Disclaimer: Obviously the world of Harry Potter is not mine. But this new plot is – and by now you should have noticed the small difference I made in the plot!

A/N:Thanks to all those who reviewed my story!! I got 618 hits in ONE day!! :D (grinning like crazy). Thanks mike for making that suggestion to remove the 'part' story concept and making it more lively. :D So... here are answers to some of your reviews. :D

keeperoliver: thanks for the review! It helps! :D

Alex: Thank you soo much for pointing this out. I have tried to correct my mistake within this chapter - I was wondering myself whether I ought to make it more emotional, but... I guess I never did... :D I really appreciate your criticism – hope you review this one too!

So here's another chapter! And no parts this time onward! :D

Chapter 4: Hidden Castles

Armed with the books that they had bought while in Diagon Alley, Harry took up the habit of reading, something he had never bothered to do, given the fact that Ron had always called reading, boring. But, now, since Ron spent most of his time outside in the open air, trying his best to master his flying skills, Harry could read – somehow – it was quite interesting.

Wanting to learn more and more about spells and the like, his first choice of reading was The Standard Book of Spells (Grade 1). Finding it deeply interesting, he immersed himself in the book propping the book up on some pillows and he never felt the time flow by, until he realized that he had completely finished reading the book and that it was nearly noon – only a day had passed since he had bought the book, and here he was, having already finished the book! He knew that if Ron found out, he would definitely be in for some ridiculing and he at once began to think of excuses he could make to Ron, to cover up his newly found obsession.

"Tell him that you were building a castle from the Exploding Snap cards." a voice came from the doorway.

He turned around and saw that it was Ginny.

"How did you know that I was thinking of an excuse?"

"Well, it's not a hard thing to figure out what you were thinking when it's clear that you've been reading the book for nearly six hours straight, and that Ron hates it completely." she smirked and strode over to the bed. "Reading isn't bad you know – I just think that Ron can't read."

As Harry stifled a laugh, Ginny picked up the book he had been reading and started reading. Leaving Ginny to read the book, Harry left his and Ron's room. Running down the stairs, he met Ron, drenched in sweat and his hair messed up with dirt and bits of grass.

"Wow, Ron! Looks like you really did fly – but were you in the air or the ground?"

Evading the tired punch, Harry laughed and made his way down to the kitchen, where his mother was busy arranging the plates on the table and was immediately called over by his mother to help arrange the table.

The rest of the holidays blew by without much incident except for Ron nearly crashing his broom into an oak tree (only saved by Harry, who had happened to be nearby examining a bird's nest in the same tree), and Harry completely finishing all the books they had been assigned for their first year. The pair of them were now getting very excited at the prospect of going to Hogwarts as the day loomed closer and closer.

When it seemed as if time could not have gone any slower, the fateful day of September the 1st arrived and with it, a pair of Muggle cabs to take them to King's Cross station. Their mother woke the pair of them up and instructed them to get ready and check through their trunks to see if they had missed anything. Grumbling, the pair of them woke up and grudgingly got dressed, stumbling over the large trunks and cages in the process. Hauling the trunks and cages (one for Hedwig and the other for Scabbers, Ron's hand-me-down rat from Percy), Harry and Ron made their way down the stairs to see their mother piling buttered toast and eggs on to plates and stuffing them in to their brother's and, surprisingly, their sister's hands.

"Mum! Ginny's coming with us?"

"Of course, dear! We just can't leave her home alone and your father also wants to come with us today. Where is he anyway? He's going to make us all late! Ah! There you are Arthur!" she said, stuffing plates into Harry and Ron's hands, while their father came in to the kitchen.

"Don't fret Molly, dear! It's still only 6 o' clock! We'll have plenty of time. But don't you think -"

Their mother cut him sharply. "No, Arthur! I told you once. We're going to take these cabs to the station and nothing else."

The children stared, apparently, something was up, but they weren't going to get to know about that. Shrugging, the lot of them quickly drowned their toast in pumpkin juice and with the help of their mother and father, dragged their trunks down to the cabs, only to find, upon drawing nearer, the cab drivers were nowhere to be found.

"Arthur! What are we going to do? We're going to get late! The train will leave! We -"

"Hush, Molly dear. You fret too much. Let's get the Knight Bus." Saying so, their father stuck out his wand hand and waved it to the road. BANG! A triple decker, purple bus suddenly exploded into view, and trundled down the road, until it had reached the Weasley family. From the entrance, a conductor, dressed in the same violent purple, jumped down and greeted their father warmly, "'Morning Mr. Weasley! Where are you off to today? Ah! The little ones off to school eh? Don't worry we'll get you there on time!"

"Morning, Jim. Children, this is Jim, the conductor of the Knight Bus. He's an old friend of mine and – enough of that, let's get these trunks aboard."

With the help of the good-natured Jim, a tall man with a rather large nose and protruding lips, the children were seated on what appeared to be large armchairs strewn all over the bus, apparently not fixed to the floor. With a sudden lurch, the bus jerked forwards and they were suddenly rolling across the floor of the bus, their armchairs toppled. Their father quickly rightened them and cast a spell on each of the chairs to prevent them from removing from the floor (a Sticking Charm) and while Ron grumbled about never going in the Knight Bus ever again, Percy looked quite sick.

After passing Exeter, then rolling through some mountainous areas and finally the streets of London, they came to a sudden halt in front of King's Cross. The Weasleys stumbled out of the bus, only too glad to see it disappear around the corner – the memory of it's roller-coaster ride still fresh in their minds. Grabbing their trunks, they made their way to the barrier between platform nine and ten. When they arrived there, they were met by a blank piece of wall – but, then, Harry thought, everything in the wizarding world seemed to be hidden behind blank walls.

Both Harry and Ron had been here previously to see their brothers off to Hogwarts and had already seen the Hogwarts Express. So, with the prompting of their mother, the two of them made a small run to the wall and were suddenly traveling through pitch darkness for a second and suddenly, light. The pair of them looked around, without moving from their spots.

There stood the Hogwarts Express in all it's glory, their only way of getting to the one place they had dreamed of, their entire life. Suddenly, the pair of them were knocked off their feet as the twins had come through the barrier and bumped into them. Their trunks flew off in all directions and Hedwig screeched as her cage rolled on the floor. The twins' trunks fell on Ron and Harry and the twins, who had abruptly gotten to their feet began hooting, only to get knocked off their feet when Percy, Ginny and their mother came running in. Now, the entire family, without including their father was on the floor, tangled in a jumble of arms and legs. Just as they were extracting themselves, their father came running through the barrier as well, to trip over an outstretched arm of Percy's and to fall, promptly on top of all of them.

Now, laughing, all of them got up and gathered their things while their mother screeched at both Ron and Harry for 'making a mess of everything'. Armed with their trunks, the children made their way towards the train, and got on one of the carriages. It seemed as if no one had arrived yet or perhaps the people who had arrived were already on the train and their parents had left. One of the compartments was full of some girls who looked about fifth year and another, full of some serious looking seventh-years. Finding an empty compartment, Harry and Ron sat down, opened the window and waved to their mother.

"You two be good, now! No messing about with the professors or Dumbledore!"

"Yes, Mum!"

"And DON'T listen to anything that your brothers say!"

"Yes, Mum!"

"Stay out of mischief and don't wander about on the corridors at night!" she said, knowing that that was what they were planning to do with their new found Invisibility Cloak which had, during the holidays, caused large amounts of baked treats disappear in broad daylight with no particular culprit to be seen.

"We won't, Mum!" they chorused, crossing their fingers behind their backs.

"Your father and I will be going, then. Take care and tell your brothers that we said good-bye to them."

The twins chose this moment to put their heads out of the windows and shout, "Bye, Mum! We'll send you that toilet we promised, Ginny! Then you can have your very own piece of Hogwarts!"

Their mother glared at them and waved, and clutching Ginny with one hand, disappeared with a "pop". Their father too, waved at them and Apparated. Harry and Ron sat back down on their seats, their trunks on the luggage rack.

"So, do you think that we could really sneak off in the middle of the night? According to Hogwarts: A History, the Gryffindor portrait won't allow us – but I bet we could convince her..."

Ron just stared at him open-mouthed. Harry stared back.

"Ermm – Ron?"

"You – you – you read those books? Ron asked mouthing the word "book" in such a way that it sounded as if he was talking about something that had come out of a sewer.

Harry lowered his head to his hands, knowing he had committed a grave mistake.

Nearly an hour later, when the Hogwarts Express was about to leave, the platform now full of mothers hugging their children and fathers standing by, apparently wanting to say good bye as well, Ron finished arguing with Harry about the concept of 'reading'; the pair of them had come to a draw. Looking around, Harry saw that many children were walking past their compartment, apparently, looking for empty compartments. A round boy, with a shiny face – covered with perspiration – came the opposite way, slid open the compartment door and poked his head in, people in the corridor cursing his over-large trunk.

"Can I come in? Everywhere else is full." he asked, his face expectant and begging.

Harry nodded.

"Thanks! You won't believe how many people there seem to be looking for compartments!" he hauled his trunk on to the luggage rack. "My name is Neville, by the way. Neville Longbottom." he added, taking a seat by Harry.

"Ronald Weasley – but call me Ron."

"Harry. Harry – Weasley." Harry said rather hesitantly, unsure of whether he ought to use his real name.

"You two brothers, then?" They nodded.

"Hmm... You two don't look a bit alike. Anyway, do you have any more in your family?"

The train gave a sudden lurch and started to rumble – it was about to start its journey to the Hogwarts.

As Ron launched into a fully fledged description of the Weasley lineage, Harry immersed himself in his thoughts. The sudden need to introduce himself had reminded him how his parents were dead and that he was actually an outsider to the Weasley family. He hadn't actually thought about it during the holidays, and no one had spoken to him about it. He had immersed himself in his books and forgotten all about it. But, now, it had all returned to him. How had his parents died? Of course, he knew that they had been killed by Voldermort – somehow Harry felt right in calling him by his proper name; to be frightened of saying his name would only make the murderer even greater – but he didn't know how exactly. Somehow it was all very important to him – though he knew that knowing it would make no difference.

His thoughts shifted to his parents. They must have loved him a great deal. They had given him a great deal of money and had even thought about he should survive if he were to be left alone in this world. This raised another question in his mind. Had they known that they were going to be killed? Was that why they had left such a great deal of money for him? If they had known, why hadn't they gone into hiding? But from the motherly love he had felt from his 'mother' he knew that they must have done everything they could have to protect him. If his 'Mum' loved him so much, while not being his biological mother – he couldn't even imagine the love his real mother would have felt for him.

He felt tears well up in his eyes as he began to think of how life would have been if his parents had been alive. He blinked. Now was not the time to think of such tings – especially with Ron in front of him. He snorted loudly as he though of what Ron would say if he knew what he was thinking. Ron and Neville stared at this sudden outburst and Harry looked outside. They were rolling through some beautiful countryside now, and the sun was past it's peak.

Sometime later, when Neville and Harry had acquainted themselves as well, a bell was heard ringing from the corridor, and a few seconds later, the compartment door was pushed open, a plump lady with a smiling, dimpled face standing in the doorway, pushing a small cart laden with all sorts of sweets that were Ron's favorites. Though both of them had plenty of sandwiches packed by their mother, the pair of them wasted no time in squandering Harry's newly found wealth and using it (very wisely as they thought) in purchasing such a great deal of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans, Chocolate Frogs, Pumpkin Pasties and the like, so that the entire empty seat next to Ron was covered with it.

Neville who, apparently had no gold to spare since his grandmother did not see him fit enough to remember to handle money properly, was promptly bought some sweets by the generous Harry, who though that the sweets on the cart were cheap enough and because he knew, from his reading, that he would not have anywhere to buy such things while in school. Pleased with his decision as he munched on a Pumpkin Pasty, he lay back to enjoy the view.

It was starting to get dark when suddenly a voice rang out through the train – one that Harry was sure belonged to Professor McGonagall – informing them to get ready to get off the train.

Soon the three of them were dressed in their new school robes and Trevor – Neville's toad – extracted from under the seat. The train gave another small lurch and started slowing down. It was now completely dark and when the train suddenly came to a standstill, the station outside was lit by lamps hung from posts. As they jumped down from the train, leaving behind their luggage as instructed, a loud, booming but familiar voice rang out, "Firs' years! Firs' years over here! All right there, Harry?"

Harry nodded and joined the small group of first years that had gathered around Hagrid along with Neville and Ron. "Follow me then all o' ya." Hagrid said and started to lead them out of the station. They stumbled into a mussy path and the sides of the path were so dark that Harry was so sure that they were currently passing through the Forbidden Forest. When he mentioned this to Neville and Ron, both of them looked stupidly back at him; obviously having no idea of the Forbidden Forest.

"Well," Harry started. "A magical castle like Hogwarts has to be protected both magically and naturally I guess. And Hogwarts has plenty of magical defenses. It's sure to be Unplottable – so that no one can plot it on a map as well as covered with Muggle Repelling Charms or perhaps even an enchantment to make it look like a ruin to any Muggle. Just the same those enchantments won't stop wizards from getting in – and if they do get in – I bet the Forbidden Forest and the Lake will prevent them from entering the castle forcibly. But the only thing I couldn't find out about was how it was protected aerially. I mean – come on – a castle like Hogwarts should be protected from wizards on brooms or threstals, right?

Both Ron and Neville were still staring at him with stupid looks on their faces. Shaking his head and running a hand through his hair, he made to make his way to the front of the group, to get near Hagrid. But suddenly, Hagrid called out that they would be getting their first view of Hogwarts and the entire group of first years stopped in their tracks as they came around the bend.

"Oooooh!"

They were close to the shore of a great black lake, the moon clearly reflected on its mirror like surface. Atop a high mountain in the middle of the lake was Hogwarts – it's many windows and towers standing gloriously in the moonlight. It looked magnificent.

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A/N:Wow! I didn't think that I would get soo many hits soo fast!! :P *Really excited!!* past 2000 hits!!! :D