Title: Child of Hogwarts
Author: Knife Hand
Feedback: Constructive feedback appreciated, flames unappreciated
Spoilers: None. Things will be different from the get go.
Rating: M
Disclaimer: I do not own Hermione, or Luna, or Ginny, or Cho, or... I would buy them all but I am broke.
Summary: After seeing baby Harry interact with a Student after the death of his Parents, Dumbledore has a better idea of where Harry should be raised. Inside the halls of Hogwarts.
Harry looked up from the block tower he was building and Mary was not where he last saw her in the Gryffindor Common Room. It was Christmas Holidays and only Mary and Mafalda had stayed of the Sixth Year girls. In total only five Students had stayed for the holiday, the other three being two Hufflepuffs, a Second and Fourth Year brother and sister pair, and a Seventh Year Slytherin boy. For the holiday both Mafalda and Mary had been given the authority to lock the entrances to the House Common Rooms so Harry could not wander about the Castle when they turned their back.
Wanting Mary to see his tower, Harry went in search of her. He slowly climbed up the stairs to the Sixth Year Girls Dorms and opened the door, but Mary was not there. He did hear a sound from a door off to the side and opened it to reveal a large communal bathroom. There was a row of three shower heads along one wall, without partitions in between them, and three stalls along the opposite wall with a pair of basins along the back wall. Mary was taking a shower under the furthest shower head.
Seeing his current minder, Harry half ran, half tottered, towards her and was surprised when, as he passed close to it the first shower head automatically turned on. He stepped back in surprise and the shower head turned off. Taking another step forward the shower head turned back on. With a squeal of joy Harry ran forward through the spray of the first and the second shower heads. Hearing his squeal, Mary turned instinctively so when Harry reached her, he wrapped his arms around the front of her legs.
"Fun shower!" Harry exclaimed, releasing her legs and then running back through the other shower heads, giggling as they turned on before he reached them and turned off once he passed, completely soaking the onesie that he was wearing.
As Mary finished her shower, Harry ran back and forth between the shower heads. Once she was finished, she called him over, while crouching down holding out a big fluffy towel. He ran into the towel and she began vigorously drying him as he laughed. After he was, mostly dry, she dried herself off and led him by the hand back out into the Sixth Year girls dorm to get dressed before following him back down to the common room to show her his block tower.
Professor Dumbledore sat in his office with his four Heads of House and Madam Pomphrey. Professors Flitwick, Sprout and the retiring Slughorn were sitting in chairs in front of his desk. McGonagall was standing behind his right shoulder and Pomphrey was standing off to the side leaning against the cold fireplace's mantle.
"Ok, so we all agreed on Miss Hopkirk of Ravenclaw as Head Girl and Mister Hodges of Slytherin as Head Boy for next year?" Dumbledore asked, getting nods from the four Heads of House. "So that is the matter of Prefects resolved. Next up is the matter of Young Mister Potter. With the School going into dormancy for the Summer Holiday, how shall we deal with his housing?"
"I am not comfortable with any Student taking him home for an entire Summer." Professor McGonagall said. "Perhaps one of the shorter holidays breaks when he is older, like Christmas or Easter, so he is not ignorant of how the average Magical lives."
"I would consider taking him except I have several ICW commitments over the break." Dumbledore interjected.
"I agree it needs to be Staff and not a Student's family." Madam Pomphrey added. "I am willing to take him for the first month of the Summer but for August I am attending a Mediwitch Conference in Australia."
"My home is no place for a child." Flitwick said.
"I'll take him for August." McGonagall said after a few moments of silence.
Dumbledore nodded in agreement and after a few more minutes of administrative issues he dismissed the meeting.
Mafalda was holding Harry against her hip with one arm around him to support him as he hugged Mary. All of the Sixth Year Girls were gathered around and taking their turns to hug Harry before they left for the Summer Break.
"Big Sisters!" Harry said as the last Sixth Year Girl hugged him.
Mafalda lowered him to the ground and Madam Pomphrey took his hand as the girls left the Entry Hall, with Harry waving to them.
Poppy Pomphrey's home was a small, rustic cabin with a large herb garden in the back yard. She awoke in her bed and found little Harry was curled up by her side. The cabin only had four rooms. The bedroom, a bathroom, a living room and a kitchen with a dining table that also served as a laundry area. Harry stretched as he woke.
"You hungry?" Pomphrey asked, and Harry nodded. "Ok, I'll give you a feed and then we'll go and get you something to eat."
Minerva McGonagall was sitting in the sunroom of her house preparing lesson plans for the new school year, which was starting in a few days, while Harry was curled up on another chair having fallen asleep reading one of the Picture Books she had gotten for him. She had given Harry his own bedroom in the house, but he always ended up sleeping in her bed anyway, curled up against her side. She could not help but smile at how much trust Harry showed. She looked out at the stark but beautiful landscape of her beloved Highlands before turning back to her lesson plans.
Harry and the new Seventh Year Girls, his Big Sister minders from the previous year, stood in a small side room off the main hall waiting for the new Sixth Year Girls to enter. Mafalda was holding his hand and smiled down at him.
The new Sixth Year Girls entered as a group, though each House stood together. Mafalda stepped forward still holding Harry's hand as he stepped forward too. After a few seconds the four Prefects stepped out of the group of Sixth Years. Mafalda gave Harry a hug. Harry faced the Seventh Year Girls.
"Thank you, Big Sisters." He said before turning back to the Sixth Years, stepped up to the Prefects, who each hugged him in turn. "Hello, Big Sisters."
"Hello Harry." The Sixth Years said, somewhat raggedly.
Then one of the Sixth Year Girls, the one who was to be his first minder for the year, stepped forward and took Harry's hand and introduced herself.
This would become a yearly ritual every September First and would become known as the 'Transfer of the Charge', or simply The TC.
Professor McGonagall looked up at the giggle from the hallway. She was teaching her new First Years and the door to the corridor was open.
"Harry! Get back here right now." A female voice called out.
Little Harry ran past, completely naked and giggling, followed a short time later by Miss Thomas, a new Sixth Year Ravenclaw, who marched by with one of Harry's Onesies, one McGonagall herself had bought the boy, in her hand.
McGonagall cleared her throat loudly and her class snapped back to looking at the front of the classroom.
The girls in the Sixth Year Slytherin Dorm were laughing as they changed, most of them either in underwear or half dressed. The exception was Elizabeth who was sitting, fully dressed, idly stroking Harry's hair as he lay in her lap reading on of his picture books.
Harry ran onto the Quidditch Pitch to hug Stephane, his Big Sister in the Ravenclaw Team at their win. He then turned to hug Elizabeth in the Slytherin team to console her for the loss. He then turned on one of the male Second Year Slytherin players.
"You bad. You cheat you poo head." Harry said at the boy.
"Harry, language." Elizabeth scolded.
"He's right though." Tracy, the Seventh Year Captain of the Slytherin Team, who was now accepting the consolatory hug from Harry as she had arrived to the group later. "You cheated, Smythe, so you are off the team."
The occasional, and increasing, tendency for members of the Slytherin Team to use… shady tactics in games was instantly quashed. Especially when Professor Vector, the new Slytherin Head of House after Professor Slughorn's retirement, upheld Smythe being dropped from the team and added four weeks of detention for cheating when he complained.
TBC….
A/N: With Snape not working at Hogwarts and Slughorn gone, I needed a new professor. I picked Vector as, as far as I can determine, her School House is unknown so she could have been a Slytherin and because why not?