Title: Harry Potter and the Summer's Secret
Author: Japhu
Pairing: HPSS
Rating: R
Disclaimer: I own nothing of Harry Potter and his world and don't make any money with it.
Summary: For one week in summer Harry disappears without trace. When he comes back he claims to have no memory. But something happened and it changed him. It remains to be seen if for the better or the worse. (will be HPSS)
Category: action/adventure/angst
Feedback: always highly appreciated
Chapter 24 – Having Breakfast
After a weighing look to the other shrunken things, Harry thought it prudent to get the practice he needed to work his wand right then, as long as he still had time and – more importantly – before the first day of classes started for real.
It was not long after that when Harry, with a satisfied grin on his face, could be seen to lazily stroll through the corridors into the direction of the great hall. His eyes were much more radiant and he was awake enough to keep them open long enough to be seen. His stride seemed much more confident and happy. It was the way everyone remembered the Gryffindor from last year, though, his loss of being-angry-at-everyone-attitude seemed to gain him an uncertain frown or two.
However, for those who thought Harry Potter a bit too cheerful in the dark times to come, they could relax marginally, because it was not long for his satisfaction of having accomplished a small feat on his way to the big one to diminish. Soon enough Harry was his ordinary non-cheerful self, walking briskly to catch up with his friends.
His thoughts were already occupied with the section of the library he would visit first. Foremost though, he needed to find a way to survive the postponed meeting with Dumbledore without giving too much away. Harry knew that giving nothing at all would not work – unless he wanted the headmaster to force some truth serum down his throat or to revive the tradition of chaining students to the wall (which Filch was so fond of).
Right before Harry stepped into the hall he took a deep breath, put a smile on his face and forcefully pushed the doors open without so much as looking at the other students strolling in and out. Most of them watched him carefully as if he would sprout horns and a hoof… or would beat them up as he did the poor painting just yesterday. Harry grimaced at the hidden and open glances he received and let himself sink down next to his friends with a curious look around.
"What is it with everyone?" he asked round eyed and pushed his glasses up his nose.
"Well, you see, there is this unbelievable stupid rumor, that you were seen beating up and threatening the Fat Lady." Dean stated matter of fact while a grinning Seamus nodded eagerly.
"Really?" Harry nodded thoughtfully and looked down to where the fifth years sat, their heads huddled together as if deep in conspiracy. It seemed Harry had remembered correctly. The third year – whatever his name – told younger Creevey, who in turn told older Creevey, and older Creevey took it upon himself to pin a headline onto the black board for everyone else to read.
"The rumors are already around?" Harry scratched the back of his head with a sheepish grin.
"'Course they are. This is Hogwarts after all, you know?"
"Thanks, Seamus. I surely would have forgotten." They grinned at each other in good humor. Harry thought that maybe the boy wanted to make up for last year's difficult start (not that Harry wanted to remind him when it was out of the way). It was good to have at least his dorm mates talking friendly for some time.
Looking around, Harry quickly decided to grab something to calm his stomach – after all he had not gotten much yesterday – and was about to bite into a juicy piece of bacon when he looked up and saw to his dismay a painfully colored head stuck curiously between Ron and Hermione, who had both shifted away to give or – if their expressions were any indication – more probably get some space upon this intrusion.
With a strained smile Harry put down his fork and nodded a polite greeting, even if all he got in return was an intent scrutiny from narrowed and somehow doubtful eyes.
"Did you really beat up the portrait?" The peacock's son sounded amused and there was an odd twinkle in his eyes. Harry thought, an ache in his facial muscles, that he did not like nosy people at all – not when they were friends or headmasters, and certainly least of all if he did not know afore mentioned people longer than a day.
"Actually, yes." Harry said with a proud, smiling face, ignoring the looks he got from his friends and concentrated on Mr. Nosy. "You want to know why?"
The other boy shrugged, his eyes narrowing further, but Harry waited patiently until the pink head bobbed up and down and the boy ground out a low "Why?".
"She was being nosy." Harry grinned and finally bit into his bacon, savoring the first taste of his breakfast and the hurt look he got from the grimacing, but luckily without further request retreating, fifth year until the snickers broke way from his friends and fellow Gryffindors who had been close enough to listen.
"I don't like it when people I don't even can properly speak the name of stick there noses into my business." Apologizing, Harry shrugged at Hermione's reproaching gaze. "He could get really hurt if he did something like that to someone more inclined to keep his own, you know? I was doing him a favor." Harry took another bite. "And he was definitely being too blunt."
Keeping Junas Bradarowicz in his line of view, Harry shook his head while packing his plate with more goods than he could possibly stomach. His life did sometimes remember him of those cartoons he had seen a few times flicker over the screen when Dudley had indulged in his much loved lifestyle of doing nothing useful except to live on a couch to stuff himself with sweets.
"Sometimes I feel like Jerry." Harry philosophized aloud with a thoughtful glance.
"Jerry?" Ron seemed to be more awake now. Certainly, Hermione had helped him to live past his hangover.
"Yep. Jerry the cartoon mouse." Harry nodded with a wistful smile and bit into a piece of toast.
"The what?"
"It's a Muggle thing, Ron." Hermione precociously informed him but kept her attention on Harry, her expression clearly asking him to elaborate.
"Yep." Harry grinned. "Poor Jerry is constantly hunted by a cat named Tom." Harry lay special emphasis on the name, "but he always manages to play a trick on him and escapes in the last possible moment." he shrugged, trying to explain. "My life is just so grotesque sometimes. It feels like something like that would happen in a cartoon rather than in real life."
"That Brado guy?" Dean inquired curiously.
"Him too, but I'm more thinking of the big bad one, not the little crazy…" Harry stole a glance to the fifth year "… pink headed one." He squinted and winced. "Or is that orange today?"
That made way for a round of wide eyed looks and let them drift into silence. They were well into eating when Harry saw his head of house striding over to them with thunder in her forceful steps and a look that spoke of danger for the one at the receiving end… most probably himself. The pieces of parchment in the professor's hands looked dangerously crumbled.
With a deep breath, Harry pushed his plate away. His stomach was settled either way, even if he would like to have some of those pancakes, but well. His professor did not seem to be in a good mood this morning. He better did not make her wait until he had finished.
"Mr. Potter!" McGonagall's lips pressed to a thin line and her eyes blazed hidden fire. She towered right next to him as if he was no more than a beetle she would likely crush in a moment. Yep, Harry was right. It was certainly not a good mood she spread. Her voice would make the stone crumble over their heads if she kept it up for much longer. She seemed ready to give him a piece of her mind for the stunt he had pulled the day before.
"Professor McGonagall?" Innocently blinking, Harry questioned the professor's angry entrance with a wide eyed gaze, as if he was uncertain whether she was justified to direct all her bad mood at him. "Did something happen? Is everything all right?" his Gryffindor heart wanted to know, ready to jump into action. "Is it Voldemort?" Harry ignored the gasps and noticed the only reaction his head of house showed was a slight twitch in her left eye. "Was there a Death Eater attack? Shall I help? Can I?"
"No, Mr. Potter." She stared searchingly at him for a long minute, then the air seemed to deflate off her and she only looked tired and worn out when she shook her head, clearly getting a grip on her emotions. It would not do to have a hall with hundreds of students – every single one watching them more or less attentively – getting into a panic. "Do refrain yourself, Mr. Potter. There was no attack."
"I don't understand, Professor McGonagall?" Harry frowned and gazed questioningly at his friends, for maybe one of them could solve the puzzle, before his attention turned back to his professor. "Not to be disrespectful, but the way you were coming over here I was certain something really awful did happen." Smiling bright and with obvious relief, Harry shook his head. "For a moment I was really worried, Professor." Now his head of house looked really troubled. Harry was relatively certain that she did not want to make her students unnecessarily terrified. She seemed pretty much chastised. Craning his neck, Harry looked up at her.
"Can I help you, Professor? I mean, you were coming down to talk to me?" he asked doubtfully and watched how his head of house pulled herself together, though now her mood was bearable for an early morning.
"Mr. Longbottom," she found her way again and gave the surprised boy right next to her the small stack of papers, "see to it, that your fellow Gryffindor students get these before they depart from the table."
"Er… yes… ma'am, Professor." The boy stuttered and gripped their future lesson plans tightly, aware of the looks he got from all around the table. Harry suppressed a grin. Everyone was desperate to know how fate had played the cards this year. To have hold of lesson plans was a dangerous thing just now.
Fortunately for Neville, Hermione reached over the table, smiling sweetly at her professor, her gaze slightly doubtful, because surely Professor McGonagall knew that Neville would be running away from the hall before he could hand out even one schedule to its rightful owner. The students would storm over to get their lesson plans in a matter of minutes.
"I will do it, Professor McGonagall." she said. Neville seemed much happier to be relieved of his sudden burden so soon after he had gotten it.
"Ms. Granger." The woman acknowledged with a curt nod and returned to Harry. "The headmaster is going to give you your lesson plan personally, Mr. Potter, right after breakfast." McGonagall did not seem too fond of him for the moment, as her narrowed eyes indicated; but still, there glimmered something like regret for only an instant.
"Yes, Professor." Harry blinked and watched Hermione handing out the lesson plans at their table, to avoid replying the cross look the professor send his way.
"He's awaiting you in his office, Mr. Potter." She looked stern, not ready to let him go just now. "Do you think you can find it today?"
"Of course, Professor." Harry smiled disarmingly at her doubtful and very much disapproving expression as if caught innocently. Thoughtfully, he glanced at his friends' time table. Somehow he doubted that his lack of an answer to his OWLs letter to choose his NEWTs courses was all about what the headmaster wanted to talk about.
"Are you certain that I should go right after breakfast, Professor? I don't want to be late or even miss my first class in a new year."
"You are excused for your morning lessons this day, Mr. Potter. You can get the assignments from one of your classmates afterwards."
Harry grinned charmingly. "That's what I thought, Professor. Thanks." Too cheerful for his professor's mood, Harry received a hard look that spoke of lots of detentions if he should miss the turn-off to the headmaster's office once again today, but nevertheless Harry had managed to take some of the wind out of her sail and changed a heavy storm into a mild breeze.
"I hope there is really everything all right." Harry said for his friends' benefit while he watched the professor's stiff departure and returned his attention to the table when she took her place at the head table. It was only Hermione from the other end of the Gryffindor table, where she was still handing out the last schedules, who gave him one of her scrutinizing gazes. All of his other friends where pretty much occupied, waiting for Hermione to get their time tables or studying and comparing their own schedules that were already handed out to them. Watching his friends following Hermione's every move, Harry was bored. Likely it was only the calm before he went to hell (better known as the headmaster's office), but nevertheless, if he had his own plan already, Harry would have something to do at last.
Harry had not really thought about his OWLs. Hell, he did not even know how much he had gotten! Propping up his elbow to support his head in his hand, Harry looked lazily around and turned the thought in his head. He did not much care for OWLs at this moment, he had not cared for the most part of his summer. It would be different if he would possibly get one or two OWLs for keeping a self appointed former lord in his head, otherwise Harry believed the less classes he took the better it would be for him and his soon-to-be-started-research to find a way to get rid of Voldemort.
Harry was pulled back from his thoughts when Seamus, who set right next to him, bent over the table and bumped into his side, relieving Harry from his comfortable position as he gazed interestedly down on Hermione's narrowly written schedule. Curiously, Harry followed his look and his brows rose questioningly.
"I don't see any free space in your schedule, Hermione. Were you not supposed to solely concentrate on your NEWTs?" Harry questioned as he glimpsed on the girl's parchment.
"You are required to take at least three NEWTs courses – though most students tend to take four in case one goes wrong, anyway – and of course History of Magic and DADA as required average courses if you're not taking one or both for NEWTs. Otherwise you are pretty much open, though more than six NEWTs level courses won't fit into your schedule, I've tried." Sorrowfully, she pulled a face.
"Yes, well… but I don't think I overdid it this time." She said with a thoughtful but satisfied glance down to the parchment she kept in a firm hold. "There is still enough space to concentrate on homework and extra credit subjects. I really did not want to drop some subjects totally, you know. Although, my parents forbid me to take on more than six courses altogether." Sadly, Hermione shook her head with a regretful look onto her tightly filled schedule and smiled.
"My parents did not want me to take average courses, but I convinced them to let me, because we were obligated to take Defense and History anyway and they shouldn't count them, because I didn't choose them." She smiled. Hermione, and everyone else who knew her learning habits, was well aware that she would have chosen DADA and History even if she had to teach it herself. After all, it was History of Magic even if Binns taught it; and in these times DADA was simply a necessity.
"I would have liked to take Herbology and Care of Magical Creatures in NEWTs level, but it just didn't fit in anymore, though, Professor McGonagall assured me that if I'm working well she would talk to Professor Sprout. So I still could get extra lessons on NEWTs level, despite being in an average course. Yes, well, and Care of Magical Creatures is not really important, but it's still interesting and it's with Hagrid." She shrugged and Harry hoped that Hermione would not forget everything else – mainly her extracurricular research – about the NEWTs.
After a moment to adjust Hermione's idea of attending classes, Ron groaned. Like everyone, he too had History on his schedule, though his plan had enough blanks to go playing with the squid or to run to London and back between classes. There was no lack of free space in Ron's schedule.
"I don't understand why they make us take History. It's boring." The redhead moaned.
Hermione straightened. "Maybe they don't want more ignorant wizards and witches running around and cry for extinction of Muggles." Her eyes narrowed dangerously. "Such things happened in Wizarding history more than once, Ron, even if it were mostly other species that got nearly ridden from the face of Earth. Take the Goblin Wars or the Battle of Rihidio, the Grovian Rebellion and the Klevian Death Marshes – even the War of the Ancient to an extent. History is full of things like that. Most of them could have been prevented if people would not always repeat the mistakes made by their ancestors." Hermione's eyes glazed over, her mind deeply emerged in some obscure book she had most probably memorized page by page. The girl did not even notice the looks the boys exchanged with each other. They had lost her train of thought right after "Goblin".
"Be that as it may," Ron shrugged her lecture to a halt. "We have lots more of homework and not much free time even without History." He scoffed. "I bet nobody took History of Magic voluntarily. Who in their right mind would take Binns for NEWTs anyway?"
"I would… did." Neville swallowed.
"I did, Ron." Hermione said affronted at the same time and looked surprised to Neville like everyone else in their little group.
"Huh?" Ron blinked stupidly. Hermione he could believe, after all she would just take everything on NEWTs level if they would only add a few more lessons – even if it was after curfew.
"Well." Neville looked uncomfortable and tried to shrug it away. "I don't have to use magic in History of Magic. It's mostly just reading books and learning. I actually know how to do that – and it's not that boring." He murmured in an afterthought.
"Yeah, well." Ron looked doubtful for a moment and scoffed. "It's still boring." Satisfied, Ron nodded when Neville shrugged without having to say something against this well proven statement. Only Hermione frowned unimpressed. It miffed her that not even her friends recognized that knowledge was power. They could learn so much more from books. It was a pity they did not even know – and never would – what they missed, especially in History of Magic.
Giving his own schedule a closer look, Ron frowned when he turned to Harry. "What do you think is the problem with your's, Harry?"
"Maybe they want me to take remedial potions like last year." Hermione and Ron knew what he was talking about. They both looked much more serious than a moment before.
"Maybe." Hermione mentioned carefully. "Those private coaching didn't work out so well, though. Are you sure that's it?"
"I don't know." Harry really hoped it was not. It was not likely so soon after he came back to school. "It's not as if I did something wrong this school year." Harry stated indifferently. He would get to know soon enough after all.
"Professor McGonagall was awfully… strict," Hermione continued drilling him for information as if that had been the opening point for her. Harry grinned.
"Maybe she had a bad dream or something. Or that stairway incident last evening was more serious than we thought." Harry shrugged. He truly did not know what had gone through the professor's head, though he could probably have made a good guess. Hermione watched him curiously but did not further this topic, well aware that they were not alone.
"It's too bad though, she couldn't even give you a hint to what your schedule would look like." Ron grumbled. He wanted to compare their time tables to know which courses they had together, as it seemed that most or even all classes were with members of all four houses mixed together, even so there seemed to be more than one class in some subjects as his DADA course had a small one written behind and his History course a small two – to make things even more complicated.
"I hope we don't have too much classes with Malfoy and the like." Ron groaned, giving a glare towards the Slytherin table.
"Ron!" Hermione shook her head. "It's time to get people to notice that Houses are a petty thing to judge a person by." She said earnestly and meant it. "After all, in two years time all of us will have to work together wherever we'll get a job."
"Yeah," Ron said with a meaningful glance to where Malfoy sat with his goons, "some more than others though, I'd reckon."
"Don't start on this now, Ron." Hermione frowned. "It's almost time to go to classes anyway. Just let it be." Clearly, slowly but steadily the majority of students was leaving the Hall.
"What do you guys have first?" Harry questioned to know what he might be missing. He blinked when he got five different answers. It really seemed as if all sixth year students were thrown together only to be pulled apart at random, though Neville seemed to have hit the jackpot, having two free periods until lunch and no homework to do for now. Having Potions, Hermione had drawn the bad end of the stick. The boys gave her a round of pity, which she did take with a relatively cold shoulder, after all she liked Potions and had chosen the NEWTs level voluntarily. Harry only hoped she would not be the only other student amidst a horde of Slytherins, as she most probably would not see any other Gryffindor during her time in that class.
"Anyway." Ron winked. "I like it when school starts with a weekend… or nearly. It's a nice short week, just right to get used to this stuff again." Ron grinned.
"And mine's even shorter than yours." Harry couldn't help but adding mischievously, twinkling towards Neville, who surely was at a loss as to what to do with his new won freedom until lunch.
The great hall was getting empty more rapidly than a few minutes before. Breakfast was finally over and Harry would need to search his way towards the headmaster's office. Inwardly, Harry became more nervous by the minute, doubting if he could pull it through as he wanted to. He did not have a plan laid out. Harry knew that plans tended to be blown up too easily. It would be better to improvise from the beginning than standing there without knowing what to do in the midst of their talk. He just needed to get certain points across without being obvious.
Getting up with his friends, Harry walked to the door with them. He grinned at them, said the obligatory good byes and watched Seamus and Dean heading off together before they parted – one on his way to the greenhouses, the other towards the DADA classroom. Harry would talk to Dean later to quiz him about the teacher. It would be interesting to see if Brado was really as stupid in everything as he made everyone believe.
"See you at lunch, Harry." Ron grunted. "You'll let us know what the headmaster did want to babble about, will you?"
"Yep, certainly." And with a look at Hermione he furthered: "You know I will. After all," Harry blinked, "I did tell you what I did yesterday, didn't I?" Alas, Hermione still did not believe him. Her only answer was a deep frown and Ron looked confused.
"What did you do?" the redhead asked and stopped on his way, wondering what he had missed.
"Shrinking my robes." Harry gave in frankly. "Nothing extraordinary, Ron, don't worry. I'd let you know beforehand."
"Oh. That's good then." Ron did not really seem to care. "See you." And he headed off towards Hagrid's hut. Three gone, two to go. Harry turned to Hermione. It was a rare occurrence that she was the last one to head off to classes.
"Good luck with Dumbledore, Harry. He probably wants to talk about your summer." Hermione whispered secretively, so that Neville would not hear clearly.
"You think so?" Harry managed to look dumbfounded.
"Yes." She nodded vehemently, certain of her conclusion. "It's most likely after all those rumors that went around, and after the report Professor Lupin and Moody seemed to have given him. Even if you think you were with the Dursleys at all times."
"I'll know it soon." Harry shrugged her worried gaze away and smiled reassuringly. "If I were you, I'd hurry or you'll be late for Potions." He grinned. After a hasty wink his friend run without further words. Smirking, Harry watched her running figure until she disappeared in the corridor that led to the dungeons. The first day of classes was not so bad for now. Thoughtfully Harry turned to Neville, the boy with too much free time, who would be harder to leave him on his own right now.