The Mirror of Erised

Harry froze at the title before sighing. He really didn't want that to come out, but knew he had no hope of preventing it. He could just hope that no one would make a big deal out of it.

The lake froze solid and the Weasley twins were punished for bewitching several snowballs so that they followed Quirrell around, bouncing off the back of his turban

Everyone in the hall started laughing, the trio among them, until Harry abruptly stopped, remembering who had been under that turban.

"Harry?" Hermione asked, realising how pale Harry had become.

"The turban. The back of the turban," Harry said quietly.

"What do you … oh Merlin," Hermione gasped, hands flying up to cover her mouth in shock.

They were hitting Riddle in the face with snowballs, Ron signed, wanting to get it out there and yet not say it, knowing they were keeping the fact that Voldemort had been under the turban a secret for as long as possible. Harry and Hermione both nodded.

"And Quirrell would have known who it was if the twins were punished for it, meaning He knew too," Hermione said.

"Bloody hell. Please tell me He doesn't hold grudges. I mean, He hasn't done anything," Ron said hopefully, only for Harry to burst that bubble.

"Um, yeah, He holds a grudge. For at least 15 years," Harry said, adding the last part under his breath and gesturing to himself.

"They're so dead," the trio exclaimed together, much to the confusion of many around them who hadn't heard half of the conversation and hadn't been able to follow the parts they had heard.

The few owls that managed to battle their way through the stormy sky to deliver mail had to be nursed back to health by Hagrid before they could fly off again.

"Yeah, that snow was not nice for the owls," Harry said.

"I remember how you told Hedwig to not leave the castle, even to hunt, and she glared at you before looking outside and just getting more comfortable on your shoulder," Hermione said.

"Yeah, she didn't even leave the dorms at night and barely left your shoulder when you were in the common room," Ron agreed. Harry just smiled; he loved his owl.

Worst of all were Professor Snape's classes down in the dungeons, where their breath rose in a mist before them and they kept as close as possible to their hot cauldrons.

"And unfortunately, warming charms would just make the cauldrons more prone to blow up," Remus said.

"I do feel so sorry," said Draco Malfoy, one Potions class, "for all those people who have to stay at Hogwarts for Christmas because they're not wanted at home."

"I wasn't sorry. Why would I want to go back to the Dursleys?" Harry asked, raising an eyebrow as he looked over to where Draco was sitting with his group of friends.

Professor McGonagall had come around the week before, making a list of students who would be staying for the holidays, and Harry had signed up at once.

"You basically sprinted over to the sign-up sheet as soon as McGonagall put it up in the tower," Neville said, remembering how excited Harry had been to sign up to stay at the castle during the holidays.

He didn't feel sorry for himself at all; this would probably be the best Christmas he'd ever had.

"Best that I could remember. I bet my first Christmas was amazing," Harry added, getting a soft smile from Remus as Snuffles rested his head on his lap.

"I hate them both," said Harry, "Malfoy and Snape."

"Who doesn't?" Fred asked.

"Professor Snape is on our side," Mrs Weasley reprimanded them softly.

"Doesn't mean we have to like him," George said.

"And it doesn't make him less of a git," Ginny agreed.

"Ah, Hagrid, the last tree — put it in the far corner, would you?"

"The last tree. How many were there?" one of the first year Gryffindors asked.

"There were twelve. It was amazing, you'll see later this year," Hermione replied.

"And that reminds me — Harry, Ron, we've got half an hour before lunch, we should be in the library."

"The betrayal," the twins exclaimed.

"Ever since you mentioned Nicolas Flamel we've been trying to find out who he is."

"Oh, that's alright then," the twins decided, stopping their dramatics.

"Unless you'd like to tell us and save us the trouble?" Harry added.

"It would be so much easier if people would just tell us these things," Ron said.

"They should know that we'll find it out either way," Hermione agreed.

"But no, they always make us go through the trouble of working it out ourselves," Harry said.

"We must've been through hundreds of books already and we can't find him anywhere — just give us a hint — I know I've read his name somewhere."

"It was right there," the trio exclaimed together, getting confused looks from many people in the hall who had forgotten about the chocolate frog card, even while Remus smirked, knowing where Harry had read the name; he could remember the description on almost all the chocolate frog cards he had.

Hermione took out a list of subjects and titles she had decided to search while Ron strode off down a row of books and started pulling them off the shelves at random.

"Those are both actually pretty good searching strategies if you have no idea what you're looking for," Luna said.

"How did you make sure you didn't grab the same book twice?" Tonks asked.

"I wrote down which books I'd checked and wouldn't go to the same row twice," Ron said.

Unfortunately, you needed a specially signed note from one of the teachers to look in any of the restricted books, and he knew he'd never get one.

"Not that year at least," Harry corrected himself. Those in his group looked over at the trio, wondering how, and why, they had gotten a book from the restricted section before their fifth year.

What they really needed was a nice long search without Madam Pince breathing down their necks.

"You'll never get that. She never leaves her library unattended," Remus said. Harry smirked; that was what he thought.

"And you could ask your parents if they know who Flamel is," said Ron. "It'd be safe to ask them."

"Her parents are muggles. I doubt they'd know about a wizard," Bill said.

"Actually, they had heard of Nicholas Flamel from fictional stories about magic. But neither of them could remember what he was famous for or what the stories said about him," Hermione said.

They had the dormitory to themselves and the common room was far emptier than usual, so they were able to get the good armchairs by the fire.

"The chairs which you always seem to get now," Parvati complained, having often wanted to grab those seats only to find the trio already in them.

They sat by the hour eating anything they could spear on a toasting fork—bread, English muffins, marshmallows—and plotting ways of getting Malfoy expelled, which were fun to talk about even if they wouldn't work.

"That was fun," the two boys said together while Hermione rolled her eyes.

He wasn't a very good player yet

"You're still not a very good player. No offense Harry," Ron said Harry shrugged; he knew that planned strategy wasn't his strong point.

"Yeah, but you're our chess player and our strategist. Hermione's our researcher and makes your strategies into fully formed plans. I think better on my feet and the 'leader'," Harry said while Hermione nodded her agreement.

On Christmas Eve, Harry went to bed looking forward to the next day for the food and the fun, but not expecting any presents at all.

He was sent many pitying looks at that.

Harry blew it—it sounded a bit like an owl.

"Thank Merlin that Hagrid sent that. None of us can sing," Hermione said, getting some weird looks for her statement.

"Weird!" he said, "What a shape! This is money?"

"You realise you were channelling your dad just then, don't you," Harry asked, making Ron blush slightly even as he grinned.

Harry had torn open the parcel to find a thick, hand-knitted sweater in emerald green and a large box of homemade fudge.

"I really appreciated it, Mrs Weasley," Harry said, smiling at the kind woman.

"Of course, dear, it was no trouble."

"Every year she makes us a sweater," said Ron, unwrapping his own, "and mine's always maroon."

"I don't mind maroon for everything else, but it just really doesn't go with my hair," Ron added at his mum's look.

His next present also contained candy—a large box of Chocolate Frogs from Hermione.

"Lifesaver Hermione," Harry said quietly.

Ron gasped.

So did Remus, recognising the description, while Snuffles perked up.

"If that's what I think it is—they're really rare, and really valuable."

Harry groaned, having not wanted the fact that he had an invisibility cloak to get out.

"It's an Invisibility Cloak," said Ron,

"Someone gave you an invisibility cloak as a Christmas present?" Tonks asked. Harry nodded, blushing.

Sure enough, his reflection looked back at him, just his head suspended in mid-air, his body completely invisible.

"Invisibility cloaks are not allowed Mr Potter. I'm going to have to confiscate it," Umbridge called, not sounding sorry at all.

"Actually, you can't do that Professor. You can't confiscate heirlooms, which is what his cloak is," Hermione said, and Harry let out a sigh of relief; he had no clue what he would have done if she tried to take his dad's cloak.

There was no signature.

Remus was frowning, trying to work out who James would have trusted with the cloak.

Had it really once belonged to his father?

"It did. And his father before him, and his father's father before him. It's been passed down to the oldest child for centuries," Remus confirmed.

Harry stuffed the cloak quickly out of sight. He didn't feel like sharing it with anyone else yet.

"Aw, come on Harry," George said.

"Let us borrow it," Fred said. Harry looked at them as if they were insane, while many of the teachers, and many of the other students, were slowly filled with dread at the thought of the Weasley twins having access to an invisibility cloak.

"I would actually like the school to remain standing, thank you," Harry replied, which caused many people to relax, thankful that the terror twins wouldn't have an invisibility cloak.

Fred and George were wearing blue sweaters, one with a large yellow F on it, the other a G.

"You're wearing the wrong sweater, aren't you?" Hermione asked.

"No, they actually weren't. The only time they don't wear each other's clothes, or switch around with each other, is when they're presents or concerning gifts," Harry said offhandedly. All the Weasleys turned to look at him, the twins gaping at him in surprise. They didn't even realise he could tell them apart, let alone that he knew that about them. The book had been saying who had done what, but they had just thought that that was part of the book, not that Harry had actually known.

"How do you know that?" they demanded.

"Wouldn't you like to know," Harry replied, smiling sweetly. The twins stared at him for a few moments before turning back to Hermione.

"He's not wrong though," Fred said.

"We treat our presents very seriously," George agreed.

"Harry's is better than ours, though," said Fred, holding up Harry's sweater. "She obviously makes more of an effort if you're not family."

"They really didn't look any different. They just said that to make me feel special," Harry said, not wanting to admit that it had worked as well.

"I hate maroon," Ron moaned half-heartedly as he pulled it over his head.

"You love maroon. It's your favourite colour," Charlie said.

"And like I said, not for clothes that I have to wear," Ron replied.

Harry watched Hagrid getting redder and redder in the face as he called for more wine, finally kissing Professor McGonagall on the cheek, who, to Harry's amazement, giggled and blushed, her top hat lopsided.

"McGonagall was drunk?" the twins and Lee asked.

"Yeah," Harry smirked. Minerva groaned at how much Harry noticed.

When Harry finally left the table, he was laden down with a stack of things out of the crackers, including a pack of non-explodable, luminous balloons,

"I think I still have those in my trunk if we want to pull them out for our next party, now that I think about it," Harry said, getting enthusiastic responses from many Gryffindors around them.

a Grow-Your-Own-Warts kit,

That, I used, Harry signed, knowing that Ron and Hermione were looking at him; he had found a charm that duplicated the kit, put a multiplying charm on each wart, and used it on all the boys in Gryffindor tower about a week into the term. Each boy had started with one wart on their face when they woke up and by the time the day was over, their warts had multiplied so that there was over a dozen warts on their faces; the warts had disappeared the next night, so they woke up without any warts.

The white mice had disappeared and Harry had a nasty feeling they were going to end up as Mrs. Norris's Christmas dinner.

"I was going to give them to Hedwig as a Christmas gift too," Harry said.

"Who's there?" squawked the Fat Lady.

"You'd think she'd stop asking that, considering the amount of times we snuck out with the cloak while we were in school," Remus said.

The Restricted Section in the library.

"Boring. The first time you sneak out at night," Fred said.

"Other than to attend a duel, was to go to the library," George said. Harry just grinned; they had no clue the number of times he had snuck out that hadn't been included in the book.

A piercing, bloodcurdling shriek split the silence—the book was screaming!

Throughout the hall, people flinched and jumped as the piercing shriek cut through the hall.

There was a suit of armour near the kitchens, he knew, but he must be five floors above there.

"There are suits of armour all through the castle," Bill said slowly.

"Yeah, but all of them look different, and that suit of armour looked almost identical to the one near the kitchens, especially at night," Harry said with a shrug, ignoring the confused looks that many people sent him; most people hadn't even noticed that the suits of armour looked different, let alone worked out where each one was.

Wherever he was, Filch must know a shortcut,

"I found that shortcut about a week later, when I went looking for it," Harry said. "It was the one between the tapestries of the baby doll and the Siamese cats, and under the tapestry of a choir." Remus and the twins all thought for a moment before nodding, knowing which shortcut he meant.

There was an inscription carved around the top: Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi.

Harry sank into the couch slightly, wrapping his arms around himself, wishing he had his invisibility cloak. He really didn't want to be here when everyone else heard this.

His heart was pounding far more furiously than when the book had screamed—for he had seen not only himself in the mirror, but a whole crowd of people standing right behind him.

"What?" Mrs Weasley asked, concerned.

She was a very pretty woman. She had dark red hair and her eyes— her eyes are just like mine Harry thought, edging a little closer to the glass. Bright green—exactly the same shape, but then he noticed that she was crying; smiling, but crying at the same time.

"Lily," Remus breathed, recognising the description without Harry's added comment about them having the same eyes.

The tall, thin, black-haired man standing next to her put his arm around her. He wore glasses, and his hair was very untidy. It stuck up at the back, just as Harry's did.

"James," Remus breathed again.

"Mom?" he whispered. "Dad?"

"You'd never seen them before, had you?" Luna asked in a sad, dreamy voice and Harry simply shook his head, ignoring the pitying looks that were being sent his way even as Hermione and Ron glared at those sending him the pitying looks.

He tore his eyes away from his mother's face, whispered, "I'll come back," and hurried from the room.

"I don't think you should go back," Bill said, vaguely recognising the signs of an enchantment beginning to work on Harry.

"It's here—just here—yes!"

"See, the suits of armour are all different, that's how I knew we were close," Harry said.

Ron, though, was staring transfixed at his image.

Ron was the one to sink in his seat slightly, not really wanting to know how his family would react to knowing what his heart's desire was.

"No—I'm alone—but I'm different—I look older—and I'm Head Boy!"

"What?" all the Weasleys asked in confusion.

"I am—I'm wearing the badge like Bill used to—and I'm holding the House Cup and the Quidditch cup—I'm Quidditch captain, too!"

Something seemed to click for Charlie.

"Ron, you don't need to do everything that Bill and I did just to get some recognition. You have your own things that are special about you. Like how amazing you are at chess." Ron blushed but nodded.

"Do you think this mirror shows the future?"

"Tact Ronald," Hermione sighed.

Ron and Harry stood quite still, both thinking the same thing—did the cloak work on cats?

"It does, but they do have a strong sense of smell," Remus said. Harry nodded.

"I know. I've started using scent blocking charms along with silencers on my feet when I use the cloak now," he said. Moody heard what Harry had said and nodded approvingly, having used the same methods when he was tracking suspects while he was still an Auror.

"You sound like Hermione."

"Is that a bad thing?" Hermione asked.

"Not at all. It just meant that he was sounding all responsible for once. And that really wasn't what I wanted to hear at the time," Harry replied, getting a shout of "Hey!" from Ron at the 'for once'.

"So—back again, Harry?"

"What?" Tonks asked, very confused, especially since she recognised Dumbledore's voice.

"Strange how nearsighted being invisible can make you," said Dumbledore, and Harry was relieved to see that he was smiling.

"If he's smiling, you'll be fine," the twins said, having been caught by the Headmaster a couple of times in the past; if their prank that they were setting up was simply for amusement and wouldn't harm anyone, he would simply smile, wink, and walk the other way.

"I don't need a cloak to become invisible," said Dumbledore gently.

"And I had been passing by the night before and heard the conversation. That was why I went back that night, to make sure they didn't come back again," Dumbledore added.

Now, why don't you put that admirable cloak back on and get off to bed?"

Harry tilted his head for a moment before snapping his fingers.

What was protecting the stone before the mirror was put down there? Neither Hermione nor Ron seemed to have an answer to that and both simply shrugged.

You could ask Dumbledore, Hermione suggested and Harry shrugged.

Maybe later.

"What do you see when you look in the mirror?"

"That is a very personal question Harry," Remus said gently.

"One can never have enough socks," said Dumbledore. "Another Christmas has come and gone and I didn't get a single pair. People will insist on giving me books."

"Oh, so that's why you bought multiple pairs of socks. Two for Dobby and one for the Headmaster," Ron said. He knew that Dobby wanted odd socks, hence them buying him two pairs rather than one, but had had no clue who the third pair was for.

But then, he thought, as he shoved Scabbers off his pillow, it had been quite a personal question.

The book stopped there and there was quiet chatter throughout the hall, with many people speculating what they would see if they looked in the mirror. However, the chatter didn't last long and Filius cast the spell again, starting the next chapter in the book.