I see that you, like hundreds before you, have found the wonders of the mirror of Erised.
Albus Dumbledore, Harry Potter à l'école des sorciers, page 211
ANSWERS TO THE DIVINE FIST OF THE REVIEWERS' WRATH
Kivrin: I agree, and thanks! You can't rush me… heck, I can't rush myself. Unless I wanna write like a Newbie. -_-
Makaveli tha don: *blush* thanks… ^_^
Adam: AUs are hard to write, but sooo much fun!! Toying around with the events… the best thing ever! ^_- I will continue this, I'm having too much fun. Now if only I could get my nose out of Warcraft III long enough to write… *sighhhh*
VMorticia: Whoo, boy… LOOONG review you gave me ^_- Thanks! I like Flint, too! He's a fun character to play around with, if a bit aggressive. Lol, I know, that's what happens when I write when I feel sarcastic. I'll try to feel that way more often ^_-. Sorry 'bout the Bludger/Budger thing!! I couldn't look it up directly, I seriously thought it was Budger. *shrug* *Curses the "Cognards" that are in the French version* Hehehe, just had to add that little thing ^_-. Draco, shut up. The Slytherin wasn't Quirrell. It was Vol-au-vent (lol). He wasn't quite happy after Harry survived ^_-.
V, I already have a Beta. Though… I could use another one, she tends to let some mistakes pass by… She's French too. *sighhh*
Shireen Mclean: Yes, yes, *Strikes a pose* I am Psycho. Demented, Psycho *wink*. Dark!Harry is fun to do, but I do wonder how he'll turn out in this fic!! (I don't have all the reins on those characters, they do what they want sometimes… ugh. Kinda feel like a farmer guiding his sheep the way he want… though these sheep are very mule-headed and tend to go anywhere I don't want them to. No 'Writers block' pits yet, don't worry ^_-) Yes, I LOVED when Harry took credit for Quirrell's mess up ^_-. It wasn't planned, actually! Evil, evil Slyth!Harry just decided to take it. -_- *sigh* Oh well.
To Shireen's best friend: what. Do. You. Mean… you. Don't. like. Slytherin. Harry. FICS???!!!! HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE!!?? (Gets tied up and locked in an asylum, mumbling something about ungrateful best friends of reviewers) JK ^_-
You: Lol, where would be the fun of that? The relationship between Harry and Snape is something that I've planned up to book 4 ^_- It's crazier than a roller coaster, tell you right now ^_-. ^_ damn, I _- can't stop… _^ winking!! ^_- (Don't ask how the last one is possible.)
There! It's finally out! Don't think I've given up on this, I've worked too hard not to get at least at the Yule Ball. Which I can't wait to write. ^_- Gotta hate Writer's block, though, eh?
Chapter 10 is Not quite finished, but my conscience hit me over the head about being so slow, so I released chapter 8 today. Count yourselves lucky. ^_-
~Akuma-sama~
Chapter 7: Christmas surprises
November came and went with no more giant three-headed dogs, injured teachers, Trolls, falling rememberalls, or problems, outside of potions and Quidditch, in which both Snape and Flint were becoming more aggressive. While the teacher had lowered a bit his comments and points-removal for a week after the match, the effort was apparently too much to maintain.
Snow had started falling, and not just a bit. The layer covering the ground was thick enough to allow the Weasley twins to create enchanted snowballs that chased after Quirrell's turban for a whole day until there was none left. By then, the purple piece of cloth was waterlogged and stunk even more than usual. The air had become so cold Hedwig categorically refused to go out for mail delivery at the Zabinis'. Although it could very well be that she would have to fly a looong way.
"Mom and dad are probably in Italy by now, visiting our family there." Blaise told Harry as they signed their names on the list of those who stayed.
"Why can't we got to Draco's place already?" Harry asked.
"It's not a good idea." Was all the platinum-haired boy replied. Of the three of them, he was the only one leaving home for the winter, along with Crabbe and Goyle. "Your name is liked by most, not all."
But Draco wouldn't say what he had meant by that.
On the potion class side, the project was finished. Harry was stunned; he had managed to keep his sanity. Although it probably was because Hermione had become much more supportable ever since the Troll attacked her. Snape had taken the doses of skele-grow, said he'd test them during the winter break. Harry dearly hoped the students remaining here wouldn't be the guinea pigs. The class ended soon after that.
"Sorry, make way! Goin' through!" the familiar voice of Hagrid came, most of him hidden by an extremely large Christmas tree with legs, strolling outside the exit of the dungeons.
"Need any help with that?" Harry asked, dearly hoping that the answer would be negative. Somehow, he couldn't picture himself holding a twenty foot tall tree like Hagrid was doing. He started to wonder why on earth he had asked.
"No need, Harry." The man replied and Harry mentally sighed in relief. "I can handle this thin' by m'self. Thanks fer the offer though."
"Probably wanted to jinx it." Weasley muttered, as he and Hermione walked by, the girl giving him a rough hit on the shoulder with an exasperated sound.
"Jealous, Weasley?" Draco said with his trademark 'I am superior, bow to me, lowly mortal' smirk. "Maybe you should ask, too, you might even become the groundkeeper when he's retired. You'd probably make more money than your family's ever had, too! Do you know what a knut is?" The last line was said in such a level of taunting that my patented Taunt-o-meter – Invented alongside the sarcasm-o-meter, which breaks practically every time I write – ran off in fear.
Weasley dropped his bag and promptly charged at Draco, grabbing him by the collar. Before it could get any worse, Snape walked through the same way they had gone from, glaring angrily at Weasley.
"What's the meaning of this?!"
"Malfoy provoked him, professor." Hermione said, trying to pull Weasley off Draco. Even though he had let go, the girl was much smaller than him and had evident trouble at it.
"Heard it m'self, professor." Hagrid said. Harry was sure there was a 'I'm gonna get him into trouble' look in his eyes. He knew Hagrid didn't like Draco one bit.
"Nevertheless… Fighting is not allowed in the halls, Weasley. Five points from Gryffindor. Now move along." The tone of his voice turned from sadistically cheerful to super instant-tooth-decay sweet, to a 'obey me or die' bark. He turned toward Draco, Blaise and Harry, but especially the last two.
"That goes for you three as well."
And he walked away, his cape blowing like bat wings behind him. Harry pulled his tongue at the teacher, then turned toward Blaise as they started walking.
"One day, I'm gonna sabotage my potion and arrange it to blow up in his face."
"When you do that, count me in." Blaise said flatly as they followed Hagrid to the great hall.
Even Hogwarts was getting into a festive mood. The great hall was richly decorated with mistletoes hanging from the roof, ready to trap unknowing victims with smoochy wet surprises. Eleven enormous Christmas trees were installed around the room, with Flitwick and McGonagall busy decorating them with magically created ornaments.
"Good, it's the last one." McGonagall said, looking at Hagrid. "Put it up behind the head table, Hagrid."
The man nodded and carried the final tree where directed. The five students separated, heading for their respective tables.
"How much time's left?" Blaise asked Draco.
"One day. Can't say I'm unhappy to go, but I just wish you two could come along with us."
He indicated at Crabbe and Goyle, who choose that moment to walk in with Pansy and Millicent, the rest of the first year Slytherins.
"You still haven't said why I cant come with you."
"I will." Draco said. "One day, maybe."
As Harry soon discovered, he and Blaise were some of the very few students to have decided to stay. Among them were, unfortunately, the Weasley army/invasion force/clan. As predictable, without Hermione to scare him off, little Weasley, the worst of the lot, became unsupportable.
"It's a real pain all the Slytherins couldn't go away, though…" He said loudly, wanting them to hear, under his twin brothers' laughs and the stern eye of the prefect one. An invasion, a plague of red-heads, that's what it was.
"It's a real pain Weasley can't drop down dead." Blaise said, just as loudly, in the same tone.
Harry nodded. "Yeah, it would make our vacation perfect. Maybe we'd better ask Santa for an 'instant Weasley eviction kit', if we're lucky, we won't have to see his freckled face 'till next year, who knows, maybe even next school year."
Little Weasley's eyes turned into a furious glare.
"Shut up, Potter."
"Make me, ickle Ronniekins." He said, having heard of the twins' 'affectionate' name for Weasley, probably along with the entire school, when they had yelled it during a dinner.
Weasley's ears turned red enough to make the air stop and wait for the green as the twins howled in laughter. The prefect one, sensing a fight coming, pulled his little brother away, glaring at the twins who faked their deaths dramatically.
The following days passed as quickly as if time had decided to enter the formula 1 race on the fastest track on earth; before they knew it, it was…
"WAKE UP, HARRY! ITS CHRISTMAS!!"
Thank you Blaise, couldn't have said it better myself.
"Whuuaa?"
This is what Harry sounds like when he's been woken up by an hyperactive girl rushing into his dorm room and jumping on his bed. Warn "Witch weekly", they'll jump on it. The story, I mean. Not Harry. Well… maybe both.
"Christ-MAS!" She repeated loudly in his ear, accentuating the final sound with a slight bounce the officially tore Harry from the blissful land of sleep and into the painful land of the 'I got woken up by a hyper Blaise' living.
Harry wasn't happy. His head was pounding, as if his brain was knocking on the side of his skull in a move of protestation against early-risers everywhere. To make things worse, she ripped the dark green curtains open, letting the light coming from the small window pour directly into his eyes, making him groan and roll up his pillow over his face.
"Awrite, I'm up…" He mumbled, sounding more like 'I give up'.
"No you're not! Ok, fine, I'll take all your presents!"
"Your—My Presents?" That started Harry's engine faster than a team of 50 racing mechanics can put up a bicycle chain. "I got presents?"
"Unless the three packages that are in the middle of your dorms spontaneously spawned themselves from thin air, or they're just stuff your dorm mates forgot lying there, at the base of your bed with "To Harry Potter" on the—"
"Allright, I get it…" He groaned, interrupting her rant. While Blaise could not normally be considered a calm girl, if given anything to excite her further, she easily became by far worse than a rampaging, panicked rodeo horse tied up in strongest point of a cyclone with earphones forcing it to listen to "the thirties' greatest hits".
(A/N: The author would like to apologize to anyone who actually likes thirties' songs. I'm sorry for you. *Gets whacked by nameless old people*)
He quickly sat up in his bed, thankful for the fact that, as both he and Blaise decided, they both slept in their night robes to prevent one of the two barging in from seeing more than he/she should. He checked at the foot of his bed; sure enough, three packages were already there. One of them was under inspection by Blaise's powerful and very precise detection system: shaking the box to hear what's inside.
"Would you mind shutting that damned light down?! Some snakes are trying to sleep here!" Nemesis hissed. Fortunately, Blaise was currently too busy to spot the boy glare at the black, green and red striped snake hiding under the covers.
Blaise gave a forceful shake to the box, turning Harry's attention toward her.
"Oi, it could be fragile!!" Harry protested, getting up.
She frowned. "It sounds like clothes." She said.
Harry shrugged and pointed at Dudley's overlarge 'Elephant skin' clothes, laying on the floor beside his bed in a way only a preteen boy can, unless it's a very disorganized teen (A/N *cough, cough*) or an even worse adult.
"Anything but those are appreciated." He said with a slight grin.
Blaise smirked. "I know what to give you next birthday."
"Anything better would be even more appreciated." He added.
"I'll keep that in mind." She replied, before her attention went back to the box. "I really wonder what it is though… who knows, maybe it's one from of your fangirls." She accentuated the last word with a 'little sister' taunting tone.
He gave her a playful glare as he tore the package from her hands, looking at it over.
"There's no 'from'… whoever sent this doesn't want me to know."
"Hmm… a really embarrassed fangirl."
After a glare at hell's 'blazing devil', he tore the package open, carelessly leaving the bright blue paper on the ground, and ripped the top of the box like a tornado rips a house's roof.
"…weird." Was the answer. It was some kind of cloak. Under his touch, it felt like a mix of silk and water, as odd as trying to imagine both is. Not wet silk, more like a feeling of the softness of silk with the smoothness and shapelessness of water. It was dark brown in color, but anywhere where the sun hit it glowed in an unusual, magical silvery light.
"That… is one… cool cloak." Blaise said, taking it in her hands. That's when they both noticed something special about that cloak, mainly when Blaise's hands under the cloak disappeared. She shrieked in surprise and let it go on the floor, where it covered the aforementioned paper and making it disappear.
"It's some kind of… invisibility cloak…" Harry mumbled, taking it in his hands. He testily put it on his head. Though he could see from inside, it became obvious that Blaise couldn't see him.
"Wicked." Blaise gasped with a wide grin. "Do you have any idea how much trouble we can put Weasley into with that?"
"Figures that it's the first thing you think about, Blaise." He said with a grin as he removed the cloak and folded it up, putting it on his bed.
"It's a gift." She said, passing her hand through her hair in a Prima-Donna fashion, before looking in the box. "There's a note there… 'This used to belong to your father, Use it well'. That's all it says."
"My father's? Is the writing familiar?" Harry asked, looking in awe at the cloak at his side.
"Nope." Blaise showed him the note, in simple dark blue ink.
"Well, whoever sent us that likes blue." Harry said, before looking at his other presents.
Mrs Zabini sent him a magical camera with a photo album, claiming that 'your years at Hogwarts are usually the best thing in a wizard's memory.'. Harry and Blaise spent a good ten minutes clowning in front of the camera, then another ten at laughing at their pictures clowning off.
Hagrid sent him a hand-made flute that let out the sound of an owl's hoot when he blew in it. Blaise tried as well and it made a glass-shattering squeak.
"Blaise, don't even try." Harry said, trying to stop his ears from ringing.
"I won't." Blaise said, in the same situation. "I should have known, I've never been able to play a single note on anything."
To Harry's great surprise, however, Hermione also sent him something. A bag of sweets, including chocolate frogs, Bertie Blott's beans – which Blaise immediately nicked a box of – and pumpkin pasties.
"Hmm… it looks like you and her are becoming good friends… oh, there's a note… 'Merry Christmas, Love, Hermione.'" She grinned like a Cheshire cat and started shouting in a little out of key sing-song "Harry Lo~oves Her~mie!"
"DO NOT!!" He retorted, his cheeks burning up in embarrassment.
"Do too! You're blushing!"
"Am not!" He replied, looking away sheepishly.
For the rest of the morning, the conversation dropped to the almighty level of immaturity that is 'Am not, are too'. For once in his life, Harry Potter behaved like a normal child, then like a normal teen when his stomach demanded food loudly enough for the 'Weasley invasion force' to run for cover screaming "EARTHQUAKE!!".
…ok, maybe I'm exaggerating a little.
They walked into the great hall to find Weasley's twin brothers prancing around, wearing two nearly identical jumpers that bore the letters F and G, while the prefect glared at them angrily, a wearing a similar jumper with, of course, his shining, polished, 'Don't look at me too long if you don't want to become blind', 'I made Draco's hair jealous' prefect badge pinned on top.
However, the little Weasley wasn't there.
"You two should take example on your little brother!" Weasley 'I eat a rulebook each breakfast' the prefect scolded them.
"Yeah right, and be stuck in the library all winter?" The twin wearing the shirt in G said.
"I'd have expected that from his girlfriend, Granger (At which Harry let out a snort), but not him, Gred."
"Definitely strange, Forge. Maybe we aughta check out what Ickile Ronniekins is up to?"
"Maybe we should too, Harry…." Blaise said, looking at her side where Harry was. Keyword: was. "Harry? Where did he go?"
"Nicholas Flamel… there's got to be at least one bloody thing about this guy…"
Harry mentally congratulated himself for bringing his new invisibility cloak in his pocket – Never mind that an object this big shouldn't be able to fit in a normal, albeit large, muggle jean pocket, this is the wizarding world after all. Weasley hadn't spotted him at all, too busy in his apparently all important research. Harry noted that the boy wore a jumper much like his brothers', in a horrible maroon color with a golden R on it.
The boy pulled out a book called 'Famous aurors of the past, present but not future, since we don't know if they'll be famous yet' – Harry made a mental note to ask Blaise if every wizarding book had names this silly – opened it at the index and started looking around.
"…nope, no Nicholas Flamel there… man, if I don't find anything, Hermione's gonna have my head…"
"Working for Hermione now?" Harry said, removing the cloak quickly while Ron wasn't looking and hiding it back in his pocket. He jumped and sat on a table, both of his hands going behind his back.
The red-haired boy whirled around, dropping the book in shock. Harry put on an unreadable, unnerving smile.
"What on earth are you doing here, Potter?"
"Oh, I have as much right to be in this library as you, Weasley. I'm surprised, really, to find you here though. It's Christmas, your whole family's here, there's dinner in the great hall, and you're here, by yourself, reading some books about famous wizards. Correct me if I'm wrong, but that's Hermione's idea of fun, not yours."
The boy didn't answer, glaring at Harry like he was an unwelcome snake, which, in some way, he was.
"From what I heard, I can tell you're here doing something for her… She's gone to see her parents, right? Thought so." He said without waiting a reply.
"What's it to you?"
Harry shrugged nonchalantly and jumped off the table, doing two steps toward the other boy before stopping.
"Like it or not, Hermione is my friend too." He said, crossing his arms. "If you're doing something for her, something with which I might be able to help, I want in. Unless it's something very personal that has to do with what your brothers are claiming."
"Now what are those bloody buggers saying now?!" Weasley hissed, earning himself a warning look from madam Pince, the librarian.
"Nothing much, except that you and Hermione are going out."
Weasley's fists clenched, his ears reddened to make his hair jealous and his eyes oozed out with fury.
"Why… those…"
Harry shrugged. "So, what did Hermione ask you to do? Something about a Nicholas Flamel?"
Weasley's anger lowered a bit, but evident disgust came to his face. Harry perfectly understood the dilemma before him.
Do it by himself and risk not finding a thing, thus getting Hermione's wrath on him – a fate none would wish for – or ask a Slytherin for help. And Harry didn't care. Whatever the reason, if Hermione had him do special research during the winter break and he agreed, it must be that this thing was pretty darn important. So, he'd just look it up personally with his cloak.
"Fine." Weasley replied, before launching himself into a story.
"So you know about Fluffy, and Hagrid said that whatever's in there is between Dumbledore and Flamel, eh?"
Weasley nodded. "After the Quidditch match."
"Hmm. 'kay, I'll get Blaise and we'll help you."
"Wh-What?!" He hissed in surprise. "Why get her to help us? You're already bad enough!"
Harry gave him a look and shrugged. "At three, we'll be much faster. And anyways, she might already know. Plus, Blaise is Hermione's friend too."
Weasley gave him a withering glare, realizing he's been cornered.
"No way."
"Blaiiise!!" Harry whined at her sharp and 'Titanium wall' solid answer.
"I am not losing a second of my winter vacations scooped up in the library! No way, mai, never, not this century OR the next fifteen!"
Her voice echoed between the walls of the completely empty common room. While, normally, the gloomy atmosphere and dim light was ignored by everyone because of the many interesting things – threats, alliances, revenges, blackmail and others – going on, when it was only two people, the room looked downright creepy. The intense cold outside chilled the air inside, but made it a very enjoyable experience to be rolled up in a warm blanket, laying down on one of the comfy couches while roasting whatever they wanted – From the traditional marshmallows to chocolate frogs (Which melted while pitifully trying to get off the stick), idea of Blaise of course – as they were doing now.
"But Blaise, of all people, Weasley's looking around in the library to find information on Flamel. Don't you think it should be important? Plus, Hagrid said it had something to do with whatever Fluffy's hiding."
"Why should we care?"
"Don't you want to know what could be important enough to make Dumbledore let a giant three-headed dog in the school?"
Blaise looked thoughtful at that.
"Hmm… maybe, but I still don't want to go to the library."
Harry crossed his arms and looked away. "Fine then, Weasley and I wont tell you what we find."
"I don't care." She said, her tone saying something all different.
"…" For a moment, both were silent. The only noise of the common room was the crackling of the fire and their slow, rhythmic breathing. Harry's face started to grin.
"Oh, fine." She let out in a sigh. "But we'll go in two days, I want to enjoy tomorrow, my last true day of vacation."
'I win.' He thought, grinning. Her curiosity got the better of her, just like he had wanted.
Later that night, Harry lay in his bed, eyes wide open, starting at the ceiling. He wasn't able to close his eyes once. What could be important enough to make someone risk stealing in a top security vault in Gringotts, to cause Dumbledore to hide the object in question here, at Hogwarts, by a large, dangerous three-headed dog – Called Fluffy, another scary detail – but a very powerful object?
He couldn't stop his curiosity. It was burning him with coals and red metal, and killing at least a dozen cat every second. He let out another sigh.
"Will you go to sleep already?!" Nemesis hissed, his head popping out of the covers to stare into Harry's.
"Can't."
"Then if you can't sleep, do something useful! Go out there and get busy on that Flannel dude!"
"It's Flamel." Harry corrected.
"Flannel, Flamer, where's the difference. Just go and let me sleep."
"I knew you had a second motive." Harry said, getting up.
"I always do." The snake replied, sneaking back into the warm sheets. Harry chuckled.
Nobody noticed him getting inside the library. Fortunately, the doors weren't locked and Pince was sound asleep in her room/office, snoring louder than a truck engine. Hidden under his invisibility cloak, he headed straight to the restricted section.
If there was ever one room creepier than the Slytherin common room and the Potions classroom, it was the restricted section. He had heard from older Slytherins that the books in here talked about dark arts or other illegal acts. Mainly since those Slytherins sometimes sneaked some books out and gave them to those who weren't allowed as pay for favors or simply for a handful of Gallions.
Silently, making sure to stay as far as possible from the "Loud books" section, he walked around, checking the rows.
"Famous wizards…" He whispered triumphantly and started digging around.
"Alchemists… probably not. Arithmancers, don't think so."
"Dark lords, seriously doubt it. Dark wizards, even more."
He stayed up until his eyes tried to shut the blinds commonly known as eyelids. Through all his search, he had picked three books, transfiguring pieces of wood into rather odd books that he clearly wished Pince wouldn't check – While the cover was very resembling, the inside was a thick piece of wood.
He walked out again, sleepily passing by a discarded book cart. Without him knowing, one of the folds of his cape touched one of the books, causing it to fall and open on the floor…
And, through a set of unbelievable PCD (Plot Convenience Device), it just happened to be a loud one.
The yell it shot out was nearly enough to make him deaf; it was far worse than Crabbe and Goyle trying to sing, or Blaise playing in his flute. It sounded like the book was being tortured in the most painful physical way, since there was no voices behind of a children TV program.
Harry cursed, put out his lamp and ran out, leaving no proof of his presence. Better not close the book, it may still pass for an accident if he left it like that. He came out of the restricted section just in time to see Filch and Pince walk in, leaving him the way out free.
Grinning like a Cheshire cat, he silently stalked down the empty halls, heading back to the Slytherin common room…
"You asked me to get you directly if one of the students tried to sneak into the library, well one just did. The restricted section, more precisely."
Harry hissed in anger at Filch's voice. He couldn't be found out yet, could he? Damn that caretaker for knowing all the secret passages!
The next voice he heard made his blood chill at the possible implications.
"The restricted section? That student couldn't have gone very far."
It was Snape.
The two of them appeared in front of him from the spinning stairway leading down, just where he had been going to. With an angry hiss, he backed away. The two men were completely blocking the way, and Mrs Norris was smelling the air in a way he definitely didn't like.
He was unfortunately forced into backing off toward the library again. Finally, the hall came to a crossing. He quickly and silently went another way…
…only to find himself in the same hallway as madam Pince. Snape and Filch noticed her and turned his way as well.
'Well that's just great.' He thought. 'Stuck between the caretaker of hell and his… cat, hell's top torturer and it's sadistic librarian.' He mentally forbid himself from calling Mrs Norris Filch's wife, even though it was the general rumor.
(A/N: Ewww)
"Any luck?" Snape asked Pince.
The woman shook her head. "None, but I noticed a couple of books were missing, and have been replaced by poorly transfigured copies."
She showed them the wooden books. Snape started walking faster. Harry nervously hid in the tiny space inside a slightly open doorway, hoping he wouldn't get caught.
…wait, read above.
…Slightly open doorway?
He gave a look through the opening behind him while Snape sneered at the job, claiming it probably was a first year's job. The room behind was dark and apparently large enough for him to hide. Hoping the door was well oiled, he pushed it open, making sure Snape wasn't looking at him. Fortunately, he seemed well interested by the book.
"Very sloppy. None of my Slytherins would do a poor job such as this."
'Geez, how flattering.' Harry thought as he pushed the door open. Mrs Norris shot him a look, but didn't move. He pushed it just wide enough to allow him to sneak in.
"You are of course aware of who there is in the school, Snape." Pince started as he managed to slip through without being noticed. "Two of your Slytherins are first years, while the only one from any other house is little Weasley. And sneaking around the restricted section in the middle of the night is clearly Slytherin behavior."
Snape frowned, but didn't answer. Instead, he barked: "Keep looking, we'll find him." and they separated, leaving Harry to shut the door with a relieved sigh.
Harry's alarms shot up, however, when he noticed what Snape had said.
"We'll find him."
Could he know?
Naa. How could he have guessed?
Harry started exploring the room he had stumbled into. It was apparently a disused classroom, virtually empty except for one object, a tall mirror over which was written "Erised stra ehru oyt ube cafru oyt on wohsi"
"What kind of weird language is that…" Harry wondered, before looking in the mirror.
He saw himself in the mirror, wearing his dark green night robe, his messy jet black hair in 'bed mode', sticking in every direction like some kind of tribute to hurricane-torn palm trees. That much was normal. However, when he was about to look away, he noticed something appearing. Or rather, two people.
One of them, a tall man with glasses, brown eyes and hair just as messy as his, if not more, was smiling, his hand passed around the shoulders of the second figure. A red-head woman with happily glittering green eyes.
…his eyes.
"Mom?" He whispered, reaching forward to touch the woman. "Dad…?"
The Harry in the picture was smiling happily and snuggled himself closer to both of his parents. The real Harry's heart teared up at the image.
'This could have been me…' he thought.
Tears were now escaping his eyes. He pulled a chair closer and sat down on it to gaze at the mirror, something he did during the whole night.
"Where were you?!?" Blaise bellowed at his return the next morning. "Snape woke me up at an ungodly hour to ask me where you were!!"
"Sorry, but I found something you have to see." Was his only reply as he pulled her by the arm out of the Slytherin common room, the girl protesting and ignored all the way.
"You pulled me all the way out here just to see a dumb old dusty mirror?!"
"shh! I don't think we're supposed to be here!" Harry warned, before turning to the mirror. It hadn't moved a single bit, which was a good thing. You never know with magical objects…
But as he had expected, the two silent, smiling figures in the mirror re-appeared. With a grin, he walked up to the mirror.
"You see them?" He asked Blaise, pointing at his parents.
Blaise's eyes grew wide open in surprise.
"That's my mom, a—" "What are you talking about? I see myself, wearing all kind of wicked jewelry… and I'm a beautiful adult, wearing one of those spiffy auror robes!"
Harry gave her an odd look and turned back to the mirror. His parents were still there, smiling at him in the same, gentle way as before. But no Blaise in jewels and auror robes.
Disturbed, Harry pulled a protesting Blaise away – "What's with you and pulling me around?!" – heading for the great hall, intent on having at least a bite of breakfast. As he told his intentions, the girl stopped protesting. The puller became the pulled.
The day passed quickly as the two of them spent most of the day scooped up in the library, searching anything with the name Nicholas Flamel, and learning 'the 1001 ways to whine and/or complain' by Blaise Zabini.
While Blaise and Harry worked together, Ron seemed to avoid them like the plague, searching a whole three rows away from them.
"You should be grateful we're helping, you, Weasley." Blaise said. "I can think of many things I'd rather be doing right now than this."
To which the red-haired boy didn't answer, his nose stuck deeply inside an upside-down copy of 'Wand envy and you'. Harry could barely stifle his laughs when Weasley realized what he had been reading, and never got in the grownup section again.
He had waited a long time that night, lying in his bed, fighting sleep with whatever weapons he could find – Ranging from Quidditch strategies to classes, anything but History of magic, which was Sleep's favorite weapon. When he was fairly certain Blaise wasn't going to spot and stop him, he got up, slipped his invisibility cloak over his head and walked out as silently as he could. One of the rules for sneaking around; always be silent, even when you're in a 'safe' place.
He stalked down the halls, barely avoiding a madly cackling Peeves charging through with two armfuls of neon pink water balloons and Mrs Norris who mewed too loudly for his taste after smelling the air for a while. Finally, thankfully without any rolling boulders or arrow-slit infested walls – You never know at Hogwarts… – he found himself inside his destination, the mirror room. He removed his invisibility cloak and sat down on the chair in front of the mirror.
"Here again, Harry?" Came a voice. A familiar voice he remembered from his first day at Hogwarts.
"Professor Dumbledore!" He gasped. The worst had happened. The headmaster of the school had found him. The old man was just behind him, sitting on a desk.
"It appears being invisible blinds you."
Used to Snape being his boss, millions of terrible, painful and bloody scenarios came to his mind, most of which crashed in a disordered heap on the mental ground of his head when he saw the blue-eyed old man was smiling, a true, genuine, unforced smile.
"I see that you, like so many before you, have found the wonders of the mirror of Erised."
"I didn't know it was called like that…"
"Do you understand what it does?"
"It shows me my parents…"
"And it shows your friend Blaise as a powerful, beautiful auror like her mother."
"How do you know?" Harry almost feared the answer. Some older students of Slytherin said he had the ability to read minds. If that was true, then it would be exceedingly hard to keep anything from him.
"Unlike you, I don't need a cloak to become invisible."
Oh. That's almost as bad.
"And do you understand what it does now?"
Harry thought for a moment, then shook his head.
"Allow me to explain. The happiest man on earth would see only himself in the mirror, as he is. Does that help you?"
Harry thought for a few seconds, then tried an answer. "It… shows us what we want to see?"
"Yes an no," replied Dumbledore. "it shows us nothing else than our heart's greatest desire, what our heart aches for. You have never seen your parents, you suddenly have them before you. Blaise Zabini, who thinks the world of her mother, suddenly sees herself an almost exact copy of her, and rich, to boot. But this mirror cannot give you knowledge or truth. Many men perished or became mad by looking at this mirror, because they didn't know if what they saw was truth, or even possible. Tomorrow, this mirror will be moved, and I must ask you not to try to find it again. But if you ever happen to stumble on it again, you will know about it's dangers. It's not good to live in your dreams and forget to live in the real world, remember this. And now, put that cloak back on and got to sleep."
(A/N: The author would like to apologize for this extremely long quote. There was no other way.)
Harry got back up, a little tiredly by all that happened. He now understood why Dumbledore was liked so much; anyone else would have probably just taken his cloak away and locked him back up in the Slytherin common room with a good detention. A question came to his mind, though. What could such a powerful man want?
"Sir? May I ask you something?"
"You just did, but you can ask another one."
Harry mentally groaned as the old man's eyes twinkled playfully. That joke was seriously overused.
(A/N: The author would like to apologize for giving a good number his readers a Serious Sirius bad joke overload. I know I suffered from one.)
"What do you see when you look in the mirror?"
"Me? I see myself holding a good pair of wool socks."
...and a wide-eyed Harry understood why many called him crazy.
"We never have enough socks. Christmas just went by and I didn't get a single pair. Everyone seems stuck on giving me books."
When he got back into his bed, Harry stayed up for quite a while, wondering if Dumbledore had told him the truth. The greatest desire of Dumbledore's heart, his deepest need: A pair of wool socks?
'Maybe he didn't want to answer.' Harry thought. It seemed like a likely exit door for an… eccentric man like Dumbledore. 'Maybe it was a bit too personal.'
FINALLLYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!! It took me TWO darn WEEKS to write this thing!!!
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