Harry Potter and the Fifth House
Christine Morgan
christine@sabledrake.com / http://www.christine-morgan.org


Author's Note: the characters of the Harry Potter novels are the property of their creator, J.K. Rowling, and are used here without her knowledge or permission. All other characters property of the author. 53,000 words. January, 2002. Adult situations, mild sexual content and violence.
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Chapter Four – Another Orphan.

He woke to a banging on the door, and Ron Weasley's voice saying, "No answer; he must have gone out."
"Someone would have seen him," Hermione's voice replied. "You know he can't go anywhere unnoticed."
"Some people have all the luck," Ron muttered.
Harry roused himself, groggy and wincing at the clear light streaming through slats in the shutters. His head gave a sickly thump as he sat up.
"Ron," he called, his throat dry. "Hermione. I'm here." He swung his legs out of bed and found his glasses.
"He's still in bed, the sluggard," Ron said.
"Harry, it's nearly ten," called Hermione. "You were supposed to meet us at Flourish and Blotts first thing this morning to buy our books."
Harry squinted at the clock. True enough, it was almost ten, His head felt stuffed with wool and his eyes were grainy. A peculiar taste coated the inside of his mouth and made him suddenly desperate for his toothbrush.
"Give me five minutes," he said. "I'll be right down."
The mirror tsked at him as he leaned close, squinting at his reflection. "No wonder, staying out half the night," it chided him.
He ignored it, washed, and brushed his teeth. Didn't need to shave because he'd done so just yesterday, as the smooth skin and healing nicks attested. He wet his unruly hair, combed it into submission – knowing that it would be unruly again before an hour was up – and got dressed.
Five minutes later, he was downstairs in the bustling common room of the Leaky Cauldron, where he just had time to wolf down a few pieces of toast before Hermione dragged them out to do their shopping.
The summer had wrought changes in his friends, too. Like Harry, Ron had shot up a few inches, except in Ron's case it was a matter of too many too soon. He was gangly as a scarecrow, his bony wrists jutting well beyond the length of his sleeves. His bright red Weasley hair was the same, but the straggling moustache Ron was endeavoring to cultivate was new. It crouched on his upper lip like a thin caterpillar.
Hermione, Harry was mildly disturbed to notice, had grown in different directions. Their first few years at Hogwarts, only the fact that she slept in a different dormitory was any reminder that she was a girl. Not until the time she'd come dressed up to the Yule Ball with Viktor Krum had he and Ron really been aware of the difference. Now, it was impossible to miss. Her flyaway brown hair framed a quite pretty face, and when she turned scoldingly to brace her hands on her hips at what was taking them so long, she bounced in ways Harry hadn't associated with Hermione Granger before.
"We've got a new instructor this year," she said as they joined the throngs of excited Hogwarts students filling the streets.
"No!" Ron cried, aghast. "I thought she was staying on! Oh, it's not fair, it's bloody unfair."
"Not her," said Hermione impatiently. "She's still on."
"Is she ever," Ron said in relief.
"I saw her last night," Harry blurted. He rubbed his temples. "Just for a minute."
"What did she look like?" Ron leaned eagerly toward him. "Was she still … you know … vavoom?"
Hermione clucked her tongue and rolled her eyes. "In case either of you are interested, it's a new Muggle Studies teacher we've got this year."
"Yeah, yeah," Ron said. His attention was all on Harry.
"There's not much to tell," Harry said. He related what had gone on the night before, having witnessed Ophidia Winterwind's Animagus transformation, and the conversation she'd had with the scaled man in the alley. "I don't know what she gave him, but it was like he'd been under a hex and whatever she gave him dispelled it. She said she was looking forward to the start of term."
"Aren't we all!"
"Some of us for better reasons than others." Hermione swept through the door into Flourish and Blotts, her class list held tight in one hand.
Harry and Ron shrugged at each other and followed. The interior of the bookstore was cluttered and crowded, and they had to wait quite a while to purchase their new textbooks. Hermione grumbled something about how there wouldn't have been such a line if they'd come early as planned, but Harry didn't catch most of it and refused to feel guilty. He'd gotten to sleep late, and he'd been very tired. What of it?
As they left, their cauldrons loaded down with copies of The Standard Book of Spells: Grade 6 and the others on their list, they ran into Ron's sister Ginny. Literally; she collided with Harry and pulled away with a blush and a giggle.
Ron glowered. "Hullo, Ginny."
"Hi, Ron, Harry, Hermione."
An awkward silence fell. At the end of last year, Ginny Weasley had made it onto the Gryffindor House Quidditch team, as a Chaser. Ron, having also tried out but not been chosen, took it badly. His twin older brothers Fred and George, now graduated and working hard to make a go of their joke shop, had been steadfast Beaters. Ron's secret dream, known only to Harry and the Mirror of Erised, had been to become captain of the team, winner of the cup, Head Boy, and so forth. His progress toward that dream had been sadly unsuccessful, and to have his little sister breeze through the tryouts was a bitter pill to swallow.
Harry felt awkward around Ginny for other reasons, mostly because she was always so awkward around him. She'd had a terrible crush on him for years, but when it came to noticing that his friends were girls, he was worse off with Ginny than even with Hermione.
"Get out of the way, Potter, you're blocking the door."
The familiar sneering tones of Draco Malfoy brought instant fists to Harry's hands. He turned. On the train from Hogwarts at the end of term, Malfoy and his cronies had been on the receiving end of some messy Transfiguration spells. All the damage had been repaired, but clearly Draco hadn't learned to keep his distance. Or else his pride wouldn't let him.
Except there was a new person in Draco's usual crowd. In addition to Crabbe and Goyle – a pair of thick-bodied and thicker-witted thugs whose fathers, like Draco's, were high among Voldemort's supporters – and Pansy Parkinson, who was wearing too much make-up and hanging on Draco's arm like a gangster's moll from an old movie, there was a tall boy Harry didn't recognize … although something about him seemed familiar.
This newcomer had to be seventeen or eighteen at least. He was much more powerfully built than Crabbe or Goyle, and his eyes were watchful and cold. If he was of Slytherin House, like the rest of his companions, Harry couldn't remember having noticed him before.
Maybe it was the addition of this big, formidable friend that gave Draco the bravado to confront Harry like this. He must have figured that the new guy would give the others pause.
Tension prickled in the air between their two groups for a moment, but then a colossal explosion blew out the window of Ollivander's wand shop. Sparks and rockets of fire shot into the street. People ducked for cover, some casting quick warding or defensive spells. When all was quiet again, a bare patch had been cleared on the cobblestones around a small boy. He looked to have been flung backward out of the shop. Lazy curls of smoke rose from his body and the wand in his hand was fading slowly from white-hot to a dull amber glow.
"Another Mudblood trying to make like a proper wizard," said Pansy, cutting her gaze at Hermione. "There really should be stricter laws."
Harry pushed past them, letting the Slytherin bunch enter the bookstore. He moved through the crowd – most of them were chuckling and shaking their heads now – and reached the boy just as Mr. Ollivander himself came out of his smoking front door.
"No, no, that one won't do," he said to the semiconscious boy. With a deft, hurried motion, like someone flicking away a stinging insect before it could do harm, he pinched the wand from the boy's hand.
"You all right?" Harry asked.
The boy coughed and opened his eyes. They were an unusual shade of blue-violet, and dazed. He had dark blond hair and his clothes were shabby and ill-fitting. "What happened?"
"A simple mishap," Ollivander said kindly. He smiled at Harry. "Sometimes finding the right wand takes a bit of trial and error."
Harry helped him up. "You're a first-year?" He asked because the boy could have passed for eight or nine, not eleven, the usual age for new students at Hogwarts.
"I got this letter and this list," said the boy, showing Harry a familiar style of envelope written on with familiar green ink. It was addressed to "Mr. Jeremy Upwood, Eighth Bed From the Window, Second Floor, Northrup Home for Orphaned Boys, Farnsworth."
"A Muggle orphanage," Hermione said quietly, and Harry knew she was thinking the same thing he was. Jeremy Upwood wouldn't be the first to come from that sort of background. But there was nothing at all reminiscent of Tom Riddle in Jeremy's perplexed, pink-cheeked face.
"Are you getting on all right?" Harry asked.
Jeremy stared goggle-eyed at a trio of passing witches, cackling hags identical except for the color of their hair. From there, his eyes moved to the display of owls hooting on their perches outside of the exotic creature shop, and then to a waddling goblin scurrying by on bank business. He looked even more lost and bewildered than Harry had when he'd suddenly been thrust into this world, and at least then Harry had had Hagrid to guide him and explain on the way.
"It's all for real, isn't it?" Jeremy held up his list. "And I'm really going to need all of these things. A cauldron and all."
Hermione thumped on the side of hers. "We've all got them. Don't worry. It isn't as strange as it seems. I was raised Muggle too, and didn't know about any of this until I got my letter."
"Me either," Harry said. "You'll catch on."
A delicate thought came to him, a subject he was always hesitant to bring up around the Weasleys, but Ron had drifted over to gawk at the Skyblazer, a new broom in the window of the sporting goods shop, and Ginny was headed inside to pick up a pamphlet on Chaser techniques.
"Do you have enough money?" he asked Jeremy.
"I think so. There was a fund left from my mum and dad, which the orphanage couldn't touch. Was to pay for my schooling. So when the letter came, they turned it over to me and showed me the door. I guess they were afraid. Didn't believe it, or didn't want to."
"How long ago did your parents die?" Hermione asked gently.
"When I was a baby," Jeremy said. "In a car crash."
Harry jerked as if jabbed with a pin. He'd been told something similar about his parents, and look how that had turned out. It was on the tip of his tongue to ask Jeremy if he'd been left with a scar from the so-called crash, but just then he sensed someone watching him. He took a casual look around.
The tall, older boy who'd been with Draco Malfoy was leaning against the wall in front of Flourish and Blotts. He had his arms crossed on his broad chest, and his eyes glittered beneath low, dark brows. When he saw Harry seeing him, he didn't even look away or pretend his gaze had happened upon them in passing. He tipped his hand at Harry in an insolent way, and a hard smile raised one corner of his mouth.
"Who's that, do you know?" Harry murmured to Hermione. She had been going over Jeremy's list, pointing out to him the various shops he'd want to visit.
"I've never seen him before," she said. "Certainly not with Malfoy."
"He must be a Slytherin, though. He's got the look."
She nodded. Ron came back, puffing and flushed with excitement. "They're having a raffle," he announced. "For the Skyblazer. I put my name in. But Harry?"
"Yeah, Ron?"
"Don't buy any tickets, what do you say? Let my luck have a chance for once."
"Sure," said Harry. "I've got my Firebolt, anyway. It's a few years old, but I'd be willing to bet it's still the fastest broom on the market."
"Oh, they're going to start talking Quidditch in a minute," Hermione said. In the past, she'd been able to ignore them by talking about other things with Ginny, but now that Ginny was a Chaser, as far as Hermione was concerned all three of them were helpless.
"Thanks for your advice," said Jeremy. He dusted himself off and marched toward Ollivander's, where Mr. Ollivander stood waiting for him with a pleasant, though moderately apprehensive, smile.
"See you at school," Harry called after. Had he looked so small and alone the first time he'd gone into that shop? The wand that had chosen him, with its core of phoenix feather, rested in his pocket. He wondered what Jeremy would wind up with.
Ginny, to Ron's disgust, entered her name in the raffle for the Skyblazer too. She insisted, when he complained, that she had to have a decent broom, that Fred's old Cleansweep Seven might have been fine for him but she was a Chaser, not a Beater.
"Rub it in, why don't you?" Ron said bitterly.
Lugging cauldrons filled with books, quills, various noisome and icky ingredients for Potions class, they finished their shopping and got a table in the shade outside a delicatessen. Harry always missed wizardly fare when he was with the Dursleys. Once, on one of the rare occasions that Uncle Vernon had taken the family to dinner and permitted Harry to come along, he'd made the mistake of asking the waitress for pumpkin juice, and almost had to spend the rest of the evening sitting alone in the car.
They ate sandwiches and sipped juice and waved to their various classmates when someone familiar went by. Harry nearly choked on a bite when he saw Cho Chang, the girl he was secretly – or not-so-secretly – interested in. Cho was a seventh-year now, and Harry knew that if he didn't ask her out this time, he'd never have another chance.
But how could he? Two years ago, Cho had been seeing Cedric Diggory, the Hufflepuff Quidditch captain and one of the champions chosen to participate in the Triwizard Tournament. He'd died in the course of that, murdered by Voldemort in a fate surely meant for Harry instead. Nobody had ever come right out and said that it was all because of Harry that poor Cedric had been there in the first place, but Harry's own guilt was worse than any amount of blame from others.
Last year, Harry had stayed far away from Cho, respecting that she was in mourning for Cedric and wouldn't want anything to do with the one responsible for his death. He was glumly realizing now that a year probably wasn't enough, that ten years might not be, that he may as well write Cho off entirely. It wasn't as if she'd ever seemed to return his interest, or shown anything other than politeness toward him.
He sighed into his glass, stirring ripples on the surface of the pumpkin juice. Funny … at the time of the tournament and the Yule Ball, the idea of having to ask a girl to go with him had seemed like the most daunting and awful task he'd faced. Now, though, he kind of liked the idea. Girls were, well, nice to look at.
Of course, his and Ron's brilliant treatment of Parvati and Padma Patil had probably done them in. They'd virtually ignored their dates, and word of it was all over Hogwarts. All over Beauxbatons, too. Harry's chances of getting either of them, or any other girl in his year, to go out with him were roughly equivalent to his chances of making friends with Professor Snape.
Thinking this made him look at Ginny. She would go to a dance with him, of that he hadn't a doubt. But she was Ginny. Ron's little sister. It would be like going with his own sister, if he had one. And as for Hermione …
Harry gave up. Girls might be nice to look at, and plenty of them might be good friends and clever and funny and all, but the business of asking them out was just too much trouble.

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page copyright 2002 by Christine Morgan / christine@sabledrake.com