Harry Potter and the Emerald Raindrop

AkashaWinters

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter or any of the Harry Potter world. JK Rowling owns the Harry Potterverse anyone who doesn't know that should be exiled to Mars, I make exceptions only for poor penniless people in remote corners of third world countries, who cannot read and don't have the money to buy the overly priced one – thousand paged books. I make no money from my poor attempt at fanfiction. A necklace of raindrops was written by Joan Aiken, I do not own any of the rights etc.

Chapter 18

Of Newspapers and Teacups

Harry woke to the sound of snoring. Rolling over he glanced at the clock on the opposite wall (a new addition to the dorm this year), it had obviously been inspired by one of Mrs Weasley's clocks as there were three hands and instead of the time, thirteen phrases adorned the face. They read:

'Too early'

'Time to get up'

'You're LATE'

'Breakfast time!'

'Morning lessons'

'Free time'

'Lunch time!'

'Afternoon lessons'

'Dinner time!'

'DETENTION'

'Quidditch'

'Homework'

'GO TO BED!'

The clock had three hands so that it could point to several appropriate phrases at once. At the moment it was pointing at both 'breakfast time' and 'You're LATE'. Harry groaned and yanked the covers of Ron before returning to dress quickly. Harry and his dorm mates had discovered that the clock responded to whoever was looking at it, this had been caused quite a lot of confusion, as they had been discussing this as all five pairs of eyes had been on the clock at once causing its hand to spin round crazily while trying to point to 'DETENTION' and 'You're LATE' for Seamus and 'free time' and 'homework' for the rest of them, an impossible feat with only three hands.

While dressing Harry's mind travelled back over late night's events. He had gone to Occulemency with Snape, which had been reasonably uneventful; he had thankfully been able to ignore all inconvenient thoughts about his Potions Master and Snape had only managed to break threw his control a handful of times, resulting in a somewhat successful, if not perfect, session. He had then arrived back at the Gryffindor tower to continue on with his homework and ended up having a long and interesting discussion with Ron and Hermione…

"You okay mate?" Ron asked as Harry threw himself into the air chair next to him.

"Yer, I'm sorry about earlier you guys. I talked to Dumbledore, he wanted to know what's wrong, even tried legimency on me! Not that I'll fall for that dirty trick any longer. Then I had to meet up with Snape for my Occulemency lesson, I guess that was a good thing since I am a little rusty and he wasn't too bad. I just don't understand why I keep loosing control all the time!" Harry ranted, throwing up his hands in frustration.

"It's okay Harry it's not your fault. I've been researching about Natural or elemental magic and apparently loosing control is very common. The magic is so powerful and raw it takes time to control how much or little you use, gypsy children often do uncontrolled by accident as they learn to manipulate it and you've only just started learning so you're going to be a little unstable a first. But you're right, Occulemency should help, if only to control your emotions better." Hermione explained.

Harry nodded remembering the time a Sir Michael's evening meal when it had taken him a while to work out the right temperature for his cup of tea, now he did it all the time without noticing. Apparently it was so subtle, that neither Ron nor Hermione had noticed him cooling his tea either.

"So you don't think Harry's out-burst of magic was just uncontrolled wizarding magic, I mean Harry's done that lots of times before. How can you tell the difference?" Ron asked confused, Harry thought he could answer this, but let Hermione plough ahead, she seemed to be finding the subject fascinating.

"Do you remember the coloured tendrils of magic Harry let out?" She asked Ron, when he nodded an affirmative, she continued. "Well, when wizards let out uncontrolled magic you can't always see the raw magic, and when you can it comes in short sharp burst of colour, a bit like bolts of lightning. That's because the magic is still being channelled, it's taken from the magic reserves inside us, all wizards have this and this is wear they get there magic from, it replenishes as we use it and that's why some wizards are more powerful than others and even those most powerful wizards like Dumbledore have their limits." Hermione paused to let the information sink in before continuing "When Harry uses natural or elemental magic, he's not taking magic from himself he's borrowing it from his surroundings, the slow moving tendrils you saw was the magic he had taken from around him. That means as long as Harry knows how to manipulate his surroundings to 'borrow' magic there is not limit to the amount of magic he can gain or where that magic comes from. Harry cast a completely spell proof shield, or burn down the school, or bring someone back to life (although that's only hypothetical) or he could drain all the magic from one of us, he could…."

Hermione had left that last sentence unfinished, neither Ron nor him had needed her to finish it. Harry could kill someone, by accident or on purpose, it didn't matter he could still do it. That made him dangerous, extremely dangerous. No wonder everyone had been avoiding him like a plague since he had shown his talents on Saturday. So this must be what Jacob meant when he said that most wizards didn't like them and that they were afraid of what they didn't understand. It was true, they were afraid. He hadn't seen or talked to any of his other doormates since before Saturday's events, though they had seemed a little off with him he hadn't really notice with everything that had been going on. Harry sighed, at least Hermione didn't seem to mind too much, although she had given him a good lecture about consequences of actions just in case and although Ron had been very quiet once he had fully understood Harry's abilities, he was still talking to him, which could only be a good thing.

"Ready to go face the Daily Prophet?" Ron smiled giving him a sympathetic look. Harry smiled back at Ron, and then groaned as Ron's question registered in his brain. Of course! He had not realised! Harry guessed, that like Hermione most of the Ravenclaws and some of the Slytherins would have put two and two together after Harry's second out burst and would have informed the Daily Prophet. The Daily Prophet was going to have a field day, as was the rest of the world, in fact the only reason it hadn't been publicised yet was because, unlike the muggle world, there were no newspapers on a Sunday. It was probably a good thing, Harry realised that very few of the students had realised that Harry had been using natural magic on Saturday, just like Ron, or there would have been a riot. Oh! The Minister and Malfoy! Harry suddenly realised. They had been there because they were concerned about the resident Gypsies, for the same reasons the school was worried about Harry, if they hadn't realised at the time that Harry had been doing Gypsy magic then they would find out as soon as the newspapers hit their desks.

When Harry and Ron entered the Great Hall silence fell, every pair of eyes was on them, well, not them, on Harry to be more precise. Harry glared in annoyance as they made their way towards the Gryffindor table. No, Harry thought, not every pair of eyes, for Harry noticed that there was a group of students in the far corner of the hall who were not paying any attention, they were starring at the ceiling in awe or pointing out the flying candles and one or two were whispering and looking at the rest of the students. Harry smiled as a tall boy with messy brown hair and bright blue eyes waved at him enthusiastically, Harry grinned and waved back. True to his word, it seemed that Dumbledore intended for the gypsy children to attend classes.

As Harry took his seat next to Hermione, McGonagall placed a short stone pillar in front of the staff table where Harry had been expecting the stool and sorting Harry next Dumbledore stepped forward and gently placed a glowing sphere of ruby red light onto the stone pillar and called for attention.

"Ladies, Gentlemen, as you may have noticed from the many newspapers lying around this morning…." Harry swiftly glanced at the closest newspaper whose title screamed 'BOY WONDER OR DEMENTOR IN DISGUISE?', how original, Harry thought rolling his eyes. "There has been some misinformed controversy over are newest residents at Hogwarts and their unique form of magic. I would like to make it very clear that rumours of danger and discreet from our resident travellers, or ANYONE within our grounds is completely unfounded and outrageous and I will remind you ALL of the warning and guidance I gave on your arrival."

Then the twinkle in Dumbledore's eyes reappeared as he straighten up and continued, "On a happier note I would like to announce the decision for several members of the Oldmoore Gypsies to join Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry for the foreseeable future. Since, as I'm sure you all know Gypsies are not Wizards, they therefore cannot be sorted threw our usual sorting hat system instead they will each come up and place both hand on the magic sphere next to me, they will then be sorted into the appropriate houses. They will not however be taking up residence in any of the dorms and therefore attendance to meals in the castle is not required, and they will be attending most but not all lessons. However, our new students are to be treated equally with the same respect as every other student in the school and will be welcome to all the facilities including common rooms and Quidditch teams."

The was a loud buzz of noise as Dumbledore's announcement came to an end, but it died away as McGonagall opened a roll of parchment. "Raven Woden Oldmoore – First Year" She called.

A Small black haired boy stepped forward nervously and placed both hands on the magical sphere and closed his eyes after several moments a tendril of blue light rose lazily from the sphere creating the Ravenclaw house symbol. Apparently his name had been well chosen, as the Ravenclaw symbol embroidered itself onto his newly acquired school robes and he nervously took his seat next to the other Ravenclaw first years.

"Hazel Aspen Petasus – Second Year" stepped up to the stone pillar, tucking a strand of chestnut hair behind one ear, she placed both hands on the sphere and was presently sorted into Hufflepuff.

She was Shortly followed by "Rowan Ash Petasus – Second Year" who quickly joined his twin at the Hufflepuff table. The twins, Harry had already met; Hazel was a quiet and sensitive girl, while her brother was slightly more outgoing, he was quick to jump to her defence and was surprisingly insightful.

"Aquila Chrysaetos Oldmoore – Third Year" Then approached the sphere, a golden eagle came into Harry's mind off its own accord and he frowned. Then he smiled as she was sorted into Ravenclaw and sat next to Raven, their close proximity showing the similarity of their features, obviously also sister and brother. Her name, Harry realised meant Golden Eagle, both named after birds and both in Ravenclaw's house. Harry smiled to himself again; he was willing to bet all his money at Gringotts that Grandma Thyme had suggested the children's names.

"Lacerta Blackthorn – Fifth Year" jogged him out of his muse and a girl with long golden hair stepped forward and was sorted into Slytherin. The house seemed uncertain of her at first, but Lacerta ignored her housemates and walked straight up to Draco and asked Goyle quite politely to move before seating herself in his now vacant space and proceeded to walk the rest of the sorted without paying any attention to the mouth of the Prince of Slytherin which hung open in surprise.

Finally Jacob was the only student left to be sorted and he stepped forward when "Jacob Sussuro Ferox" was called. Placing both his hands on the sphere he closed his eyes, his face showing a huge concentration. Finally after minutes of baited breath "Gryffindor" was called which was greeted by much enthusiasm from Harry and his friends, although the rest of the applause was unnaturally thin for the Gryffindor house.

As Jay plonked himself down next to Harry, Dumbledore waved his hands and breakfast continued. "Oh don't you look dashing!" Jay teased a piece of toast in one hand and a copy of the Daily prophet in the other.

Harry waked him on the arm, snatching the newspaper from him and critically casting his eyes over the picture Jay had been looking at. It had been taken on Saturday when Harry had been riding round the grounds on Taz; Taz was cantering and Harry was smiling as the wind wiped threw his loose hair and he clutched as the horses mane. He actually thought Jay was right; the photo wasn't half bad. He was a little flushed from the crisp day and his eyes seemed unnaturally bright, but the sunset (or had it been sunrise?) cast a soft glow over his skin. Harry began to form a smile… that was until he noticed the headline stretched across the top of the page it proclaimed; "IT'S OBVIOUS HARRY'S GAY!". For the second time Harry's head hit the table and he groaned. Life was just not fair!

Chapter 19… Break me off a piece of that! Lessons with Jacob and sessions with Snape.

Special Thanks go to:

Barbarataku – thanks for your swift review!