Disclaimer: I don't own anything other than the little prick that is Silas… his owl Hercules, Romulus, and some of the plotline… O.O;;

Chapter 4

The morning of September the first was a cloudy one. Large, billowing clouds covered the morning sky, acting as a blanket, smothering the world in grey. Mornings like that made people lethargic, and Harry was no exception.

The first sound he heard when he woke up was Silas yelling for his mother to come find his miniature quidditch pitch. Why he needed it, Harry had no clue.

Groaning, he pulled himself out of bed and looked at the clock. It read eight thirty AM. He glared at the ceiling, wondering WHY it took his brother so long to get ready. He would be ready to go within minutes, and all his stuff was packed.

Suddenly, he thought of something. Running over to his closet, he started digging through it. A large pile of broken junk left over from Silas was in there, and buried at the bottom, was Romulus, The stuffed wolf that uncle Moony had given him for his seventh birthday. It had been a joint present from Sirius and Remus, because they all would have gotten in trouble if Sirius had given him anything.

He shook his head to dispel the memories, and hastily shoved the well worn, and well loved stuffy into the bottom of his trunk. There was a knock at his bedroom door, and He quickly shoved all the junk back into his small closet.

"Come in." He called, and turned around. Lily was standing there, holding a train ticket.

"Here." She said simply, and turned to go out the door again. She stopped for a second to say "You'd better be ready soon, we're leaving at ten." And with that, she left, letting the door slam shut behind her.

"That was strange." Harry mumbled, and lugged his trunk downstairs, leaving it in the entry hall. He looked around and saw the poor house elf, Milly, lugging Silas' luggage around. He had FIVE trunks, and Harry suspected that there were more coming.

Rolling his eyes, he went to help the house elf. Milly wasn't the youngest house elf, and had been in the family since James was a kid. Harry wondered just how old house elves could grow to be.

Milly squeaked in surprise as the large thing she was carrying suddenly lifted into the air. Peeking out from underneath the trunk, Milly's eyes widened.

"Master Harry shouldn't be working. Working is Milly's job!" She exclaimed in her squeaky voice, and Harry had to laugh.

"Alright, but I'm carrying this one. Where do you want it?"

Milly huffed, but accepted it. "It needs to go over with the other trunks." She said, pointing to the pile of trunks already there. Harry had suspected as much, but he liked being polite, especially since Silas treated Milly so horribly.

He put it down slowly. It was quite heavy. No wonder Milly had been having so much trouble with it.

Nodding to Milly, he ran off to the kitchen to make himself breakfast. He looked up at the clock hanging on the wall. He had and hour before they were leaving. Plenty of time then, he thought mildly to himself.

He ate breakfast, taking his time, and then amused himself by reading one of the books he had received from uncle Padfoot when they visited him in Diagon Alley last month. It was called 'Ten steps to becoming an Animagus'. It was Sirius' book. He had spent a lot of time on it, and had never actually published it. Harry had read it cover to cover, and was in the process of re-reading it. He new he wouldn't be able to actually transform, or even get close to transforming, until he was at least in his third year, but hey, the more he studied, the more prepared he'd be.

Soon it was ten O'clock, and the family gathered in front of the house.

James stood and checked his watch. "Okay. We're taking a rented car from the Ministry. They wanted to make sure that Silas got to the platform safely, I suspect." He told them.

Suddenly there was a flash, and a black car appeared in front of the house. Luckily they had concealment charms, or people would have wondered. Lily looked over at James questioningly.

"They portkeyed the car here." He said, and they all started the grueling task of putting all of Silas' luggage into the magically expanded trunk. Silas' eagle owl,

Hercules, started hooting madly when they moved him, which in turn made Harry's snowy owl, Hedwig (she was a gift from Remus and Sirius as well) irritated.

And so, it was after a very difficult stage of packing everyone and everything into the car, that they set off for King's Cross station.

Harry stepped through the barrier between platforms nine and ten, knowing full well what was on the other side. Knowing and seeing are different things. Before him was a bustling platform, filled with mothers saying teary farewells to their children, the children rolling their eyes, and in some cases, crying as well.

Harry turned and saw Silas come through the barrier, and immediately swamped by fans and admirers. It made Harry sick just watching it.

Shaking his head, he grabbed his trunk and Hedwig, and attempted to lift them. They were lighter than Silas', but still heavy, and he dropped the trunk painfully onto his toe. One of the redheads from Diagon Alley popped up. "Want a hand with that?"

"You don't have to-" Harry replied, but the redhead wouldn't hear of it.

"Oy, Fred, C'mere and help!" He called, and another redhead who looked identical to the one in front of Harry, appeared.

"By the way, I'm George." The first one said. "That's my twin, Fred." Fred waved, and went back to dragging the trunk onto the train. Harry followed them, looking for an empty compartment, Hedwig's cage in his arms. After a little bit of searching, he found one that suited his liking.

"This one's fine." He said, and the twins stashed the trunk in the luggage racks above the seats, and left. Looking out the window, he saw Lily sobbing and hugging Silas tightly. James was pounding Silas on the back, looking proud. Harry sighed and collapsed onto the seats. He really wished that someone would treat him that way.

The door opened, causing Harry to look up. Ron entered and walked in, sitting across from Harry.

"Hey, mate. Told you I'd see you o the train." He said, grinning.

Harry grinned back. "Yep, you did."

The door slid open again, and the eldest red-head came in. He was scowling, and looking like he'd rather do anything but carry the trunk. He stashed the trunk in the luggage rack, and left without a word.

"That's Percy. He's mad because mum made him carry my trunk. He thinks it's degrading because he's a prefect now" Ron said, rolling his eyes.

"What's that thing?" Harry asked, pointing to a small fluffy thing in Ron's arms.

"This?" He asked, picking the fluffy thing up. "This is a chinchilla. It's actually Ginny's, but she's making me take care of it for the year because she's going to Cuba with her friend, Luna." He said, scowling. He poked the chinchilla, and it didn't move. "It's pretty useless during the day though. Apparently it's nocturnal."

Harry found it hard to keep a straight face when the small fluffy thing sighed and seemed to relax suddenly. Ron noticed this and picked the chinchilla up.

"Bloody hell!" He exclaimed, looking down at his lap. "The bloody thing peed on me!"

"Maybe you should change?" Harry asked. Ron shook his head.

"No, I'm going to try out a spell that Fred and George taught me." He said, pulling out a ratty looking wand and brandishing it.

Suddenly, the door slid open and a girl entered. She had bushy brown hair, and large, brown eyes. They widened when she saw Ron's wand, and immediately sat in one of the seats.

"You're doing magic? Let's see it, then." She said happily, watching Ron intently.

Ron gulped and started waving his wand.

"Abra zebra genki zezh, make this mess clean and fresh!" There was a sizzling sound, but nothing else happened.

"I don't think that was a real spell." Harry muttered, looking sideways at the girl.

"Me either. Well, I was looking through my books and I found this useful spell." She said, and also pulled out her wand.

"Scourgify." She said simply, pointing her wand at Ron's pant leg. The wet spot immediately vanished. She stood up and opened the compartment door.

"Oh, and if you find a toad, a boy named Neville has lost his. By the way, I'm Hermione." She said, and left.

"That was strange." Harry said, still looking at the door.

"You can say that again." Ron mumbled, glaring at the chinchilla that was snacking happily on Ron's corned beef sandwich.

"I didn't know that chinchilla's ate meat." Harry whispered, staring nervously at the (apparently) carnivorous rodent.

"Me either. And why are we whispering?" Ron whispered back.

"Dunno."

A while later, the trolley lady came by. "Anything off the trolley, dears?" She asked cheerfully.

"Umm, yes please." Said Harry, remembering the money uncle Padfoot had given him for this exact purpose. Ron stared wide eyed as Harry bought some of everything.

"You want some?" Harry offered, and Ron just stared.

"I'll take that as a yes, then." He muttered, and tossed some candy at Ron. It hit him square in the face.

"Oy, what was that for?" He yelped. Harry rolled his eyes.

The rest of the ride was uneventful, and it was about half an hour before they would arrive that the door opened again, revealing Hermione and another boy.

"This is Neville." She said, "And are you SURE that you haven't seen a toad around here?" She questioned. The two boys in the compartment shook their heads, and Hermione sighed. "Oh well. You should get changed now, I expect that we'll be arriving soon."

Ron looked over at Neville. "Hey, aren't you the Neville we met at that party, ages ago?" Neville blinked.

"Party?"

Harry nodded. "Yeah, my brother Silas' birthday party. Remember?"

Hermione suddenly looked interested. "Silas? As in Silas Potter?"

"Yeah." Ron mumbled.

Hermione glowed. "He's famous! I know all about him. He's in a lot of books. Oh, I expect that he'll be the top of his class!" She was almost bursting with excitement.

"He's going to be coming this year.

Hermione, Ron, and Neville all blinked.

"Wait, isn't he only ten though?" Neville questioned.

"Yeah," Harry sighed. "But mum and dad ended up getting him in early."

"Wow! I'll get to meet the famous Silas Potter!" Hermione crowed.

Harry glared off out the window. "He's not that great. I expect that he'll be in Slytherin, the nasty little prick that he is." He said the last part venomously, and Hermione blinked but didn't say anything. This wasn't what she would have expected to hear from the brother of the savior, but she passed it off as jealousy.

A few minutes later, she left, leaving the boys to get changed into their robes. And soon, they were pulling into the Hogsmead station…

A/N: Ok, thank you once again for all the encouragement. Especially my one certain crazy reviewer for all of her incessent messages badgering me to post... O.O;; . AnywaysI looked on my e-mail today, and I found it flooded with reviews. Thank you! And a contest for all of my wonderful reviewers: who can guess what the proposition was that Albus had for Sirius in the last chapter?

- Crimson Dragongem