DISCLAIMER: I'M NOT THE OWNER OF ANY OF THE STUFF YOU RECOGNISE. ALL CREDIT GOES TO J.K.ROWLING FOR ALLOWING US TO USE HER CHARACTERS. THE FOLLOWING ARE CHARACTERS THAT ARE MINE (NO TOUCHIE! MINE!); HENRY SHAYDE, ANNE SHAYDE, ALYSSA SHAYDE, TAMMY, AIDEM DEJAN SHAYDE (THE NAME, ANYWAY), AND MR TILBET A.K.A KORRY XORA.

A/N; I know for a fact that this will take awhile to come out, so I'm writing this now...sorry for the delay whether it's been two months/days/ years. Hehe, I really hope it's not that last one... Anyway, I'm preoccupied, so I don't know how long its been. Oh well, you still got the next part, right? Okay, moving on now before I go insane.

Dedicated To:

Sierra, my totally insane friend who cannot stop bragging that she has more reviews than me...I wouldn't have gotten this far if not for her constant publishing of new stories...

Tom, my brother, who without I would never found this site because he was annoying me to death...literally.

Chapter Seven: Time Flies

"Wands!" She screamed, jumping up and down like an overexcited kangaroo. "I almost forgot! Wands are what can make us cast spells! This is going to be awesome!"

"Yeah, well calm down. We're only going to Ollivander's. He's suppose to make the best wands in the entire country and I'm not letting you step foot inside that shop until you calm down enough to get your head out of the clouds and down to where it belongs." Aiden managed to hold her off for a couple minutes before he gave into the temptation himself and they both enter ed the shop. Aiden saw Ollivander hiding in the shadows, waiting to make his big entrance. Only Alyssa jumped when he emerged. Aiden could only laugh at the look on her face. "Oh come on, Alyssa. Don't tell me you couldn't see him standing there!"

"Maybe you just have exceptionally good eyes, Mr..." Ollivander pointed out.

"Shayde. Aiden Dejan Shayde. And this is Alyssa Shayde, my sister. We're going to Hogwarts this year."

"Ahh, so you'll both be needing a wand?"

Aiden nodded along with his sister. Ollivander immediately set to work finding Alyssa a wand. Amazingly, on the fourth wand a beautiful red spark flew from the tip and a warm feeling descended upon the three witch and wizards. "Nine and a quarter inches long, stiff, made of Holly. Unicorn hair core. Very reliable and a great wand for new charms." He handed the wand back to her after a quick examination. "Now for you, Mr Shayde." But Aiden proved to be a problem. He tried many wands of all lengths, with several different cores, yet none of them seemed to be right. A couple blew things up, some more seemed to make the several shelves disappear altogether, and some had some effects that Aiden wasn't going to speak to his parents about anytime soon.

But no matter how much of the shop Aiden destroyed, Ollivander only seemed to get even more excited. "A tricky customer, eh? No matter, no matter. Hmm." Ollivander suddenly was gone as he disappeared to a back room somewhere. "I wonder...try this one, Mr. Shayde. Holly and Phoenix feather, eleven inches. Nice and supple." Aiden waved the wand and a show very much like Alyssa's emerged. "Yes, curious. I never did think that wand would be sold."

"Why not?"

"I don't think I mentioned earlier that every wand is different. None are perfectly alike, yet some are similar to others. Like, the wand you're holding right now has a twin Phoenix feather is another wand. The wand of You-Know-Who."

"I'm not sure I understand." Aiden pressed. Korry had taken up plenty of time explaining the effects the name Voldemort had on everyone. No one dared to mention his name out of fear and it sickened Aiden. It was a name, and anagrammed name at that. He saw nothing to be afraid of in that one word. One simple word, nothing more; nothing less. Voldemort was gone, at least for now. He didn't believe a wizard of his status to disappear because of one simple spell.

"Then I can't help you anymore."

The rest of the summer couldn't go fast enough for either Aiden, nor Alyssa. Aiden had only been told about a few of the things to expect in the outer parts of Hogwarts. Korry had never cared to explain the inside of the castle no matter how much Aiden had already begged him. Now Aiden waited impatiently, reading the textbooks three times each before getting bored of them. Then he satisfied himself by getting away from Alyssa and heading into the woods to practice his animagus forms. Mostly he stuck to the pitch black wolf, because it was the easiest form and it made him feel so free.

Though the wait for the upcoming school year was tough, Aiden didn't know what he would do when he had to say goodbye to his parents until Christmas break. They were the first people to prove that they loved him and would never think about harming him like the Dursley's had all those years ago.

But the day came, and Aiden was unsure of whether he was happy or not. Poor Anne and Henry had to watch both of them go off to an unknown school in an unknown part of Scotland. Even though Alyssa had gone away to boarding school, it had only been for a year. Now, they would have to watch Aiden and Alyssa go away from home for months at a time, only seeing them a handful of times each year. No matter how much he thought of how much he would miss the people he now knew as parents.

It took them all a few minutes to find out how to get to Platform 9¾, but they soon figured it out with the help of a unaware redhead family who chatted a little to loud about wizardry for Aiden's liking. They talked as if the muggles couldn't hear a thing they were saying. Aiden knew that it couldn't be that way because Anne and Henry were clearly able to hear it by the puzzled looks. "Did they just say we have to walk into that very solid looking brick wall?" Alyssa whispered to Aiden "Because if they did, then I think I'll feint."

Aiden shook his head. "Sorry, but I think they're speaking the truth. See? One of them is running towards the wall now..." They both winced, expecting to hear a loud crash, but the redhead just simply disappeared rather than crashed. "I guess that means it has to be safe..."

"Come on, Aiden. Let's go through at the same time. It looks just wide enough for both our carts to squeeze through. If it doesn't work, then at least we'll look stupid together."

They both took firm holds on the carts, earning nervous laughs from Anne and Henry, who said there goodbyes a few minutes before. They were nervous about walking through walls, so they left as soon as the two eleven year olds disappeared through the solid wall.

Once through the wall, the twins were astounded by the beautiful gleaming red engine that shone brightly in front of them. Behind it, carriages stretched into the distance, but his sight was already on the frame of the train. When he was smaller, he'd loved trains almost as much as he did his family. He knew this trains was perfect and it would run smoothly to Hogwarts, wherever that was.

"Come on, Aiden!" Alyssa giggled as she pulled him away from the front of the train and towards one of the doors leading inside one of the several carriages. Around him there were more wizards, some of which looked older than he'd expected. "Let's get on before everyone else. Since we're only first years, we'll have a harder time finding a compartment that isn't filled with seventh years."

Aiden agreed silently and followed her inside, settling on a compartment near the back of the train. While Alyssa started to make sure she wasn't missing anything from her trunk, Aiden took a book from his own trunk and sat back for a long train ride to a school he had been counting on for the last two years.

Aiden was about three pages into Hogwarts, A History when the door to their compartment opened revealing a brunette with unruly, bushy hair standing next to a boy Aiden knew was one of the redheaded family that had unknowingly helped them get in. Aiden stood and greeted the brunette as warmly as he could. He like to have his privacy every once in awhile.

"I'm sorry, " The brunette blushed, "I'm Hermione. And this," she tugged the boy closer to the open door, "is Ron. We were wondering if we could share the compartment. The others are all taken up."

" No problem." Aiden stepped aside, picking his book up off the seat and sitting beside his sister, who was now in her own book. He grimaced as he saw the title; Making the Love Potion. That was one book he would never read.

Ron and Hermione took the two remaining seats and stowed away their trunks above their heads. "By the way, " Aiden said, never looking up from the book. "I'm Aiden Dejan Shayde, and this," he attempted to get his sisters attention to no avail. Apparently, she found the book highly interesting, "is my twin sister, Alyssa Shayde, who I don't think has ever been this interested in a book before."

"What?" Alyssa looked up, "Did someone call me?"

"Alyssa, just keep reading."

"Okay."

"Little loony if you know what I mean." Aiden sighed, perturbed by his sisters strange interest in a book. "So are you both from wizard families? Neither of my parents are wizards, so I guess I'm not."

"I am." Ron said, but he didn't look very happy about it. "But Hermione isn't, are you? I don't know any purebloods with the name Granger."

"No, I'm not. Didn't even know there was such a thing before I got my letter. My parents loved it. I've read all the textbooks so I'm not too far behind. It's all rather exquisite, isn't it?"

"Who reads the bloody textbooks before classes start?' Ron moaned.

"I do." Aiden said. "I got a little bored and read them all three times. Now I'm on Hogwarts, A History again. It's fascinating really. There's supposed to be dozen of charms and wards placed around the schools and muggles aren't able to see it at all, even if they know it's there. I think it's got a charm placed around it so that any muggles that see it, suddenly remember that they have to be somewhere else."

'You've read the textbooks three times?" Ron looked amazed, as if he hadn't heard anything else. "Hermione is the only person I've met that's read it once, let alone three. You have to be a bloody genius to be able to understand one word that comes from those books."

"Then I must be a bloody genius." Aiden said, borrowing it from Ron, "because it was really simple for me."

'Oh, Aiden." Alyssa mumbled from behind her book, "please do stop acting like you know everything. It really does sour everyone else's moods. Including mine."

"I didn't ask you-"

"Hey," Hermione said nervously, "aren't you two twins? I never thought they fought like you two are..." Aiden narrowed his eyes and he watched as she struggled to change the subject. "Err, so what house do you think you're going to be in. Personally, from what I've heard. I'd be a Ravenclaw."

Suddenly, Alyssa was glad Aiden had insisted she read the page in a book about the four houses of Hogwarts. "I don't know. I was thinking of either Gryffindor or Ravenclaw. I couldn't be a Slytherin, could I? They don't put, what that words again, muggleborns? They don't put muggleborns in Slytherin."

"I could be any of them, I think, but I don't think I'd like being in Hufflepuff."

"You're muggleborn too, Aiden," Alyssa reminded him. At the moment, Aiden didn't feel like lying, so he just just shrugged "So you only have Gryffindor and Ravenclaw too."

Ron butted in, grumbling. "I already know I'm getting into Gryffindor. My whole family has for centuries now. My five brothers have all been in Gryffindor too."

The train ride was uneventful for the most part, but Aiden couldn't help but wonder what the reaction would have been to him if he'd come on the train as Harry Potter. He knew he was their supposed 'Savior' and he could hardly care. He didn't want the weight of this world pressing upon him.

They were only a couple of minutes away from Hogwarts when Ron brought up that subject he'd been waiting for the entire ride. "Any of you seen Harry Potter? This is the year he was supposed to go, you know. Everyone says he's dead though. Been missing for four years."

Alyssa looked perplexed. "Harry Potter? Who's he? And," she turned to Aiden who'd nodded a confirmation. "how do you know who he is?"

"Books."

"Of course. So who is he then?"

"He's supposed to have survived the Killing curse when he was only a baby. Some of the most powerful wizards died from that curse. Yet he didn't die as a baby! He's the only one to ever survive the curse in our entire history."

Alyssa snorted. "It sounds like he'd be a stuck up brat."

Aiden blushed. She had no idea..."I think, " he interrupted her, "we'd better start getting dressed. We're supposed to arrive in fifteen minutes and personally I don't feel like being late on the first day. Imagine the letter mum would write me!"

Aiden and Ron were swiftly kicked out of the compartment and sent to get dressed elsewhere. He scowled and muttered curses to his sister under his breath, which Ron seemed to think was amusing. Aiden slipped into the only bathroom, taking his time and letting Ron only have a couple minutes to change. "That teach him not to laugh at me."

Aiden and the three friends emerged from the scarlet engine a few minutes later, gazing around them in shock. To their right there was a rather large lake, but to the left there were carriages without horses. Aiden was clueless where to go until a large man, almost a giant, was yelling, "Firs' years! Firs' years! Come along, mind yer step―any more firs' years?"

"He is trying to say first years, right?" Hermione asked, a little nervous as all the other students young and old scrambled here and there is a big hurry. "Because in my opinion, I do hope he isn't. Those rowboats don't look all that stable to me."

"Oh, come on, Hermione. This is magic, right? So I figure you've got to trust it. They've probably been doing this for years."

"Firs' years watch your step! Only four to a boat!"

The four friends all clambered into one of the last boats, which was also one that looked the most unstable. This fact made Hermione a very annoying pest for the first part of the ride until she realized that no one was listening to her antics.

"DUCK!" Luckily, this was part of the trip to Hogwarts that Korry had felt free to explain, so Aiden had been tense most of the ride, waiting for that lone shout. He ducked instantly, making a quick decision and pulling Alyssa down with him. They got through the cave unscathed, though both Ron and Hermione weren't so lucky. Aiden took another look around and was sad to see Malfoy, the son of a faithful Death Eater, had also been smart enough to follow the giant's directions.

Alyssa gave him a grateful look when seeing about half the first years moaning and rubbing their foreheads. "What was that?"

"Well," Aiden grinned, "I think it was a cave with a very low ceiling covered by vines so you could not see the entrance, therefore making your first day at Hogwarts an unpleasant one."

"Did you just make that up?"

"Pretty much."

"Prat." She mumbled.

When the large group of soon-to-be students finally docked at near the castle entrance, even Aiden was stunned. He'd seen many books with pictures of Hogwarts. He'd even seen a moving photo of it, yet neither of those were even close to showing the real Hogwarts. The real Hogwarts was beautiful and so alive. This was the building that had talking portraits and moving staircases. This was the place he would call home for the majority of his next seven years.

"Aiden." Alyssa poked her brother hard in the gut. "Wake up. The rest of the students are already at the castle doors with that lady up there. We need to catch up before we get locked out or something. I don't want to miss sorting because you're looking at the castle. You'll have plenty of time in between classes, so come on!"

"Okay, okay!" Aiden held his hands up in self-defense while being pulled towards a rather strict looking woman with spectacles. "Now that we're all here," Aiden blushed as she gave him a disapproving look, "I want you to tidy yourselves up. This is the only time you get sorted with no exceptions. Now if you will follow me to the Great Hall."

The students crowded around her, excitement bubbling up. Aiden took a deep breath...because of that closet he'd been forced to live in for the first five years of his life, he had one of the worst cases of claustrophobia, a major weakness when dealing with magic. Even the simplest of Body-Binding charms could send him into a panic if he didn't keep himself controlled. "It's okay," He muttered to himself. Alyssa gave him a reassuring smile. "Everything will be fine." With that final word he followed the woman through the doors, down a couple halls to a place where two large double doors stretched for to the ceiling

He knew this must be the entrance to the great Hall itself, the place he'd be eating every meal for the next few months. It was had to digest that he was finally here after two tedious years of practicing both light and dark magic. When he'd first started to learn the dark magic, he'd been hesitant, but it only took Korry describing that he needed to know what he was up against in his upcoming battles, to get him to learn it willingly and well.

He knew he could never be perfectly free here. He was a first year who knew magic all the way up to fifth year fluently. He could do more than every first year. No duel would ever be fair, unless it was with a fifth or even sixth year. The professors would always stop any duel like that claiming that it would be unfair, when the only thing that would be unfair was how little Aiden would have been harmed. Any duels were out, even in teacher demonstrations. He would have to pretend not too be too good at anything, and then try to pretend not to be absolutely horrible at anything either.

The Professor, Minerva McGonagall if Korry had described her correctly opened the large doors and Aiden found himself starring at hundreds upon hundred of other students, who starred back at them in turn. He felt his sister shrink a little beside him and made time to give her a small smile before being marched up to the front of the room where a sorting hat sat on the seat. He knew this, but it still made him a little nervous. Any second now...

"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty

But don't judge on what you see,

I'll eat myself if you can find,

A smarter hat than me,

You can keep your bowlers black,

Your top hats sleek and tall,

For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat,

And I can cap them all,

There's nothing hidden in your head,

The Sorting Hat can't see,

So try me on and I will tell you,

Where you ought to be,

You might belong in Gryffindor,

Where dwell the brave at heart,

The daring, nerve and chivalry

Set Gryffindor's apart;

You might belong in Hufflepuff,

Where they are just and loyal

,

Those patient Hufflepuffs are true

And unafraid of toil;

Or yet in wise old Ravenclaw,

If you've a ready mind,

Where those of wit and learning,

Will always find their kind;

Or perhaps in Slytherin

You'll make your real friends,

Those cunning folk use any means

To achieve their ends,

So put me on! Don't be afraid!

And don't get in a flap!

You're in safe hands(though I have none)

For I'm a Thinking Cap!"

Aiden looked at the hat with dread. He hadn't even heard the whole poem... he'd been too nervous when he'd heard that there was nothing it couldn't see. Did that mean it would tell everyone he was really in infamous Harry Potter? The boy who was supposedly dead? He wanted to back out of the hall and go home now so he wouldn't have to deal with this, but he knew a weakness when he saw one, and he could have sworn that there was some sort of spell on the hat.

"When I call your name," Professor McGonagall said, pulling a piece of parchment from her robes, "you will put on the hat and sit to be sorted. Abbott, Hannah!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Bones, Susan!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Boot, Terry!"

"RAVERCLAW!"

"Brocklehurst, Mandy!"

"RAVENCLAW!"

"Brown, Lavender!"

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Bulstrode, Millicent!"

"SLYTHERIN!"

Finch-Fletchley, Justin!"

"HUFFLEPUFF!"

"Finnigan, Seamus!"

"GRYFFINDOR!"

"Granger, Hermione!" Aiden focused his sight on the brunette girl just as the hat slipped over her eyes. There was no doubt she would be in Ravenclaw...She was an intense bookworm, like Aiden himself

"GRYFFINDOR!" He blinked, surprised at the hats choice.

Aiden let his attention slip. The names were getting royally boring. He was beginning to wish that he'd picked a family with the last name starting with an A or a B, maybe a C. This S stuff was not working out and Aiden knew he was not considered a patient person. Aiden hadn't even realized how long he'd been daydreaming until the Professor called out a name he would never answer to. "Potter, Harry." Aiden looked at the staff table where everyone was tense, as if waiting for him to step out a say, 'Hey, I'm here! Sorry to keep you waiting!' The silence stretched on for what seemed like hours to Aiden, until McGonagall sighed and read the next name off the list, "Shayde, Aiden." As he sat down on the stool he could only think of how much irony there was for him to be called right after his real name.

"Hmm," he heard a small voice say in his ear, at almost a whisper, "Well, this is a surprise. I daresay I've been waiting to meet you for quite awhile, Mr. Potter. You've got a lot of secrets hidden, haven't you?" Aiden winced and felt like nodding, but he could only think of how stupid he would look to everyone else. 'You worry I'll tell your secret? Mr Potter, you have no reason to worry, my boy. I'm bound under and oath of secrecy. Nothing you tell me can ever be forced from me." The hat seemed to suddenly realize it had to get back to business. "I don't think Hufflepuff would suit you, not now. Ravenclaw..no. You're wise beyond your years but you'd never be accepted there...Yes, I see quite a lot of cunning here, but yet, so much bravery...I'll have to say you're a GRYFFINDOR!"

Aiden lifted the hat off his head, trying not to show his clear pleasure. He knew he'd fit into the house, since Gryffindor was a house that many muggleborns ended up in. The hat had made a wise decision in his case. Had it put him in Slytherin, then he would never have been able to keep up the constant act of being a muggleborn.

He took the seat next to the muggleborn he'd sat with on the bus...Hermione. Still, he was surprised that she was even at this table, but she looked pleased, so he didn't mention it. "SHAYDE, ALYSSA" then a couple of seconds later, his sister took a seat on the right of him, eying the empty plates longingly.

The rest of the sorting seemed to stretch on for hours, though it couldn't have been any more than two or so minutes. Shayde was practically the last name on the list other than Weasley, Ron, who was quickly sorted into Gryffindor and Zambini, Blaise. Slytherin.

Ron took a seat by Hermione and the four easy friends lapsed into sudden laughter as they shared what the hat had told them. Apparently, the hat wasn't very bright--well, that was Ron's opinion. Aiden kept himself silent, staring at his plate even as the hall grew silent and Dumbledore stood to speak. Not even when the old man said something that caused the whole hall to burst into laughter, he didn't look up. Yes, he was happy about being in Gryffindor, but there was still so much wrong...

A/N: I want to clear this up before someone asks. I've recently read an article that said when transforming into an animagus that creature retain features from when they were human, such as glasses. None of Harry animagus forms hold the markings around their eyes, because when Harry healed himself the first night on the streets, he managed to heal his eyesight and restore it. Despite the glamour charm Harry/Aiden has on himself, his scar does appear on the foreheads of all three forms.

Also, you might have noticed that I took a lot of this chapter (and the last one too) out of the first book (such as the letter from Hogwarts, the school supples list, the Gringotts thief poem, and the sorting hat's song.) There may be a few other things, but I do not take credit for it. It's all J.K. Rowling marvelous work and she's just kind enough to let us use it.