Hi everyone! Thank you to everyone who has followed and favourited this story and all the great reviews! I had a little break from writing this story while I was working on others but I'm back working on it now. If you have any votes for who you want Harry to end up with, comment now cause I am going to decide before I start working on the next chapter.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy this latest chapter!

And as always, I do not own Harry Potter

Chapter 8

The next morning started in a similar fashion to the one before. Harry woke before the others and quietly got ready for his day. Instead of laying on his bed however he grabbed his broom and made his way outside to the quidditch pitch that he had been shown the day before. He thankfully didn't meet anyone in the halls as he made his way outside to the morning sunshine. It had only been a few days but felt like ages since he had taken his broom out and he thought to himself that if he kept waking up early, he may make this a regular occurrence.

The air whipped his face and through his robes as he flew around the pitch, pushing himself faster and faster with each lap. Feeling any concerns that had been resting on his shoulders float away on the wind. After a dozen laps around the pitch he felt sufficiently warmed up and started working on a few of his favourite quidditch moves. He was playing with the idea of trying out for his house team when they ran trials but was a little bit worried about drawing attention to himself. He decided to play it by ear and decide as trials got closer.

He checked the time and seeing that it was close to breakfast he headed back into the castle, shrinking his broom and placing it in his pocket as he went. The hall was pretty much deserted as it was still quite early so Harry just took a seat at his table and started dishing himself up some muesli with yogurt and a cup of tea. He felt something brush against his leg and looked down to see Zima curling around his feet.

"Hey beautiful, would you like a sausage?" Harry asked quietly, breaking up a sausage and placing it on the ground in front of Zima, before giving him a scratch behind his ears and returning to his own breakfast. Harry watched as the hall slowly filled around him, enjoying the quiet time to observe the other students. Quiet time didn't last long, as he soon found himself surrounded on both sides by Lukas and Roman, while Blake sat down opposite him.

"Where's Timur and Martin?" Harry asked looking between Lukas and Roman.

"They are just finishing getting ready, we decided to come down early to check you were ok seeing as how you were gone before anyone else was awake this morning." Lukas said, a slight snip to his voice as he ran his eyes over Harry to make sure he was OK.

Harry looked surprised at the admission that they had been worried about him.

"Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to worry you. I woke up early so decided to go out for a fly before breakfast."

Lukas rolled his eyes at that. "Just be careful Harry, you're new around here and there are people here who may try to take advantage of that."

Now it was Harry's turn to roll his eyes, "I'm pretty good at looking out for myself, but thank you for your concern."

Lukas just nodded and went back to eating his breakfast.

HPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHP

Harry checked his timetable before leaving the hall with his three dormmates, Zima having wandered off some time during breakfast. Today they had Potions and Transfiguration then free time in the afternoon. Harry had a spring in his step as they made their way to potions, to the amusements of his new friends. Harry had always quite liked potions but had never done well with Snape breathing down his neck and Slytherins sabotaging his potions, maybe this year could be different. As they walked into class the potions Professor asked everyone to remain standing, he then proceeded to place everyone in pairs.

"Your partner today will be your potion partner for the rest of the year, so I suggest you do your best to get along and work together."

Harry's partner was a boy name Anders, though he didn't have a clue who that was and Harry being much shorter that everyone in the class couldn't get a good look around. He decided to just wait while people started moving to their partner and found a table. A stocky blonde started walking toward him, he was still taller than Harry but where Harry was lithe this boy was solid, with a broad chest and thick arms and legs.

He inclined his head as Harry smiled and walked over, "I'm guessing we must be partners?"

"We are if you're Harry Krum?" Anders replied.

"As far as I know" Harry replied with a small grin as the pair made their way to a spare desk.

Today they would be making a wit sharpening potion, Harry went and collected the ingredients while Anders set up their cauldron.

They started preparing the ingredients Harry cutting up the fluxweed roots while Anders set the water on to boil.

"Harry, make sure that you cut the pieces the same width" Anders said gently. Harry swung around his eyes widening in surprise and Anders froze for a second as he took in the stunning green and black eyes.

Anders moved Harry to the side with a slight nudge, "here let me show you." With that the stocky blonde proceeded to slice the roots showing Harry how to hold the knife and roots to ensure they were cut correctly.

"Oh, I'm sorry" Harry said sheepishly. "Potions isn't my strongest subject, but I promise to work really hard" he said sincerely. Worried that Anders wouldn't want to be his partner anymore if he knew how terrible he was at potions.

Anders simply nodded again, "if you need help just ask."

"I will, thank you" Harry said with a small smile as he started grinding up the flitterby wings.

By the end of the class they had quite a good potion and Harry was happy that they had managed so well.

Anders hadn't spoken much all lesson, but it wasn't in a rude way, Harry just got the impression that he wasn't much of a talker. Harry quite enjoyed the quiet comradery that sprung up between them as they brewed and thought that this year potions might actually be enjoyable.

Harry waved goodbye to Anders as he walked over to Timur, Lukas and Roman who were waiting for him at the door.

"Alright there Harry?" Roman asked as they started walking off to lunch.

"Yep, that was probably the best potions class I've ever had. I can't wait to see what we brew next time."

"Anders treat you OK?" Lukas asked. "He isn't known to be the friendliest person."

"Oh yeah Anders was great," Harry said. "Gave me some good pointers to help with my potion skills and trust me I can use all the help I can get." He finished with a small self-deprecating chuckle.

They were just finishing their lunch when the people around Harry went quiet. Harry looked up from his roast beef sandwich to see Anders standing behind him.

"Hey Anders, would you like to sit down?" Harry asked as he shuffled down the bench pushing Timur along.

"No thank you, I just wanted to give you this." He handed over a book. "I thought you may find it useful." Before Harry could respond he had walked off again.

Harry looked down to see a book titled The ins and outs of Potion Making: A how to guide to mastering potions.

Timur leaned over to read the title of the book, "why'd he give you a potions book?" The red head asked in confusion.

Harry just smiled thoughtfully, "I was telling him I need all the help I can get, I guess he thought this book would be useful."

Harry opened the book straight away and started flicking through it. It looked really interesting with information on how different ingredients interact, the proper way to store and cut ingredients, there was even explanations on the proper way to harvest certain ingredients. Harry knew the book was going to be invaluable and cursed himself for not thinking of looking for something similar earlier, maybe the last four years of potions wouldn't have been quite so bad if he'd had it.

Harry was amazed when he got to transfiguration and discovered that this year they would be working on their animagus transformation. There were very strict rules guiding the process but Durmstrang deemed it a necessity to learn and Harry couldn't help but agree. He wondered why Viktor hadn't mentioned it but decided that he probably didn't realise that it was out of the ordinary, that Hogwarts didn't teach it.

He nearly jumped out of his chair in excitement when the teacher made his announcement earning a raised eyebrow from Roman who was sitting next to him. He couldn't explain that this meant so much to him because his father had been an animagus, to Harry it felt like a connection to his family. He felt a touch of sadness when he thought of Sirius and how he would've probably been very helpful during this, but the ex-Gryffindor brushed the feelings aside, determined not to let them ruin his excitement.

He wasn't even disappointed when he found out that this lesson would simply be reading the textbook and taking notes on animagus transformations.

Their Professor an elderly man with curly white hair handed out the textbooks, one between two and Harry and Roman spent the rest of the lesson hunched over their book taking as many notes as possible.

As they were leaving the classroom Harry saw Anders up ahead leaving with a group of fellow Atticus students, he hurried up and tapped him on the shoulder.

The whole group stopped and turned to look at Harry. He paused for a moment as he found himself assessed by five sets of eyes.

"I just wanted to say thank you so much for the book Anders, I know it's going to come in very handy. I've only just skimmed through it but I've already learnt why its important not to mix dragon blood and armadillo bile which will no doubt save us from some potions related catastrophe in the future." Harry chuckled wryly and Anders lip quirked to the side in amusement.

"Well anything to save us from a future potion related catastrophe" Anders said dryly, his blue eyes shining in amusement.

"I was wondering if perhaps you wanted to meet up once a week to work on our potion homework together?" Harry continued looking a little nervous. He had never been great at making friends, but he was determined not to enclose himself in one small group within his own house this time. He wanted to at least try making friends with others.

The group of Atticus students eyed him in surprise for a moment and Harry began to wonder if he had made some social faux paus, but thankfully Anders nodded at him.

"Sure Harry, how does Thursday after dinner in the library sound?"

"Great, I will see you then" with a wave goodbye Harry headed off back down the hall to Roman, Timur and Lukas who were waiting for him, eyes trailing him as he walked away.

"The new student is a bit different" said one of the boys standing with Anders.

Anders simply nodded as he watched the small figure walking away. While the students of Durmstrang were friendly to each other there was also a fierce rivalry amongst them. It was expected that all students strived for their absolute best which often meant that fellow students weren't usually very willing to offer assistance. If you didn't understand something in class, it was expected that you studied and practiced until you got it right. Sure, Anders had given Harry the book, but that had mostly been because his own potion mark was tied to him, so he needed to ensure that the raven-haired student didn't make simple mistakes and cost them marks. The offer to study together was unexpected though not unwelcome and Anders found himself quite looking forward to it.

HPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHPHP

That night found Harry curled up on a couch in the common room his head on the arm rest reading his new potion text, his feet resting in Martins lap, who was busy reading a copy of advanced transfiguration for class the next day.

"Wow, did you know that stirring clockwise then anti-clockwise actually helps to release magical properties in some ingredients?"

Martin looked up from his textbook and smiled at the small fifth year curled up next to him.

"Actually, yeah I did, it's pretty basic knowledge for potion making actually." Martin said though he didn't sound condescending, just like he was stating a fact.

"Huh" Harry said as he went back to reading his book, "well I never knew, no wonder my old potions teacher used to get so cranky."

Martin rolled his eyes at that, but Harry already immersed in his book didn't notice.

The pair stayed there in companionable silence until they were interrupted by a group of Martin's friends from his own year. Harry sat up and shuffled next to Martin to make more room on the lounge for people to sit on. He ignored the conversation around him as he continued to read his book slowly drifting until he was leaning against Martin's side his head resting on the others shoulder. Martin's eyes flashed to Harry in surprise, but he didn't say anything letting the younger boy lean against him.

Harry finally put his book down and looked around when he heard a large number of students enter the room. Apparently, it was quite common for groups of students to go flying after dinner, sometimes playing quidditch, sometimes just flying around the castle grounds. Harry had been tempted to join them but decided against it for the moment.

"Welcome back" Harry said as he stretched, his body stiff from being in the same position for so long. "How was your flight?"

Blake, Timur, Lukas and Roman all crowded in on some nearby chairs.

"It was great, even managed to beat Lukas in a race around the castle" Roman said with a smirk.

"Only cause you bloody cheated" Lukas responded giving his twin a shove.

"You should join us next time Harry, I'm sure with your Krum genes you're a natural."

"Maybe" Harry said non-committally and thankfully the others dropped it. Harry felt eyes on him and glanced around the room until he found Annika glaring at him. He looked away but wondered what her problem was. Was it honestly just because he wasn't a pure blood? Because not everyone here was, maybe she just needs time to warm up to me Harry thought to himself as he listened to Timur's tale of nearly doing a perfect wronkski feint.