Chapter 18

A couple of days after that first flying lesson, a large eagle owl wearing the Greengrass crest swoops down to the Hufflepuff table at breakfast. Daphne holds her arm out in front of her when she sees the crest and grunts as it lands on her forearm. On her shoulder Solar hisses at the owl, who flinches sensing a predator that is much higher up the food chain than it is. Once Daphne has taken the letter from it's leg, it carefully hops off of her arm, taking great care not to disturb Solar, before taking off with a mighty beat of its wings.

Daphne turns to Solar and scritches her breast, "You're a good girl, oh yes you are."

While Solar is preening from the praise, Daphne unrolls the letter.

Daphne,

It pains me to admit that this is the third letter that I've written to you since the beginning of the school year. The first was to be a scathing rebuke for getting sorted into Hufflepuff. I was mulling over whether to just disown you or put you on notice when your Phoenix delivered your letter to me.

The second took me some time to write, as I needed to mull over the implications that gaining a phoenix as a companion would have for our family going forward. I still haven't finished writing that letter as a matter of fact.

Last night I was paid a visit by Mr Malfoy, who very loudly complained about dodgy brooms causing his son to almost be killed. As such I am sending you this frank and uncharacteristically blunt letter to ask a simple question.

By Merlin's name, what is going on in your school this year?

With Regards,

Duncan Greengrass

Daphne reads it twice before bursting out laughing.

Tracy cranes her head over the table to try and see what's made her friend laugh, "Daph, what's going on?"

Breathlessly, Daphne hands over the letter to her closest friend. Once she's read it, she rolls it up and hands it back, a hand over her mouth to cover a giggle.

Ernest calls down the table, "What's so funny? Enquiring minds wish to know."

Getting herself back under control, and isn't it nice to be able to laugh like that without needing to worry who's going to use it against you, she responds, "It's just a letter from my father asking me what's going on. It was just the way he beat around the bush with some not so subtle implications."

"What are you going to tell him?"

"Everything that has been going on in the school. After all, that's what he asked about."

The rest of the first years nod understandingly, it's not the first introduction they've had to politics this year. But it's probably the most personal.

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Apart from Malfoy, the flying lessons continued over the next month successfully, with Ron actually paying attention to his individual instruction at the beginning of the next lesson, not that he had much choice. True to Andromeda's prediction, members of the Hufflepuff house start becoming a more common sight in the Great Hall again, though they're all suffering from too-much-magic-itis. Much to the rumour mill's delight. Which has take the idea that the Potters had a hidden nesting ground of Phoenixes, and Harry has been sharing it with his house. When directly questioned, nearly every member of the house answers with 'Something like that, yeah' and then laughs. The older years, having seen similar happen a few times over the years, just shrug and write it off as a Hufflepuff thing.

Lucius' letter does indeed come in. Minerva, dutifully, informs the board member that Harry Potter donated the brooms.

In the last Potions class before they start brewing, Andromeda provides every student with a cauldron filled with a special potion, that's rather complicated to brew so most teachers don't bother until their students are ready for more complicated brew patterns at the NEWT and Mastery level. This potion changes colour depending on how hard, and what pattern you are stirring in. Returning to it's base colour of blue if allowed to come to a rest. On the board are a list of colour goals for the lesson, only the first 5 have the directions filled in. The point of the entire class is to find out how to produce the other colours. The last two colours being white and black proves to be too much of a challenge for all the students, though they have fun trying to find out. It turns out that the answer is 5 turns clockwise moving smoothly into a figure 8 and then smoothly into 5 turns the other way for white, and the reverse for black. If it's not done smoothly then you don't get white or black.

Once Potions moves onto actually brewing potions, Harry gets the Herbalism skill at 1. The class is also able to two of the first-year potions in a single class with only minor mistakes that Andromeda corrects, and then teaches about in her next lecture class. Most notably is when Neville puts porcupine quills in before he takes the potion of the flames for the first potion. A quickly cast flame freezing charm meant that it simply boiled over rather than exploding. In the next lecture, she brings it up as an example of mis-reading the instructions. For Neville, she suggests that he copies the recipe out onto a sheet of parchment before the class, then uses a straight edge like a ruler to keep his place in the recipe. She also suggests other methods like making a check list, re-reading the recipe after ingredient preparation, and finally, placing volatile ingredients like Porcupine quills under a note indicating what needs to be done before they're added. Neville, much to his chagrin, needs to redo the potion after school one evening before the next brewing class.

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There is much excitement amongst the Hufflepuffs as they queue up outside the Charms classroom for their first lesson where they will be casting an actual spell, rather than single word or movement tricks. Apart from the Lumos charm in the first week, every other lesson has been about theory and a minor trick, typically with an enchanted toy, to illustrate the wand movement or multisyllabic strings for spellcasting. While entertaining, there's only so much interest toys can give a class of 11-year-olds. So, from today, they would be moving onto actual spells, starting with the levitation charm.

When Filius opens the door, Hermione draws the short straw and ends up sitting next to Ron. As they are coming to expect, the beginning of the class is full of theory and explanations of what the levitation charm will do, including diagrams. Much to their disappointment, Professor Flitwick informs them that the limitation of this spell is that they need to be pointing their wand at the item they're trying to levitate, though they can change the distance between the wand and the object by varying the amount of magic they're using. With more magic pushing the item away slowly, and less pulling it back.

Once they're allowed to try casting the spell, Hermione is the first to get it right. Though she almost puts the professor's eye out when she uses a little too much magic to move her feather away from her. Swiftly following behind her is Harry and then Daphne. All three of them then turn to help others in the class. As the class is coming to a close, the only person that hasn't got it, even with Hermione's help is Ron. After she's tried to correct his pronunciation for the umpteenth time, he shouts into her face, "Well if you're so brilliant, why don't you do it then."

Shakily, Hermione casts the spell again on his feather and levitates it before gathering her books and storming out of the room and disappearing to the Realm of Magic to cry.

"Mr Weasley, 5 points from Gryffindor for disrespecting someone that has just been very patient with you." Ron sags with those words, as he didn't mean to say that to Hermione. It's just, she finds it so easy.

Fortunately, the bell goes signalling the end of class, and he quickly packs up his bags and leaves with Dean and Seamus. Once they're outside, his frustration causes his mouth to run away from him again as he says to Dean, "She's a bloody nightmare know-it-all, I don't know how anyone stands her."

Seamus glances at the murderous glares from the Hufflepuffs coming out of the classroom behind him and quickly grabs his arm and drags him down the corridor and into a side room with Dean.

Once there he pushes Ron up against a wall, "Look, I don't know what you have against Hermione. But she's only been helpful to us over the last couple of months. Do you realise that you came this close," – He holds his fingers up " apart – "to being put into the hospital wing for saying those things. I'm inclined to lamp you too, so I think you need to take a break and steer clear of the Hufflepuffs for the rest of the day."

Once the two of them have checked that the coast is clear and left him to his thoughts, Ron slumps against the wall. It doesn't take him long to decide that it wasn't actually his fault, she just wasn't patient enough with him. With that resolved, he makes his way to his dorm and raids his stash of snacks, and grabs his chess set. He then makes his way down to an empty classroom on the second floor where he's close enough to get to the feast, but out the way enough to avoid the puffs. As he gorges himself on sweets and cake, he ends up smearing chocolate around his mouth. Which he attempts to wipe off with his sleeve. After a couple of games of chess against himself, the amount of food he gorged himself on sends him off to sleep with a sweet meat pie by his head, the smell wafting out of the room.

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Harry watches Dean and Seamus drag Ron away with his fists clenched, nails almost drawing blood from his palms. Once they're out of sight, he turns to the rest of his friends, tears in his eyes, "I'm going to get Sunbeam to take me to Hermione. If I'm not at the next class, can you let the professor know what happened?"

Justin speaks up, and speaks for all of them, "No way, we're going to look for Hermione. If we're not back then we'll take the detention together."

Daphne says, "Solar agrees, and she knows where she is."

Xingwei comes out of the classroom after helping Flitwick clean up, "Xingwei must ask for your indulgence. Mistress Hermione is currently suffering distress, please inform Madam Hooch that I am taking care of her."

Tracy shakes her head, "Na uh, we've already decided to go and find her. You're welcome to come along."

Xingwei bows, "I will ask Kuanwei or Wulian to do so then. Please wait a moment, they are just talking to Professor Flitwick."

Seeing Harry's agitation, Daphne says, "Go, there's another three Phoenixes to bring the rest of us when she gets back."

Harry disappears in a flash of light and reappears by the tiered gardens that bracket the path that used to lead to the main university. He can hear Hermione crying somewhere ahead of him, and she sounds so very sad. So he carefully picks his way down the tiers until he finds her sitting, knees pulled up to her chest, crying under one of the low trees. Carefully picking his way through the flowers, he makes his way over before sitting down next to her.

"Hey, you're not alone, you know that don't you."

Instead of speaking, Hermione latches onto him and continues crying, this time into his shoulder. Awkwardly he puts his hand on her back and rubs it in circles, "You know the others are going to be here in a minute, they're just waiting for Xingwei to pass a message onto the other red dragons before they all come by phoenix flight. I was very impressed with just how much patience you showed with Ron today, I don't think anyone else in our class could have done the same."

Harry continues to talk to her, helplessly hoping that it would help, "I got a couple of notifications in class today. Let me check what they were, apparently the levitation charm is from the manipulation school of magic. Oh, and the interface has auto completed a spell called moveroo, let me check that in my spell book. Well, that's a little disappointing but still useful I guess. The spell allows the caster to move small objects. If I remember correctly, a small object is anything I can put in my inventory. Maybe it's not so disappointing after all, as I can't put things in there that have an explicit owner. I also can't go into build mode here, or outside a property. I guess that would make it useful in quite a lot of places then."

At some point while he's just talking the others start to sit down around them, and give Hermione reassuring touches, a handkerchief, and some reassuring words. It takes hours, but eventually she calms down enough to stop crying. When he finally pays attention to anyone other than his first friend, he notices that Professor Sprout is sitting on a chair off to one side of the group with a smile on her face. It doesn't take long for her to get the entire groups attention once Harry's noticed.

"Now, you all know you're not supposed to be off the grounds without permission, so 2 points off for all of you, and detention with me Saturday Morning at 6am. However, 5 points to each of you for caring for a friend in need. Now, there's still time for you to all make it to the Halloween feast. Hermione, are you OK?"

"I think so Professor, I may have also discovered why I broke down like that."

As she stood up, Harry saw a bloodspot on her skirt and discretely cast a Scruberoo on her, hopefully before too many people noticed. Then standing up behind her he givers her a hug from behind and whispers in her ear, "Would you like me to change your gender settings to be able to get others pregnant?"

Hermione nods and turns round to return the hug, "I just wish I had the interface too."

Harry quickly makes the adjustment, and Hermione squirms as her Period is erased, "My aunt and Dudley both have it, so it's almost certainly just a matter of time and exposure to the nano-machines."

"I know, it's just that with days like today, I could really have done with being able to just look at my feelings and know exactly why I was feeling the way I do."

"So it has nothing to do with being able to carry around your entire library without worrying about space?"

Hermione laughs, "No it isn't silly."

Harry smiles at her, "It made you laugh though. Shall we go to the feast?"

Hermione beams as he holds his elbow out for her, "Certainly dear chap. Portal or Phoenix?"

"Phoenix travel Professor?"

"Only if we're going to the entrance hall, I don't think we want to overwork Madam Pomphrey tonight."

"Over to you Sunbeam." Harry smiles up at the phoenix as she launches from the nearby branch, leaving scorch marks where she was perched. The other three phoenixes swoop down to their respective humans and together they all flash to the entrance hall of Hogwarts.

While they are slightly late, it just means that the feast is in full swing once they take their seats. For both Harry and Hermione this is their first ever party type atmosphere where they are actually included. It's around half way through the feast that things go wrong, as Professor Quirrel bursts through the main doors to the hall.

Breathing heavily from exertion, he gasps out, "Troll, there's a Troll in the Dungeons." Before collapsing in a faint in the middle of the floor between Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw. Quickly Harry locks all the doors in the Main Hall and signals to Professor Sprout what he's done.

Before she is able to say anything, Professor Dumbledore stands up and makes the most idiotic statement he could as far as the Hufflepuffs and Slytherins are concerned, "All students, head to your Common Rooms, the feast will continue there."

Before anyone has managed to get to the doors a double cannon blast goes off, as both Professors Sprout and Tonks have their wands in the air.

"Are you going senile in your old age? The Slytherin dorms are in the dungeon, and we don't know where the Troll is."

"The Hufflepuff Dorms are in the basement, only one level below us. I am not risking my puffs just because you couldn't take 30 seconds to actually think for once."

The Deputy puts her wand to her throat and says in a voice that can be clearly heard across the hall, "All students return to your tables, the staff will ensure that the school is cleared before any of you are allowed out of the Hall." – taking her wand from her throat she calls for a house-elf – "Ceeley, please let Madam Pomphrey and Potions Master Snape know that there is a Troll loose in the school. Could you also ask the portraits to locate the troll please? Flitwick, Dumbledore, and Kettleburn with me to find the troll, everyone else look after the students and hold off the Troll if it gets here.

Seeing someone actually take charge calms many of the students, and Harry quickly adds the 4 teachers that were pointed out to the allowed list for the doors. When the 4 dragons stand up to go with the teachers he adds them to the list as well. Minerva is about to object when Shenjing changes her hand into a large claw before shifting it back.

It's about 45 minutes later when they return with grave faces. Albus takes his place at the teachers table, "The troll has now been dealt with. Gryffindor prefects, please see your head of house. To everyone else, I regret to inform you that a Gryffindor student was caught by the Troll. He is currently under statis and on his way to St Mungo's. Madam Pomphrey is hopeful that he will make a full recovery as he managed to disarm the troll before it did any mortal damage. However, that didn't stop it from using it's hands. Please bow your heads for a moment as we hope he has a speedy recovery." Once a moment passes, he raises his head, "Please continue with the feast, I understand that the person in question wouldn't want us to waste the food."

It is a somber end to the feast, but the students do all eat their fill. Astronomy that night is also quiet as the absence of Ron tells all of the first years just who it was that got caught. Even the knowledge that there will be energy potions waiting for them doesn't lift their spirits.

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The next morning Professor Sprout calls a house meeting. Once everyone is gathered she invites them all to take a seat while she perches on the edge of the cauldron.

"Last night a tragic thing happened to one of the students at the school. I know that the first years are probably feeling some guilt associated with is. However, you did everything you could reasonably have been expected to do. I'm sure that if you noticed that the student was missing during the feast you'd have let people know. You didn't, Madam Hooch didn't, and neither did the prefects. It doesn't matter what happened earlier in the day, none of you are seers, so you couldn't have known that he would leave himself vulnerable, or that a troll would find it's way into the school.

"You may be interested to know that all of the Gryffindor prefects have been replaced as of last night. You can ask any of the prefects here, and they will all tell you that one of their duties is to check that everyone is accounted for. Something that the Gryffindor prefects obviously failed to do, otherwise the fact that a student was missing would have been mentioned at the time and we could have gone looking for the student before looking for the troll. What I want you all to do is think about why you couldn't have known that he was missing, or what would happen. Prefects, I want you to keep an eye on the first years today, as they're probably emotionally fragile.

"First years, remember you have detention with me at 6am tomorrow morning. So either stock up on potions tonight in addition to the normal batch that's been made for the Astronomy year, or go to bed early. Also, show of hands. Should we buy another cauldron for the common room?"

When most of the house put their hands up, she addresses Harry, "Mr Potter, would you be able to see if you can purchase another Cauldron for the common room."

Harry nods and his eyes unfocus as he goes into the build mode, he can see that the amount he can spend on an item has gone up a few simolians, but not enough to really make a difference yet. He places the new cauldron near the old one so that they're not getting in the way. He also takes the opportunity to buy a cheap sound system and a couple of cheap computers. As his eyes refocus, everyone's eyes are staring at the new additions.

"Mr Potter. What may I ask are these?"

Harry walks over to the beatbox, "This is a stereo system. It can be tuned to play far more radio stations than the wizarding wireless that I've seen a few people use. So I figured that it could be used by people that are relaxing over here."

He then moves over to the computers, "These are computers, the same ones that they use outside the realm of magic. As the interface is written in simian, I didn't buy them before. But they should allow anyone to view the internet, send e-mail to Simeon and L, and also browse the forums. I know that you can get to English speaking forums, as I have one at home in Surrey. There is also the option of playing video games on them, but as there's only two computers, I don't think that would really be fair on anyone else."

"You should have asked me before buying those."

"In fairness Professor Sprout, I don't think you'd have understood what I was asking to buy if I did."

Sprout grudgingly nods.

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To the surprise of the first years, the detention the next morning involves travelling to the realm of magic, where Professor Sprout uses magic to unlock the old Greenhouse. They then spend the morning clearing it out and lifting paving slabs, all without magic. It is an exhausted, but happy group of first years that head back to the common room for a shower and then lunch.