Disclaimer: Harry Potter will never belong to me. I can only wish.
Reminder: Please, please review.
Anyway, I know very well that people are feeling impatient for the plot part of Harry and Voldemort. Some are even feeling that the summary is actually completely unrelated to the story. Of course, I don't blame them. But I can assure you that this is only the build-up, and Harry will be attracting Voldemort's attention again soon. Perhaps in the next few chapters.
Feel free to proceed.
"Harry!" hissed Hermione, dragging him to the front of Snape's classroom. "Something's bothering you."
"Class is going to be starting soon, Hermione," warned Harry, leaning back in his chair. "And I have a feeling Professor Snape isn't going to be particularly happy with you if you continue talking like this."
"Harry!" Hermione snapped. "You've been behaving like this for days! Tell me what happened that afternoon."
"Nothing."
A week had gone by since Harry had been introduced to James Potter's past, and since Voldemort had last disturbed him. It was perhaps fortunate that Voldemort kept to his word and his distance.
Hogwarts was amazing, Harry now had to admit. He had been through most of the classes at least once.
Charms had been one of his favourites. Professor Flitwick was a tiny man but he was fond of using big spells. Impressive ones.
The students had already learned how to conjure rum. A Gryffindor student named Seamus Finnigan had managed to explode the goblet while chanting, "Eye of rabbit, harp string hum, turn this water into rum."
To his surprise, Harry had been one of the first students to complete the task, and in turn received ten house points from Professor Flitwick and a nod of acknowledgement from Blaise Zabini.
Harry and Hermione both had been late for Transfiguration earlier in the week. It was largely due to him oversleeping, but he thought it was a bit rich of Hermione to still be complaining about it.
At first they thought they had gotten away with it, but later it turned out Professor McGonagall had been watching them the whole time in the form of a tabby cat.
The class itself had been enjoyable, with everybody learning how to transfigure toe nails into feathers. Harry actually succeeded in narrowly beat Hermione in the actual 'quality of the feathers' – or so Professor McGonagall said – despite losing at the quantity.
And Hermione hadn't exactly been pleased. Her mood had got even worse when Professor McGonagall gave them both detentions with Snape for arriving in class late.
He and Hermione both had to clean out ten cauldrons each for Professor Snape, who had seemed maliciously satisfied with their detention; greeting them when they came in with a, "What a pleasure to see you here. I do hope you've both done your homework – because you won't have time for homework when you get back."
Harry had known, then and there, that Snape had meant every word.
Annoying, greasy dungeon bat.
The first Potions class had been one of Harry's biggest disasters. His natural talent at the other subjects apparently did little to aid him in potions.
At first, Harry seemed to be doing very well, despite Snape constantly breathing down his neck. Harry was following all the instructions, and he was ahead of the other students, and his potion was turning the lovely blue it was supposed to be. It all went perfectly smoothly until he came to the last set of instructions on the board: stir five times clockwise with your wand.
It was really weird. The moment Harry dipped his wand in the blue liquid, there was an exploding sound and the potion spurted everywhere; all over his clothes, all over the floor, all over a boy who was sitting next to him, and all over Professor Snape who had been watching him intently.
This was why Harry was dreading it this time, but with Hermione asking him about that afternoon, worrying about facing Snape's wrath was no longer Harry's priority.
"Harry!" insisted Hermione exasperatedly.
"All right, fine!" Harry threw both his hands up. "I'll tell you later, okay?"
Hermione slammed down her books on the desk in frustration. "I'm been asking you about it all week, and you've told me you'd tell me later about a hundred times!"
"I'm sorry, then!" hissed Harry. "It's none of your business anyway!"
Hermione recoiled, stung.
Spreading his palms out in emphasis, Harry said, "Pardon my tone, but it is true. We all know you love reading books and gaining new knowledge and all…but I'm not an open book for you to read and you really don't have to know everything!"
"Oh, really?" whispered Hermione in a stiff voice. "Is this what I seem to you? A nosy, book-obsessed geek?"
"Hermione," said Harry, "you are overly curious, you are obsessed with books, and you are a geek."
Hermione sniffed and crossed her arms. "Very well then, don't tell me. But I'll –"
The door banged open and Professor Snape strode him, his black cloak flapping behind him.
"Get your cauldrons out. The potion we're making today is the Swelling Solution. Don't let me see you dawdling around or accidentally skipping instructions. You may all go and get your ingredients. I expect everyone to be finished in forty-five minutes. Starting now," said Snape, his lip curling menacingly.
The sounds of chairs scraping sounded all around the room as Hermione haughtily stood up. "I'll go get the ingredients," she said stiffly to him. "You can stay here."
When she came back, they worked without talking for half an hour. Harry emptied a whole jar of bat spleens into the cauldron while Hermione crushed dried nettles in the mortar. When they came to the last instruction, Harry's doubts arose again.
"Why don't you do it?" suggested Harry tentatively to Hermione. "Stir it with your wand two times anticlockwise and once clockwise."
"Don't you want to do it?" she questioned brusquely.
"Last time, my potion exploded. I wouldn't want to ruin it again."
"Fine."
Hermione got out her wand and pointedly stirred the potion. It immediately turned into the desired colour.
She leaned back into her chair and glared at Harry emphatically.
"Well, that was very difficult," said Hermione.
"Exactly," deadpanned Harry, voice dripping with sarcasm.
Hermione rolled her eyes and filled the empty flask with the potion. "You can give it to Professor Snape."
Without another word, Harry took the flask and marched towards Snape's desk.
"Well done, Mr Potter." Snape smirked at the flask as it was placed in front of him. "Twenty points to Slytherin."
Harry waited for Snape to give Ravenclaw points, but the Potions master turned away. He saw Hermione's fluffy head jerk up and her eyes narrowing.
"Professor, you forgot Hermione," said Harry, awkwardly, feeling as if he ought to put something in for Hermione.
"Oh?" said Snape. He turned and sneered at Hermione who was sitting a few seats away. "Very well, five points from Ravenclaw for not coming up herself."
Harry saw Hermione's eyes widen in surprise and hurt, and felt marginally annoyed at the Slytherin Head. He frowned at Professor Snape who ignored him.
There had been rumours that Professor Snape favoured his own house. Harry had now seen for himself exactly how true those rumours were.
Shaking his head in exasperation, Harry made for his desk again.
Just as he was passing by, Malfoy stuck out his leg deliberately, a look of vicious amusement on his face.
Not expecting it, Harry stumbled. He tipped forward as he struggled to find his balance. His involuntarily flailing arms hit Malfoy's cauldron.
Instantly, with a deafening crack, the brass cauldron exploded. Not just the potion – but the whole cauldron.
Eyes widening, Harry saw Malfoy's mud-coloured potion surge forward, out from the cauldron, spraying directly onto Malfoy.
Perhaps, in this case, Malfoy was unfortunate in making his potion correctly. The flesh on his hands almost immediately started swelling up like a balloon. His hands continued to expand until they were as plump as ripe tomatoes and as big as small melons.
"Oww!" Malfoy cried out – whether in shock or pain, Harry didn't know.
Professor Snape's ever alert eyes spontaneously narrowed in their direction.
"Professor!" Draco howled. "Potter threw something explosive in my cauldron."
"I didn't!" Harry protested. "I barely touched it. He tripped me."
Professor Snape's face was indifferent as he shoved his way past the desks towards the pair of them.
Harry also saw Hermione peering concernedly at him.
"Did you or did you not wreak his potion, Potter?" asked Snape, aloofly.
"I didn't!"
"Stop lying, Potter!" shouted Malfoy, his face turning redder by the second.
"Silence!" Snape interrupted impatiently as he bent down.
Professor Snape wiped a bit of it off with his index finger, ignoring the swelling that immediately began. He turned it this way and that, inspecting it at different angles before finally lifting it towards his nose and taking a whiff.
"It's not caused by an object," said the Professor slowly. "At least not an object a student can get their hands on."
"How do you know, Professor?" said Malfoy, his face disbelieving.
"If it was some sort of explosive, only the cauldron would be harmed – the potion itself would be untouched. In its natural state, the Swelling Potion has no smell. However, in this case, there is an aroma that I cannot name on the potion. This suggests that it is magic that triggered the explosion – and the currant smell of the potion is the scent of the magic that triggered it."
Malfoy listened, his mouth opening and closing soundlessly. "But…but Professor! Potter did do something to it, I swear! He's lying! My potion was perfectly fine until he came along."
"Does it always have to be me?" retorted Harry.
Inwardly, though, the gears in his mind were working fiercely. Last time his own potion had exploded when he held the wand that was meant to be stirring the potion, and this time he had touched Malfoy's cauldron.
He had a bad feeling that he was the person setting it off.
"Exactly," said Professor Snape, smoothly. "Potter's magic is activating it. He has no way of controlling it. He exploded his own potion last time, you remember, Mr Malfoy?"
Malfoy huffed.
"But the true mystery here is," said Snape, "why Potter's magic sparks off the potion. This is the very first time it's happened in my class."
Harry suddenly found himself under the scrutiny of Snape's probing eyes. There was a very interested gleam in the Potion Master's eyes that he found himself uncomfortable with.
"You'll come to my office after dinner, Potter," Snape stated, with a curl of the lip.
What a nightmare.
Harry was walking down an empty corridor towards Snape's office when a pair of strong hands wrapped themselves forcefully around his mouth. Harry gagged as he was dragged roughly into another corridor.
In panic, Harry scanned the corridor. No Professors or students in sight. It seemed, unfortunately, this time that he really was in trouble.
Gathering his strength, Harry lashed out with his legs at his kidnapper.
He was satisfied to hear a cry of pain emit from his kidnapper's mouth.
Harry grunted, continuing to struggle to free himself when, surprisingly, the hands constraining him let go. Harry wheezed in shock when he looked into the face of his attacker.
Neville Longbottom.
"Neville!" Harry gasped. "What were you doing with me?"
Neville, seeming very apologetic, looked down sheepishly at his shoes. "I'm sorry, Harry. I just wanted to show you something."
"You didn't have to bundle me up like a prisoner!" Harry complained.
"I know! I'm sorry!"
Hearing Neville's rueful voice somehow calmed Harry down a little.
"You scared me half to death."
"I'm so terribly sorry!" apologised Neville again.
"Is there anything I can help you with?" said Harry. "I was on my way to Professor Snape's office. He… he wanted me for something… I don't know what."
"There is something I want to show you… if you have time, that is…" said Neville hesitantly.
Harry shrugged. "Professor Snape will probably skin me alive if I'm late for our meeting, but I don't see how a few minutes can hurt."
"Oh, thank you, Harry!" Neville beamed brightly.
"Where is it?"
"Not far from here," said Neville quickly, his face lighting up like a Christmas tree. "Follow me!"
Harry managed to keep up Neville with a bit of effort as he ran up two flights of stairs and through another corridor.
Harry made a mental note never to conclude something from somebody's body build again. Despite Neville's rather chubby build, he was extraordinarily fast.
Puffing, Harry was half relieved and half sceptical when they finally stopped outside a broom cupboard.
Relieved because they finally stopped and sceptical because…
"This?" asked Harry incredulously. "You wanted to show me a broom cupboard?"
Harry gestured helplessly at the little wooden door. "A broom cupboard…"
"Not quite," said Neville cheerfully.
"What do you mean?
"It's called the Room of Requirement," provided Neville. He scrunched up his face in an expression of concentration.
"What are you doing?"
Harry was starting to feel a little cynical.
After a moment, during which nothing happened, Neville looked at Harry again. "Open the door, Harry. You'll be surprised."
It turned out Harry was indeed surprised, pleasantly so.
The room itself was more like a spacious hall. The ceiling was very high up, and there were piles of mats on the floor, as well as numerous book shelves lined against the walls.
There were wooden dummies, which Harry, for the life of him, couldn't figure out what was for.
As he and Neville stepped through the door, a bunched-up group of thirty or so students huddled together, gawking at him and Neville with looks of amazement.
The students had, apparently, been talking… but it was painfully obvious, with the ringing silence and the gawping, that they had not been expecting Harry and Neville.
Harry hoped they weren't crashing a party of some sort.
Soon enough, the looks of amazement turned to confusion, fright and even anger.
"Why did you bring him, Neville?" asked a girl, her voice abnormally high… perhaps from fear… Harry didn't know.
"Yeah. Neville, you're a dimwit. He's gonna tattle to Snape," said another boy, looking fierce. "He's a Slytherin! Why did ya bring him?!"
Harry was feeling worse by the minute as the looks of accusation were directed on to him. It seemed that he was the one they had not been expecting.
"Oh my god, Neville Longbottom! Are you mad?"
"And you were the one who told us never to reveal anyone our secret!"
Soon, they were swarmed by heated voices and objections. They were cornered by the students as Neville raised both his hands to say something. "Look, I assure you –"
His voice was quickly overwhelmed by the other louder ones.
Harry shrank back.
It took quite a lot of Neville's effort to calm the students down enough so that they'd back off a little. But he managed, nonetheless; something Harry didn't think was possible.
"Look here, I know you're all concerned about our secrecy being risked. I know I'm taking a risk here by introducing him to our group without earlier precautions. I know you think it is irresponsible of me to do such a thing. Therefore, I alone will be answerable to all consequences," said Neville.
Apart from a few murmurs, it seemed the students had all calmed down enough to listen.
It was also that moment that Harry realised how valiant Neville actually was. A few words of persuasion from him could calm an angry horde.
"Without further ado, I'd like to introduce you to Harry Potter, a first year student. Yes, he is a Slytherin… a fact that distresses all of you. But since he has shown no signs of menace towards any of us, I say we shouldn't put that against him without consideration. We are not so prejudiced as to dub all Slytherins with the title of evil."
Neville looked like the symbol of leadership, standing there with his face confident.
Harry was truly amazed. How could anyone who was so shy have another side like this?
"You all know just as well as I do that we need new members…more members. Harry has potential, and if he wants to join, why should we not include him. If he actually becomes one of us, he will be the first Slytherin. And while that may put us at more risk, it can also be worked to our advantage. Besides, we'll have to have Slytherin members in the future. This is a good time as any to start."
Harry turned his confusion towards Neville.
"Include me in what?" he asked.
"An organisation of sorts," said Neville.
He turned back to address the other students. "I admit I haven't conversed with him all that much, but he seems like a good guy." Neville smiled lopsidedly at Harry. "I think we should give him a chance. Besides…"
Harry watched numbly as Neville left his side and walked towards the children. Neville and the others huddled together in a circle for a moment as Neville whispered something quietly to them before coming back to stand beside Harry.
"Here. Why don't we all have a drink first before we proceed onto anything else? Eleanor, if you please?" suggested Neville.
A seventh year girl took out her wand, conjured a number of ice teas and handed them out to everyone. Harry himself received a cup.
He took a small sip.
It was wonderful. The refreshing coldness somehow made him more alert.
"Harry…"
Neville had downed his cup and was looking at Harry directly in the eye.
"There's this organisation we want you to consider joining. And since we'd be delighted if you participate, it is probably not a good idea to tell you straight off that our organisation isn't exactly permitted by the school and that it's not even legal. However, these are things you need to know. It wouldn't be fair if we withheld it from you."
Harry nodded briefly, signalling he was all ears.
"The Headmistress and the Professors do not, and cannot, know such an organisation as ours exists. Only we can know. You see, the main purpose of our so-called organisation is to disarm the currant way the school is ruled. And the school is being ruled – by Carrow who listens to every instruction that passes through Voldemort's lips."
Harry blinked at Neville's blatant use of Voldemort's title. Everyone else he'd met either referred to Voldemort as 'Lord Voldemort' or 'the Dark Lord'.
He was also put slightly off guard by the quiet contempt and the steel determination with which Neville said his lines.
Neville let out a sigh. "I'm going to be absolutely blunt here. You've seen a lot of the things yourself. You've seen the way Carrow tortures students, you've seen the way Voldemort has all the control here, you've seen how he threatened Professor McGonagall at the Sorting, you've seen the way muggleborn students are disgraced by their heritance. You can't just hope all these things will just eventually go away as the school year goes on. Believe me; you haven't seen half the things that go on around here. It's not going to get better, it's only going to get worse…this is just the very beginning."
Harry himself was captivated by Neville's speech. It was true and sincere and factual in every sense of the words. It wasn't going to get better – it was only going to get worse.
He felt himself being won over… despite that he knew he had only heard half of what Neville was going to say.
"Now you get to decide whether you're going to accept the way things are run here. The group we've formed is comprised of students who want to fight to regain what we've had before Voldemort won. That's why we named ourselves DA; standing for Dumbledore's Army. I'm the unofficial organiser, but everybody has an important part."
Harry blinked. No wonder Neville had demonstrated so much leadership. He was the leader of Dumbledore's Army.
"If you join, you cannot speak of this to anyone but the people who are in this already. You must not talk about this with any of us in public. You must not let the Slytherins know. You must not let the Professors know. If you do, we're all going to be in trouble. Dead trouble – and perhaps in every sense of the word. Anyway, we're all very frank here. We call Voldemort by his name; we have no tolerance for his deatheaters. We're in many ways like a miniature army, ready to fight for Hogwarts whenever it's needed."
"You can't fight the deatheaters though. You'd get your covers blown," said Harry. "What do you do?"
"We resist indirectly. Sometimes by refusing outright to learn a Dark spell, but mostly by helping students who are suffering from Carrow's hand. Doing whatever we can, basically," answered Neville. "Just this week, we managed to sneak into one of Carrow's secret chambers, and we released a fourth year student she had chained to the wall."
"Tell him about our night missions," said a boy from the crowd.
Neville grinned at Harry. "The most exciting of all the things we do, though, is probably what we occasionally do by night. Sometimes, we sneak into the Dark Arts classroom and trash it, and other times we graffiti stuff on the walls; things like 'Deatheaters can die' and 'Carrow eats dung.' Along with some other bits and pieces that we do. It's not much, but every little bit counts. So what do you think?"
Harry smiled. "I'm glad at least some people are doing something about it. Voldemort needs to be reined in."
"Well," said Neville, "currently, there's no way we can control Voldemort…but you never know what'll happen in the future."
"It's dangerous though, isn't it?" said Harry.
"Very," agreed Neville. "You should back out now if you can't handle it. There was once a third year student who was caught in the middle of wreaking Carrow's property. Carrow had him flogged and then thrown out of Hogwarts. No one knows what happened to him after that."
"I don't care," said Harry, stubbornly. "I've seen Voldemort murder someone with my own eyes, and Carrow forced me to torture my friend. Since we're all under their control, I don't see why we should be afraid of facing a little more danger. I want to join."
Harry felt a sudden rush of exhilaration, as if he was finally doing something worthy. After everything Voldemort had done to him and to the people around him, he'd be a fool not to do something about it.
Here was an organisation that not only allowed him the chance to do something, but also allowed him to communicate with students with exactly the same purpose as him.
"I'll join," he decided.
"That's the spirit!" Neville cheered.
"Obviously, I don't mind joining, but why would you guys not mind?" asked Harry. "I mean, how can you trust me?"
"Veritaserum," said Neville matter-of-factly. "It's a truth potion – forces the drinker to speak nothing but the very truth. Your tea was spiked with it. Sorry, Harry, but it was a precaution."
"What would you have done if I said 'no' to you?"
"Erased your memory," replied Neville simply. "Eleanor can do it. She's very advanced at magic."
Despite a little tinge of annoyance at the back of his head, Harry supposed he could accept it. He supposed he would have done the same if he was in Neville's position.
"Whatever it is, I'm just happy I'm in."
"So am I, I assure you." Neville laughed brightly.
"So…when do we get to do something?"
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