry just hmmmed noncommittally.

Slytherin politics were far too complicated for him to even bother explaining. Hermione would probably at least follow, but she'd be flabbergasted by the layers and layers to it; she'd think they were all a bunch of nutters.

Greengrass and Pansy's rivalry was capped only by a sense of mutually assured destruction; Davis mostly hung around Greengrass and kept her head down. Pansy exerted significant influence over Malfoy that she mostly used for her own social advantage. Bulstrode was the smarter female version of the beefcakes; Harry might've actually worried about her if she hadn't seemed perfectly content following Malfoy's lead. Harry, Blaise, and Theo were on mostly decent terms with Greengrass and Davis, even if Greengrass liked to keep Harry on his toes with snide comments and clever power plays. Pansy and Harry didn't make a point to spend time together but at least got along better than they had before the holidays. She recognized that he had useful ties to other Houses and he knew she was a valuable ally, so they had come to a mutual truce even though Harry and Malfoy were sniping at each other more often than not. Pansy even occasionally showed up to the study group, and if she cold shouldered Hermione and Justin, Harry counted it as improvement that she was even willing to be near them.

Early morning practices with Wright were suspended leading up to the Hufflepuff versus Slytherin game. Harry was glad of the reprieve. He and Theo and Blaise had started reviewing for their exams, and while he wasn't worried per se, adding review on top of his classwork, his extracurricular wandwork practice, hanging out with his study group circle, and Potions experimentation was tough.

They piled into the stands the day of the game. Theo swapped barbs with Justin and Hannah while Blaise convinced Harry to wandlessly jostle Malfoy's perfect hair every few minutes. It was highly amusing to watch the blond get increasingly paranoid and twitchy.

Lee Jordan was commentating, as usual. "The Slytherin team—Flint, Pucey, Wright, Higgs, Bletchley, Derrick, and Bole!"

Seven green blurs shot onto the pitch in perfect formation, Flint in the center flanked by Wright and Higgs, who took precedence as seventh years. They did a lap of the stands. Slytherin and Ravenclaw cheered. Hufflepuff didn't. Gryffindor booed.

"Aaaand the Hufflepuff team—Fitzsimmons, Park, Stevens, Taylor, Terry, Diggory, and Corner!"

None of the Slytherins booed as the black-and-yellow-clad Hufflepuffs did their lap. Harry was proud of his house's class.

They all cheered themselves hoarse. Harry knew enough about Quidditch now to be impressed by the smooth certainty with which the Slytherin Chasers worked together. Pucey, Wright, and Flint were a machine. They practically read each other's minds. Harry didn't like the thought of being expected to fill Wright's shoes next year, but there really wasn't anyone else—

"Two more goals for a Snitch-proof game!" Malfoy yelled, all composure gone as Slytherin scored yet again.

Suddenly, Higgs' broom lunged forward through the air. Diggory twisted and shot off after him. The stands went nuts.

"He's got it!" Harry shouted, watching through his omnoculars—Higgs was way ahead of Diggory; Hufflepuff didn't have a chance—

Wham!

"Slytherin Seeker Higgs flies directly into Chaser Stevens!" Jordan's amplified voice bellowed. "Nasty blow—Diggory's in the lead now—yes! Diggory's got the Snitch! Two hundred forty to two hundred thirty, Hufflepuff wins!"

"Foul!" the Slytherins screamed. "Foul!"

"Is he just going to ignore that?" Blaise shouted.

Noah Bole looked about ready to climb out of the student section and over to the announcer's platform. "That was flying to collide!"

But Madam Hooch didn't call the foul. To his credit, Diggory protested the victory, but he'd caught the Snitch before a whistle blew, and that was that.

The Slytherins returned to their common room in a nasty temper that lasted for days. The Hufflepuffs flatly refused to acknowledge that Stevens had deliberately flown in front of Higgs, even though it was obvious to anyone who'd been paying attention. The Slytherins were out for blood and had the backing of most of Ravenclaw. The Gryffindors, meanwhile, got louder and more obnoxious with every day closer to the Hufflepuff-Gryffindor match, bragging about "their Seeker and their Keeper and the sparkles coming out their asses," as Bletchley sneeringly put it, and how they were going to knock Slytherin off the House Cup for the first time in seven years. The guerrilla war landed thirteen people in the hospital wing in one week—eighteen if you counted Jack Stevens' five separate trips—and only ended when Snape sat all of Slytherin down in the common room and threatened hellish detentions for anyone caught hexing another student.

The day before the Hufflepuff-Gryffindor match, Harry and Wright were walking back up to the castle in the half-dark predawn, exhausted and soaking wet from the rain. Wright had been tense as a wire all week and he was practically vibrating with nervous energy now.

"What're Gryffindor's chances, do you reckon?" Harry said.

"Hard to say, really," Wright said. "Gryffindor's Chasers are all fairly young, and it's the Terrors' second year flying. Half their team graduated last year. But their Keeper, Wood, he's a maniac and right brilliant at flying. He's in fifth year and being recruited by Puddlemere. Plus there's your brother, the Seeker prodigy." He sneered. "The Diggory's got experience on his side, but the Other Potter has a better broom, so that's a toss-up. Meanwhile, the Puff Chasers are all older and more experienced than the Gryffindor set, but they have a weaker Keeper."

"What'll their strategies be?" Harry asked. He was fairly sure he could guess accurately but it never hurt to ask advice. He'd found it usually made people feel important if you seemed to want their opinion.

Sure enough, Wright launched into a rapid-fire assessment that left Harry's head spinning. The short version was mostly what he'd have guessed—the Hufflepuff Beaters would be out for Jules Potter's blood, the Puff Chasers would be trying to monopolize the Quaffle, and Diggory would mark Jules to keep him from using his better broom. Meanwhile, the Gryffindor Beaters would be working on disrupting the Puff offensive maneuvers and were apparently absolute nightmares on the pitch, which surprised Harry not at all.

It played out more or less like Wright predicted. Harry watched Jules catch the Snitch in less than five minutes with a sense of resignation, barely even noticing the fight that broke out between Malfoy, the beefcakes, and Jules' three hangers-on until the game was over and Malfoy emerged with a black eye, which somewhat made up for the frustration of having lost the match to Gryffindor.

Snape, predictably, looked livid.

Harry looked over at the seventh years and winced. Blaise followed his glance and smirked at the expression on Wright's face. "Oh dear," he said, "tomorrow morning is not going to be fun for you."

"Don't make me regret telling you, Zabini," Harry said.

Theo sniffed. "As if you'd have been able to pull off your whole sneaking-out-for-secret-training thing without us covering for you."

Wright's bad mood hung around a lot longer than just the day after the match. Neville chose the moment after Harry's brutal Wednesday morning Quidditch session to accost him in a corridor. "Harry, g-good, I need—why are you soaking wet?"

"Because it's raining, Longbottom, what do you think?" he snarled.

He blinked and wavered. "There's no—no call to be rude!" Neville said with a sort of resigned courage. Clearly Gryffindor was rubbing off on him.

He took a breath. "Yes, you're right, that was—my bad mood's not aimed at you," he said, because apologizing made him think of cowering on the Dursleys' kitchen gasping out I'm sorry over and over. It hadn't done anything to stop his uncle's belt, and he did not like being reminded of that helplessness. "What's going on?"

"Jules overheard Snape threatening Quirrell."

"Did it never occur to you that maybe Snape's threatening Quirrel to stay away from the thing in the trapdoor?" He wasn't about to let him know it was the Sorcerer's Stone.

"He was telling Quirrell to help him get to the Stone—Hermione thinks there's probably loads of enchantments and—and Snape needs Quirrell to take them down—"

Harry resisted the urge to bang his head into a wall. "Snape didn't try to kill Jules," he said.

"Listen, I—I want to believe you, but—" Neville's face was white but determined. Clearly, arguing this long was hard on him, but he was sticking to it. Harry had to give the boy credit.

"Neville, listen. Either Quirrell's being victimized, in which case he can go to Dumbledore, or Snape is doing the right thing, in which case I'm pretty confident he can handle it, or they're both up to something and Dumbledore still lives here so I highly doubt any Dark Arts mess is going to happen. And no matter what is actually going on it's nothing first years should be getting involved in."

Neville deflated a bit. He had enough sense to agree, unlike most everyone else in his House. "Will you at least keep an eye on Snape for us?" he said.

"Of course."

Harry walked into his dorm, dragged Theo and Blaise out into the hallway, and related in a furious whisper what Neville had just told him.

He also learned that not five minutes before, in the Great Hall, a very excited Hermione had told a much less excited Theo that they'd found a reference to Flamel and from there figured out what was probably hidden in the school.

"Finnegan found it on a Chocolate Frog card," Theo said in disgust, "only a bloody Gryffindor," and Blaise went to go tell Professor Snape that the Gryffindor first years were now aware of what was the Cerberus was guarding. He came back and told them he'd never seen Snape so angry. As they'd all seen Snape in a towering rage after the inter-House warfare before the Quidditch match, this made the point quite nicely.

"Hagrid has a what?"

"A dragon," Pansy said with relish. "Draco saw it! Longbottom, Granger, and Jules Potter and his idiot squad were all in there arguing."

"What was that Mudblood doing with the gamekeeper, do you think?" Bulstrode said with exaggerated curiosity.

"He lives in a wooden hut," Harry said in disbelief, storing away Bulstrode's comment for later reprisal and noting with interest that while Crabbe and Goyle laughed, Parkinson, Greengrass, and Davis all refrained.

"Stupid oaf," Greengrass scoffed. "He shouldn't even be trusted with an earthworm."

"How did he even get a dragon?" Theo wondered. "That's a Class XXXXX restricted magical creature."

"I don't even want to know how you know that," Greengrass said.

"Draco found out the Gryffindors are planning on smuggling it off the grounds this weekend," Parkinsons said, looking absolutely vicious. "If anyone lets this get out, I'll flay them, the Gryffindors are going to lose so many points. Maybe even get expelled. Dragon smuggling."

"Can we talk about this?" Blaise muttered.

Harry heaved a sigh, admitted that he couldn't avoid the conversation forever, and slipped sideways into a secret passageway that connected the second floor Transfiguration wing to a back way in and out of the library. It was as good a place as any for a quick private conversation.

He and Blaise and Theo pulled the tapestry over the passage's entrance.

"Are we going to interfere?" Theo said. They all knew exactly what he meant.

Harry frowned. "I'd really rather not Hermione and Neville get expelled."

"I cannot believe this," Blaise said. "You're about to jump in some Gryffindor's idiotic plot for a Muggle-born and a Gryffindor so timid he literally jumps at his own shadow?"

"I never said I was going to jump into their plan," Harry said, mind churning. "And I'm interfering for my friends."

That shut Blaise up.

"Come on," Harry said grimly. "I need to talk to Hermione. And I bet you anything she's in the library."

She was in the library.

Harry dropped into the seat across from Hermione. Theo leaned on the table on her left side, just close enough that his presence was pushing on her personal space, and Blaise took the seat on her right. They hadn't even had to discuss it beforehand. Harry had great friends.

Hermione looked up with a smile, but it faltered when she took in how they'd kind of surrounded her. "Harry?"

"Hagrid's breeding a dragon and Malfoy knows about it," Harry said flatly. Hermione choked. "If you stick with your plan to get Charlie Weasley's friends to fly the thing to Romania, Malfoy's going to tip off the teachers and you'll all get expelled. At best. Hagrid could do hard time and he'll probably never hold a job again. And that's just the penalty for illegal dragon breeding; Weasley's friends would be in even hotter water for dragon smuggling."

"You— prat!" Hermione said, twin spots of color burning on her cheeks. "Like you care about Hagrid—"

"Excuse you," Blaise said coolly, "Theo and I both told him not to get involved. He's risking his neck here. Technically all three of us are already accessories to a crime. He doesn't want to see you lot expelled or Hagrid fired."

"How did Malfoy even…" Hermione trailed off, looking miserable. "He was looking in Hagrid's hut last week—he must've stolen the letter from Ron…"

"Because trusting Ron Weasley is a stellar way to keep things secret," Theo muttered.

Harry pinched his nose. "Hermione, will you please at least consider that your plan needs some work?"

"It's too late to owl Charlie again, they're coming tomorrow!"

"Merlin's balls," Theo muttered.

Blaise looked massively annoyed. Harry decided he should probably move things along before Blaise got irritated to the point of hitting Hermione with a body-bind and dealing with it himself. Merlin knew Harry was tempted to do so himself. And he would. He'd wrap her up in ropes and stick her in a broom closet until this all blew over if that's what it took to keep her from getting expelled.

Harry thought quickly. He needed to get them out of this; it'd discredit Malfoy, help Hagrid, and also keep two of his friends out of massive trouble. But there was no way he'd go to an adult. Snape was supposed to be his Head of House but the man clearly had a grudge with the Potters, not to mention the incessant bullying of Neville. Harry didn't like bullies and he was pretty sure Snape only ever looked out for him out of a grudging sense of duty. Dumbledore was aloof; McGonagall far too stern. And he didn't trust any of them.

Broom closets. "Brooms," he said, eyes snapping to Hermione's. "Jules and his crew—they can slip outside during dinner tomorrow, hide in the Gryffindor locker rooms until it's time, and fly an interception pattern over the school, high enough that no one will see them, low enough to stay in the wards. Hermione, given that you've got Hogwarts, A History memorized, I'm sure you can figure out what kind of altitude we're working with. When Weasley's friends show up, just take them down to Hagrid's hut." He still thought it was moronic to transport a fire breathing dragon across country lines in a box strung between multiple brooms, but if the actual dragon people thought it would work, Harry wasn't going to stop them. He hardly cared if they got themselves incinerated as long as they did it far away from his friends. "They can take the dragon and disappear."

Hermione looked impressed. "That's… pretty clever actually," she said grudgingly.

"How will they get back in?" Theo said, eyes gleaming. "If the rendezvous is at midnight, sneaking back in will be breaking curfew. Won't be easy. Unless—Harry, you're friends with the twins, maybe they could cause a diversion."

Hermione looked uncomfortable. "Well, Jules has an invisibility cloak. Some kind of family heirloom."

Harry gaped at her for a few seconds before he found his voice. "Of course he bloody does," he hissed. "Could James' favoritism be any more obnoxious?"

Hermione winced.

Harry controlled himself, still coldly furious but trying to work past it. "Okay. Fine. They use the Cloak to slip back in. Four people under one garment? Do they all fit?"

"Barely. If they squish," Hermione said. "And shuffle."

"Okay, so the Cloak can get them back in… that still leaves—"

"Covering for them," Blaise said.

"Neville." Harry tapped the table.

Hermione chewed her lip. "You think he'll agree?"

"All he has to do is say they went up to bed instead of dinner because they weren't feeling well if anyone asks," Theo said. "He'll go for it. It's his house points we're saving. Plus we're sticking it to Malfoy. If he tells the teachers to go look for you lot by Astronomy Tower with a dragon and nothing happens, he'll lose credibility."

"Speaking of which…" Harry looked at Hermione with a very serious expression. "If anyone asks, you and I are fighting right now over some comment a Slytherin made to you and you haven't spoken to me in a week. Same for Neville, if you could pass it on."

Hermione looked a little lost by all the scheming, but she figured it out quickly. "Because the Slytherins will be angry if you help Gryffindors out of trouble?" she said with vague disapproval.

"Because the Slytherins will be angry I deprived us of a chance to sit back and watch Gryffindor lose any shot at the House Cup," Harry said. "Plus, I was told about Malfoy's little plan in extreme confidence and one of the more terrifying Slytherin witches threatened to flay anyone who tattles. For the next week, we are not friends, clear?"

"I guess Neville and I shouldn't come to study group then," Hermione sighed.

"That, or I'll skip," Harry said.

"No, I'll sit it out," Hermione said determinedly, eyes glinting. "You're right about all this. I owe you. I'll keep Neville up to scratch in Potions for as long as you need us to stay away."

"Just until next weekend," Harry said. "We'll have a public, cool but cordial greeting, and then just go back to study group like normal."

Hermione nodded. "I take it you want me to pitch this to the others?"

"They won't take it well if you drag me in there to tell them what to do," Harry said. "In fact, I'm pretty sure that would make them even more dead set on going with the first plan."

"True. Let me see if I've got this." Hermione rattled off the Slytherins' plan almost verbatim.

Harry nodded appreciatively. Her memory really was incredible. "Glad we've got this sorted."

Hermione rubbed her temples. "Why did Hagrid have to go and get a dragon of all things?" she hissed.

Theo, Blaise, and Harry trooped back down to the dungeons.

"Does no one else think it's suspicious that Hagrid managed to get his hands on a dragon egg about the same time he's in charge of the beast guarding something very valuable and hidden in this School?" Theo said abruptly.

"Of course we have," Blaise said acidly. "Not much we can do, is there? Professors are obviously out; Snape would just snatch up Potter and the rest…"

Theo sneaked a sideways glance at Harry. "Well. If we really wanted, we could make sure they're caught coming back in," he murmured.

"How?" Blaise said.

"Summon the Cloak?" Harry said. "One of us can probably figure out the Summoning Charm before tomorrow."

Theo shook his head. "Invisibility cloaks are usually spelled against Summoning Charms, and if they've got that it'll be almost impossible to get them caught."

It would be the best of all possible outcomes, Harry supposed. Hagrid safe, the dragon gone, Hermione and Neville safely tucked away in their dorms and out of the crossfire—if the Gryffindor quartet got caught creeping about after curfew, they'd lose massive points and get detention but definitely not be expelled. And all he had to do was make sure they didn't have the Cloak.

"Unless you can sort out a way to make Jules Potter just forget about his priceless family heirloom, I don't know that this is going to work," Blaise said drily.

Harry stared at him. "Say that again."

"I don't know how this is going to work?"

"The first bit."

"What, about making him forget about the Cloak? It's a family he—"

Harry shushed him, thinking. And then he grinned.

"I think we can," he said. "Potions."

A pause, and then—

Theo's eyes flew wide. "Oh."

Blaise nodded appreciatively, and Harry smirked.

In the end, their role was simple. Harry brewed the potion and cast the Notice-Me-Not spell on Theo that Wright taught him over break. Theo crept out of the castle between lunch and dinner; Harry and Blaise went to study group and told the rest he was looking for a missing textbook. He rejoined them about thirty minutes later and pulled off a flawless nothing-is-wrong act, aside from tapping Harry and Blaise's feet twice each, which had been their signal for everything going without a hitch. Harry and Hermione talked to Neville and the twins. Neville agreed to the plan. He looked unbearably nervous, but Harry clapped him on the shoulder and projected absolute confidence, and Neville managed a weak smile.

They retired to their dormitory early and promptly sneaked back out. The Slytherin dormitories were expansive and twisting, with a number of unused rooms and forgotten spaces the farther back you went. A short and extremely cramped passage led to another point in the dungeons close to the Potions classroom. Theo and Harry slipped into the classroom and waited.

At thirty minutes to midnight, they pulled out their note, written upside down and in reverse to make the handwriting untraceable—a trick Harry picked up from Muggle movies that greatly impressed Blaise and Theo—informing Professor Snape that several Gryffindors had been talking about sneaking out of the castle for an unknown reason and creeping back in around midnight. Harry and Theo positioned themselves by the classroom door, and then Harry tilted his head and concentrated and floated the letter from Theo's hand across the room and under the door of Snape's office.

They ducked out of the classroom and pressed themselves to the wall, listening closely.

Snape's door opened a few seconds later.

That was enough. Heedless of noise thanks to their spelled shoes, Harry and Theo bolted all the way back to the passage to their dorms.

Blaise glanced up when they came in the door. Crabbe and Goyle were snoring away in their beds and Malfoy was still gone. Harry nodded at Blaise with a faint smirk, and then they all fell into bed.

"The Gryffindor table seems remarkably subdued this morning," Blaise said cheerfully over breakfast. "I wonder why that could be?"

Harry turned around to look, and had to hide a smirk. Jules, Finnegan, Weasley, and Thomas were sitting at the end of the table, where first years usually did, but they were obviously being shunned. The lot of them had their heads down and didn't look like they were talking. Hermione and Neville were sitting with the other Gryffindor first-year girls, with several feet of space between them and the outcasts. Loads of the upper years were shooting Jules' crew disgusted looks.

Pansy slid into a seat next to Blaise, which was something of a surprise because Malfoy, Bulstrode, and the beefcakes weren't here yet, and Pansy normally came in with them. "Good morning."

"I think you set off her 'where can I spread gossip' detector," Theo told Blaise solemnly.

"What do you know?" Harry asked Pansy.

She shrugged delicately. "Only that last night, Draco was convinced he would catch Weasley and the other Potter sneaking up to the Astronomy Tower with a baby dragon. McGonagall caught him lurking about and hauled him off to Snape, only to find Snape looking for her with an extremely terrified pack of Gryffindor first-years."

Theo looked at the Gryffindor table again. "Three guesses who they are."

"Have you seen the hourglasses?" Pansy said gleefully.

They all shook their heads.

"Malfoy only cost us twenty for going after them himself instead of getting a teacher involved, because he turned out to be right about Gryffindors sneaking around. But Gryffindor lost two hundred points."

Blaise choked on his juice and Harry dropped his toast.

"What?" Theo coughed.

"That's more than…" Harry trailed off, remembering with a jolt of dying euphoria that Pansy didn't know about their plan. "I mean—how much is left?"

Pansy smirked. "Let's just say they're more or less out of the running for the House Cup. We've just got to beat Hufflepuff now; Ravenclaw's still trailing by forty-three."

"Weren't they ahead of Hufflepuff last week?" Theo said.

"Yes, but then somehow all of the Ravenclaw third and fourth years got into a debate that lasted two days and none of them did any of their homework, and they lost loads of points for not turning it in and not knowing the class material."

Noah Bole leaned over from the second years' section of the table. "There's more than just them all getting caught out of bed," he said. "My brother—Derrick, third year Chaser, you know— he heard from Wright at Quidditch team meeting this morning that someone tipped Snape off. He got a note shoved under his door last night just before curfew."

Harry could see Pansy filing that one away.

Bole winked at them and went back to talking with his year mates.

When the other first years joined them at the table, Malfoy looked absolutely irate. "Potter!" he snarled.

"Keep your voice down," Harry drawled. "Can't let Ravenclaw hear us arguing. Why are you pissed at me, anyway? You're the one who lost us twenty points."

Malfoy threw himself into the seat next to Pansy, who immediately lost any sign of being on friendly terms with Harry, Blaise, and Theo. "You told them I was going to catch them so they'd change their plan," he hissed.

Pansy's gaze snapped to Harry. Clearly she hadn't thought of that. Her eyes narrowed.

Harry was actually kind of impressed that Malfoy had figured that out. "Look, Malfoy, I'm not even on speaking terms with my brother. Why do you think I suddenly went and spilled Slytherin secrets to him?"

"I don't know," Malfoy hissed, "but they had a dragon. They'd all have been expelled! And the oaf would be gone!"

Harry had to take care of this and he could only see one way out.

"Well, Potter?" Bulstrode said sweetly. "Did you betray your House?"

"No," Harry said in the coldest voice he could muster. "The opposite, really."

They blinked.

"I learned about the change in plan from Granger and Longbottom," he hissed. "Malfoy, you are the idiot who stole Weasley's textbook with the letter in it—did you really think they wouldn't figure out you knew about the plan? Granger's Muggle-born but she's not stupid. No way were they just going to merrily waltz up the Astronomy Tower with an illegal dragon if they knew you were going to be waiting. I found out about the change in plan and I tipped off Snape to when they'd be sneaking back in."

The beefcakes looked vaguely impressed. Malfoy was having none of it. "Well if you were a true Slytherin, you'd have told him everything and gotten rid of the oaf, too!" he snarled.

"Again with the loudness," Harry said. "Seriously, do you want the entire school overhearing this conversation?"

Malfoy glared at him.

"I didn't," Harry said, "because I'm trying to build a relationship with the Heir of an Ancient and Noble House that my dearly bigoted father can't muster up a problem with, and if I'd told Snape everything Longbottom probably would've been expelled. I've got no problem with Hagrid, either—he's a bit brutish, yeah, but he's never been anything but nice to me. No reason to want him chucked in Azkaban for a year for dragon smuggling. Instead, I arranged for Gryffindor to lose massive points and destroy my brother's social standing in the process while you cost us twenty points. In fact…" He put on a mock thoughtful face. "As far as I can see, you could've gone to Snape any time to tell him about the dragon, and you didn't, which tells me you wanted the glory of catching them to yourself. So you sneaked out clumsily and got us caught while I was making sure Gryffindor got the worse end of the deal. Tell me, Malfoy, which of us is the "true Slytherin" here?"

Malfoy stared at him with pink cheeks. He was the first to break eye contact. "Don't just sit there, pass me, the pumpkin juice!" he snapped at Crabbe, who blinked in confusion before passing over the pitcher.

Harry sat back with a smirk, knowing he'd won this round. And when, after breakfast, Greengrass and Davis invited him and Blaise and Theo to use their first names, he knew it was a sign things were changing. First names meant the girls thought Harry and his friends had a high enough social standing that they were worth looking familiar with to others. Malfoy had commanded respect at the start of the year simply for being a Malfoy, but he'd quickly proven himself a self-centered peacock with no sense of subtlety, class, or cleverness, only a family name and a loaded Gringotts account. Harry had been working to undermine him all year long and it felt fantastic to finally knock him down a peg. Now Malfoy was weakened, Daphne and Tracy occupied a neutral middle ground, and Harry couldn't just be overlooked anymore as unimportant.

It'd be interesting to see where Pans fell out—whether she stuck with Malfoy for some reason Harry couldn't figure, tried to edge in on the neutrality of her roommates, or used her agreements with Harry to work her way in with him and Theo and Blaise. He hoped she didn't go with the first option. Malfoy wasn't worth a girl as smart as Pansy.

He, Theo, and Blaise sneaked out of the castle that morning, taking advantage of the Sunday laziness, and made sure they covered their tracks. It wouldn't be good for anyone—an especially clever bushy-haired Gryffindor, say—to get over her anger and wonder how exactly the boys left a priceless magical artifact in Hagrid's hut and go looking for interference. It was the work of a good thirty minutes to replace the mead, jugged pre-steeped tea, water, and whiskey in Hagrid's hut with liquids that weren't spiked with Forgetfulness Potion. Harry wasn't surprised in the slightest that the Gryffindors had stopped for a celebratory snack with Hagrid afterwards—Weasley and Finnegan in particular never seemed to stop eating.

They crept back up to the school when they heard Hagrid coming back from somewhere in the forest and sauntered into the Slytherin common room. Several of the second and third years gave them appraising glances. Harry did his best to ignore it.

The meeting of their study group that afternoon was really more of a gossip session. Hermione and Neville had to field endless questions about what happened and what the fallout had been. Hermione told them rather grimly that none of Gryffindor was talking to the four boys, except the other first years, and then only when they had to for class. Harry, Theo, and Blaise managed to stay out of it as only the Slytherin first years and Hermione and Neville knew they'd been involved at all, and none of them was talking.

At least, he thought so, right up until Jules, Finnegan, Thomas, and Weasley cornered them in the courtyard Sunday afternoon.

"Incoming," Theo muttered, eyeing the angry Gryffindors with anticipation.

"Keep your wands handy, I'd give this good odds of turning ugly." Blaise almost seemed to hope it would. Harry couldn't blame him. He wasn't going to start a fight with the Gryffindors, but if they picked one with him—well.

Weasley was in the lead, wand out but held down. "You slimy wanker!"

"Oh," Theo said, "how clever and original. Did you spend all morning coming up with that one?"

"Shut it," Finnegan snarled, an ugly scowl on his face. "We know you went and told—told Snape where we'd be—"

"Hardly," Harry said witheringly, while wondering if they actually did know and if so from who. "I know this might be surprising but I actually have better things to do than come up with ways to get Gryffindors in trouble."

"Apparently not, since you were the one who came up with that blasted plan in the first place!" Jules yelled.

So Hermione blabbed. At least she didn't know everything; they were probably just pissed and looking for someone to blame.

"That blasted plan kept Hagrid out of jail and you lot in school," Blaise said sneeringly. "It's not our fault if you went running noisily around the first floor and got yourselves caught."

Jules folded his arms and glared at Harry. "Haven't you got any sense of loyalty?"

"Oh yeah," Harry said cheerfully. "I'm very loyal, except only to people who earn it."

"I'm your brother!"

"Yes, and you and our father both decided I was a stupid Slytherin not worth your time or affection the second I was sorted. Sorry, but after that I'm not racing to join the Jules Potter Fan Club."

Finnegan raised his wand threateningly. "You leave us alone, you here? Stay out of our business, stay away from Neville—"

"Really? First Hermione, now Neville? Do you seriously think trying to control who they're friends with gives you an kind of social high ground here?" Harry asked.

The Gryffindors glared.

"Okay, this is boring, let's go," Theo said.

They left Jules' pack standing aimlessly out in the snow, and by some heroic effort managed to contain their laughter until they were down in the dungeons.

"And of course I got paired with the other Potter," Malfoy said dramatically, "because Longbottom was too terrified to wander around with that oaf with him—and we were following a trail of blood, of all things, and then there it was! All shining and white, practically glowing—And then when that hooded figure came out of nowhere, I hid, like any sensible person, and of course Potter did his noble idiot routine and had to be saved by a centaur of all things—it was like a—like a short man in a cloak, except beneath it was nothing but darkness and he moved like he was made of shadow—"

"How long has this been going on?" Harry muttered, sliding into a seat next to Blaise, who smirked.

"At least ten minutes," he said, low, "this is the second retelling and it's already gotten about half again as dramatic."

Harry listened for a few seconds, eyeing Theo, who was staring blankly at a textbook that clearly wasn't actually being read. "Yeah, this is definitely not how the Gryffindors are telling it."

He'd just gotten back from the Great Hall, where he'd lingered after his year mates to study the Gryffindors' interactions more. Things had gone from frigid to just an unpleasant chill between the first year boys and the rest of the House, probably because they now had such an incredible story to tell. And the rest of Gryffindor didn't know the half of it. Harry was still trying to process what he'd learned that morning from Hermione—not only was there a link between why you'd want to drink unicorn blood and why you'd want the Sorcerer's Stone, but the centaurs, who could apparently read the future, thought said link was Voldemort.

Harry thanked Merlin Malfoy hadn't overheard that conversation between Jules and the centaur. He really didn't have time to deal with a Malfoy who thought his dad's probable old boss was back and looking for allies. It'd be all over Slytherin by morning and Harry would have to triple ward his bed.

"I can't focus with that peacock strutting around," Theo said suddenly, "I'm going to bed." He shut his book decisively.

"Good plan," Harry said, narrowing his eyes slightly. "We do have exams in two weeks, better make sure we're caught up on sleep…"

Blaise looked between them. "I think I'll come too. I didn't sleep well last night. I had this very odd dream about llamas and Quidditch."

"Your mind is a very strange place," Harry informed him, gathering his things.

"Obviously, seeing as I decided to befriend you."

They kept up the banter until the door to their room closed behind them. Harry checked that Crabbe and Goyle were gone—probably still up at dinner stuffing their faces—and sat on his bed. Blaise wandered over to the foot of Theo's bed and folded his arms.

"All right, what was so important you dragged us back here?" Blaise said. "I was going to prod Malfoy into another retelling of the story, some of the third years looked about ready to hex him, and I heard they've been learning some good ones from Emily Bletchley that she got from the Quidditch team."

Theo perched on his own bed, looking uncharacteristically nervous. "I've been thinking."

"Don't hurt yourself," Harry said.

Theo glared at him. "About—about the Dark Lord."

That made even Blaise drop his flippancy.

"What about him?" Harry said cautiously. Unofficial rule eight, live and let live about blood purity politics, had probably saved his arse several times this year. Slytherin was complicated because no one could throw "Mudblood" and "blood traitor" around without being certain everyone around you wouldn't take it badly. On the other hand, professing a love for Muggles was a great way to murder your social standing. Harry kept it to defending Muggle-borns and retaliating when people used Mudblood—which reminded him, Bulstrode was still on his To Do list after the dragon episode—and Theo mostly stayed out of it. Blaise expressed derogatory comments towards Muggles on occasion but he'd gone from pretending Hermione and Justin didn't exist to treating them like casual acquaintances. And that was all without bringing up the whole mess of whose parents had or had not supported the Death Eaters back in the day. He did not want to have this conversation.

"He's dead," Blaise said flatly. "I still think the centaurs are full of shite. Divination's nonsense at best, actively harmful at worst—whatever's special about Jules made the Killing Curse rebound on You-Know-Who, you really think he's coming back from that?"

"You probably know my dad has certain… sympathies," Theo said carefully. "That I was raised hearing certain things. One of those things was that—well, there were a lot of hints that the Dark Lord wasn't completely dead. Just weakened, biding his time. More than the rumors that always floated around. Dad… had it on good authority."

Blaise looked rather like someone had hit him on the head. "Oh… kay, I take it back. That's bad news."

"You have a gift for understatement," Harry muttered. Secretly he was shocked Theo had even told them. It was the same as admitting he was willing to rebel against his family for Harry's sake, even if in just this small way.

Harry pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. First Voldemort killed his mum, then he tried to kill Jules and set Jules up as some sort of wizarding Messiah, which was ultimately why Harry ended up enslaved by his horrid Muggle relatives for ten years, then the shadow of Voldemort's war made Harry's first year of school ridiculously complicated in his house, and now to top it all off he was apparently hanging out around school to bring himself back to life, probably so he could get a second crack at the Potter twins. It was almost comical how messed up the whole thing was.

"They say Dumbledore's the only one the Dark Lord ever feared," Harry said. "So we should just keep our heads down and let the actual adults handle this. I'm sure they're not completely unaware of what's going on."

"Yeah," Theo said. He looked as uncomfortable as Harry felt.

"I can't believe you expect me to take my exams with the shade of the Dark Lord lurking around school," Blaise said suddenly. "It's absolutely ridiculous, as if anyone could concentrate…"

Harry grinned and Theo threw a pillow at Blaise's head and the tension was broken. They all clambered onto Theo's bed and played Exploding Hearts until they were all nursing burned fingers and had mostly forgotten the schemes and dangers floating around Hogwarts School.

Gossip and a New Opponent

The approach of exams ramped up the pressure on everyone. It was greatly entertaining to Harry to watch the different reactions of his friends in different Houses. Justin and Hannah just spent a little less time talking and buckled down to work with unrelenting determination. Neville was a wreck who more or less stayed functioning thanks to Justin and Harry tag teaming him, with Harry delivering hard truths in between Justin's repeated assurances that he had absolute faith and Neville would do great. Hermione set to reviewing with a vengeance and tried to impose study schedules on everyone. Daphne coldly set her schedule on fire while maintaining eye contact with Hermione and then walked away once it was ash, which luckily made Hermione back off bossing everyone around. (She'd been doing better; Harry thought the stress was just getting to her.) They said the rest of the Gryffindors had been happily ignoring the approach of exams for months and were now running around in a panic. This made all the Slytherins laugh; they'd been reviewing for two months now so they didn't have to cram it all in at the end. "That's what happens when you value planning ahead," Blaise said smugly.

The funniest part was the Ravenclaws. Harry didn't think Anthony, Lisa, or Sue had to worry at all about their exams, but apparently almost everyone in Ravenclaw was running on very little sleep and way too much coffee. Harry resolved to get his hands on a large supply of Muggle energy drinks over the summer, and maybe bring the twins in on it, since they clearly had ways to sneak things on and off campus; they'd make a killing selling Red Bull to the Ravenclaws during exam season. He only questioned this decision when Lisa bounced into their corner of the library with a manic gleam in her eye and informed them that she hadn't slept in three days and had just chugged four mugs of coffee. Harry smiled and edged away from her.

"I'm worried about Potions," Neville confessed, looking terrified. "Snape knows I—fall apart when he's looming and sneering…"

"I'll loan you my essays to go over," Harry said. "Just remember to stop and breathe if you make a mistake."

"And if you've got a measuring cup, never put more in it than you need," Tracy advised. After Harry, she was one of the best at Potions among them. "That way if your hand slips you don't accidentally dump double the amount of lacewing flies you need into your cauldron."

Neville nodded, still looking uncertain.

"He's been leaving you alone for the last few months," Harry pointed out. It was true—once Neville moved from causing explosions every other week to turning in mediocre but stable brews, and probably also thanks to his alliance with the first year Slytherins, Snape seemed to lose interest in bullying him and plant Neville right next to Harry in his blind spot. Neville's improvement had increased slightly once Snape started ignoring him in class and Harry got to study his second favorite subject while watching Snape go after Jules, Weasley, Finnegan, and Thomas. It was really a win-win as far as Harry was concerned.

"Yeah, but—I'll be brewing on my own! And it's the exam, there's loads more pressure—"

"If you keep thinking like that, it'll only be harder," Justin said kindly. "You've been studying really hard for ages, Nev, it'll work out. And you're a genius with Herbology and solid at Charms and History."

Neville looked slightly more at ease.

Harry was mostly only worried about the Transfiguration written portion, the Charms practical, and the entire History of Magic exam. Transfiguration theory was nastily complicated and he could cast all the charms they'd covered in class but Flitwick said part of the test would be figuring out how to cast an unfamiliar one in a short time span. Practicing for that had at least drilled a number of small, useful spells into Harry's memory as he flipped through his massive charms compendium and tried incantations at random. History of Magic was aggressively boring, and Harry had been reading history and politics and law books during Binns' lectures all year, but he honestly couldn't say whether his independent study overlapped with the lecture at all.

When he said as much, Pansy, who was easily the best at Charms, gave him a sweet smile. "I'll trade you Charms tutoring for copies of those Potions essays you promised Longbottom."

"Deal," Harry said quickly.

"I want in on this," Theo said. "I'll trade my Transfiguration notes plus explanations, because frankly, none of you has any idea what you're doing with the theory."

"Excuse you," Hermione said without looking up from her book.

"Except Hermione," Theo amended.

"Probably because I'm the one who actually studies during study group," Hermione said severely.

"Oh Merlin, she bites. It's a miracle," Daphne gasped delicately.

Harry grinned, Hannah laughed and promptly clapped a hand over her mouth, and Theo smirked.

"I will hex you," Hermione said.

Daphne's smile was predatory. "I'd love to see you try."

Anthony chose that moment to shoot a Stinging Hex at Lisa for spilling water on his notes. She jumped to her feet and retaliated. Blaise had been sitting with them to work on Astronomy and somehow got roped into the fight. Madam Pince descended on them like the wrath of God and chased them all out of the library with their books whacking them on their heads.

Once outside, Justin, Tracy, and Harry separated the bickering Ravenclaws and Blaise. They reorganized their hastily gathered papers and books and set off for the common leisure spaces on the first floor. Hermione spent the whole trip scolding Blaise, Sue, Anthony, and Lisa. Harry counted it as a considerable success that Blaise took being harangued by a Muggle-born no differently than he would have if she'd been Pureblood—namely, rolling his eyes and ignoring her, but without any real hard feelings involved.

Smugness over their better study planning aside, even the Slytherins were feeling the pressure. Blaise complained the last Sunday before exam week that he'd appreciate it if the Dark Lord could make his move during the History of Magic portion. "Surely if we get attacked by an evil wizard during the test they'll give us all E's," he said wistfully. Theo and Harry shared a glance and decided not to say anything. It wasn't like either of them had a perfectly innocent and wholesome sense of humor, either. Then Noah Bole knocked on the first year dormitory and told them to go out to the common room and listen in on the debate about how to break the Anti-Cheating Charms on the exam quills, either for the academic value or the entertainment of watching stressed-out upper years have an argument. Harry, Theo, and Blaise packed up in a hurry to go see that show.

As expected, the Transfiguration written was tough. Harry walked out feeling like his brain was a wrung-out sponge but also like he'd done reasonably well. The practical was much easier and McGonagall favored him with a rare compliment when he turned a mouse into an ornate snuffbox without a trace of its origin as a rodent. In Charms, he demonstrated all the first-year spells perfectly well and managed three out of four of the unfamiliar ones on his first or second try, which was frustrating but as good as he could've hoped. Astronomy was rather boring, he got through Herbology with only a few nicks from the Barbary Ticklemoss, and he breezed right through the written and practical portions of Defense. It was Harry's easiest subject and between his extracurricular studying and the constant magical sniping and impromptu duels of the Slytherin common room, Quirrell's lessons had always been something of a letdown. Snape set them to brewing a Forgetfulness Potion for their final, which made Harry, Theo, and Blaise have to stifle laughter, and marched around with a sneer peering disdainfully into everyone's cauldrons. Harry made a perfect potion and handed it in with a respectful nod. He didn't much like his Head of House, or bullies in general, but Snape's hostility had cooled and Harry would take a truce.

The last exam was History of Magic, and Harry was quite relieved to find that he'd covered most of the relevant material on his own. What he hadn't he could bullshit his way through an answer that should at least net a few points. He left the stifling classroom feeling quite cheerful and headed down to the lake, where all of his friends had agreed to bring some food to celebrate.

Harry waved to the Weasley twins, who for some inexplicable reason were tickling the giant squid while it basked in the warm shallow water, and flopped down next to the Gryffindors and Ravenclaws.

"—needn't have learned about the 1637 Werewolf Code of Conduct or the uprising of Elfric the Eager," Hermione was saying. "And on question thirty-two—"

"Can we please not go over all the exams again?" Neville said.

Hermione sighed. "Fine." She paused. "I'm still going to recreate it tonight."

"Have you done that for all of them?" Daphne asked, forgetting her usual disdain for Hermione. "From memory?"

"Yes," Hermione said, looking startled and a bit pleased to have the Slytherin girl speaking to her. "It's not that difficult—"

"I want copies," Daphne declared.

Hermione opened her mouth.

Harry could see the yes forming on her lips and kicked her ankle. Hermione looked at him, and he glared.

She turned back to Daphne with a determined face. "If you leave off treating me as inferior for my blood status," she said.

Harry settled back onto the grass with a smirk while Theo, Tracy, and Anthony tried unsuccessfully to pretend they wasn't laughing.

"Fine," Daphne said with a snarl. She saved a bit of her anger for Harry, who met her eyes with nothing more than a grin. He could handle whatever Daphne decided to throw at him as payback for this one.

"Don't be so cocky, Potter," Daphne said. "I'm passing these on to any of next year's set who can trade me something for it and you won't see a knut."

"I don't need to," Harry said smugly, "I've already got copies. It helps that I've been nice to her all year long."

Hermione looked slightly affronted to be dragged into their power plays, but Harry just grinned at Daphne until Daphne finally relented and offered a tiny, tiny smile of her own in return. It was cold and more an acknowledgement of a hand well played than anything else, but hey, progress.

"Harry!" Sue said, dropping onto the grass next to him. "I've been arguing with Justin for twenty minutes—he says not to encourage you, but I've got to know. What was that spell you used on Weasley this morning?"

Harry laughed, remembering how delightfully red the Gryffindor boy's face had been before he went staggering back out of the Hall on gales of laughter. He'd been saving that one for a month, ever since he found the charm written on a bit of paper and tucked into a book in the Slytherin library. "Watch," he said with a wink, and rolled over to look at Hannah, Lisa, and Justin, who'd kicked off their shoes and rolled up their trousers and waded out into the lake for a bit.

He pointed his wand at Justin. "Fundihosen."

Within a second, Justin's pants undid themselves and flew obligingly down around his ankles, leaving him in just his white boxers. He yelped, tried to pull his trousers up, and promptly toppled into the lake.

"Brilliant," Sue said with a wink.

"Harry, that was mean," Hermione said.

"Relax, just a bit of fun," Theo said lazily.

Once Hannah and Lisa stopped laughing long enough to help fish Justin out of the lake, Harry cast a drying charm on the other boy, the same one he'd learned from Padma way back in the summer. Justin tried to be indignant but it only lasted until Harry offered to teach him the incantation. "Absolutely," he said with a grin, "I can use this on Ernie next time he calls you a slimy git," and Harry ended up sharing the incantation and wand movement with the whole group.

Pansy turned it on Parvati Patil not ten minutes later when she walked by with Lavender Brown, Susan Bones, and Sophie Roper. Parvati shrieked a few obscenities and stormed off in a huff. Then Blaise cast it on Pansy while she was laughing, and Sue took the opportunity to pants Anthony and Lisa almost at the same time.

"I think you may've started a war, mate," Theo said.

Blaise rolled his eyes. "Like it wasn't intentional."

"We were getting boring," Harry said, grinning.

"See. He doesn't even deny it," Blaise said.

Harry put on his best innocent face while both of them laughed.

They spent a very pleasant evening playing a Gobstones tournament among all the first years. Bulstrode won. Someone managed to spirit a load of food and drinks into the common room, half of the upper years got drunk, and everyone had a fantastic time, except for when two fifth years settled some kind of bet by spraying sparks out of their wands and setting half the House's hair on fire. Harry went to bed far past midnight, sleepy enough that he thought he might actually dodge his nightmares for once…

He turned out to be completely correct. Harry slept nine straight hours for the first time he could remember. The pleasant feeling this gave him was entirely ruined by the fact that the following day was a nightmare of its own because according to the rumor mill Jules Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, and Seamus Finnegan had stopped an insane Quirrell from stealing Dumbledore's family wealth. Or almost been killed by Quirrell before Dumbledore saved them. Or gotten into a duel that killed Quirrell when he tried to break it up and landed Jules Potter unconscious in the hospital wing. Or possibly stopped Quirrell from hurling the entire school seven hundred years into the past, though where exactly that last rumor came from Harry had no idea.

The Great Hall was in an uproar during breakfast. Students mingled freely between the House tables. Harry and Blaise drifted over to talk to their Ravenclaw friends, who spread the word to the Hufflepuffs and then the Gryffindors.

To Harry's immense surprise, several of the middle year Slytherins came over to the end of the table. "Potter," Alton Bole said. Fourth year Chaser. He was flanked by the third year Beaters, Peregrine Derrick and Adrian Pucey. Beyond him, Harry could see Noah Bole, Alton's younger brother, and his friends Jody Harper, Anita Strickland, and Brendan Owens, all second years, paying close attention.

"Bole," Harry said as neutrally as possible. All the rest of the firsties were quiet and watching closely. Malfoy looked about to pop with rage that Harry and not him was the first to get attention from anyone above first year.

Bole nodded to Blaise, Theo, Daphne, and Tracy. "I hear you all have a network with the other Houses," he said.

Harry withheld a smirk as Malfoy's face got even redder. Now he knew exactly what this was. Honestly, he should've seen it coming.

"Yeah," Harry said, when it was clear his year mates were going to let him do the talking. Bole had rightly pegged him as the one to go to; Harry was one of the reasons the study group existed at all. "What about it?"

"Have you talked to your Gryffindor friends?" Bole said, a gleam in his eye. "No one seems to know what happened—"

"Plus it's your brother in the hospital wing," Pucey added.

"I don't know if you've noticed, but we're not exactly swapping friendship bracelets with the Other Potter," Theo said.

"I'd hope not, he's an idiot, but I'm betting you still have an idea of what's going on. And also whether he'll be awake in time for the Quidditch match," Bole said.

Harry shrugged. "I know Dumbledore and a bunch of the teachers were hiding a single very powerful artifact in the school this year, that Quirrell wanted to steal it, and that Jules Potter stuck his nose where it didn't belong and dragged a bunch of his friends along for the ride. I've no idea what's wrong with him or whether he'll wake up in time for the match."

"Noted," Bole said with a mean grin.

Pucey clapped Harry on the shoulder. Harry controlled his flinch; he still didn't like people touching him, especially people he didn't know very well, but he was figuring out how to handle it as long as he wasn't taken by surprise. "I hear we'll be seeing you at tryouts next fall," Pucey said with a wink. "Don't slack off over the summer, Potter, we need more people who're decent on a broom." He and Derrick followed Bole back up toward their section of the table.

"You're trying out for Quidditch?" Malfoy demanded.

"I might," Harry said, knowing that playing it casual would infuriate the other boy. Sure enough, Malfoy snarled something about "stupid blood traitors" to the beefcakes and Bulstrode, who followed when he left the table in disgust.

Theo leaned around Harry, pointed his wand at Malfoy's back, and whispered "Fundihosen." The next second, Malfoy's blue silk underwear and his pale skinny legs were on display for all of the mid-year Slytherin and Ravenclaw students, who burst into gales of laughter. Harry tucked his wand away and went back to his food like nothing was happening.

Daphne eyed him. "Any particular reason he just got pantsed in front of half of next year's Quidditch team?"

Harry looked at Bletchley, Bole, Derrick, and Pucey. They were sitting together and laughing uproariously.

"Complete coincidence," Theo said innocently.

"Not bad," Pansy said.

Harry glanced up at the High Table and saw Snape watching them with an unreadable expression. He nodded respectfully and went back to his food.

His friends converged in the same spot by the lake as the previous day. Hermione and Neville were the last to arrive.

"I heard Quirrell was trying to destroy Wizarding Britain with time paradoxes," Hannah said eagerly, "and that Jules is in a coma because he saw seven hundred years of history at once and his brain couldn't handle it—"

"That's ridiculous," Anthony cut in, "time travel's ridiculously complicated and anyone who gets involved in a paradox doesn't come back—"

"Well, no one's ever survived the Killing Curse before either, this is Jules Potter we're talking about—"

" I heard a rumor that Weasley went off the rails and killed Quirrell," Sue Li said, examining her nails. "Also that Finnegan is secretly the grandson of Gellert Grindelwald and was here for revenge on Dumbledore and Dumbledore's pet project Jules Potter."

"There was the one where Quirrell and Snape were secretly in love all year and the Gryffindor boys filmed them as blackmail and Snape didn't take it well," Justin said, producing an immediate outcry of "Who'd want to date Snape?" and "How they think anyone could've filmed our teachers without barfing" and, from the Slytherins, a general sense of "that's actually really good blackmail material".

Hannah waved; Harry turned and saw Hermione and Neville approaching at last. Hermione looked exhausted. Her hair was even frizzier than usual. "Excellent, we can sort out whether this was a secret love affair or just your usual run-of-the-mill murder plot," Blaise drawled.

The Gryffindors arrived in time to hear the tail end of that statement. "What?" Hermione said.

Neville looked confused. "Did I hear 'secret love affair?' Because I'd love some drama other than this…"

"Oh no, that's part of this whole mess," Theo assured him. "Some people are convinced Quirrell and Snape were… you know."

"Blech. What the— Snape?" Neville choked.

"I think you traumatized him," Tracy said, giving Theo a reproachful look and patting the grass next to her. Neville sat down gratefully. Harry was strongly reminded of a Muggle nursery rhyme: come into my parlor, said the spider to the fly.

"Okay, Hermione," Lisa said. "The moment we've all been waiting for. What the bloody hell happened last night?"

Hermione took a deep breath and told them how she'd been hiding in the common room to watch for the Gryffindorks and only realized they'd sneaked out under the Invisibility Cloak, minus Dean Thomas, who was in the hospital wing with a bad case of the flu, when the portrait hole closed on their heels. She'd followed them, gotten waylaid by dodging Mrs. Norris, distracted Peeves, lost him, and finally arrived at the third floor corridor just in time to jump in after the boys and save their lives from the Devil's Snare with conjured flame. Fluffy woke up as Hermione was running past it and sat on the trapdoor. She'd had no choice but to continue through the traps. Jules caught a flying key, Weasley played his way past a giant chess set and sacrificed himself to win, Finnegan started a fire that distracted a troll long enough for them to sneak by, and Hermione solved a complicated riddle that sounded like exactly the kind of nastily clever thing Snape would cook up. Jules had played the sacrificial idiot and gone in after You-Know-Who alone while Finnegan went back for help. Trapped, the bottles refilled after three minutes and Hermione found herself with a choice: go forward and help Jules, or backwards and find someone else to help Jules. Harry kept thoughts on what would've been the prudent decision to himself. Hermione, being a Gryffindor, went forward under a Notice-Me-Not charm just in time to watch the final showdown—Quirrell and Jules struggling, falling; Jules and Quirrell screaming, Quirrell flaking away to ash beneath Jules' touch. And then Jules passed out cold.

She looked drained by the time she was finished.

Hannah leaned over and gave Hermione a one-armed hug. "I'm just glad you're okay," she said kindly.

Harry could tell Hermione was hiding something. Neville already knew whatever it was. Theo and Blaise could probably see it, and guess the subject of the secret, and like Harry they knew better than to say anything.

The Slytherin girls didn't. "You're not telling us everything," Pansy said, watching Hermione closely. "What are you hiding?"

"Oi," Justin said sharply.

Neville turned pale and Hermione blushed. "I'm not," she said. "Hiding. Anything. I told you like—like it happened."

"Parkinson's right, there's something off here," Daphne said coolly. The rarity of her admitting Pansy was right about anything actually shut Pansy up for a second.

"Lay off," Harry said. "She almost died at the hands of a madman, that'd rattle anybody. I still think you should've gone for McGonagall, but you all survived, so I suppose it worked out."

"I was afraid she'd take more points," Hermione admitted, "we're so low anyway—we really can't afford to lose any more…"

"On the other hand, if you did, you're already so far behind it wouldn't matter," Theo said cheerfully.

Harry snorted. "The twins are definitely taking advantage of that state of affairs."

"I can't believe you lot are still thinking about House points," Neville grumbled. "Bloody Slytherins."

Tracy grinned at him. "We're never too busy for a bit of friendly competition."

Neville gulped.

They found out about Voldemort later.

"Vol- sorry, You-Know-Who was involved, wasn't he?" Harry said. He, Theo, Blaise, Hermione, and Neville were walking back up to the Great Hall together.

Hermione flinched and looked not subtly at Theo and Blaise, then back at Harry.

"Give up the attempts at nonverbal communication," Theo said. "It's obvious enough to look painful. We already know."

"I told them," Harry added. "They're my friends and they had a right to it."

Hermione bit her lip. "Okay…"

"It's fine, Hermione." Neville sounded surprisingly confident. "Just tell them."

She told them.

"Let me get this straight," Blaise said. "The Dark Lord was riding around on the back of a teacher's head all year under a turban, possessing him like a giant malevolent pimple, and no one noticed?"

"Pretty much," Hermione said, sounding miserable.

"Merlin, Dumbledore is useless."

"He's a great wizard," Hermione said sharply.

"Sure he is," Theo agreed amiably. "He's also terrible at running a school."

"Agree to disagree," Harry cut in, because he didn't want to start a debate right before dinner. "Hermione… Congratulations on surviving the death gauntlet."

She smiled at him. "Thanks, Harry."

It was as close as he could bring himself to admitting he'd been worried. And that he'd miss her if she'd died.

It was the most subdued Harry had ever seen the Gryffindor table. He did his best not to enjoy it, but failed miserably. Even Malfoy's obnoxious, boastful, tasteless bragging couldn't spoil his mood.

"It's thanks to you we're in this position," Daphne reminded him with a gleam in her eye. "Thirty points above Ravenclaw, and we crushed the Gryffindors—"

Harry was watching the staff table, and he didn't like what he saw. Dumbledore kept looking at the subtly but extremely smug Snape with that damnable twinkle turned up full force. "Yeah," Harry said. "About that."

Dumbledore stood. "Another year gone! And I must trouble you with an old man's wheezing waffle before we sink our teeth into our delicious feast."

"Wheezing waffle? Seriously?" Theo snarled in a whisper, glaring at his plate. "Does he think we're four? Making fun of himself isn't nearly as funny as he thinks it is."

"I think it's supposed to make us like him," Daphne said scornfully.

Blaise smirked faintly. "It fails. Miserably."

Harry hushed them with a quick gesture; Dumbledore was finished reading off the House Points, putting Slytherin in the lead, and before they could begin to celebrate, the Headmaster held up a hand. "However, recent events must be taken into account. I have a few last-minute points to dish out."

The Slytherins' smiles faded slightly. Harry wanted to drop his head into his hands.

"How'd you know, Harry?" Pansy said, clearly also cottoning on.

Harry sighed as Dumbledore looked towards the Gryffindor and the twinkle brightened. "Lucky guess."

"To Mr. Ronald Weasley, for the best-played game of chess Hogwarts has seen in years, I award fifty points."

Cheers sounded from the Gryffindor section. Harry could see people clapping a dazedly happy Ron Weasley on the back hard enough to nearly drive his face into the wood.

"To Mr. Seamus Finnegan, for clever use of magic under extreme duress, I award fifty points."

More screaming. Harry could see where this was going. Resignation warred with disbelief.

"This isn't happening," Daphne hissed.

Tracy rolled her eyes and clapped for the sake of appearances. "I'm pretty sure it is. Even my nightmares didn't call this one."

"To Miss Hermione Granger, for the use of cool logic in the face of fire, I award Gryffindor House fifty points."

"Bugger," Bulstrode hissed, "they're only seventy ahead now—"

Sixty-four, actually, but Harry wasn't going to correct her.

"To Mr. Julian Potter, for pure nerve and outstanding courage, I award Gryffindor House seventy points."

Harry stopped clapping while the Gryffindor table absolutely exploded. Then he caught Snape's glare from the corner of his eye and sighed heavily and began politely tapping his hands together for the sake of appearances.

"Nerve and courage," Theo griped. "Like any of us would get points for pure cunning or outstanding resourcefulness."

"If the administration liked Gryffindor any more it'd be the only house," Daphne said.

Harry glared across the hall at Jules' back. "I'm pretty sure they only keep all four of us around for the sake of watching the drama."

"I believe," Dumbledore said with a smile, "that a change of decoration is in order."

Harry groaned and finally gave in to the urge to drop his head onto the table. Jules and Weasley were going to be absolutely insufferable this summer.

"Jules."

Jules stopped and turned, expression wary. "Yeah?"

Harry resisted the urge to cross his arms. "Look, I know—I know we haven't been on the best of terms this year."

"That's one way of putting it," Jules muttered.

"I wrote our dad twice back in autumn," Harry said, throttling the bitterness that threatened to choke him when he remembered writing twice and not getting an answer. From his father. "He never answered. I can make other arrangements if he—if you lot don't want me at home this summer, but—well, I'd like to know for sure. If I have to."

"Dad hasn't written? At all?" Jules said, visibly shocked. Harry almost thought he was faking but Jules wasn't that good a liar. "I thought—er. Never mind. So… you want me to talk to him?"

"Yeah," Harry said. "And let me know. Or tell him to write me."

"Okay."

They hesitated. Harry was somehow unsure of himself, and annoyed about it. They'd been at odds all year, but—his animosity was slipping through his fingers.

"Congratulations," he said at last. "For—Quirrell. I'm… glad you didn't die."

Impossibly, James almost smiled. "Er—thanks, yeah, me too."

Harry nodded sharply and decided this was enough brotherly almost-bonding for one day after a year of glaring at each other in the hallways. It was time to go, before one of them said something or one of their friends showed up and this all went down the toilet.

"Harry," Jules said suddenly. Harry looked back. His brother seemed uncertain. "I, uh—Theo Nott. Hermione says he's not… a blood purist. Is that true?"

"If you're asking me, either you don't trust Hermione's judgment or you think she's lying to you," Harry said with a smirk. This was familiar ground—mocking the Gryffindors. "So which is it?"

"Shut up," Jules said, scowling. "Why do you always—never mind. Forget I asked."

"He's not. We're not all what our families might have wanted to make us. I mean." Harry tapped the Slytherin crest on his robes, mouth twisted into a bitter smile that for once he didn't try to hide.

"Okay," Jules said. He looked slightly pained. "If you—if you want. We can… hang out… this summer. Nott can come."

"Zabini?" Harry asked before he could stop himself. "And if this happens at the Weasleys', it'll end badly."

"Zabini's a blood purist," Jules said. "I know it for a fact."

"Well, I also know that he enjoys the company of both Hermione and Justin, and respects both of their abilities as witch and wizard." This was non-negotiable; Harry would be outnumbered by Jules' entire circle of hostile Gryffindor friends, and Harry wanted backup.

"I'll talk to Dad," Jules said.

Harry nodded. "We can hang out. I guess… it'll be fun." He tried a smile. "And with the Trace, if we meet somewhere that's not a wizarding home, we'll be forced to not hex each other."

"This is so weird," Jules muttered.

"After the year we've had, this conversation shouldn't even rank on your weird scale," Harry informed him.

"Jules, wait up—oh. It's you."

"Well spotted, Weasley," Harry said, giving the redhead a lazy smile. "Done stuffing your face?"

Weasley flushed. "I was hungry!"

"Trust me, we could all tell." Harry was already determined to avoid sitting across from Weasley anytime they were eating a meal at the same table. His manners were atrocious. Granted, Harry's had been too at the beginning of the year, but he'd watched the other Slytherins and learned quickly. Weasley still ate like a starving cave man.

"Lay off," Jules said. He turned a pointed stare on Weasley. " Both of you."

Harry pasted a sunny expression on his face. "Let's start over. Weasley, so good to see you. Congratulations on surviving the traps; I hear you're quite good at chess."

Neither of them seemed to know quite what to do with this. Harry had to fight hard to keep from smirking. For his part, he'd meant the compliment, but delivering it in a fake pleasant tone made them both suspicious. Annoying Gryffindors was honestly hilarious.

"Thanks," Weasley said stiffly. "Dumbledore's looking for you, by the way. Go to Snape's office."

"I'll head straight there. See you this summer," Harry said with a cheery smile, and walked away, hands in his pockets and a bounce in his step that didn't at all match his thoughts.

"Did that just happen?" he heard Weasley ask behind him.

As soon as he was out of their line of sight, Harry started jogging. Snape didn't like to be kept waiting and he had no idea how long Weasley had taken to deliver that message.

He skidded to a halt outside his Head of House's office, paused for a few seconds to get his breathing under control, and knocked.

"Enter."

Harry pushed the door open and walked inside, straight-backed and blank-faced. "You wanted to see me, sir?"

"I did," Snape said, examining him. "I suppose we can attribute your improved attire to Miss Greengrass. I ought to thank her. You almost look a proper Slytherin."

Harry was pretty sure Snape had just complimented him, if in the most convoluted and backhanded way possible. Or at least delivered the Snape version of a compliment. "Thank you, sir."

"I've called you here because I wished to speak with you before bringing you to the headmaster's office," Snape said. "He has… requested… your presence."

Requested or ordered?

"It regards your plans of residence for this summer."

Harry's stomach went cold. He fought for composure. "What… what authority does the headmaster have to dictate where I go during the summer? Sir."

"You will find that Albus Dumbledore's reach extends far beyond this school," Snape said with a hint of a sneer that only a Slytherin would've picked up. Harry'd gathered as much from his history and political readings and from the Slytherin conversations about the Ministry, but that it would extend to this—

"Mr. Potter."

Something about Snape's tone made Harry look up and focus.

"Slytherin House favors students who are cunning, resourceful, clever, sly, rational, self-disciplined, willing to break the rules in the pursuit of what they want," Snape said, watching him closely. "I have been Head of Slytherin House for a decade now, Mr. Potter, and I have found that these traits are often fostered in… certain upbringings."

Oh. Oh.

"Slytherin then plays host to students with less than ideal childhoods at a greater rate than our sibling Houses." Snape's voice was perfectly neutral, which was about the only thing keeping Harry still. He didn't want—didn't want this man thinking of him as weak, didn't trust Snape enough to have this information about him, not when it could so easily be turned against him, not when it could be spread around and used to turn Harry into a thing to be pitied— "I have grown somewhat skilled at recognizing the signs. It is not always easy to tell when a situation permits or requires my interference, so I am asking you to tell me now, Mr. Potter. Do I need to interfere?"

Okay. Okay, he wasn't asking Harry to talk about it, wasn't going to bring anything up, wasn't going to ask about his feelings, Harry could work with this—

"I have alternate plans for the summer, sir," Harry said, keeping his voice as steady as he could. He would never know how impressed Snape was by his composure in that moment. For an eleven-year-old. "If James Potter won't let me come to Potter Manor, I can stay with—with several friends so I don't have to go… back."

They both knew where back was.

"Very well. If that ever changes, as a member of my House, you are encouraged to contact me." Snape slid a bit of parchment across his desk to Harry, who pocketed it without looking at it. "My address, if you do not have access to wizarding lines of communication."

Harry didn't want to be grateful to Snape for anything; the man had bullied Neville and was a cold, distant git—but damn if he didn't have an uncomfortable tightness in his throat even as he raced through all the angles and looked for hidden motives. "Thank you, sir."

Snape nodded. He looked about as comfortable as Harry felt. "Excellent. Now that's settled—follow me."

He stalked out of the room with a dramatic billow of his black robes. Harry had to jog to catch up with his Head's longer strides, wondering if the robes were enchanted for maximum dramatic effect.

Snape led him up and out of the dungeons, then to a pair of gargoyle statues Harry vaguely remembered seeing before. "Cockroach clusters," he sneered, and the gargoyles leaped side as a door appeared behind them.

Harry pushed it open and climbed the spiral staircase, acutely aware of Snape behind him, and of his wand in his holster.

"Harry! Come in, my boy. Severus, thank you for bringing him. Please, both of you, have a seat." Dumbledore twinkled madly at him both. Harry had the distinct feeling that a stronger twinkle meant he was about to say something Harry wouldn't want to hear.

The chairs were surprisingly comfortable. Harry sat directly across from the Headmaster and Snape perched to his right. He was aggressively blank-faced. Harry took that to mean he was extremely uncomfortable and hiding it, and tried to emulate him.

"I'm sure you're wondering why I've called you here," Dumbledore said.

"Yes, sir." Harry didn't know whether Snape had been allowed to tell him what was going on. Or if Snape was testing him for discretion. Either way, he wasn't going to mention that he'd had a warning.

"I'm aware that your Muggle relatives do not take well to owl post—would I be correct to assume that you have not contacted them this school year?"

"You would, sir." Harry felt a bit queasy.

Dumbledore smiled kindly. "Well, in that case—I'm sure you still need to make arrangements for them to pick you up from the station. I can arrange for a letter to arrive at their home by Muggle channels within an hour or two, if you—"

"Excuse me," Harry said. "Sir. I can't—you seem to have some incorrect information. I'm not—I'm not going back to the Dursleys this summer."

The twinkle dimmed. "Harry…"

"I have other arrangements," Harry said evenly. "I don't know yet if James will let me come back to Potter Manor, but if he doesn't my friend Neville Longbottom has offered his family home. I don't need—"

"Harry," Dumbledore said. "I must stop you there… You see, it is not a matter of you having other options, but of… other complications. You must return to the Dursleys this summer."

"With all due respect, Headmaster, you don't have a say in where I go or what I do outside of school," Harry said as politely as he could manage. "I don't see where you get the authority to force me back to—back to people who haven't treated me very well."

Understatement of the century.

"Mr. Potter," Snape said quietly but firmly. A reprimand—no, a reminder to stop and think.

Harry set his jaw. Dumbledore was old, powerful both politically and magically, and Harry was just an eleven-year-old with authority issues. If push came to shove Dumbledore would crush him with hardly a thought. And it wouldn't do their relationship, and therefore Harry's ability to get things out of Dumbledore in the future, any favors if Harry forced Dumbledore to admit that he'd be pulling strings to send Harry back to a bad home. Since clearly the headmaster wasn't about to change his mind.

"Can you tell me why?" he said instead.

Dumbledore looked relieved. "There are blood wards linked to the Dursley home, Harry, erected with old, powerful magic when your mother died in an effort to save both you and Jules from Voldemort. They are tied to her sister and to you. As long as either you or Jules calls that place home, the wards will stay, and the both of you will have a last resort safe house to retreat to in the event of an emergency."

Harry pictured himself and Jules hiding in the house while the Dursleys went about their business and Death Eaters tried to break the wards, and winced. This was just seven kinds of stupid as far as he could tell. "I lived there for ten years, sir. Surely Jules could call the Dursleys' house home for this summer and keep the wards up."

He knew it wouldn't work, but Dumbledore's reaction would be telling.

"Ah, Harry, if only it were that simple. I'm afraid Jules needs to go to his training," Dumbledore said. So bloody kind. "And the logistics alone of retrieving and returning him to Number 4, Privet Drive every day would be a nightmare, and nothing the Dursleys would appreciate. No, it's far simpler for you to continue on as you have."

Translation: Jules was still more important than Harry, he'd always be more important, his privileges trumped all of Harry's needs, never mind Harry's psychological welfare as long as Jules got to his bloody training—

"How long, sir?"

Dumbledore blinked. "I'm sorry, my boy?"

"How long do I have to stay with the Dursleys this summer to keep the wards active?"

"I must say I… am not entirely sure." Dumbledore was examining him more closely now. Harry clearly wasn't what he'd expected to be dealing with. He could go to hell. Harry had spent ten years being a slave to stupid people and he was done being what others expected him to be. "Three weeks, I believe would be… sufficient."

"I will stay three," Harry said. "After that I've done my part for the Boy Who Lived's welfare, and I'm free to live where I want. With my father's awareness, of course."

"Of course," Dumbledore agreed, still watching Harry. The twinkle was gone, replaced by a hard craftiness that reminded Harry this man was probably the greatest wizard alive. "That seems entirely reasonable. I should also inform you that I will have watchers assigned the house, to make sure you are safe."

You mean to spy on me, since if these wards are so great it's about the safest I can be from Death Eaters and you clearly don't care about my aunt and uncle. Harry sent Dumbledore his best charming, polite, and sweet smile. "Thank you, sir. I'm glad we're on the same page. Was that all?"

"Indeed it was," Dumbledore said slowly. "Have a pleasant summer, Harry."

"I'll do my best." No thanks to you.

"Good afternoon, Albus," Snape said, and then he and Harry left.

It took most of the walk back down to the dungeons for Harry to get his anger under control and not feel like hexing the next thing that annoyed him into pieces.

"Thank you, sir," he said when they passed Snape's office, expecting this was the last time he'd see the professor until the next term.

"Mr. Potter."

Harry turned back. "Sir?"

Snape had paused outside his office, expression unreadable, as always. "I confess, when you were Sorted, I thought it… some kind of cosmic joke. However… it seems there is hope for you in Slytherin yet. Do not forget to owl me if you need."

He jerked his head and billowed into his office. The door slammed. Harry stared at it, mouth open. Had Snape just approved of him? After a year of cold glares and refusing to compliment Harry's near-perfect potions?

Feeling just a little bit lighter, Harry headed for the common room.

Blaise and Theo took the news about as well as he'd expected. Both were furious and spent a solid five minutes inventing creative insults for Dumbledore. This was somewhat therapeutic but didn't actually solve anything. Harry let them blow it off and started planning. They agreed to write each other during the weeks Harry was at the Dursleys and once he moved to either Potter Manor or Longbottom Manor, they'd pick their summer spell practice up, and hopefully rope some of their other friends into it.

"Wait," Theo said with sudden horror just when Harry thought they'd gotten it all settled. "If Dumbledore's got watchers—you can't use wandless magic. You don't know how close attention they're paying—if it's a house-elf, it could shadow you day and night and never be seen!"

"Well that's just all kinds of creepy," Harry snarled, rubbing his forehead. He'd been counting on using wandless magic to evade the Trace and intimidate the Dursleys into treating him more like an actual human being. "Not to mention bloody frustrating."

Blaise shook his head in disgust. "A school headmaster shouldn't have this much influence."

"He'd provide a better service to the students walking around and using his beard as a boot brush to shine our shoes than leading the school!" Theo said, and they were off again.

Even Hermione and Neville's confidence in Dumbledore was shaken when Harry told them. He probably shouldn't have felt vindicated by that, but he did. Hermione promised to write him and even hugged him when she found out, which Harry allowed even though it made him as tense as a board. Neville seemed to have a hard time processing the fact that Dumbledore was doing something that didn't line up with the Paragon of Wisdom and Kindness that seemed to be the overwhelming Gryffindor view of him, but he insisted Harry could come to the Longbottom Manor at any point over the summer. "You got me through Potions this year, I'm pretty sure Snape would've given me a breakdown without your help," he said. "Even if we weren't friends, I'd owe you for that. And we are friends. So. You can come. I mean, if you want—I know you'd probably rather be with Theo or Blaise—"

Harry assured him that he did want to, and believed he'd have just as much fun with Neville as with one of the other boys, relieved that he and Neville both seemed a little anxious about this. Then Lisa and Pansy and Blaise dragged them into a game of Truth or Dare in a dusty disused fourth-floor corridor to celebrate the last night before they went home.

The First Goodbye

Chapter Notes

See the end of the chapter for notes

Harry,

This is hard for me to do. When you went to Slytherin—No Potter has been in Slytherin for centuries. It just doesn't happen. And I've never had a good experience with a Slytherin.

I apologize for not writing this year. I received your letters last fall and didn't know what to say, and I was angry enough that I thought it was better for me just to not respond. Jules tells me you're worried about where you're to stay this summer. Potter Manor is legally always open to its Heir, but I think we tried to rush things last summer. I should've known not to expect you to be a carbon copy of Jules, or to integrate into our family without a hitch. If you spend this summer with the Longbottoms after your stay at the Dursleys is over—Dumbledore wrote me about the plan—you and Jules and your friends can spend time together, and you can spend time with just Jules and me, and we can start trying to piece this family back together.

James

Harry scowled at the parchment. At least his father had been prompt; Harry had only spoken to Jules two days ago, and tomorrow they'd be boarding the Hogwarts Express for King's Cross. But still.

"He only invited me home because he's legally obligated to," Harry complained to Theo, Pansy, and Blaise over breakfast. The rest of their year mates were sleeping in, but Harry got up early and his three closest Slytherin friends at least got up earlier than the rest. "And that last bit? Piece our family together? No thanks. I'm not interested in having him as my family. Git." He attacked his porridge with a scowl.

"He legally can't disinherit you either," Pansy reminded him. "Not without a felony conviction with a four plus year sentence or proven magical or mental handicap that would prevent you from running an estate, which clearly you don't have. Blaise, darling, pass the cherries."

Harry smirked and flicked his wand at a bowl of cherries. Wingardium Leviosa, Incendio, Alohomora, and Glaci were still the only spells he could cast nonverbally, since they were the closest proper spells to his wandless magic abilities, and he didn't think he would be able to cast any more for a long time. It still made Pansy's eyes bug out when the bowl floated over to her.

"You—you just—wordlessly— how?" she squeaked, cherries forgotten.

"Harry's special," Theo drawled.

Pansy threw a cherry at his head.

"Open the other one," Blaise said, ignoring Theo and Pansy with the air of a disdainful adult letting the children play. Harry was impressed that he managed to pull that off given that they were all the same age.

He picked up the other envelope, addressed to Harry Potter in handwriting that looked a bit like James' except messier. "Three guesses," he said, breaking the seal.

"Cornelius Fudge," Theo said, putting on a pompous air.

"Nope. That might actually say something interesting," Harry said, grinning, and unfolded his brother's letter.

Harry—

I wrote Dad. He said he'd write back once he figured out what to say. I'm writing because the twins said it might cause you problems in Slytherin if you look too friendly with me. I was going to track you down during dinner last night, actually, but they convinced me not to. Is it really that bad for you in Slytherin? I'd like to try to be friendly at least but let me know if your House won't let you.

"Remind me to thank the Weasley twins later," Harry said, wincing as he imagined the stir that would be Jules Potter venturing into Slytherin territory. On his own it might not be too bad but he'd almost definitely bring backup, that backup would almost definitely be named Weasley and/or Finnegan, and that would almost definitely result in hexes.

So you know how my birthday is kind of a big social event in the summers? I was thinking we should make it a joint thing this year. You invite your friends, I'll invite mine. Dad says no suspected Death Eaters or their children. I think I can get him to make an exception for Nott since Hermione will back me up. We can do the social thing and let the reporters take pictures and then have our actual birthday with just our friends once the guests leave. If it goes up in flames we'll know not to keep trying to mix our friends.

I know you don't like the Dursleys much but it'll be fine. Write me after you leave and we can… I don't know. Something that doesn't involve hexing each other, preferably. I'll even leave Ron behind; I know you and he don't get along.

Jules

"Look at that, the Other Potter grew a brain," Theo said, giving the letter a cursory glance. "Wonder where it's been hiding all year?"

"I think realizing Quirrell was the bad guy all along hit him in the face a bit," Harry said. "Quirrell is evil and Snape isn't. My smarter twin was right. Hey, maybe he's not evil either!"

"What's it say?" Pansy said, trying to grab it, but Blaise was faster. He read the letter and his eyebrows slowly crept upwards.

"It says, dear Pansy, that we are going to be hanging out with the Other Potter and his fan club some this summer," Blaise said.

"I can be friendly with you."

Jules looked up. "Huh—oh. Harry, hi. Er—sit?"

"No, thanks," Harry said, adjusting the strap of his bag. He had a few library books to return before he went to finish packing. "Just wanted to clear up—I can be friendly with you. Slytherin politics are complicated but not that brutal." Only a partial lie—it would be harder for Harry if he was known to be on decent terms with his brother, but not impossible. He'd handle it. It helped that his feud with James was a poorly kept secret. "It's just maybe not a great plan to march over to the Slytherin table during the middle of breakfast to invite me to a joint birthday party backed up by the dumbass duo."

"Hey!" Weasley protested.

Harry gave him a charming smile. "Just kidding."

"Er," Jules said, clearly judging Slytherin. "Ooookay. So you like the birthday plan, then?"

"It's worth trying," Harry said. "One condition—the lot of you keep the Death Eater comments out of it. I'm sure you can manage a few hours in the company of Slytherin preteens without calling them murderous lunatics."

"Only if you keep your crowd from firing hexes from behind," Weasley said instantly. "We know you do it—"

"No hexes from either side, and no Death Eater comments from you," Harry said. "If someone does call one of us a Death Eater, all bets are off and you can count on magical payback. Deal?"

"Deal," Jules said, looking at Weasley and Finnegan. Weasley agreed. Finnegan glared at Harry for a few more seconds before he reluctantly gave in.

"Great, see you guys," Harry said.

He was accosted by Fred and George in the hall.

"Sooo," Fred said. Harry had finally managed to tell them apart. He thought. "We see you've been putting our little jinx to good use."

"Nailing Malfoy in the Great Hall was excellent."

"Truly inspired."

"Slytherin Quidditch team seemed to find it particularly amusing."

"Surely that was just a coincidence."

Harry grinned at them. "I've no idea what you're talking about."

"Sure you don't," George said with a wink. "Word is you're trying out next year."

"We'd be happy to fly with you this summer," Fred said.

"Not that we'll give up Gryffindor maneuvers, mind."

"Of course not," Harry agreed. "And I don't actually know any Slytherin maneuvers to share yet." Not strictly true; Wright had taught him some things that the seventh year said Harry had better not show to anyone outside Slytherin on pain of death even if he didn't make the team, but Harry could keep those to himself.

"Can't wait," George said.

"Can't wait to see ickle Ronniekins' face when you cream him," Fred added.

"I won't be," Harry said sweetly. "Not until Quidditch next year, if he even makes the team. He and Jules won't see me fly. Or get any idea of my skill level."

Both twins snickered and winked at him. "Sneaky, you are."

"Worthy of Slytherin."

"You're pretty sneaky yourselves," Harry pointed out.

"Ah, but we are much fonder of attention than you snakey lot," George said.

Harry laughed. They really were impossible to not like. At least for him. "See you this summer."

"Oh, definitely," Fred said with a smile that promised chaos. Harry headed for the library feeling vaguely terrified and mostly excited to see what kinds of pranks the twins would pull, and what he could learn from them in the process.

Justin, Hannah, Lisa, and Anthony managed to snag one of the compartments with Expansion Charms and lock the door to keep the upperclassmen out, which meant all of Harry's friends managed to pile into the one compartment. Even Hermione and Neville showed up eventually. "Ron and Seamus were playing with the animals," Hermione said irritably. "They wouldn't give Trevor back to Neville. Once they started trying to juggle Trevor and Ron's stupid rat I levitated the toad away from them and we left."

"How about some Exploding Snap?" Justin said, clearly taking the look on Neville's face to mean they should do something to help him unwind. This probably would have worked better if he hadn't picked a card game that involved exploding cards. Harry budged over to let Neville sit between him and Theo, and between the two of them they needled and prodded the Gryffindor out of his nervousness. It took almost an hour but they eventually got him shouting and taking risks along with the rest of them, and Neville's fingers didn't even end up more scorched than anyone else's.

Harry brought up the birthday party and told them they were all invited. "It's a bit of a social arse-kissing session," Theo said, "but it should be fun to watch full-on adults practically kowtow to the Boy Who Lived."

"I promised Jules no hexes," Harry said, "so no one Fundihosen him while he's talking to the Minister." Lisa, Sue, Theo, and Blaise all looked like he'd just taken away their Christmas gifts.

"How'd you know we were thinking that?" Lisa demanded.

Harry grinned at her. "Lisa, trust me, that was the first thing that went through my head when Theo told me exactly what kind of social gathering this is. Plus, I know you."

She heaved a theatrical sigh and went back to her sketchpad.

"You said no hexes," Blaise said. "What about pranks that don't involve magic?"

Harry smirked at him. "Don't get caught?"

"Thank you for that brilliant piece of advice, O wise one," Theo said. Harry elbowed him.

About a half hour before arrival, people started to peel off to say goodbye to house mates and, for the Muggle-borns, change out of their robes. Eventually only Blaise, Theo, and Pansy were still in the compartment with Harry. He noticed within about five minutes of reading and casual conversation that Blaise had something he wanted to say.

"Spit it out, Blaise," Harry said.

Pansy instantly turned away from Theo, who she'd been bugging while he read, and faced Blaise. "Yes, please do."

Blaise frowned at them both. "I think Dumbledore set your brother up for a confrontation with… Quirrell."

Pansy pounced on his hesitation. "You were going to say something else," she said, leaning forward intently. "Not Qurirell. Was Quirrell working for someone? Was he actually involved or did he die in the crossfire and they blamed him as a coverup?"

"I love having friends who think like this," Harry said with fake bliss.

"I'm serious, Harry," Blaise scowled.

"I know. I think the same thing," Harry said, finally closing his book and looking up at Blaise. "But there's not much we can do, is there? It's not like Jules would believe me."

"Hold up, why do we think that?" Pansy said.

"Because of the traps," Theo realized. "The Devil's Snare—either Neville or Hermione. A Seeker's trap for Jules, a giant chessboard for Weasley, the troll for all of them—Hermione's already helped take one down once, so has Neville, Finnegan's a pyromaniac and Harry here already proved pretty firmly that trolls can be taken out by fire—then the logic puzzle, also Hermione, and finally the Mirror of Erised, which Jules and Weasley have already beaten."

Pansy blinked. "Well. That… complicates things."

Blaise was still frowning at Harry. "Were you just going to not say anything?"

"I was waiting to see if you'd notice," Harry said with a grin.

"Wanker," Blaise muttered, going back to his book.

"Don't think I've forgotten," Pansy said. "Harry. Who did Blaise almost mention?"

Harry looked at Blaise. Blaise thought for a second and nodded. Theo watched the interchange. Harry waited. Seconds stretched almost into a minute before Theo nodded, too.

So Harry cast a Colloportus at their compartment door and told Pansy about Voldemort.

He registered the surrealism of the moment, of course. He was the Boy Who Lived's Slytherin twin, sharing a compartment with the son of the Black Widow, the son of a suspected Death Eater, and the daughter of a Dark pureblood family, talking about ho that Lord Voldemort was still alive in some form and trying to return. But somehow Pansy had become a friend in the last few months and if Harry couldn't trust Blaise and Theo by now he couldn't trust anyone.

When he was done, Pansy cocked her head. Processed for a few seconds. And asked him point blank, "Where will you stand if he comes back?"

Harry looked around the compartment. Blaise was doing the thing where he pretended to be disdainfully amused with the lot of them, and Theo was aggressively faking boredom, which told Harry they were both fully invested in the answer.

"I'm going to fight him," he said quietly, but with conviction. He'd been stewing over this since Hermione first told him in a shaking voice about watching Jules face off with Voldemort. "He killed my mum. I don't remember her, but maybe if he hadn't… maybe I'd love her, maybe things would be the same, I don't know and now I never will. More personally—he's the reason I spent ten years in misery with my Muggle relatives. Just for that I want him dead. Preferably painfully." He smirked, trying to defuse some of the tension. "Besides, it's not as if Jules and his Gryffindor goons could win any kind of war on without some cunning to back them up."

Blaise and Theo swapped a glance.

"Guess that means we'd better brush up on our dueling," Blaise said. "Since we're probably going to be dragged into this on your heels."

He turned to Pansy. "Exploding snap?"

And, somehow, that was the end of it.

Harry and Theo went to get their owl cages from the storage compartment, leaving Blaise and Pansy to curse at each other over burned fingers.

"Did you mean it?" Theo asked quietly.

Harry paused. "Yeah. But look, mate—I know… your dad and all. I'm not asking anyone to go into this with me. And we're eleven. Almost twelve. I'm not planning on fighting anytime soon. Just—if he comes back. You know where I'll stand. And I plan to be ready to stand there."

"I know," Theo said. "Honestly I think you'll be better at it than your idiot brother."

"He's not as bad as my idiot father," Harry muttered.

Theo snorted.

They walked in silence for half a car.

"My father's not an easy man to defy," They said in an almost-whisper. "But you know I don't hold with the kill-all-the-Muggles ideology."

"I do," Harry said. "Hermione backed you on that one to Jules, actually, which seems to have been an interesting conversation."

"I bet," Theo said sourly.

After a few more seconds' consideration, Harry bumped Theo's shoulder lightly with his own. Theo shoved back, a little harder. They left it at that, but they were Slytherins. They didn't need to spell everything out.

"—need time to perfect it."

Harry recognized George's voice and grabbed Theo's arm, pulling him to a halt. Theo looked at him, irritated; Harry made a hushing noise and pointed at a compartment door that had slid open an inch or two.

"And money." That was Fred. "Time we've got; we just finished third year."

"The fireworks aren't blowing up anymore."

"They're also the wrong color. We need better materials."

"Like Mum would let us find an investor," George grumbled. "Or work on our stuff. Or do much of anything other than try for OWLs and NEWTs and respectable Ministry jobs, because that's done Percy and Dad so much good."

"We wouldn't find an investor anyway, we're barely fourteen ."

Harry felt his eyes widen as an idea hit him.

Theo squinted at him. "I know that look," he hissed. "You've an idea—"

Harry pushed the door open. "How about an investor who's younger than you?"

Both of the twins jumped about three inches in the air and had their wands trained on him by the time they hit the benches again.

"You're jumpy," Theo said, following Harry into the compartment and closing the door. "Didn't sleep enough? Or maybe you were talking about things you don't want overheard."

"Don't let the compartment door unlocked in the future, it slid open," Harry advised.

George and Fred lowered their wands. "Did you say something about investing?" George said.

"I did." Harry reached for the Gringotts bag in his pocket. "That book you sent me for Christmas? I'm pretty sure you enchanted it yourself. And I spent months searching and didn't find any references to it, which tells me you two invented Fundihosen. At thirteen and without dying in an experimental magic accident."

"You didn't tell us it was experimental," Theo said indignantly.

Harry shrugged. "I knew it worked by then, what would've been the point? Plus I figured these two wouldn't want it getting back to their mum that they were dabbling in experimental magic. Or Percy. Or Ron."

"Or hey, the Ministry," Theo said, catching on and grinning at the twins. "Seeing as experimental charms licenses are regulated to hell and back."

The twins looked at each other.

"Oh don't worry, I'm not blackmailing you," Harry said. "The point is you're prodigies. I don't care what's on your score reports. I'm curious what you'll make with more funds."

There was definitely an interested gleam in the twins' eyes now. "How much are we talking?" Fred said.

"How about… say, twenty Galleons to begin with?" Harry said. It was a decent sum of money, about five times as much as what he'd spent on their Zonko's Christmas gift. He pulled a bag with the money from his Gringotts bag and held it out.

Fred and George smiled identical Cheshire Cat grins as Fred took the bag. "Pleasure doing business with you," Fred said.

"Write me," Harry said. "Later this summer we'll talk. Once you start turning things out, I want priority orders and a small discount."

"I knew it was going to be fun having you around," George said.

"You dumped me in a lake."

"And you handled it well!" Fred said.

"Almost drowned me when I hauled you out of the water."

"And you looked like you were about to hex Ron to bits."

"We always love needling our brothers."

Harry smiled at them and left.

Blaise and Theo both looked askance at Harry's hideous Muggle clothes. "What in Merlin's name are you wearing?" Blaise demanded. "It's horrid."

"My cousin Dudley's old clothes," Harry said with distaste.

"Is he related to Hagrid by any chance?" Theo said, poking his wand at the extra folds of fabric on the outside of Harry's leg.

"Nah, Hagrid's nice, if a bit oafish," Harry said. "Dudley is just a spoiled little monster. Think Malfoy with stupid parents, no magic, and maybe four times the size."

Blaise and Theo looked disgusted. "And you can't wear your wizarding clothes?" Blaise said. "Even buy quality Muggle ones?"

"I wish. No, Aunt Petunia'd flip tables trying to find out where I got the money for them. They've no idea about my inheritance in Gringotts and I fully intend to keep it that way. Plus I'd just ruin them; I'll probably have some chores to do."

Theo frowned.

"It's appalling," Blaise said, "a wizard, forced to work for Muggles…"

"On the up side," Harry said, "they don't know I'm not allowed magic outside of school. So as long as I don't do any, I can probably threaten my cousin at least, to keep him in line…"

"Want to come see my uncle?" Harry said on impulse. "He's coming to pick me up, if you leave your things by the Floo—"

"Oh yes," Theo said, a gleam in his eye. "I would love to meet your uncle."

Harry knew exactly what his expression meant and grinned. "Great, let's go."

Theo and Blaise followed him back through the barrier. Blaise looked disdainfully at the Muggles, many of whom were giving them odd looks: Harry in his oversized hideous worn-down clothes, carrying a large empty birdcage and wearing his pack with the collapsed trunk secured in it; Blaise and Theo in summer robes, trousers, and leather shoes.

"There," he muttered, pointing.

Uncle Vernon glowered at them as they approached. His face was red and he was even more massive than Harry remembered. He contemplated setting the stupid mustache on fire.

"Merlin, he's disgusting," Blaise hissed.

Theo folded his arms. "How much does he eat?"

"A lot. Hello, Uncle Vernon."

"Boy," Uncle Vernon said. He glanced over Blaise and Theo and curled his lip. "Hurry up, we haven't got all day."

Theo pointed his wand, keeping it disguised in the flow of his robes. Harry and Blaise pretended not to notice. "Tarantallegra."

Uncle Vernon shouted as his legs began to dance like mad. Expletives echoed through King's Cross and dozens of people turned in shock. Some hurried on, looking disgusted; others began to laugh.

"Enough," Harry muttered after a few seconds, and Theo sighed and ended the enchantment.

"You're no fun," he said.

"I've got to live with him," Harry retorted. "Wait 'til we're seventeen."

Theo grinned malevolently. Blaise looked Uncle Vernon over. Harry's uncle was gasping, out of breath, shining with sweat, and looking around wildly, clearly in shock.

Harry winked at them and approached his uncle warily. "Uncle Vernon?" he said as politely as he could manage. "Are—are you quite all right? There's a bench over there if you need to sit down for a bit—"

"No," Uncle Vernon growled, with a fearful glance back at Blaise and Theo. "No, hurry up—we need to get away from that lot—why they let your sort wander around in public looking like that I do not understand—shouldn't be—shouldn't be permitted—public disgrace—"

Harry shifted his pack on his shoulders, tuned out his uncle, and braced himself to face three more weeks at the Dursleys'.

Chapter End Notes

Well! First year's done. All the comments are wonderful and very much appreciated! It's my first time writing Harry Potter fanfic and I really hope I'm doing the story and characters justice. Feedback and suggestions are welcomed!

The next work in this series is tentatively called HP and the Monster of Slytherin, though that is subject to change, and I'm currently partway through rewriting book 2. About 2/3 actually. First chapter will be posted sometime in... probably early December. Definitely before Christmas. I want to finish book 2 and get a better handle on the plot of book 3 so I can go back and insert hints/edits for cohesion with future plot elements if necessary. It might go up sooner than that, depending on my schedule with finals.

In the meantime: I recommend On the Way to Greatness by mira mirth ), On A Pale Horse by Hyliian (this one's a little creepy but hilarious and so worth ), A Very Slytherin Harry by geoffaree (AO3), and Ruthless by AngelaStarCat ). Ruthless is complete, the others are not; A Very Slytherin Harry updates fairly frequently. Oh right, forgot to mention--I appreciate and welcome any and all fanfic recs, not limited to Slytherin Harry or even HP fandom at all. ;)

I'll respond to comments sometime soon-thanks to everyone who left one!

Afterword

Works inspired by this one

Harry Potter und der Bau der Schlangen by gruenglas

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