A/N: You would actually have had this chapter earlier this evening, but after uploading I kinda forgot to add it to the story, which is a little stupid. Oh yeah; cliffhanger at the end. Sorry.

Chapter 7: A True Friend Will Curse Your Enemies For You

Saturday Night

Dumbledore sat at his desk, frowning, his Pensieve placed in front of him. The silver basin was full to the brim, shimmering with silver light. A close observer would have seen a young boy in the memory at the top, giggling as various toys floated around him, bobbing up and down above his head. That particular memory had drawn a smile from Dumbledore. It had been Harry's first incident of accidental magic following his arrival at the Dursley's; unfortunately for them, it had taken place in the middle of a shop. A squad of Obliviators had been required to clean up the ensuing mess, and the Minister had not been very happy.

It was one of many memories of Harry's accidental magic that Dumbledore had been studying, from before he started at Hogwarts and after his arrival. It had always been clear that Harry would be a powerful wizard; even without the evidence of his accidental magic, it would have been a huge surprise if the son of such a gifted witch and wizard had not been powerful. Harry had been able to put more power behind his spells from the moment he lifted his wand, a fact proved by his ability with the Knockback Jinx – instead of a spell to use for target practice, it had become a useful defensive spell in Harry's hands, as Theodore Nott had found out to his cost the day before.

When Dumbledore had learnt that a significant portion of Harry's power had been blocked off by the Dark magic wrapped around his magical core, he had been shocked, but not overly concerned. He had assumed that Harry's magic would slowly grow more powerful over time, that Harry would have time to grow into his power. This did not seem to be the case. After his encounter with Quirrell, Harry seemed to have become much more powerful much quicker than any of them had anticipated, although Dumbledore had not realised how powerful until he had lowered his barriers in the Hospital Wing. However, even this had not been too much of a surprise, once he had thought about it. He had observed that Harry's magic, like many wizards and witches, was affected by his emotions. He had also observed that the more magic Harry used, the more the barrier on his magic broke up – therefore, it was a logical conclusion that if he had used a lot of magic in a highly stressful situation, he would have broken up far more of the barrier, thus releasing more magic for him to use.

But it should have been obvious. The fact that Dumbledore had had to look for signs of more powerful magic in Harry was worrisome. Ironically, the fact was that Harry had too much control over his magic; he should have been losing control of it far more often than he had done if it had increased so rapidly. By all accounts, he had suffered from one minor accident after a nightmare during the holidays, but nothing more. At the moment, he wasn't sure whether Harry's magic was being suppressed by the barrier or by Harry's will. He knew which he preferred; if Harry had that much instinctual control over his magic at such a young age, then perhaps Severus was right to be worried about him. Bad things happened when a wizard was too closely entwined with their magic. Voldemort was only one example; Dumbledore privately believed that at least part of the problem had been Tom Riddle's fascination with his own power. He had become lost in it, ruled by his magic, succumbing to the wildness that was, essentially, the root of all Dark magic, no matter what the Ministry blathered on about. Dumbledore knew the power of such fascination. He had seen it corrupt Grindelwald, indeed, had nearly been corrupted by it himself; he supposed that in a way, the death of his sister had at least prevented that fate, however awful it had been.

Dumbledore couldn't really see Harry falling to the Dark as Tom Riddle had, but it wouldn't hurt to keep an eye on him.

Harry's friends were sat around the fire in the Gryffindor common room, brooding on their injured friend. Ron and Hermione were carefully ignoring each other; when Hermione had tried to excuse Lockhart's incompetence, Ron had lost his temper with her in a very impressive display, which had caused Madame Pomfrey to deduct points. On the other hand, Neville and Ginny were talking quietly, as Neville went over the injuries Harry had suffered in his first year; ordinary classroom accidents as well as the more serious injuries he had suffered against the troll and Quirrell. Ginny was relieved to hear that Harry had bounced back from them all incredibly quickly, even quicker than normal for magical people, who would shrug off injuries that could kill a Muggle – a sign of his powerful magic looking after him. On the other side of the room, in a quiet corner, Fred and George were twitching as they drew up a list of pranks to pull on Lockhart, their protective instincts having been roused by Ron's information.

A significant proportion of the rest of the room was staring at the group by the fire, whispering to themselves. It hadn't taken long for people to notice that Harry had been absent all day, and given his past exploits, and the harassed expressions on his friend's faces, the rumour mill had gone into overdrive. However, past experience had suggested it wouldn't be a good idea to go and make enquiries.

They remained by the fire most of the evening, as the other Gryffindor students gradually left, to bed or just to work more privately. By the end of the evening, the group had settled down, and were feeling a little more cheerful. Ron and Hermione had even started talking again, albeit carefully, avoiding sensitive subjects. However, there was one student who still wanted to talk to them. Colin Creevey's nervousness over approaching the older students was tempered by his burgeoning friendship with Ginny, and as his other friends disappeared he gradually moved over to them, trying to remain inconspicuous.

Hermione had seen him coming over though, and smiled at him in greeting, boosting his confidence. Ron let out a soft sigh of irritation when the younger boy sat down, but forced himself to greet him as well. They sat there, waiting for Colin to say something, until Hermione broke the silence.

"What can we do for you?"

"Well… I was just wondering what was wrong with Harry. I mean, he did say we were friends, so I guess I should know…"

Hermione smiled at him in appreciation.

"I'm sure he'd be delighted to know that you care Colin. But he's fine, he's just being kept in the Hospital Wing until Madame Pomfrey's totally satisfied. He passed out in detention last night, but it's nothing serious."

"What? What did Professor Lockhart have him doing?"

"Oh, it wasn't anything to do with that, he was just helping the professor answer some mail. He just felt a little ill."

Colin nodded, pleased.

"That's good. It'd be awful if he was seriously ill or something!"

"It certainly would."

The foursome watched Colin walk off, smiling to himself. Neville shook his head slowly.

"His obsession with Harry is a little creepy isn't it? I mean, even the people he knows weren't that interested. I'm glad I don't have a stalker."

Ginny frowned at him.

"I think it's quite sweet. At least he's taking an interest, and not just hiding away with the other Muggleborns. And Harry is rather fascinating you must admit. I used to be quite the fan myself. Then I met him, and the illusion shattered."

Ron grinned at her.

"Didn't you have one of the action figures? I'm sorry, I'm sorry!"

The next day, Colin's interest seemed a little less sweet.

Harry had been dismissed from the Hospital Wing mid-morning, with a stern warning to take it easy for a few days. He also had a mild pain potion, to counter the itching in his scar if it got any worse. He had woken up in that morning with an ache in the centre of his forehead, as if someone had hit him bang on his scar, but it had died down within a few minutes. As he made his way to the common room, he bumped into Ron and Ginny, who were heading downstairs. Ginny pulled him into a hug, while Ron rolled his eyes, settling for a firm slap on the back.

"Where are you guys off to?"

"Hagrid's. He won a dragon egg in a card game, and he's going to send it to Charlie."

Harry stared at them.

"A dragon egg? What kind of card game was he playing?"

Ron shrugged.

"Probably best not to ask. Hermione and Neville are in the common room if you want to see them, or you can come down with us."

"I'll go back; get Hermione's lecture about catching up on my homework over and done with. Say hi to Hagrid for me!"

Harry continued on up the stairs, eager to see his other friends. Sure enough, Hermione began to lecture him almost immediately on getting his work done, and he quickly scribbled a few answers for his Defence homework to appease her. However, he then dragged Hermione and Neville away from the copy of the Quibbler that they were giggling over to go for some lunch. As they walked towards the Great Hall, Harry noticed a few people – Gryffindors mainly – staring at him, then turning away to mutter to their friends. Once, he thought he heard someone snigger as he went past. Hermione and Neville were still giggling over the idea of Snorkacks or something, so he said nothing. Ron and Ginny were already at the table when they arrived, with much to tell them about Hagrid's dragon; a Norwegian Ridgeback apparently, who Hagrid had, for some reason, named Norbert. According to Hagrid, he was a loveable softie. According to Ron, he was a vicious beast with no business being anywhere near the school. Either way, Charlie had agreed to collect it at the weekend, which both Weasley's were looking forward to. As they ate, Harry noticed more people staring at him; they were different to those he had seen on the staircase though. This observation was more anticipatory. As he met the eyes of a Hufflepuff student – Macmillan or something – someone hit him on the shoulder.

"What's this I hear Potter? Detention a little too much for you?"

Harry sighed as he turned around. They hadn't even reached Halloween yet, and he was already sick of Nott. If he carried on like this, then one of them would be dead before they finished Hogwarts, he was sure of it. Nott was staring down at him, a gleeful look on his face.

"Your stalker's been talking about you a lot this morning Potter. Says you passed out while answering some mail; that's possibly the most pathetic thing I've ever heard."

At his side, Harry heard Hermione suck in her breath, but Nott was carrying on.

"I mean, it would explain a lot; that's the only reason anyone would want to associate with the Weasley's. You must be forming your own social group; the utterly useless."

Nott had learnt from their previous disputes. The words had barely left his mouth before his wand was raised, a shield charm springing into existence in front of them, only a breath before Ron and Ginny's spells flew past Harry's head. They bounced off, one to the ceiling, and one, by very bad luck, straight back past Harry. Nott began to roar with laughter, and Harry turned round to see Ron sitting hunched over, a miserable expression on his face and a large pool of slugs on his plate.

Ron's expression fell further when he saw Professor McGonagall walking over, a furious – and entirely unsympathetic – expression on her face. Ron sank ever deeper into his seat under her tirade, going bright red in anger and embarrassment, the smirk on Nott's face growing wider. It was diminished somewhat by McGonagall taking five points from Slytherin for provocation, but returned full force as McGonagall turned her attention to Ginny. By the time she had finished, both Weasley's were in detention, and Gryffindor was twenty points down from their earlier total. Fred and George had 'kindly' volunteered to take Ron to Madame Pomfrey to get his slug problem cleared up, although Harry rather suspected it might take them awhile to get him there; the direct aftermath was the best time to take advantage of something so humiliating after all, and they would have little sympathy for their little brother, given that he had been stupid enough to try and hex someone in full view of every teacher in the school.

Harry shook his head as the brothers walked out, turning to the others. Ginny was still glowing with embarrassment, not to mention anger, her head bowed much like Ron's. What was strange however, was a faint blush on Hermione's face. Harry looked askance at her, and she looked down at her own plate.

"What's wrong?" Harry asked her.

Hermione looked up at him, allowing some of her bushy hair to fall into her face, as if it could shield her from any anger.

"Well… Colin Creevey was asking about you last night, and… Well, I thought it was really sweet, you know, that he was taking an interest, showing he cared and so I – I kind of told him about what had happened to you."

Harry stared at her.

"And you didn't think that he might talk about it with someone? He's famous for his obsession with me Hermione – I'm pretty much the only person he talks about! I've been getting funny looks ever since I left the Hospital Wing because of that!"

Hermione looked mortified.

"I'm really sorry Harry, I just didn't think! I'm sure he didn't mean anything by it, he's just a little naïve, that's all…"

"Forget it Hermione. It's already done. This is Hogwarts after all; with any luck something a little more interesting will turn up for us to talk about before too long."

They sat there for a few moments, before a snort of laughter from behind them broke the silence. Harry turned round to see Nott swooning while Blaise Zabini held up a piece of paper in front of him. Harry scowled, and got up to leave. As he did so, he felt a momentary flash of dizziness, and he stumbled, but it had passed before anyone else noticed. Hermione and Neville followed him out, Neville attempting to distract his friend with talk of the approaching Halloween feast.

None of them noticed the small snake that had appeared under the Gryffindor table. It started to slither away, but it vanished barely a moment later.

It was a week later. By and large, the sniggers that had followed Harry wherever he went had died out, kept going only by a few die-hards who actively disliked him; largely friends of Nott he'd noticed, whether from Slytherin or not. Another point of dissatisfaction was the state of the weather – not a major interest for him normally, but Quidditch practice in hail was fast becoming one of his least favourite ways to pass the time.

In fact, he had just finished a practice in some of the worst weather he had ever experienced. Uncharacteristically for a wizard, he was praying for better weather for their first match, against Slytherin. If it didn't improve, then he would lose his only serious advantage over Draco, making it a much tougher match than it should have been. It was in this state, his clothes filthy and his temper only mildly better that he encountered Nearly Headless Nick, the Gryffindor Ghost, who appeared to be in a bad mood himself. Since it was always a good idea to be polite to the ghosts – people appearing in your food at mealtimes was always disturbing – Harry spent a few moments making polite conversation. Just as he began to feel that Nick's displeasure would be worth escaping his constant whinging, they were surprised by Filch, in his customary bad mood.

Dragged back to the caretakers office, Harry resigned himself to spending a few nights scrubbing floors around the castle, Filch's traditional punishment for those he caught 'befouling the castle'. A loud bang provided a timely distraction however, and while Filch stormed off in pursuit of the culprit, Harry leafed through the papers on the desk, trying to find his punishment slip. However, the first thing he found was a leaflet for a 'Kwikspell' course, which he swiftly covered up. He did not think that Filch would be over impressed with anyone finding out he was actually a squib. Sadly for Harry, Filch's eagle-eye for dirt also seemed to apply to his desk; he noticed that the papers had been moved and dismissed Harry, threatening dire consequences should the news ever reach the Hogwarts grapevine. Since Filch was on good terms with Professor Snape, Harry was not inclined to call his bluff; there was a good chance the punishment would be truly awful. His encounter with Filch led to more bad news. The crash had been caused by Peeves, at Nick's urging. This put Harry in Nick's debt, much to his displeasure, which in turn resulted in an invitation to Nick's Deathday Party, something that promised to be almost as much fun as it sounded.

A few hours later, Harry was grouching about his afternoon to his friends. Ron took the news rather badly.

"Oh that's just marvellous! I've got my detention with Filch tonight, Merlin only knows what he'll have me doing if you've got him in a bad mood. Thanks a bunch."

"Well I'm sorry! If I'd known I'd have obviously waited outside until he'd gone to bed. Even Lockhart would have been able to track me given how much mud was dripping off me."

"Haven't you ever heard of a cleaning charm?"

"I'd have thought you more than anyone would remember that little rule about no magic outside of class, don't you remember your little slug outbursts?"

"Don't remind me, I still throw up the odd one or two… And that's not the point!"

"Will you both shut up!"

Harry and Ron both looked at Hermione, who was staring at them in horror.

"This is nothing serious enough to argue about! You're good friends!"

They looked at each other, then back at Hermione.

"Hermione," Harry said cautiously, "we aren't arguing."

"No, we're just trying to prove that we're better than each other."

She stared at them.

"Well, don't you think it's rather pathetic?"

"What, it's not like you don't argue with us over the slightest thing" said Ron with a smile.

Hermione stared at him, apparently trying to come up with a suitable response, but in the end she just stood up, tossing her head and walking purposefully from the room. Harry and Ron looked at each other in confusion, while Neville glared at them in reproach.

"Couldn't you be a little more sensitive? You know she doesn't like arguments."

"Yeah, but she ought to know we don't mean anything by it. I've known Ron since I was six, a little argument about cleaning isn't going to damage that much."

"Still, you could give it a try couldn't you?"

"If it'll make you happy Nev, anything. When's Ginny doing her detention Ron?"

"Tonight, same as me. Dunno who she'll be with though."

As it turned out, Ginny was following Harry in having a detention with Lockhart. When she returned a few hours later, she revealed that she had had a much more interesting time than Harry had; since she wasn't a celebrity, she was actually required to do something educational – which meant she had actually been set to research a topic of her choice and write about it. The closest contact she had had with any of his fan-mail was knocking a stack of it over. That said, like Harry, she did end up going straight from detention to bed, her research having apparently been worthy of Hermione.

Both the Weasley's were exhausted after their detentions as a matter of fact. Ron had been set to polishing the trophy room. Not an especially difficult task, but complicated by the remnants of the hex he had attempted to cast on Nott; he had vomited slugs onto one trophy, an award for special services to the school.

"It was weird though. I must have polished that thing about fifty times before that git was satisfied, but I barely noticed what was on it. I can't even remember who it was for – someone called Riddle I think. I know I'm not the brightest kid in the school, but you'd think I'd remember more about it than that!"

"Nah, I guess they all blend into one after a while. There's only so much silver the eye can take Ron."

"Yeah, well it's not as if I ever get to see much of it anyway…"

Harry and Neville swiftly steered the conversation away from silver; it was clearly associated most heavily in Ron's mind with sickles, or more precisely, his lack of them.

It was two weeks later, and things were looking up. The weather had improved – not exactly balmy, but Harry could put up with the cold while he was flying. In addition, even Nott seemed to have decided he had got as much mileage out of Harry's collapse as he could, and no-one was sniggering behind Harry's back anymore. On the other hand, it was the day before Halloween, the day before Harry's least favourite day of the year. And that was before you took into account the fact that he had promised to spend his evening socialising with dead people.

Harry was walking back to the common room from the classroom he had taken over for his practice with the Serpensortia spell to get ready for the party. He was trying to think of anything weirder than a party to celebrate your death; so far, despite all that had happened to him, nothing had managed to top it. Then he noticed the boy standing at the end of the corridor he was walking along, and he nodded grimly. Without question, Zacharias Smith was the weirdest person he knew, and easily took the top place in his list. Smith nodded to him as he drew closer, and stepped out into his path.

"Smith. What can I do for you?"

"It is what I can do for you that concerns me Harry Potter. You are too late."

"Too late for what? I'm on time for the party, or is this leading up to you telling me that someone's going to try and hurt me again?"

"Possibly. I can't be certain about that. Nevertheless, you are too late to stop events totally. There is something dangerous coming Harry Potter."

"You couldn't be more specific could you? I mean, some of our lessons are dangerous, so if you've just come to tell me that I'm going to mess up a potion then I didn't need you to tell me that thanks."

"Nothing so mundane sadly. But as I said, I cannot always be certain. Have fun at the party Harry."

With that, Smith turned away, walking back the way Harry had come from. Harry shouted after him.

"Oi! What in Merlin's name are you talking about? Smith!"

Smith paid him no attention.

"I could really learn to hate that kid."

Harry turned round to continue his journey, but almost immediately bumped into another Hufflepuff student, a girl. She glared at him in a rather frightening manner, and hurried off after Smith.

The Deathday Party was everything he had expected and more. The food was rotten – literally. The guests were tedious, scary, just plain weird, or all three, with the exception of Moaning Myrtle, a ghost who was as depressing as she was utterly, insanely weird in Harry's considered view. There was something wrong with someone who haunted a toilet in a school surely? Peeves made a few attempts to liven the proceedings, but, given the largely dead audience, he decided to forget about restraint and just go crazy, resulting in some frankly dangerous jokes. When Nick decided to actually make a speech, Harry decided that discretion was the better part of valour, and beat a hasty retreat.

He headed straight back to the common room. The others had agreed to bring him some food from the feast, rather than risk wandering around looking for the kitchens later on. He was not feeling in the best of moods; he always spent Halloween feeling fairly miserable, and commemorating his parents by hanging around with dead people made this feeling even worse.

As he began to climb the stairs, he stopped, the hair on the back of his neck bristling. He winced in pain as his head began to ache, right in the middle of his scar. Then he heard it, a low voice, like the wind in the trees:

"So hungry… I must feed, let me kill, let me feast!"

His eyes widened in shock, and he sprinted up the stairs, pulling his wand from his robes. The voice echoed in his ears, calling to mind encounters beneath the school with Quirrell, in the Forest with unknown attackers…

As he reached the second floor, he began to hear the voice more clearly, and the pounding in his head intensified. He staggered, raising his hand to his scar; when he pulled it away, there were spots of blood on his fingers. He forced his concern to the back of his mind surprisingly easily, and charged round the corner, wand raised. There was a figure standing outside Myrtle's flooded bathroom, someone he recognised. He shouted their name, before falling silent as he noticed the shadow on the wall. It looked like –

And then he was flying backwards, ribs cracking as he was hit in the chest by a powerful blast of magic. He hit the wall with a dull thud before falling to the floor. As darkness clouded over him, he heard footsteps coming towards him…

A/N: Reviews are, as always, greatly appreciated. I should be updating tomorrow as well, Monday at the latest.