A/N: Most of the characters and the main plot belongs to J.K Rowling.
Harry woke up the day after visiting Sirius in a good mood, things seemed to have gone well with the head of the DMLE, and she had said that it was good that the public would see them laughing together, it would make them question the fact that Sirius had betrayed his parents to the Dark Lord. He just hoped everyone would see the truth, and not hide behind old beliefs. Of course Sirius would be interrogated under Veritasirum, so at least he would have that going for him.
Harry knew there would be some people who would still try going against the movement though, but that was to be expected from the former Death Eaters who had claimed they only did the Dark Lord's bidding under the influence of the Imperiuse Curse, one of the Unforgivables. Harry had made it his future mission to send all those who had claimed to be under the curse, and were lying, to Azkaban. He just hoped the Dark Lord himself wouldn't rise again, that would make his mission considerably more difficult.
He had worked a lot on his mastery of the first year spells in Charms, Transfiguration and DADA. He knew that Transfiguration wasn't your typical spells in a combat, but he had imagined a few ways to make it useful. He also knew that Transfiguration was the base for Conjuration, with that, he would be able to conjure something in front of him in case he had an Unforgivable launched at him, he already knew that a simple 'Protego' wouldn't stop it.
Harry got out of bed, and went through with his normal morning routine. When he reached the common room, Hermione was already waiting for him, although this time, she didn't have a book in her arms, she seemed just about ready to leave without him. "Oh finally, took you long enough !" she said as he appeared at the bottom of the stairs.
"Good morning Hermione, sorry, I just slept in a bit more, you've gotta admit that yesterday was quite a big day for me" he said with a lazy grub on his face, one that only appeared on his face when he was around people he was comfortable with.
"Fair enough, but I'm hungry, so let's go" she said as she grabbed his arm forcefully, and dragged him out of the common room towards the Great Hall. They were moving much quicker than usual, but it didn't really surprise Harry, when Hermione said that she was hungry, she meant it. They had reached the Great Hall around 2 times faster than they usually did.
As soon as they entered the Great Hall, everyone spun around and looked at them. Hermione and Harry both had a confused expression on their faces. They both went over to the other Ravenclaw first years, and sat down at the table. The whispers hadn't subsided in the slightest, and they were getting harder to ignore as there were some at their own table.
Harry looked up quizzically to Padma, and she handed him the Daily Prophet. Now that he saw what she was handing him, he thought he had a vague idea of what was going on. His guess turned out to be right, he could tell that just by looking at the title of the first page.
Boy-Who-Lived talking and laughing with Dark Lord's right-hand man, Sirius Black.
Early yesterday afternoon, Harry Potter, the Saviour of the Wizarding, the Boy-Who-Lived, was spotted walking through the Atrium of the Ministry of Magic. But he was not alone, with him was the Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Amelia Bones, someone who this reporter doesn't know the name of, and most importantly, former right-hand man to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, Sirius Black. The man is said to have betrayed the late Lord and Lady Potter to the self-proclaimed Lord on the night they were killed.
He was said to be the Potters secret keeper for their Fidelius Charm (see more on the charm on page 9) that they had put up because it was said that the Dark Lord himself was looking for them, which of course, turned out to be right. No one knows why he searched for them, but speculations are that he had a very good reason. The late Lord Potter and Lord Black were said to be best friends, and considered brothers in all but blood while they were at school, even afterwards, when they joined the Order of the Phoenix (see more on the Order of the Phoenix page 10).
Some people were extremely confused the night it was declared that Sirius Black had killed Peter Pettigrew, who was awarded an Order of Merlin posthumously. They were also friends while at school, and it seems that Sirius Black had fallen out with them, and had taken it to the extreme, which led to him joining He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, and leading to the deaths of two of his childhood friends.
It is for this reason that seeing the two men walking and laughing together, it's almost as if young Mr Potter doesn't know or believe in the story. Either that, or he has reason to go against it. Lord Black is currently being held in a Ministry holding cell, but the reasons behind this haven't been revealed as of yet. We will update you as soon as we can.
John Connors, writer for the Daily Prophet
After reading the front page Harry seemed rather unfazed to Hermione, who had read the page along with Harry. She knew what he believed about Sirius Black, but it surprised her that if Harry was right in his assumptions, that the Ministry could have messed up so badly. Harry had relayed what had happened yesterday between him, Sirius, Remus and Amelia Bones to her and Neville. She hoped Harry was right, for his sake, it would mean he would have a family, because from the little she had heard about his aunt and uncle, they weren't exactly the nicest of people to walk this Earth.
The two of the continued their meal as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened, Hermione with a bit more difficulty than Harry. She knew the eyes weren't on her, but it still unnerved her. Harry seemed to have gotten used to his fame quite quickly, although it was evident to anybody who knew him that he didn't care for it, it was obvious that he found it rather annoying. She knew that all Harry wanted was a normal life.
With it being a weekend, she had planned on spending some time in the library, she did after all have exams to revise for.
"Are you going to the library today Hermione ?" Harry asked as she thought about it, it caught her off guard that they were both thinking the same thing, but she didn't linger on it.
"Yes, I've got to revise for the exams at the end of term. Why ?" she asked with a hint of curiosity in her voice.
"Well," he began "I was thinking of coming with you. I know I'm good at the practical stuff, but in theory I'm not the best, so I need to read up on some of that. I'm sure we can convince Neville to join us."
"Harry Potter in the library ? Something must have changed the course of the Earth for that, you hate studying anything that isn't Transfiguration, Charms or DADA" she said letting out a little laugh.
"It's not that I hate it, it's just that those are the three things I prefer, I mean come on, if you had to choose between studying History of Magic or one of the three you just mentioned, I'm sure you would agree with me, History of Magic is just so dull, it's not like we're studying the history of Magic itself, we're studying Goblin Revolutions all the time, and I must say, he is really biased against the goblins, I found them quite nice."
"Yeah like teddy bears" a voice from behind them spoke out. They turned around, and saw that the voice belonged to Neville.
"Oh hey mate, we were just in our way to ask you if you wanted to join us in the library later, I know it's boring, but we gotta study for this sh-"
"Harry !" Hermione interrupted him
Neville chuckled at this, the fact that Hermione, didn't allow the Boy-Who-Lived to swear was quite funny, you should think he could do what he wanted with his status, but that didn't seem to mean anything to Hermione. "Yeah I'll join you, just need to go grab some books, I'll meet you there."
So, Harry and Hermione made their way to the library, while Neville went to fetch his books. Neville was thinking about how much he had changed this year. He had gone from being rather timid, and not expecting to make any friends at all, to having two of the best friends he could ask for. He also had friends in his own house, but they weren't like Harry and Hermione, they were completely different relationships.
Daphne and Tracey were on their way to the library, they were both smart enough, but they would rather be sure that they didn't have to do the year over, they wanted to try out some better things, Tracey wanted more complicated Transfiguration, she was rather good at that, and Daphne wanted more complicated Charms, she was quite good with that, most of the gaming spells were charms.
One of the reasons that she wanted to become a healer was to cure her sister's blood curse. It was a curse that had been in their family for generations, and it had fallen upon her sister. She had been trying to find a cure for the last 3 years since they had learnt that she had it, but she had found nothing.
They reached the library and settled on a table at the far end of the room, there were quite a few groups of students there, but she paid them no time. She began studying straight away, Tracey not far behind. They were in there for around 10 minutes when another group of students came in, well more precisely 2 students, the very two that they had had an adventure with. The two of them saw them and made their way over. She didn't know why, but it didn't really bother her, she knew it should because there would be quite a few things going around if they saw some Ravenclaws hanging around some Slytherins. They didn't seem to mind either, so what the hell.
"Good morning ladies" Harry began with a lazy grin that the two girls had gotten used to while their classes in Herbology. The teacher had thought that it would be a good idea to keep the same groups as they worked well together.
"Morning Thunderbird," the two girls said together, then Daphne continued "what would you be doing here, I don't think I've ever seen you here before, has the Earth changed its course ?" she tried not to produce a smile, but it was quite hard, she didn't know what it was with him, he seemed to make the people around him comfortable, it frustrated her immensely, she was meant to be the Ice Queen, and that grin just melted that away.
"Yes well, I need to study for my exams too Queenie" he smirked st her. She just shook her head, and returned to her studies. A few minutes later Neville Longbottom came up to the table, but he didn't start chatting with them, he just went straight into his studying.
She didn't know the boy well, but he seemed shy around people he didn't know, but when she saw him around Harry and Hermione, he seemed to be more like himself, and lighten up.
A few hours later the group left the library for lunch. As they walked through the corridors, they talked and laughed, but they received a lot of stares and curious looks. Some people seemed ready to pounce on them because Slytherins could only hang around people of their own house, they had done for generations, why should that change now. Sure there were occasions where a Slytherin would spend time with someone from another house, but that was generally because they had already known the person before Hogwarts. Here however, they knew that it wasn't normal, so people sent them disgusted looks, especially Slytherins, the other houses didn't seem to mind that much, they were more curious as to why people would hang around with Slytherins willingly.
"Oi ! Greengrass, Davis, what are you doing with a mudblood, a squib, and a half-blood ? It's a disgrace to our house !" a voice from behind them said. That voice belonged to none other than Draco Malfoy. Harry was about to respond to him, but Tracey beat him to it.
"Well in case you forgot Malfoy, I'm a half-blood myself, secondly, I don't care about your blood purity bullshit, and thirdly, how is this a disgrace to our house ? Maybe we were trying to get them to tell us something, but that would have been fucked up because of your meddling. Not very cunning of you is it Draco ?" Draco seemed speechless at that, and the people who had witnessed it, were lingering at the fact that the blond ponce was once again, shown up by Potter and his friends.
Draco left towards the Slytherin common room with his face red with rage. Harry and the others left for the Great Hall with smiles on their faces, they knew that by saying what she had, it would reduce the comments towards them quite a lot. She knew there still would be some things said towards them, but they could deal with that at a later point. Right now, they were all hungry.
It was the next day, and Harry had decided to have a sleep in, it was Sunday after all. He stayed in bed for a bit, but not long after he had awoken, he heard pecking against his window. He got out of bed, stretched and headed off to the window. He opened the curtain, and noticed a brown barn owl with piercing yellow eyes. He wondered whose owl it was, so he opened the window, and let it in. It offered him its leg which had a letter attached to it. He took it, and noticed the Ministry seal on it. He thought that he knew what this would be, he imagined it was a summons to Sirius' trial. He broke the seal and opened the letter.
Dear Mr Potter,
It has come to our attention that you might have some information pertaining to the trial of one Sirius Black. His trial will take place on the 18th of May 1992. You will be exempted from all classes on that day.
Yours sincerely,
Madam Bones, Head of the DMLE
Harry was happy at this, it meant that in two weeks, his Godfather should be free, and he could hopefully have a family again. He hadn't even noticed the owl leave while he was reading the letter. He decided to leave the window open, it was nice to have the spring air going through the room. It was nice because, it had a different smell to the rest of the seasons, here you could smell freshly mowed grass, and he loved that smell. On his way down to the common room, he failed to spot Hermione anywhere. He guessed that she would be at the library, she wasn't the sort to sleep in after all.
He made his way over to the library, and found her on the table that was the most concealed, she didn't like being watched as she studied. He went over to her, and made sure she knew he was there as to not scare her. "Hey Hermione, how are you ?" he asked
"I'm fine, I see you slept in" she said with a chuckle
"Well, it happens to everyone from time to time, well except you of course" they both laughed at this. "Here I received this letter this morning." he said, taking out the letter and handing it over to Hermione.
He waited while she read it. When she had finished, she had a big smile on her face. "This is good news Harry, if what you've told me is true, then I am sure he will be freed." Harry nodded at this, and sat down at Hermoine's table. She went back to studying, while he was back to his thoughts. He had to prepare some sort of defence for his Godfather, he wanted a family back.
A/N: Thank you for the reviews, I know this chapter is late, I had things to do today, sorry. Again, no reviews to reply to, hope you enjoy the chapter :)