Disclaimer:

I do not own Harry Potter. Obviously...

Summary:

Ever since first year, Harry's had a problem.. He's just to darn photogenic and no matter what he seems to do there's always a photo the next day in the newspaper calling him the next merlin.

This fic is slightly Au and will get increasing Au as the story progresses.

Chapter 7 The Detention(s).

"Oh dear," mumbled Dumbledore as he read his morning paper. After it had become apparent to Dumbledore that young Harry would continue to appear in the papers, he had wisely called in a few favors to make sure this first newspaper owl delivery would always be to him.

He was thankful he had because this morning's paper was especially troubling. His old eyes once again scanned over the page before looking at the photo of Harry with the baby dragon.

Unlike with Harry's previous dalliances with the press, this one had the potential to be very dangerous. If it was to come out that Harry had the dragon in his possession without a license or under the watch of someone who did, then there would be some serious legal complications. Either for Harry himself or as Dumbledore suspected his game keeper Hagrid.

The press would have a field day! Not to mention Harry's positive reputation may be destroyed, for if there was one thing the press enjoyed more then building up a hero, it was tearing one down.

Now while Dumbledore was very concerned about what all this fame could do to young Harry's ego, he was even more concerned what the misguided hatred and distain of the masses could do.

It was critical that Harry liked the wizarding community if there was any chance, he would save it.

He was also somewhat mollified after learning about what Harry saw in the mirror of Erised. Not to mention that Harry seemed to remain very humble and find his fame more uncomfortable than not.

Thankfully he thought as his eyes darted to the subheadings on the front page, the daily prophet had even offered up the perfect way to defuse the situation.

No doubt Minerva would be dragging Harry to see him by the end of the hour once the rest of the school heard of the news. He would also likely be swamped in correspondence from the public and ministry asking questions once the public at large became aware.

He needed to defuse this situation quickly and quietly as possible, so that he could continue his plan to train and test the character of the boy. As he gave a great big sigh, he leaned back into his chair with his hands steepled before him and he considered how all of this would affect his plans.

Charlie Weasley cursed as he flung himself out of the way of a great burst of fire. He and his fellow dragon handlers had been called out to another nesting site, where another suspected poacher had tried to steal an egg. Ever since those damn articles came out with Harry Potter holding the baby dragon, attempted egg poaching had been up nearly 50%!

'Of course, attempted was the key word here' thought Charlie as he watched one of his coworkers drag a very burnt man behind cover.

With dragons now becoming very popular from those photos, demand for illegal poached eggs as pets or to sell had gone up substantially. As if that wasn't bad enough many foolish wizards thought they could easily snatch an egg to sell and often ended up like this very burnt man.

As the handlers slowly began to push the angry mother back towards her nest and evacuate the injured thief, Charlie sincerely hoped this little fad would end quickly.

Harry gave a tired sigh as he made his way down the Hogwarts grounds towards Hagrid's. it had been a busy month since the dragon incident and all things considered Harry figured he got off pretty light.

After Hagrid had also shown up at the headmaster's office and everything was explained (minus Hermione and Ron's involvement), Dumbledore decided to place them both under his dragon license. Though he had also decided that since they were both going to be under his license, they had to have at least a basic knowledge and assigned them both a long essay about dragons and why they made poor pets.

Next, he assigned Harry punishment for the breaking of school rules. After consulting with McGonagall, He took off 50 points from Gryffindor and assigned three detentions. The three detentions would be set for each of the following Fridays and served with a different teacher.

Harry was just glad he hadn't been expelled or sent to prison. However, he was worried that his house would be furious with him for losing those points. They were only barley ahead of Slytherin now after all.

As it turned out, he needn't have worried, apparently hatching a baby dragon while sneaking out after hours and being on the front page was just so 'awesome' and 'wicked' that most didn't seem to care. If anything, it seemed to make him more popular with his house mates.

They probably cared even less since despite losing those points, Harry easily remained as one of the top Three-point earners of the house. between his quidditch, good grades and various heroic acts through out the year so far.

Speaking of quidditch his second match had come and gone. Harry had been very worried at first with Snape as the referee, but with Dumbledore himself in attendance the game went smoothly. Well maybe a bit too smoothly because the game was over incredibly quick. Harry had caught the snitch in the first 15 minutes or so and the other seeker hadn't even bothered diving after him, convinced Harry was just trying to pull off another feint.

The only thing that slightly soured that victory was overhearing Snape threating poor professor Quirrell in the forest after the match.

After his first match Harry's first detention had been with McGonagall who had been the most upset. She made Harry clean all the cages of the various animals used in her transfiguration classes out by hand. It was a long detention, but Harry was used to cleaning and when his time was up, he had offered to stay and finish the last few cages he hadn't got to yet. McGonagall had softened considerably after hearing that and then let him go.

Harry's second detention had been in the hospital wing. Much like with McGonagall he had been tasked with cleaning bed pans and potion bottles by hand. It was only about halfway through this detention when something far more interesting happened.

Harry was leaning over a bed pan scraping at it's surface with a brush when he was startled by a loud bang. Looking up he saw the hospital wing doors had been thrown open and several upper year students came rushing in holding a boy by his arm.

It only took a moment for Harry to notice that the boy was limping. As Madame Pomphrey came out and ushered them to put the injured boy on a bed. She pulled up the tattered pant leg to reveal a large gash along the boy's leg that was bleeding.

"What happened?" she asked curtly as she began waving her wand over the wound.

"Peeves knocked over a suit of armor and it's sword cut into his leg," said one of the slightly panicked students.

Madame Pomphrey audibly grumbled before she stopped her wand waving and pointed her wand at the wound.

"Episkey" she said with a slight circular motion of her wand.

Harry watched amazed as the boy's skin seemed to heal before their very eyes. He quickly got back to cleaning the bed pans and promised himself he would look up more healing magic with Hermione later.

Finally, we come to today as Harry finally reached Hagrid's cabin. Based on his previous detentions he assumed he would be cleaning something of Hagrid's by hand. So, Harry was quite surprised when Hagrid came out of the door wielding the largest crossbow Harry had ever seen.

"Cleaning?" Hagrid replied after Harry asked. "Nah nun of tha codswallop, were going into the forest to find unicorns."

As it turned out something had been attacking the unicorns in the forest and Hagrid wanted to see if they could find the source or see if they could find any of the injured unicorns.

Despite his trepidation Harry did trust Hagrid and so after getting some tips and advice they made their way into the forest.

The first hour was rather uneventful until they found some silvery liquid on a bush. Hagrid dipped his large fingers into it and after observing it closely told Harry it was unicorn's blood. They started to follow the trail when they ran into some centaurs.

Harry was fascinated with meeting centaurs in real life and couldn't help but be amazed. His amazement faded a little bit when he learned the crucial fact that centaurs were useless in conversation.

After telling them mars was bright for about the tenth time, they finally gave up asking about the unicorn and moved on hoping they hadn't lost the trail.

They reached a clearing in the forest where two separate trails of unicorn blood led off.

"looks like we ave to split up -arry" Hagrid grumbled. He made Harry practice shooting up green sparks in case of an emergency. Once that was done, they split up and agreed to meet back at the clearing by the end of the hour if they didn't find anything.

As Harry followed the path through the forest, he couldn't help but spook at every little noise he heard in the rapidly darkening forest. Eventually as he approached another clearing, he heard a painful whinnying sound. Had he found the unicorn?

Harry quickly rushed into the clearing and was surprised to find a beautiful golden colored foal lying on the ground. It was giving off little whimpers and as Harry slowly approached, he saw a gash along it's neck. As Harry arrived next to the creature it's eyes locked into Harry's and he saw great pain and fear in them. It tried to get up desperately but was clearly too weak to do so.

Terrified the injured unicorn would hurt itself more Harry did his best to calm it. He walked right into the center of it's vision and tried to be as open and non threating as possible just as Hagrid had advised.

He tried to sooth the unicorn humming and saying "There, there, it's going to be alright."

Harry slowly drew his wand and sent up the green sparks, hoping Hagrid would spot them. As he was about to put his wand away, he saw more blood drip from the unicorns wound. This unicorn foal had clearly lost a lot of blood and if it wasn't getting up maybe it wouldn't even survive until Hagrid arrived.

Harry felt a great sadness fill his heart that such a beautiful and fantastic creature was suffering and might die. But what could he do to help? It was only then that he remembered about his last detention with Madam Pomphrey, and how she had healed that student's wound.

Hoping desperately that it would work Harry kneeled next to the unicorn and after slowly petting it a few times to hopefully help it relax he pointed his wand at the wound.

"Episkey" he spoke firmly waving his wand in the same circular motion he had seen the healer do.

At first Harry didn't think it worked but then he noticed the edges of the torn flesh slowly start to mend before stopping.

Trying again had the same effect with only the edges looking a little better. Determined Harry focused on the wound and imagined it fully healing like he had seen the boys wound. He took that mental image and pushed it at his wand with all his might as he once again cast the charm.

This time the wound clearly began to seal, and the flesh quickly formed a small straight scar along the unicorn foal's golden neck.

Harry gasped, he did it! He continued petting and humming to the foal as he waited for Hagrid and as he did so he noticed the foal seemed to relax a bit. It's eyes were still clearly focused on Harry but where there had once been fear and pain there seemed now to be calm and even appreciation.

Suddenly he heard rustling, Harry looked up hoping it was Hagrid only to be hit with the most terrible pain he had ever felt coming from his scar. Through tearing eyes, he looked across the clearing towards a terrible dark cloaked figure that seemed to ooze menace. It didn't help that the more Harry looked the more pain that burned from his scar.

Collapsing to his knees before the now once again terrified unicorn foal, wand dropping from his painful grasp, Harry knew he was done for.

As he tried one last time to look up at the monster approaching, he suddenly heard more rustling from the forest. Turning towards the sounds despite the danger he saw a centaur charge full speed from out of the bush.

*WHAM* The centaur bawled over the cloaked monster and even delivered a kick to it's head as it passed by.

The cloaked figure went down in a heap before suddenly disappearing with a loud crack.

Harry looked at the centaur that saved his life, immensely grateful as the spots clouding his vision finally overtook him and he blacked out.

Eliza giggled as she snuck out of the quidditch pitch changing rooms with her boyfriend. She had a wonderful evening with him. They had walked across the grounds together, taken pictures and even enjoyed a romantic picnic. As they watched the sun go down, they had started a serious snogging session that led to some private time in the changing room. Now though they had to focus on sneaking back into the castle without getting caught.

As they exited the changing room and finished straightening their clothes, they were spooked by a voice coming from the forest. Quickly she grabbed her boyfriend's hand and they ducked behind an outcropping of rocks.

Unfortunately, her bag caught the edge of the rock and split open, dropping it's contents all over the ground behind the rock.

As her boyfriend began quietly picking the stuff up, Eliza grabbed the first thing near her which by chance was her camera and hoped it wasn't damaged. She peaked over wondering who was coming from the forest when she saw it.

Out from the bushes walked a centaur with long blonde hair and on it's back was a student... wait a minute, was that Harry potter?!

Remembering the large stack of coins one of her friends had received after taking the picture with the troll and presented with a golden opportunity she quickly prepped her camera…

Harry had woken shortly after his collapse on the back of the centaur Firenze. They had a very enlightening conversation and while the Voldemort implications were frightening, Harry was very relieved to learn that centaurs could actually talk about something other then the stars or how bloody bright mars was tonight.

After their initial conversation was over and they were unable to find Hagrid, Firenze had decided to take Harry back to the school and promised he would continue his search for Hagrid once Harry was safe.

As they finally arrived at the outskirts of the Hogwarts grounds near the quidditch pitch Harry gave a great sigh of relief. As his eyes looked up at the castle surrounded in the moonlight, he missed a small quick flash of light from some rocks near the pitch. He quickly jumped off of Firenze's back and walked up to his front. After offering his thanks Firenze gave a short bow to Harry, not wanting to be rude Harry awkwardly did the same. He waved as the centaur went back into the woods before turning to run up to the castle. He had to let one of the teachers know about Hagrid. He quickly turned around and ran back up to the castle, never noticing the couple that snuck away behind him.

Harry was walking down to the great hall with Hermione and Ron quietly discussing what he had learned the previous day. As they entered the great hall and walked towards their regular seats Harry looked up at the staff table and smiled at Hagrid. Luckily it had turned out that Hagrid was fine and made it back out of the forest shortly after Harry did. He also noticed that poor Quirrell had a swollen black eye and Snape looked even grumpier then usual. He hoped Quirrell was alright.

As he sat down and began buttering some toast. The morning owl post came in. his now regular large pile of mail was quickly tucked into his and Hermione bag for later sorting when the news papers arrived.

Harry was happily eating his toast when Ron gave a small gasp. Looking over at him and wondering what was so shocking he was surprised to see himself on the cover… Again!

Plastered across the front page was a picture of Harry from last night. It was when they left the forest with a slightly dirty Harry ridding on the centaurs back from out of the forest and dismounting from Firenze's back. A second smaller picture showed Harry and the centaur bowing to each other in an endless loop.

Stunned and wondering how someone could have possibly taken the picture his eyes drifted to the paper's headline.

Harry's Potter's Equestrian Escapade in The Forbidden Forest!

Looking to the subheadings he read:

Pg. 4 Boy-Who-Lived saved by Centaur?

Pg. 6 History of the Forbidden Forest

Pg. 7-9 History of Centaurs in Britain

Pg. 12 How to Make Your Hair as Bright and Shiny as a Centaur!

Harry groaned, even as he finished reading, he could hear the chatter beginning and feel the eyes starting to focus on him. Quickly he snatched up his toast and some bacon, wrapped it up in a napkin and made a beeline for the library with Hermione and Ron in tow.

The golden trio knew the drill by now..

Authors note:

Hello everyone,

I think this might have been my longest break in-between chapters yet. Life got busy and this chapter was challenging. I must have rewritten this chapter 3 times before I settled with where it is. At first I couldn't decide if it was just going to be an interlude or if we would do the detention as well. it kind of ended up with a bit of interlude and then the detention itself. I'm super pumped for second year as I have so many fun ideas it almost hurts my brain.

I just want to make sure people know that not every incident in every year will have a photograph and not ever photograph will get its own interlude. I'm not aiming for a 300-400 thousand word fic. I want to keep it reasonable. That being said I'm really excited for the upcoming years so stay tuned!

A big thanks to all the follows and favorites and a big thanks to those who left wonderful reviews. It's that support that gets me excited to write the next chapter.

Stay Magical!