Unlike the day before, the staff table was more than half-full at breakfast. Harry sat between Flitwick and Snape and was just reaching for some scrambled eggs when a haughty eagle owl dived at him, dropping a red envelope on his plate, and flew away with a glare and a judging hoot.
Harry had just a few seconds to decide what to do. He could just blast the damn thing. Most of his mail was rerouted either to Grimmauld Place or to his office, and the list of people who could contact him directly was very small. Of those, there were only two people who would send him a Howler, and Pansy wouldn't jeopardise his cover like that.
Still, Harry was curious. With a practised swish of the wand, he created a bubble around the envelope that had already started to smoke and put the Howler in his pocket to listen to later.
Flitwick looked at Harry with interest. "I know the ways to destroy the Howlers, but I've never seen anyone preserve it. Is this some kind of a Stasis Charm?" He asked excitedly.
"Basically yes, tweaked to create a vacuum around the envelope. My friend created it." After the war, the avalanche of mail was unstoppable, from well-wishers and marriage proposals to wannabe Death Eaters and disgruntled individuals demanding to know why Harry hadn't saved everybody earlier. It took Hermione a couple of months to come up with the spells to sort that mess out, and Bill and Fleur helped to set up mail wards on him when he first started his PI business.
"I wonder why you would need such a spell," asked a rich baritone on Harry's other side.
Good question. There were plenty of reasons for Harry Potter to use it, but what about Polyidus Thompson? Thankfully, Harry had vast experience with coming up with bullshit excuses. "Some people forget that Divination is such an imprecise subject and get quite mad if predictions do not come true right away."
Snape made a face and turned away, but not before throwing a suspicious glance at Harry.
After breakfast, Harry roamed the castle a bit, as he didn't want to go up to his classroom just yet. Apparently, McGonagall didn't trust Trelawney to be up first thing in the morning, so Harry had a free period again, and he had every intention to use it productively.
Ducking into the alcove on the first floor, Harry donned his Invisibility Cloak and headed for the dungeons. Remembering just which wall hid the Slytherin common room was a struggle, but Harry was in luck as some late students were coming out of the entryway just as he was passing it.
Thanks to Edgar's Farley memory, Harry knew exactly where the sixth year dormitory was. To his surprise, he found Edgar himself inside.
The boy stared in confusion at the door opening and closing seemingly by itself, his hand creeping to his wand. Harry chose this moment to reveal himself.
Edgar jumped up slightly, looking at Harry with wide eyes. "Professor Thompson? How did you get here?" Edgar asked.
"What a useless Seer would I be if I couldn't even find a place where a quarter of student population lives in this school?" Harry said with his best mysterious smile.
Edgar looked at Harry curiously, "You were a Slytherin yourself, Professor, weren't you?"
"Alas, Polyidus Thompson was homeschooled," Harry studied his nails.
"We've only met once when I was six, but I distinctly remember cousin Polyidus to be blond. And also a squib."
So there was a real Polyidus Thompson after all. Harry had wondered about that.
"Don't you have a class right now, Mr. Farley?"
"I have Defence actually, but I don't see the point of going there." Edgar scowled, "Richardson keeps throwing those snide remarks about Alex all the time, and I'll only lose a bunch of points anyway. I'll just read the textbook for now," Edgar lifted the book he was reading.
"Defence is all about practice, though."
"Maybe I'll ask Dad to hire me a tutor for the summer. I really struggle with the Shield Charms."
"I can help you with those if you want, Edgar. I've been told I'm rather good in Defence," Harry offered. He thumbed through the textbook curiously. It was decent, if a bit all over the place, jumping from shields to Inferi to cursed objects.
"Thank you, Professor Thompson, maybe I'll take you up on that offer," Edgar looked at Harry questioningly. "Erm… Not to sound rude, but what are you actually doing here?"
"I wanted to look around your dorm myself for some clues, see if maybe Alexander left something," Harry explained.
"I've looked everywhere, even sifted through his rubbish bin. There was nothing. Only a pair of dirty socks in the bathroom hamper."
"Do you still have that rubbish?" Rummaging through trash certainly wasn't Harry's favourite pastime, but it was important if unglamorous part of being a PI that did help him solve more than one case.
"No, the elves took it away. There wasn't anything important though. Only a draft of his Potions essay and a half-eaten apple."
Harry clicked his tongue, going through the room methodically. Neither the wardrobe nor the bedside table revealed much of interest, though both had empty hidden compartments, probably from the previous generations of Slytherins. Harry examined the bed and dove underneath. Hidden compartment once again, this time warded with a variation of the Balding Curse, with what seemed like a complete set of History of Magic homework for years one through five inside. The parchments looked at least half-century old, but with Binns still teaching the class, they were likely up-to-date.
'Draco Malfoy' was carved on the inside of the bed frame, together with the crude picture of what appeared to be a dragon. There was also a wizardspace inside the headboard, where Harry found a package with familiar Potter Stinks badges, which he pocketed discreetly, a Dumbledore chocolate frog card painted over with a clown face, its occupant nowhere to be seen, and a box of mouldy pumpkin pasties.
Next was a windowsill. Harry pointedly looked at a grindylow leisurely swimming by, while Edgar took away a certain magazine, red-faced. At first, it seemed like nothing was there, but a couple of more obscure spells he had picked up from Bill later, an opening was revealed in the stone. Some more wandwork (the boy was evidently serious about becoming a curse-breaker), and Harry took out a Muggle biscuit tin and a leather pouch.
"Hey, it's Alex's! I remember him sharing those biscuits with me last year!"
Since Harry couldn't imagine Draco Malfoy eating cheap Muggle biscuits, he came to the same conclusion. The box, however, was warded even more heavily and refused to open no matter what spell Harry threw at it. In contrast, the pouch didn't have any spells on it. There thirty galleons inside.
Edgar stared at the money. "How did he get them? He is po—I mean, his family is not well off. He took a part-time job this summer, with Muggles, but all the money from that went to his supplies."
Harry took the tin and the pouch. "The box is beyond my skills, so I'll show it to an expert. Any ideas on what's inside?"
Edgar shook his head. "I didn't know he had any secrets from me."
"Maybe it's just a very embarrassing diary. I only hope it's not blood-protected, or it will be very hard to crack, especially without a sample."
"You can crack blood wards?" Edgar asked in surprise. "I thought those were impenetrable."
"There is no such thing as impenetrable, Edgar. Any spell that's been cast can be broken. The only question is whether we can do it without much damage to what's inside."
When Harry left the Slytherin dorm, the first lesson had already finished, and the dungeons were bustling with students. There were probably hidden passages from the common room to the above-ground parts of the castle, but he didn't know any. Instead, he had to go past the Potions classroom. The corridor was crowded, so he reluctantly took off his Cloak.
He almost reached the ground floor when he heard the voice behind his back.
"Professor Thompson? What a surprise to see you here in the dungeons. Those who live far above don't usually feel inclined to grace us with their presence."
Damn, but the surly bastard had one sexy voice.
"I've just been exploring the castle, Professor Snape." Harry resisted the urge to fidget. What was that about Snape that made him feel like a first-year again? "Are there some interesting places you'd advise me to see down here? Maybe some deep fortifications?" Then again, he had been a very daring first year.
"There's a torture chamber on the second level," Snape said through his teeth.
"Oh, that's... curious, although a little too kinky for me."
Snape gave Harry an indecipherable look and stormed past him in a flurry of black robes.
Coming to the classroom, Harry was surprised to see the Gryffindor trio, Talbott, Higgs and Ferguson, already there. Apparently, they were a part of his combined N.E.W.T class, with two other students being seventh year Hufflepuff girls. As the lesson progressed though, it became increasingly clear that they didn't hold Divination in much regard and took this N.E.W.T just to have a class to slack.
"We've just started the noble art of palmistry with our beloved and most enlightened Prophetess, Professor Trelawney. If you cross my palm with silver, Professor Thompson?" Talbott had the gall to grin and wink mischievously.
Harry did not have the patience for all that. "We'll switch the curriculum around a bit," he said curtly. "Let's start with—" he looked around. "Let's say, crystal balls."
He waved his hand, and five crystal balls flew over and landed in front of the students.
"I believe that Divination, vague and imprecise though it may be, can, however, serve as a useful tool," Harry lectured. "As I've learned since my arrival to Hogwarts, there's a boy, one of your year mates, who's recently gone missing. So let us open our Third Eyes and try to focus on him in your... orbuculums." Pansy underlined that word several times in his notes and dared him to use it as often as possible.
Talbott paled.
"He is not missing! He just left!" Higgs exclaimed hotly. "It's not like anybody was sorry to see the back of him!"
"Whatever your feeling about Mr. Rowle might be, his mother and his friends are very worried for him."
"As is his Daddy, I'm sure." Higgs bared his teeth.
"Enough, Mr. Higgs," said Harry forcefully and Higgs shut his mouth, looking taken aback.
Ferguson took his ball and peered into it disdainfully, leaning backwards in the chair. Between this class and the memory, Harry could see that he wasn't the most talkative fellow.
"Excuse me, Professor Thompson." One of the Hufflepuff girls hesitantly held up her hand. "But how exactly do we get the image to appear in the crystal ball? I've never quite managed to do that with Professor Trelawney."
Well, neither did Harry.
"Just try to clear your mind of all external thoughts. Let them float through your mind, never dwelling on anything in particular, while you are trying to reach the Higher Planes. Then, after you've reached this state, concentrate on the ball in front of you."
"So it's like Occlumency?" the other Hufflepuff asked.
Harry gaped at her. Yes, he did in fact describe a basic Occlumency exercise that Snape had failed to teach him and Pansy had finally explained to him years later. Minus the Higher Planes, of course. He did not, however, expect a Hufflepuff girl whose bag had a unicorn on it to be proficient in the Mind Arts.
"The basics are the same," he managed to say, "But everyone has their own path to See beyond, Miss–"
"Libra Pucey."
"What's Occlumency?" asked Higgs.
"It's a subject that is not on the Divination curriculum. Concentrate on your orbuculums, please."
For the next five minutes, everybody just stared inside. Judging by Miss Pucey's carefully blank look, she had mental walls to rival Snape's. Soon the boys started to fidget.
"I see a room," Talbott proclaimed finally. Everyone looked at him. "There are shelves with some books and a desk, but the picture is all wobbly and unclear. There is some kind of greenish light there, though."
"Slytherin greenish?" Higgs grinned.
A strange frustrated expression flitted across Talbott's face, but then he grinned back. "Exactly Slytherin greenish!"
It seemed that the Occlumency technique lent at least some results. The first Hufflepuff girl, Aradhya Roy, managed to see the scenes of Alexander Rowle's sorting, him transforming a matchstick into a needle and replanting Mandrakes. Since the girl was present during all of these events, she was probably just projecting her own memories on the ball subconsciously, but Harry awarded Hufflepuff full twenty points all the same.
"For your homework, I want you to open up your Third Eye and concentrate on Mr. Rowle every evening. Report to me if anything comes to you, or if the flow of energy through your Chakras helps you remember any important details that will help locate him."
With that, Harry stalked to his desk to look into his own crystal globe under the glares of three Gryffindors.
In the evening, Harry finally remembered about the Howler he'd had in his pocket all day. Sighing, he took it out and cancelled the spell.
The shrill voice of Draco Malfoy filled the room.
"POTTER! YOU WILL CONTROL THAT HARPY OR ELSE! I WILL! RESORT TO DRASTIC MEASURES! SHE BROKE INTO MY FLAT, POTTER, SHE BROKE INTO MY FLAT, AND I KNOW IT WAS HER! SHE LEFT HER CALLING CARD!"
"Her calling card—?" Harry mouthed incredulously.
"YOU'VE TAUGHT HER ALL ABOUT BREAKING AND ENTERING AND STALKING, POTTER, YOU'VE TAUGHT PANSY HOW TO STALK ME, BECAUSE LET'S FACE IT, IT USED TO BE YOUR SPECIALTY BEFORE IT BECAME HERS! SHE IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY NOW! THIS IS MY FINAL WARNING!"
With that, the envelope burst in flames and landed in a pile of ashes on the floor. Harry looked at it for a couple of seconds before grabbing his powder box.
"PANSY!"